Hi Steefen! I was very lucky to pick up a physical copy  of ** you do not have permission to see this link ** yesterday. (Thank you library.
It will be my first academic biblical book I’ll read cover-to-cover.)

Flipped through it a little and Holy Ship. Dr. Baker uses Mandaean texts to arrive at some of my exact same conclusions.

After I had the realization that Jesus was re-enacting the water ablution savior of humanity traditions, then Marduk made sense, but there was one more figure in the direct Mesopotamian line, and that is Nabu. And then durr, Nbu is a name that Mandaean (recap: John the Baptist’s followers) texts have for Jesus.

So I began looking up Nabu traits, and that day I found mention of this book online. Dr. Robin Baker is a colleague and collaborator with Dr. Simo Parpola, the prominent Assyriologist who wrote the Ezekiel to Jesus book.

So Dr. Baker explains why they call Jesus by the names of both Nabu and Mercury, because in the First Century Mesopotamian region, Nabu had been interpretio’d as Mercury. It looks like such an intelligent and deeply cited read.

Of great price, even.

As an early Sumerian myth indicates, the reed is the most potent symbol of authority of all since it materializes the indelible word. In fact, it proved by far the most common means of portraying the god. He is ‘Lord of the Stylus’, the stylus not only produced the (vertical) wedge, it resembled it, and symbolized the Father of the Gods (Anu) as well as Nabû.

Just as Jesus alone was qualified to read the scroll that was handed to him from the throne (Rev 5:4), ‘Nabû had access to secrets that others could not read.’ Both divine figures read out the determined destinies and keep the accounts of sin and righteousness.

– Dr. Robin Baker, ** you do not have permission to see this link **, Cambridge University Press, 2022

from Chapter 6, page 282, The Cult of Nabu Compared with NT Presentation of Christ

This is a big book. 452 pages.  Academic citations. Dr. Baker goes into a lot more detail on many matching symbols, but why I chose that quote first, and what interests me the most of course, is that the Crucifixion has the reed. Imo, no Roman soldier is reaching for a weed in dry-ahh Jerusalem on a dry-ahh hill to match a scepter for the purposes of mockery and finding a reed. A 👏 reed 👏only👏grows 👏in 👏swamps 👏.

A non-local plant like a reed appearing in the Cruxifixion narrative would raise some questions, I hope? 

Frequently, in Nabû’s symbolic iconography a tablet or writing board accompanies the wedge/stylus. In her disquisition on the cheirographon of Colossians 2:14, Oliva Blanchette asks, ‘Did [the writer of Colossians] apply the metaphor of the “celestial book” to Our Lord as St. John and other apocalyptic writers seem to have done?’ She considers the text to contain ‘two veiled allusions to the theme of the heavenly writing with Christ as their pivotal point.’ If she is right, then the image of a written document symbolizes Jesus as well as Nabû. In anthropomorphic form, the latter is depicted holding a tablet and a stylus, recalling the kind of imagery that Revelation applies to Jesus. Wilder described Jesus in terms that epitomize Nabû: ‘prophet, sage, and scribe.’ Thus, the parallels between the two divine figures, based on their roles as son, crown prince/king, recorder of sins and salvation, custodian of heavenly writings and judge of humankind, are multifarious.

Four other substantial parallels exist between Christ and Nabû, namely, subduer of the infernal sea, vizier of the divine sovereign and yet co-ruler with him of the universe, the personification and source of wisdom, and the divine bridegroom. To varying degrees, these four likewise have biblical antecedents but, set in the context of the other qualities the Babylonian deity shares with Jesus, the similitude of Jesus and Nabû cannot be dismissed.

Then Dr. Baker goes into the Mandaean weigh-in, which is surprisingly nuanced — some aspects of Nabu are disparaged and some praised. Particularly interesting to me is Nabu’s epithet in Mandaeanism as the “Lord of Love”! Remember how I had found another Assyriologist who claimed that the name Enki[g] could work out to the “Lord of Love/Benevolence” in my earlier comment in this thread?

As Nabu is Enki’s grandson, I think it could be an inheritable title.

Stephen said:

But since by the time of Jesus, Judaism had already thoroughly imbibed Ancient Near Eastern traditions, I’ll be interested to see what chain of transmission Dr Baker detects from the ANE to Christianity that bypassed Judaism. 

Glad that we are now at the point where we are acknowledging that Mesopotamian traditions had been thoroughly imdrankened by Judaism by the time of Jesus. 

Stephen said:

I’ll be interested to see what chain of transmission Dr Baker detects from the ANE to Christianity that bypassed Judaism.

Drawing on a formidable range of primary sources, Baker’s conclusions challenge the widely held opinion that the theological imprint on the New Testament by Babylonia and Assyria was minimal, and what Mesopotamian legacy it contains was mediated by the Hebrew Bible and ancient Jewish sources. After evaluating and substantially supplementing previous research on this mediation, Baker demonstrates significant direct Mesopotamian influence on the presentation of Jesus and particularly the character of his kingship. He also identifies likely channels of transmission.

That’s part of the back-cover intro to ** you do not have permission to see this link **

As far as riddles, codes, and ciphers, Robin (I like to call him Robin) gets into that in this book, too. And the other Scandinavian Assyriologist, Dr. Parpola, goes ham with them. 

I’ve read about 5 of the 452 pages, so I’ll let you know.

An Upright Cross

One of the logograms that commonly designates Nabu, (d) PA, an upright cross…

Because this representation depicts a syncretism of Nabu and Muati, there are two crossbars in this upright cross that remind me of how Simon of Cyrene is also in the crossbar narrative.

Let’s see, the cross, the reed, and the fish — this chapter in ** you do not have permission to see this link **includes a photo of a stele depicting Nabu with his reed and his fish symbol.

Nabu is unique for being originally a West Semitic deity first seen in Ebla, that is imported into Mesopotamian cosmology as Marduk’s son and Ea’s grandson by being syncretized with the Mesopotamian deity Muati. (So a little like how the Lahmu/lahmu, Ea’s occasionally divinized servant(s) who I’ve compared to John the Baptist, is/are considered to have a Semitic language-origin name.)

If you are having a West Semitic Antiquarian Revival, Nabu the son is who you’d weave back in.

Nabu doesn’t have a lot of studies like Marduk, so I was surprised to learn that Nabu had risen to such high status in the First Century, in West Semitic-language-speaking areas including Elephantine, Egypt (which hosted a Jewish temple until 70 CE), Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Asia Minor, which are connected by the new trade route.

Being associated with a trade route group of cities makes sense as this is not a conqueror deity, and one of his skills within his scribal duties is accounting (compare the unusual accounting theme of forgiveness in the Bible scholars’ vote for most confusing parable, the Parable of the Shrewd Manager.)

I’ve already compared the Marduk Ordeal text line-by-line with the Crucifixion narrative in this thread, in which I depicted Nabu’s role in brackets as the [Son of God]. Dr. Baker offers his own translation of a line that isn’t yet included in the consensus translation that regards Nabu, to show its similitude to Jesus. 

Next, Dr. Baker compares the text The Exaltation of Nabu with the Gospels: 

In both the Exaltation of Nabu and the narratives in Matthew (8:23-32, 14:24-33) and Mark (4:35-5:16, 6:47-6:54) of Jesus’ calming the wind and sea and walking on the water, the same sequence of events obtains: the beloved son’s journey on a boat, his overwhelming of demons, and his walking on the roiling sea. The combination of confronting and overpowering demons and demonstrating power over the sea, including the ability to walk on it, is fundamental to Matthew and Mark’s affirmation of Jesus’ divinity. They show that these domains are conceptually linked. In the Mesopotamian material they play the same role, mutatis mutandis, in affirming Nabu’s divinity…

And Nabu just really has that knowledge, word, and fish association going on, that you might compare to the Gospel of John especially.

…as god of wisdom, knowledge, and the word, Nabu was conceived as closely connected with the “ocean of wisdom” and with fish.

Nabu’s epithets are not just the “lord of love” (compare John 13:34-35):

He possesses the epithets “god of the life-force”, “vivifier of the dead”, “bestower of life”, and “preserver of the breath of life.”

This researcher, Dr. Robin Baker, has four aces in his hand! He has all the rare Nabowledge. That’s why he’s not picking up the spare change of proving if or how other water ablution savior of humanity deities were syncretized.

Nabu’s sometimes syncretization with Muati, dependent on region, compares with the syncretization that scholars assume for Yahweh, or Moab’s Chemosh-Ashtar.

Geopolitically speaking 🧐🎩, it looks as if the civil instability against the Herodian Dynasty and Rome coincides with the middle layer of governance, between tribes and empire, swapping from a decreased scope for Judaeans to an increased scope for the Mesopotamianized Northwestern Arabians operating out of Petra, Palmyra and Edessa. The beginning of this new trade route cooperative coincides with the erection of the new Marduk temple in 32 CE. Then, the Great Jewish Revolt that begins in 66 CE coincides with the erection of the new Nabu temple in 67 CE. Then, the 70 CE decision to um, return the Second Temple to flat-pack and quell the civil unrest sees Rome being joined by Syria and Nabataea in security-keeping roles. This is the Nabataea of confederacy leader King Malichus II, whose reign, interestingly, coincides with his acceptance of Jewish refugees. 

I call my novel hypothesis here Follow The Money.