Friday, April 5, 2024

The God Culture: The Search for King Solomon's Treasure Sourcebook Review

In this article I want to take a look at some of the odd stuff in The God Culture's sourcebook which accompanies "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure." One would think this book would be rather straightforward. It's purpose is to show their sources. Now one does not have to scour the internet for PDF's or run to the library.  Instead you just look up the source in the sourcebook and see their proof. Most entries have a link to the source. But with all things concerning The God Culture there is more than meets the eye. If this group were Transformers they would be Decepticons. 

Follow Our Research In Detail In Our

SOURCEBOOK

Over 400 Sources That Prove

The Philippines Is Ophir & the Garden of Eden

In Addition to the Bible and Extra-Biblical Books

As I wrote above the premise is very straightforward. Timothy Jay Schwab is laying all his cards on the table for everyone to see. With this hand he has finally and indisputably proven the Philippines is Ophir and the Garden of Eden. No one can disprove him. 

Everyone should at least be mindful this is a very credible case with full support which is why no one has been able to disprove it.

But hold on a minute there's some writing on these cards! Tim has turned a Jack into a King. The King has turned into an Ace! What's going on here? What I'm saying is Tim adds his own little commentaries to some of these sources so that now they don't contradict him. Let's look at a few of these instances.


page 20

NOTE: Perfect example of British manipulations to this narrative: This Periplus quoted by Suarez is deceptively incomplete omitting important directions. We do not use Suarez in his misrepresentation of part of the directions to Chryse provided by the Periplus of the Erythaean Sea which we instead quote directly. We use his misrepresentation of Mela as an example of such. He totally misrepresented this by removing parts of the 2nd half of the directions which indicate it is the island beyond China and to the Southeast of China in the sea. That cannot be Malaysia but only the Philippines fits. He does so to force the Malay Peninsula into the equation which requires deliberate British fraud. See Next Page for Mela's actual words translated and the following page for the actual Periplus with full directions you will not find with this author. How any author could offer the Periplus and leave out the portion within "After this region under the very north, the sea outside ending in a land called This." [China] can only be fraud. Let's be clear. 

There is a blogger attempting to capitalize on this fraud by further advancing it and additional fraud of such also ignoring the actual Periplus wording and going right to authors like this who are clearly deceiving and not attempting to represent the truth. 

Suarez then misinterprets Mela above who located Chryse and Argyre as islands in the South China Sea not the Malay Peninsula, misrepresents the Periplus completely and then, goes on to claim Pliny the Elder and geographer was confused about whether Chryse was an island or a Peninsula thus it must be a Peninsula yet Pliny calls it an island every time. He seizes on directions where Pliny involves 3 rivers in China, a bay and the "Promontory of Chryse." Again, Pliny was a geographer. He knew the difference between an isle and a peninsula. He also knew the word promontory refers to a rocky point and islands can have promontories just as much as peninsulas. Yes the word can be a peninsula but not when the same author calls it an island many times and a promontory only this once which is also a description found on an island. That's deception not scholarship. However, he fraudulently deals with such and concludes Pliny must have meant peninsula. To make such assumption requires one to believe Pliny did not know the difference and was confused yet his writings are very clear and he was a geographer. This is propaganda

In this commentary Timothy is calling Thomas Suarez, the author of Early Mapping of Southeast Asia, a fraud and a propagandist. He even takes time to mention me! I think he is referring to my article, The God Culture: Finding Chryse: Don't Follow Biased Paradigms. Why is the man who wrote the authoritative book on early maps of Southeast Asia a fraud? Tim says it's because he omits the 2nd half of the directions to Chryse. Here is the full text.

63.   After these, the course turns toward the east again, and sailing with the ocean to the right and the shore remaining beyond to the left, Ganges comes into view, and near it the very last land toward the east, Chryse. There is a river near it called the Ganges, and it rises and falls in the same way as the Nile. On its bank is a market-town which has the same name as the river, Ganges. Through this place are brought malabathrum and Gangetic spikenard and pearls, and muslins of the finest sorts, which are called Gangetic. It is said that there are gold-mines near these places, and there is a gold coin which is called caltis. And just opposite this river there is an island in the ocean, the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself; it is called Chryse; and it has the best tortoise-shell of all the places on the Erythraean Sea.

64.   After this region under the very north, the sea outside ending in a land called This, there is a very great inland city called Thinae [i.e. China], from which raw silk and silk yarn and silk cloth are brought on foot through Bactria to Barygaza, and are also exported to Damirica [=Limyrike] by way of the river Ganges. But the land of This is not easy of access; few men come from there, and seldom. The country lies under the Lesser Bear [Ursa Minor], and is said to border on the farthest parts of Pontus and the Caspian Sea, next to which lies Lake Maeotis; all of which empty into the ocean.

https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/periplus/periplus.html 

Paragraph 63 describes the land of Chryse. Paragraph 64 says "after this region" is China. Understand the directions are moving eastward. From Chryse we go east to China. Is China to the east of the Philippines? No. So Tim is wrong in his interpretation of this text. He is also wrong about Suarez. He does not ignore paragraph 64 as Tim alleges. Here is what Suarez writes.

Early Mapping of Southeast Asia

Chryse most likely represented Malaya, while Argyre was probably Burma, perhaps Arakan. Both are seen as islands in the world map after Mela (fig. 9), Chryse being the island off the east Asian coast, and Argyre the island at the Ganges delta next to Taprobana. On the twelfth-century 'Turin' world map (figs. 30 & 31), they appear as a single island in the easternmost ocean sea, the right-hand isle of the two immediately above Adam and Eve (the left-hand isle is simply designated insula, and thus may have been intended for either Chryse or Argyre). 

Mention of Chryse is also made in the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea, which describes Chryse as "the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself, " a land from which comes "the best tortoise-shell of all the places on the Erythrean Sea." The work's anonymous author then described the land of This (China) and city of Thinae, from which raw silk, silk yarn, and silk cloth, acquired through silent barter, were brought overland to India. Isidorus Hispalensis (Isidore of Seville, ca. 560-636 A.D.), in his Etymologiae, one of the most popular cosmographies of the Middle Ages, also placed the lands of Chryse and Argyre in the southeastern extreme of the world, along with Taprobana and Tyle (Tile, an island near India).

Suarez says Chryse is mentioned in the Periplus of the Erythean Sea. After that place is described Suarez says the author moves on to describe China. Again we are going east and China is not east of the Philippines. Tim does not agree wth Suarez so he calls him a fraud and misrepresents his book.

I'm not going to bother to refute him on Mela and Pliny. The fact that Pliny, Mela, and everyone else has different directions and descriptions for Chryse as being both an island and a peninsula should alert Tim to the fact that  Greeks were unfamiliar with this region and never sailed there for gold. 

There are two places in the sourcebook where Tim mentions the Rothschilds. The first one is located on page 35.

This search tells us that there is a huge paragraph on page 35. But there isn't. Instead the text is hidden!


Why does Tim have hidden text in his sourcebook? Doesn't he want his readers to be informed about everything he has to say? If you look at the coding it hardly seems unintentional especially considering the hidden text he has on all his other webpages. As far as I can gather the text reads as follows:

’s have funded the suppression of Ophir since the 1600s when they paid Purchas to commit their   …   propaganda. The Malay Peninsula was never an island and no sailor nor cartographer in those days could possibly confuse the two unless they operate in a   …   completely broken paradigm such as Ptolemy regarding the Far East in which he had no clue. In fact, mariners would largely hug the coasts thus they would   …   follow India through Burma to Malaysia noticing Malaysia to be a peninsula. It is impossible for them to mistake based on their practices. These maps are   …   our interpretation based on this mindset. We are using a modern map but notice we are blacking out the Malay Peninsula and Indochina to the left just as   …   most of these maps do even the ones we already covered on the previous pages. When you follow these directions from The Periplus of the Erythaean Sea,   …   Pomponius Mela, Dionysius the Tourist and others, this becomes evident as they all tie and lead to the same place in the correct paradigm. Additionally,   …   the maps we selected actually represent their written directions which we covered. All of them call Chryse an island and none of them accidentally meant   …   a peninsula just as Pliny the Elder calls it an island and never a peninsula. Dionysius even adds in an incredibly fixed marker regardless identifying Chryse   …   directly under the Tropic of Cancer. This made us realize that is exactly what The Periplus was describing as “under the very north” as the North begins   …   at Cancer. No one can move that and Malaysia is not even a remote fit as there are 2 countries North of it between such line yet the Philippines is directly   …   under Cancer which is inline with South China and Taiwan. Malaysia is also on top of the Equator and could never to associated with accuracy with the   …   Tropic of Cancer. Review these in detail, compare with the previous maps and any others you can find, and prove it out. We believe you will find this to   …   be accurate. As you complete this chapter, you will find this thinking fully confirmed on the next pages as the Portuguese found Chryse and Argyre and   …   documented it with a government-commissioned map.   …   20 continued...

That paragraph should start with "Rothschild's" but if you look at the coding you see that Rothschild is separated from the text by a mark tag <mark>. How can that be unintentional?

The second instance where the Rothschilds are mentioned is on page 128.

page 128

NOTE: Dr. Craig did not wish to make a case for the Philippines as Ophir as he references Former Prime Minister Paterno did. Such is understandable. However, if he had actually truly researched the Biblical passages as we have, especially knowing the abundant history which he certainly did, such connection would become incredibly obvious. Does he quote Sir Douglas properly? Yes. See below. These are all native products of the Philippines and Ophir brought to China. See Testing All the Resources of Ophir. Though Douglas does not state Philippines by name nor could he as the Rothschilds would have his head, the products match and the deduction accurate especially in lieu of all the other evidence in context. Ophir/Philippines was trading across the ocean by ship as early as 990 B.C.  

In this note Tim calls Sir Robert Douglas a pawn of the Rothschilds who could not mention the Philippines or they would "have his head!!"

What evidence does Timothy have that Sir Douglas was working for the Rothschilds? What evidence does he have that the Rothschilds were actively suppressing historical information about the Philippines trading with China millennia ago? He does not say. Tim claims Douglas is covering up the Philippines' role in early shipping to China by not naming them. But Sir Douglas does not name any of the eight nations alleged to have been trading with China during that period. Here is the text.

During the Shang dynasty (1766-1154 B.C.) we learn from the native records that' travellers from the neighbourhood of Canton came bringing fish-skin cases, sharp swords and shields. These men wore their hair short, we are told, and their bodies were tattooed. Other companies arrived bringing pearls, tortoise-shells, elephants’ teeth, peacocks' feathers, birds and small dogs. 

At the beginning of the next dynasty — the Chou (B.C.1122-255) — intercourse had been established with eight foreign nations; and it was at Canton that the merchants of these states exchanged their goods for the products of Cathay. 

Europe and the Far East, 1506-1912, pgs 1-2

That text says nothing about the Philippines or any other nation. To make it fit his purposes Tim resorts to quoting Dr. Austin Craig who says that those are products of the Philippines. Thus the Philippine-China connection is established, right? Wrong! Tim does not quote Dr. Craig in full and thus misrepresents him.

The British Museum's oriental scholar (Douglas: Europe and the Far East, Cambridge, 1904) states that by the beginning of the Chou dynasty (B. C. 1122-255) intercourse had been established at Canton with eight foreign nations. Duties as early as 990 B. C. were levied, and among the imports were birds, pearls and tortoise shell, products of the Philippines, but the origin of these has not been investigated. "Reliable history,"' says Dr. Pott (A Sketch of Chinese History, Shanghai, 1908), "does not extend further back than the middle of the Chou dynasty (B. C. 722). 


After the time of the Chou dynasty we come to more solid ground, for at the beginning of the Han dynasty (B. C. 206) the custom originated of employing Court chroniclers to write a daily account of governmental proceedings. These diaries were kept secret and stored away in iron chests until the dynasty they chronicled had passed away; then they were opened and published, and so form the basis of our knowledge of the events that had transpired while the dynasty was in existence." 

Philippine history, however, has attracted only incidental interest in the translating of these voluminous chronicles so that while the first three mentions hereafter to be cited are well within the reliable history period they have not been verified and are valuable only as suggesting more definitely where to investigate.  

On page 137 of "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" Tim write this:

In his original work "Europe and the Far East", 1506-1912," Sir Douglas, whom Dr. Austin Craig is citing, notes this trade took place in Canton in 990 B.C. thus Filipinos and others travelled there. Dr. Craig (1914) concluded that these products originated in the Philippines.

Tim could not be further from the truth. Dr. Craig says the history of China is unreliable beyond 722 B.C. and "solid ground" to determine history does not occur until around 200 B.C. when records began to be kept. Furthermore while Dr. Craig does admit those are Philippine products he says unambiguously that the origin of those products has not been investigated. He absolutely does not conclude they originated in the Philippines. This passage in "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" is a blatant lie.

Tim has twisted Dr. Craig's words and he has smeared Sir Robert Douglas as being an agent of the Rothschilds.  That's neither the work of a scholar or an honest man. That's the work of a propagandist. To quote Tim, "That's deception not scholarship." Tim does not know how to play the game right. He does not know when to hold 'em or when to fold 'em. He should just walk away from the table. He should not have entered the game in the first place. He is no scholar. He is the fraud here.

There is more commentary like this throughout the book but let's look at the strangest thing of all about this sourcebook: there are missing sources! Sources 161, 184, 190, 209, 225, 229, 230, 272, 277, 278, 290, 327-334, 342-346, 357-360, 363, 375, 385, 391, 413, 415, 416  are all missing from the Sourcebook! I cannot show all of these so I will show the most egregious case.  

The Search for King Solomon's Treasure Sourcebook

There is a leap here from 326 to 335. Why did Tim OMIT these sources from his Sourcebook? It does not make sense. That is a real problem because this authoritative sourcebook is supposed to prove his case beyond all doubt. Some of these sources do not even show up in the main text of his book. 

Even though 209 is not listed in the bibliography of the sourcebook it is in fact on page 212. 346 is found on page 183 despite not being in the bibliography. 346 is a little confusing because it is the same reference as 179.




1. "History of Batnagas." Batangas Provincial Information Office. Province of Batangas. 2. Strong's Concordance "Ba'ah" #H1158, "Tan" #H8565, and "Gan" #H1588. Blue Letter Bible.

Source 298 is in the sourcebook and in the bibliography of "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" but is not in the main text. Like 179 and 346 it is a reference to "Gan" #H1588. That means Tim has three sources with the same reference. Why is that?

Several sources appear to not show up in the book "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" except for in the bibliography. These are: 161, 184, 190, 225, 229, 230, 277, 278, 298, 327-334, 342, 344, 357-360, 375, 413, 415. That is 26 sources unaccounted for. I noted in my review of "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" that source 28 does not show up in the text of the book but only in the bibliography. That could have been a simple oversight but what are we to make of 26 other sources being left out of the book? What are we to make of all the sources missing from the sourcebook?   

Some of these omissions could possibly be explained by the fact that they are duplicates. For instance 229 and 216 have the same reference to "pealim.com #6051." Source 216 actually has two references the second being to "pealim.com #5053." It is not clear why this reference to #6051 is repeated for 229.  

Sources 161 and 166 refer to the same book but a different page. 166 makes it into the sourcebook and main text while 161 does not.

Sources 230 and 217 are exactly the same. They both refer to "Strong's Concordance #4327 Biblehub.com." 

34 and 357 are basically the same as they refer to the same book and chapter of The Antiquites of the Jews. However 357 has two additional references to a Wikipedia article about the Kabul River and to "Old Iranian Online" which is a glossary of old Iranian words. Curiously Tim does not include this in his sourcebook though he clearly discusses these matters on page 52 of "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure."


The Search for King Solomon's Treasure, pg 52

Josephus is only dealing with Mesha in this rendering not Sephar and he is narrowing down the area very specifically based on references that we can connect even today in modern history. I)ohir and family lived initially in the bort', region of what we would identify today as Iran and Afghanistan. The Cophen River is acknowledged as the modern Kabul River in Afghanistan. Notice then Joseph. connects this with "and" meaning this is at border legion. The second region is "part of Aria adjoining Is it." Aria is very easy to identify Arya is the Old Persian name of what we call Iran today and its etymology still originates in Aryan. Therefore, Josephus is locating Mesha on the border of Iran and Afghanistan. Meshad, Iran accordingly materializes to be positioned on the Northeastern border or Iran right next to Afghanistan exactly where he placed it

What we have here is a bizarre instance where Tim did not attribute his sources in the text but did include them in his bibliography yet kept them out of the sourcebook. That is a huge oversight and certainly requires emendation for any future editions of this book.

Sources 22 and 344 refer to the same book. But source 22 actually refers to 3 sources not just one. In fact a few of Tim's sources have more than one reference attributed such as 346 with 2, 367 with 3, and 10 which has 4. This makes for a lot of clutter and overlap.

One of the sources left out of the sourcebook is 385. It is in the book. Here is the passage.

In fact, it was not until 1599, until the Philippines legally recognised the Spanish sovereignty over the Philippines. [385]

"The Search for King Solomon's Treasure," page 262

The source is listed as 

Villarroel 2009, pp. 93–133

What exactly is this source? What is Villarroel 2009? If you Google that citation you will find out that it comes from Wikipedia. That means Tim did not read this source, has no idea what it says, but simply lifted the citation from Wikipedia. It's no wonder he excises it from his sourcebook. He cannot prove to his readers anything from it. How sad and pathetic for Tim to lift a citation as proof for his case even though he has no idea what it says because he never read it. But that is his method and we have seen this before in the 100 Clues review where he lifts three citations for proof that there was Filipino gold jewelry found in first century Egypt.

Source 345 is a strange case because there is no source number 345. Not in "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" and not in the sourcebook. Tim skips from 344 to 346. 


Again, is that an oversight or is it intentional? 

Source 144 appears to not be in the bibliography but it is there. You just have to look closely.


Why is source 144 not in the margin?  That is incredibly sloppy.

Let's end this critique with one more anomaly. Tim has 417 sources listed in the bibliography of  "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure." But in the sourcebook he has 419 sources listed. Where do these two extra sources come from? 

The Search For King Solomon's Treasure

The Search for King Solomon's Treasure Sourcebook

Again, is this a mere oversight or was it intentional? 

Source 418 is actually included in the book on page 201 and in the sourcebook on page 209.


The Search for King Solomon's Treasure, pg. 201
Sinai. Hebrew: ×¡×™× ×™‎: Modern Sinait [418] Near Laoag where the Lost Tribes of Israel may have landed in the desert, we oddly find three symbols of a second exodus. Today the name has been changed adding a "t" on the end but on this 1775 map, the area, the river and an island North are all labeled Sinai. Unto itself this is perhaps coincidence. However; with all the overwhelming such references in the Philippines, this is certainly a Hebrew word. Vigan, originally Bi-Gan, is also a Hebrew possibility meaning come and go in the Garden. 
Exactly how a map drawn up by a Frenchman in 1775 has anything to do with the Lost Tribes and residual Hebrew is left unexplained by Tim. It is not clear at all why Jean-Baptiste d'Après de Mannevillette, the man who made this map, labelled three places "Sinai" but it is rash to jump to Tim's conclusions. With no actual proof as to why three places are named Sinai Tim's explanation is ad hoc. In fact Wikipedia offers a totally different account of why there is a place named Sinait in Illocos Sur which totally contradicts Tim.
Small battles were daily occurrence so that in the year 1535, when the locality was organized and established as a “Pueblo” Salcedo named the new community as “SIN-NAIT”, a word in the local tongue which means “CONTEST”. 

In the year 1575, the natives fully realized the hardships of pronouncing the term “SIN-NAIT” and to go away with the trouble, Salcedo declared that one of the letter “N” be dropped. Since then, this Municipality has been called “SINAIT”.

Is it true? I don't know and that's not the point. The point is there are alternate explanations for all the place-names in the Philippines rather than ancient residual Hebrew. And by the way the map Tim uses is actually from 1810 and not 1775. The link he gives for this source tells us that. A small detail but important nonetheless as accuracy is crucial.

What can we conclude from this? If this were all a mere oversight then we can conclude that Tim is a very sloppy editor. He claims to have 30 years of experience in the publishing industry and his self-published books are the fruit of all those years. It's hard to imagine that a man with so much experience in publishing could be such a sloppy editor. It is also equally hard to imagine that these are mere oversights. There are too many anomalies. What accounts for all the missing sources? Why are there 417 sources in the main book but 419 sources in the sourcebook? Why are there sources in the bibliography of "The Search for King Solomon's Treasure" missing from the main text? Why are there duplicate sources? Why is 345 completely missing?

Lest Timothy Jay Schwab and Anna shriek out that I am nit-picking let me remind them of their own words.
Everyone should at least be mindful this is a very credible case with full support which is why no one has been able to disprove it.

They are very proud of this sourcebook and declare it proves all their claims. Why is it so sloppy? Their listeners and readers deserve an answer. 

Thursday, April 4, 2024

The God Culture: Dishonestly Edited Videos

It was my intent in three blog posts to look at the God Culture's claims and give them an honest critique.  I posted links to two of those blogs on the God Culture's Facebook page so they would have a chance to respond. Instead of dealing with the issues I raised they insulted me and made emotional appeals while copping an attitude of victory as if my criticisms were nothing and they did not care what I had to say. All the while behind the scenes it appears I really struck a nerve so much so that Tim and his gang have taken the time to remove and edit three of the very videos I criticized. I am aware they edited a few other videos too but I didn't watch those so I won't comment on them.


Here is the message they left on my previous post:
There is nothing erroneous in our research. A YouTube Channel quoting a source is normal. It is rare a YT channel sites anywhere near as much as we have and this is a ludicrous track of negative nothing. We have been updating our videos with more extensive sources and even page #s so thank you for pointing this out but let us not pretend you have a gotcha because you do not and you can stop with the act. What is truly laughable is we went back and listened and we never mention Suarez in that slide at all but the Periplus. We have removed Suarez completely and we have added quotes from Nowell proving your thinking that Suarez was right is wrong and Magellan proved that. You found nothing. Enough. We have more than satisfied your questions and we changed our videos already accordingly as one seeking truth should and would. We are also focused on larger print for the sources as the one you criticized was actually even larger than 30 pt but 40 pt in our program but we do get your point on that and we are responding to that as we have responded to your questions fully. There is nothing further to discuss on these
http://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-god-culture-100-clues-philippines.html?showComment=1581003123603#c7535920846141965828
They changed their videos! I couldn't believe it but it's true.  They deleted videos 2, 3, and 4 from their 100 Clues series in order to alter them. You know I feel a little flattered.  Now if only I could get the Senate to launch a proper investigation into the causes surrounding the Marawi siege!


What did they change?  Let's take a good hard look. Here is the playlist once again.

Clue #2

This is the video where they claim that the Philippines is the ancient source of Greek gold. Here is the very first change in their slides.

Original:


Edited:


You see what Tim did here?  He excised the reference to Thomas Suarez's book "Early Mapping of Southeast Asia" from the slide. But that does not matter because he is still referencing it in the audio when he talks about Chryse and Argyre.

Contrary to what the God Culture says their reference is not in 30 or 40 point font but is in VERY TINY FONT at the bottom of the slide. If you do go to the link they provide which is https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/periplus/periplus.html you will find nothing about Argyre, the legendary island of silver, in the whole text of the "Periplus of the Erythaean Sea." Because the audio has not been changed from the original any talk of Argyre in the edited video still comes directly from Suarez who mentions Argyre by quoting Pompoinous Mela. Tim also falsifies what Mela actually wrote about Argyre by claiming it is "placed beyond the Ganges" rather than "in the vicinity of the Ganges."  Here is the quote from Saurez:
Gold and silver, in fact, characterize the earliest extant specific Western Reference to Southeast Asia. Pomponius Mela (37 - 43 A.D.), a Roman geographer and native os Southern Spain, largely carried on the Greek tradition about the East, perpetuating stories about Amazons, people without heads, griffins, and other such characters, but adds two lands which lay to the east of India. One was Chryse, said to boast soil of gold, the other, Argyre, said to have soil of silver: 
In the vicinity of Tamus is the island of Chryse, in the vicinity of the Ganges that of Argyre, According to olden writers, the soil of the former consists of gold, that of the latter is of silver and it seems very probable that either the name arises from this fact or the legend derives from the name.
This makes the God Culture's claim:
"we never mention Suarez in that slide at all but the Periplus"
just another lie. Did Tim not realize there is no mention of Argyre in the "Periplus?" At 2:20 he says the following:
"Periplus of the Erytheaen Sea in the first century records Chryse and Argyre as being located in "the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself beyond the land of China which brought silk to India." Gee, umm I don't know which islands are east of China? Wait! Ethiopia? Nope, that's not it! Yemen?  No. India? Ugh! Someone must know their geography very well in speculating that those guys could possibly be this ancient land of gold. It's the Philippines. Oh yeah! And they also map it.  So really this is not rocket science folks."
The section highlighted in red italics shows just how condescending Tim is to his listeners. He talks this way in every single one of his videos. Here is the section from the Periplus he is referencing.  
63.   After these, the course turns toward the east again, and sailing with the ocean to the right and the shore remaining beyond to the left, Ganges comes into view, and near it the very last land toward the east, Chryse. There is a river near it called the Ganges, and it rises and falls in the same way as the Nile. On its bank is a market-town which has the same name as the river, Ganges. Through this place are brought malabathrum and Gangetic spikenard and pearls, and muslins of the finest sorts, which are called Gangetic. It is said that there are gold-mines near these places, and there is a gold coin which is called caltis. And just opposite this river there is an island in the ocean, the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself; it is called Chryse; and it has the best tortoise-shell of all the places on the Erythraean Sea.
Not only does the Periplus not mention Argyre but it locates Chryse as being near the Ganges. "Just opposite this river" in fact. Tim claims this text says it is located "beyond the land of China." Did he even read the Periplus? Or did he pick through it, combine information from elsewhere, and make up his own facts? Let' compare where Tim, Mela, and the Periplus locate Chryse and Argyre.
Tim: Chryse is beyond the land of China and Argyre is beyond the Ganges. 
Mela: Chryse is in the vicinity of Tamus and Argyre is in the vicinity of the Ganges. 
Periplus: Chryse is near the Ganges just opposite of it and there is no mention of Argyre. 
See how Tim does not agree with the sources he is quoting? He says something completely different from both Mela and the Periplus.

Tim kept the same audio which refers to Suarez and changed the slide to appear as if he did not. He also misrepresents the Periplus as saying it mentions Argyre and that the island of Chryse lies "beyond the land of China" when it makes no mention of Argyre and clearly says Chryse lies just opposite of the Ganges. That is deception. But why be so deceptive? It doesn't make any sense and it doesn't further his cause.  It only exposes him as at best a poor researcher who misrepresents and does not read his sources and at worst a liar.

Starting at 3:26 in this video is where we get an entirely new section. In this part he quotes from a different  source, "Magellan's voyage around the world; three contemporary accounts," by Charles Nowell.

This book contains the account of Pigafetta and other documentation. Tim does not quote from any of the primary sources but only from the introductory material by Nowell. This is all rather dumbfounding because the subject of this video is the Philippines being the ancient source of Greek gold and Nowell's book says absolutely nothing about the Greeks. It's totally out of place.



Tim quotes a bit from pages 21 and 22 but I think it would behoove us to quote a little more starting on page 20 and going to page 23.
Duarte Barbosa, who wrote a geographical account of the countries bordering on the Indian Ocean and those within range of the ocean, has this to say of the Ryukyu inhabitants:  
From Malaca they take the same goods as the Chins [Chinese] take. These islands are called Lequios [in one version ‘Liquii']. The Malaca people say that they are better men, and richer and more eminent merchants than the Chins. Of these folk we as yet know but little, as they have not yet come to Malaca since it has been under the King our Lord.”  
The Duarte Barbosa who wrote this book has been identified by some with the Portuguese of the same name who became Magellan's cousin by marriage and accompanied him on his great voyage. Medina has shown that this was probably not the same man, but it makes little difference.” The Barbosa book was finished by 1516 and was available in manuscript to Magellan as he studied to complete his plan in Portugal before transferring allegiance to Spain. Magellan digested Barbosa's work and with his own hand rewrote one passage, which consisted of a list of places between the Cape of Good Hope and the Lequios that were known but not yet occupied by the Portuguese. Magellan's version substitutes for Barbosa's “Lequios” the words “Tarsis” and “Ofir.”” 

These are, of course, the biblical Tarshish and Ophir associated with Solomon and his trading partner, Hiram of Tyre. In I Kings 10:11 the statement is: “And the navy also of Hiram, that brought gold from Ophir, brought in from Ophir great plenty of almug trees, and precious stones.” II Chronicles 9:21 says: “For the king's ships went to Tarshish with the servants of Huram: every three years once came the ships of Tarshish bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks.” Elsewhere these Old Testament books agree in saying that Solomon received more than four hundred talents of gold from Ophir. 

We shall not enter into the centuries-old debate as to what and where these lands actually were. The writer of I Kings certainly meant that the journey to Ophir began by way of the Red Sea, because in connection with Ophir (9:26) he says: “And the king Solomon made a navy of ships in Ezion-geber, which is beside Eloth, on the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom.” Later Christian writers for centuries associated the gold of Ophir with East Africa, but at the time of the Portuguese discoveries Ophir was thought of as the Aurea Chersonnesus (Golden Peninsula) of Ptolemy, in which that Greek geographer also placed Cattigara, mentioned by Pigafetta as the immediate transpacific goal of Magellan. But Magellan connected Solomon's treasure with something else he had read in Barbosa: 
 
"Facing this great land of China there are many islands in the sea, beyond which [on the other side of the sea] there is a very large land which they say is mainland, from which there come to Malacca every year three or four ships, like those of the Chins, belonging to white men who are said tobe great and rich merchants: they bring much gold, and silver in bars, silk, rich cloth, and much very good wheat, beautiful porcelains, and many other merchandises.”  
Barbosa, in mentioning this great land across the water from China, might have been referring to Japan. More likely, though, he meant the island of Taiwan, or Formosa, separated by the Gulf of Fukien from mainland China. At the time Barbosa wrote, the Portuguese can scarcely have had information about Japan. They had some regarding Formosa and the Ryukyus, whose exact latitudinal position they did not know but correctly placed northward of Malacca and the Moluccas and hence north of the equator. These are obviously what Magellan took to be Tarshish and Ophir.  
If further proof is needed that he sought these places in addition to the Moluccas, we have it in the agreement between the Spanish crown and Sebastian Cabot. On April 4, 1525, less than six years after Magellan sailed, Cabot, now pilot major of Spain, signed a contract to make much the same voyage, though with objectives more concisely stated. He offered to go with three ships through the Strait of Magellan to reach the Moluccas “and other islands and lands of Tarshish and Ophir and eastern Cathay and Cipangu.” “The Spanish government had preferred to leave the names Tarshish and Ophir out of the earlier Magellan contract, but now that the western route to the Orient had been discovered, security regulations could be relaxed to the extent of openly mentioning the biblical lands. 
We now see what Magellan's aim in the Far East was: He expected to claim for Spain the Moluccas and the lands known to Solomon and Hiram of Tyre. It remains to be shown how he expected to reach those lands, and for this we must understand his mental image of the New World across the Atlantic.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.31822013755558&view=1up&seq=34
It is a long quote but rather necessary. What we see here is Magellan himself falsifying Barbosa's text and inserting "Ophir" and "Tarshish" when Barbosa had written no such thing. We also see that Nowell refers just as everyone else does, including Suarez, to the Aurea Chersonnesus as being the Golden peninsula. That is literally what the name means. But Tim discounts everything Nowell has written, admits he is a good scholar, and calls his conclusions wrong. He says at 8:44
"One blogger even said, "Why use an author if you do not agree with his conclusions?" Well, a lot can still be gleaned from the research many times so obviously it's a good thing to do that.  It is unwise not to."
Tim is not just gleaning from one author. He is gleaning from multiple sources and no one of any repute identifies the Aurea Chersonnesus as anything except the Malay peninsula.

Yes I know Tim does not quote this book. The title and subtitle is what is important.

However Tim doesn't care what any scholar says. It is Timothy Jay Schwab, (a man who is no trained cartographer, geographer, oceanographer, historian, linguist, or theologian), who is right, and all the academics who have dedicated their entire lives to studying history, languages, cartography, theology, or geography are wrong. Don't misunderstand me here. Sometimes the scholars, academics, and experts are wrong. Case in point Heinrich Schliemann the amateur archaeologist who discovered the ruins of Troy.  But what Tim is doing is rejecting a solid body of geography and history stretching back to Ptolemey which identifies the Aurea Chersonnesus as the Malay peninsula and twisting it to fit his pseudo-history of the Philippines being both the Garden of Eden and Ophir and Tarshish and Filipinos being members of the lost tribes of Israel.

Tim mentions Columbus and says the following at 9:27
Are we to now call America "Southeast Asia" because Columbus said it was Southeast Asia? Of course not. 
But this is exactly what Tim is doing with the Philippines! He is calling this place Ophir because Magellan falsified Barbosa's book and introduced the names Ophir and Tarshish. Tim is ok with this falsification.  In fact in the video "Solomon's Gold Series - Part 6: Little Known History of Ophir. Philippines History" at 7:46 Tim says the following:

https://youtu.be/12tOU7Szbpk
"In "Magellan's Voyage Around the World" the author Charles E Nowell, notes that Magellan himself had rewritten part of Barbosa's book referring to the Lequios and in his version Magellan substituted "Tarsis" and "Ofir" for the word "Lequios." So "Lequios" equals "Tarshish" and "Ophir." This is huge."
Wow this really is huge!  Magellan falsifies a book and Tim thinks what he wrote is the truth. In Tim's world truth is whatever you want it to be. Lequios is Ophir and Tarshish because Magellan said so. Just as, despite the Philippines being comprised of 7,000 islands, two tiny islands on an old map are the Philippines because Tim says so.


In numerous videos Timothy Schwab claims the two mythical islands of gold and silver, Chryse and Argyre, are Luzon and Mindanao respectively and he uses Mela's map as proof. However not only does Mela have Argyre located at the mouth of the Ganges near India while Mindanao is nowhere near India but none of the rest of the Philippines is accounted for! Tim expects us to believe that the Greeks visited the Philippines and accurately mapped the Philippines BUT somehow forgot to include the Visayas and misplaced Mindanao thousands of miles away at the mouth of the Ganges River!


The next edited slide is the one with the Greek armor.  


How can Tim with a straight face tell us at 13:56
"The thing is these are indisputably Greek from the symbols and structure and they are dated all the way back to 800 B.C. up to about 480 B.C."
when on the slide he has written "Archaeology confirmation pending?" Is it confirmed and indisputable or is the confirmation still pending? As with the first edited slide he keeps the original audio and only changes the slide. The result is a contradiction between the audio and the visual. What a boner from Tim the Joker!


Thankfully Tim listed the place where he saw this armor which is the Balanghai Hotel and Convention Center Museum in Butuan. Sadly there is no website for this hotel/museum and thus no online collection to look at.  However I was able to find a picture of the armor displayed in a glass case outside the entrance to the museum.


Why not just tell everyone the first time around where he saw it? How is anyone supposed to confirm all things when information is being withheld? 
That's it for Clue #2. Let's recap everything we have learned so far.  Tim excises Suarez as a a source but still utilizes him when talking about Argyre because the Periplus of the Erythaean Sea does not mention Argyre. He misrepresents the Periplus' location of Chryse and Mela's location of Argyre. He quotes from Nowell but ignores everything he says especially his identification of the Aurea Chersonnesus. He is ok with the fact that Magellan inserted "Ophir" and "Tarshish" into Barbosa's book thus falsifying it. He says the armor is indisputably Greek while on the slide he contradicts himself by having written "Archeological confirmation pending!"

This edited video is worse than the original because it contains blunder after blunder as Tim tries to cover up his tracks, like removing Suarez from the slide but not from the audio, and it is also about 10 minutes longer because he added the totally unnecessary section with Nowell!  Moving on.

Clue #3

This is the video where we are told Philippine gold was found in first century Egypt. My criticisms of this video were that Tim did not quote from any of the three sources he cites and one of them, J.T. Peralta, he cites erroneously. So what does Tim do to rectify this mess? Does he make a correction of the Peralta citation? No! He gets rid of Peralta altogether!

Original:


Edited:


Let's look at his new sources which are still in the same VERY TINY FONT!
Sources: Wikipedia, Ancientblogspot.ph cite 
1. Legeza, Laszlo, "Tantric Elements in pre-Hispanic Philippines Gold Art," Arts of Asia, July-Aug, 1988, pp 129-136. 
2 Villegas, Ramon N. "Ginto: History Wrought in Gold", Manila: Bangko Central ng Pilipinas", 2004
Tim in his infinite wisdom eighty-sixed the Peralta citation as if that clears everything up. If he was attempting to be honest he would have corrected the citation and not deleted it. He still does not prove to us Philippine gold was found in first century Egypt by quoting the relevant matter from the two remaining sources he listed. It is also still badly cited. What Wikipedia page is he sourcing? What is Ancientblogspot.ph? That is not even a website! It is just another boner on Tim's part. How many more boners can Tim make?


Towards the end of the video he inserts a new section which is a timeline. 


This timeline is supposed to prove that the Philippines has more gold than any nation in the world at any time. I never disputed that. What I did dispute is Tim's baseless assertion that Philippine gold has been found in first century Egypt. Since he took the time to edit this video and still did not include any quotations from Legeza or Villegas it's a safe bet he has not actually read those sources.

Clue #4

Tim edited this video but I don't care because I never took any issue with what was in the original.  The Boxer Codex shows Filipinos decked out in gold. That was never under question.

Summation and End

I only have a few more things to show before I close out. In my original post I wrote:
I can just hear Tim now excoriating me for watching only 6 videos in the 100 Clues series rather then the whole Solomon's Gold series and saying I am uninformed, a hack, and a fraud. Such would be pure deflection on Tim's part as I have already demonstrated his research is incredibly biased, faulty, and downright dishonest. If he cannot deal honestly with his sources here he won't be dealing honestly with them there either. 
https://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-god-culture-100-clues-philippines.html
Sure enough I was called all of those names and Tim's editing of these videos shows his outright dishonesty in dealing with sources both in the 100 Clues series and elsewhere. He may have edited out Suarez from Clue #2 and Peralta from Clue #3 but these two sources are scattered throughout the rest of his videos including the Solomon's Gold series

In the video for Clue #30 at 12:11 we see Timothy quoting Suarez. 

https://youtu.be/mCM371q6_AU

Of course in discussing Argyre he is compelled to cite Mela via Suarez because the "Periplus" does not mention Argyre. Remember every slide that follows which claims the Periplus locates Chryse "beyond the land of China" and Argyre "beyond the Ganges" is a lie. As I demonstrated above the Periplus does not say that nor does Mela.

Clue #33 at 21:23 contains this same quotation from Suarez.

https://youtu.be/q0zY1NYsJCA

In the video "Solomon's Gold Series Part 1C: UPHAZ GOLD & OPHIR. Origin of Gold Sheba, Tarshish, Havilah" at 8:27 we see the following slide:

https://youtu.be/jQWp_OPfEXA

In the video "Let There Be Light... Philippines? Origin of Ophir, Sheba and Havilah. 12G" at 12:58 we see this slide:


https://youtu.be/Xm6REaRW7nw

Suarez is quoted again in the video "Solomon's Gold Series - Part 6: Little Known History of Ophir. Philippines History" at both 18:19 and 19:29.


https://youtu.be/12tOU7Szbpk

https://youtu.be/12tOU7Szbpk

It is pretty clear that Thomas Suarez's book "Early Mapping of Southeast Asia" is an important source for Tim. So why did he delete it from Clue #2 when he includes it in several other videos? He still rejects what Suarez has to say as to the identification of Chryse, Argyre, and the Aurea Chersonnesus but that is no big deal to Tim who picks and chooses, or rather gleans, what will confirm his thesis like any good and honest scholar.

At 32:03, and for almost seven straight minutes, in the video "Solomon's Gold Series - Part 6: Little Known History of Ophir. Philippines History" we see the same three citations that were used to claim Philippine gold was found in first century Egypt which are Legeza, Peralta, and Villegas. But again no actual quotations from them.

https://youtu.be/12tOU7Szbpk

Look closely because those citations are in VERY TINY FONT underneath all the text. At 41:40 in the same video we see this slide:


It's the same claim of Philippine gold being found in first century Egypt with the same three citations and with no actual quotations from those sources. Tim goes on to show us not actual Philippine gold found in Egypt but the similarity between a Philippine gold necklace and an Egyptian gold necklace. As if similarity of style proves his claim. 

In the video "Solomon's Gold Series Part 1D: Testing the RESOURCES of Ancient Ophir, Tarshish, Sheba" we see the following slide at 21:39:

https://youtu.be/gG39WFEYfiU

The same claim about Egypt with the same three sources as were in the video Clue #3 before he edited it is to be found right here.  Obviously Tim thinks these three sources are important which is why they are included in the main series Solomon's Gold which he tells everyone to watch!

What is going on here? Why is Timothy Schwab and the God Culture being dishonest about their sources? Why edit information out of some videos when other videos include the exact same information? These edits do not make any sense whatsoever. They are totally absurd and don't add to the veracity of their claims. They are not even good edits because, as in Clue #2, the original audio is kept and only the slide is changed!

The God Culture has been posting HUGE BLOCKS of text in the comment section on this blog. They have insulted me, they have made appeals to emotion (like the testimony of the lawyer), and they have manifested a triumphalist attitude ignoring everything I wrote about their poor research and documentation. In comment after comment they disdain what I have written as the work of an ignorant hack. They even called me a communist agitator twelve times!

But in private it is obvious I struck a nerve or they would not have edited their videos. They put up an offensive front when they knew I was right all along as these edits prove. But the edits cannot obscure what is in the main series Solomon's Gold which is Thomas Suarez and J.T. Peralta being used to bolster their claims.  Is Tim going to edit those videos too?  Will he be an honest man and quote the Periplus accurately? Will he be a good researcher and actually order the articles by Legeza and Peralta from Arts of Asia? The burden of proof lies squarely on Tim, not me. It would be better if Tim and the gang simply believed the sources they cite rather than make up their own facts, like Magellan did when he rewrote Barbosa's book, in order to propagate their pseudo-history.

As I wrote before, "If he cannot deal honestly with his sources here he won't be dealing honestly with them there either." Tim's quick editing and reposting of his videos without the same sources he utilizes elsewhere reeks of dishonesty. This is just a tiny sampling of the God Culture's output. I can't imagine what duplicitous twisting of facts lies in their other videos. And yet thousands of people are being taken in by this garbage.

P.S. 

After writing all of the above I must add a postscript. The God Culture is adding links to their videos which have sources for people to check up on and confirm. That's a good thing. Why didn't they do this earlier? However they are still making blunders.

https://f2568e15-4b6b-4cbb-b68a-3d729eeed9e4.filesusr.com/ugd/e23929_c5850fbfa12d4a3390a6a541db01540d.pdf

Let me this get this straight. Tim edits Suarez out of the video for Clue #2 saying he wasn't quoting Saurez anyway but now he includes him in this PDF as a "Supporting Research Source!?" Then why did he edit him out of Clue #2?  It makes zero sense!

The little note requires our attention.
NOTE: Under Fig. 31 is the exact quote we cited for the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (1st Century C.E.)
“the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself”
The note says the exact quote is "“the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself.” But in this video Tim says much more than just that. He says at 17:36
"the last part of the inhabited world toward the east, under the rising sun itself beyond the land of This (China) which brought silk to India"
https://youtu.be/12tOU7Szbpk
Tim says this making it appear as if he is quoting the Periplus as locating Chryse beyond China! It doesn't. It says it is just opposite of the Ganges. Why doesn't he tell us exactly what he is quoting and what are his own words? It's simply confusing and dishonest. See above where I already discussed this.

In this PDF mention is made of Peralta and the Philippine gold allegedly found in Egypt. See the relevant slide above.
16. PH Gold found in Egypt: Wikipedia, AncientBlogspot. ph and many others cite 1 Legeza, Laszlo. “Tantric Elements in pre-Hispanic Philippines Gold Art,” Arts of Asia, July-Aug. 1988, pp.129-136. 2 Villegas, Ramon N. Ginto: History Wrought in Gold, Manila: Bangko Central ng Pilipinas, 2004. (FYI. Peralta is out of print but cited as well.)
This is basically the same edit as was made in the video for Clue #3. Instead of correcting the erroneous Peralta citation they leave it in the video and remove it from the sources listed in this PDF. Why didn't they just give the correct citation?

They also mess up the citations again. What Wikipedia article or articles are they sourcing? AncientBlogspot.ph IS NOT A WEBSITE!!  The FYI about Peralta being out of print is a non-issue because so is Legeza and it is Legeza, though not cited here as such, that has the reference to Philippine gold being found in Egypt.
"Legeza, Laszlo. "Tantric Elements in pre-Hispanic Philippines Gold Art," Arts of Asia, July-Aug. 1988, pp.129-136. (Mentions gold jewelry of Philippine origin in first century CE Egypt)" 
Both Legeza and Peralta can be ordered and shipped to the Philippines for $15 per article. I'm not going to do any research for Tim and order those articles. The burden of proof lies on him not me.

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