The Tiburtine Sibyl (est50 B.C.)

The Tiburtine Sibyl,also known as Albunea, lived in Tibur (now Tivoli) and located about fifteen miles Northeast of Rome. Her temple, which still stands today, was surrounded by a "sacred" grove and by mineral springs which, poetically enough given the topic of this page, flowed into the Tiber. The reason for this Sibyl's importance to Christians is her meeting with Augustus, he had gone to seek out knowledge about his own divinity and also about his successor, however, instead he was informed of the coming of Christ “This Child will be greater than thou”.

Furthermore one of the writings from the Sibylline Oracles has been attributed to the Tiburtine Sibyl, which include predictions; that the final Emperor of Rome will be the ninth and he will vanquish the foes of Christianity, that the coming of the Antichrist will happen and he will oppose the two witnesses and eventually be slain by Michael the Archangel.

For more information please read Old Document Review 'The prophecy of the Tiburtine Sibyl' which formed part of the Mirabilis liber published in 1522

Cumaean Sibyl (est1500-500 B.C.)

The Cumaean Sibyl lived in Cumae (now Cuma) which was the first Greek colony founded in Italy, which is about twenty miles from Naples. Her home was a grotto under the ground which can still be seen to this day in a volcanic region where vapours would issue from the ground.

Her existence is recorded from two main sources, the first is from the manuscript Aeneid by Virgil where he writes about the mysterious woman;

“Arriv'd at Cumae, when you view the flood
Of black Avernus, and the sounding wood,
The mad prophetic Sibyl you shall find,
Dark in a cave, and on a rock reclin'd.
She sings the fates, and, in her frantic fits”

Also during his visit, she took him on a tour of the underworld where he questioned her about her existence, asking if she was an immortal goddess, to which she answered that she was not a goddess and she was mortal yet she had been granted a long life, yet the long life was not that of eternal youth but one where her body will fade until all that is left is her voice, living for a thousand years.

In other manuscripts it is recorded that she went to king Tarquin with nine books that contained the destiny of his kingdom and the world, they were called the Sibylline Books, the king refused and the sibyl burned three books in a fire, when he refused the second time she burned three more, but the king eventually bought the last three books for 300 coins. The books are recorded to have been destroyed in a fire in 83 B.C. This led to the Roman Emperor demanding that the collection to be reformed from other copies which became the Sibylline Oracles.

It is possible that this is the Sibyl in which Naevius spoke about in his books about the Punic War, yet he called her the Cimmerian Sibyl or Carmentis as he recorded the same place near Lake Avernus in Italy as being the place where she resided.

Old Document Review 'Prognostications'

This fantastic document was originally published in 1536 A.D and was written by Paracelsus (d.1541). It contains 32 images with very cryptic statements to go with them. Paracelcus was originally born as Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim and was a German-Swiss, in his life time he was a physician, a botanist, an alchemist, astrologer and occultist. He was famous for many things, he gave zinc its name and contibuted greatly to the development of medicine.

The 32 predictions are of mundane events, ecclesiastical affairs and political upheavals, yet they are so cryptic that has made them almost impossible to interpret. The Past, Present and future are described as three separate entities yet there are the same. Like a Trinity of time itself, and Paracelsus claims that it is through divine intervention that he has been shown things, as nothing is impossible through the Trinity of God. He speaks many times of Magic, yet by magic he means divine power. Magic and Occultism at his time ran the risk of being tried for heresy, yet in reading extracts of his various writings, the only thing that comes clear is that he was a devout believer in God, a spiritual person with a great understanding of the nature of God.

An example of the text from the book;'What a thing is internally is shown by its outward sign. As Nature signs her own so does Magic. You have been signed as a devourer of all who have to do with them'

As you can see the text is very cryptic and quite hard to understand yet some scholars claim that several of the prophecies have been fulfilled. They interpret seperate words from the texts just as one would do with interpreting dreams, for example the bear is Russia, the lion is England and so on.

There are a couple of interesting things I found in the document; the first is a reference in Figure 26 to Sibyl, meaning the Sibylline Oracles perhaps, or maybe he had access to other writings from the Sibyls that is now lost to time. Secondly; In the third figure, the image contains beams of sunlight 6 on the left, 7 on the right, is this possibly a reference to the same beliefs that the Mayans had of the sevens days of existence (seven days and six nights) making the number thirteen.

The Sibyllines Oracles

Prophet Name:The Sibyl sisterhood, the prophetesses

Origin & Message:
The Sibyls were a set of prophetesses who uttered oracles which were recorded, their advice was much sought after (by the Roman Empire and also the early church) and their influence is mentioned in many cultures such as the Greeks and the Anglo-Irish.
It is believed that the very first Sibyl was a daughter of Noah, or it may even have begun with Noah's wife whom is said to have been the grand-daughter of Enoch (Enoch is mentioned further in my analysis of the Book of Giants). Enoch was supposedly a man of great power vision and an apostle, and therefore some of his natural talents may have passed on down through the generations. Noah's daughters name Sambethe is mentioned in the preface of the surviving writings, and it is said that she moved Greece where she started writing oracles.

Supporting documentation:An early Arab document Kitab al-Magall gives the names of Noah and his daughters, and supports the stories told in the surviving 12 books. There are various authors of these oracle books, yet it is known that other book did exist, in particular The Sibylline Books which were owned by the Roman Emperor and mentioned several times in history, however those books are said to have been destroyed in a fire in 83B.C. The documents of the Sibylline oracles were believed to have been put together (as a collection) between 200B.C. and 500 A.D. They are further mentioned in many other documents dating from around the same time.

Content of the Oracle Books:Some of the books just contain the history of mankind, these are not written exclusively from the Christian viewpoint as they often contain Greek history for example and also Asian kings and even Alexander. Other books contain oracles for specific people such as rulers and kings and warriors and kingdoms.
Some of the books also describe prophecies of the events leading up to the last day on Earth. Book Two describes the events leading up to the last day of Earth, the day of destruction where fire from the sky, stars from the sky will fall and destroy life on earth. With the slight reprieve that some get saved from the flames. Book Three says how in the end times there will be a great war, of dust clouds that cover the earth so that the suns light is darkened and the moons light appears as red as drops of blood. Seems to describe nuclear war. Book Eight is much more prophetic about the end times, it is mentioned about the stars in the sky effecting our weather causing a giant hurricane that desolates the earth.

Validity:
I find these books fascinating, most profound is how they nearly always write in future tense which actually makes me quite confused. It is possible that the Oracles written are just fakes, that someone decided to try and replace the original documents which were destroyed in the fire. Another theory is that after the fire had destroyed the original works, that sections of the original documents had been made (in order to pass on to people etc) and that someone gathered all this information back and compiled them into this set of works in the hope to at least keep some of the original information. This would give the impression that these works would have been very highly valued, and the sibylline oracles were famous in their time for their predictions. Lastly a third theory in which these documents are total fakes, designed to fool people, that they only foretell things that had already happened. For me I like the second theory best.