BAD HISTORY in ZEITGEIST: THE MOVIE

Since its release in 2007, Zeitgeist: The Movie has been seen by millions. Most people remember the second part of the film, which discusses 9/11, but the first section is of special interest to ancient history buffs. In this review, Dr. Miano looks at the history claims made by Peter Joseph, the writer of the movie, to see if they are in keeping with the facts.

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► REFERENCES

Discussion between Richard Carrier and D.M Murdock about the Luxor Temple inscription concerning Horus:

Gerald Massey pseudohistorical work, Ancient Egypt: The Light of the World

Information about the Egyptian Book of the Dead:

Professor Miano's handy guide for learning, "How to Know Stuff," is available here:

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[USS-SNAKE-ISLAND]

The 'really' bad thing about this Zeitgeist Horus thing is that it's so well done! It hooked me the first I saw it. I bought completely into it until I found Richard Carrier on Youtube, who said, "Nope! Not true! And here's why..." and that began my education, as I learned to check even Carrier's claims. Careful study requires a lot of work. Don't take one person's word for anything.

[adamATOM]

Hi, I just discovered your channel and wanted to say I really appreciate all your hard work. I always appreciate it when scholars make their knowledge and their research skills available to public that are outside academia.

[Sabatuar]

Man, I remember watching this thing as a little baby pagan, and the inaccuracies surrounding Horus pulled my Egypt nerd self right out of it.

[LeBehemoth]

Excellent video. I remember watching this back in the day (also when it was still WIP) and l remember there was a part where the narrator mentions that Quetzalcoatl was coincidentally born the 24th of December. From that moment on l realized that if they lied about that “fact” (which l knew was a lie) then what else had they lied about? I had to stop watching after that. Glad to see you’re going even deeper with this :)

[tkgsingsct]

I wish, like others, this video had been available 10 years ago. Thank you for helping dispel pseudohistorical nonsense with facts. Agitprop is the perfect label for the movie.
Proud Patreon supporter 👍

[exittomenu]

This is a blast from the past, baby’s first deconstruction before I actually went through real grown up deconstruction- I think even back then I knew deep down it was whack, but I was ravenous for anything to break my world view at 14- and it did and I became utterly insufferable for years lol
One of the few things in my past I would happily trade for an opened bag of week old skittles

[theonlygoodlookinghabsburg]

Oh how I wish this video was made years ago.

[unicyclist]

Thanks for bringing these corrections to light. I still see false claims from Zeitgeist all over the internet.

[gregsmith]

Love this video, I remember watching this movie years ago and having my mind blown. This videos reaffirms my belief in having a healthy skepticism.

[jjw]

Don’t hurt’em doc, eh … go head and destroy these fake historians.

[andybeans]

I found it really interesting, but then a Japanese speaker pointed out that the "Christ-like" Japanese character had a name that literally cannot be pronounced in Japanese.

[ThePoliticrat]

While he didn’t explicitly mention Massie by name, I recall Spengler respectfully refuting his claims in the first volume of TDotW.

[nancyM-Boo]

Congratulations 200K Dr Miano💝
Safe/Happy travels
01/2024

[KaitlynBurnellMath]

Geez, I remember this movie; I was way less literate on religion and ancient history at the time, so I actually bought into it at the time too.

The funny thing is that if he wanted to give links between older religions and historical contemporaries or predecessors, there are some links he could point to in the old testament. Scholars have made various claims about figures in genesis being linked to myths from Sumer. The Noah flood story has an equivalent, right down to similar birds being sent out. Of the JEPD theory, the P seems influenced by babylonian mythology--with the creation myth that P presents being that the entire world was water and god separates the water above from the water below, and then when he wants to flood the world opens up a hole in the "firmament". (J provides a different creation myth and different noah story). There's just a contextless mention of the tree of life in the garden of eden along with the tree of knowledge. There's a weird passage about Nephillim coming down and impregnating women who gave birth to demigods who become the heroes of the day (never mentioned before or after in the canonical bible). The books of the bible will quote each other, and sometimes they quote books that are no longer in the bible (like "the book of battles of YHWH").

Comparing the mythological part of the bible to other myths in the area suggest some of the myths were borrowed from older traditions in the middle east. And even reading the old testament itself, it occasionally references older works, occasionally has moments where the old testament seems to say "okay, you can have a little bit of polytheism just this once".

Later parts of the old testament (And Christianity of course) seem to show signs of influence from Zoroastrianism with struggles between good deity figures and evil deity figures. These would be after the Persian occupation, of course.

If he wanted to make the case that Christianity and Judaism were influenced by older religions, yes, of course they were!

There were also coins of Emperor Nero with the catchprhase "divine son" or "son of god", though if memory serves I think he actually points that out later in the film.

Just...there's no whole cloth copying of an existing myth. Even the Sumerian myths and Babylonian myths that scholars are convinced influenced the old testament have a whole bunch of differences when you actually hear them.

[andrewmole]

Thank you. Very helpful. I have never seen the movie, but I know what it is like to be hit by these claims and to not know what to do with them due to lack of knowledge.

[ReDhEnSkY]

Great video as always, Dr. Miano! The fact that so much pseudohistory and pseudoarchaeology comes from people interested in symbolism and mythology - on a very distorted comprehension of such things, actually - really makes me think. Looks like there are deeper cultural trends at work. Do you know of any academic book/study that delves into the relationship between esoterism, conspiracy theories and fringe theories about our past?

[enlosluceros]

The birth of Horus the child was believed to be during the Renenutet festivity, in the beginning of the Egyptian month of Pachons that goes between March 27th and April 25th.

[maxwellgarrison]

An additional note: the filmmaker refers to Horus as "prodigal". He means to say PRODIGIOUS. Prodigal comes from a Latin word meaning "wasteful, lavish".

[hugoperch]

Good video. I remember watching Zeitgeist and being totally persuaded by it around 2008. It took me a few years to come to my senses.

If you are interested. Peter Joseph did not come up with this stuff himself. He simply used the research of a Jordan Maxwell. I think Maxwell wrote about this in the book "That Old Time Religion". I believe Jordan Maxwell based his ideas on the works of obscurist/symbologist Manly P. Hall

[yllibtaog]

The first YT video I've ever seen where the comment section was more entertaining than the video.
Well done Dr. M.