The Stairway to Heaven: Book II of the Earth Chronicles

The Stairway to Heaven: Book II of the Earth Chronicles

by Zecharia Sitchin
The Stairway to Heaven: Book II of the Earth Chronicles

The Stairway to Heaven: Book II of the Earth Chronicles

by Zecharia Sitchin

Paperback(Mass Market Paperback - Reprint)

$8.99 
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Overview

The groundbreaking, bestselling series—millions of copies sold worldwide!

A classic of ancient human history—and one of the inspirations behind the History Channel’s Ancient Aliens—Zecharia Sitchin’s Earth Chronicles series is the revelatory and deeply provocative masterwork that forever altered humankind’s view of our history and our destiny.

Since earliest times, human beings have pondered the incomprehensible questions of the universe, life . . . and the afterlife. Where did mortal man go to join the immortal Gods? Was the immense and complex structure at Giza an Egyptian Pharaoh's portal to immortality? Or a pulsating beacon built by extraterrestrials for landing on Earth?

In this second volume of his trailblazing series The Earth Chronicles, Zecharia Sitchin unveils secrets of the pyramids and hidden clues from ancient times to reveal a grand forgery on which established Egyptology is founded, and takes the reader to the Spaceport and Landing Place of the Anunnaki gods—"Those Who from Heaven to Earth Came."


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780061379208
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: 03/27/2007
Series: Earth Chronicles Series , #2
Edition description: Reprint
Pages: 464
Sales rank: 64,842
Product dimensions: 6.74(w) x 10.92(h) x 1.22(d)

About the Author

Zecharia Sitchin is an internationally acclaimed author and researcher whose books offer evidence that we are not alone in our own solar system. One of a handful of scholars able to read the Sumerian cuneiform tablets, he has combined archaeology, ancient texts, and the Bible with the latest scientific discoveries to retell the history and prehistory of mankind and planet Earth. His trailblazing books have been translated into more than twenty languages; his first one, an oft-quoted classic, celebrates the thirtieth anniversary of its publication. A graduate of the University of London and a journalist and editor in Israel for many years, he now lives and writes in New York.

Read an Excerpt

Chapter One

In Search of Paradise

There was a time -- our ancient scriptures tell us -- when Immortality was within the grasp of Mankind.

A golden age it was, when Man lived with his Creator in the Garden of Eden-Man tending the wonderful orchard, God taking strolls in the afternoon breeze. "And the Lord God caused to grow from the ground every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for eating; and the Tree of Life was in the orchard, and the Tree of Knowing good and evil. And a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it was parted and became four principal streams: the name of the first is Pishon ... and of the second Gihon ... and of the third Tigris ... and the fourth river is the Euphrates."

Of the fruit of every tree were Adam and Eve permitted to eat-except of the fruit of the Tree of Knowing. But once they did (tempted by the Serpent) -- the Lord God grew concerned over the matter of Immortality:

Then did the Lord Yahweh say: "Behold, the Adam has become as one of us to know good and evil;

And now might he not put forth his hand and partake also of the Tree of Life, and eat, and live forever?"

And the Lord Yahweh expelled the Adam from the Garden of Eden...And He placed at the east of the Garden of Eden the Cherubim, and the Flaming Sword which revolveth, to guard the way to the Tree of Life.

So was Man cast out of the very place where eternal life was within his grasp. But though barred from it, he has never ceased to remember it, to yearn for it, and to try to reach it.

Eversince that expulsion from Paradise, heroes have gone to the ends of Earth in search of Immortality; a selected few were given a glimpse of it; and simple folk claimed to have chanced upon it. Throughout the ages, the Search for Paradise was the realm of the individual; but earlier in this millenium, it was launched as the national enterprise of mighty kingdoms.

The New World was discovered -- so have we been led to believe -- when explorers went seeking a new, maritime route to India and her wealth. True -- but not the whole truth; for what Ferdinand and Isabel, king and queen of Spain, had desired most to find was the Fountain of Eternal Youth: a magical fountain whose waters rejuvenate the old and keep one young forever, for it springs from a well in Paradise.

No sooner had Columbus and his men set foot in what they all thought were the islands off India (the "West Indies"), than they combined the exploration of the new lands with a search for the legendary Fountain whose waters "made old men young again." Captured "Indians" were questioned, even tortured, by the Spaniards, so that they would reveal the secret location of the Fountain.

One who excelled in such investigations was Ponce de Leon, a professional soldier and adventurer, who rose through the ranks to become governor of the part of the island of Hispaniola now called Haiti, and of Puerto Rico. In 1511, he witnessed the interrogation of some captured Indians. Describing their island, they spoke of its pearls and other riches. They also extolled the marvelous virtues of its waters. A spring there is, they said, of which an islander "grievously oppressed with old age" had drunk. As a result, he "brought home manly strength and has practiced all manly performances, having taken a wife again and begotten children."

Listening with mounting excitement, Ponce de Leon -- himself an aging man -- was convinced that the Indians were describing the miraculous Fountain of the rejuvenating waters. Their postscript, that the old man who drank of the waters regained his manly strength, could resume practicing "all manly performances," and even took again a young wife who bore him children -- was the most conclusive aspect of their tale. For in the court of Spain, as throughout Europe, there hung numerous paintings by the greatest painters, and whenever they depicted love scenes or sexual allegories, they included in the scene a fountain. Perhaps the most famous of such paintings, Titian's Love Sacred and Love Pro Profane, was created at about the time the Spaniards were on their quest in the Indies. As everyone well knew, the Fountain in the paintings hinted at the ultimate lovemaking; the Fountain whose waters make possible "all manly performances" through Eternal Youth.

Ponce de Leon's report to King Ferdinand is reflected in the records kept by the official court historian, Peter Martyr de Angleria. As stated in his Decade de Orbe Novo [Decades of the New World], the Indians who had come from the islands of Lucayos or the Bahamas, had revealed that "there is an island ... in which there is a perennial spring of running water of such marvelous virtue, that the waters there of being drunk, perhaps with some diet, make old men young again." Many researches, such as Ponce de Leon's Fountain of Youth: History of a Geographical Myth by Leonardo Olschkil have established that "the Fountain of Youth was the most popular and characteristic expression of the emotions and expectations which agitated the conquerors of the New World." Undoubtedly, Ferdinand the king of Spain was one of those so agitated, so expectant for the definitive news.

So, when word came from Ponce de Leon, Ferdinand lost little time. He at once granted Ponce de Leon a Patent of Discovery (dated February 23, 1512), authorizing an expedition from the island of Hispaniola northward. The admiralty was ordered to assist Ponce de Leon and make available to him the best ships and seamen, so that he might discover without delay the island of "Beininy" (Bimini). The king made one condition explicit: "that after having reached the island and learned what is in it, you shall send me a report of it."

The Stairway to Heaven. Copyright © by Zecharia Sitchin. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

Table of Contents

I. IN SEARCH OF PARADISE

II. THE IMMORTAL ANCESTORS

III. THE PHARAOH'S JOURNEY TO THE AFTERLIFE

IV. THE STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN

V. THE GODS WHO CAME TO PLANET EARTH

VI. IN THE DAYS BEFORE THE DELUGE

VII. GILGAMESH: THE KING WHO REFUSED TO DIE

VIII. RIDERS OF THE CLOUDS

IX. THE LANDING PLACE

X. TILMUN: LAND OF THE ROCKETSHIPS

XI. THE ELUSIVE MOUNT

XII. THE PYRAMIDS OF GODS AND KINGS

XIII. FORGING THE PHARAOH'S NAME

XIV. THE GAZE OF THE SPHINX


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