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The belief that Moses had been murdered haunted Sigmund Freud, in his own words, ‘like an unlaid ghost’.  Forty years of covert investigation had convinced him that the prophet had been killed and replaced by an impostor.   The idea was so radical that Freud feared it might jeopardize the growing field of psychoanalysis.

After the Nazis occupation of Austria he fled to London where he spent the remaining years of his life finishing Moses and Monotheism.  It was released in May 1939. Freud died in September, the month World War II was unleashed.  Catastrophe swept away any serious consideration of his last book.

Freud never identified the murderer.  Surprisingly, he overlooked the significant fact that Moses masked his face during the final years of his reign.  The Forbidden Manuscript explores, for the first time, the profound significance of that mask and its role in concealing the murder of Moses.

The people lived in terror of direct contact with God, believing that the sight of Him would bring immediate death.  They had been warned, “man shall not see Me and live.”  Moses became the exception.  When he descended from the Mountain of God carrying the Ten Commandments, “the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him.” Exodus 34:30

To calm their fears Moses “put a veil on his face.” The tribe would never see his face again.  Little did they suspect that by accepting a masked man as God’s singular representative they had set themselves up for rule by a despotic outsider.

It was immediately apparent that the prophet had undergone a dramatic personality change.  The ‘first’ Moses had been a quiet, almost shy, shepherd who rarely spoke publicly – probably due to an embarrassing stutter.  After concealing his face the “second” Moses became a dynamic and unpredictable extrovert who repeatedly demonstrated a powerful speaking voice that held no trace of a stutter.

The first act of the “new” Moses was to order the death of three thousand Israelites.  It was just the start of a series of mass murders.

What was the source of this brutal change in the leader?  Did the mask inspire in Moses a more dynamic, eloquent personality who used its anonymity to enforce his power in a new and violent manner?

Or was there another man behind the mask?

Prime Suspect:  Motive

Our prime suspect in the murder is Reuel, a Prince of Edom and an Egyptian-trained magician.  Reuel’s father was Esau, the first of twins born to Isaac, the founder of the Jews.  The second born twin was Jacob whose name means ‘deception’.

Reuel’s grandfather, Isaac, favoured Esau while his grandmother, Rebekah, wanted Jacob to inherit the leadership.  When the time came to bestow the final blessing from his deathbed Isaac was virtually blind.  Rebekah carefully groomed and coached Jacob to take his brother’s place and succeeded in misdirecting the old man to bless the wrong son.

Thus, deception and impersonation robbed Reuel’s father of his inheritance as the leader of the Hebrew people.  Reuel’s skills of hypnotism and illusion, learned from the highest-ranking Egyptian priests, would propel his ruthless drive to reclaim that loss.

The Egyptian myth of Osiris provided Reuel with a blueprint for murder.  Osiris, like Reuel’s father, lost his leadership through an act of deception.  Tricked by his younger brother, Seth, into climbing into a chest, Osiris died when he was locked inside.   Seth then mutilated the body.

Osiris’s son, Horus, later took revenge on Seth.

The story of an avenging son seeking justice against a deceitful uncle resonated with Reuel.

Impersonation and deception had cost him leadership.

Impersonation and murder were the weapons he wielded to seize power.

Contents of the Ark of the Covenant

Several authors have proposed that the Knights Templar recovered the Ark while secretly digging beneath the ruins of the Temple in Jerusalem around 1100 AD.  Only the most elite would have been present at the opening of the Ark.  What they found remains a continuously fascinating enigma.  What is known, however, is that following their stay in Jerusalem, the inner circle suddenly adopted a bizarre burial ritual.

It is the Christian custom to preserve their deceased in preparation for the final resurrection.  Elaborate measures are taken to create the illusion of sleep.  This makes the bizarre rites introduced by the Knights Templar most extraordinary and out of character.

They initiated a practice of mutilating their comrades’ remains by amputating the legs enabling them to lay the bones across the torso.  The skull was placed above the crossed bones.  (The skull and bones emblem flew as the flag of the Knights Templar.)  Templar coffins were truncated because they replicated the Ark of the Covenant.

Traditionally, the Ark is believed to hold the tablets recording the Ten Commandments.

The Forbidden Manuscript suggests, for the first time, that the true contents of the Ark of the Covenant were the skull and bones of the murdered Moses.