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I've been a preacher for more than 30
years. I've studied and taught through

the book of Genesis many, many times
in churches all around the world

and I've trained pastors in the skills of
interpreting texts

and it's very clear they're not stories
about Gods.

They're stories about the powerful ones in
the Bible.

And the sky people, the Anunnaki
and the Sumerian tablets

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[Narrator] In 1896 eminent scholar
Nathaniel Schmidt

was fired from his position
as Professor of Semitic languages

at Colgate University

For eleven years, this American University
had enjoyed Nathaniel Schmidt erudition?

and Semitic Languages

He delivered numerous courses in Hebrew,
Aramaic, Coptic , Arabic , Syriac

and other ancient languages besides

In fact, Nathaniel Schmidt was one of
America's leading scholars in the field

So why, after eleven years
of outstanding achievement

was he tried for heresy,

and fired from his tenure in 1896?

Though a devout Christian
and a Baptist pastor

The authorities considered 
that his recent

theological papers had struck
at the very roots

of two world religions

Christianity and Judaism.

What Nathaniel Schmidt had done wrong

was read the Sumerian and Babylonian

and Assyrian text and notice
that they were full

of fascinating parallels.
Stories that occurred there

that were uncannily similar to all
the stories and beginnings

of the Bible.

Stories like: Adam and Eve

The Fall , Cain and Abel

The Flood, the limiting of human life,

the event of the Tower of Babel,

and Schmidt's work demonstrated that

the Sumerian accounts

and those that follow it
from nearly 6000 years ago

where in all probability 
the source of all those familiar

biblical stories.

Now, that was a problem
in the 1890's

because if you think about it

the Church was still reading from
the after effects of

[Paul] Charles Darwin's 
"On the Origin of Species"

and it is busy 
putting together

new doctrinal basis

and new doctrines 
of biblical inherency

to shore up the ship

So the idea that the Bible

might actually be based 
on somebody else's stories

was a bit of an embarrassment

It shouldn't have been

because Judaism 
and Christianity

both find their roots

in the story of a Sumerian family.

The family of Abraham and Sarah.

Abraham and Sarah 
grew up and spent

the best part of their lives
in (research name)

A Sumerian culture

and so when they emigrated
from there

it's hardly surprising that
they would carry with them

[Paul] all the stories of beginnings

that they had 
grown up with.

and sew them
into the foundations

of what was to become

their culture

their religion

and their Bible.

And so, it shouldn't be a surprise
that in the Bible

we have a summary version
of all these stories

that ? the Sumerian, Babylonian 
and Assyrian texts.

The problem and the shock horror

is that the original versions

the Sumerian versions of these stories
make no mention of God at all.

In the Sumerian originals
these are stories

of our ancestor's contact 
with another species.

A species called 
The Anunnakki.

[Narrator] Could Judaism
and Christianity

familiar stories of God

really be a retelling of our
ancestor's close encounters

with extraterrestrials?

the cuneiform tablets which has fascinated 
Nathaniel Schmidt were first on Earth in 1500.

As colonial powers began to escalate the ancient 
sites of Mesopotamia.

Over the decades had followed some 200,000 clay tablets were uncovered.

The tablets were adorned with strange etchings
hieroglyphs

made when the clay was soft.

Scholars of the day divided us to the meanings of these markings

Some believe that the glyphs to be an unknown written language.

Others refuse to accept this.

since the tablets appear to predate any known language.

They presume the markings to be no more than decoration.

And so the tablets were archived,

the secrets were locked away for three centuries.

Until it 1835,

Henry Rawranson arrived. In south western Iran.

Rawranson was a military man. He was employed by the East India Tea Company.

And he was in Iran helping the Shah of Iran to train his troops.

As worth pausing there for a moment because if you thought that

corporations rivaling nations states was something new

take a look at the East India Tea company.

A tea company that's able to move a standing army

around the world and train the armies of nation states.

That's quite a tea company.

In fact, Rawranson presence in Iran wasn't part of