fulltimestudent

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Posts by fulltimestudent

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  11

  Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls-Do the Scrolls Help us Understand Early Christianity?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i think most scholarship would agree with a positive answer to that question.

  but let's take a look for oursselves.

  geza vermes, in his excellent translation ( the complete dead sea scrolls in english-penguin.

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  fulltimestudent

  Crazyguy : I believe that the experts believe that the scrolls we're burried before the 1 century so in effect they never effected christianity.

  Thnx for raising the point of the DDS chronology, Crazyguy?

  One thing first though, the DDS were not buried, but stored in caves, at least for most of them.

  And in regard to whether the scrolls (or, at least the people who wrote them) affected early Christianity, I think that if these scrolls reflect Jewish thinking in the first century (and before) we would have to agree that they may have done so.

  We cannot be absolutely sure of how these documents came to be in the cave. Vermes (and many other scholars) think the Qumran site buildings were most likely used by a monastic branch of the Essenes. Some of the documents describe the rules for such a group and also for those of the sect that lived in towns. If that's true, then the buildings and caves were simply abandoned in the chaos preceding the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.

  Of course, there are other possibilities, including one which suggests that the documents came from libraries in Jerusalem, and they were hurriedly moved out of the city as the Roman armies approached. One item of evidence that suggests that is a list of treasures, but I think we'd have to agree that if the site was occupied by sectarians, who held all things in common, for some 200 years, that a deal of wealth would have been accumulated.
  

  The reasonably agreed dating as being in the first century CE, allows for the probability of contact between the Qumran sectarians (if they did indeed live there) and early Christians. They were all part of the religious ferment that bubbled away in first century CE Judaism.

  Why not get a copy of Geza Vermes', The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English, for yourself. Amazon list it for sale at about US$13. Vermes explains a lot about the scrolls as well as offering his translation.

  
  

  The Israel Museum has also digitised some of the scrolls, but only the Isaiah scroll has been translated in their version. http://www.english.imjnet.org.il/page_1348

  
  

  
  

  
  

  Some of these suggestions are outlined in this Smithsonian overview:

  
  

  http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/who-wrote-the-dead-sea-scrolls-11781900/?all

  
  Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls?
  Resolving the dispute over authorship of the ancient manuscripts could have far-reaching implications for Christianity and Judaism
  By Andrew Lawler - Smithsonian Magazine - January 2010

  
  

  
  

  
  
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  Indian Social Issues: Honor Killings! - "Can anything be worse than killing your own child?"

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. social
  2. current

  this question is explored in an asia times overview of the problem:.

  in the name of family honor, india is dishonored.

  the issue is dramatised in a new film, chauranga.. quote: kill a child for honor, but how heinous!.

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  fulltimestudent

  This question is explored in an Asia Times overview of the problem:

  In the name of family honor, India is dishonored.

  The issue is dramatised in a new film, Chauranga.

  Quote: Kill a child for honor, but how heinous!

  BY GAUTAMAN BHASKARAN on JANUARY 30, 2016 in ASIA TIMES NEWS & FEATURES, INDIA
  India is a cauldron of conflicting content. While womanhood is revered and celebrated, a woman is often tortured, maimed and murdered.

  Quote: A few weeks ago, debutant director, Bikas Ranjan Mishra’s Chauranga (also from Bollywood), came as a powerful indictment of honor killing. A low-caste Dalit teenager, a pig-rearer, makes the fatal mistake of taking a fancy for a schoolgirl, whose land-owning father is an upper caste Hindu. The boy writes a love letter to the girl, and the father happens to read it, and it is Hell after that.
  The boy and his slightly older brother are beaten, and one of them is bludgeoned to death. Mishra, while elaborating the bestiality of it all in his fiction feature inspired by an actual incident in central India, exposes the hypocrisy of the father, who has no qualms, whatsoever, about sleeping with the mother of the boys!

  The problem is not confined to rural areas, and the executions of the killings expose minds that approve of the most brutal violence.
  

  Quote: "Last year, a 20-year-old youth in New Delhi was crushed to death under the wheels of a car, driven by a relative of a 16-year-old girl after an affair between the two young people was discovered. The girl begged her relative to show mercy while he kept running his vehicle over the hapless youth — whose death could have only been painfully torturous.

  Nor is the problem confined to India. Honor killings, also take place in the UK and other locations.

  Quote: A BBC report quoting women’s advocacy groups says 20,000 women are killed for honor worldwide.
  In 2010, the British police recorded 2800-plus incidents of honor crime, which included murder, mutilation and facial disfigurement. Most of these occurred among south-Asian families from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

  Source: http://atimes.com/2016/01/kill-a-child-for-honor-but-how-heinous/
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  11

  Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls-Do the Scrolls Help us Understand Early Christianity?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i think most scholarship would agree with a positive answer to that question.

  but let's take a look for oursselves.

  geza vermes, in his excellent translation ( the complete dead sea scrolls in english-penguin.

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  fulltimestudent

  In regard to 1.b. in the first post, we can expand further on leadership. Both early christians and the DDS communities developed a monarchical administration, ( a single leader to each community). There were overseers at Qumran (where the DDS were found) and of course, bishops in the Christian communities.

  Both Christian and DDS communities developed some sort of communal care, funded at Qmran by a religious communism ( all things in common) and similarly in the early days of early Jerusalem Christian community (Acts 2:44-45). Vermes suggests that not having any other model the inexperienced church took the DDS communities as a model.
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  11

  Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls-Do the Scrolls Help us Understand Early Christianity?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i think most scholarship would agree with a positive answer to that question.

  but let's take a look for oursselves.

  geza vermes, in his excellent translation ( the complete dead sea scrolls in english-penguin.

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  fulltimestudent

  I think most scholarship would agree with a positive answer to that question. But let's take a look for oursselves.

  Geza Vermes, in his excellent translation ( The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English-Penguin. 2004) suggests that there are three main headings under which the DDS can help us deepen our understanding of early Christianity.

  1.a Similarities of terminolgy. e.g. both in the DDS and the NT, the faithful are called 'sons of light.'

  1.b. Ideology. Both communities thought of themselves as the 'true Israel, both were governed (in theory anyway) by 12 leaders, and expected the imminent arrival of the KIngdom of God.

  1.c. Similar attitudes to the scriptures, both considering their own history as a fulfillment of the words of the prophets.

  Of course, there may not have been any direct influence (though, its hard not to imagine that), but these similarities may have been due to the general religious atmosphere in that era in Palestine.
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  15

  Babylonians Discovered Calculus

  by cofty in

  1. social
  2. current

  it had been assumed that rudimentary calculus was developed in europe in the 14th century but now it turns out that the babylonians worked it out more than 2000 years ago.. researchers have deciphered a detail on a cuneiform tablet held at the british museum and revealed that it describes the movement of jupiter.. babylonians believed that jupiter's position was integral to predicting the weather, the price of goods, and the fluctuating river levels throughout the year.. "the now-decoded 'text a' describes a procedure for calculating jupiter’s displacement across the ecliptic plane.. by tracking jupiter’s speed as a function of time and determining the area under a time-velocity curve.".

  read more here....

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  fulltimestudent

  It's a great discovery, isn't it.?
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  21

  If the trolleydolly carts are a failure, what's next?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  they could try this:.

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  fulltimestudent

  They could try this:

  
  
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  The Winter festival in Harbin - piks of this year's ice constructions.

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. social
  2. current

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  fulltimestudent

  No reason to post this image, except I liked it and wanted to share it. It was photographed in China's far northern province of Heilongjiang and is part of a series on Yilehuli Mountain of the Olunchun people.

  
  
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  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  Off topic, but interesting.

  That Pewforum chart stated that 8% of Jehovah's witnesses support the idea that evolution is a better explanation for the origin of human life.

  Since this conclusion is based on surveys of some kind, I wonder who those (jws?) were?
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  And for an analysis of how religions (generally-grin) view evolution, this Pew research centre provides useful summaries.

  http://www.pewforum.org/2009/02/04/religious-groups-views-on-evolution/

  and another Pew Summary can be found at: http://www.pewforum.org/2009/02/04/religious-differences-on-the-question-of-evolution/

  which contains this chart:

  

  and you may note that in lumping Muslims together, I 'generalised' again. As the chart shows, the Pew researchers hold an opinion that 45% of Muslims agree that evolution poses the best explanation for the existence of life on earth.

  The 'special creationists' are indeed a minority.
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  Village Idiot : Your chart only included Turkey amongst Muslim nations and there was a big difference between the USA, 40% pro-evolution, and Turkey at 25%. Also, your title's mention of American Christians implies that most who identify themselves as such, about 85% of its population, hold on to that belief. It's fundamentalist Christians who are the focus, not liberal Christians and moderates who tend to believe in evolution and outnumber the Fundamentalists.
  Of course, the USA lags behind the secular minded Europeans because of its having a larger fundamentalist Christian presence but it is not fair to compare them to Muslim nations.

  Unfortunately, not 'my chart' V.I. but 'the chart.' I would love to have the facilities to produce such charts)

  Nonetheless, you are quite right. Both 'the chart' and my comments contained generalisations. The fact that Christianity is hopelessly divided on this (and, other topics) is a point I made in Shadow's thread, "What are the biggest holes in Evolution." This is the point I made, emphasising that relatively few Christians (a minority) refute evolution.

  Even more basic is that the question can be reduced to this, "How did humans come to exist on this planet?"
  Faith based Christian religions, a rather small minority of the 2.2 billion professed Christians* in the world insist that it is by special creation. If you ask the same questions that you suggest should be asked about evolutionary scientists, what answers do you think that you will get?

  I fail to see why it is 'unfair' to compare fundamentalist Christians to Muslim nations. Though of course, to speak of Muslims as a monolithic, homogenous bloc is also a generalisation. Not all Muslims are the same, not all are fanatical. Neither, are all Christians peace loving, are they? The point I wanted to make in the thread's title was that the beliefs of both groups on the topic of evolution are similar.

  But I accept your judgement that it may have been better to define the term, 'American Christians' more specifically to fundamentalist American Christians.