Slashdot Mirror
Vatican/HP To Put Library Online
darkuncle writes "I first read it in the LA Times print edition this morning, but the story is also available on several websites via news.google.com. Apparently the Vatican has enlisted Hewlett-Packard in an effort to put the contents of the Vatican Library online, including many rare Bible texts and previously unavailable manuscripts, including handwritten notes by the likes of Martin Luther and Michelangelo."
We can finally see if Samuel Jackson was actually quoting the bible in Pulp Fiction, or if he was just making shit up...
...to Slashdot the Vatican? I guess we just might find out!
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Just give it a week and Carly Fiorina(HP CEO) will have a plan to merge the catican library with the library of congress. Of course they'll have to lay 15,000 of the cardinals and it will cost 20 times as much...
Step One: Merger Libraries
Step Two: ???
Step Three: PROFIT!!!!
Will it include all the rare texts? Including the prediction of the fall of the cathlic empire? Or will it jsut put texts to show the struggle of the cahtholic religon to make it look more appealign to the general public?
BTW I am a cathlic, and I am not bashing, just curious.
NO! NO! Please don't mod me, I'm too young to die a troll. *click* Oh the pain, the pain...
Hey, maybe I'm just a religion n00b, but I was under the impression that all the text of the Bible was, uh, in the Bible.
Are they talking about original scans or something?
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
It will be interesting to see if this stuff is public domain (you would think), or does the Vatican claim copyright ownership, in the manner of Scientology?
Unfortunately the DMCA forbids them from putting any of Leonardo's work on the Web, since he used a simple encryptation system and didn't write them an access license.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I mean there are documents going back to the Roman Empire. Could you imagine if it all was available online? And searchable? The man-hours to do it would be incredible.
I mean, there are rumors of intelligence reports from Pontius Pilate being archived there. Watch all the Bible geeks have a field day.
Plus I imagine, a copy of every forbidden book written since then. Kept around, just as evidence.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Is there any specific reason that the Vatican would pick HP over other candidates? I'm sure that they have a good web team, but that isn't their primary occupation... Why not pick a company that has done this kind of thing before? (Or, alternatively, has HP done this before?) Just curious...
I know HP makes some nice scanning equipment, and I can just picture an engineer trying to figure out how to sheet-feed a 14th century handwritten Bible. Shall we propose this as the biggest OCR task this side of scanning the Rosetta Stone?
You never know with religion, maybe there's something to it, maybe there isn't. Maybe life imitates art, art imitates life.
In the case of Raiders of the lost Arc the movie was done so well that one could almost "imagine" it to be real. Does the vatican hold onto ancient relics with seemingly supernatural powers? Could some of these be alien technology recovered years ago by clerics?
What of other things such as Exorcisms, demonic possesions, spirit speak and the like, will the cases surrounding these events be made public.
I was baptized catholic, but thats about it. I'm really curious to see if any of the cool stuff that went on in hollywood catholisism goes on in real life.
It's about time. The Vatican has, arguably, the worlds most diverse collection not just of religious writings, but also of scientific, historical, mathematic, political and cultural documents known to man.
Looking forward to seeing whats online.
=U= "Just because you're not paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you"
Found in the margin of one old copy of the bible "I have proved the existance of god which this margin is too small to contain -- Peter"
But this project was to allow access to specified scholars. It's nice to see expanded access.
This happened when the Dead Sea Scrolls were fist reseased to a set of specific people. A data set was made available to the general public of word occurrences and relationships. A group of people used this data to compile the original texts, and released them to everyone. It pissed a lot of ivory tower types off, IIRC.
I wonder if it includes the Vatican's extra specail collections.
There's a "Holy See Plus Plus" joke here somewhere.
I object to that article, and to the next reply.
I'm sure they'll filter a lot. "Rare texts" are rare, because it's easy to use them agains Catholic Church. I think they'll stay "rare".
Just as a correction, they are releasing their WWII era documents. And try to refrain from making wildly opinionated and unsupported comments about something as sensitive as religion...any religion.
I wonder if there will be info about the buddy Jesus? Seriously though....this could be really neat, especially if they post everything(hehe...right).
I think IBM Global Services was doing some work in this area. I guess the estimate was too much, even for the Vatican.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
I hope they don't try to control the content like they with everything else. That way some of the other scholars and oridinary folks alike can study/understand the real text in the bible and not let it be interpreted by others who might leave out a thing or change the meaning to what they feel is right. Don't get me wrong. Not everyone intreprets it incorrectly, but just that all of think differently and you might have published your view of what is in the bible. Now I get to read and figure out the view in the printed version is correct
It's C-A-T-H-O-L-I-C
=U= "Just because you're not paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you"
I heard the Vatican had a huge archive of erotic art & such. If it's true I wonder if any of it is going online.
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
1. Nail decree on church door
2. ???
3. Prophet!!!
For more information about becoming part of this project, point your web browser to http://www.vatican.va/switch/
When modding "Informative", please make sure it both has a source and IS actually informative.
" Is there any specific reason that the Vatican would pick HP over other candidates?"
Remember the Compaq merger? HP's got a reputation for fudging facts. Precisely what's required for a job involving the Catholic church and ancient texts.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
I would imagine most Slashdotters are aware that the Vatican is the head of the Roman Catholic Church. Another factoid, but possibly not so obvious, is that the Bible as we know it today -- most people are familiar with the King James Version -- is a collection of works whose inclusion (or exclusion if you want to think of it that way) is more or less arbitrary. For example, "Esther" is omitted (yes, I'm serious).
So what I'm getting at is whether the Vatican plans on opening up all works for perusal or do they plan on omitting certain works based, possibly, on how well the information fits in with the desired line of thinking.
What if there are works that don't dovetail with the accepted works? What if some writings in their collection outright contradict other writings? Is the Vatican ready to drop the line that theology is too important to leave to the commoners, really?
My
Limekiller
And the cathedrals! Catholicism is the first multinational corporation dedicated to its self preservation and profit. It existed for how many centuries before the people even understood a single word of mass? The cathedrals are castles that were funded by the faithful who really had no clue what their faith was. The crusades were financial ventures, that much is common knowledge.
I'll most likely be modded as flame bait, but that would really only prove my point. There has never been any type of openness or disclosure about what the Catholic church is up to, and for a very good reason. It siphons money from believers in order to fortify its position and find a reason to exist. So they'll publish their library, so what? This certainly won't be the dawning of a new age of responsibility, accountability, righteous ethics, or social service in the Church.
So, anyhow, the moderators can prove me right by marking this as flamebait. If I were wrong, there would be more than enough people to explain why I'm mistaken and stupid, but barring that unlikely scenario, mod me to -1 so nobody gets the sniffles or sheds a tear.
For instance, only one page from the rare "B" version of the "Codex Vaticanus" Bible is available online.
Coming soon: The Holy Bible - Special Edition
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
Thanks. Very mature of you. More /. posters should be as considerate.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
To start: here are the images and descriptions of the Vatican City euro coins ;-)
Jan
Including that illicit copy of Carmina Burana the librarians keep under the desk?
And by the way, I'm not atheist and not a follower of some trendy-flavor-of-the-week-fringe religion. I am religious, I do believe in the God of Abraham, but am certainly not a fan of Catholicism.
The news.google.com results:
... 4567222). I thought for a fleeting moment that The Vatican had acquired ...
...blargle...
Vatican/HP To Put Library Online
Slashdot - 4 minutes ago
HP. I would've liked to have seen the org chart for that one...
[snip]
My other sig is also a
Will the site offer translation services? Babelfish doesn't do Latin.
Probably, the price was right.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
All people need to do is READ the Bible to discredit Modern Christianity and the Catholic Church.
Ursula Andress, Catherine Deneuve, and Charo, twice...
Christianity is of course an amalgmam of pre-existing religous/ cultural beliefs and a new tradition. The point is, it had one pretty good leader and he had a bunch of followers who weren't to shabby either. Discredit?, far from it. Exhibit failings? absolutely. That's a huge difference. It still will be those who choose to believe, will believe. Those who refuse to believe, won't.
So long and thanks for all the fish . . . !!!
How would you being moded as flamebait in any way shape or form prove you right? Couldn't it simply be that what you have written merely incites anti-Catholic prejudice rather than adding anything useful to the conversation? Or is anyone that disagrees with you just 'damn Catholic opressors?' Way to go thinking that you're somehow in on the 'Catholic conspiracy' and the /. community is in on it.
If the Vatican puts the contents of the Vatican library I guarantee they will censor the living hell out of what goes online. They wouldn't dare put the old Pre-Nicean Counsel (sp) texts up on the library. I am certain all the old Gnostic works will still be locked up in a vault. The pre-latin translation, arimeic, (sp) texts and countless other "forbidden" texts won't make it in. This is a joke right? It's hard enough when I was studying theology to get Pre-Vatican II texts from them. The bulk of what is in the library I doubt will ever see the light of day. I wonder if they still have the notes and comments from the Nicean Councel on what was removed and what was kept and what was changed. (Case in point the whole Virgin thing is in question as prior to most Latin text Mary wasn't mentioned as being a Virgin. So maybe his brother really was a half brother) I will be interested in seeing the results of this no doubt but I have a feeling we'll only get the tip of the iceberg.
P.S. Yes I know I butchered this but I have no spell checker at the moment.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
Hasn't happened yet as far as I know...
Most of the external stuff runs on Alpha hardware (May explain the HP connection there).
Funny aside: It's rumored that the Pope is an avid surfer.
Pan
I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
How can the Vatican Library exert copyright over a document written by, of all people, Martin Luther. I suppose he was a Monk at the time he wrote it....
Are they simply exerting copyright over the photograph of the document, and not on the contents of the document itself? Is that okay, even?
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
Pr0n, pr0n and more pr0n.
The Vatican supposedly has the largest collection of erotica in the world.
Cecil Adams disagrees, though, so I suppose it must not be true.
--
E_NOSIG
No basis to criticize, the Doctrine of Papal Infallibility mandates that HP is divinely suited to do this job.
Considering all the brainpower that seems to be concentrated(?) at the /.-ers PCs when it comes to more or less mindless trivia like asteroids threatening Earth, new ways to make ultra-thin condoms or whatever, it's rather scary to see all the glibness and plain ignorance at a moment like this.
The fact that a tremendous lot of historical data will be acessible is, in it self, fantastic news.
Of course, it will be selected and skewed, and no, the p)0(rn will not be there, but that's not the point. It will be THERE, to help all those interested to learn more. Like any great museum, if you will.
I'm not a Catholic, I'm not a bit religious, but I think things like this make the Net something great!
"Not to mention, it would bring out a lot of texts that would show just how modern Christianity and Catholicism was practically invented by Roman Councils picking, choosing, and editing text as they pleased, and how all the text of the Bible either came from oral history or history written 70 years after Jesus' death, of which none of the original texts still exist."
Yeah, whatever. You obviously know absolutely nothing about Historical Criticism. Your bias against Christianity has scewed your view of New Testament development so severely that you lack any objectivity. Though, IMHO, traditional authorship (as claimed by Christians) of NT texts has a tendency to be incorrect, save for Paul's writings (and even some of those are up for contention), it's a stetch to say "modern Christianity and Catholicism was practically invented by Roman Councils picking, choosing, and editing text as they pleased" and "written 70 years after Jesus' death". There are some that argue (including myself) that Mark and "Q" predate the revolt/Temple destruction and 'Luke'/'Mat.' reliance on said texts shows a level of care in constructing their gospels that sceptics don't want to admit.
I'm probabally wasting my time...
Learn some Biblical history and take your anti-Christian bias out of the picture, it makes you look immature, even to non-Christians (like myself).
Burn Hollywood Burn
I think that it's funny, but also unfortunate, that people can aver that texts upon which they've never laid eyes will (not might, but will) serve to discredit the church, et c., et c.
It's also unproductive to rail on a previous lack of transparency to argue against (or so the writer's intention would seem) the current move(s) toward increased transparency.
Silly kids.
That's kind of like saying that because a couple of Muslims got together and killed a few thousand innocent citizens, the entire Islamic religion will be discredited. While witch hunts, pedophilia, and God-knows what other atrocities have been committed in the name Christianity (Crusades...), any rational person would attribute that to the zealots who took a good thing and perverted it.
I have strong doubts that exposing historical atrocities commited in the name of Christianity will be the "nail in the coffin." I didn't even realize there was a coffin for that matter...
Humm..... I wonder how close the one I stole from the book store when I was twelve is to the one the above looser belives the vat has?
So you still belive that Lovecraft wasn't fiction?I found my inner child, then I got caught abusing it...
Too bad the Catholic church isn't Christianity...
According the the Second Vatican Council, only the Vatican has the right to interpret Catholic laws, and tradition comes before Biblical teaching. That's why Catholics pray to saints, the exact OPPOSITE of what the Bible teaches.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
They're actually in the Bible, too.
p e=AND&language=english&searchpage=0&search=unicorn &version=KJV
http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?SearchTy
Numbers 23:22
God brought them out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn.
Numbers 24:8
God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows.
Deuteronomy 33:17
His glory is like the firstling of his bullock, and his horns are like the horns of unicorns: with them he shall push the people together to the ends of the earth: and they are the ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the thousands of Manasseh.
Job 39:9
Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib?
Job 39:10
Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee?
Psalm 22:21
Save me from the lion's mouth: for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.
Psalm 29:6
He maketh them also to skip like a calf; Lebanon and Sirion like a young unicorn.
Psalm 92:10
But my horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of an unicorn: I shall be anointed with fresh oil.
Isaiah 34:7
And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness.
Actually, If I understand you, Ester (Esther?) is only omitted in the protestant version of the bible, as well as all the books of wisdom.
The protestant and catholic versions of the bible differ in number of books and content in many areas.
"...At the end of the day"..."when everyone goes home, you're stuck with yourself." RIP Layne Staley
I think this is an excellent move for the Catholic church. I am not catholic nor do I like the practice much, but I see the potential the church has if it ever becomes righteous...
"And try to refrain from making wildly opinionated and unsupported comments about something as sensitive as religion...any religion."
While I agree it's never good to make "wildly opinionated and unsupported comments", I don't think that's the case here. After spending all my years in schooling up 'til college in either Sunday school (first 4 years) or a Catholic school (the rest), I learned a great deal about the Catholic Church and its history. And you know what? (S)He's right. The statements made aren't supported by links etc., but generally speaking, facts stand on their own. If you would like to debate anything that was said, feel free. I'm more than willing to find a plethoria of evidence to support each and every claim made in that post.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
I'm not sure what this 'Catholic conspiracy' thing is... Is that like an 'enemies are bad' conspiracy? I never intended to 'let anyone in on it', but to point out that it is hardly going to be a surprise when the Vatican omits large portions of their library from public view. I mean, let's be honest, inciteful or not, the Catholic Church is simply NOT an organization known for being open about themselves. There is a well established history of concealing their documents and actions. Does that incite you? It certainly should not, since it ought to be very common knowledge at this point.
As for things to contribute to the conversation, I've already shared my expectations with regards to the publication of materials critical of or harmful to the Church. It won't happen. That's a type of transparency and accountability which goes against hundreds of years of Vatican policy. That much is fact. If that is inciteful, the fault is not with me. If I'm modded down for pointing out these facts, it only serves to justify my criticisms, specifically that the Catholic Church has no excuse for itself and must therefore silence criticism rather than address it.
Thanks for the response.
Doesn't the Vatican have the largest collection of porn in the world? Well, that's one way to build bigger churches! :-)
Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
Just as a correction, they are releasing their WWII era documents. And try to refrain from making wildly opinionated and unsupported comments about something as sensitive as religion...any religion.
Yes.
It is OK to laugh at an adult who believes in Santa Clause, and with the right judge, you can probably get said adult committed and their next-of-kin awarded power of attorney.
But do not ever question religious beliefs, or express unflattering opinions thereof, and for god's sake don't ever imply that religious beliefs might be on the same order of silliness as a belief in Santa Clause!
Conviniently, we have decided pointing out the foolishness of adults who believe in modern day myth to be rude, while of course their expounding on the eternal torture of those who do not believe in precisely those same myths, or do believe in those same myths, but with slightly differing interpretations thereof, and proseletyzing such beliefs to others, whether or not the victim of such proseletyzing wants to hear it, is merely an "expression" of their "faith."
So have some tolerance, and for crying out loud stop calling a jack-of-diamonds a jack-of-diamonds.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Those are far from the only reasons... Read this:
English - Are Roman Catholics Christians? ©1985 by Jack T. Chick LLC
The work that IBM did was over 10 years ago... and they were working on the library management system and creating a local system to view digital versions of documents that shouldn't be handled frequently. However none of that work translated to the web very well...
The1Genius - Littera Scripta Manet
Okay, I'll take the challenge.
Myth #1: Catholicism is the first multinational corporation dedicated to its self preservation and profit.
Fact: Catholicism is niether a corporation nor for profit. It is a widely held misconception that the Catholic church is obscenely rich, when in fact it has relatively limited liquid resources (everything is in priceless sacred art, buildings, etc). And the vast majority of what money that comes into Rome goes into making the Church the world's #1 providor of care of AIDS, and countless other charitable activities.
Myth #2: It's an entire heirarchy built around the practice of duping people into coughing up cash for rewards in a future life.
Fact: Buying indulgences was never a licit practice in the Church and has been soundly rejected over and over again.
Myth #3: The crusades were financial ventures, that much is common knowledge
Fact: Many historians would disagree (Hillare Belloc for example). In fact, the Crusades were incredibly costly, rather than profitable. And a question: While you're bashing, why not claim they just wanted to masacre Jews and Muslims? That's another common one you seemed to have missed. Most anti-Catholic historians seem to take that position.
I could go on, but frankly, there's no point. You haven't provided any support for your points, so there's really nothing to argue against rather than your opinions.
Once again the Slashdot lemming mentality strikes.
Had anyone but a few people bothered to read the article, or even the headline of it at the LA Times link, they'd see that only documents from 1922-1939 would be opened. They seem to be doing this to reduce criticism of the papacy's role in pre-WWII events. (With all the bad press they've been getting lately, who can blame them?)
So no really important mystery-solving and faith-smashing texts will be released. Boo hoo.
Anyway, I can understand why people didn't go look. I mean, you had to click on the link in the post, and then click on the "The World" link, and then scroll down half a page, and maybe even click again. That's a lot of effort to not sound like an ignorant jackass. Hell, I did it, and I probably still do.
Esther is in my Bible, as well as Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. There are some books the Roman Catholic Church considers to be Scripture such as Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, the Maccabees books, III and IV Esdras (I think?), etc., that most Protestants do not.
Not sure where the poster above got the idea that Esther was omitted in Catholic or Protestant Bibles...
I figure I'm capable of examining each book myself on its merits and deciding if it is Scripture or not myself. People were doing so long before any councils decided what was canon and what was not.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
what Martin Luter could have written to Vatican.
Certainly you could find many sources. And I could find many counter-sources as well. No doubt you would refer to something like 'Hitler's Pope' while I would counter by pointing to all the Jewish historians and leaders who have shown their support for Pius IX. It would go on and on. But above all what the poster and most others fail to do is to distinguish between what Catholics do and what the Church teaches. No doubt there have been many individual Catholics who, in forsaking Church teachings, have brought shame to the institution as a whole. It is vitally important to make the distinction.
"Rare texts" are rare, because it's easy to use them agains (sic)Catholic Church. I think they'll stay "rare".
No, rare texts are rare because few copies exist. Why not? For one thing, many of the books and manuscripts that we're talking about predate the printing press. No need to come up with conspiracy theories to explain it.
** The opinions expressed here are my own, and do not reflect those of my employers - past, present, or future**
Reverend Chick cited non-ironically?!?! The sky is falling!
Actually the King James Bible probably isn't the one most people are familiar with. It's one of the great works of English literature, but for day-to-day use most people use modern versions such as the New International Version.
So will they use the dated Theological Markup Language (ThML)? Or do they go with Cocoon/TomCat to mark-up this data the same way the CCEL does?
--- have you healed your church website?
Some chapters (not all) of Esther are omitted from Protestant Bibles.
Isn't the Web "the largest collection of erotica in the world"?
see also "P0rn again Christians"
Whatever anyone says about the content of these documents is irrelevant. The fact is, most people in the world wouldn't have access to these documents unless they got on a plane to Rome and had lots of time to peruse church archives.
This move is going to make theological research easier for those of us who:
1. don't have a doctorate in it
2. don't have hundreds of dollars for plane tickets
3. don't know the Pope personally
Have you tried to sit down and actually READ that thing lately? It's really not interesting. Most Bibles I've seen are written in wording that makes Yoda seem like a Rhodes scholar. Is there any wonder there is such disinterest in something that is based around a bunch of made up stories that supposedly happened thousands of years ago? I'd be more than happy to faithfully follow Jesus's teachings if he'd take a moment to come back and perform some more miracles for us modern people. He did it for them two thousand years ago, why are we supposed to be so naive that we believe a bunch of folk stories? If I was god I wouldn't want my followers blindly following a bunch of half truths based on some notion of blind faith. Perform the miracles, show the awesome power of Jesus and God and make believers out of BILLIONS of people. What would it hurt? A few lousy miracles is all it would take. Bring someone back from the dead. Turn water into wine. Whatever... give us something to believe in again and we will follow you without question. All I get are riddles and rhymes from the clergy about how I have to have faith and god works in mysterious ways and other such bullshit. If god actually cared what the fuck was going on on this planet or whether we worshipped him or not he'd take a little more active role in trying to win over followers. The people running for public office have more dedicated constituents than the average religious follower! It's no wonder though, if they get elected at least you're pretty much guarenteed a handout. With God it's "well, maybe when you die you'll go to heaven and live in eternal happiness." Riiiiggghhht. Can I have that in writing? Oh yea, I forgot, it's probably a sin to dare question the word of god. Blah. OK, I guess I'm going to hell. Who's coming with me? :-)
Damn! Google is fast. I clicked the link in the Slashdot story, then without looking, clicked the top link on the news.google.com site -- which was back to the Slashdot story!
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
That said, I'm not searching for anything spiritual and it is truly inconceivable that Catholicism is The Answer for me (or anyone, but that's just my opinion ;) I won't be surprised when the online Vatican library is not comprehensive and suppose I was a bit too opinionated in saying so.
The Catholic Church has a bunch of original works by the Martin Luther? Author of 95 theses? One of the founders of the Reformation and perhaps the biggest and most influential critic of the Vatican? I'm curious as to why they have them. History shows they weren't exactly the most open-minded bunch back when they collected them. Was it to "learn thy enemy"?
That's like finding out Linus has a collection of signed First Edition books written by Bill Gates.
jdavidb writes:
"Not sure where the poster above got the idea that Esther was omitted in Catholic or Protestant Bibles..."
It's called "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." =)
My main idea is still there (will the church allow possibly conflicting books' "source code" to be released?), but I was a bit hasty in including Esther. I read that it was omitted in some works and made a leap of logic that apparently was wrong.
My
Limekiller
The sacking of Constantinople was an action condemed by the Pope during a Crusade that was condemed by the Pope before it was even started. I hardly think that could be considered evidence against the Vatican, only that Catholic people have done horrible things, just like any other group of people.
There is a well established history of concealing their documents and actions.
Every institution does this, not just the Catholic Church. It just happens to be that you assume they are up to something sinister because of it. It's anti-Catholic bias. It doesn't incite me that you mention this fact, only that you assume evil intentions when you have no idea one way or another.
And I will repeat, if you get modded down it's not because you're 'pointing out these facts' (as if you're the only one ever to make these claims). Don't be so paranoid and be assured that everyone here is just as committed to free discussion as you are. The Pope isn't lurking
However, I believe that when the grandparent poster said "wildly opinionate and unsupported comments," he was referring to the claim that the Vatican would hide the records of such past sins. That claim was provided entirely without evidence, unless we're to believe that "that's just the sort of thing that those Catholics would do." To the extent that the original poster was implying that, I am rightly offended.
MSK
What if some writings in their collection outright contradict other writings
This would probably have no additional effects, as there are already self-contradictions within the bible.
Some Christians would still not admit that such contradictions disprove a fundamentalist interpretation (which they do)
And some Atheist would keep telling us that such contradictions disprove Christianity in general (which they don't)
Tor
"No doubt there have been many individual Catholics who, in forsaking Church teachings, have brought shame to the institution as a whole. It is vitally important to make the distinction."
This is true in any organization, and is one of the inherent weaknesses of organized religion. That being said, the Catholic Church itself has, throughout the years, advocated everything from slavery, to torture, to execution.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
I see you've played sig-gy spoon-y before...
As soon as there is a post that mentions religion, the trolls come out of the wood work to flame and run. The really sad part is that this posting is of much more significance than religion. Some of those manuscripts may contain clues to unlock mysteries in history. A lot have nothing more that just historical significance, but that's enough. We should all be happy that more information is being put into the mainstream, not flaming it because we just don't like the people it's coming from.
Someone has unicorns on the mind.
Now, what would Freud say?
(har har)
Maybe the unicorns missed out on the ark?
When the Bible was first assembled from the Gospels, Acts, Revelations, and the various letters of the apostiles to the early churches, there was much debate as to which versions of various books to include. Most of the books of the Bible had various differences as they were copied by various scribes attempting to preserve them before the first collections of them were gathered. Here's a good timeline of the history of the Good Book.
Furthermore, there's the Pseudepigrapha. These are rejected books of the Bible that scholars of various times either considered falsified or otherwise not worthy to include in the Bible. Usually, they purport to be written by a Biblical figure, but were generally not believed to have actually been written by them at the time of the Council of Laodicea. Then you have the books where are in the Catholic Old Testament but not in the Protestant Old Testament. These are the books most commonly labelled as Apocrypha.
Here's some more info on early church texts.
Here's a FAQ on the history of the Bible.
You can find a lot of this on Google if you know what to look for, but I've been nice and included links without bizarre obscurist religious or UFO ranting. The "lost" books of the Bible are a rich source of material for people with fringe beliefs that are looking to justify them or people who have an axe to grind with mainstream Christianity.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Yes I have read it recently.
I think most of the disinterest is not because of the confusion but the misrepresentation of the so-called learned men. Lets face it. In how many wars have priest blessed both sides in the name of god?
For over a thousand years the Church has used it's power to squash out the truth, keep people down, and insinuate itself into governments, when as a representative of the Kingdom of God it has no business being involved.
I understand perfectly the frustration that many face.
The key is not to put faith in man and let him get between you and god.
Ursula Andress, Catherine Deneuve, and Charo, twice...
Soo... Is Vatican/HP like GNU/Linux?
If so, is the library free? (as in speech or as in beer)
I honestly don't mean to be a jerk, but can I venture to say that "it is truly inconcievalbe that what you THINK Catholicism is is The Answer for you"? Hell, if it was anything close to what you say it is I never would have converted this past Easter. Count me as one of those who used to think much the same way you did, but when I actually began to read about it I discovered that I hated what everyone said Catholicism was, and not what it actually IS. There is a HUGE difference, as there is profound misconception out there about what the Church actually teaches.
inherently evil. Hard to keep track of that rascally Catholic church.
FoundNews.com - get paid to blog.,
For the last 15 years, the Vatican has been working on transferring many texts and artwork to a secure digital format in hopes of saving it for all future generations.
Most of the text that the project has successfully transferred (and a good majority of text that has not been transferred) is available here. You do have to fill out some forms and then the materials are copied and sent to you.
All jokes and criticisms aside, the Vatican possesses the majority of the world's greatest works of literature, art, and historical documentation. I hope that they make all of it available to the world very soon.
'King James Version .... For example, '"Esther" is omitted (yes, I'm serious).'
Actually, Esther was in the original King James Version of the Bible. The 14 books of the Apocrypha were officially removed in 1885. See, e.g., this google search.
"he was referring to the claim that the Vatican would hide the records of such past sins. That claim was provided entirely without evidence, unless we're to believe that "that's just the sort of thing that those Catholics would do." To the extent that the original poster was implying that, I am rightly offended."
I think the poster was referring to what the Catholic Church tends to do; and I have to agree. Nobody likes to admit mistakes, and the Catholic Church is no different; they try to bury that which does not make the Church look good. Unless you're a Catholic Cardinal, I don't think you should be offended at all. Personally, as a Catholic myself, I'm offended by the way my Church has acted in the past and in the present. The Vatican has been ordering NDA's for settlements for years in abuse cases (despite calls for reconciliation by a number of bishops), and now one of the things the Vatican is fighting is reporting of molestation accusations to local authorities. That offends me greatly, as it should you and every other good and decent human being on this Earth. The poster wasn't Catholic-slamming, (s)he was Catholic Church-slamming; something I do every chance I get. Why? I'm Catholic, and I was taught that the stuff my church is doing is wrong.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
What if there are works that don't dovetail with the accepted works? What if some writings in their collection outright contradict other writings?
There are already many, many works that don't quite jive with accepted beliefs and some that even contradict the teachings. When the new testament letters were being combined, there were many letters that were not accepted because there was not 100% certainty that they were not from one of the Apostles. Most of these letters are available today.
As for the some bibles not including some stories in the Old Testament, it goes back to when the Jewish community "cleaned up" the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and left out any text that was not written in Hebrew.
Conspiracy Theorist aside - The Vatican is usually very open about any information you would want, or need. The main role of the Catholic Church is to save souls, and to hide any relevant information would not be in their best interest (They want to save their souls too !).
Too bad the Catholic church isn't Christianity...
You're a moron. According to the dictionary, Christianity is defined as The Christian religion, founded on the life and teachings of Jesus. That definition could be (and has, in the distant past) interpreted to mean that only Catholics are Christians. No matter what, the Church is founded on both scripture and tradition, which itself is merely interpretation of scripture. Take your fundie slander elsewhere, please.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
In a letter addressing the pastoral treatment of homosexuals, the Catholic Church gave what some perceive as permission (or at least acceptance) of violence towards homosexuals:
"People should not be surprised when a morally offensive lifestyle is physically attacked." --The Vatican
It would be a nice gesture, in my opinion, if the Vatican proved both the existence and authority of the superior deity which allows this "unsurprised" attitude toward physical violence. Until then, perhaps they should not be surprised when their own intolerant lifestyles are physically attacked.
[What's that smell? Ah, my karma burning.]
Your evidence being...
And don't say the Inquisition because that was a POLITICAL phenomenon carried out by the civil authorities in response to the very serious threat the Turks were posing to Eurpoe at the time.
Not a troll.
read for yourself this passage in 1 Tim 4:1-5 and make your own conclusions.
Ursula Andress, Catherine Deneuve, and Charo, twice...
Inclusion of text into the bible was not arbitrary. Texts were chosen based upon a set of fairly clear criteria that became established over centuries of debate. Not everyone agrees with the final decision, but that hardly makes it arbitrary.
Additionally, BS Catholic conspiracies aside, they have no earthly reason to hide works that they disagreee with. In fact the works they are putting onine were already available to visiting scholars and practically anyone with an interest. I, for instance, have the full text on the 20-something different Gospels we have discovered to date at home on my shelf...and if you read them all, you'd see pretty quick why some were excluded. I also have the many of the other non-canonical texts. No great hidden secret. Just order them from Amazon like I did.
There is no great scholastic coverup to keep the juicy religious bits away from the masses.
Disclaimer: I am not Catholic, but I do have a degree in Religious Studies.
-Tom
No, rare texts are rare because few copies exist. Why not? For one thing, many of the books and manuscripts that we're talking about predate the printing press.
I know of a few famous texts, written before the advent of the printing press, that reached wide circulation. Name one? Oh... it's right at the tip of my tongue.
Sorry, can't remember at the moment. Maybe I'll get back to ya.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
The Catholic Church has a bunch of original works by the Martin Luther? Author of 95 theses [iclnet.org]? One of the founders of the Reformation and perhaps the biggest and most influential critic of the Vatican? I'm curious as to why they have them. History shows they weren't exactly the most open-minded bunch back when they collected them. Was it to "learn thy enemy"? That's like finding out Linus has a collection of signed First Edition books written by Bill Gates
And the Master [Sun Tzu] said: 'If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles'
But seriously, Martin Luther was much more than just an enemy of the Vatican, he was also one of it's greatest reformers. Letters of forgiveness were eventually abandoned - in no small part due to his criticism.
Tor
It would be really great if they made scans of scores of medieval and renaissance sacred music available. For hundreds of years, church music was the only music written down. Plus, many of the choirbooks are works of art in themselves.
No disrespect to Martin Luther's handwritten notes, but give me Josquin Desprez's scores any day.
First off all the King James Version is protestant not catholic. You want something like the Saint Jerome Bible for a Catholic bible. Second the inclusion list for the Kind James isn't arbitrary its following the organization from Martin Luther's Geneva Bible.
e =UTF-8 &oe=UTF-8&selm=4ne7kh%24qq6%40geneva.rutgers.e du
Anyway here is an old list with pretty good information about what got included when
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&i
Need more paint!
Love,
Michelangelo
PS: My back is killing me!
Ed Wedig
Graphic design services
docbrown.net
I think you're jumping to conclusions when you assume that the citation wasn't ironic.
I write in my journal
Couple of points:
(1) Esther is in both. The books that are not in both include Tobit (an excellent novel, worth reading, and amusing at some points. Did you know you get cataracts from sleeping outdoors with your eyes open? Birds poop in them, you see...), Maccabbees (an excellent documentary), Daniel and Susannah, maybe Wisdom.
(2) Martin Luther, if I understand correctly, picked the Hebrew Bible because he liked the feeling he got that he'd understand things better in the original Hebrew. The RC Church picked the Septuagint, which was archived in Greek in the Library of Alexandria, because this was archived *before* the time of Christ, and was generally accepted as scripture at the time of Christ. The Hebrew Bible was written by Sadducees after Masada, and does include some significant changes. Sadducces did not believe in the Resurrection, for example, and thus did not include books that pointed heavily towards the Resurrection. Also, "virgin" was changed to "maid" (neanis) at the part where the prophet says to the king "is it not enough that you should weary the ears of men? Must you weary God as well? But since you do not ask for a sign, this shall be a sign unto you: a virgin shall concieve, and shall bear a son..." One can only guess the reason for such a change.
There is something to be said for both sides. I prefer the RC side, though.
(3) Then you get to books like the Gospel of Thomas. This is a case where you especially have to look at the source. The paper is quite old, and indeed would be one of the earliest gospels based upon the age of the paper. However, the ink dates back to the time of the Saracen invasion of Spain, and the pollens in the ink seem to place the writing in Italy. So it would appear, especially since that book supports Islam more than Christianity, that it was a work of fiction written at that time. Perhaps it was written on very old paper to try to support Islam -- perhaps not.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Pretty argumentative. Sure, you can name one, but can you name 100? 1000? Texts written by hand before the invention of the press have to be wildly popular to remain in print. Even modern books go out of print, and become hard to get ahold of.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
And some Atheist would keep telling us that such contradictions disprove Christianity in general (which they don't)
These contraditions are in fact errors, and there are a great many errors in the bible at that. If you accept that these errors(contradicions) exist then you have to resonably believe that other facts presented might also be incorrect. Without the bible as a source of truth Christianity becomes arbitrary, something that people believe in because they were told they should(not that this excludes all other religions though).
When they put their copy of ol' Alhazrad's Necronomicon online then I'll be impressed.
Da Blog
No. More /. posters should feel unrestrained to attack belief systems which:
1) are responsible for large amounts of documented hatred, intolerance, and violence, and
2) fail to prove the existence of a deity which their hatred, intolerance, and violence is committed in the name of.
Sure, but are you really in favor of wildly opinionated and unsupported attacks? That seems odd.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
Looks like all those busted long haul transoceanic fiber companies will now have some users. I can only imagine how they are going to scan those documents in.
Anyone know if there is a good OCR program for ancient greek or latin?
I suppose they could use some sort of bitmap format at high rez. but that is gonna suck up some bandwidth.
I can also hear it now:
Mom - What are you doing up there on the computer at 2AM?
Kid - Honest mom, I was just reading Constantine's notes on the empire relocation!
"Murderer? Well, that's a harsh word. I prefer to think of myself as a Mortality Technician."
That only shows that oral tradition has a reason. May i introduce you to the world of Homer, not the Simpson guy, but the blind greek poet who wrote the Illias and the Odysee?
... whenever a text is transmitted, variation occurs. This is because human beings are careless, fallible, and occasiona
I thought it was a little funny that they were releasing "handwritten notes by the likes of Martin Luther". How much time in energy did they spend trying to shut him up?
Why would you? No, really.
sic transit gloria mundi
but can we read it?
Are they going to translate the works/documents, or put them up in the native raw text.
I would love to sift thru the piles of text, but I don't speak Latin, especially not Latin of 2000 years ago.
This is going to be an incredible tool for the educated, but nearly useless for the common folks. Afterall think about all the various translations of the Bible, the differing opinions on words, etc.
Who do we trust to translate these documents?
Tournament Management Online &
Yea, but its an interpreted document, and the interpretations were selected by councils, popes, etc.
When/who wrote it is less important than the uses it was put to, and the interpretations it inspired, and that was done by the church.
A complete record of all their changes of opinion, selective enforcement of canon law, and their political intrigues would make for very interesting reading.
Theres probably 2000 years of history in that library, all of it important, and all of it affecting the modern church. There's much more in there than just early copies of the New Testament gospels, and while important, the gospels are not the only thing that influenced, informed, and motivated the early church and early Europe.
Europe and the rest of the western hemisphere by extension owe their existence to the church, and as such, their history is really the history of the west. Keeping it locked up in the basement of the Vatican is not where this should be.
What? TLD's don't exist for the US states?
Is this internet thing, like, international or something? Call in the marines, I say!
- Colin
Tuus crepidae innexilis sunt.
Isn't that what realigion, well, is?
sic transit gloria mundi
to say your prayers before clicking the link, and you will be absolved.
Don't use python, and don't work on an Apple, and everything will be fine.
One of my first jobs while a grad. student was teaching at a Catholic college. I taught Philosophy of Language, but also Ethics. I was a bit worried about things with regard to the latter, being a semi-heathen. So, during the interview, I asked whether there was any requirement to toe the party line. I was given an emphatic "no". Indeed, I had no problems at all.
Best wishes, Bob
That sig reminds me of Jack Handy's work. They quote him on SNL a lot. I have a few of his books. Makes a great quick read.
Understanding is a three-edged sword. -- Kosh Naranek
At least according to Google, The only source anybody lists for that quote is Peter McWilliam's book "Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do: The Absurdity of Consentual Crimes in Our Free Country". The online edition (it's in a yellow box, find for "vatican") atribbutes it to "THE VATICAN", with no details about who exactly said it or when, and the book doesn't appear to have any footnotes.
--
Benjamin Coates
Check it out here
;)
-- -=innocent ramblings from the mind of an insomniatic programmer=-
Your assertion the Jesus is "NOT" God is incorrect, from a Roman Catholic perspective. The dogma of the Holy Trinity holds that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, are one, and indivisible in nature. They are all God.
I'm pretty sure even the protestant faiths (at least the ones I'd call mainstream) hold the same beliefs.
This would probably have no additional effects, as there are already self-contradictions within the bible.
Can you name one?
Most of the so-called contradictions are either translation errors or time differentials. (Ex: During WWII, "Germans are Bad." In 2000: "Germans are just peachy.")
I don't think you've read much of the bible to understand the difference between the Old and New Testaments. I suggest you do so.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Some chapters are omitted from Protestant Bibles... or some chapters are added in Catholic Bibles?
I'm looking at a Jewish Bible right here, and Esther (an Old Testament book) jibes precisely with the King James - same number of chapters and same number of verses in each chapter.
In case you want to verify this, take note of the following: In Christian Bibles, Esther comes between Nehemiah and Job. In the Jewish Bible, Esther (Ester) comes between Ecclesiastes (Kohelet) and Daniel (Dani'el).
If I were wrong, there would be more than enough people to explain why I'm mistaken and stupid
(raises hand) Ooh! Ooh! Can I be first?
It's an entire heirarchy built around the practice of duping people into coughing up cash for rewards in a future life.
The Church is a hierarchy indeed, just like any other organization. I'm pretty sure that's part of what makes an organization an organization. However, coughing up cash doesn't garauntee any sort of salvation. In fact, it was until only recently by papal decree that Works were considered as important as Faith in detirmining your eternal destination. Works would include donations. Faith would include prayer.
And the cathedrals!
"And the Whitehouse!" People would have a lot less pictures of Europe if it weren't for these amazing structures. Every major religion has some sort of elaborate temple-like structure. This is because any church is made up of people who like to have a pretty building in which to worship. Makes them feel closer to God. Anyone with any common sense knows this.
Catholicism is the first multinational corporation dedicated to its self preservation and profit.
Even if that were true, don't you think the Roman Empire deserves mention? Just shows your ignorance.
It existed for how many centuries before the people even understood a single word of mass?
It also kept the written word in existence in many parts of the world. Much of modern mathematics and philosophy is derived from work done by Catholic monks. You are also wrong in other ways: the Mass wasn't said exclusively in Latin until centuries after it was said for the first time, and Latin isn't exactly a secret language. Many church-goers understood what they were saying. I read a little Latin myself, in fact.
There has never been any type of openness or disclosure about what the Catholic church is up to,[...]
Now you're not even making sense. Since when? Have all 1 billion of us been keeping secrets from the rest of the world? I lived in a monastery for over a year. I didn't find out anything I couldn't have learned from history books. Do you have any first-hand, intimate knowlege of the topics you're discussing? No, a few years of Catholic school don't count.
This certainly won't be the dawning of a new age of responsibility, accountability, righteous ethics, or social service in the Church.
Says who? You? Bah! For one, the Church is the single largest charitable organization in the world. Its track record for social service is plain.
Who's next?
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
Cecil Adams of the Straight Dope researched the topic of Vatican porn. His findings are here
I remember reading somewhere that the Vatican had the worlds largest collection of erotic literature. I wonder if that is included in the "library" that they are putting on-line.
If they did, it would sure beat the Spammed Usenet sewers, or the half-spammed Google groups.
You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button.
But above all what the poster and most others fail to do is to distinguish between what Catholics do and what the Church teaches.
/. are by and large intelligent. (Mod me +1 "insightful" for that statement.)
For instance, I have it on good authority that the first leader of the Roman Catholic Church, Simon Peter, actually denied that he was friends with Jesus just before J.C.'s execution.
Point being: Individual actions of people -- even famous people -- who belong to a group do not = the beliefs of the group.
Side note -- it is often said that Ghandi once said, "I would have been a Christian if it wasn't for all the Christians."
People who read
There certainly seems to be a lot of un-thought through anti-relgious (and anti-Christian) bigotry floating around among this crowd, though. (Mod me -1 "troll" for that statement)
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
"he Catholic Church itself has, throughout the years, advocated everything from slavery, to torture, to execution
Your evidence being..."
The Maleus Malificarum. The inquisition was not the response of the civil authorities to the Turks.
> I'll most likely be modded as flame bait
No you won't. The only way to get modded down in this discussion is to profess to be a follower of a religion (in particular Catholic).
In all the years spent as an Atheist (really more agnostic, at least while intoxicated), never had any problems BECAUSE of my non-beliefs...
I find it humorous to listen to people bitch about being persecuted for being atheist. Why? Most of the time that "persecution" revolves around the fact that someone at some point have the NERVE to say they followed some religion and maybe ask if they did or had heard of it. That's not persecution that's conversation. Tell'm to shutup and they typically will. Other complaints about persecution revolve around those fundies of all religions (be they Krishna's or whatever) who seem determined to bug them at airport/subway or ring the bell on weekends with junk. Annoying? Yes. Persecution no.
There is little, if no, persecution for being an atheist in the USA. Think I'm wrong? Prove it. Show me the facts and figures where people are losing their jobs, houses or being treated like second-class citizens because they don't profess some faith.
I see a crap load more persecution these days of anyone who professes some sort of faith, be it Wiccan, Christian, Moslem or whatever, than I see of atheists. Maybe it's just because I've lived places where Christians and the like would get eaten for lunch.
BTW Whadda want to bet this winds up at a -1 Flamebait because I dared to not to the party line...
Bugs Bunny was right.
Now, perhaps, I'll find the reason that the Gospel of St. Thomas was kept out of the New Testament. Which is interesting considering that the experts think it's the oldest, and most accurate, version....
Actually the Vatican approached us when I was working at a consultancy (not IBM) to do this project. "Mmm, cool," thought I. "They have loadsa money."
Ah, but not so, grasshopper. We met with their librarians and "IT" people and when it came to money, not only did they try and make us feel guilty about charging the Church (I'm Jewish..that didn't work on me) but they wanted us to PAY for the privilege. Yes, we would eat all production costs, hardware, hosting, travel costs, encoding, delivery, etc...AND we were expected to make a "sizable honorarium" to the RCC for the privilege of being permitted to work on the project. (Picture: Ellen Feiss going "nnnnggggh?")
"Hmm, well they have lots of money...they'll pay us for the next project," thought I.
Ah, not so. When I asked as to $$ arrangements for future work we were told that if they liked the library project, we could expect more work, but each project would require an additional honorarium.
"Wow, look at the time, I gotta run," said I. We never even considered doing the work.
Looks like HP got the same treatment, as evidenced by this line in the press release:
"HP's contribution included technical consulting along with donated computer servers, scanners and other hardware items.
Didier Philippe, HP's director of strategy and development in Europe, said the motivation for the donation had more to do with history and art than with business.
But he recognized that the Catholic Church could be a huge buyer."
So they are HOPING the RCC buys some hardware in the future, after they already gave them a couple mil worth of free stuff. Great business sense, eh?
I'm calling my broker now.
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
Look! It's still there in the KJV! Scroll down about 1/3 of the page and you'll seen Esther with ten chapters.
It's been in every version of the Bible I've ever seen, including the 1889 Darby Bible. Of course, the additional apocryphal text is not there.
Oh, sure, HP'll do the scanning for cheap, but wait until they get the bill for the ink cartridges...
--
Benjamin Coates
I have no life. *breaks down crying*
Correct you are. All I can think was I was thinking Esdras and got thrown off by what I was responding to... yeah, that's the ticket...
You don't really know anything about The Bible, Catholisism, or Christianity at all, do you?
The New Testament was written because of Jesus, who is described as the Son of God. Jesus, who is recognized as a actual historical figure (although his divine heritage is debated), is written as having performed various miracles, declared a new covenant in his blood, and was arrested and crucified for his beliefs. The New Testament is primarily, about Jesus's life, death, rebirth, and this new covenant, although it does also cover several other subjects.
The Old Testament, (known as the Torah, if you're Jewish), covers the orgin of the Universe, the creation of man, Abraham, the Ark, The 10 Commandments, quite a large amount of "begetting", and people doing very bad things and being punished for it. Jesus doesn't have anything to do with it, he isn't in the picture yet.
And if you are Christian, Jesus IS God. He is a part of the Holy Trinity, which includes God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost (Spirit). Separate but equal. Also, if you are Christian, he IS Omnicient, and Omnipresent. He knew that he was to be betrayed, and who his betrayer was. He died because he was chosen for that fate, and he rose to life again.
Whether or not the other Apostles liked Paul is irrelevant. I seriously doubt the Apostles liked "doubting Thomas" (what, you didn't know where that saying came from?) very much either. The Apostles were chosen for a purpose, and I really don't think whether or not they got along really matters in the long run. In fact, I believe any stories about the Apostles having personal problems with each other would make them more real, make them more accessible.
I've been called a "Fucking Dick" by better people than you.
There in fact was a Bishop in the Viking settlement in New Foundland who did (while briefly) have some correspondence with an other Bishop in Iceland. Whether the Church was able to conclude that from this Bishop's experiences there in fact was a "new world" is pretty unknowable. They likely didn't even think much about it at all.
...and IN SOVIET RUSSIA, beowulf clusters imagine 1, 2, 3 profit!!!! jokes made out of YOU!!!
You have a good point, but we're not really talking about a person here. Since God is supposedly an all-powerful being, who's to say he/she/it can't be three people at once? It's the same issue I take with people how insist on referring to God as "He". What need does God have for a gender?
I've been called a "Fucking Dick" by better people than you.
If the banner above is flashing you might go to heaven?
Priests, click here instead of abusing the children in your church. Look, but don't touch.
Okay, that was bad, I'm going to hell...
Given that most of what the vatican "owns" it stole during the crusades and its long, less than compassionate history of pillaging.
You are correct about the Protestant part. "Protestant" was created because of disagreements with decisions and politics of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, and disagreements regarding translations and intent of The Bible. The core values and concepts are the same.
The only two that would really come up as exceptions to this idea are Jehovah's Witnesses, which have some beliefs that are kind of in left field as far as the other Christian sects are concerned, and the Mormons, who have a third Testament.
I've been called a "Fucking Dick" by better people than you.
Wow.. I really didn't expect that!! I guess nobody does..
Pan
I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
while he took criticism at the Catholic Church's practices, he was not advocating a new religion nor church. It was only after he was forced to seek refuge in Saxony, and he had an army of followers did anything tantanount to a religion form. furthermore...
Luther was first a German nationalist. (And rabid anti-semite). he had long been upset at what he saw as foriegn potentates (i.e. popes) usurping from German princes the control over their lands. That was one of his biggest beefs.
His was an argument that dated back to a guy named Henry IV, who challenged the pope on appointing of bishops, which by default menat control of church lands. He wrote against things like the Concordat of Worms, and the Treaty of Constance. Luther was a supported of royal appointed clergy. So he sided with the kings, or in German lands, the princes. Many of his writings were not so much anti-clerical as anti church practices. Many of these the church has since abandoned.
My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
I certainly did not mean to imply some cabalistic conspiracy. But I am suggesting that the Vatican might be hesitant to go out of their way to invite problems.
That's all.
My
Limekiller
The confusion over the book of Esther (and Daniel) stems from the part that these books have additional chapters in the Catholic canon. For instance, the Catholic book of Daniel includes the chapter on Bel and the Dragon, and the Catholic version of Esther has some additional content such as the prayers of Mordecai, the text of the royal decrees, etc., which is generally regarded as apocryphal by Protestant and Hebrew scholars.
Tcl my Pico! There are 10 kinds of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't.
Neither omitted nor added, exactly, though maybe saying omitted from Protestant bibles is closer to the truth.
This is a gross oversimplification, but there are two major forms of the OT involved here: the Massorah (Hebrew, first millennium AD), and the earlier Septuagint (Greek, ~2nd century BC). Neither is the original Hebrew, though to put it in perspective, they are better attested than most accepted historical documents of the era.
There aren't huge differences between them for the most part, but the Septuagint contains the additional books in question. It also (generally) matches the Dead Sea scrolls more closely than the Masoretic.
Palestinian Jews of Christ's era spoke primarily Greek and Aramaic (as a result of the Persian/Syrian/Alexandrian conquests), and consquently used the Septuagint. Naturally the early church also used it (OT quotations in the NT are from the Septuagint).
Modern Jews do use the Massorah. Luther and later Protestant reformers also adopted their canon from the set of Masoretic books, but to the best of my knowledge up until the Reformation, Christians used the OT canon as in the Septuagint.
IIRC, the Greek Orthodox church actually still uses the Septuagint directly, since they never made the switch to Latin.
Modern translations (whatever canon they use) often look at both the Septuagint and Masoretic copies (in addition to other sources), since they both offer valuable material for the translator.
I'd encourage you to research the history of the various documents on your own -- I am not an expert and this is only a very cursory treatment.
DNA just wants to be free...
First off all the King James Version is protestant not catholic.
Acutally the Authorised/King James version is Anglican. You'll hardly ever see it in the US, but King James's translators definitely did translate the Apocrypha and a complete edition of the KJV will include those texts.
Check the
Articles of Religion for the Anglican view of the Apocrypha.
Second the inclusion list for the Kind James isn't arbitrary its following the organization from Martin Luther's Geneva Bible.
The Geneva Bible had nothing to do with Luther. It was the work of English exiles in Geneva during the reign of Mary Tudor. It is much more Reformed (i.e. Calvinist) in outlook than Luther would have been.
The books included in the Protestant canon are those selected in the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Scriptures.
The idea that Pius XII did and said nothing about Nazism is about as true as the idea that the holocaust never happened. Also, no one ever mentions the fact that MILLIONS of CATHOLICS were also put to death by Hitler. Yes, it's true. Read a history book if you don't believe me.
As for the idea that Pius XII didn't speak out, I suggest everyone read this: http://www.ewtn.com/library/answers/piusjews.htm
It even quotes the New York Times of the day giving MUCH well-deserved praise to Pius XII.
I hope this get's modded up...
I've dealt with the man, he bases all opinions about anything on opinion and hear-say. If you show proof his is incorrect about something, he just barley stops short of puting his hands on his ears and going la-la-la-la.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Even though Jack Chick is a loon, that's neither here nor there. What is the definition of a Christian? One who follows the tenets of the Bible (the teachings of Christ). You are a Muslim because you follow the Koran. If you do not follow the Bible, you are something ELSE, not a Christian. If Catholics READ the Bible, instead of allowing the clergy to interpret them instead, they'd see that what the Catholic church teaches and what the Bible says are complete opposite. Just because Catholics believe in Jesus just means they believe in the HISTORICAL Jesus. That's like saying I believe in electricity.Saying you follow his teachings, yet don't is being something else. I Timothy says not to follow those who forbid marriage! That's one example.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
I only go by what the Bible says, not tradition....it's not slanderous. Go to http://justforcatholics.org for more info....
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
http://www.bede.org.uk/library.htm
Unix is a standard, DOS is a standard, windows XX is not.
I know this is a bit off topic, but when I clicked on the link for news.google.com, there was a link at the top to a story titled "Vatican/HP To Put Library Online" (sound familiar?). Clicking on that link, I was confused to find that I was at the Slashdot article. Turns out that news.google.com is referring to the Slashdot story that refers to the news.google.com story - WHEN WILL THE INSANITY END???
First Falcon-1 to orbit, then Falcon-9. Then I can die a happy man.
I was browsing through the U.S. State Department's online "dossier of countries" (whatever it's called), which includes some interesting statistics for each country.
The Vatican is the only country in the world to have a literacy rate of 100%. (Granted, there's only a few thousand citizens, but still...)
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
Collections of the earliest manuscripts are called codices, and are given a name usually based on where the codex was first discovered, or is kept.
Codices and variants on codices are also given single-character abbreviations. I have a very good book on how Bible translations are done, but I can't reach it right now (broken leg), anyhow I believe "B" is one of the more complete manuscripts ever.
The contents of the early manuscripts can be fascinating. For example, the Lord's Prayer originally didn't end like it does today.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
Some of the posters here should go learn french or german and start reading Gérald Messadié's work.
...
....
...
... it used to be
the inquisition, now these same folks are against
abortion, safe sex and the marriage of priest.
As one catholic mercenary said upon entering a
city "infested" with heretics and asked by his
men how they should go about identifying true
catholics from heretics: "Kill them all, God
will recognize his people." ... He sure has, he sure
has ...
Unfortunatley, his only book available in english is his "A History of the Devil" (see it on Amazon), which hardly conveys the breadth and impact the stuff he's written.
This isn't some conspiracy theory wacko, but really a guy that dedicated 20 years of his life at actually revealing what the new testament really contains. I would have usually dismissed claims such as his, but he does layout the proof and asks to be shown wrong.
Basically, Jesus never died on the cross. He fainted, was taken off the cross, hidden while he healed, fled to Damascus and from there to India where is currently burried: a few pictures of the tomb (unfortunately this I'm not sure all that is on that site textually is accurate, but the pictures are).
What was his name in India? "Yuz Azaf", pretty close phonetically to the arameic "yusu". Why did Maria think he was a gardner when she saw him after his death? Because he had shaven his beard. What's that have to do with gardning? In old Jerusalem some workers didn't have the privilege of wearing a beard, gardners were some of those. Yes, but they put a spear through his side and water came out of it? Jesus was crucified around April, which is pretty cold in Jerusalem. When you are cold your plevra (the envelope that holds your lungs) gets filled with a water-like liquid. But he couldn't have survived that? Yes he could, read up on some of what WWI (or previous wars) wounded went through.
Jesus never claimed that he was the messiah. If you don't believe this then try to find the passage in the new testament that he says he is. You won't find it because he never does, not even once.
The reason Paul claims that he met Jesus on his way to Damascus was because Jesus was indeed hiding there and Paul did indeed meet him in flesh and blood.
Yes, but how can you claim that he didn't die on the cross? Do a little research. By all standards crucifixion was an old punishement even by first century standards. We have a lot of texts which show that someone that was crucified could stay up there for up to a week before actually dying. That's why the new testament insists on the fact that they didn't break Jesus' legs. They usually have to do that so that the poor bastard dies faster. Jesus was up there for less that 6 hours, they didn't break his legs or break his scull (which they sometimes did). He didn't die up there, he fainted. The guards were probably bribed to take him off of there. Proof, Pilate doesn't believe his ears when they tell him that Jesus is dead and actually sends a guard to verify this.
One more thing, the first century tomb I allude to above has a stone slab in it that is quite revealing as to the identity of the person being buried in it. The slab has an over-sized carving of two footprints. These footprints are characterized by assymetric crescent-like markings which are distinctive of a person being crucified.
Unfortunately, no one can open or even approach this tomb at this point in time. Why? Because it's in Srinigar which lies in the region of Kashmir that is disputed between India and Pakistan. If you've been following the news lately then you understand that all of us western boys and western girls are not welcome there. Not to mention that even the locals get caught in nasty killing sprees
Yah, but how th f"/$"%k did Jesus get to India? They used to call it the Silk Road
No need for any secret book, really. Now, if only I could get a copy of the original of Josephus' manuscripts; the ones where he actually tells the truth about Jesus, not the doctored ones we currently have where he is made to say that Jesus is the messiah and so on. Bet they have one of those in the Vatican's library
Oh, and I forgot to add that I did go to mass on every Sunday 'til I was 23. Nowadays I follow what Jesus taught, not what Paul and his lunatic fringe have been using to justify every possible lunacy for the past 2000 years
Very few /.-ers are historians, or very interested in history unless we're talking about 8-bit hardware. The greatest contribution of Christianity, in my opinion (former Catholic school kid), is all those dutiful monks painstakingly copying documents that otherwise would have perished in the Dark Ages. Now we'll get to see some more of 'em. As someone pointed out, maybe not anything that could embarrass the church, but who knows?
Was going to moderate the parent of this comment; unfortunately you can't moderate something as "just plain stupid". Honestly. Chick tracts.
The Pope isn't lurking /. with unlimited mod points.
Are you sure? Taco's been awfully friendly to him. As recently as when Geeks In Space aired, at least. Maybe Kurt's been given an editor account.
May I ask what the titles are? I've also been trying to find a copy of the full collection of dead sea scrolls they release not long ago. I think it was fourteen volumes?
Paul Anderson
"I drank WHAT?!" -- Socrates
Main (English) site: http://www.vatican.va/phome_en.htm
v at_secret_ archives/index.htm
s /vat_secret_ archives/collections/index.htm
_ secret_ archives/docs/documents/vsa_doc_10121999_regeng_en .html
..... ..... ..... ... There follow 21 rules, the most interesting to me was:
_ secret_ archives/docs/documents/vsa_doc_06082002_intro_en. html
The link at the top left of the first page
goes to (seriously) the
Vatican Secret Archives
http://www.vatican.va/library_archives/
There are some very nice images shown,
along with a great deal of Italian text.
Example:
http://www.vatican.va/library_archive
shows the following:
- Historical Documents of the Vatican Secret Archives [Italian]
- Seals reproduction of the Vatican secret Archives [Italian]
- CD ROMs of the Vatican Secret Archives [Italian]
- Publications of the Vatican Secret Archives [Italian]
Just about everything is in Italian, except for the bits in Latin.
This link:
http://www.vatican.va/library_archives/vat
takes you to a page showing:
THE VATICAN SECRET ARCHIVES
(opened to the public by Pope Leo XIII)
RULES FOR SCHOLARS
[
#19
Admission to the Archives carries with it the obligation
to send the Prefecture one copy of any publication
(articles in journals, exhibition catalogues, books etc.)
in which documents from the Archives are used or cited.
]
Note: This page:
http://www.vatican.va/library_archives/vat
has some useful information,in English, about
the Documents of the Vatican Secret Archives.
Scroll down to the very end to find a link
to the Collections Index in PDF form.
The PDF file "indexEN.PDF" is only 486 KB.
Even though it SAYS that it is an English index,
it actually is still mostly Italian and Latin.
SWIT
Well, all these old bible texts are all well and good...but when will they put up texts from the infamous "Z Library"? (all the uncensored, unedited books of scripture, and all the black magic stuff.)
No, it was religious. It was meant against hereticals, and the trials were by clerics according to canonical law.
Only after a religious trial, and with full support from the Roman hierarchy.
Huh? The threat was restricted to South-Central Europe (Balkans), but the Inquisition ranged from the Americas to Prussia. And it was not target at heathens, but at reformists and heretics.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
That he wasn't, except retroactively in Papist spin. Simon Peter was one of the leaders (Apostles) of the so-called Primitive (first century) Church, together with Paul of Tarsis and Yagov the Just (James the brother of the Lord) among others, perhaps 12 in total. Actually Paul is the most influent in Scripture, and Yagov was probably the most respected of the original Apostles due to his blood brotherhood with the Messiah, to his living in Jerusalem, and to his reputation for fairness and pureness of heart.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
Actually "Catholic" means "Universal", and thus apply to the set all faithful Christians, the specifics is known only to God. That the Roman Church calls itself Catholic is but propaganda.
The name was more properly applied in the middle ages to denote all the people who subscribed to the orthodox doctrines, but the whole point was lost when the Roman Church got corrupted from too much power and the Eastern Church got corrupted by submission to temporal power. Even so the name was never intended to denote an institution, just a body of people.
Anyway when there was the split between Rome and the East, both sides lost rights to the title "Catholic". Perhaps Rome lost it more clearly, because its doctrines had changed more, and strikingly continue to do so; by any standards but itself's, Rome is heretical against the Scriptures and the Apostles' standards, and becomes even more so every few decades by proclaiming new, Scripturally unwarranted dogma. The same holds mostly true for the Eastern churches, and BTW for all the self-named Catholic church at least since the Iconoclasts were defeated, and probably since somewhat before Constantine; it's just more striking about Rome.
The few Protestants who really know some History still call themselves Catholic, but with an eyewink. We know Rome won the propaganda war to call itself Catholic. Think Wintel calling Unix on RISC "proprietary" and itself "open standards".
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
Actually you contradict yourself.
The orthodox, universal, apostholic and Scriptural historical doctrine of the Trinity says "One God, Three Persons". The One God is said to be not only One being, but a Triune one. While you can think of "parts" of God as you did, you can't think of modes or functions as in your analogy with a man; this would be the so-called modal heresy. Your error appeared when you wrote "a person can't be three people", because it is not one person and three people, but three persons in one being.
It is not clear by any means, but that's what comes of the finite (us) thinking about the infinite (Him).
Please read the Creeds, specially the Athanasian. And look for "The Forgotten Trinity" from James White.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
He didn't. I do and I don't like it.
So called High Criticism is just applying to Scripture a methodology that has long been discredited in both History and Literature.
I forgot the specifics, but around and after the turn from the XIX to the XX century there was an academic fashion that denied the historical existence of several authors, from Homer to Shakespeare. This based on differences found thru textual analysis between several texts attibuted to the same author.
The fashion got discredited both because of the good historical evidence for several so "deconstructed" authors and because it was realised that the differences found thru textual analysis where there for good reasons: different themes being tackled in different styles and forms at different times by the same author.
Archaeological discoveries of manuscripts and other evidence keep putting nails to High Criticism's coffin.
That Scriptural High Criticism still gets a following a century after being discredit says more about its proponents than about Scripture.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
At the request of the civil authorities without the support of the Pope.
full support from the Roman hierarchy.
not true
The threat was restricted to South-Central Europe (Balkans)
Outrageously inaccurate. Southern Spain was taken and occupied by the Turks and was in serious danger of falling completely. This was the major inroad made by the Turks into Europe.
ot target at heathens, but at reformists and heretics.
The Inquisition that most people think of happened in Spain directed at Turks long before (hundreds of years) any major reformist movment threatened the Church.
Actually, no. You are ignoring the fact that if that were all there were to it, it would go away in about one generation. Rather, there is a ton of personal experience that supports it, in every generation. Some of that experience -- a lot of it -- is mundane: the confirmation of Biblical truths in our everyday lives. Other is supernatural: God does work miracles in our lives, sometimes: just read "The Cross and the Switchblade."
For contrast, consider how the WWII generation often either got married in less-than-perfect circumstances, or concieved before they were actually married. They then told their kids "well, don't do it before you get married, just because it looks bad." Their kids, the baby boomers, took that for what it was -- hypocrisy -- and ignored it. Thus we got the sexual revolution (yeah, I'm oversimplifying, but it's approximately correct. The seeds of the sexual revolution were spawned in the WWII generation's personal choices).
In the same way, if it were just "we were told that it was good to believe" Christianity would not last more than a generation. Christianity lasts because it has truth, and because God reinforces it continually.
As far as the errors go, yes: some of the contridictions are errors, and some are not even contradictions, just an individual's misunderstanding. But it is an item of faith the God will not let the vital parts be wiped out.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
So, I tried translating this page from Italian using babelfish (ignoring the irony), but the translation left a lot to be desired. For example:
Historical documents of the Secret Archives Vatican
* Liber Diurnus
* Agreed of Worms
* Diploma of Federico the Barbarossa
* All your base are belong to us
Quite disappointing, I must say...
There's a 68.71% chance you're right.
Now you will have to prove it. References, please.
You are mixing up the Turks and the Moors.
By the time of Reformation, the Moors were already being totally routed from Spain, but the Inquisition continued in full force to erradicate the Reformation wherever it lacked civil authorities support or at leat protection.
Even pre-reformists in Central Europe were killed by the Inquisition (OK, by civil authorities because of Inquisition trials) and other branch of Romanism even if they were not connected neither to Turks nor to Moors, and very far away from the places of conflagration. One of them was assassinated by a Council even after the Emperor had guaranteed his personal safety.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
Essential Guide to Bible Versions, ISBN 0-8423-3484-X
The first chapter is an introduction, discussing the various problems involved in translating any part of the Bible (or any other ancient text). The next N chapters deal specifically with Old Testament manuscripts. The N chapters after that do the same thing for New Testament manuscripts.
The important part is that those 2N chapters also introduce the names and abbreviations for the various codices.
One of the final chapters is a list of New Testament verses that have appeared or disappeard over the years, as compared to the abbreviations of the codices (which is why you need to read the whole book, not just skip to this chapter).
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
We dedicate this book to our fellow citizens who, for love of truth, take from
their own wants by taxes and gifts, and now and then send forth one of
themselves as dedicated servant, to forward the search into the mysteries and
marvelous simplicities of this strange and beautiful Universe, Our home.
-- "Gravitation", Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler
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