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British Library Puts Oldest Surviving Bible Online
Peace Corps Library writes "BBC reports that about 800 pages of the earliest surviving Christian Bible, the 1,600-year-old Codex Sinaiticus manuscript, have been recovered and put on the Internet. 'The Codex Sinaiticus is one of the world's greatest written treasures,' says Dr. Scot McKendrick, head of Western manuscripts at the British Library. 'This 1,600-year-old manuscript offers a window into the development of early Christianity and first-hand evidence of how the text of the Bible was transmitted from generation to generation.' The New Testament of the Codex Sinaiticus appears in Koine Greek, the original vernacular language, and the Old Testament in the version, known as the Septuagint, that was adopted by early Greek-speaking Christians. For 1,500 years, the Codex Sinaiticus lay undisturbed in a Sinai monastery until it was found in 1844 and split between Egypt, Russia, Germany, and Britain. It is thought to have survived because the desert air was ideal for preservation and because the monastery, on a Christian island in a Muslim sea, remained untouched, its walls unconquered. The British Library is marking the online launch of the manuscript with an exhibition which includes a range of historic items and artifacts linked to the document. 'The availability of the virtual manuscript for study by scholars around the world creates opportunities for collaborative research that would not have been possible just a few years ago.'"
But is it wiki'd so that people can make corrections to it?
1 In the begining was the psot. And it was frist.
2 And yea, I faileth it.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I'm really interested to see what different translators come up with. Now that it's been made available, there is going to be a wonderful opportunity to compare translations and interpretations from a much more 'original' source.
Though, I have this nagging feeling that "And it was Good" might also be interpreted as "Sorry for the inconvenience."
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
Well, unlike most regular books that are uploaded, having this one accessible on the net 'creates opportunities for collaborative research that would not have been possible just a few years ago.'
..... and the old priest looked at the original copy, and came out crying.
When asked why, he looked at the young novice and said "the word is CELEBRATE not CELIBATE"
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
a good use for technology instead of just another way to twitter/facebook/blog what you had for lunch.
1600 years old, from earlier manuscripts that pre-date Constantine's adoption of Christianity as a state religion.
It has no mention of a resurrection.
For example, St Mark's Gospel ends 12 verses before later, revised, versions - omitting the appearance of the resurrected Jesus Christ.
The incorporation of Osiris/Attys/Adonis/Mithras cultism, which dominated the eastern empire with it's symbolic resurrection theology was key to the success of Constantine's venture. It was so deeply held a belief, the bishops under Constantine may not even have realized they were fabricating and innovating.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
Disney? Is that you?
Sinaiticus is arguably one of the most important discoveries in the history of the textual transmission of the New Testament. Add an exciting controversy involving either idiot Greek monks who had quite literally dumped it in the wastepaper bin or a conniving Russian manuscript hunter-turned-thief making up lies to cover his crimes and you've got a great story that never fails to turn up fundraising dollars.
That said, I wish they could produce software for the examination of the codex that doesn't suck. But because they refuse to release the database of manuscript photos for public download (even though, at least in the United States, those images are uncopyrightable and therefore in the public domain) enterprising folks like me can't build a better system and give it away to people. So you have to suffer with their terrible system if you want to examine the manuscript. It's typical conservator behavior, building unnecessary walls against access to information that should be free.
We really really need to start making sure that digital copies of the ancient literary patrimony are available for free with no conditions -- i.e., in the public domain, but apparently everyone is too interested in fighting for scarce research grant dollars to produce something that all of their academic competitors could use.
How do you calculate "life of author" if the author exists outside of time? Should we just assume that the clock starts ticking in 1882?
All these revisions ought to successfully reveal the "literal word of God" to be a pile of horsecrap. The "literal word of God" was decided by many committees of fallible men many times over that originated from unoriginal tall tales passed down by oral tradition for thousands of years.
This work should be helpful in the translation issues that some scholars and theologians have faced, or worse, perpetuate.
IMO, the most difficult problems in Bible translations is (1) bias based on a reader's idea of what things say and (2) literallist POVs that don't consider that idiom and metaphors in the text shouldn't be taken (ahem) as gospel. One example from a Catholic apologist is the modern statement "it's raining cats and dogs." We today know that means "it's raining very heavily." Write that down in a book, bury it for 2,000 years. What would people then think that phrase means. A literalist will honestly think that cats and dogs fell from the sky. A person skilled not only in translation but in the culture of the time knows it to be a figure of speech--and will NOT change the wording despite that understanding.
And that, in an oversimplified example, is why humankind went from one Christian church to over 23,000. It's become a matter of bad translation and/or interpretation.
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
You seem to have confused the author with one of the protagonists.
"Welcome to our world. We are the wasted youth. And we are the future too." Yes, I know these are stupid lyrics.
From the images they have of the document, it gives "its all Greek to me" a whole new meaning, and it prompts important questions, spiritally meaningful questions, like: What year did we invent the spacebar anyhow?
stuff |
If there's a substantial OT manuscript dating to the 4th cent. BCE on consensus then I'd love to see it.
The reason why Sinaiticus is so important is because it substantially a transcript of what is agreed to be the most accurate record of the original text of the New Testament. It's called the "Alexandrian text-type." Almost all of the tiny fragments that predate the fourth century (and they are very scanty indeed) agree with the text of Sinaiticus extensively. As a result, Bible scholars believe that the alterations we find in later manuscripts are untrustworthy corruptions rather than viable alternate readings.
As to the textual corruption that took place in the late first and second centuries AD we have very little evidence and therefore no remedy. Christians believe that God would not have permitted His word to be corrupted beyond our ability to understand it. I am an atheist and work extensively on ancient Greek textual criticism so you can imagine I do not have much patience for this point of view, but the fact is that the New Testament is the most well-attested ancient Greek or Latin text still in existence. Even Vergil's Aeneid, for which we have three manuscripts predating the fifth century CE, is not supported so well, and in the cases like the tragedies of Sophocles we are on much shakier footing.
1. Author: God
2. Lifespan: Eternal
3. Copyright: Eternity + 50 years
4. ???
5. Profit!
Translated from English to Greek and back, it translates as "Greek"
Why did the little Greek boy leave home? He didn't like the way he was being reared. Why did he come back? He didn't want to leave his little friends behind.
Free Martian Whores!
So what you are saying is that anyone who does not speak the same dialect of Arabic as Mohamed cannot truly understand the word of God? Which effectively means that no one today understands the Koran because no one today speaks Arabic as it was spoken/written in the time of Mohamed.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
The Qu'ran is over 500 years younger than much of the New Testament, and well over a thousand years younger than the Old Testament. That's like bragging that Macbeth is better than the Norse Sagas because we have a much better textual history for Shakespeare's plays than for Nordic mythology. In other words, it's a moronic, childish argument.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
It is one more reason why the true followers of God look down on all other competing theologies.
Which is very nice, except everyone else also believes themselves to be true followers of God, has their own reasons for believing this and doesn't really care too much that the Koran hasn't changed.
(On a side note - the Koran may not have been translated but it must have been transcribed back in the days before printing presses. Further, I wonder if some words in Arabic have acquired slightly different meanings over the years....)
The New Testament of the Codex Sinaiticus appears in Koine Greek, the original vernacular language, and the Old Testament in the version, known as the Septuagint, that was adopted by early Greek-speaking Christians.
I just hope they aren't using Recaptcha to digitize the text....My Koine Greek is a little rusty, and I'd like to be able to join forums..
The oldest complete Old Testment dates to the medieval period. The oldest complete manuscripts of a single book are part of the Dead Sea Scrolls which date to the second or third century AD. There are pieces of OT books in artifacts that are from the BC period, but not much.
We, honestly, know a lot more about the NT than we do the OT because of the larger manuscript collection.
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. -Martin Luther
I'll take the flame bait: http://www.answerbag.com/a_view/2564828.
Looking at them solely as literary works, there are more extant copies of Christian epistles dating to within as few as 50 years of Christ than there for any ancient historical work. So, theology aside, there is greater likelihood that other texts are less corrupt than the Koran/Qur'an (the professed earliest texts of which are written in a dialect that did not appear in the historical record until at least 100 years after the texts were supposedly written).
I use irony whenever I can, but my shirts are still wrinkled...
A slow Tuesday.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Just copy and paste the whole thing into bablefish and click translate.
If I were God, wouldn't I protect my churches from acts of me?
Not true, there is plenty of disagreement. You should read a book called 'Cracks In The Crescent', about a man who was a madrassa teaching assistant and muadhin (calls Muslims to pray) for Islam until he became disillusioned with all the discrepancies and contradictions. He provides countless examples to back up his point.
One of the more humorous examples is a story where he proves to several Muslims that Islam teaches that they will all go to hell.
"The majority is always wrong; the minority is rarely right." - Henrik Ibsen
Contrast this book with the Holy Koran, which has not changed one iota since it was written
The question is, who wrote it. I could write you a poem about the afterlife that had not been changed one iota. It means pretty much nothing though, because I'm nobody special.
Unchanged does not necessarily mean special, important, or true.
Unconfirmed reports suggest that a half-japanese, half-english woman is making tremendous speed towards the British Library right now, and other reports further suggest this woman's sole interest is this bible.
Her appearance was given as short, well-built, blue-eyed, long shaggy unkempt black hair, rather mannish-looking squarish glasses, and an ability to manipulate paper in remarkable ways.
If spotted ring up the Paper Sisters Detective Co.
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
If you look into 1 Timothy, chapter 3 -
"2: A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;
3: Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous;
4: One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity;
5: (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?)"
you will see that it was not the intention of the church founders that priests should be celibate.
Learn and understand. Memorizing the entirety of the Holy Koran in its original is common among clergy. Think about Classical Arabic like reading Chaucer or maybe Beowulf. And your reward isn't some moldy old piece of literature written by dead European white men, your reward is knowing exactly what God meant for you, and how He meant you to live your life. It's all there, right down to which hand to wipe with, and it is all 100% true and undistorted by the centuries.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Unless I am totally high, I remember the CNN article to have wording almost identical to this source when orginally posted:
http://www.bilalaliproductions.com/religion/oldest-known-bible-goes-online/
Correct me if I am wrong (or hell this is /. correct me in any case) but I wonder if it hit too close to home to most of thier US audience. It will be nice when people are able to get all of this messy business of imperfect copying and editing proceedures mucking up the details. Not being a scholar, I was a bit suprised to find most (if not all) of the resection references to be missing. But I am sure a small detail like that won't shake anyones faith in what is real...
You also need to understand the world view of the people who were writing it. Understanding NT Greek is a lot more than just a reading knowledge. It's the "lifetime study" category of things, which is why this document is of very little use to so many people. (And no, I know just enough to have an idea of the sheer amount I don't know.) It's a bit like putting the data from the LHC on line for anybody to look at; very few if any people who don't currently have access will be able to draw any meaningful conclusions from it.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Contrast this book with the Holy Koran, which has not changed one iota since it was written
Maybe. The original Koran is lost. It was copied off its original materials into book form by the first Caliph after Mohammed's death. The original book was then borrowed and copied and distributed 4 times by the third Caliph, from which all other "official" copies are made (while the rest were destroyed). Diacritical marks indicating vowels and pronounciation were added by the fifth Caliph which some claim actually slightly changed some meaning (it reduced ambiguity in particular words). None of these acts were carried out by Mohammed, and therefore were not verified against the "original" heavenly text.
E pluribus unum
mu
I think "wc -l examples" can handle this problem.
www.isoHunt.com
The apostles didn't live outside of time, and neither did the man they wrote about.
Free Martian Whores!
Who wrote it!? It was dictated by God and written down by the Prophet Mohammed. Is education really that bad where you are? Again, mock all you want, but this is deadly serious to millions of real people. Try walking down the streets of Malmo or Rotterdam wearing a T-shirt saying that the Koran was not written by Mohammed, and see how far you get.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
There is some controversy about that. The copyright on the Bible could expire in a few decades.
I'll wait for the Ron Howard movie, tks.
Ah, so not only do you use moronic arguments, but you're also a cultural bigot.
I find Beowulf immensely more interesting than either the Qu'uran or the Bible, and I find the greatest evils ever committed were the destruction of so much of the cultures that predated both Christianity and Islam as both religions began their despotic reigns of terror over the Classical world by putting so much beauty to the sword and the torch.
At any rate, others have pointed out that the Qu'uran isn't what you make it, but even if it was, I see no reason to accept that it's the word of God any more than the Bible or the writings of a Zarathushtra (though at least Zarathushtra gets points for at least some originality, unlike the Christian and Islamic founders and early theologians who basically ruffled through the remnants of Jewish and Classical thought to create their edifices).
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
If you read Koran, it is written like poetry. Idea was that it can be memorized. That idea worked out very well. People started memorizing it from day one, and there were enough people (even today) to catch any discrepancies. This has kept Koran unchanged.
Yes words in Arabic could have taken different meanings over time.
Sorry for the error, I spend most of my time on the New Testament and got mixed up.
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. -Martin Luther
Other holy books go through revisions, get translated, have pages lost, etc etc - they can hardly be called the True Word of God at all.
Even DNA has gone through revisions over time. The very Earth has changed. God's creation is, itself, mutable. Any work of Man in interpreting and understanding God is inherently incomplete.
...Mock all you want...
--------
Not that I need your permission, but I mock the Qur'an and any other religious text any chance I get, as they are all based on the same absurd premise, namely omnipotence.
You are comparing ONE work of ONE person in "completeness" to the bible, of which the youngest parts are a few centuries older, by several authors, originally in several languages.
But that's not your point. You bizarrely agree that chopping off hands is fair, in the same post where you claim that your god is the "truest" :)
I live in Denmark, and I'm extremely proud that the gov'ment didn't bow to the pressure and apologise for what a private newspaper printed, or even punished them. This was after massive
protests and demands from countries that didn't quite understand the idea that freedom of expression isn't up for discussion, and the government was indeed powerless to punish something
that wasn't illegal.
I've seen religion destroy so much it pains me. /end rant
"As for the man who steals and the woman who steals, cut off their hands as punishment for what they have earned, an exemplary punishment from God"
Well, sign me up with THAT religion!
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Have you got any evidence that God did any such thing? And thanks for reminding us all that behind every religious bigot is a violent little prick. Screw you, you violent piece of shit.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Actually, the "corruptions" appear in every new Bible. They are listed in the footnotes. The King James text actually contains all of them in the text itself. This dynamic is well understood and nobody is freaking out over it.
Also, Papyrus fragments predating Siniaticus contain most of the New Testament if you look at all of them as a whole. There is far more agreement than disagreement between the mass, which is to be expected if you understand copying and textual criticism.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
it is all 100% true and undistorted by the centuries.
A Very Short Story:
Yesterday, I saw some faeries in my garden. They helped me with my tax return, and told me to wake up at dawn every day and walk to where I saw them. By doing this I'd always get my tax return done on time.
This story is 100% true and undistorted.
Do you think I made it up? If so, apply the same reasoning to the stories you've been told.
Remember, there's a big difference between kneeling down and bending over...
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
Actually, many books of the Old Testament were found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, which almost certainly predate Christ, and CANNOT go past the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
By your logic, the Book of Mormon has even greater claim to Truth than the Koran, since it was "translated" for us all by Smith in 1823, into English under divine inspiration.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
Is it out of copyright?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I would think that the Bono Act would have ensured that this work was still under copyright.
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
Yes.
Yes, yes.
Yes.
Nope.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
Well you better sign up first _before_ you steal something. Otherwise start learning to write with your foot.
Once I was a four stone apology. Now I am two separate gorillas.
I read Chauser in high school. We had to memorize and recite lines from Canterbury Tales. Reading and/or memorizing the original Middle English doesn't make it any more meaningful. Studying it with footnotes relies on someone else's interpretation. The only way to understand it is to become fluent in a dead language, frozen in time at the time of the writing of the book, and ignore presuent uses of words if they conflict with the usage at the time. Since the language from that time is dead, it's impossible. So, though the word may be recorded, we do not know for certain what those words meant at the time. We can only guess based on what they mean now or correlations with other uses at the time. The Word of God is set in stone and may never change, but we will never know for certain what was meant. And though the words will not change, language will, further separating us from the true meaning.
Learn to love Alaska
Unlike the Koran, early copies of the Bible that don't agree weren't gathered and burned, leaving no copies of the "changed beyond 1 iota".
Burned Korans
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
s/English/American/
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
scholars have discovered that this bible bleeds when it rains
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Actually, atheists such as Stalin and Mao committed the worst atrocities of the 20th century. Even Hitler believed in atheist concepts such as speeding up "survival of the fittest", which in his mind meant white people and certainly not Jews.
People of religion actually risked their own lives to save others (often strangers) from these tyrants.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
I dont know exactly what that means, but I think /. just got cussed out in Aramathean, which was translated to German, via .net.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
Who wrote it!? It was dictated by God and written down by the Prophet Mohammed.
Like Jesus, Mohammed didn't waste time writing down things. It was those that came after him that wrote down what they heard someone else say they heard him say (or something like that). As for who dictated it, that's irrelevant to the question of who wrote it. And, given that it's in language more recent than Mohammed and that it was "compiled" after his death, it is no better than the Bible for accuracy.
Learn to love Alaska
Tried finding it, didn't. Did find this but that's only a few days shy of a year ago.
But the wiki mentions:
In June 2005, a team of experts from the UK, Europe, Egypt, Russia and USA undertook a joint project to produce a new digital edition of the manuscript (involving all four holding libraries), and a series of other studies was announced.
I don't think I was mocking, and I know it is deadly serious to millions of real people. In fact, that's one of my reasons that I don't think it was written by God... the fact that millions of real people are so willing to kill me because I don't believe it was written by God. It is certainly not what Jesus, who is recognized even by the Koran, seemed to think was right behavior that was glorifying to God. Jesus seemed to think being patient, kind, and loving was behavior that was fitting to a follower of God.
...your reward is knowing exactly what God meant for you, and how He meant you to live your life. It's all there, right down to which hand to wipe with...
And you *want* your life to be dictated to you in this manner?
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
The violent reaction against violent people is somewhat ironic.
What a pity his later followers didn't think so. Christianity spread in many areas through the sword.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I'm telling him to screw off, I'm not threatening him. There is a difference.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Yes, "Christianity" or "Christendom" did. But not by actual disciples of Christ. I reject the idea that you can truly be a "follower" of someone when you look absolutely nothing like him. I can't say "Dude, I'm a follower of Michael Jordan" and hate basketball. Well, yeah I can say that, but I doubt YOU would call me a follower of Jordan.
If someone tells me he or she is a Christian and knows nothing about Jesus, cares nothing about Jesus, and acts in no way similar to Jesus, then why should I believe he or she is a "Christian" (i.e., a "little Christ")? And why should I refer to him or her that way? And, more to the point, why should I think all Christians are the same, or why should I think he or she discounts the claims of those that actually DO know about, care for, and act like Christ?
That is standard Islamic doctrine, yes. More hardline Muslims will in fact destroy translations of the Koran as perversions of the original.
The language, and the interpretations, are carefully preserved and taught in Islamic religious schools.
And to top it off, a No True Scotsman argument! If someone says there a Christian, I have no reason to disbelieve them. If trying to distance yourself from your naughtier coreligionists makes you feel good, be my guest, but no one else is bound by your rather self-serving definitions. Christianity spread throughout Europe by getting converted princes to bash the brains in of any of their subjects or neighbors who decided that worshipping Odin, Zeus or Lugus was just fine by them.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I don't think that's terribly accurate of some "dead" languages, in particular languages like Coptic, Latin, Koinei Greek, Middle English and 7th century Arabic. The languages are dead from the perspective that they ceased to be spoken centuries ago, but we still have a good deal of knowledge of how the languages were spoken. What's more, written forms of languages tend to be considerably more conservative than the spoken forms. The chief problem with Middle English was that there was no standardized spelling, which complicates reading it.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Actually, the "corruptions" appear in every new Bible. They are listed in the footnotes. The King James text actually contains all of them in the text itself. This dynamic is well understood and nobody is freaking out over it.
Well, nobody who practices Christianity. It's an example of deliberate blindness to textual defects that would cause infinitely more doubt and discussion if their context was not as emotionally felt as one's relationship with one's God. These variants were never problems in the early church and they are not not in Catholicism and the Orthodox churches because there is a very long tradition among them that church fathers, even today, can transmit to their followers the ultimate meaning of God's message and effectively channel God's will through themselves. Protestants are long since severed from that tradition, and their dependence on the determinacy of the text destroys the power of their message. I'm convinced that you cannot have a good knowledge of the history of the textual transmission of the Bible and be a Protestant.
Papyrus fragments predating Siniaticus contain most of the New Testament if you look at all of them as a whole.
That's possibly true but totally irrelevant. The intrinsic reliability of a papyrus fragment is not determined by its age, and if you try to piece together a text based on nothing but papyri of completely different provenances and values you're going to get a Frankentext that looks far worse than even a comparatively late but integral and complete exemplar. I am extremely well-trained in textual criticism and I don't appreciate your snarky comments. If you want to whip out your degrees I'd be happy to compare, but don't think that passive-aggressive appeals to what you think is my lack of understanding will help you.
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2 And the earth was waste and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3 And God said, "First Post!".
Do millions of people use that story as a template for their daily lives? No. Bad example, try again.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
> It was dictated by God and written down by the Prophet Mohammed. Is education really that bad where you are?
Sorry, the local madrassa closed down a few years ago.
> Try walking down the streets of Malmo or Rotterdam wearing a T-shirt saying that the Koran was not written by Mohammed, and see how far you get.
Are you 12 years old?
I find it hilarious that you chose to omit the second half of that quote which ends up poofing God in a puff of logic.
Have you got any evidence that God did any such thing?
Ocf course he does - the book says that the book is the infallible word of God, what more evidence could you need?
And thanks for reminding us all that behind every religious bigot is a violent little prick. Screw you, you violent piece of shit.
Do you believe that DNS-and-Bind is actually Muslim?
He does make a good point: Islam is the last major religion that is still doing the "my religion says I have to kill you, so I will" trick on a large scale. The Christians have largely stopped that (even those still bombing abortion clinincs or Nothern Ireland usually try to avoid actually killing anyone), and the other major religions were never that big on it to begin with.
And the fact that not just the text, but the interpretations of the Quoran are (theoretically) fixed and unchanging will make this hard to fix. Sure, most people who fllow any religion don't care much about it, but religions leader need to be directing the most zealous 0.1% away from violence, or that is a problem with the religion itself.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Have you never encountered these ideas before? They're out there. I'm not even a Muslim, I'm just explaining this as I see it, from a point of view that's not usually found on Slashdot. You're the one projecting your unacceptable thoughts on others.
It's one thing to reject an idea, it's another thing to not even understand what you're rejecting. Muslims are quite proud that their holy book has survived unscathed through the centuries. And the scholarly debates about which parts got included are just that, left to scholars...they don't affect the faith of the rank and file. It's like how Confucious isn't really understandable by regular Chinese folk, and yet his thoughts rule their daily lives.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I can't read either form of archaic Greek, you insensitive clod!
Look, I like the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy at least as much as the next guy, but it's not exactly canon, nor is that idea from it a basic tenet of Christianity (for sure) or Islam (as far as I am aware). It has been used in apologetics from time to time, but it's not a particularly strong argument.
Your brain is not a computer.
At one time, millions of people believed the world was flat and the center of the universe. Bad example.
The Qur'an wasn't originally written but rather recited. Qur'an, after all, means "the recitation." It survived through oral tradition until Uthman, the third Caliph of the Muslims, ordered for a standardized text to be compiled. While it is impressive that the text has survived more or less in its original form, it hasn't saved the Muslim world from having some majors divisions and differences of opinion. "God's will" was sufficiently unclear that a mere 50 years after the death of Muhammad, the Muslim world was so torn apart by questions of succession that The Battle of Karbala erupted and forever cemented the rift between Sunni and Shi'a Muslims. Later mysticism would come to influence Islamic religious traditions and Sufi schools would open and promote teachings considered heretical and blasphemous by other Muslims. You've also conveniently forgotten to mention the Hadith, which feature a dizzyingly convoluted system of attribution to "prove" the accuracy of customs and sayings attributed to Muhammad. Oh, and you also forgot the part where this whole thing was revealed to a single person in a cave by an angel that no one else saw. You're free to believe what you like, but don't tell me that your magic book and invisible man are any more "real" or "reasonable" than their Christian equivalents.
So are YOU when it to Zeus, Ra, Mithra, Cuthulu, Ares, Gan, and too many other to list. See the List_of_gods for more silly names.
Science is the Real TRUTH!
12 And we urge you, brethren, to recognize those who labor among you, and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, 13 and to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake. Be at peace among yourselves. 14 Now we exhort you, brethren, warn those who are unruly, comfort the fainthearted, uphold the weak, be patient with all. 15 See that no one renders evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good both for yourselves and for all. 16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 19 Do not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise prophecies. 21 Test all things; hold fast what is good. 22 Abstain from every form of evil.
You can't legislate morality... or intelligence.
Psalm 111:10 (New King James Version)
10 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; A good understanding have all those who do His commandments. His praise endures forever.
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
It survived because : [Source - http://www.cyberistan.org/islamic/charter1.html%5D In 628 C.E. Prophet Muhammad (s) granted a Charter of Privileges to the monks of St. Catherine Monastery in Mt. Sinai. It consisted of several clauses covering all aspects of human rights including such topics as the protection of Christians, freedom of worship and movement, freedom to appoint their own judges and to own and maintain their property, exemption from military service, and the right to protection in war. An English translation of that document is presented below. This is a message from Muhammad ibn Abdullah, as a covenant to those who adopt Christianity, near and far, we are with them. Verily I, the servants, the helpers, and my followers defend them, because Christians are my citizens; and by Allah! I hold out against anything that displeases them. No compulsion is to be on them. Neither are their judges to be removed from their jobs nor their monks from their monasteries. No one is to destroy a house of their religion, to damage it, or to carry anything from it to the Muslims' houses. Should anyone take any of these, he would spoil God's covenant and disobey His Prophet. Verily, they are my allies and have my secure charter against all that they hate. No one is to force them to travel or to oblige them to fight. The Muslims are to fight for them. If a female Christian is married to a Muslim, it is not to take place without her approval. She is not to be prevented from visiting her church to pray. Their churches are to be respected. They are neither to be prevented from repairing them nor the sacredness of their covenants. No one of the nation (Muslims) is to disobey the covenant till the Last Day (end of the world).
Most religious people are proud of their traditions (where there are any). But the Qu'uran is simply not as old as even the youngest sections of the Bible, so it's not really a fair comparison.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
But i thought god's laws were absolute and not subject to interpretation.. huh, go figure.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Mohammed's sayings were collected, written down and placed in a big chest. When the Quran was written down, there was an attempt to put the sayings in order, but there is little doubt that the context and sequence was lost. Hence apparent contradictions, such as "protect the people of the Book" (Jews and Christians) and "Christians can only be enemies, never friends".
It's not a self-serving definition. If you'd rather, I won't use the word "Christian." I'll use "disciple of Christ," since that's what Jesus referred to His followers as (disciples).
The point is this: why are you imposing on my the history of my "religion" when I am trying to say that I'm not part of the "religion" whose history you are referring to, except that we share a word?
In other words, you complain that I am trying to distance myself from my "coreligionists;" so be it. I, in turn, will complain that you are trying to lump me in with people that have nothing to do with what I am about, simply in order to disqualify me from having a place to stand.
Who is being self-serving, then, with definitions? The one trying to clarify beliefs with actions, or the one trying to generalize?
Let's put it this way. I tell you I'm an atheistic evolutionist. I give lots of money to the Institute for Creation Research. I attend an extremely conservative "Bible-thumping" literal 6 day creation believing church. I pass out Creation vs. Evolution pamphlets and tracts. I have a website trying to debunk evolution.
Next, along comes Joe, who hears you are an atheistic evolutionist, too. He knows about me. He tells you that you're just a hypocrite and that you are probably actually attending this church, believe in creation, fund ICR, etc. When you tell him that he's unfairly judging you because someone else has misused your title/description, Joe tells you that you're just using self-serving definitions that on one else is bound to.
Long method to show the point, but hopefully it works.
Besides, I wasn't even saying they weren't "true Christians." I said they weren't disciples/followers of Christ. In my lingo, they weren't true Christians. But I DO have a different definition of "Christian" than you do, most likely. However, we hopefully have very similar definitions of "disciple" or "follower."
disciple: A person who learns from another, especially one who then teaches others; An active follower or adherent of someone, or some philosophy etc
follower: # a person who accepts the leadership of another # someone who travels behind or pursues another
original ? which original ?
which of the more than 15,000 pages of "original" korans held by the yemeni government you guys like to memorize ?
the koran has as much history as any other sacred book out there. it's just that other religions are more willing to accept the fact.
What ? Me, worry ?
True, religion has destroyed so much; however, much much more has been destroyed by the anti- or non-religious (e.g., Stalin's Communism or Nazism {even though Nazis called themselves Christians, the atrocities of the Nazis were not done "in the name of religion" other than trying to eliminate those of particular belief sets and/or religions [most prominently Jewish]}).
Modern democracy is based on Judeo-Christian principles. I'll quote from an insightful essay on the matter:
"It is this point that I wish to make, and it is also one of the points made by Nietzsche in his Master-Slave morality, that the concept of equality, of legal, political and social equality is derived from Judeo-Christian morality. As Nietzsche puts it in Section 202 of his book Beyond Good and Evil, 'the Democratic movement is the inheritance of the Christian movement.'" (http://quantumleap42.blogspot.com/2009/06/religious-origins-of-our-democratic.html)
For every bad thing done in the name of religion, I can counter with many more good things done in the name of religion. We shouldn't resort to straw man arguments.
I do not live in Denmark but I too am glad that the Danish government did not bow to pressure from extremist Muslims. Besides, Islamic terrorists hold a very twisted view of Islam that very few other Muslims hold. What the few do that's negative in the name of religion should not reflect on broader religious beliefs. That's like focusing only on what America "destroys" while completely ignoring all the good that comes from America (this example holds true for Denmark as well).
Unfortunately the article is confusing. It says that the account of the resurrection is missing from Mark. First, this manuscript isn't news. Recent translations either omit the missing section of Mark or flag it in some way. More seriously, what is missing is Jesus' appearances to some people after the resurrection. The resurrection itself is there.
That's what they want you to think. You have access to the bits they allow you to s'~[]##' no carrier
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
When the Holy Koran says something, it *means* it. "As for the man who steals and the woman who steals, cut off their hands as punishment for what they have earned, an exemplary punishment from God" is a real command from the real God who really exists
Well it's certainly a command but even if it is from a god that doesn't mean that you have to obey it. Sorry to drop some pop-philosphy into this but I think this bit of Kant (quoted by Popper) says it better than I can:
For in whatever way ... the Deity should be made known to you, and even ... if he should reveal himself to you: it is you ... who must judge whether you are permitted [by your conscience] to belive in Him and to worship Him.
Also, I cant say if they're a cause or a symptom but ideas like this one seem to link themselves with brutal, violent and sometimes tyrannical societies far too often.
"Welcome to our world. We are the wasted youth. And we are the future too." Yes, I know these are stupid lyrics.
Holy Ghost? Ohh I'm soooooo scared!
People believe lies all the time ... just look at Hitler in the last century, Reaganomics and "trickle down", Bush and his "mission accomplished" and "Iraq has WMDs", Obama re-implementing Raeganomic "trickle down" policy via bail-outs, ANYTHING coming out of Sarah Palin's mouth, OJ's innocence, MJ's innocence, "housing prices never go down", "Yes, I'll still love you in the morning and no, I won't come in your mouth, and the check is in the mail" ...
Paul did what he did because he wanted power and influence - better a big fish in a small pond - same as what motivates most religious leaders today ...
Codex Sinaiticus is a Gnostic corruption of the original text. It includes Gnostic books such as The Shepard of Hermas and Barnabas. There are *thousands* of differences in the text of this book and the Majority Text (Textus Receptus). The Majority Text is the text which virtually all copies of the Greek text outside of Alexandria share. There are thousands of copies of the Majority Text in part or whole. The Alexandrian manuscripts which are largely responsible for our modern translations (post KJV) are primarily Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus. These two copies are both from Alexandria (a big Gnosic area). These 2 texts do not agree well with each other, nor other copies of the text.
Codex Sinaiticus survived to such a great age because it was discarded in a trashcan. Valued texts were worn out (copying by hand made good texts too valuable to discard). These texts became popular in the modern era in the 1800s when Wescott and Hort used these to create a *new* Greek manuscript by combining Codex Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and Textus Receptus. Wescott and Hort weren't exactly upstanding Christians to look to for spiritual advice. They founded the Ghostly Guild, an occult society with a very elite pagan membership.
It is one more reason why the true followers of God look down on all other competing theologies.
I'm not even a Muslim, I'm just explaining this as I see it, from a point of view that's not usually found on Slashdot.
Somewhere in there, there is a cognitive dissonance just waiting to explode. If you want to pretend that you're talking about someone else's religion, make sure to at least avoid words like "true followers" and "God".
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
As a human being, I was proud that some where there is a papers that won't bow to religious zealots.
Kudos to Denmark.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Religious status does not predict character, morality, or ethical principles[citation needed]. The sociopaths you mentioned were sociopaths first. Your characterization implies that these sociopaths had an impaired sense of ethics because they did not believe in a religion. I would characterize them as sociopaths who selectively believed, preached, and practiced whatever they thought would secure the most power and fulfill personal fantasies.
Sadly, at this point, he failed to create anything with ears to hear, making his announcement just as silly and useless as it is now, 6000 years later.
Huh, that's funny, God spoke to me too ... and said your 'prophet' Mohammed is false, that you've all wasted your lives.
Sucks to be you huh.
Sadly, the followers of your imagined creator will just keep on killing for 'his' glory.
George Bush + Linux = "I will not let information get in the way of the fight against Windows"
The problem is, polls in the USA show a very large percentage of people believe every word in the bible is literally true. So if there are different versions of the bible, this causes problems. The original bible texts probably said "It is easier to get a rope through the eye of the needle than for a rich man to attain salvation". In the modern bible, the word rope has been changed to camel - which makes absolutely no sense, yet is still widely quoted. Small religious phrases have contributed to major rifts and even wars between Christians ("and the son..."). YES, to any sensible person these minor discrepancies mean little, but when you act like a Christian and throw all logic and reason out the door and start dealing with faith, divine authority and divine revelation, then these little phrases mean a lot. The parent is dealing with Christians on there own terms, and you seem not to understand this and are blaming the quite reasonable parent poster for the insanity of Christians.
Read Matthew chapter 27 and 28 from Codex Sinaiticus. These two chapters describe the account of Jesus' death and resurrection, and there is no omission from the Codex. Amen.
I once had a signature.
True, religion has destroyed so much; however, much much more has been destroyed by the anti- or non-religious (e.g., Stalin's Communism or Nazism {even though Nazis called themselves Christians, the atrocities of the Nazis were not done "in the name of religion" other than trying to eliminate those of particular belief sets and/or religions [most prominently Jewish]}).
Bullshit. It's amazing how hard christians try to hide the fact that Hitler was a lifelong catholic and so were his followers. Hitler sought -- and received -- support from the catholic church. Later on that proved to be quite an embarrassment for which the church had to apologize.
Stalin is an interesting case. He was educated in a religious primary school and then in a seminary. He gave up his christian faith only to create a state-based religion with him as some sort of demi-god. [Similar examples can be seen in ancient Egypt (pharao was "god"), imperial China, modern North Korea, etc.]
Modern democracy is based on Judeo-Christian principles. I'll quote from an insightful essay on the matter:
Bullshit again. Show me where the bible or torah or whatever advocates a democratic system of government. Don't quote what some guy said about some other guy who wrote some book you never read. You are a christian -- go directly to the supposed source of your values, the bible. The bible I'm familiar with advocates slavery, genocide, torture, rape, collective punishment, human sacrifice, etc.
For every bad thing done in the name of religion, I can counter with many more good things done in the name of religion. We shouldn't resort to straw man arguments.
I would argue that there are far more bad things than good that are done in the name of religion. The chief problem with it is that it requires you to surrender critical thinking. It values unquestioning obedience, even when someone tells you to do something clearly immoral.
___
If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
The announcement came out sounding much like "Let there be light.". Hence the Big Bang ;).
Hey, do you mind if I ask you a tangential question since it seems like you know what you're talking about? A while back I ran across some discussion over whether Jesus was an actual historical figure or a mythical one. There's a Wikipedia article with a summary and a much longer article with some more detailed arguments, for instance. Have you heard of any of this, and if so, do you have an opinion on it? I've been hoping to find another point of view, but most of what I've run across is from Christians who seem more interested in defending their faith than anything else.
Visit the
Modern democracy may be based on Judeo-Christian principles. But so were monarchies, dictatorships, theocracies, feudal states, slave states, apartheid states, genocidal states, etc.
As much as I dislike religion (I don't think I need to go into why), it is a powerful force for good as well as evil. Just as any human institution can be a powerful force for good or evil. Equal amounts of good and evil are done by the religious and non-religious alike.
The BBC is the last group of people I'd imagine would help such a cause. Let's not forget:
What are you talking about? The BBC is merely reporting some news. What is your problem with that? Are you confusing the British Library with the BBC?
- "The GENIUS of Charles Darwin"
- "The God Who wasn't There"
- "The Secret Diary of a Call Girl" with everyone's favorite Dr Who girl, giving a blow-job on national TV.
Errr... unless I'm very much mistaken, "The Secret Diary of a Call Girl" was an ITV program, not from the BBC... not that it matters. FWIW, I only saw one episode, but it seemed ok to me.
> They should call it Paulism instead of Christianity.
I don't think Paul would like that, if you read what I've excerpted from the First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians, Chapter 1:
In case you're wondering, as best we know, Paul was beheaded with a sword.
Speaking of which, this wasn't actually written by me. I'm actually an impostor with the same name publishing a pseudepigraph. Obviously, I've never used the word sesquicentennial on Slashdot before, let alone vestigial or varmint, so the word frequency and vocabulary is all wrong, as astute scholars may eventually realize some thousands of years from now. Hopefully, this post will prove to be pivotal when they debate whether Slashdot should have been called Cowboy Neildot given that CmdrTaco was actually a minor figure in the whole rise of the Cult of Slashdot in Ancient America.
Learn and understand. Memorizing the entirety of the Holy Koran in its original is common among clergy. Think about Classical Arabic like reading Chaucer or maybe Beowulf. And your reward isn't some moldy old piece of literature written by dead European white men, your reward is knowing exactly what God meant for you, and how He meant you to live your life. It's all there, right down to which hand to wipe with, and it is all 100% true and undistorted by the centuries.
Just because someone memorizes the Koran in its original doesn't mean they understand what it meant when it was written.
And you're right it isn't moldy old literature written by dead European white men, it is terrible literature written by misogynistic Arab men.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
The language, and the interpretations, are carefully preserved and taught in Islamic religious schools.
Ah, so the way I know what God wants is that some Authority tells me what is written in his Word, since I don't truly understand the language the Word of God was written in.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Ah, but now atheism is the fastest-growing belief, even in the U.S. of A. Look at the nut cases religion attracts - people like Sarah Palin, with her near-hysterical wide-eyed ignorance-is-bliss positions on all things.
If their god is so powerful, and prayer works, let them waste their breath praying me to death. At least it will keep some of those knuckle-draggers off the stree... NO_CARRIER.
Jesus - "I will survive".
There are many liberal progressive protestants, whole demnominations really. I'm convinced that you cannot have a good knowledge of the history of the textual transmission of the Bible and be a fundamentalist.
I paid the going retail price for a Windows screen reader and got a free Unix computer!
No, actually, we call this "intellectual illumination". It is the ability to see both sides of an argument, even if you disagree with one of them. Sadly, this ability has become reviled - if you don't understand it, then it's OK to hate it. Ignorance and bigotry go together like peanut butter and jelly.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I think my friend who is studying to be an Episcopal priest would disagree with you. Not all Protestants believe in the literal truth of the Bible, although in the US it seems that all the noisy ones do.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Nice how you still avoid the whole issue of Palin allowing an unwed daughter to fornicate in her home. Whatever happened to the admonishon to avoid even the appearance of evil? Doesn't apply to republicans with feet of clay? THAT is why we think fundies are stupid - they can't even see their own hypocrisy.
BTW - The King James Version is one of the least credible versions of the bible - it traces its' lineage through what are known as the Byzantine family of texts, which only go back to the 9th century.
You'd at least want something from the Alexandrian or Cesarean lineages, which go back much further - but of course they weren't rediscovered until well after the fools who place so much import on "Thee and Thou" vs. "You", failing to realize that it's no more significant than "vous" vs. "tu" en francais. Or going on about how some parts were written in all-caps, not realizing that lowercase didn't even exist at the time, and that it was all caps.
Then again, anyone who couldn't parse out the NT from the greek would just shut their pie-hole, since they'd get a fail anyway.
Unlike the bible, science allows us to construct a theory then test it by direct observation. We have a theory of evolution, it allows us to make predictions. Those predictions have been validated, so we have reason to believe in the theory of evolution. What predictions have people been able to make based on the bible have come true? None. The end of the world was supposed to happen in the first century AD. Then the 900s. Then in 2000. (and a whole bunch of intervening times). Those "end times" sure have stretched out a lot ...
Then again, what do you expect from a book that commands genocide, murder, slavery, rape, human sacrifice, and the worship of the "god" who commands all that. The bible is hate literature. Sane societies teach it as something to condemn, not worship. Within 100 years, it, and christianity in general, will be just a minor cult followed by the most impoverished, backwards societies.