Dr. Silberman:
You knew it was inevitable: The Bible Unearthed, the controversial new thriller from the creators of The Da Vinci Code. In theaters everywhere.
I wonder how many times you’ve been approached by someone planning to write a dramatic screenplay based on one of your books. (“Oh, dozens of times.”) I would guess that any filmmaker who does contact you has a documentary in mind. I don’t know that there are too many screenwriters who would read The Bible Unearthed and picture a drama emerging from the material. But I could be wrong.
My thinking went that way, when I finally discovered your book only this year, because the Middle East is on everybody’s mind like a gigantic insoluble puzzle that must be solved to prevent the onset of nuclear winter. While reading The Bible Unearthed, I began to think that the whole tangled mass can be traced down to a very small point of origin: the Deuteronomist. Remove the Deuteronomist and the Pentateuch crumbles. Remove the Pentateuch, and the rest of the Old Testament crumbles. Remove the Old Testament, and the New Testament and Qu’ran crumble. Remove the Qu’ran, and the basis for the Sunni-Shia conflict crumbles. Remove the Torah, and with it God’s covenant giving the land to Abraham’s innumerable offspring, and the basis for the 1948 declaration of Israel’s independence crumbles. Remove Israel’s claim to the land and the basis for Israel’s occupation crumbles. Remove the occupation, and the Muslim world’s stated intention of scraping Israel into the sea is defused.
The story I’m planning to write will center on a dig near Ramat Rachel where artifacts are uncovered that show unmistakably that the Book of the Law found in the temple during the time of Josiah went through a messy rough-draft phase, making it doubtful that God guided Moses in writing the original document six centuries earlier. The artifacts are clay tablets which Josiah’s scribes used to write the early draft of the book prior to committing it to a scroll and which show numerous places where text was smoothed over and rewritten. The tablets are discovered in a trash pit. When the archaeologist pieces some of the tablets together and recognizes the writing, with its obvious corrections, he theorizes that the rough-draft clay slabs, rather than being rolled and squashed to obliterate the writing before being returned to the clay pile, were mistakenly fired. When the head scribe realized this, he directed someone to dump the tablets into a trash pit. Because of their weight, the tablets dropped out of sight below lighter organic rubbish already in the pit, and no one was the wiser. Twenty-six centuries later, those tablets are discovered beneath a parking lot.
Of course it would be naive of me to think that eliminating the credibility of the book of the People of the Book would change anything. The revenge algorithms have been in place so long that, even given concrete, undeniable evidence, were that possible, that the sacred writings are not what people believe they are, people still would not be able to set the conflicts aside. I suppose the reason I’m still motivated to tell the story is that I simply want to show people what they’re doing, to say “Here is where you choose to be blind.” I wonder if you’ve been surprised since the publication of The Bible Unearthed by how little your research affects the global dialogue on faith. For the public, it’s as if archaeological research hasn’t advanced past the 1950s. So I know that one little two-hour drama buried on cable TV isn’t going to have much of an impact. It just seems important to make the statement: Here is where you choose to be blind.
I would like very much for you to consider acting as a consultant for the writing of the screenplay and during production and post-production. Your knowledge would help us to avoid misstatements and inaccuracies that might not be discovered until after the film was released. You considered the information important enough to publish in a book. I hope that you will consider helping us in this way to extend the reach of that information with a film.
Thanks very much,
John Garvey
(A letter from November 2007 I ended up not sending)
Thursday, March 01, 2012
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Press release: New novel for Kindle
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
John Evan Garvey
Burbank CA 91502
info@carpecranium.com
RUG-PULLING FOR A GOOD CAUSE
New novel by John Evan Garvey released for the Kindle Fire
With the religious right now trying to shame every woman into abstaining even from contraceptive use, wouldn’t it be nice to pull the rug out from under them in their crusade to establish theocracy? And to do so with the very book on which they base their crusade? John Evan Garvey’s new novel, The Talpiot Find, an ebook for the Kindle Fire released in February 2012, explores a brief passage in the Old Testament which offers an intriguing clue to the possible fraudulent origins of Scripture. In brief: Priest finds lost scroll during Temple repairs, scribe reads scroll to king, king initiates national reforms based on scroll, greatly enhancing priests’ authority. The passage is II Kings 22:8-13. Since the early nineteenth century biblical critics have suggested that the scroll that was found was an early version of Deuteronomy, synthesized by the priests and scribes from different regional oral traditions and deceptively presented to the people as the writings of Moses. Consequently, if New Testament writers were unaware that the Torah may not have been the work of a single author, then their claim to divine inspiration is seriously undermined. And if the writings of the Apostle Paul are simply the writings of a man living in the first century CE, and not Scripture divinely inspired by an eternal, timeless God, then the religious right has a very weak basis for imposing first-century thinking on a twenty-first-century society.
The novel The Talpiot Find emerged when the author wondered “What if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?” He pondered the plausibility of rough-draft clay slabs ending up at a potter’s for kiln-firing. When the mistake was discovered, the tablets would have been quickly, secretly discarded in a trash pit. And that location, after centuries of erosion filling in the pit, might now lie beneath a parking lot in the Talpiot neighborhood of Jerusalem.
Synopsis: The Talpiot Find follows a grad student from Los Angeles doing his required fieldwork in archaeology at a dig site in the Talpiot neighborhood. He uncovers ancient clay tablets while excavating a twelfth-century well, and when one of the archaeologists begins translating the tablets, he realizes that this document may have been part of a deception coordinated by Temple priests and scribes in the seventh century BCE. The archaeologists contain the information as long as they can, but a disgruntled student on the dig team leaks it to the public. The archaeological team then learns that anonymous groups want to discredit the tablets and are determined to keep any further information about them from reaching the public.
About the author: John Evan Garvey grew up in a strictly evangelical home environment where life, centered around the church, consisted mostly of prohibitions of activities like dancing, movie-going, and dining in restaurants that served alcohol. This was in New Jersey about an hour's drive southeast of Philadelphia. He attended a Christian high school and college, earning a BS degree in evangelical cinema from infamously racist, sexist, homophobic, unaccredited Bob Jones University. Since Garvey’s midlife crisis in his early 30s pulled the rug out from under him, he has distanced himself from evangelical culture and beliefs and would like to help others in the religious right experience a similar anagnorisis.
ASIN: B0076RL38I
THE TALPIOT FIND
Available at the Kindle Store on Amazon.
Review copy available on request.
More info at the 0 comments
John Evan Garvey
Burbank CA 91502
info@carpecranium.com
RUG-PULLING FOR A GOOD CAUSE
New novel by John Evan Garvey released for the Kindle Fire
With the religious right now trying to shame every woman into abstaining even from contraceptive use, wouldn’t it be nice to pull the rug out from under them in their crusade to establish theocracy? And to do so with the very book on which they base their crusade? John Evan Garvey’s new novel, The Talpiot Find, an ebook for the Kindle Fire released in February 2012, explores a brief passage in the Old Testament which offers an intriguing clue to the possible fraudulent origins of Scripture. In brief: Priest finds lost scroll during Temple repairs, scribe reads scroll to king, king initiates national reforms based on scroll, greatly enhancing priests’ authority. The passage is II Kings 22:8-13. Since the early nineteenth century biblical critics have suggested that the scroll that was found was an early version of Deuteronomy, synthesized by the priests and scribes from different regional oral traditions and deceptively presented to the people as the writings of Moses. Consequently, if New Testament writers were unaware that the Torah may not have been the work of a single author, then their claim to divine inspiration is seriously undermined. And if the writings of the Apostle Paul are simply the writings of a man living in the first century CE, and not Scripture divinely inspired by an eternal, timeless God, then the religious right has a very weak basis for imposing first-century thinking on a twenty-first-century society.
The novel The Talpiot Find emerged when the author wondered “What if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?” He pondered the plausibility of rough-draft clay slabs ending up at a potter’s for kiln-firing. When the mistake was discovered, the tablets would have been quickly, secretly discarded in a trash pit. And that location, after centuries of erosion filling in the pit, might now lie beneath a parking lot in the Talpiot neighborhood of Jerusalem.
Synopsis: The Talpiot Find follows a grad student from Los Angeles doing his required fieldwork in archaeology at a dig site in the Talpiot neighborhood. He uncovers ancient clay tablets while excavating a twelfth-century well, and when one of the archaeologists begins translating the tablets, he realizes that this document may have been part of a deception coordinated by Temple priests and scribes in the seventh century BCE. The archaeologists contain the information as long as they can, but a disgruntled student on the dig team leaks it to the public. The archaeological team then learns that anonymous groups want to discredit the tablets and are determined to keep any further information about them from reaching the public.
About the author: John Evan Garvey grew up in a strictly evangelical home environment where life, centered around the church, consisted mostly of prohibitions of activities like dancing, movie-going, and dining in restaurants that served alcohol. This was in New Jersey about an hour's drive southeast of Philadelphia. He attended a Christian high school and college, earning a BS degree in evangelical cinema from infamously racist, sexist, homophobic, unaccredited Bob Jones University. Since Garvey’s midlife crisis in his early 30s pulled the rug out from under him, he has distanced himself from evangelical culture and beliefs and would like to help others in the religious right experience a similar anagnorisis.
ASIN: B0076RL38I
THE TALPIOT FIND
Available at the Kindle Store on Amazon.
Review copy available on request.
More info at the 0 comments
Sunday, February 12, 2012
The multilateral rug approach to peace in the Middle East
If we connect the dots, we will realize that
"• if the Torah is the work of man and not the word of G-d, • then Judaism can’t be true, and then realize that, • if Judaism isn’t true, • its outgrowths, Christianity and Islam, can’t be true since they assume that Judaism is true, and then realize that, • if the religions of the Book aren’t true, • then no covenant was made with Moses and the people, nor with Abraham, giving them the land forever and • Muhammad didn’t ascend to Heaven from Mt. Moriah and, of all the people crucified by the Romans, • none of them was the Son of God."The above quote is taken from a novel I've written, an ebook optimized for the Kindle Fire, challenging the notions of the inspiration of Scripture and Israel's traditional claim to the land.
You could say my book is a little controversial.
What it is, is a reasonable novel that addresses these controversial issues. No one has any final answers regarding the modern state of Israel, and I certainly don't, because the conflict is too complex, but Americans can start looking at the realities of Israel with a little more objectivity and maturity. American conservatives see it as the land where the Baby Jesus was born, and so they feel it must be protected at all costs from those terrible Muslims; just ask Sarah Palin. I used to feel that way, too. It wasn't until a few years ago, when I was working on a writing project set in Medieval Jerusalem, that I started learning about how modern Israel came into being. I was amazed. I came across photos of abandoned Palestinian villages where the residents had been forcibly driven out decades ago and the villages have been left to crumble since then. And then I read the harumphing defense some Jews give, that the Palestinians were leaving Israel anyway, they weren't being driven out. Their leaders were ordering them to leave. Uh-huh. I learned that, in a study of radio broadcast transcripts from 1948, the Arab radio stations were ordering Arabs not to leave and the Zionist radio stations were inducing them to leave with exaggerated reports of Israeli victories in the war and with fabricated statements by Arab leaders encouraging the exodus. And on and on, realization after realization. But in my novel I don't pretend to have solutions; I just have people talking about the conflict—rather than avoiding the topic—and thinking about it and about the justification given for the occupation being drawn from ancient sacred literature which could have, very plausibly, originated in a deception like the one I describe in my novel.
And what it is, also, is an enjoyable read. I've created characters who don't take themselves too seriously, and nobody gets preachy. I don't especially enjoy writing or reading dry paragraphs, and I had a really enjoyable time writing the book, so you could make a safe wager that you will enjoy the book too. I created a website to provide some more information about the book, and the website has links to the book's page at the Kindle Store on Amazon.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Dear HR:
I’ve always thought that my real strength lies in the diversity of my interests/talents, and all along I’ve been resistant to focusing on one ability exclusively.
Thanks very much for considering me for this position.
John Garvey
(A cover letter I ended up not using.)
• On occasion I describe myself as a walking film studio because I’ve become familiar with almost every aspect of filmmaking (except producing and acting, at which I would fail miserably), from writing to set design to directing to cinematography to editing to effects to sound mixing to scoring to creating posters and trailers.
• Meanwhile, the left side of my brain has been contemplating creating a new global language, one that embodies utter simplicity and that could, hypothetically, replace English as the resented, unwieldy lingua franca (as Latin was the lingua franca in the Roman Empire). I’ve learned that the Phoenician alphabet was the first to be useful for practical applications and was used widely throughout the ancient Mediterranean world, replacing cumbersome cuneiform writing, and I’ve based the new alphabet on that alphabet. Phoenician has the advantage of being the root of almost every language except Mandarin, and thus the new language wouldn’t seem as eurocentric as it would if it employed the Latin alphabet. I would borrow the absence of tense from Asian languages to simplify the learning of the language by keeping all verbs in the infinitive. I would also eliminate gender from the vocabulary, an aspect of language that never should have developed in the first place. In French, a film is masculine but a theatre is feminine? Who decided that?
• I’ve written a potentially controversial novel about an archaeological dig in Jerusalem uncovering artifacts which seem to suggest that the Torah/Pentateuch arose out of a deception in 622 BCE. I learned from The Bible Unearthed by Finklestein and Silberman that biblical scholars since the early eighteenth century have speculated that the scroll of the law found by the priests during Temple repairs, as described in II Kings in the Bible, was actually a newly composed scroll but was presented to the people of Israel as if it were ancient writing handed down from Moses. The novel resulted from my wondering “What if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?” In extrapolating from that possible ancient deception to the current conflict over the West Bank and Gaza, I’ve arrived at the unpopular conclusion that the modern nation of Israel may have no claim to the land. Israel ceased to be a nation governed by Jews after the Bar Kokhba revolt in the second century CE, and the land was under Muslim control from the seventh century CE until 1948. Israel seems to base its claim to the land on the covenants God made with Abraham, Moses and others. If those covenants actually originated with the scribes and priests in 622 BCE and thereafter, Israel’s claim to the land is very tenuous. That doesn’t mean I’m antisemitic; it just means I’m a realist who wants the conflict resolved. Enough.
• I also wrote an atypical novel about the Templars in twelfth-century Jerusalem because, a few years ago, I overlaid The Da Vinci Code with Brokeback Mountain and a story emerged.I could discuss additional topics, like songwriting without having formally studied music or my study of drawing and oil painting in high school and college or my interest in object-oriented ActionScript 3 for Flash, but your eyes might glaze over. And even though this letter sounds like I’m all about me-me-me, I’m the type of person who focuses on not being egocentric. I like being just another member of a bright, cooperative team.
Thanks very much for considering me for this position.
John Garvey
(A cover letter I ended up not using.)
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Buffett must be the GOP's thorn in the flesh
Warren Buffett Ready to Take Republicans' Tax Challenge
By Rana Foroohar, Time
Warren Buffett is ready to call Republicans' tax bluff. Last fall, Senator Mitch McConnell said that if Buffett were feeling "guilty" about paying too little in taxes, he should "send in a check." The jab was in response to Buffett's August 2011 New York Times op-ed, which made hay of the fact that our tax system is so unbalanced, Buffett (worth about $45 billion) pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. Senator John Thune promptly introduced the "Buffett Rule Act," an option on tax forms that would allow the rich to donate more in taxes to help pay down the national debt. It was, as Buffett told me for this week's TIME cover story, "a tax policy only a Republican could come up with."
Still, he's willing to take them up on it. "It restores my faith in human nature to think that there are people who have been around Washington all this time and are not yet so cynical as to think that [the deficit] can't be solved by voluntary contributions," he says with a chuckle. So Buffett has pledged to match 1 for 1 all such voluntary contributions made by Republican members of Congress. "And I'll even go 3 for 1 for McConnell," he says. That could be quite a bill if McConnell takes the challenge; after all, the Senator is worth at least $10 million. As Buffett put it to me, "I'm not worried."
Buffett doesn't want to sound ungrateful, especially since McConnell and other Republicans have lobbied to keep taxes low for the über-rich, saving him between $6 million and $7 million this year. Oddly, though, conservatives can't seem to make up their mind about taxes. On Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal, supply sider Arthur Laffer bashed Buffett for, among other things, shielded income, because he doesn't pay taxes on unrealized capital gains (currently taxed at 0%) or charitable contributions (which are tax deductible). "Well, I had a net unrealized loss in 2011," says Buffett. "But if Arthur has a plan for how he wants to tax unrealized capital gains, I'd love to hear it -- it's an interesting thing for a Republican to put forward!"
If Buffett had his way, he'd pay more than the 17% rate he currently forks over on his net adjusted income -- and he'd have the government put that additional money to work by making sure that whatever portion of the 99% that isn't thriving in the market economy gets some help. As Buffett wrote in Fortune a few years back, "I've worked in an economy that rewards someone who saves the lives of others on a battlefield with a medal, rewards a great teacher with thank-you notes from parents, but rewards those who can detect the mispricing of securities with sums reaching into the billions."
Buffett doesn't want to hobble capitalism. He just wants to give it a heart. And he says the way to do that is to change our tax policy to ensure that people who earn their money from investments rather than by working for a paycheck contribute their fair share. "We need a tax system that takes very good care of people who just really aren't as well adapted to the market system and to capitalism but are nevertheless just as good citizens and are doing things that are of use in society." Note to bond traders: your higher taxes should help subsidize the building of bridges and the running of state-sponsored day-care centers.
Buffett has plenty of other prescriptions for America -- from more progressive consumption taxes to penalties for errant corporate directors to an overhaul of health care. He's also got a few choice words for the Republican field and their ideas about bootstrapping and "merit" economies: "This whole business about [Newt] Gingrich going down to Occupy and saying, 'They ought to be getting a job,' that's just ... you know, maybe they can be historians for Freddie Mac too and make $600,000 a year." When I ask whether Mitt Romney is a job creator or destroyer, Buffett says that while businesses shouldn't keep people they don't need, "I don't like what private-equity firms do in terms of taking out every dime they can and leveraging [companies] up so that they really aren't equipped, in some cases, for the future."
By Rana Foroohar, Time
Warren Buffett is ready to call Republicans' tax bluff. Last fall, Senator Mitch McConnell said that if Buffett were feeling "guilty" about paying too little in taxes, he should "send in a check." The jab was in response to Buffett's August 2011 New York Times op-ed, which made hay of the fact that our tax system is so unbalanced, Buffett (worth about $45 billion) pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. Senator John Thune promptly introduced the "Buffett Rule Act," an option on tax forms that would allow the rich to donate more in taxes to help pay down the national debt. It was, as Buffett told me for this week's TIME cover story, "a tax policy only a Republican could come up with."
Still, he's willing to take them up on it. "It restores my faith in human nature to think that there are people who have been around Washington all this time and are not yet so cynical as to think that [the deficit] can't be solved by voluntary contributions," he says with a chuckle. So Buffett has pledged to match 1 for 1 all such voluntary contributions made by Republican members of Congress. "And I'll even go 3 for 1 for McConnell," he says. That could be quite a bill if McConnell takes the challenge; after all, the Senator is worth at least $10 million. As Buffett put it to me, "I'm not worried."
Buffett doesn't want to sound ungrateful, especially since McConnell and other Republicans have lobbied to keep taxes low for the über-rich, saving him between $6 million and $7 million this year. Oddly, though, conservatives can't seem to make up their mind about taxes. On Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal, supply sider Arthur Laffer bashed Buffett for, among other things, shielded income, because he doesn't pay taxes on unrealized capital gains (currently taxed at 0%) or charitable contributions (which are tax deductible). "Well, I had a net unrealized loss in 2011," says Buffett. "But if Arthur has a plan for how he wants to tax unrealized capital gains, I'd love to hear it -- it's an interesting thing for a Republican to put forward!"
If Buffett had his way, he'd pay more than the 17% rate he currently forks over on his net adjusted income -- and he'd have the government put that additional money to work by making sure that whatever portion of the 99% that isn't thriving in the market economy gets some help. As Buffett wrote in Fortune a few years back, "I've worked in an economy that rewards someone who saves the lives of others on a battlefield with a medal, rewards a great teacher with thank-you notes from parents, but rewards those who can detect the mispricing of securities with sums reaching into the billions."
Buffett doesn't want to hobble capitalism. He just wants to give it a heart. And he says the way to do that is to change our tax policy to ensure that people who earn their money from investments rather than by working for a paycheck contribute their fair share. "We need a tax system that takes very good care of people who just really aren't as well adapted to the market system and to capitalism but are nevertheless just as good citizens and are doing things that are of use in society." Note to bond traders: your higher taxes should help subsidize the building of bridges and the running of state-sponsored day-care centers.
Buffett has plenty of other prescriptions for America -- from more progressive consumption taxes to penalties for errant corporate directors to an overhaul of health care. He's also got a few choice words for the Republican field and their ideas about bootstrapping and "merit" economies: "This whole business about [Newt] Gingrich going down to Occupy and saying, 'They ought to be getting a job,' that's just ... you know, maybe they can be historians for Freddie Mac too and make $600,000 a year." When I ask whether Mitt Romney is a job creator or destroyer, Buffett says that while businesses shouldn't keep people they don't need, "I don't like what private-equity firms do in terms of taking out every dime they can and leveraging [companies] up so that they really aren't equipped, in some cases, for the future."
Friday, September 23, 2011
Palestinians submit UN statehood bid
[What part don't you understand? The "Pal" or the "estinian"? Hello? Hello? Is this thing on?]
I understand the necessity for the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1948, after the horrors of the Holocaust. I think anyone in the West who was against its creation at the time had to be completely devoid of a capacity for empathy. But in 1967, rather than having a Six-Day War, Israel and Jews worldwide should have taken stock of themselves and seen how well things were going for them then and realized that they didn't need modern Israel anymore. They had outgrown the need for it. (In 1967, Jews were ghettoized in New York? In L.A.? In Atlanta? In Dallas? What, Beverly Hills was a ghetto in 1967? Nice ghetto. Gays should have had to endure such ghettos in 1967.) Instead of ramping up the conflict, Israelis should have just lost interest in having a homeland that hadn't been their homeland for 19 centuries, since the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-136 ce). The land should have just drifted back to Palestinian possession over time as Israelis left to find nicer digs elsewhere.]
By Amy Teibel and Mohammed Daraghmem - Associated Press | AP[The US and Israel against the world. ♫ Sometimes it feels like... ♫
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Defying U.S. and Israeli opposition, Palestinians asked the United Nations on Friday to accept them as a member state, sidestepping nearly two decades of failed negotiations in the hope this dramatic move on the world stage would reenergize their quest for an independent homeland.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was greeted by sustained applause and appreciative whistles from the delegations in the General Assembly hall as outlined his people's hopes and dreams of becoming a full member of the United Nations. Some members of the Israeli delegation, including Foreign Minister Avigdor Liebermann, left the hall as Abbas approached the podium.
In a scathing denunciation of Israel's settlement policy, Abbas declared that negotiations with Israel "will be meaningless" as long as it continues building on lands the Palestinians claim for that state. Invoking what would be a nightmare for Israel, he went so far as to warn that his government could collapse if the construction persists.
"This policy is responsible for the continued failure of the successive international attempts to salvage the peace process," said Abbas, who has refused to negotiate until the construction stops. "This settlement policy threatens to also undermine the structure of the Palestinian National Authority and even end its existence."
To another round of applause, he held up a copy of the formal membership application and said he had asked U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon to expedite deliberation of his request to have the United Nations recognize a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem.
Ban has to examine the application before referring it to the Security Council. Action on the membership request could take weeks, if not months. [If not years. If ever.]
The speech papered over any Palestinian culpability for the negotiations stalemate, deadly violence against Israel, spurned peace offers and the internal rift that has produced dueling governments in the West Bank and Gaza. It also ignored Jewish links to the Holy Land. [Cough-cough, excuse me? They want to take all of the Holy Land away from Israel? Of course not; they just want the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem. Israel doesn't overlook the Palestinians' links to the Holy Land? It's been more than seven centuries since the Battle of La Forbie in 1244. Look it up. Do the math.]
Abbas' jubilant mood was matched by the exuberant celebration of thousands of Palestinians who thronged around outdoor screens in town squares across the West Bank on Friday to see their president submit his historic request for recognition of a state of Palestine to the United Nations.
"I am with the President," said Muayad Taha, a 36-year-old physician, who brought his two children, ages 7 and 10, to witness the moment. "After the failure of all other methods (to win independence) we reached a stage of desperation. This is a good attempt to put the Palestinian cause and the Palestinian people on the map. Everyone is here to stand behind the leadership."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, addressing the General Assembly shortly after Abbas, said his country was "willing to make painful compromises." [Painful? How painful?]
"I extend my hand to the Palestinian people, with whom we seek a just and lasting peace," Netanyahu said, to extended applause.
Palestinians, he added, "should live in a free state of their own, but they should be ready for compromise" and "start taking Israel's security concerns seriously." [Israel has security concerns because they continue to build settlements on Palestinian land. If they withdrew from the settlements, what would happen? Threats to their security would increase? Of course not. They have security concerns because of their own actions.]
I understand the necessity for the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1948, after the horrors of the Holocaust. I think anyone in the West who was against its creation at the time had to be completely devoid of a capacity for empathy. But in 1967, rather than having a Six-Day War, Israel and Jews worldwide should have taken stock of themselves and seen how well things were going for them then and realized that they didn't need modern Israel anymore. They had outgrown the need for it. (In 1967, Jews were ghettoized in New York? In L.A.? In Atlanta? In Dallas? What, Beverly Hills was a ghetto in 1967? Nice ghetto. Gays should have had to endure such ghettos in 1967.) Instead of ramping up the conflict, Israelis should have just lost interest in having a homeland that hadn't been their homeland for 19 centuries, since the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-136 ce). The land should have just drifted back to Palestinian possession over time as Israelis left to find nicer digs elsewhere.]
Thursday, September 22, 2011
The fiction unearthed
My email (4/9/2011) to the authors of The Bible Unearthed:
Dear Drs. Finkelstein and Silberman:
I know I can't be the only one who, after reading The Bible Unearthed, actually came up with a novel based on some of the information you present in it. In any case, I'm interested in knowing your reaction to the idea of broadening the discussion about the origins of the Bible by way of fiction. Bad idea? Or would it be good to reach an audience who wouldn't ordinarily read a nonfiction book on the subject? Or do you expect that broadening the audience would do nothing more than add to the number of people who already resist the ideas expressed in your book? My own hope is that, if greater numbers of people were to realize that neither Moses nor Muhammad had any special revelation and were just writing from what they understood at the time, the conflict over the modern state of Israel might ease somewhat, as might the conflict in the US between right and left over the fusion or separation of church and state; but that may be just my naivete. If you consider it inadvisable to popularize the discussion of the Bible’s origins any more than it already is, it would be interesting to know your reasons. If you thought that (given that the writing in my book is of high enough quality and the research thorough enough) broadening the discussion in this way would benefit the public, it would be very appreciated if you would consider giving your reasons in a foreword for the book.
I'm currently querying the book to literary agents and describing the book to them with the following paragraphs:
There's a short episode in II Kings in the Bible where an old scroll of the law is found during Temple renovations. I learned from reading The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman that scholars have speculated for quite a while that the scroll that was found was actually new, composed by the priests and scribes not long before its "discovery." So I thought, what if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?
At the core of my debut novel, The Talpiot Find, is an archaeological dig in present-day Jerusalem uncovering ancient clay tablets that potentially will anger Jews, Christians and Muslims alike when the text they contain is made public. The novel weaves together two storylines. The story set in the 7th century BCE focuses on a slave manager at the Temple in Jerusalem who is given the task of disposing of clay tablets used to compose the rough draft of the scroll of the law that was later "found" during Temple renovations, but which were mistakenly taken to a potter and fired, preserving the edited text on them. Because of the secrecy surrounding the tablets and the scroll copied from them, the manager suspects that the Temple scribes plan to have him killed. In the present-day story, the archaeologists try to keep the tablets low-profile, but a provocative video about the tablets surfaces on YouTube. They then learn that one of the tablets, acquired in the 12th century, has been kept a secret through the centuries by a small, select group of rabbis. In order to contain this knowledge, special-ops agents contracted by Mossad detain a student from the dig team and threaten to kill him if the rabbis’ tablet is disclosed by the few people who know about it. Word count: 71,000.
Regarding my background, I spent my first 32 years as a super-Evangelical. (We even thought Jerry Falwell was a little on the liberal side.) I graduated from Bob Jones University with a B.S. in cinema and with extensive knowledge of conservative Bible doctrine and history. I’m now an agnostic, better educated and a bit older, but my knowledge of Scripture provides valuable perspective when I examine history and contemporary issues from a secular standpoint.
I haven't read any of Dan Brown's books, in case you're wondering; I wrote my book as literary fiction rather than as a thriller. My writing is influenced much more by Umberto Eco and John Updike than by popular authors.
Thanks very much.
Dear Drs. Finkelstein and Silberman:
I know I can't be the only one who, after reading The Bible Unearthed, actually came up with a novel based on some of the information you present in it. In any case, I'm interested in knowing your reaction to the idea of broadening the discussion about the origins of the Bible by way of fiction. Bad idea? Or would it be good to reach an audience who wouldn't ordinarily read a nonfiction book on the subject? Or do you expect that broadening the audience would do nothing more than add to the number of people who already resist the ideas expressed in your book? My own hope is that, if greater numbers of people were to realize that neither Moses nor Muhammad had any special revelation and were just writing from what they understood at the time, the conflict over the modern state of Israel might ease somewhat, as might the conflict in the US between right and left over the fusion or separation of church and state; but that may be just my naivete. If you consider it inadvisable to popularize the discussion of the Bible’s origins any more than it already is, it would be interesting to know your reasons. If you thought that (given that the writing in my book is of high enough quality and the research thorough enough) broadening the discussion in this way would benefit the public, it would be very appreciated if you would consider giving your reasons in a foreword for the book.
I'm currently querying the book to literary agents and describing the book to them with the following paragraphs:
There's a short episode in II Kings in the Bible where an old scroll of the law is found during Temple renovations. I learned from reading The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman that scholars have speculated for quite a while that the scroll that was found was actually new, composed by the priests and scribes not long before its "discovery." So I thought, what if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?
At the core of my debut novel, The Talpiot Find, is an archaeological dig in present-day Jerusalem uncovering ancient clay tablets that potentially will anger Jews, Christians and Muslims alike when the text they contain is made public. The novel weaves together two storylines. The story set in the 7th century BCE focuses on a slave manager at the Temple in Jerusalem who is given the task of disposing of clay tablets used to compose the rough draft of the scroll of the law that was later "found" during Temple renovations, but which were mistakenly taken to a potter and fired, preserving the edited text on them. Because of the secrecy surrounding the tablets and the scroll copied from them, the manager suspects that the Temple scribes plan to have him killed. In the present-day story, the archaeologists try to keep the tablets low-profile, but a provocative video about the tablets surfaces on YouTube. They then learn that one of the tablets, acquired in the 12th century, has been kept a secret through the centuries by a small, select group of rabbis. In order to contain this knowledge, special-ops agents contracted by Mossad detain a student from the dig team and threaten to kill him if the rabbis’ tablet is disclosed by the few people who know about it. Word count: 71,000.
Regarding my background, I spent my first 32 years as a super-Evangelical. (We even thought Jerry Falwell was a little on the liberal side.) I graduated from Bob Jones University with a B.S. in cinema and with extensive knowledge of conservative Bible doctrine and history. I’m now an agnostic, better educated and a bit older, but my knowledge of Scripture provides valuable perspective when I examine history and contemporary issues from a secular standpoint.
I haven't read any of Dan Brown's books, in case you're wondering; I wrote my book as literary fiction rather than as a thriller. My writing is influenced much more by Umberto Eco and John Updike than by popular authors.
Thanks very much.
Friday, July 22, 2011
A seed sprouts in Gaza
My email to John Brockman
Mr. Brockman:
You see the absurdity in the term "Christian atheist" of course. But in the term "Jewish atheist" you see no absurdity. You just see your heritage informed by science. You may not even see any absurdity in the concept of a secular synagogue. Jews who no longer believe in G-d, continuing to go through the motions? Keeping to the 613 mitzvot, give or take a few? Like using the Sabbath mode on their oven? The reason for that, ultimately, is simple: They haven't set Judaism aside because they don't want to become common like everyone else. To an objective observer it's very clear that that is the motivation. Can you detect it in yourself? Don't veer off into an accusation of anti-semitism. Focus on the question itself. Examine your reluctance to change any action or reaction that is specifically associated with your Jewish heritage. Your reluctance to x is based on what? It's harmful? It's inefficient? Of course not. It would make you seem common.
My reason for writing this to a complete stranger is because you and the other thinkers involved with the Edge Foundation are so influential. And you cannot reach the furthest boundaries of human knowledge and understanding if you continue to wear that 4,000-year-old hat. You've cut off the brim, yes, but that just makes the hat look ridiculous. You need to take it all the way off. And it's puzzling to observe, from a distance, that your innovative, iconoclastic thinking cannot reach that point. Exempli gratia, is the modern nation of Israel an occupation of Palestinian land? Do you believe that modern Israel has no claim to the land 19 centuries after the Bar Kokhba revolt marked the dissolution of the nation of Israel? That hat influences your thinking. If a people can make a claim to land 19 centuries after the land ceased to be an independent nation of those people, then modern Iranians of Babylonian descent could make the same claim regarding Babylonia in modern Iraq, since Babylonia was taken over in the Arab conquest only 13 centuries ago, after having been under Persian control for the previous 12 centuries. Would the UN condone a military invasion of Iraq motivated by Iranians' desire to reclaim their beloved city of Babylon?
As I understand it, the foundation and justification for the modern state of Israel are the covenants G-d made with Abraham, Moses and others giving the land to the people of Israel in perpetuity. With Jews who believe that G-d directed Moses to write the Torah and chronicle the covenants, it's understandable that they feel the land will always belong to the people of Israel. But Jewish atheists go along with that? People who believe that there was no G-d to make a covenant with Moses or Abraham have to acknowledge that the land of Israel must have been given to the Israelites in perpetuity by the Israelites themselves. Nineteen centuries ago Israel had a valid claim to the land, yes, and Rome was quite wrong in so brutally denying Israel its independence. But after 19 centuries of rule by peoples other than the people of Israel, the land having been given to the Israelites in perpetuity by the Israelites themselves is a very tenuous claim. As much as Palestinians have lost the moral high ground with the atrocities they've committed, their claim to the land is obvious: seven centuries of continuous governing of the land following the defeat of the Crusaders at the Battle of La Forbie in 1244.
Lest you think the book is a diatribe: Of the four central characters, two are very sympathetic portrayals of Jews, one an American, one an Israeli. The other two are also sympathetic, a Jordanian Muslim from London and an American atheist. I didn't portray any evangelicals sympathetically, although I kept them low-key.
I'm not interested in the argument that the novel wouldn't sell. Controversy sells books. Making the claim that the Torah grew out of a deception in 622 bce would be controversial. I'm not even convinced that the writing in the novel is terrible. My favorite novelists are John Updike and Umberto Eco. I've never read a novel by Stephen King or Dan Brown.
Thanks very much.
Mr. Brockman:
You see the absurdity in the term "Christian atheist" of course. But in the term "Jewish atheist" you see no absurdity. You just see your heritage informed by science. You may not even see any absurdity in the concept of a secular synagogue. Jews who no longer believe in G-d, continuing to go through the motions? Keeping to the 613 mitzvot, give or take a few? Like using the Sabbath mode on their oven? The reason for that, ultimately, is simple: They haven't set Judaism aside because they don't want to become common like everyone else. To an objective observer it's very clear that that is the motivation. Can you detect it in yourself? Don't veer off into an accusation of anti-semitism. Focus on the question itself. Examine your reluctance to change any action or reaction that is specifically associated with your Jewish heritage. Your reluctance to x is based on what? It's harmful? It's inefficient? Of course not. It would make you seem common.
My reason for writing this to a complete stranger is because you and the other thinkers involved with the Edge Foundation are so influential. And you cannot reach the furthest boundaries of human knowledge and understanding if you continue to wear that 4,000-year-old hat. You've cut off the brim, yes, but that just makes the hat look ridiculous. You need to take it all the way off. And it's puzzling to observe, from a distance, that your innovative, iconoclastic thinking cannot reach that point. Exempli gratia, is the modern nation of Israel an occupation of Palestinian land? Do you believe that modern Israel has no claim to the land 19 centuries after the Bar Kokhba revolt marked the dissolution of the nation of Israel? That hat influences your thinking. If a people can make a claim to land 19 centuries after the land ceased to be an independent nation of those people, then modern Iranians of Babylonian descent could make the same claim regarding Babylonia in modern Iraq, since Babylonia was taken over in the Arab conquest only 13 centuries ago, after having been under Persian control for the previous 12 centuries. Would the UN condone a military invasion of Iraq motivated by Iranians' desire to reclaim their beloved city of Babylon?
As I understand it, the foundation and justification for the modern state of Israel are the covenants G-d made with Abraham, Moses and others giving the land to the people of Israel in perpetuity. With Jews who believe that G-d directed Moses to write the Torah and chronicle the covenants, it's understandable that they feel the land will always belong to the people of Israel. But Jewish atheists go along with that? People who believe that there was no G-d to make a covenant with Moses or Abraham have to acknowledge that the land of Israel must have been given to the Israelites in perpetuity by the Israelites themselves. Nineteen centuries ago Israel had a valid claim to the land, yes, and Rome was quite wrong in so brutally denying Israel its independence. But after 19 centuries of rule by peoples other than the people of Israel, the land having been given to the Israelites in perpetuity by the Israelites themselves is a very tenuous claim. As much as Palestinians have lost the moral high ground with the atrocities they've committed, their claim to the land is obvious: seven centuries of continuous governing of the land following the defeat of the Crusaders at the Battle of La Forbie in 1244.
But it’s not his issue. It’s ultimately between the Israelis and the Palestinians. People have been trying for more than half a century to resolve the conflict and haven’t been able to because the parties don’t want the conflict resolved. Conflict is a raison d’etre. Without it, life is dull. Ergo, as long as no Muslim nation fires rockets on Los Angeles because of its large Jewish population, Marc isn’t involved in the conflict. It’s not his issue; graduating with high honors is his issue. Three hundred years from now, Israelis and Palestinians will still be fighting over who owns the land. Five hundred years from now. Whatever. It’s not his issue. As long as they don’t blow him up, or the people he cares about, it’s not his concern. They benefit, somehow, from the perpetuation of the conflict. They actually don’t want to win the conflict; a victory or an accord would be followed by an awkward silence. The conflict gives them a script and a to-do list.The previous paragraph is from a novel I wrote about a fictional archaeological dig in Jerusalem. A novel you would decline to represent, not because of the writing or because it's fiction or for any other aspect but because of the ramifications of the book's premise: It's possible that the priests and scribes under King Josiah of Judah in the 7th century bce synthesized a new scroll, an early version of Deuteronomy, from the oral traditions of different regions but presented it to the people as if it had just been found in the Temple, after having been lost long ago, and held within it the words of Moses. The novel resulted from my wondering "What if the rough draft of that scroll surfaced?" If what you already believe regarding the Torah—that priests and scribes, not G-d through Moses, composed Devarim—somehow became clear to the public with the discovery of a rough draft preserved on clay tablets, the dynamics of the conflict over the possession of the land could change. Israel would no longer be able to claim that Moses informed the people that G-d had given the land to them in perpetuity if G-d needed to start with a rough draft before committing the text to parchment six centuries after Moses was believed to have lived. Even though the discovery of the rough draft on clay tablets in the story is an invention, it points to what has been there all along, the episode in II Kings concerning the finding of the scroll of the law in the Temple and the King initiating reforms based on it. Other things being equal, if the publication of this novel could, just very hypothetically, result in the Palestinians gaining the advantage in the conflict over the possession of the land, how would you react? Would you feel that you needed to prevent that from happening?
Lest you think the book is a diatribe: Of the four central characters, two are very sympathetic portrayals of Jews, one an American, one an Israeli. The other two are also sympathetic, a Jordanian Muslim from London and an American atheist. I didn't portray any evangelicals sympathetically, although I kept them low-key.
I'm not interested in the argument that the novel wouldn't sell. Controversy sells books. Making the claim that the Torah grew out of a deception in 622 bce would be controversial. I'm not even convinced that the writing in the novel is terrible. My favorite novelists are John Updike and Umberto Eco. I've never read a novel by Stephen King or Dan Brown.
Thanks very much.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Objectivity and archaeologists in the Holy Land
My response to a review of the DVD The Bible Unearthed posted on Amazon by R. R. Morris:
I used to be just like you. My faith in God was absolutely unshakable. I even graduated from a Christian university and was thoroughly grounded in conservative Bible doctrine. So I know that you (and I at the time) started with the premise "The Bible is true" because of the verse you referenced in your review "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good work" (KJV, quoted from memory), and everything you have learned about the Bible since then has been judged on the basis of whether it agrees or disagrees with that premise. But if you are honestly interested in learning whether something is true or not, you need to start with no premise and simply see what information is produced by careful research. If you were to look objectively at the doctrine of the inspired inerrancy of the Bible being established by the Bible itself, you'd see that it wasn't a very reliable proof on its own. Any author can claim to be inerrantly inspired of God. You can agree with that. There must be some external, disinterested, objective proof to corroborate that author's claim. With the Bible, all you have for objective proof are tradition and the unquestioning faith of billions of people. Even the scientific evidence used to prove the truth of the Bible isn't entirely reliable because it's produced or interpreted by scientists who start with the premise "The Bible is true." Starting with a premise always skews research results in the direction the scientist wants it to go, and some secular scientists are guilty of that, you're right. But believing that all secular scientists are bad scientists producing skewed data is too broad a generalization.
When you wrote "with no proof and contrary to archaeological finds," you were referring to the interpretations of archaeologists who started with the premise "The Bible is true." Before 1960 or so, all Holy Land archaeologists started with that premise, and they would even tell you that. It was simply a given among those archaeologists. So if recent reinterpretations and new findings disagree with the long history of interpretions in support of the Bible, they should be considered seriously because previous archaeologists were admittedly not very objective.
___
The review by R. R. Morris:
I didn't know and the cover doesn't say whether the DVD was going to endorse the Bible or present it contrary to its own testimony,"inspired of God" 2 Tim.3:16. The first 52 minutes "argues" there is no archaeological evidence of camels, Philistines during Abraham's time and no evidence of Abraham ever being in Ur, so therefore the Bible is wrong on those issues. (I guess there is nothing left for archaeologists to find, they found it all!) "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." They also say Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were never father, son and grandson with no proof and contrary to archaeological finds! Go figure! Just more Bible-predicted degrading of God's word.
I used to be just like you. My faith in God was absolutely unshakable. I even graduated from a Christian university and was thoroughly grounded in conservative Bible doctrine. So I know that you (and I at the time) started with the premise "The Bible is true" because of the verse you referenced in your review "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good work" (KJV, quoted from memory), and everything you have learned about the Bible since then has been judged on the basis of whether it agrees or disagrees with that premise. But if you are honestly interested in learning whether something is true or not, you need to start with no premise and simply see what information is produced by careful research. If you were to look objectively at the doctrine of the inspired inerrancy of the Bible being established by the Bible itself, you'd see that it wasn't a very reliable proof on its own. Any author can claim to be inerrantly inspired of God. You can agree with that. There must be some external, disinterested, objective proof to corroborate that author's claim. With the Bible, all you have for objective proof are tradition and the unquestioning faith of billions of people. Even the scientific evidence used to prove the truth of the Bible isn't entirely reliable because it's produced or interpreted by scientists who start with the premise "The Bible is true." Starting with a premise always skews research results in the direction the scientist wants it to go, and some secular scientists are guilty of that, you're right. But believing that all secular scientists are bad scientists producing skewed data is too broad a generalization.
When you wrote "with no proof and contrary to archaeological finds," you were referring to the interpretations of archaeologists who started with the premise "The Bible is true." Before 1960 or so, all Holy Land archaeologists started with that premise, and they would even tell you that. It was simply a given among those archaeologists. So if recent reinterpretations and new findings disagree with the long history of interpretions in support of the Bible, they should be considered seriously because previous archaeologists were admittedly not very objective.
___
The review by R. R. Morris:
I didn't know and the cover doesn't say whether the DVD was going to endorse the Bible or present it contrary to its own testimony,"inspired of God" 2 Tim.3:16. The first 52 minutes "argues" there is no archaeological evidence of camels, Philistines during Abraham's time and no evidence of Abraham ever being in Ur, so therefore the Bible is wrong on those issues. (I guess there is nothing left for archaeologists to find, they found it all!) "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." They also say Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were never father, son and grandson with no proof and contrary to archaeological finds! Go figure! Just more Bible-predicted degrading of God's word.
Monday, February 22, 2010
A little perspective on the Torah
My response to a review, posted on Amazon by Ken Tells All, of Who Wrote the Bible? by Richard Elliott Friedman:
Poor Ken. You can't help swimming upstream, can you, while explaining to everyone that "up" is really "down." You said "there are many more who disagree with him [Friedman] than those who think like him." You could be absolutely correct. There are also about a billion people who believe that the number 8 is lucky. That must be true too, because how could a billion people be wrong? Never point to the number of people believing something as proof that the something is true.
You said "a book on the creation of a nation called the children of ISRAEL." You're absolutely right on that too. It's interesting that you aren't bothered by the G-d of the Torah focusing exclusively on Israel, with all other people on Earth being considered "others" whose lands could be taken and "every living thing that breathes" in that land put to the sword. A G-d who created all people for the sole purpose of worshiping him and who killed, or instructed to be killed, anyone who didn't. Don't try to squirm around this one. It's right there in print. How many times were Israelites instructed to take up stones to kill a person who went after other gods? A response like "G-d can do that because he's G-d" doesn't actually explain anything. And "G-d's ways are higher than our ways" is just lame.
You said "he [Friedman] is not an expert." You checked his credentials? Or do you just feel that, if he were an expert, he wouldn't disagree with you?
You said "The individuals in the Torah did exist and that is confirmed by the lines of descent of the Kings of Israel and Judah." Are you sure you want to use the word "confirmed"? That we've determined that Hezekiah and the kings following him were very likely historical figures because of the references to them in the writings of other nations, proves that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph were also historical figures? That's stretching a proof a bit too far.
This statement is interesting: "The Hebrew bible is only concerned about the children of Israel and their relationship with the one G-d of the Universe." The entire universe was made for the children of Israel? Is it okay that I'm here? Or am I trespassing on private property?
You wrote "I could go on and on" - I could too. This could easily grow into a book - "but it is foolish to try and convince people, who do not believe in G-d, that there is a G-d." Move the "not" from before "believe" to after "is" and you still have a true statement. Neither of us is going to budge from our position. But I'm fortunate to have been on both sides of the debate. It doesn't matter the flavor of my previous beliefs; for my first thirty years the strength of my faith matched yours. And now I'm able to look back on my absolutely immoveable faith in G-d and see it as the result of the conditioning I was exposed to from very early childhood. You were conditioned from early childhood too. And where you live in New York now you are completely immersed in a Jewish environment, aren't you. You spend as little time as possible with non-Jewish people, don't you. And as a result you can't really look objectively at your construct of the universe: The G-d of Israel created the universe and focuses exclusively on his people. So what does that make all those other people on the sidewalks and streets of New York? Just animals? Props? Projections? Debris? When you subtract the number of Jewish people in the world from the global population of nearly seven billion, that's a lot of debris. You probably argue that, in the Torah, all of the nations around Israel consciously rejected G-d and that all non-Jews today are descended from them, and they can repair their situation now by accepting God and converting to Judaism. But if you honestly look in your heart, you know you feel that it isn't the same when a person converts to Judaism as when a person is born Jewish. Be honest with yourself. You need to confront that aspect of yourself. Connect the concepts: The G-d of Israel created the universe and focuses exclusively on his people, and the other people sharing the universe with them cannot hope to equal those for whom the universe was created. That is not a good perspective from which to view the world.
You said "Oh by the way, there is today a nation called Israel that was gathered from the nations of the world after nearly 2 thousand years." And, by the way, it's an occupation. After eighteen hundred and sixteen years, from the Bar Kokhva Revolt in 132 to the Arab-Israeli War in 1948, the land was no longer the Jews' to retrieve like a lost hat. The Jews' claim to the land ended in the second century. If it were any other people invading any other land, it would have provoked a war to protect the rights of the invaded (cf. World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War). An occupation isn't something to be proud of.
Poor Ken. I wish I could help. If you were an Anglo-American I would describe you as superhyperpatriotic. Your identity is so tangled up in your heritage-ethnicity-religion (like mine was) that you've forgotten that you are a complete individual on your own and able to think independently. I hope someday you'll be able to untangle your identity and to free yourself from the need to conform to the expectations of the people around you.
___
Following is the review of "Who Wrote the Bible?" by Richard Elliott Friedman posted on Amazon by Ken Tells All:
Friedman talks a lot but proves nothing. He "OBVIOUSLY" believes that the events in the Hebrew bible are for the most part fiction and written by different people for nation building & political propaganda. Bottom line, there are many more who disagree with him than those who think like him. He is not an expert in the field of religious study or is he able to understand that the Torah is not a world history book but a book on the creation of a nation called the children of ISRAEL. Its main purpose was to serve as a moral teaching for them to live by. The individuals in the Torah did exist and that is confirmed by the lines of descent of the Kings of Israel and Judah. Foreign nations of the time have acknowledged that these kings existed back to Hezekiah at least. Hezekiah is just another link to the ones before him back to David & Solomon. The people of Israel & the House of David have also been acknowledged by other ancient sources. Also, other nations date their histories by their royal lines, Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Roman, etc., why not accept the same when looking at Hebrew/Israelite royal documents. The Hebrew bible is only concerned about the children of Israel and their relationship with the one G-d of the Universe. Other stories that involved foreign nations were only necessary to show the people that when they sinned against their fellow man G-d would punish them by foreign nations attacking them. I could go on and on but it is foolish to try and convince people, who do not believe in G-d, that there is a G-d who does communicate with humans and does act in this world. Let them write their misconceptions because in the end they will be proven wrong! Oh by the way, there is today a nation called Israel that was gathered from the nations of the world after nearly 2 thousand years. This proves that the Hebrew bible and its prophets told the truth and that those who doubt the truth of the Torah are wrong!
Poor Ken. You can't help swimming upstream, can you, while explaining to everyone that "up" is really "down." You said "there are many more who disagree with him [Friedman] than those who think like him." You could be absolutely correct. There are also about a billion people who believe that the number 8 is lucky. That must be true too, because how could a billion people be wrong? Never point to the number of people believing something as proof that the something is true.
You said "a book on the creation of a nation called the children of ISRAEL." You're absolutely right on that too. It's interesting that you aren't bothered by the G-d of the Torah focusing exclusively on Israel, with all other people on Earth being considered "others" whose lands could be taken and "every living thing that breathes" in that land put to the sword. A G-d who created all people for the sole purpose of worshiping him and who killed, or instructed to be killed, anyone who didn't. Don't try to squirm around this one. It's right there in print. How many times were Israelites instructed to take up stones to kill a person who went after other gods? A response like "G-d can do that because he's G-d" doesn't actually explain anything. And "G-d's ways are higher than our ways" is just lame.
You said "he [Friedman] is not an expert." You checked his credentials? Or do you just feel that, if he were an expert, he wouldn't disagree with you?
You said "The individuals in the Torah did exist and that is confirmed by the lines of descent of the Kings of Israel and Judah." Are you sure you want to use the word "confirmed"? That we've determined that Hezekiah and the kings following him were very likely historical figures because of the references to them in the writings of other nations, proves that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph were also historical figures? That's stretching a proof a bit too far.
This statement is interesting: "The Hebrew bible is only concerned about the children of Israel and their relationship with the one G-d of the Universe." The entire universe was made for the children of Israel? Is it okay that I'm here? Or am I trespassing on private property?
You wrote "I could go on and on" - I could too. This could easily grow into a book - "but it is foolish to try and convince people, who do not believe in G-d, that there is a G-d." Move the "not" from before "believe" to after "is" and you still have a true statement. Neither of us is going to budge from our position. But I'm fortunate to have been on both sides of the debate. It doesn't matter the flavor of my previous beliefs; for my first thirty years the strength of my faith matched yours. And now I'm able to look back on my absolutely immoveable faith in G-d and see it as the result of the conditioning I was exposed to from very early childhood. You were conditioned from early childhood too. And where you live in New York now you are completely immersed in a Jewish environment, aren't you. You spend as little time as possible with non-Jewish people, don't you. And as a result you can't really look objectively at your construct of the universe: The G-d of Israel created the universe and focuses exclusively on his people. So what does that make all those other people on the sidewalks and streets of New York? Just animals? Props? Projections? Debris? When you subtract the number of Jewish people in the world from the global population of nearly seven billion, that's a lot of debris. You probably argue that, in the Torah, all of the nations around Israel consciously rejected G-d and that all non-Jews today are descended from them, and they can repair their situation now by accepting God and converting to Judaism. But if you honestly look in your heart, you know you feel that it isn't the same when a person converts to Judaism as when a person is born Jewish. Be honest with yourself. You need to confront that aspect of yourself. Connect the concepts: The G-d of Israel created the universe and focuses exclusively on his people, and the other people sharing the universe with them cannot hope to equal those for whom the universe was created. That is not a good perspective from which to view the world.
You said "Oh by the way, there is today a nation called Israel that was gathered from the nations of the world after nearly 2 thousand years." And, by the way, it's an occupation. After eighteen hundred and sixteen years, from the Bar Kokhva Revolt in 132 to the Arab-Israeli War in 1948, the land was no longer the Jews' to retrieve like a lost hat. The Jews' claim to the land ended in the second century. If it were any other people invading any other land, it would have provoked a war to protect the rights of the invaded (cf. World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War). An occupation isn't something to be proud of.
Poor Ken. I wish I could help. If you were an Anglo-American I would describe you as superhyperpatriotic. Your identity is so tangled up in your heritage-ethnicity-religion (like mine was) that you've forgotten that you are a complete individual on your own and able to think independently. I hope someday you'll be able to untangle your identity and to free yourself from the need to conform to the expectations of the people around you.
___
Following is the review of "Who Wrote the Bible?" by Richard Elliott Friedman posted on Amazon by Ken Tells All:
Friedman talks a lot but proves nothing. He "OBVIOUSLY" believes that the events in the Hebrew bible are for the most part fiction and written by different people for nation building & political propaganda. Bottom line, there are many more who disagree with him than those who think like him. He is not an expert in the field of religious study or is he able to understand that the Torah is not a world history book but a book on the creation of a nation called the children of ISRAEL. Its main purpose was to serve as a moral teaching for them to live by. The individuals in the Torah did exist and that is confirmed by the lines of descent of the Kings of Israel and Judah. Foreign nations of the time have acknowledged that these kings existed back to Hezekiah at least. Hezekiah is just another link to the ones before him back to David & Solomon. The people of Israel & the House of David have also been acknowledged by other ancient sources. Also, other nations date their histories by their royal lines, Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Roman, etc., why not accept the same when looking at Hebrew/Israelite royal documents. The Hebrew bible is only concerned about the children of Israel and their relationship with the one G-d of the Universe. Other stories that involved foreign nations were only necessary to show the people that when they sinned against their fellow man G-d would punish them by foreign nations attacking them. I could go on and on but it is foolish to try and convince people, who do not believe in G-d, that there is a G-d who does communicate with humans and does act in this world. Let them write their misconceptions because in the end they will be proven wrong! Oh by the way, there is today a nation called Israel that was gathered from the nations of the world after nearly 2 thousand years. This proves that the Hebrew bible and its prophets told the truth and that those who doubt the truth of the Torah are wrong!
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Evangelicals praying for Obama's death??
Is this for real? It's a little early for an April Fool's prank. And this one is in especially bad taste.
It's unfortunate that any ruckus this story causes will only bring Anderson and Wiley more attention which will result in higher praise from evangelicals and a surge in tithes and offerings. And to think I used to be part of that population. One can't choose one's family background, but one can choose to crawl out of his early conditioning if he works hard enough at it.
Obama is evil in what ways?? Because he wants insurance and pharmaceutical companies to be competitive? Because he's an African-American? Because he's not Republican? Once again I'm extremely embarrassed by the country in which I live. Yes this is the ranting of the far-right fringe but, knowing the evangelical perspective like I do, this is the thinking, to at least some degree, of far more conservatives than just the fringe.
(Newser) – While a handful of Americans might have taken a few minutes to reflect favorably on George Washington and Abe Lincoln on Presidents Day, some evangelical leaders devoted their time to praying for Barack Obama's death. The "Imprecatory Prayer" is a favorite of Arizona’s Baptist preacher Steven L. Anderson and Orange County's Wiley Drake, who told supporters in an email over the weekend that the supplication is "now your DUTY."
If "you have an evil leader above you, you pray that Satan will stand by his side and you ask God to make his children fatherless and his wife a widow and that his time in office be short," Drake told Daily Beast columnist John Avlon. Anderson has said he hopes Obama dies of brain cancer "today." To those offended by the sentiments, Wiley responds: "I’m praying the word of God. I didn’t write it. Don’t get mad at me.”
It's unfortunate that any ruckus this story causes will only bring Anderson and Wiley more attention which will result in higher praise from evangelicals and a surge in tithes and offerings. And to think I used to be part of that population. One can't choose one's family background, but one can choose to crawl out of his early conditioning if he works hard enough at it.
Obama is evil in what ways?? Because he wants insurance and pharmaceutical companies to be competitive? Because he's an African-American? Because he's not Republican? Once again I'm extremely embarrassed by the country in which I live. Yes this is the ranting of the far-right fringe but, knowing the evangelical perspective like I do, this is the thinking, to at least some degree, of far more conservatives than just the fringe.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
GE's Olympics ad sounds suspiciously familiar
Did my arrangement of Ode to Joy inspire GE's Olympics ad? (Patients saying "ah" building into a chorus ah-ing Ode to Joy.) When's the last time you heard a choir ah-ing Ode? (A sample is at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/garveyjohn3 but the full choir begins after the sample ends.) The track is available at several of the music-licensing sites, and an adman, while browsing, could have become curious about Ode to Joy in the "experimental" category. And when s/he listened to it, s/he got the idea for the ad. (Public domain, their arrangement. I have no claim.) Stranger things have happened.
Tuesday, December 08, 2009
Main Street's Revenge: Use Cash
From OpEdNews.com
Right now, there is a growing movement to Use Cash instead of credit and debit cards whenever possible. Once it gets going it will terrify the Banksters.
...
This relatively easy, non-violent action against the banking abuses and financial scams that continue to plague our economic system has many advantages:
1) By using cash we can significantly decrease a important stream of money that directly finances the very institutions that inspired our wrath.
2) Using cash instead of plastic is an action that everyone, to some degree or another, can take both immediately and everyday.
3) Unlike a boycott, no participant will need to suffer any self-denial of necessary goods or services. Just substitute cash for plastic as much as possible.
4) The economic standing and physical well-being of the protest participants are, generally, not at risk. For example: No negative effects on credit reports, like those associated with foreclosure or non-payment. No risk of bodily harm from police or other altercations during a march or other protest.
5) Denying the dysfunctional part of the current economic system funding is an effective, nearly terrifying, prospect to banking and finance target of the protest.
6) As the action of using cash grows along with the numbers of participants, visibility for the protest will expand until it can no longer be ignored.
7) With the tools available on the internet, there is little to no cost for either advocates of, or participants in, the movement. Simple: Use Cash and let others know you're part of the movement.
8) Because Use Cash is the choice of one payment system in the market over another, they – the banking/finance cartel and the government – will not be able to stop the protest.
Yes, cash is less convenient than plastic for many transactions. It's a small sacrifice we should be willing to make if we really want change. Use Cash is is a lot easier than throwing a lynching party we were never going to have in the first place, isn't it?
Learn how to make the Use Cash movement work at Use Cash Movement.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Zazzling free speech
My email to Zazzle.com, where I have some T-shirt designs for sale:
How was it unsuitable? If I remember right, the design was only text and read "Caution. Think before you replicate." It was a reference to the environment and the negative impact "baby booms" can have on it. Most likely a pregnant mother ran across my T-shirt design and it offended her, and you deleted the T-shirt at her request. Would you like to see my other product designs that would offend her as well? You could delete them too, but then where would you stop deleting designs that offend people?
You are probably aware that this deletion falls into the area protected by the First Amendment.
In your email, what does this mean? "• Policy Violations: o Design contains a trademarked image or text." What is the "o" for? Did the typist intend to type "0" (zero) but missed that key? Or is the "o" acting as a bullet in the list under "Policy Violations"? The design contained a trademarked image or text?? Do you have a copy of the deleted design in archives or backups? You need to show me what part of the design was trademarked. "Caution. Think before you replicate." What part of that text is copyrighted?
I think it's possible that an employee took it upon him/herself to delete the T-shirt because the message offended him/her. And because the list of reasons for deletion didn't include "It offended me," s/he selected "Design contains a trademarked image or text." Could the reason for deletion be a little more specific? What part of the design was trademarked?
Whenever I see an anti-Obama design on a Zazzle product, it really offends me, mostly because the designer isn't interested in the facts about the Obama Administration. They just want the guy outta there, and they'll say anything to discredit him. Have I complained about any of the anti-Obama products? Of course not. Free speech protects those designers as much as it does me. So why didn't free speech protect me this time? Because my design included child pornography? Of course not. My design simply included a message that offended someone.
Is this becoming a trend at Zazzle? You need to find out.
Zazzle said:
Unfortunately, it appears that your product, Replication T-shirt, contains content that is not suitable for printing at Zazzle.com.
• Policy Violations:
o Design contains a trademarked image or text.
How was it unsuitable? If I remember right, the design was only text and read "Caution. Think before you replicate." It was a reference to the environment and the negative impact "baby booms" can have on it. Most likely a pregnant mother ran across my T-shirt design and it offended her, and you deleted the T-shirt at her request. Would you like to see my other product designs that would offend her as well? You could delete them too, but then where would you stop deleting designs that offend people?
You are probably aware that this deletion falls into the area protected by the First Amendment.
In your email, what does this mean? "• Policy Violations: o Design contains a trademarked image or text." What is the "o" for? Did the typist intend to type "0" (zero) but missed that key? Or is the "o" acting as a bullet in the list under "Policy Violations"? The design contained a trademarked image or text?? Do you have a copy of the deleted design in archives or backups? You need to show me what part of the design was trademarked. "Caution. Think before you replicate." What part of that text is copyrighted?
I think it's possible that an employee took it upon him/herself to delete the T-shirt because the message offended him/her. And because the list of reasons for deletion didn't include "It offended me," s/he selected "Design contains a trademarked image or text." Could the reason for deletion be a little more specific? What part of the design was trademarked?
Whenever I see an anti-Obama design on a Zazzle product, it really offends me, mostly because the designer isn't interested in the facts about the Obama Administration. They just want the guy outta there, and they'll say anything to discredit him. Have I complained about any of the anti-Obama products? Of course not. Free speech protects those designers as much as it does me. So why didn't free speech protect me this time? Because my design included child pornography? Of course not. My design simply included a message that offended someone.
Is this becoming a trend at Zazzle? You need to find out.
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