I just wished my jewish superintendent a Merry Christmas and Happy Holocaust. Be charitable and don't forget about these important celebrations among our minorities
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Forwarded from Red Ice Uncensored ⨁
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Well, look at that. The BBC did a puff piece on Taleb Al Abdulmohsen, the terrorist migrant that killed at least 2 and injured countless others at the Christmas market in Germany today.
The video is from 2019 and showcases his "refugee resettlement" website.
Source
The video is from 2019 and showcases his "refugee resettlement" website.
Source
Forwarded from 𝕀𝕟 𝕄𝕒𝕘𝕟𝕒 𝔼𝕩𝕔𝕚𝕥𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠 (_ScalpS_)
This is on the mountain where Jesus was transfigured, btw.
It was a holy pilgrimage site that just got defaced by the IDF.
This is unacceptable.
Other Israeli Jews are telling the account to keep quiet, and not broadcast this kind of anti-Christian hate so loudly because it could jeopardize, well, their status as "muh Greatest Ally."
https://gab.com/NeonRevolt/posts/113689321620672858
It was a holy pilgrimage site that just got defaced by the IDF.
This is unacceptable.
Other Israeli Jews are telling the account to keep quiet, and not broadcast this kind of anti-Christian hate so loudly because it could jeopardize, well, their status as "muh Greatest Ally."
https://gab.com/NeonRevolt/posts/113689321620672858
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For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. -John 5:46
Courtesy of https://news.1rj.ru/str/thebeaconsofgondor
Courtesy of https://news.1rj.ru/str/thebeaconsofgondor
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Forwarded from Dull Academic Incessant Liturgical Yapping: Philosophical Orations on Order & Reaction
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Footage from our Lake Superior home.... The chance of being annihilated by a frog while in a hot tub is low, but never zero....
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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Two U.S. Navy pilots were shot down Sunday over the Red Sea in an apparent “friendly fire” incident, the U.S military said, marking the most serious incident to threaten troops in over a year of America targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
Both pilots were recovered alive after ejecting from their stricken aircraft, with one suffering minor injuries. But the shootdown underlines just how dangerous the Red Sea corridor has become over the ongoing attacks on shipping by the Iranian-backed Houthis despite U.S. and European military coalitions patrolling the area.
Both pilots were recovered alive after ejecting from their stricken aircraft, with one suffering minor injuries. But the shootdown underlines just how dangerous the Red Sea corridor has become over the ongoing attacks on shipping by the Iranian-backed Houthis despite U.S. and European military coalitions patrolling the area.
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Forwarded from The Stiff Pour
Lets not quibble over a few details, this is EXACTLY and PRECISELY right on:
Christmas Isn’t Pagan
Growing up I was taught that the date of Christmas, December 25th, was a borrowed pagan festival. I couldn’t tell you exactly when or where, but I remember being told (more than a few times) that there were a myriad of ancient pagan festivals like Sol Invictus, Saturnalia, Brumalia, and European feasts like Yule, that also took place on the 25th of December.
“The Christians,” the narrative went, “moved the celebration of Christ’s birth to the place of these other pagan festivities in order to make it easier for converts and/or to encourage pagans to convert.”
In many ways this story made sense. Why not supersede, redeem, and cover-up the former pagan festivals with a Christian celebration? Christen and baptize these already celebrated days with a new meaning that moved new and inquiring Christians away from the darkness of their former heathen worship and fill it with light?
I was sometimes told, certain pagan activities were inevitably smuggled in, sometimes purposefully and other times completely unintentionally. Christmas trees, holly, wreathes, and so on, were all grandfathered trappings of a previous pagan context, forgotten and replaced. These decorations were incorporated into Christmas and over time their original meaning was lost and simply associated with the Christian celebration rather than their former pagan beginnings.
All of that, however, is bogus.
Where does the “pagan Christmas” idea come from?
If we turn back the pages of history and look into the first-hand sources, none of the modern traditions associated with Christmas today turn out to be some lost trapping of a long forgotten and profane past.
If you tried to get to the origin of these accusations you would find that their beginnings prove more modern than ancient. A lot of the blame falls on a Free Church of Scotland minister and certain concerns expressed by the Puritans of the 16th and 17th centuries.
The Puritans were well intentioned and undoubtedly pious. However, in their zeal to pursue truth they did not always get it right. The rowdy and undisciplined celebrations that accompanied Christmas concerned the Puritans greatly (probably for the right reasons), but where the Puritans’ motivation might have been well intentioned their solution to the perceived problem, at least on this topic, turned out to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Meanwhile, a Scottish minister named Alexander Hislop, in the late nineteenth century, also waged his own case against Christmas. Hislop wrote a pamphlet in 1853 noscriptd The Two Babylons, which was eventually expanded into a book of the same name. In his book Hislop argued that Roman Catholicism found its beginning as a Babylonian mystery cult, established during the Emperor Constantine’s rule in the fourth century.
Hislop argued that traditions like Christmas trees found their way into the modern world from Europe, but that the Europeans had adopted them from Roman paganism who in turn appropriated them from the ancient Babylonians. Hislop’s work has a conspicuous lack of citations for any of these assertions and prefers to make statements rather than provide any sources.
Nonetheless, many (if not all) of the detractions concerning modern Christmas celebrations and traditions can be traced to these two sources: Puritan skepticism or Hislopian condemnation.
The earliest mention of customs like Christmas trees are actually ascribed to Martin Luther. The story goes that during a winter evening stroll Luther was overcome by the brilliance of the stars in the night sky, painting the background over the evergreen forests. In order to capture that moment Luther cut down and erected a tree in the main hall of their house, covering its branches with lighted candles (Bruce David Forbes, Christmas, a Candid History, 50).
Christmas Isn’t Pagan
Growing up I was taught that the date of Christmas, December 25th, was a borrowed pagan festival. I couldn’t tell you exactly when or where, but I remember being told (more than a few times) that there were a myriad of ancient pagan festivals like Sol Invictus, Saturnalia, Brumalia, and European feasts like Yule, that also took place on the 25th of December.
“The Christians,” the narrative went, “moved the celebration of Christ’s birth to the place of these other pagan festivities in order to make it easier for converts and/or to encourage pagans to convert.”
In many ways this story made sense. Why not supersede, redeem, and cover-up the former pagan festivals with a Christian celebration? Christen and baptize these already celebrated days with a new meaning that moved new and inquiring Christians away from the darkness of their former heathen worship and fill it with light?
I was sometimes told, certain pagan activities were inevitably smuggled in, sometimes purposefully and other times completely unintentionally. Christmas trees, holly, wreathes, and so on, were all grandfathered trappings of a previous pagan context, forgotten and replaced. These decorations were incorporated into Christmas and over time their original meaning was lost and simply associated with the Christian celebration rather than their former pagan beginnings.
All of that, however, is bogus.
Where does the “pagan Christmas” idea come from?
If we turn back the pages of history and look into the first-hand sources, none of the modern traditions associated with Christmas today turn out to be some lost trapping of a long forgotten and profane past.
If you tried to get to the origin of these accusations you would find that their beginnings prove more modern than ancient. A lot of the blame falls on a Free Church of Scotland minister and certain concerns expressed by the Puritans of the 16th and 17th centuries.
The Puritans were well intentioned and undoubtedly pious. However, in their zeal to pursue truth they did not always get it right. The rowdy and undisciplined celebrations that accompanied Christmas concerned the Puritans greatly (probably for the right reasons), but where the Puritans’ motivation might have been well intentioned their solution to the perceived problem, at least on this topic, turned out to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Meanwhile, a Scottish minister named Alexander Hislop, in the late nineteenth century, also waged his own case against Christmas. Hislop wrote a pamphlet in 1853 noscriptd The Two Babylons, which was eventually expanded into a book of the same name. In his book Hislop argued that Roman Catholicism found its beginning as a Babylonian mystery cult, established during the Emperor Constantine’s rule in the fourth century.
Hislop argued that traditions like Christmas trees found their way into the modern world from Europe, but that the Europeans had adopted them from Roman paganism who in turn appropriated them from the ancient Babylonians. Hislop’s work has a conspicuous lack of citations for any of these assertions and prefers to make statements rather than provide any sources.
Nonetheless, many (if not all) of the detractions concerning modern Christmas celebrations and traditions can be traced to these two sources: Puritan skepticism or Hislopian condemnation.
The earliest mention of customs like Christmas trees are actually ascribed to Martin Luther. The story goes that during a winter evening stroll Luther was overcome by the brilliance of the stars in the night sky, painting the background over the evergreen forests. In order to capture that moment Luther cut down and erected a tree in the main hall of their house, covering its branches with lighted candles (Bruce David Forbes, Christmas, a Candid History, 50).
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Forwarded from The Stiff Pour
Santa, wreaths, mistletoe, and many other modern Christmas traditions may not necessarily have much to do with the ancient Christian celebration, but they also don’t have anything to do with overt paganism.
I don’t doubt that the Reformed Puritans and Alexander Hislop himself were well intentioned in their desire to weed-out paganism from Christian belief and practice (aside, of course, from Hislop’s fabrication of nearly all of ancient history). However, their understandings of many of the traditions they endeavoured to critique were often shallow, misguided, or fabricated wholesale.
Some of these critiques against Christmas sound like they could be spoken from the pages of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, where very similar accusations are made. For example, Sir Leigh Teabing, the distinguished professor from Dan Brown’s novel, retorts that “Nothing in Christianity is original! The pre-Christian god Mithras — called the Son of God and the Light of the World — was born on December 25th” (The Da Vinci Code, 55.28-29).
Brown thus portrays early Christianity as a group who were knowingly and purposefully appropriating the traditions of the pagans in order to coerce them into conversion. In their effort to win out against both the pagans and the growing Christian heresies, early Christianity is depicted as somewhat of a predatory religious movement, willing to dismantle and appropriate other cults for its own growth and wellbeing.
However, if you actually study what really took place within early Christianity that portrayal couldn’t be any further from the truth. To be sure Christianity did stand its ground against paganism and heretical factions, but their portrayal as a proverbial religious bully on the playground is complete fiction.
What does the historical record tell us?
The reality is that modern Christmas traditions are far less sensational and nefarious than all that and the date was not stolen from neighbouring pagans. It is true that many other pagan festivals did happen around the Winter Solstice, but correlation does not equal causation and when it comes to paganism and Christmas the evidence for causation is very weak.
While there were other festivals taking place on ancient Roman and European calendars, these had nothing to do with the Christians’ choice for choosing December 25th as the date to celebrate the incarnation.
The origin of December 25th as the date for Christmas finds its beginnings in the late second and early third century with the historian Sextus Julius Africanus. Africanus, wrote a volume noscriptd Chronographiai, an early Christian treatise that attempted to chronologically cover world history from creation to his own day. Based on calculations from his reading of Luke and Matthew’s Gospels, Africanus concluded that Jesus was conceived on March 25th. For the birth then, he counted nine months ahead which landed him on the date of December 25th (Sextus Julius Africanus, De solstitia et aequinoctiaconceptionis et nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae).
Africanus wasn’t alone on his dating of Jesus’ birth. A contemporary of Africanus, Hippolytus of Rome, wrote a commentary on the book of Daniel in the early third century in which he too states that Jesus was born on December 25th (Hippolytus of Rome, Commentary on Daniel 4.23.3.).
It is true that Sol Invictus, the festival commemorating the Roman sun God, fell on December 25th. However, our earliest innoscriptions concerning this festival place it at the beginning of December not at the end. In his work The Origins of the Liturgical Year, historian Thomas Talley argues that “[i]t is more likely that the Roman Emperor Aurelian moved Sol Invictus to December 25th to compete with the growing rate of Christianity” (The Origins of the Liturgical Year, 88-91).
I don’t doubt that the Reformed Puritans and Alexander Hislop himself were well intentioned in their desire to weed-out paganism from Christian belief and practice (aside, of course, from Hislop’s fabrication of nearly all of ancient history). However, their understandings of many of the traditions they endeavoured to critique were often shallow, misguided, or fabricated wholesale.
Some of these critiques against Christmas sound like they could be spoken from the pages of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, where very similar accusations are made. For example, Sir Leigh Teabing, the distinguished professor from Dan Brown’s novel, retorts that “Nothing in Christianity is original! The pre-Christian god Mithras — called the Son of God and the Light of the World — was born on December 25th” (The Da Vinci Code, 55.28-29).
Brown thus portrays early Christianity as a group who were knowingly and purposefully appropriating the traditions of the pagans in order to coerce them into conversion. In their effort to win out against both the pagans and the growing Christian heresies, early Christianity is depicted as somewhat of a predatory religious movement, willing to dismantle and appropriate other cults for its own growth and wellbeing.
However, if you actually study what really took place within early Christianity that portrayal couldn’t be any further from the truth. To be sure Christianity did stand its ground against paganism and heretical factions, but their portrayal as a proverbial religious bully on the playground is complete fiction.
What does the historical record tell us?
The reality is that modern Christmas traditions are far less sensational and nefarious than all that and the date was not stolen from neighbouring pagans. It is true that many other pagan festivals did happen around the Winter Solstice, but correlation does not equal causation and when it comes to paganism and Christmas the evidence for causation is very weak.
While there were other festivals taking place on ancient Roman and European calendars, these had nothing to do with the Christians’ choice for choosing December 25th as the date to celebrate the incarnation.
The origin of December 25th as the date for Christmas finds its beginnings in the late second and early third century with the historian Sextus Julius Africanus. Africanus, wrote a volume noscriptd Chronographiai, an early Christian treatise that attempted to chronologically cover world history from creation to his own day. Based on calculations from his reading of Luke and Matthew’s Gospels, Africanus concluded that Jesus was conceived on March 25th. For the birth then, he counted nine months ahead which landed him on the date of December 25th (Sextus Julius Africanus, De solstitia et aequinoctiaconceptionis et nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae).
Africanus wasn’t alone on his dating of Jesus’ birth. A contemporary of Africanus, Hippolytus of Rome, wrote a commentary on the book of Daniel in the early third century in which he too states that Jesus was born on December 25th (Hippolytus of Rome, Commentary on Daniel 4.23.3.).
It is true that Sol Invictus, the festival commemorating the Roman sun God, fell on December 25th. However, our earliest innoscriptions concerning this festival place it at the beginning of December not at the end. In his work The Origins of the Liturgical Year, historian Thomas Talley argues that “[i]t is more likely that the Roman Emperor Aurelian moved Sol Invictus to December 25th to compete with the growing rate of Christianity” (The Origins of the Liturgical Year, 88-91).
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