Is There Any Archaeological Evidence for King David?

Cyber Penance

This is the 3rd part of a response to an article that was sent to me via Twitter entitled Leading archaeologist says Old testament storeis are fiction. (Yes, that’s the actual title of the article.) That article was sent to me in the midst of a Twitter firestorm of responses to an article I shared entitled 5 Uncomfortable Facts Atheists Need To Hear by Barak Lurie, a former atheist. (You can read my responses to the firestorm here, here, and here.)

The opening sentence of this article, posted on Sunday, March 28, 1993, says: “ABRAHAM, Jacob, Moses, King David, and King Solomon in all his splendour, never existed, a 15-year study of archaeological evidence has concluded.” The first post in this series addressed the question of Is There Archaeological Evidence for Abraham?. The next post addressed the question of Is There Any Archaeological Evidence for Exodus?

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Samhain: An Introduction to its Mythology and Folklore

Heathen Harvest

Yesterday I was in the supermarket shopping for ingredients to make spiced apples. It’s a large hangar in South East London which could happily accommodate several small aircraft – arguably more useful than the hordes of shoppers unthinkingly purchasing useless goods for the weekend. Being late October there’s a respectable Hallowe’en section [the fresh pumpkins get thrown away on 1st November] comprising all kinds of artifacts from ghost to cat trinkets and plastic scythes. As I made my way to the tills to purchase my ingredients I caught sight of an abhorrently corpulent mother buying armfuls of Hallowe’en materials, deadened face, deadened appearance, going through the motions of purchase at the shop’s behest. One of the things she was buying was a witch’s broom – probably for her daughter.

It occurred to me in that moment that there was a strong likelihood she had no idea why the broom was…

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The harmony and lucidity in Palladio architecture is a matter of scale and not of size

angelsferrerballester

Villa Badoer (1556). Fratta Polesine

Recommended book: Witold Rybczynski, The Perfect House. A Journey with the Renaissance Master Andrea Palladio. New York: Scribner, 2002

“It seems to me that it would be possible to learn a great deal about Palladio by looking at his buildings, not with an eye of an art historian but with the eye of an architect, and not only as works of the imagination, but as products of a particular time and place.” This is the reason why I strongly recommend this book written by the architect and professor of the University of Pennsylvania, Witold Rybcynski, who has visited many Palladian villas in the Veneto, has lived in one of them and so summarizes his experience: “Palladio’s design had the immediacy and freshness of something built the day before yesterday.”

As it is known, Palladio is one of the most influential architects of the history…

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The comming of the Golden Age

Cradle of Civilization

The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology and legend and refers to the first in a sequence of four or five (or more) Ages of Man, in which the Golden Age is first, followed in sequence, by the Silver, Bronze, Heroic, and then the present (Iron), which is a period of decline, sometimes followed by the Leaden Age. By definition, one is never in the Golden Age.

By extension „Golden Age“ denotes a period of primordial peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity. During this age peace and harmony prevailed, people did not have to work to feed themselves, for the earth provided food in abundance. They lived to a very old age with a youthful appearance, eventually dying peacefully, with spirits living on as „guardians“.

Plato in Cratylus recounts the golden race of humans who came first. He clarifies that Hesiod did not mean literally made of gold, but good…

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Hintergrund 13: Das Buch des Propheten Daniel

Mt. 18:20 Today

Text als pdf downloaden: Klick!

„Daniels Antwort an den König“ von Briton Rivière, R.A. (1840-1920), 1890 (Manchester City Art Gallery) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-1923).

Zum Hintergrund: Das Buch Daniel

Im Jahr 605 v. Chr. schlug Nebukadnezar II.¹ als Heerführer der Armee seines Vaters, des babylonischen Königs Nabopolassar, die vereinigten Streitkräfte der Assyrer und Ägypter nahe der Stadt Karkemisch. Die Stadt, die zum Einflussgebiet zweier Völker – der Hethiter und der Mittani – gehörte, liegt heute auf türkischem Gebiet unmittelbar an der Grenze zu Syrien und trägt den türkischen Namen “Karkemiš“. Mit seinem Sieg über die Assyrer und Ägypter sicherte Nebukadnezar II. für Jahrzehnte die babylonische Vorherrschaft über den gesamten damaligen Nahen Osten. Für die Vasallenstaaten der Assyrer und Ägypter war die Schlacht bei Karkemisch ebenfalls ein historischer Wendepunkt, denn auch sie mussten sich nun genauso der Macht Babylons unterwerfen wie jene Staaten, von denen sie bisher abhängig gewesen…

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Nippur (E-kur/Duranki) : The omphalo of the Sumerians

Cradle of Civilization

An omphalos is a religious stone artifact, or baetylus. In Greek, the word omphalos means „navel“. In the ancient world of the Mediterranean, it was a powerful religious symbol. The omphalos was not only an object of Hellenic religious symbolism and world centrality; it was also considered an object of power. Its symbolic references included the uterus, the phallus, and a cup of red wine representing royal blood lines. The omphalos at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem, represents, in Christian mediaeval tradition, the navel of the world (the spiritual and cosmological centre of the world).

Among the Ancient Greeks, it was a widespread belief that Delphi was the center of the world. According to the myth regarding the founding of the Delphic Oracle, Zeus, in his attempt to locate the center of the earth, launched two eagles from the two ends of the world, and the eagles, starting…

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Markus – das Verklärungsevangelium

Aus dem Hollerbusch

Der 25. April ist der Gedenktag des Evangelisten Markus, dem Verfasser des kürzesten der vier kanonischen Evangelien. Er bietet einen kompakten Bericht, der mit dem öffentlichen Auftreten Johannes’ des Täufers beginnt, zur Verklärung führt, die einen zentralen Platz einnimmt, um dann nach eindringlichen Lehren den Einzug in Jerusalem und die Leidensgeschichte zu schildern. Markus endet mit der Himmelfahrt Jesu.¹

Bei Markus wird die Geschichte Johannes des Täufers eng mit dem Auftreten Jesu verwoben: Der Täufer wird anfangs gesandt, um dem Herrn den Weg zu bereiten (Mk 1,2-4), wie es schon Jesaja prophezeit hatte. Der Täufer weist schon auf den hin, der nach ihm mit dem Heiligen Geist taufen wird — da kommt Jesus, lässt sich taufen, und der Geist schwebt auf ihn herab. (Mk 1,9-11) Mit der Einkerkerung des Johannes des Täufers beginnt Jesu eigentliches öffentliches Wirken, das sich sogleich in drei Heilungswundern als vom Herrn erfüllt erweist.

Später…

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The Irish-Galician Connection

über The Irish-Galician Connection

The goddess Hekate — Hellenismos

Vlassis G. Rassias: «Η ΘΕΑ ΕΚΑΤΗ», in Rassias (Κείμενα), March 2015, last time checked: August 15, 2020. This is the translation of the original Greek text about the goddess Hekátē in excerpts. THE GODDESS HEKATE Moon goddess of the secret knowledge, of transitions and changes, which has power over the sky, the earth, the sea, […]

über The goddess Hekate — Hellenismos

A blast from the past: Boyne Valley; Ireland.com — All About World Heritage Sites

A blast from the past: Boyne Valley Source: A blast from the past: Boyne Valley

über A blast from the past: Boyne Valley; Ireland.com — All About World Heritage Sites