Learn how to mow down the enemy with machine guns at Ḥamas summer camp!

Greetings.

Jewish date:  22 ’Av 5770 (Parashath Re’eh).

Today’s holidays:  Feast Days of Eusebius of Vercelli and Peter Julian Eymard (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of St. Robert Goddard (Church of the SubGenius).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Ask Your Reps to Support the National Alzheimer's Project Act - The Petition Site”, “Support Clean Energy Jobs - Take Action Today @ The Rainforest Site”, and “Tell the FDA to Come Clean About Gulf Seafood - The Petition Site”.  Also along the lines of something worthy to do:  Save the oak trees.

Note:  I have finished reading The Hebrew Goddess by Raphael Patai and have written a draft review of it.  I hope to present the finished review tomorrow.

Topic 1:  More anti-Semitism (as if you did not know that was coming):  “Israel "Ethnically Cleansing" Bedouin Arabs?” and “Gaza Missile Hits, UK Press Misses” both deal with biased reporting.  The Dry Bones cartoon “No Big Deal”, only less politely.  “Hamas summer camp: Weapons training for leaders' kids” has a title which shows just what is considered important in Gaza.  “From Gibson to Ahmadinejad” notes that anti-Semitism may often be ignored or explained away when other forms of irrational bias are not.

Topic 2:  I cannot make this up:  “Sharia in New Jersey: Muslim husband rapes wife, judge sees no sexual assault because Islam forbids wives to refuse sex”.  The title summarizes it well, though do note the decision was overturned.  References in the Islamic literature permitting marital rape are provided.  Though I cannot say that the Muslim husband did anything wrong according to Islam, I am under the impression that freedom of religion stops when it tramples on the legal rights of other human beings.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor: “Teh Ten Commanments of Ceiling Cat”:


Peace.

Aaron

“Just a theory” does not mean what many people think it does

Greetings.

Jewish date:  1 Tammuz 5770 (Parashath Ḥuqqath).

Today’s holidays:  Ro’sh Ḥodhesh (Judaism), Eleventh Sunday of Ordinary Time (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of St. Annie Sprinkle (Church of the SubGenius), Feast Day of Ludovicus Rex Bavariae (Thelema).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Tell Boehner: No BP Bailout”, “Take Action: Support ECEA - Hold Big Oil Accountable!”, “A victory for the Clean Air Act... for now.”, “JCRC-NY State Dept Petition:  Urge State Dept to Investigate Flotilla Passengers”, “Make Alzheimer's a National Priority! - The Petition Site”, and “Take Action: Urge your Senators to support the Appalachia Restoration Act | Rainforest Action Network”.

Topic 0:  I have finished Mort (book 4 of the Discworld Series) by Terry Pratchett.  Now I have to get around to writing a review, which is going to be an interesting challenge since I am going to have a busy week…

Topic 1:  Updates on the latest anti-Semitism:  “Yahoo Divides Jerusalem” discusses Yahoo! trying to enforce an artificial distinction between East Jerusalem and West Jerusalem which only exists as part of a jihad tactic.  “Reuters' Double Exposure” discusses propaganda photograph which has little relation to reality.  And then there are two videos:



Your humble blogger also would like to note “Hamas rejects Israel-approved snack foods for Gaza”, which is absurdly petty; these people are very lucky that Israel does not close the border completely and forbid letting anything whatever getting through.

Topic 2:  “Russia Church wants end to Darwin school monopoly”.  The Russian Orthodox Church wants creationism taught in Russian public schools alongside evolution.  Needless to say, this is a bad idea since evolution is correct and creationism is wrong.  Revealing is this rationalization:

"Darwin's theory remains a theory. This means it should be taught to children as one of several theories, but children should know of other theories too."

“Just a theory” is a common misunderstanding often voiced by creationists.  “Theory” colloquially means what “hypothesis” means an explanation, whether or not it has any real support or is particularly coherent.  To scientists, a “theory” is not a mere hypothesis; a “theory” has evidence to back it up, and it is self-consistent.  E.g., the Theory of General Relativity is not a mere hypothesis; it has been backed with multiple lines of evidence and has technological applications, such as GPS.  Likewise the Theory of Evolution, which is also known to be a fact.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor: “good solz go to celing cat”:

Peace and happy new month.

Aaron

V is for “five”

Greetings.

Jewish date:  12 ’Iyyar 5770 (Parashath ’Emor).

Today’s holidays:  Day 27 of the ‘Omer (Judaism), Festival of Ridvan (Bahá’í Faith), Monday of the Fourth Week of Easter (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of St. Jethro Tull (Church of the SubGenius), Universal Ordination Day (Discordianism).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Close the Gun Show Loophole - The Petition Site”.

Topic 1:  The latest episode of V, “We Can't Win”.  (Yes, I know I have to get around to reviewing these things faster.)  This is not a heavily religious episode, but there are two items of note.  The first is that Father Jack uses his position as a priest to get to talk to a person of interest on his deathbed.  (Think last rites.)  The second is that Chad metaphorically calls Anna a god, which certainly fits in the image she works to create for herself.  Anna strongly implies in a retort that if she is a god, Chad is her prophet, which works considering his position as her favored reporter.

Side note:  It has occurred to me that the name of the Visitor opposition group, “Fifth Column”, is extremely appropriate.  After all, the Roman numeral for 5 is V.

Also:  Someone prod me on faster reviewing in general.  I finished The Color of Magic (Discworld Series, book 1) by Terry Pratchett the other day, and I need to start writing up a review on it very soon before I bury what I read under thoughts of the next book in the series, The Light Fantastic.

Topic 2:  Daily dose of anti-Semitism:  “Could Hamas Be Any More Disgusting?”  I really cannot make up anything this lopsided.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “devil skwerl”:


Peace.

Aaron

The comedian on Caprica should be banned from theology

Greetings.

Jewish date:  9 ’Adhar 5770 (Parashath Teṣawweh).

Today’s holiday:  Feast of Polycarp (Roman Catholicism).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Demerit Walmart”.

Topic 1:  Caprica, in its latest episode, “Gravedancing”, continues throwing us scraps of theology, and the scraps are not all that appealing.  Once again we encounter the cliché of “polytheism good, monotheism bad”, specifically in the form of statements made by a comedian/talk show host who claims that God is a “moral dictator” and a “big destructo-god in the sky”.  These are cliché insults.  The former is a complaint about the notion of a deity holding us to a moral standard.  The alternative would be what?  That we can do whatever we want?  That we should be allowed to do whatever we want?  The comedian is clearly not a moral nihilist; he opposes the “anything goes” attitude of the virtual world and shows moral revulsion at the notion of creating virtual people.  The latter insult conjures the image of a overly violent god.  This is, in fact, the sort of cliché one invokes about the god of one’s opponents.  Your humble blogger is unaware of anyone who actually worships such a two-dimensional god; even Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, has benevolent aspects.  (She is a tender mother as well as a war goddess.)  Such petty pundit theology is a mental shortcut to avoid thinking about religious issues, not to truly understanding them.

Meanwhile, the writers seem to have put a lot of work into Tauron culture, filling in details and motives.  I increasingly feel that I may have to rewatch everything in the series so far to pick of items I have missed.  A 13-year-old Tauron boy is considered a man.  Taurons are marked with tattoos indicating their ancestry and acheivements.  And revenge seems to be a virtue.  How much of this is religious and not merely cultural is unclear and remains to be seen.

Topic 2:  Today’s coverage of anti-Semitism:  “Mossad Passport Affair: A Stick to Beat Israel?”

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “wonders if i has evil twin??”:

Fortunately this sort of essentialism is only true in fiction.

Peace.

Aaron

Reality stubbornly refuses to conform to our expectations, and some people really do not understand this

Greetings.

Jewish date:  4 ’Adhar 5770 (Parashath Terumah).

Today’s holiday:  Thursday after Ash Wednesday (Roman Catholicism).

Worthy cause of the day:  “DemocracyForAmerica.com » Become a Citizen Co-Sponsor” (on health reform).

Topic 1:  More anti-Semitism:  “Double Standards? Nato's Afghan Errors:  Why are Afghan civilian casualties "accidents" but Palestinian civilian casualties are "war crimes"?”.  This is even worse than the title suggests.  Not only is an Orwellian abuse of language being perpetrated, but also noted is even outright denial of contradictory evidence.  Major rule to keep in mind:  our universe never changes itself to be as we want it to be.  Therefore denying photographic evidence showing that Ḥamas stores weaponry in mosques is just plain stupid.  (Yes, I know that is not the most polite terminology possible.  But it is the terminology which fits best.)  The theme of denial of reality also shows up in “How Christian Were the Founders?”, which deals with the efforts of conservative Christians to modify textbooks used in American public schools to fit their understanding of reality, regardless of whether or not the available evidence shows they are right.

Topic 2:  “Give up your iPod for Lent, bishops urge”:  I am impressed by this.  Self-denial is not seen as an end it self but as a means towards self-improvement.

Image via Wikipedia; the guy on the right is indirectly responsible

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “Cthulhu in Love Perfume”.  This product makes absolutely no sense once you realize what sort of character the fictional pseudo-god Cthulhu is.

Peace.

Aaron

A dancing monk, words with multiple meanings, and Jon Stewart

Greetings.

Jewish date:  25 Shevaṭ 5770 (Parashath Mishpaṭim).

Today’s holiday:  Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Ordinary Time (Roman Catholicism).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Heart Disease and Stroke. You’re the Cure.:  Alert Letter:  Let the Senate Rules Committee Know it's Time to Pass the Cigarette Tax”, “MoveOn.org Political Action: Tell Congress: Stand with Melanie”, and “Take Action: Help Protect New Mexico's Paleozoic Treasures”.

Topic 1:  “Japanese monk gets down with the beat for Buddhism”:  An interesting tactic for promoting Buddhism.

Image of the frontispiece of the KJV via Wikipedia

Topic 2:  Yet another problem with translation:  words may have multiple meanings.  Thus says the King James Version (KJV) of Exodus 22:28:  “Thou shalt not revile the gods, nor curse the ruler of thy people.”  The original Hebrew actually allows for four possible interpretations of whom one is not supposed to revile:  1) gods in general, 2) ’Elohim (= YHWH, God of Israel), 3) angels, and 4) judges.  The KJV, strangely, takes the interpretation least compatible with Jewish and Christian theology, option 1.  Intuition suggests the KJV’s misinterpretation may be an inspiration for Mormonism’s polytheism

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor, submitted by Harold:  “Scewby Jew”, in which Jon Stewart deals mercilessly with Ḥamas’s anti-Semitic cartoons for children.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Story Hole - Children's Cartoons From Hamas
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Peace.

Aaron