Free Republic

Ever since the peak of the Hellenic empire, visiting the seven wonders of the ancient world has been the way to pay homage to the early achievements of human civilisation. But there was one catch for those who wanted to see them all. The farthest one from Athens, the famed Hanging Gardens of Babylon, in what is now central Iraq, existed in reports but its exact location had never been definitively proven. Of the other six, the pyramids of Giza remain relatively intact and there are ruins or at least traces of the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the statue...

It has all the outward trappings of another Arab Spring: tens of thousands of demonstrators, a permanent protesters' "camp", and megaphoned demands for the removal of another "dictator". Yet the slogans that now ring out on the streets of Iraq each Friday are the voice of a community not best known for championing civil rights - be it for themselves or anyone else. Instead, they are the disenfranchised members of Saddam Hussein's Sunni minority - the Muslim sect that enjoyed three decades of privileged status under his rule, and which spearheaded the long and bloody insurgency against British and American...

A research article posted on the website of terrorist-turned-Christian Walid Shoebat contends the oldest known references to the Islamic deity Allah are not in Arabian records but in Babylonian artifacts. Ancient tablets describe “Alla” as a deity of “violence and revolution.” “This link sheds new light since for many years we have been hearing various ideas on where Allah came from. Christian and Muslim scholars – as well as secular professors – presented numerous arguments on just who Allah really is,” wrote Ted Shoebat, the son of Walid Shoebat. In his heavily footnoted project, he writes that historians have suggested...

After a controversial six-year-long translation project, a Jordanian think tank based in Amman published an Arabic translation of the Babylonian Talmud. After gaining enthusiastic responses to the project from the Arab League, 96 scholars began work on the translation. The editors are happy with the project, stating that the lack of an Arabic Talmud "has always been an obstacle to understanding Judaism." Despite some polarized and politicized responses, most have adopted a positive impression of the massive scholarly work. Dr. Raquel Ukeles of the Israeli National Library states that the project stemmed from scientific curiosity, and the introduction discusses the...

Bible prophecy indicates that in the End Times, the nation we know today as the Republic of Iraq—known variously in Scripture as Babel, Babylon, Babylonia, Mesopotamia and Shinar—will emerge as the global center of wealth, power and terrible evil. Eventually Iraq will pose a direct and existential threat to the State of Israel, particularly during the Tribulation. Since the fall of Saddam Hussein and his regime in 2003, Iraq has not been a regional threat, much less a danger to Israel. Some have assumed, therefore, that Iraq would no longer play a major role in Middle Eastern or global affairs...

"We are brothers, We are a family of God. Not one of us is better than the other in His eyes. He loves us both. The future can only be won against the "Evil one" by all of us standing strong together." Malcom X

The Vatican is now reiterating demands for control of religious sites in Jerusalem. Jordan's occupation 1948-1967 didn't bother them. “Peace negotiations in the Middle East must tackle the issue of the status of the holy sites of Jerusalem”, Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, head of the Vatican’s Council for Interreligious Dialogue, declared several days ago in Rome. The Vatican’s former foreign minister asked to place some Israeli holy places under Vatican authority, alluding to the Cenacle on Mount Zion and the garden of Gethsemane at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. The first site also houses what is referred...

The Queen’s role as head of the Church of England may no longer be “appropriate” following changes to the law of succession, a group of MPs has suggested.Reforms agreed earlier this year by Commonwealth countries would create a potential conflict of interest because they allow a monarch to marry a Roman Catholic, said a parliamentary committee. It said that if a future heir to the throne were raised as a Catholic, there would be an “obvious difficulty” in that person becoming head of the Anglican Church on their succession. Under current laws, the Queen is required to “join in communion”...

The Catholic church in Germany is to sell Weltbild, its bookselling arm, after the unit admitted last month to publishing pornographic novels. Last month it was reported that German publishing company Weltbild, which is 100 percent owned by the Catholic church, was profiting through the sale of erotic novels. Weltbild is one of Germany’s main book enterprises, with annual sales of 1.6 billion euros and a workforce of 6400. Its interests include general publishing, a main national bookshop chain and book clubs. Catholic leaders were outraged that the profitable company’s book range included steamy pulp novels with titles like Boarding...

In 1925, archaeologist Leonard Woolley discovered a curious collection of artifacts while excavating a Babylonian palace. They were from many different times and places, and yet they were neatly organized and even labeled. Woolley had discovered the world's first museum. It's easy to forget that ancient peoples also studied history - Babylonians who lived 2,500 years ago were able to look back on millennia of previous human experience. That's part of what makes the museum of Princess Ennigaldi so remarkable. Her collection contained wonders and artifacts as ancient to her as the fall of the Roman Empire is to us....

Last Friday, Rev. Robert Jeffress, the Dallas pastor who introduced Gov. Rick Perry at the Values Voter Summit, spoke derisively about the Mormon faith of Mitt Romney, making the case that “Mormonism is a cult.” Two days later, he chided Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism as “false religions.” Last year, Rev. Jeffress said the Roman Catholic Church was the outgrowth of a “corruption” called the “Babylonian mystery.” He continued, “Much of what you see in the Catholic Church today doesn’t come from God’s word. It comes from that cult-like pagan religion. Isn’t that the genius of Satan?” Catholic League president Bill...

Who is the Scarlet Whore who sits on the Beast First we should consider what it means that the Whore sits on the beast. Walid Shoebat reasons by interpreting mountains as nations / empires and not as hills, the seventh beast empire was Islamic ending with the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1922AD. Revelation 13 claims that the “head” will be revived. That is, the Islamic empire will be rejuvenated coming from the same persecuting empires that preceded it, but NOT including Rome. This is a clear indication that the eighth beast empire will be Islamic, NOT Roman. We...

Comparing Christianity and the New Paganism The most serious challenge for Christianity today isn't one of the other great religions of the world, such as Islam or Buddhism. Nor is it simple atheism, which has no depth, no mass appeal, no staying power. Rather, it's a religion most of us think is dead. That religion is paganism — and it is very much alive. Paganism is simply the natural gravity of the human spirit, the line of least resistance, religion in its fallen state. The "old" paganism came from the country. Indeed, the very word "paganism" comes from the Latin...

Thousands of years ago, the king of a great city ordered that this inscription be carved in stone at the city gate: “Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, the pious prince appointed by the will of Marduk...full of prudent deliberation... the never-tiring governor who always has at heart the worship at Esagila and Ezida... the firstborn son of Nabopolassar, King of Babylon am I. “I had the gates built of sheer blue stone, on which bulls and dragons were elaborately painted. “I let the temple of Marduk, highest of all, supreme of gods, a place of joy and jubilation for major and...

snip Following years of devastation under the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and the ensuing American invasion of Iraq, World Monuments Fund conservationist Jeff Allen told The New York Times this week that archeologists are beginning to work on ancient Babylonian sites and possibly restore some of them. snip

If the cost of digging a trench is 9 gin, and the trench has a length of 5 ninda and is one-half ninda deep, and if a worker’s daily load of earth costs 10 gin to move, and his daily wages are 6 se of silver, then how wide is the canal? Or, a better question: if you were a tutor of Babylonian scribes some 4,000 years ago, holding a clay tablet on which this problem was incised with cuneiform indentations — the very tablet that can now be seen with 12 others from that Middle Eastern civilization at the...

Aizawl: The fear of the 'Beast' or the Devil in the Christian-dominated state of Mizoram has caused almost 1,000 families to refuse to enroll their names in the National Population Register (NPR) taken up along with the Census 2011 here from May 15. The dread stems from Chapter 13 Verse 17 of the Book of Revelations in the Bible which says "... and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark or the name of the Beast or the number of his name." The problem has stemmed from the Unique Identification Authority of India stipulating...

Well this should not be a surprise to anyone but Red Dawn is the latest film to be put on hold due to MGM’s financial status. With no executives to control the studio, creditors have placed the responsibility of the once great film company on themselves. This move has affected all the movies it was tied to, from the twenty-third Bond film to The Hobbit. Because of MGM’s financial problems Daniel Craig left Bond 23 for Girl with a Dragon Tatoo and Gullimero Del Toro left The Hobbit.

Ever since the Tower of Babel rebellion about 4,200 years ago (Gen 11:1-9), the vast majority of mankind has been governed and ruled by this godless political and religious system. This idolatrous ideology has indeed developed and deepened throughout the world system for ~ 4,200 years. Civilizations and cultures, ideologies and philosophies, religions and societies, cities and nations, morals and traditions have all sprung forth from this event. God in His judgment scattered the people (Gen 11:8-10; Deut. 32:7-8) to the “four corners” of the earth. It is these God-rejecting rebellious seeds - planted by the founders of Babel -...

A current study, known as the Future of Babylon project, documents the damage from water mainly associated with the Euphrates River and irrigation systems nearby. The ground is saturated just below the surface at sites of the Ishtar Gate and the long-gone Hanging Gardens, one of the seven wonders. Bricks are crumbling, temples collapsing. The Tower of Babel, long since reduced to rubble, is surrounded by standing water. Leaders of the international project, describing their findings in interviews and at a meeting this month in New York, said that any plan for reclaiming Babylon as a tourist attraction and a...