[Kansas58]

Point taken on the Old Testament.

By the way, once had a Catholic Monsignor, in a class for adults, (I was sponsoring someone to join the Church), ask where the word “testament” came from.

Of course it means “promise” or “pact” or “covenant” -— that is all he wanted.

Of course, however, the word itself came from the Romans placing their hands over their reproductive organs, when making a promise. The point was, “If I can not keep this promise, my children will”.

Think "testes". I tried to wiggle out of answering the question, but finally I did.

It was more information than he wanted, but it was the truth!

[Buggman]

Cool tidbit of information, if one that leads to some funny imagery (e.g. a bunch of Roman soldiers taking their oaths while clutching themselves as if they'd just been kneed, Michael Jackson as a covenant-maker, etc). That'll be fun to share with the class. Thanks.

Btw, I'd like to point out that the rabbis rejected Maccabees and the rest of the apocryphal books as Scripture (though they retained them as historical works) for a very simple reason: There were no prophets between about 400 BCE and Yeshua's times. In fact, Maccabees even makes a point of stating that there were no prophets then in the land, when they were trying to figure out what to do with the defiled altar stones.

No prophets, no Scripture.

Shalom.