Posted on 03/30/2011 5:36:35 PM PDT by Islander7
British archaeologists are seeking to authenticate what could be a landmark discovery in the documentation of early Christianity: a trove of 70 lead codices that appear to date from the 1st century CE, which may include key clues to the last days of Jesus' life. As UK Daily Mail reporter Fiona Macrae writes, some researchers are suggesting this could be the most significant find in Christian archeology since the Dead Sea scrolls in 1947.
The codices turned up five years ago in a remote cave in eastern Jordan—a region where early Christian believers may have fled after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. The codices are made up of wirebound individual pages, each roughly the size of a credit card. They contain a number of images and textual allusions to the Messiah, as well as some possible references to the crucifixion and resurrection.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Oh, I forgot, “In the Year of Our Lord”, of course, remains a perfectly acceptable way to write dates.
Most of your peer review journals as well as popular science/history periodicals are published FOUR TIMES PER YEAR at roughly equal intervals.
There's a USPS rule regarding the minimum number of times you need to publish to be recognized as a Periodicals Class publication entitled to the lower Periodicals Class rates of postage.
That minimum number of times is FOUR. It's been in place for over a century!
So, publish in December ~ then publish in April ~ then publish in July ~ then publish in September ~ you are hitting some peak times in America's public life ~ to wit: Christmas, Easter, Mid-Summer and Fall Semester/Harvest. This is a very popular schedule particularly since you can expect your readers to have some Holiday Free Time to read your publication. With that seasonality in place it's a logical step to do the Bible/Rome/Greece stuff in December. Other related materials gravitate around the other holiday periods.
Most of your peer review journals as well as popular science/history periodicals are published FOUR TIMES PER YEAR at roughly equal intervals.
There's a USPS rule regarding the minimum number of times you need to publish to be recognized as a Periodicals Class publication entitled to the lower Periodicals Class rates of postage.
That minimum number of times is FOUR. It's been in place for over a century!
So, publish in December ~ then publish in April ~ then publish in July ~ then publish in September ~ you are hitting some peak times in America's public life ~ to wit: Christmas, Easter, Mid-Summer and Fall Semester/Harvest. This is a very popular schedule particularly since you can expect your readers to have some Holiday Free Time to read your publication. With that seasonality in place it's a logical step to do the Bible/Rome/Greece stuff in December. Other related materials gravitate around the other holiday periods.
Only then will these people allow the Chinese the use of the Bible or to follow Christianity.
My whole point was that visual symbols can communicate powerful meanings to even the illiterate, and indeed up until the time of Gutenberg and for a while afterwards, much of what the faithful knew of their faith came from sermons greatly enhanced by sculpture, painting, stained glass, etc.
There's a fascinating little passage in the movie The Mission, when Jeremy Irons's character meets up with the Guarani Indians. One of the few items he has to instruct the natives is a small painting of a Madonna and Christ child.
Most Christians imagine that since Christians don't do that, and Jews no longer do it, nor do Moslems or a number of other fairly well known religions that we have reached that "time".
Hindus still use the burnt offering ~ particularly those who also "adore" a portrayal of a young child (as an icon, not a statue) who is also Krishna ~ a presumptive messiah sent by God or God's counselors or a Heavenly committee (or another hundred ways of describing how that happened).
I think we are falling behind with the Hindus. Words alone, and even limited Christian iconography have not succeeded in pushing aside one messianic vision with another.
We haven't even converted the Jews !!!
Note, I have a friend who does his "adoration" while standing on his head with his legs in a seated lotus position. He's now in his 70's. Try it some time. Otherwise his bigtime traditional "god" is the one of money ~ keeps a copy on his keychain.
I know enough about this business to figure out what is simply imagery used as a memnonic, or to push a certain philosophy into the mind, and also to figure out what is traditional idolotry.
I wish I could handily find the thread where this got hashed out. You'd be surprised at the number of people on this forum who aren't capable of differentiating...
Still waiting on someone who can explain how we can produce a Bible for the Chinese to read that isn't full of pictures.
This is no small issue with me. Think logically ~ let's say that to receive salvation we need to participate in the sacraments ~ and with respect to one of them every time. Communion is ordered by Jesus Himself.
So, we go further and someone says "Yes, we must always serve bread and wine" ~ not just a cracker and grape juice. I show up for Communion as directed but let's say I have that East Asian gene that makes it impossible to consume alcohol, and let's add to that Celiac disease which makes it impossible to consume wheat, barley or rye products.
That right there writes East Asian Celiacs out of Christianity!
So, I go back to the Sccriptures and they tell the Disciples to preach to the whole world ~ there's no exception for Celiacs or East Asians.
Logically, then, Communion can be satisfied with something besides wine and wheat flour bread. Protestants have earlier overcome their resistance to alcohol by relying on grapejuice, or water under duress.
Same here ~ we may need to use pictures or even statues to convey the elemental religious truths. But, we don't worship them.
That doesn't mean there aren't people who don't worship the statuary and pictures, but that's a choice ~ a bad choice. Kind of like making the Koran "holy". Moslems have buildings specially constructed for he storage of old Korans ~ a clear piece of evidence that they worship a book.
I hate when my conspiracy theories are punctured with facts!!!!!!!
Thanks.
Actually, that would be AD 750, AD 1066, 450 BC, etc. (AD DCCL, AD MLXVI....
You smoked me on that one Joe.
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