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Long before the fiery pits and pitchforks of Christian Hell haunted the religious imagination, the afterlife in ancient Hebrew thought was a muted, shadowy place known as Sheol. The Hebrew Sheol and the Greek HadesIn early Hebrew belief Sheol was not a realm of torture or glory but a land of forgetfulness—where all the dead, both righteous and wicked, shared a common fate. In many ways, Sheol resembled the Greek Hades—not in its geography or grandeur but in its indifferent stillness for humans. It was a silent cavern of shadows, where even the most luminous of biblical figures—Adam, Moses, David—drifted...

Just before writing this piece, I saw Gary Oldman in a London production of Samuel Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape. For those unfamiliar, the play revolves around an old man listening to a series of tapes recorded by himself when he was younger, musing pompously on his hopes and dreams for the future. In his present, desiccated state, he can only scoff at his middle-aged self, before being overcome by the pathetic realization that it is all up for him and that he is doomed to a miserable, unhappy future. It is hard to think of ten people who will want...

There are a number of questions regarding the whole Odyssey saga. One is how somebody as smart as Christopher Nolan got entangled with woke nonsense in the first place. (And yes, Nolan is smart – anybody who could take a storyline as convoluted as that of Memento and make it not only comprehensible but enthralling to the average audience is no slouch when it comes to intellect.) Another is why he felt compelled to pick up wokism just as it’s collapsing in the culture at large. It’s May 1945 in the Wachenbunker and everybody else is fleeing – but here...

The posthumously released book had been previously unavailable to adaptPeter Jackson has revealed that he is in talks to adapt further works by The Lord Of The Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien, including The Silmarillion. The Oscar-winner directed the original Lord Of The Rings trilogy between 2001-03, as well as splitting The Hobbit into three movies from 2012-14. These remain the only films to have been directly adapted from Tolkien’s books, with films such as The War of the Rohirrim and TV show Rings Of Power taken from information within the appendices within the books. However, in a discussion with Deadline,...

Alec Baldwin didn't take kindly to Elon Musk disparaging Lupita Nyong'o's looks over her casting as Helen of Troy in the upcoming film The Odyssey based on Homer's epic poem. The Tesla CEO grumbled that Nyong'o couldn't play Zeus's daughter, whose exceptional beauty sparked the 10-year Trojan War after she was taken to Troy by the Trojan prince Paris, according to Greek mythology. Nyong'o will also be playing the role of Helen's sister Clytemnestra, who was beautiful but not enough to launch a thousand ships. Baldwin defended Nyong'o via Instagram: 'Dear Elon… but she IS the most beautiful woman in...

"This is the house of Tarzan, the killer of beasts and many black men". This is how Tarzan introduces himself to Jane in Tarzan of the Apes (1914). Later in the book he rescues her from a “black ape rapist”. Tarzan started off as a character written by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950) in the 1912 All-Story Magazine before being edited into a series of books and films. The story charts the life of an aristocratic offspring of Lord Greystoke, who is orphaned as a child in Africa, raised by apes in the jungle, and soon becomes the King of that...

In this video, I review The Camp of the Saints by Jean Raspail, and talk about how I was blown away by how prophetic it was. I was especially shocked at how it predicted so many specific things back in 1973.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has identified more than 10,000 cases of potential fraud associated with a program that allows foreign students to extend their stay in the United States after graduating from college, ICE acting Director Todd Lyons told reporters Tuesday. At a press conference with officials from ICE and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Lyons outlined some of the findings of an agency investigation into fraud associated with the Optional Practical Training program. OPT allows foreign nationals who enter the United States on a student visa to work in the U.S. for 12, or in some cases 24, months....

Paradise Lost is the first epic of English literature written in the classical style. John Milton saw himself as the intellectual heir of Homer, Virgil, and Dante, and sought to create a work of art which fully represented the most basic tenets of the Protestant faith. His work, which was dictated from memory and transcribed by his daughter, remains as one of the most powerful English poems. (Summary by Caeristhiona)

Another of his timeless hits entered the Hot 100 in May 1960.Sam Cooke made so many outstanding contributions to music history that it’s impossible to choose just one song that defines him. His smooth, lyrical and expressive voice adorned countless gems, from “You Send Me” to “Chain Gang,” “Only Sixteen” to “Cupid,” and of course the immortal “A Change Is Gonna Come.” Another of his all-time greats, “Wonderful World,” debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 on May 9, 1960. The song was written chiefly by A&M Records co-founder and hitmaker Herb Alpert with Lou Adler, but Cooke himself is credited...

New audiobook release: Mourt's Relation; or Journal of the plantation at Plymouth, by Edward Winslow Because American culture is important to celebrate and remember. In this instance, the first Thanksgiving. Mourt's Relation; or Journal of the plantation at PlymouthMourt's Relation is an account of the first year of the Plymouth Colony who arrived in Massachusetts, and is one of two books used as primary sources about the first Thanksgiving. The other is William Bradford's "Of Plimoth Plantation". - Summary by progressingamerica"Of Plimoth Plantation": Bradford's History of the Plymouth Settlement, 1608-1650

Death of a Salesman follows two days in the life of the Loman family, who live in Brooklyn and have, at long last, very nearly paid off their mortgage. But they have perhaps never felt more insecure. Bills are piling up. Willy’s job as a traveling salesman has stopped paying him a salary. In his 60s, he is beginning to feel his age, and as he works for scant commissions, he’s started to exhibit a faltering grasp on reality, and an increasingly vigorous drive toward self-destruction. His wife Linda — senses terrible possibilities just around the corner. Meanwhile, adult sons...

Archaeologists in Egypt recently uncovered a massive statue believed to depict King Ramses II, the pharoah believed to be a major character in the Old Testament. The statue was found at the Tel Pharaoh site in Husseiniya Center, Sharqia Governorate, the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said on April 22. The site is in Egypt's Nile Delta, northeast of Cairo. Officials also described the statue as "remarkable" in size, weighing between 5 and 6 tons and measuring over 7 feet long. In a translated statement, the ministry described the statue as being in a "relatively poor condition of preservation,"...

It is not a book you need. It’s not anywhere near the top of your to-read list. But you have to buy it. You already know where you’ll put it: on top of the pile of books on your bedside table.

An example of Linear Elamite( Image Credit: Darafsh/Wikimedia/CC 3.0) An ancient Iranian mystery has finally been solved, according to a French archaeologist who reports successfully cracking the code to an enigmatic, undeciphered writing system. Known as Linear Elamite, the 4000-year-old script—once considered impossible to decode—has now been unlocked by François Desset, in an achievement that has drawn comparisons to Jean-François Champollion’s famous deciphering of the enigmatic Rosetta Stone. Desset, a 43-year-old archaeological researcher based at the University of Liege in Belgium, says the remarkable ancient script is the only truly “local” writing system from the country’s early history, which is...

This video has gone viral in the last day on Instagram, X, and TikTok. Reading ability (proficiency and literacy skills) among youth has declined in recent years, especially in the US, with scores hitting historic lows on national assessments. 👀📚 pic.twitter.com/CCMpWdx2Ls— Rain Drops Media (@Raindropsmedia1) April 29, 2026Like a ghostly silhouette, this video demonstrates the gauche condition of America's hollow education system and its extraordinary failure to teach children to read. Here's Google Gemini reminding us that "extraordinary" is an intermediate level word. It's not a five-dollar word. It's just a normal part of language. "She wore a silhouette of...

Sitting on bench seats in a retrofitted old hearse, stuck in quintessentially choked Los Angeles highway traffic, I listened to a woman narrate the macabre details of an 80-year-old murder. The guide, Blaze Lovejoy—whose business card identified her as a “dark storyteller” and “Manson specialist”—had already driven us through Hollywood. Now she was bringing us to downtown Los Angeles, the heart of this particular darkness. Lovejoy wore combat boots with flames across the toes and had a microphone headset on, her British accent giving the narration a Vincent Price vibe: “A Hollywood dream turned to a real-life nightmare, with a...

Mauricio Jimenez, 48, of Hialeah, was arrested Tuesday on charges of grand theft over $100,000 and organized fraud of $50,000 or more, Miami-Dade jail records showed. The manager of a Miami-Dade Home Depot store has been arrested in a years-long fraud scheme involving merchandise markdowns that cost the home improvement company millions, authorities said. Mauricio Jimenez, 48, of Hialeah, was arrested Tuesday on charges of grand theft over $100,000 and organized fraud of $50,000 or more, Miami-Dade jail records showed. According to an arrest report, Jimenez was the manager of the Home Depot at 7899 West Flagler Street and had...

Jean Raspail’s ‘The Camp of the Saints’ isn’t a racist screed, it’s a story about how civilizations die. In an act of censorship that liberals would normally decry as fascist and authoritarian, Amazon banned a new edition of The Camp of the Saints by the late French novelist Jean Raspail — and then quietly re-listed the book after online backlash to the company’s attempted censorship. The book, published by a small outfit called Vauban Books, was removed from Amazon’s U.S. site on Monday with almost no explanation. As of this writing, Amazon has not explained why it de-listed the...

We were newlyweds. We still walked around holding hands, even if we were just going to the store. I would say to him, "I love you." But I didn't know then how much. I had no idea… We lived in the dormitory of the fire station where he worked. There were three other young couples; we all shared a kitchen. On the ground floor they kept the trucks, the red fire trucks. That was his job. One night I heard a noise. I looked out the window. He saw me. "Close the window and go back to sleep. There's a...