Posted on 04/02/2005 5:41:14 PM PST by John Lenin
Still, you cannot turn the ancient Israelites into Irishmen. History, language and archaeology demonstrate that they are different.
And when it comes to supporting millions of people in states around the Middle East, you pretty much have to wait until Cleisthenes invented demoracy circa 500 BCE. He also invented the credit union and that made it possible for the Athenians to propagate an advanced olive tree ~ that tree made them exceedingly wealthy (which is another story) but when it was spread throughout Greece and the Middle East it allowed for a vast increase in human population.
Before Cleisthenes you are talking about city states of a few thousand people with rural areas virtually devoid of population. Empires were strings of small city states before the Greeks began colonizing the Mediterranean.
It takes a lot of technology to keep a large population together.
The Picts are continental Celts? First I heard of that. It is my understanding that the origin of the Picts, like the Basques and the Finns, is shrouded in mystery. No one really knows where they came from originally. The Basques and Finns speak a language totally alien to their neighbor races.
"Try the poster called Lenin."
Oh. My bad.
I do not believe in the Rapture. I've not seen the Rapture mentioned in the Bible even once.
Surely you believe in the rapture. I think what you mean to say is you do not believe in a particular version of it, the highly popularized version called the PRETRIBULATION rapture. Am I correct?
Though the word "rapture" is not in the Bible, yet the resurrection at the coming of Christ, and the gathering together of saved believers of Christ in the air as he descends from heaven certainly is.
"Rapture" is just a word that describes the following sequence of events: the resurrection that takes place at the coming of Christ, and the gathering together in the air as He descends.
I could read a book on brain surgery, but that won't make me a brain surgeon.
Perhaps you seek should spiritual guidance concerning what transpired between us, and I hope you will, before you again suggest that any part of the Bible is to be dismissed as unimportant.
Have a Blessed Day.
I don't apologize for things for which I was not responsible anyway.
Then, concerning how Islam spread, it wasn't all by the sword. Most of it appears to have been open, willing conversion. It gets spread the same way today.
Yeah, I bet those girls just line up to wear sacks over their head.
No you are telling lies about me. You really are a little pissant aren't you? All I said that for a first time readthrough one could skip the begats and you jumped in my sh_t likie you were my momma. Take a hike newbie.
You have to remember, wearing a sack isn't the worst thing that can happen to a woman ~ having her feet bound, which actually did happen to millions of Chinese women, is reputed to be far worse.
Your exact words:
" Skip the begats ... they only matter if you want to study geneology and attendant prophecy"
Shame on you for calling me a liar.
muawiyah, you appear to be the number one apologist for Islam on this website. What religious persuasion are you anyway, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, New Age Occultist, Mason, atheist, or what? Or none of the above, just a post stirrer.
I've never read the davinci code. Try Asimov's guide to the Bible.
First of all, I live in an incredibly mixed neighborhood. I can spit in any direction and hit anything from a Moslem to a Jain.
Secondly, I've studied the Middle and Near East extensively over the years.
You will find I am not "apologizing for Islam" but instead I'm usually correcting the record regarding ignorant claims. The Moslem world has enough problems without folks trying to solve the problems it doesn't have.
In my experience those guys are no more blood thirsty than Christians or Buddhists or Hindus have demonstrated themselves to be, nor are they less blood thirsty (as long as nobody looks at WWII). There are several other regular Free Republic posters who keep pointing this out to folks ~ to wit: these guys are human too.
In the meantime I actually belong to a mind-numbed, robot-like, knee-jerk Liberal mainline denomination called the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). They still preach ecumenicalism. I also have close relatives galore (by the hundreds), and some of them belong to the original cult, live out on mountain sides or other wilderness areas, wear sackcloth, don't see doctors, and chew peyote in between smoking doobies. I even found a couple of cousins at a two removes up at Red Lake the other day ~.
So, what would you prefer that I say about Moslems? Should I say they are all moongod worshipping crazy people? Or, maybe I should pass on my personal experience, one of which is that Abe across the way is a nice guy, and Abe two blocks down is also a nice guy, as is Mohammad, and Ahmet, and Mo, and Omar ~ I think you should get out more often. Meet the world. Find out what you have in common. Cease looking for reasons to kill your neighbors.
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