What We're up Against

Time to get the Bhurkas out, the theocratic Christo-Taliban regime is here, next they will be banning kite flying and music in hair salons.

Are there links available to the original news reports? If so, I'd really like to read what's been reported and any follow-up stories.

If this is true as reported, it greatly disturbs me. I'd rather not see this teacher cut and run, but to get some sound legal advise as to what her options are.

This just in: a teacher has been ousted by his christian community for reading a book promoting infanticide, genocide, rape, incest, and genital mutilation. But then they reinstated him when they learned that the book was the bible. J/K of course.

The rocky mountain news picks up some interesting stuff from time to time.

Tim asked:
"Are there links available to the original news reports?"

Try "teacher faust colorado bennett" at news.google.com

Sorry, Tony asked that, not "Tim"

GW

Web search for "rocky mountain news teacher faust", maybe?

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4486164,00.html

The story as written here is even worse. The school administration did not appear to stand up for her at all.

If you leave "faust" off the search terms, you'll find stories about another Colorado teacher put on suspension for criticizing Bush. He was reinstated last week. His case is different, and not as sympathetci, but it makes interesting reading as well. Letters on both incidents appear here:

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/letters/article/0,2777,DRMN_23966_4522348,00.html

Now this sounds familiar; from Wiki.

The name of "Faust" has since become attached to any number of legendary tales about a charlatan alchemist (some claim "astrologer and necromancer"), whose pride, vanity, and vile hucksterism would inevitably lead to his doom. Similarly, the adjective "faustian" has come to denote any acts or constellations that involve human hubris leading to doom.

Cervantes' "Don Quixote" and 'Count' William Dembski
Conrad's 'Kurt' in 'The Heart of Darkness' and Nabokov's 'Humbert Humbert' in 'Lolita'

All these stories are about the creation of private myth, literally a private reality which is actually 'Hell on earth' for personal gain, that the anti-hero knows is a hell and only on impeding death does the anti-hero repent.

Cervantes, Goethe, Conrad and Nabokov have their anti-hero neatly follow a 'Christian' death.
In the end, God saves Faust by bringing about his purification and redemption

See what happens when you only read the Bible.

OMFG. That's all I have to say. I can *maybe* understand what might get Fundamentalist Christians might get upset about stuff like Toni Morrison and Catcher in the Rye, but opera?

Just when I think the bigoted fanaticism of Fundamentalist Christians couldn't get any more over the top, it does.

Christians, can't live with em, can't feed em to the lions anymore.

What is it with Colorado? it must be the altitude and lack of oxygen to the brain.
Faust is a passionate drama,about unconscionable choices, and heartbreaking consequences - the ultimate battle of good and evil. One of the world's most popular operas, it is filled with touching melodies, rousing choruses, and unforgettable characters.
How could that be even slightly detrimental to a students education?

Sorry, I usually include references, but URL's to newspaper articles are sometimes transient, so I omitted references. Here's the best I can do.

RM News:
Tillie Fong, Teacher who showed 'Faust' video awaits her fate, Feb 22, 2006.
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4486164,00.html

Deborah Frazier, Despite support, educator sees no future in Bennett, Mar 10, 2006.
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4529857,00.html

Denver Post:
Kyle MacMillan, Dramatic tension bedeviling Bennett, Mar 21, 2006.
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3540512

The Post also had a column that I didn't use as source material: Ed Quillen, Another tragedy of Dr. Faustus, Feb 19, 2006. Quillen commends Bennett for at least having a school music program, then discusses Faust and scary children's fables.
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3517622

LA Times:
Search their site for Arts Notes, by Chris Pasles, Feb 5 and Mar 19, 2006. You will have to pay for those. I got one by e-mail and another from an unauthorized Web site.

At least since the beginning of the modern ERA, the English speaking world has had its Luddites. They have waxed and waned over time. In our time they have gained enough ascendancy to elect one of their own to the White House. Nevertheless, just as the 19th Century English man
wanted cheaper cloth, modern Americans will not go long without the benefits of modern science -- especially the benefits on modern medicine. Perhaps "informed consent" forms should include an acknowledgment that the treatment/drug/whatever was developed under the assumptions of Darwinian biology.

That's f***ing pathetic, is all.

Thank you to all for the news links. What I'm reading is really disturbing. Obviously, these narrow-minded screwball fundamentalists haven't heard about Article I in the Bill of Rights.

I hope that Ms. Waggonner takes this school board to court for wrongful termination and religious persecution. Last time I checked, burning at the stake was unconstitutional.

For whatever it's worth, I found this website. It has some news links, although some of the information is dated. It also has the email addresses of the school administrator and school board.

http://www.savetresa.org/

The ignorance and intolerance of the religious right is astounding. Don't these people read anything else besides their bibles?

What is it with Colorado? it must be the altitude and lack of oxygen to the brain. Faust is a passionate drama,about unconscionable choices, and heartbreaking consequences - the ultimate battle of good and evil. One of the world's most popular operas, it is filled with touching melodies, rousing choruses, and unforgettable characters. How could that be even slightly detrimental to a students education?

It is a stupid situation. I heard an interview with Tresa Waggoner's husband the other day on the local Boulder radio (Jay Marvin show on AM760). He's got a website (www.savetresa.org)that has a lot more links to news articles and other info.

Oh my Gawd! Danny Miller is right, this country turning into, a Margaret Atwood novel!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/danny-miller/janet-jacksons-breast-is_b_17611.html

Just what is it with these pig ignorant folk? Even worse, why do we listen to them at all? They should simply be told they are wrong, and be done with it.

Wow!! I suppose the Theocrats better ban Handel's "Messiah" and a few other traditional oratorios. Some of the solos were written for castrati and we wouldn't want that getting mixed up with our "pure" religion. And about those "trousers" roles.... Boy, real history is almost as bad as the bible.

Wow!! I suppose the theocrats better ban Handel's "Messiah" and a few other traditional oratorios. Some of the solos were written for castrati and they wouldn't want that getting mixed up with their "pure" religion. And about those "trousers" roles.... Boy, real history is almost as bad as the bible.

All good fiction is modeled after reality in some way.

Yup, it gets worse. The teacher was pressured to write a letter of apology to all of her students' parents for the transgression of teaching elementary school students about the venerable art of opera. Although she's still being paid her salary, she has not yet been allowed back into the classroom.

These people are absolutely nuts, and by this I mean no disrespect to people who are suffering from mental illness. (Mental illness isn't "nuts" -- it's illness. Filing complaints about a teacher because your kids learned that men and women sometimes played each other's roles on stage is just plain nuckin' futs.) Besides, I keep hearing complaints from the wingnuts that we're too hung up on cultural diversity to value the classics of "Western civilization". What in Faust's rec room do these people think opera is?

Was this country always this collectively stupid? For the life of me, I don't understand any more why anyone would want to be a teacher and subject herself to this kind of crap. And, no matter how teachers try to counter this in the classroom, the kids are being taught at home that education is an inferior option to remaining ignorant, superstitious, and provincial.

Public education was supposed to be our way out of this morass. Un-buggin-believable.

Excluding Christimas songs from a winter concert is idiotic, but so is suspending someone for showing a video of Faust.

We would all be a whole lot better off if we just lightened up and grew thicker skin. Life is too short to have to constantly worry about offending this or that group.

Was this country always this collectively stupid?

Other parents complained that the video deals with abortion.

— Matt Young

Sorry about the double post. I have no idea how it happened. Now, a further comment.

The superintendent sounds just like many other adminstrators I met through forty years of calling on schools (as a science textbook editor and publisher). For many the most important goal is to keep the school quiet and calm. Any teacher who tolerates boisterousness or does semething that upsets just one parent is a candidate for dismissal. Too many school boards don't like waves of any kind. So the teacher with initiative, like Tresa, either gets harassed or canned for doing nothing more than being a good teacher.

Was this country always this collectively stupid?

It probably used to be worse.

Those people are pathetic. Just plain, stupid, beyond hope, pathetic.

We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart. --- H.L. Mencken

Those parents are uncultivated idiots and their brains must have the electrical activity of walnuts.

I have a fundie-in-law that will readily tell anyone that Harry Potter and LOTR are devil worship simply because they deal with evil and sorcery.

A quote from Lazurus Long:

"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. "

mibad. obviously I mean't 'shouldn't be wearing'

"Excluding Christimas songs from a winter concert is idiotic"

Yes well then I would require some Mega-Death songs to also be included, with some Marilyn Manson added for effect.

How on earth does one illustrate the concept of abortion using sock puppets?

These are the people we are up against. I have absolutely had it with people like Matt Young and their concerted effort to censor traditional American culture and values and replace it with their own new age crap. Get out of my country, Young. Right now. Pack your trash and g-e-t o-u-t.

— DaveScot at UD

I think it was a mistake to exclude Christmas songs from the winter concert. They are part of the culture and can reasonably be included in a concert, as long as the concert is not wholly devoted to Christmas songs and does not become, in effect, a religious celebration. For example, a music teacher can use the opportunity to introduce Christmas music from other cultures, while excluding songs that might be perceived as "too religious." That is not to say that Ms. Waggoner should have been persecuted for excluding the songs, only that she could have been more sensitive to the wishes of the community.

what the fuck?????

good mother of god. Children in Detroit are rationed toilet paper and are lucky if they hear music other then what eminates from the cars that pass the schools and we are punishing someone for exposing children to creativity?

good god..

At least part of the motivation for the attack may be Ms. Waggoner's earlier refusal to include Christmas songs at the winter concert. The Rocky Mountain News quotes Ms. Waggoner as saying, "I told her we couldn't sing them because public schools didn't want to offend people of other religions, including Jewish people, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses."

Mormons sing Christmas songs.

(Mental illness isn't "nuts" --- it's illness.)

Has this teacher been put on a scale yet? After all, if she weighs as much as a duck, she's made of wood, and therefore a cross-dressing Satanist lesbian.

It's not even a metaphor anymore -- this is so much like a historical witchhunt it's scary.

Combining this story with the news item this week that an individual is being tried and faces the death penalty in Afghanistan, a supposed democratic ally of ours, for violating the law prohibiting conversion from Islam to Christianity, and I shake my head and say to myself were it not for Judaism I would be an atheist just to spite these intolerant and therefore un-Godly religions. No creed this intolerant can be an instrument of God. It is not possible.

I simply can't understand this at all. I've sung in Faust, and for the life of me I can't imagine what ANYONE would find objectionable in it. I would think any Christian parent would be giddy that their child was being exposed to Faust rather than South Park. After all, Faust has an overwhelmingly Christian perspective.

And DaveScot's idiotic response is similarly hard to fathom. Did he just say that a 19th-century opera was "new age?" What planet is he on? Oh right, that one with the supercalifragilisticexpialadoshus designer.

I would love to ask DaveScot since when is a classic opera like Faust considered "New Age"...

From Wikipedia:
Faust was so popular in the United States that in New York the opera season began with a performance of it every year for several decades in the late 19th century, a fact to which Edith Wharton makes great reference in her Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Age of Innocence.

Maybe somebody should take a trip to an opera house?

Perhaps it was idiotic of the high school teacher to keep Christmas songs out of school concerts (I sang plenty of Christmas songs in chorus back in high school), but using an excuse like showing Faust to fire a teacher is anti-intellectualism at its worst. (or is it because they're too stupid to notice the themes of repentence and redemption?)

My $.02: The most obscene statement I have ever heard came from a fundamentalist Christian. She was interviewed during a local news report on some teapot tempest over banning from the school library such blasphemous books as "Huckleberry Finn" and "Alice in Wonderland," and this woman actually said, "We have to put bounds on our children's imaginations."

I wanted to ask if she also planned to bind their arms and legs so that their bodies would grow up as stunted as their minds.

Wait, I can see DaveScot's defense of this travesty coming: She got what she deserved because she had excluded the Christmas carols from a holiday concert. So she deserved to have people lie about both her and Faust to serve that ends? Very nice.

Yes well then I would require some Mega-Death songs to also be included

If I can omit the usual polemics for a moment, I have considerable sympathy for traditional folks who are upset by the threat the outside world poses to their way of life. To college educated people it may be bizarre to regard Faust as a newfangled attempt to promote devil worship. It requires a serious exercise of negative capabilty to put yourself in the place of people threatened on all sides by a world they simply don't understand. These people are like an ice cube trying not to melt in hot water by sheer will power.

Matt Young puts up a post about how we're up against hysterical overreaction, and what happens? The idiots at Uncommonly Dense hysterically overreact.

http://www.uncommondescent.com/index.php/archives/936

Who knew Matt Young was a new ager?

I didn't mind when Mr. Scot ordered me out of "his" country, but to call me a new ager was beyond the pale.

You're darn tootin'!

Us old agers need to stick together...

(Anyway, aren't New Agers some kind of subsect of YECs?)

Kudos to poster tinabrewer at UD for investigating the matter more fully and pointing out that DaveScot, as par for the course, is completely full of it. Like many of the parents cited in the case, he blatantly misrepresented the situation with his ludicrous spin. Will tinabrewer now find herself censored for pointing out the site's chief jackass is a liar?

With all due respect to Jim Harrison, who said:

"I have considerable sympathy for traditional folks who are upset by the threat the outside world poses to their way of life. To college educated people it may be bizarre to regard Faust as a newfangled attempt to promote devil worship."

According to the Denver Post article (http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3540512), the average income in this area is $59k. This is not a group of uneducated people. They should know better. Most of them probably are college educated. These are people who are deliberately pulling the wool over their own eyes. Now they want to pull it over everyone else's eyes as well.

Get out of my country, Young. Right now. Pack your trash and g-e-t o-u-t.

Will tinabrewer now find herself censored for pointing out the site's chief jackass is a liar?

Abortion gets inserted into this topic the same way that the Catholic Children's Aid of Hamilton "discovered" a huge group of fetus-eating Satanists several years ago--by overheated questioning of children who scuffle their toes and say, "Yeah, I guess so." Fortunately for us all, the police found absolutely no physical evidence, no missing people, etc. etc. to indicate that it had ever existed.

What folks here fail to mention or even recognize in their profane expressions of shock and disapproval is that Ms. Waggoner, because of this censure, will have a very difficult time being an effective teacher in a public school system in the future. She will find herself thinking twice before presenting anything to in a classroom that is in the least bit "controversial". Most likely, she will err on the side of caution, especially if her family needs the money.

To my way of thinking, that is the real tragedy in this story.

Bob

Before giving Ms. Waggoner hell for not including Christmas carols in the winter concert, it's worth considering that had she either included Christian pieces or tried to be even more inclusive by adding non-Christian religious music, she might have had to field complaints as well.

One essayist (it may have been Garrison Keillor) recently pointed out that people who keep their holiday cheer secular in public situations aren't usually trying to be anti-religious; they're simply trying to be nice. Fox News may have put a "War on Christmas" spin on "Happy Holidays" cards, but when you're greeting groups of your students, business associates, or casual acquaintances, it's actually polite to assume nothing about their religious beliefs ahead of time, and that's even before one considers the role of the Establishment Clause in a government-funded workplace.

no thinking religious person would object to Faust

-World-famous soprano Joan Sutherland and her magical puppet friends present opera programs designed for the whole family. Presented with fun and humor, designed to make adults and children comfortable with this area of western culture. Spotlights two operas: Faust and Rigoletto".

There can be no thinking outside the book.

No deletion; Dave Scott has responded to tinabrewer, saying that Waggoner had to go because it's inappropriate to show 'dark operas' to six-year olds. What was that book about infanticide, rape, genocide, incest, genital mutilation, capital punishment and the end of the world called again?

Bob says:

She will find herself thinking twice before presenting anything to in a classroom that is in the least bit "controversial". Most likely, she will err on the side of caution, especially if her family needs the money.

To my way of thinking, that is the real tragedy in this story.

NOT JUST HER _EVERONE_ ELSE around who is watching.

Keanus pointed out earlier.

The superintendent sounds just like many other adminstrators I met through forty years of calling on schools (as a science textbook editor and publisher). For many the most important goal is to keep the school quiet and calm. Any teacher who tolerates boisterousness or does semething that upsets just one parent is a candidate for dismissal. Too many school boards don't like waves of any kind. So the teacher with initiative, like Tresa, either gets harassed or canned for doing nothing more than being a good teacher.

Theocrazy your breathing it.

One essayist (it may have been Garrison Keillor) recently pointed out that people who keep their holiday cheer secular in public situations aren't usually trying to be anti-religious; they're simply trying to be nice. Fox News may have put a "War on Christmas" spin on "Happy Holidays" cards, but when you're greeting groups of your students, business associates, or casual acquaintances, it's actually polite to assume nothing about their religious beliefs ahead of time, and that's even before one considers the role of the Establishment Clause in a government-funded workplace.

One can divide the state of Colorado into 3 zones. The blue-state capital of Boulder and includes Denver, Fort Collins and the mountain resorts. The Mormon zone is the Grand Valley capital of Grand Junction and paradoxically includes our vineyards and mountain biking areas. The red state is the rest headquartered in Colorado Springs and ruled by an iron fundamentalist fist. One needs only to go a few miles in any direction of Denver to get there. For all of you auslanders who think that Mormons (correctly called the Church of Jesus Christ) are scary religious cultists with many wives and scores of uneducated children, you are mistaken. It is the protestant fudamentalists that have caused this commotion and fear in these communities. Interestingly enuf solidly in the red state territtory is the small town of Trinidad which is the sex change capital of the USA.

No responsible commentator would suggest the USA is sinking toward theocracy.
Or would he?

Business: CPM LABFAB Labfab builds laboratories worldwide. We build interior and exterior, temporary and permanent labs at the fraction of the cost of remodels... Website: cpminc.com Contact Person: Mike Babi

"No deletion; Dave Scott has responded to tinabrewer, saying that Waggoner had to go because it's inappropriate to show 'dark operas' to six-year olds. What was that book about infanticide, rape, genocide, incest, genital mutilation, capital punishment and the end of the world called again?"

"Dark Opera?" FAUST? More proof that the bloviating DaveScot doesn't have the foggiest idea. It shows he has never seen Faust and likely knows nothing about it.

Gounod's Faust was roundly panned by the serious Germans because it was, to them, "Faust lite." It removed all the richness of Goethe's masterpiece and presented a tuneful, naive theatrical experience. To be frank, it's a lot of gloss, tuneful as it may be.

More to the point, it isn't remotely "dark." The ending is uplifting. The devil is reduced to a comic, snarky charicature who sings a "laughing" song and really has no menace whatsoever.

Don't get me wrong, it has glorious music--as I've said, I've actually been in it. But a "dark opera" it is not. No doubt DaveScot would consider Beethoven's Ode to Joy to be depressing.

To further my point about DS's mendacity, on the UD page he is corrected--rightly--that the Faust shown to them was not a play, but an opera. Unable to admit the slightest error on his part, DS insists it is a play and that there is a "musical adaptation of it." That's not the point, of course, since what he had said was they had been shown the play, which is flat-out wrong, as they had been shown a PUPPETIZED version of the opera that was specifically designed for kids.

Anyone who has seen Dame Sutherland's wonderful and classic series would know that these are as appropriate for this age of kids as WB cartoons are (which contain far more violence).

I remember being frightened as a kid by the cartoon where Sylvester and Elmer Fudd spend the night in a "haunted" house (really it was just the mice). Why oh why didn't my parents right angry letters to the TV networks???!!!

Get out of my country, Young. Right now.

Look ignorance has never stopped DS from sticking his foot in his mouth. His response shows that ID is really about religion and especially Christianity.
The real issue is that some want to impose their religious faith onto others in this country and that those who oppose this are given the opportunity 'to leave'. What a wonderful display of Christian charity.

Not that there was much of any doubt but DS helps strenghten this
observation.

Let's ignore DS, his contributions to both science and religion are mostly vacuous.
But let's not forget DS's behavior, and wonder how Dembski can condone such a behavior.

No creed this intolerant can be an instrument of God. It is not possible.

Another funny thing about this situation is that Charles Gounod, the composer of Faust, also wrote some fine sacred music! You can check some of it out at the Choral Public Domain Library.

One of his settings of the Ave Maria was composed as a kind of extra melody to Bach's well-known Prelude no. 1 from the Well-Tempered Clavichord. The Bach-Gounod Ave Maria remains one of the most beloved settings of that text ever composed. It's also popular with violinists as a transcription.

I guess that fundies do violence to more than just science!

What's so depressing is that a theocratic minority is able to impose their will on the majority through threats of intimidation and unfounded accusation.

American Taliban, indeed.

How long before the madness spreads to classroom readings of "The Tempest"
and "A Midsummer Night's Dream"?

No doubt DaveScot would consider Beethoven's Ode to Joy to be depressing.

Caledonia,bravo!Everybody,read "THE SECRET ORIGINS OF THE BIBLE"TOSEE WHY THAT BOOK OF FABLES IS NOT WHAT MOST THINK IT IS.iS rev.LINNIE A REAL PERSON ?

Let's see...um, it's okay to tell 1st graders about Jesus being nailed to a cross and that you will be tortured in hell forever if you're not a christian, but god forbid if they see a few minutes of an opera which I bet you contained nothing scarier then what they do on halloween.

When I read what Dave Scot wrote it just confirmed my belief that he is a very disturbed person. If I were Dembksi I would toss his ass out of his blog, not just remove his control over the blog, but out, gone, goodbye. Dembski is trying to present ID as a purely science based ideology without influence from religious or political motivations, but he puts a deranged nazi right wing psychotic as his representative? C'mon Bill, I hear Dave Scot has some bucks, if you're kissin his ass for money you should ask yourself if it's worth it, you're losing whatever respect you had by having a gigantic cretin douchebag as your calling card.

I support ID, But people like Dave Scot make me want to disassociate myself from whomever supports his nazi ass. I know I am not alone. Dembski is risking a lot of peoples goodwill by keeping a clearly hateful demonic person as his maitre'd. Just because someone believes in ID doesn't change them from being a lowlife into a good person. C'mon Bill, if it aint the bucks he's throwing your way why is that crap bag in charge of your blog?

Not everyone in the world is a Christian.

— AD

Resistance is futile.

The firing of one for making inappropriate decisions regarding what six year old children can and cannot be exposed to isn't the end of the world.

— DaveScot

What is it with Colorado? it must be the altitude and lack of oxygen to the brain.

I guess it would be too charitable to assume that the parents had mixed the opera up with the play, probably the Goethe version? Which, among other things, was inspired by an infanticide case, and has the devil as the only sympathetic character?

Nah, thought so.

Ah well, fundies have been happily burning books for hundreds of years.

Alas, though, burning books inevitably leads to burning people.

Caledonian,

The record speaks for itself, very loudly and clearly.

TheCult, you should join the little clan at ATBC.

http://www.antievolution.org/cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi?s=4420fe1506e12e1b;act=ST;f=14;t=1274;st=1620

The Cult, over at AtBC we've been watching Uncommonly Dense for months. You are not the first ID supporter to criticise Davetard. He's banned several ID supporters. Read through the thread at AtBC and you will find his dumb contradictions and misantropy well documented.

I expected Davetard to be dismissed months ago. But I've concluded that Dembski's already come to grips with the failure of ID, and now is just going through the motions to pull in the royalties and speaking fees. Putting Dave in charge reduces his workload. I don't think you would put complete amateurs like Dave Springer, Doug Moran, etc in charge of anything if you were seriously trying to build a scientific movement. You only put them in charge when you realize that your audience can't tell the difference between science, and technical sounding mumbo jumbo.

14. Do you believe America is more your country than Young's? If so, howcome? That was hyperbole designed to get the loony left stirred up enough to comment. That said I do believe that many people feel no patriotism and don't really belong in the U.S. reaping the benefit of a country formed and defended with the blood and treasure of patriots. Young probably doesn't fit that unpatriotic category but I want to see him explain why he doesn't fit.

Yes, well that is the point, isn't it? These folks are working hard to correct that "problem".

That was hyperbole designed to get the loony left stirred up enough to comment. That said I do believe that many people feel no patriotism and don't really belong in the U.S. reaping the benefit of a country formed and defended with the blood and treasure of patriots. Young probably doesn't fit that unpatriotic category but I want to see him explain why he doesn't fit.

What's really ironic is that the third commandment, "Do not use God's name in vain" applies here. It's a prohibition on using God's name for silly or petty reasons. This includes making proclamations that make God look stupid, petty, or evil, whether it's this mess in Colorado, the mess in Dover, beheading captives in the name of Allah, or Pat Robertson sounding off about Ariel Sharon's stroke.

According to Torah, this is the one sin God will not forgive.

According to Torah, this is the one sin God will not forgive.

The ignorance and intolerance of the religious right is astounding. Don't these people read anything else besides their bibles?

If they read the bible at all!!!! May be they just read the parts of the old testament about wars, killings, rape, incest, etc and stop at that, hence their lust for blood and persecution (of others that is). Christ must be disgusted that his so-called children are such a screw up they did not heard his teachings and specially did not read any uplifting passages from the new testament. But, alas they and only they are been appointed to determine what a christian is. As sure as one day follows another, Jesus comes today would have been shout at YOU ARE NOT A CHRISTIAN.
Way to go FUNDIES.

What the hell is wrong with these people!? How could a fundamentalist Christian object to "Faust"? It's ten times more about with their message (including its Christian authorship) than the "Chronicles of Narnia" ever was.

""We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture."

*sigh*

Karl,

Nobody has mentioned God's name here. "God" is not God's name. And I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it.

The Cult said
C'mon Bill, if it aint the bucks he's throwing your way why is that crap bag in charge of your blog?

er have you any idea about 'Count' William Dembski ?

He's a right wing nut-job and Dave Scott Springer is his alter ego, 2 peas in a pod.
Nice of you to step up to Dembskis defense but you assign him with far too much moral credibility.
Go and have a look at the comments on UD on the beating up of the comparative religion Prof at K.U.
What is this thread about? Faust ?
A charlatan alchemist (some claim "astrologer and necromancer"), whose pride, vanity, and vile hucksterism makes him choose unconsionable morals all for personal gain. Just replace alchemist with mathematician/theologian flogging a dead canard, charging $200/hr and selling glossy pseudoscience quasi religious tracts and we have our own modern day Faust.
The story is as old as mankind, Faust is loosely based on an old Greek Myth, How many Faust's are going to wake up, shower and shave tomorrow morning?

You may be sympathetic to the quasi religious implications of neoCreationism previously known as scientific creationism however the Money behind the DI comes from The Rushdooney Christian Reconstructionist Howard Ahmanson, a movement with a radical reactionary agenda and is purely political. The aims are NOT to promote creationism but to flout the law of the land by exclusively teaching their own religious opinions using science as a respectable figurative authority (actually scientism ) repeal the laws regarding the separation of church and state by hook or by crook. In short a theocracy.
Which is fine IF you agree with THEIR religious OPINION.

Is that what you want ?

oooooh Carol
Now I'm intrigued!!!
What IS god's name ?
It's OK no one is listening and writing it is not saying it so let's have it.

The sad part about all this- it does not even appear that the "offended" parents even really care about the actual contenet of the video. (how many have bothered to watch the 12 minutes of the puppet show presented to kids?) This whole thing is 1 person (the wife of a BOE member) having a infantile temper tantrum over not being able to have her way (re the christmas carols at the recital) and convincing others to complain based entirely on her authority. The same kind of crap heard in testimony in the dover case - Did anyone READ or UNDERSTAND the "pandas" book - no they just followed what the chairman TOLD THEM TO BELIEVE - I bet its the same thing here - 1 ignorant vindictive "holier than thou" busybody and a bunch of SHEEP!

Carol, Let me try? In Jewish thought, a name is not merely an arbitrary designation, a random combination of sounds. The name conveys the nature and essence of the thing named. It represents the history and reputation of the being named,it is represented by the Hebrew letters Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh (YHVH).
How did I do Carol?

I'm inclined to agree that this has nothing to do with Faust at all, and everything to do with punishing this teacher for disallowing Christmas carols. She painted such a big target on herself that anything she did afterwards would be adequate reason for termination - and doing nothing would ALSO be adequate reason.

# I was just slumming through that thread and found this: "Christians, can't live with em, can't feed em to the lions anymore." It's comment #88206 by BWE. I should also say that I looked pretty hard to find where this person was somehow reprimanded for it but couldn't see that it was even acknowledged. Over here, we have no tolerance for attacks like that directed toward any faith. I can hardly believe you wrote this immediately following a comment about people being overly sensitive. Non sequitur. -ds Comment by crandaddy --- March 21, 2006 @ 8:03 pm

Yes well then I would require some Mega-Death songs to also be included, with some Marilyn Manson added for effect.

— Kevin from nyc

Let's see...um, it's okay to tell 1st graders about Jesus being nailed to a cross and that you will be tortured in hell forever if you're not a christian, but god forbid if they see a few minutes of an opera which I bet you contained nothing scarier then what they do on halloween.

— TheCult

Holy Mackerel! After reading the absurd and demonic comments of Dave Scott at uncommon descent, is he Larry Fafarman brother?

I guess that fundies do violence to more than just science!

BWE,

I think most of us just ignored your comment. I suppose that's the difference between here and UD.

Here, if you disagree or say something we don't like, we let you talk. There, if you disagree or say something they don't like, you must be punished.

If DS is reading this, I'd like to know why he complains about being muzzled and silenced in scientific quarters and yet is advocating doing that very thing to anyone who says something he does not like?

You may be sympathetic to the quasi religious implications of neoCreationism previously known as scientific creationism however the Money behind the DI comes from The Rushdooney Christian Reconstructionist Howard Ahmanson, a movement with a radical reactionary agenda and is purely political.

— k.e

Jonboy,

All you have there are four Hebrew letters, the equivalent of four consonants in English without any vowels. That does not a name or even a word make. But you did great as far as it goes.

Do you know how the name is pronounced? Do you know what it means or represents?

I cannot and will not indicate here how to pronounce the name in order that I not be the cause of who knows how many lurkers out there trying it out in vain.

By the way, the name is never pronounced except once a year, on Yom Kippur, the holiest day, by the High Priest, the holiest person, when he enters the holy of holies, the holiest place on earth.

TheCult,

DI = Discovery Institute, and is indeed bankrolled by Howard Ahmanson. I'm sure the good Rev Flank will roll by shortly to provide you with a link to his website, which will explain in detail.

Carol you tickle me with all that stuff.
Now I'm off to the stoning. Are you coming?

CAROL,I would assume (and I am probably wrong)that how you pronounce Gods name depends on the context?
Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh (YHVH) is frequently shortened to Yah (Yod-Heh), Yahu or Yeho (Yod-Heh-Vav), especially when used in combination with names or phrases, as in Yehoshua (Joshua, meaning the LORD is Salvation), Eliyahu (Elijah, meaning my God is the LORD), and Halleluyah (praise the LORD).I think God can also be refered to as El Shaddai. There is another word but I'm not sure,I think it is in the sense of a military grouping or an organized array(tzvaot maybe?)
That's it, I tried,so the next time you say" I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it"give me a break!!!!

"God" is not God's name.

— Carol

Re "And I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it."

His name is Art - as in "Our Father, Who Art in Heaven". ;)

I don't believe that all of the working scientists and professors who support ID are doing so under the master plan of a covert or overt organization who is handing them money and their orders.

You're right -- many ID supporters are simply clueless stubborn folks who, having nothing of use to share with their peers, choose instead to amuse themselves by pretending to hold "controversial" views.

Can you feel the excitement?

It must be noted, however, that the individuals who are the most visible propagandists on behalf of the notion that "intelligent design" should be taken seriously all seem to be affiliated in one way or another with the Discovery Institute. And most of them are not "working scientists." They are discredited deadbeats, preachers, or mediocre attorneys (or a combination of these).

The connection between the Chalcedon Institute and the Discovery Institute, via Howard Ahmanson, who was associated with the former when his Fieldstead Foundation started giving money to the latter, is documented by Paul Gross and Barbara Forrest in Creationism's Trojan Horse. It's also referred to in this article by Barbara Forrest:

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/barbara_forrest/wedge.html

in the following extract:

"An ambitious strategy like the wedge would have been useless, however, without money. The CRSC has been generously funded by a number of benefactors, the most forthcoming of whom is Howard Ahmanson through his organization Fieldstead and Company. A rather ominous aspect of Ahmanson's identity is his long-time membership (until 1995) on the board of the Christian reconstructionist Chalcedon Foundation, one of the most extreme right-wing fundamentalist organizations in the country.[33] Ahmanson's contribution of crucial start-up funding is acknowledged in the Discovery Institute's announcement of the CRSC's establishment in its Summer 1996 Journal"

Nobody has mentioned God's name here.

"God" is not God's name.

And I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it.

I know god's real name, for I have seen it.

http://www.io.com/~o_m/omworld/images/blog/05-05/jesus_license.jpg

This whole story would be hilariously funny, if it wasn't for the fact that a teacher's job is at stake. Now it's just sad, and infuriating.
In my country, Greece, most people don't think of themselves that much influenced by Western culture (yeah I know, go figure).
However, if that incident happened here, the protesting parents would serve as a mere display of widely-spread stupidity, and maybe as something for the media to feed off for a few days. And that would be that.

Wow... Just finished reading the comments over at UD. "Dark Faustian ideas", eh? Out of a 12-minute sock puppet show?

...OK, I'll buy it. After all, for Dave to be so sure about that, well, he must have used his search engi- his vast arsenal in knowledge and skills, let alone his IQ of 153, to conduct a thorough and credible research.

It's also fun to see how he's "updated" his post, using his all-too-familliar style to make it seem like it's Mr.Young who actually apologized or took something back.

PS. "Who's afraid of opera"? LOL! If only they had known...

Wow... Just finished reading the comments over at UD. "Dark Faustian ideas", eh?

k.e. --

Please do not compare Dembski to Don Quijote. You need to brush up on your literature. Quijote did not live in a private hell. In fact, he saw things in a better light than they actually were. His was not a tortured mind, just a confused one. He was not a huckster, nor was he out for personal gain. Alonso Quijana believed he was a knight living by a strict moral code. He was, of course, a little daft. Cervantes' message was that even the daft can act more sane than "normal" people do.

Comparing Dembski to Quijote elevates Dembski. I'm not sure that was your intent.

Sorry for the grumpiness. I studied Cervantes for three years in college, so I'm touchy on the subject.

One point I think needs to be stressed is that the people attacking Ms. Waggoner are anti-Christian. The community members accusing her of devil worship and such are anti-Christian. Her school administration is anti-Christian. DaveScott is anti-Christian. There are few people more virulently anti-Christian than a fundamentalist Christian. Oh, they may support one narrow interpreation of Christianity which has a couple dozen followers, but they are very much opposed to the rest of the Christians in the world. Many of them go so far as to refuse even to call other Christians Christians. I occasionally see Christian beliefs attacked by athiests; I see such attacks incessantly from other Christians.

So for those of you who think it is okay for the government to support religion, remember that any religion which the government supports has about a one in a million chance of being your religion.

BWE: Your remark reminds me of one from an ancient historian (name forgotten, I'm afraid) who was asked, 'What do you think of the Roman repression of Christianity?' His reply: "Too little, too late."

I wanted to add: Those making such a fuss about your crack need a perspective adjustment-- there's a big difference between trading a witty insult or two & firing someone for doing something creative and educational in their classroom.

Yup, it gets worse. The teacher was pressured to write a letter of apology to all of her students' parents for the transgression of teaching elementary school students about the venerable art of opera. Although she's still being paid her salary, she has not yet been allowed back into the classroom.

Tina Brewer posted: In the news article which is linked, specific reference is made to the comment of the mother to the teacher "aren't you a Christian?". To me, this just says it all. So what if she isn't a Christian?

Your point seems to be that somehow a caring mother's questioning of the teacher's faith vindicates her (the teacher) from the crime of conspicuous emotional and spiritual abuse of innocent children. Since when are 6 year old children able to judge the moral value of entertainment media? Any parent of a first grader would know that it is not a slippery slope; it is quite simply barbarian indoctrination to expose children to such crud. Put a six year old in front of a porno and they will react quite predictably.

Locked behind closed doors in public schools, parents have no defense. You might as well bring in live sex shows and indoctrinate our children in Kindergarten so they're ready for all the pain and agony of the adulthood they're being groomed for by the primary "defenders" of our democracy: the ACLU.

Did I get a post deleted? Or did something go wrong? I responded to dougmoran, and I believe I sent it off properly...

Your point seems to be that somehow a caring mother's questioning of the teacher's faith vindicates her (the teacher) from the crime of conspicuous emotional and spiritual abuse of innocent children.

Here's more of what we're up against.

I could swear DaveScot wrote the above.

"God" is not God's name.

Off topic, but indirectly relevant to the issue of blasphemy: In the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe, the superdooper computer determined that the ultimate answer is 42--we never find out what the ultimate question was. I've wondered for a long time if the 42 is a reference to the especially powerful 42 letter name of God discussed in the Kabbalah. Does anybody have a line on this?

In Fulton, Missouri, local "Christians" complained about the high school putting on Grease because it referred to (HORRORS!!) smoking, drinking, and maybe even SEX in high school. The drama teacher then suggested The Crucible for the spring play, but that was deemed too "controversial." The teacher is leaving the school district at the end of the year.

Ironically, the play chosen for this spring was Midsummer Night's Dream, which features (HORRORS!!) cross-dressing, fairies, and BESTIAL SEX.

This latest episode of The Attack of the Bluenoses would be laughable except for the cowardice of people who should know better.

"I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it."

'Clapton,' right? Isn't it 'Clapton'?

Jonboy,

All the Hebrew terms for God you cite are considered "titles" for God, not His personal name. For example, Elohim means "ruler", El means "the mighty", Adonay means "master", and so on.

God's personal name, the one tradition asserts that He chose for himself and conveyed this choice to the Israelites through Moses, and the name that is forbidden to be uttered but for the High Priest on Yom Kippur in the Holy of Holies, is none of those you mention.

Do I know that name? Yes. And I am not the only one. Will I reveal it here? No.

AR,

Now, despite the fact that the above "titles" are not names of God and are not in the same lofty catagory as the name, observant Jews do treat those titles with great care and respect and use substitutes in their stead.

Your declared expectation of a condenscending comment from me was most condenscending. Keep it up and you will join the club here of those I do not talk to.

Congratulations, AR! If enough of us all get into the cool "Carol won't speak to us" Club, maybe she won't have anyone left to talk to and she'll go pandering elsewhere. Perhaps responding to the deceptive little book salesperson isn't such a bad idea after all.

I think I've been in the club for a while now, but it's never been so explicitly laid out. Maybe we can all get cool decoder rings, so we can all read the flood story in the original --- it's called the "Epic of Gilgemesh" and it wasn't in hebrew.

And as has been pointed out to you several times, book salesperson, elohim is plural, and nobody cares what you or Landa think, and god's name is Fred.

Nobody has mentioned God's name here. "God" is not God's name. And I am quite sure most folks here wouldn't know God's name if they tripped over it.

Carol, Let me try? In Jewish thought, a name is not merely an arbitrary designation, a random combination of sounds. The name conveys the nature and essence of the thing named. It represents the history and reputation of the being named,it is represented by the Hebrew letters Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh (YHVH).

I know about the lunatics of the Christian Reconstructionist movement but I have never read anything about Rushdoony or the Chalcedon Foundation bankrolling the ID movement. Can you direct me towards some info on that?

I don't believe that all of the working scientists and professors who support ID are doing so under the master plan of a covert or overt organization who is handing them money and their orders.

Carol, Sole Keeper of the Ultimate Answer to Life, The Universe, and Everything, That Knowledge Which is Without Form and Void Unless Spoken in the Original Language, didst write:

Keep it up and you will join the club here of those I do not talk to.

That's most of us already -- she's completely ignored any question or fact that brings the slightest doubt on her silly and untenable thesis.

And they were dumb enough to allow their written plan to get leaked to the Internet...

They HAD to release the plan, otherwise their public rhetoric would be utter gbberish, even to their most ardent supporters. How else can they keep their radical Christian base mollified while telling the rest of us that their creation-story has nothing at all to do with religion? At some point, there would have had to be a definitive statement assuring their Christian supporters that their "we're not saying it was God" line is a lie -- otherwise the wrong people would have believed it.

.... You might as well bring in live sex shows and indoctrinate our children in Kindergarten so they're ready for all the pain and agony of the adulthood they're being groomed for ...

A bit off topic, but:
Do not underestimate the terror and trauma puppets can inflict. In Swedish television in the 70's there was a children's program series called "lost in the pancake", by a man called Staffan Westerberg, that featured puppets. That traumatized an entire generation of Swedish children. In polls about who people hate most, he tends to come just below Hitler and Stalin.

(Is it a coincidence that Staffan is spelled almost the same as Satan?)

http://www.wellbutrin-xl.com/

The above helps the pain and agony part too. (Plus a little ky.)

Oh, that's right, Carol is well above the knowledge of the actual writers of the Torah. The Elohist writer apparently didn't know "God's name", or that El was just a title, but Carol knows better than a mere Torah author.

Well, I'm glad that's all clear now. What I'm still wondering is if God had a name before Hebrew evolved into a form that we'd recognize. Did He just wait around being called "hey you" by all of the angels, hoping that primates on planet earth would come up with a language in which He could be named?

The IDists strike again, this time at the autonomy of God.

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/b8ykm

wheatdogg Said:

Please do not compare Dembski to Don Quijote....Sorry for the grumpiness. I studied Cervantes for three years in college, so I'm touchy on the subject.

Another literature lover, Namaste. No need to apologize.
Yes there is always a danger drawing a bow when life imitates art, just remember the story has only started for Dembski he has a long way to go yet and the future is anyones guess. Actually life doesn't imitate art as you know, but arts source IS life and can provide a window into other peoples minds. The Greek Myths are not just about an ancient culture, Paris, that smooth operator is chasing girls in a nightclub tonight.

You're right my brush did paint a little too broadly over Don Quijote by not making clear that 'Count' Dembski's hucksterism for personal gain was more Faustian or Kurtish? (Heart of Darkness) or HH in (Lolita) than Quixotic. Note Kurt who created his own cult based on his own private myth, and had a mural of Lady Justice on the inside wall of his hut and knew he would have to face the music one day....Our Billy boy took the chickens option of not having his day in court in Dover and don't tell me he didn't know what would happen or that it didn't bother him. He will have to meet his maker the mad molecule(his conscience if he has one) one day so I'm guessing a death bed confession ....or not. Lolita takes the private myth creation to justify H.H's Madness to a new level but that arc in western literature can be traced back to Don Quixote. Madness as unfulfillable material desire.

Allow me to offer this. Note this is how I SEE it I'm not saying it is how anyone else would see it.
Cervantes wrote his masterpiece, which someone I met recently claimed was the second most popular book in the world after the Bible, at a time when the age of reason was beginning, the world was spherical after all and the idea of heaven and hell as separate places was plainly nonsense. The old romantic ideas of chivalry, honor and the idea that a man could find spiritual fulfillment by following an Arthurian idyll(yes That strict moral code, but also the lone journey of self discovery and the getting of wisdom), were on their way out. In a reaction to early humanistic reason's rejection of romanticism Alonso Quijana embarks on his own 'Fools Journey'(read this SUBJECTIVELY) he is called on a voyage of self discovery suddenly everything makes sense, or so it seems. He creates his own reality by reading mythic knights tales (creating a private myth) and imposes a semiotic heuristic onto the real world, that reality in his case, is actually a form of schizophrenia(the inward journey) his windmills (reality) are enchanted monsters from the imagined heroic deeds of the knights in the stories he has read. His platonic ideals of how life should BE cause him to create a magical reality, a common problem with new converts to particular religious sects interestingly enough. That insanity or madness is literally "to loose ones senses" if that is not a personal Hell, then what is hell ? Cervantes,Conrad,Nabokov move their characters resolve the insanity and redeem their anti-heroes so art may not imitate life ...no?
The Demskian parallel complete with Salvador Cordova as his Sancho Panza is just too much to resist.
All Sal wanted was a little fame and glory he knew Dembski's pontifications were just crazy rants in the end, after trying and failing to get them accepted here on PT. The end for him was when he popped his top after Eugenie Scott gushed all over him at some gig but still knifed him by coyly referring to their scheme as social engineering.

"These people are like an ice cube trying not to melt in hot water by sheer will power."

One of the best lines I've ever heard. Anyone agree with me that it seems to be the prevailing human condition?

Cervantes wrote his masterpiece, which someone I met recently claimed was the second most popular book in the world after the Bible

Not Marx? I couldn't find it on the web but for some reason I always thought it was marx. Athough Cervantes is pretty good. Hi Ho Rocinante.

I'm an athiest and as liberal as the day is long and i still don't think FSM is funny.
it lacks any subtlety. good satire should be should be scathing and clever and witty. FSM is a sack of doorknobs to face, it's a dick and fart joke, not a very good one either. it reads like a fifth graders idea of parody.

also expelled for trying to expose kids to high culture. yeah thats gonna help the american education system

Hmmmm. If sex is "pain and agony", doesn't that mean you're doing it wrong?

Do I know that name? Yes. And I am not the only one. Will I reveal it here? No.

Keep it up and you will join the club here of those I do not talk to.

Somewhat off topic, but since it came up, Carol Clouser has exposed an interesting conundrum:
1. The name of G-d is pronounced only once a year, by the high priest, in the Holy of Holies, on Yom Kippur. The high priest is supposed to be alone; no one else may enter.
2. It is forbidded to write the name of G-d.

So how is the name of G-d passed on the next high priest? Perhaps exceptions are made for the training of the next high priest?

But women are prohibited from being high priests, so how did Carol learn this information? And to what purpose?

When I was a kid, we used to tease other children by saying "I know something you don't know, and I'm not gonna tell." Of course what we knew was inconsequential, but it sure irritated the others.

Now I'll go back to lurking.

so how did Carol learn this information?

k.e. --

And did I mention how much I dislike psychological literary analysis?

Just kidding. I got out of that game ages ago. Your point is well taken, if you are saying that Dembski et al. have created their own internally self-consistent world view that has little to do with the real world. They tilt at windmills (evolution), only to be dashed to the ground, then rationalize the experience by referring back to their internal world. Wizards enchanted the giants and made them into windmills!

Quijote was more likeable as a character, though. Humbert Humbert was just plain creepy, as well as tragic.

The debate about God's name here brings to mind an Arthur C. Clarke short story called "The Nine Billion Names of God." A computer in a Buddhist monastery has been programmed to find all of the names. When it reaches the last one, the stars go out.

So, just in case, folks, ease up on the names. You've used up a few already.

Put a six year old in front of a porno and they will react quite predictably.

— Doug Moran, at Uncommon Descent, apparently

Wheatdog:
Sure Psychological analysis of literature can take the pleasure out of letting a story wash over us and just let its meaning float to the surface, but for me on revisiting a story and trying to understand today's events, it does help to make sense of the human condition an 'aid de memoir' if you like. And artists (probably unknowingly) tap into what for me are the hidden aspects of that condition. One tool of many. And depending on the point of view of the reader (are there any left ?) that type of 'reading' will of course provide 'internally consistent' results.
I agree Don Quixote IS a sympathetic character.... and for the later 'incarnations'.... has the world become a less sympathetic place ?
Anyway it all gets a bit academic, like science, art 'as a spectator sport' is subject to the prejudices, personal beliefs, likes and dislikes of the spectator.
A truly great artist is one who can construct a story that talks to all of us and we each see 'into the mind of man' or the 'aspects of the other', expanding our horizons.
Movies today are probably performing that function best; note where they get their inspiration from ...mans timeless tales, mythology.
Strangely that would be the ideal function of the old sacred texts which religion and windmill tilters constantly manage to twist into a form of madness.

burredbrain,

There always existed a small circle of priests (kohanim), Levites (assistants to the priests) and scholars who knew the name in the holy tounge and passed the information on from generation to generation by providing instructions for its enunciation without actually enunciating it.

I happen to know this by virtue to my good fortune as a Levite and my many years of study.

The name is based on a hebrew acronym for the Hebrew words that mean, "was, is and will be", not in this order.

As I said the Bible (that is the original correct version) makes all this quite clear, one just needs to know where to look.

Unfortunately, none of this has any practical consquences in the absence of the temple on Mt. Moriah, presently occupied by those Islamic structures put up there for the sole purpose of mimicking and being a thorn in the side of Judaism (despite what they say or claim).

There always existed a small circle of priests (kohanim), Levites (assistants to the priests) and scholars who knew the name in the holy tounge and passed the information on from generation to generation by providing instructions for its enunciation without actually enunciating it.

— Carol Clouser

I happen to know this by virtue to my good fortune as a Levite and my many years of study.

The name is based on a hebrew acronym for the Hebrew words that mean, "was, is and will be", not in this order.

As I said the Bible (that is the original correct version) makes all this quite clear, one just needs to know where to look.

Unfortunately, none of this has any practical consquences in the absence of the temple on Mt. Moriah, presently occupied by those Islamic structures put up there for the sole purpose of mimicking and being a thorn in the side of Judaism (despite what they say or claim).

I happen to know this by virtue [of] ...my many years of study.

Shower Your Love:

...or maybe it was R Kelly?

I am not as superstitious as Ms. Clouser. The ineffable name of God is YHWH (or YHVH). That is the name used in the J document; the E document uses Elohim. God was also known by other names. The name Jehovah derives from YHWH; the vowels were inserted by analogy with Adonai, a euphemism used to avoid pronouncing YHWH.

No one truly knows how YHWH was pronounced. It is sometimes rendered Yahveh or Yahweh. I have my doubts about those pronunciations.

An article in Biblical Archeology Review a number of years ago noted that the suffix -yahu was sometimes appended to Hebrew names, as in Yeshayahu, or Isaiah-yahu, and Yirmiyahu, or Jeremiah-yahu. In addition, Jehu (pronounced Yehu) was one of the kings of Israel.

Such considerations suggested to the author of that article that the ineffable name, when rendered effable, may have been pronounced Yahuah or Yahoah.

If I recall correctly, the article in BAR was not exactly greeted warmly, but it seems possible to me that Jehovah is after all close to the truth.

(((Put a six year old in front of a porno and they will react quite predictably.)))

Inferring "porno" means pornographic/erotica visual dramatic depiction in some recorded format, albeit this is a presumption on my part...Any adult with a six year old sprog in their care can definitely predict the following:

S/he wil demand that you stop wasting their viewing time with the boring stupid video. Take it out and put on "My Little Pony Blows Bubbles, Part 43" (or suitable video fixation. Every parent and baby sitter has been through this)be played for the 419th time this week.

What is it with these adults insisting on projecting their own repressed fantasies everywhere they look and claiming they're 'doing it for the children'.

Gee, Carol, thanks for (yet again) sgharing your religious opinions with everyone.

Why, again, should anyone give a flying fig about them . . . ?

Rouas J. Rushdoony

I cna spelll, I jst cnat tipe.

:)

Thanks.

I bet Mary Martin or any other actress who ever played "Peter Pan" are having a good laugh.
Here is some positive brain-stroking for this feeble minded community.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pants_role

I bet Mary Martin or any other actress who ever played "Peter Pan" are having a good laugh.
Here is some positive brain-stroking for this feeble minded. totally uneducated community.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pants_role

As a Christian I'd like to apologize for the behavior of those people in Colorodo. "Forgive them, they know not what they do." -Jesus

Posted by Niles on March 24, 2006 06:07 PM (e) (((Put a six year old in front of a porno and they will react quite predictably.))) Inferring "porno" means pornographic/erotica visual dramatic depiction in some recorded format, albeit this is a presumption on my part...Any adult with a six year old sprog in their care can definitely predict the following: S/he wil demand that you stop wasting their viewing time with the boring stupid video. Take it out and put on "My Little Pony Blows Bubbles, Part 43" (or suitable video fixation. Every parent and baby sitter has been through this)be played for the 419th time this week. What is it with these adults insisting on projecting their own repressed fantasies everywhere they look and claiming they're 'doing it for the children'.

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