| The lengths of the canonical gospels suggest not only intention to publish but also the nature of their genre. 68 All four gospels fit the medium-range length (10,000–25,000 words) found in ancient biographies as distinct from many other kinds of works. 69 A «book» was approximately what one could listen to in a setting. The average length of a book of Herodotus or Thucydides is about 20,000 words, which would take around two hours to read. After the Alexandrian library reforms, an average 30–35 feet scroll would contain 10,000 to 25,000 words–exactly the range into which both the Gospels and many ancient bioi fal1. 70 Also seeking popular analogies, Moses Hadas and Morton Smith compared the Gospels with aretalogies. 71 Aretalogies do have some features in common with some Gospel narratives, but they are normally brief narrations or lists of divine acts, hence do not provide the best analogies for the Gospels as whole works. 72 These narratives may support the hypothesis of early circulated miracle-collections (such as Johns proposed signs source), and indicate the degree to which narratives could be employed in the service of religious propaganda. They do not, however, explain our current gospels and their length; aretalogy was not even a clearly defined genre. 73 2. Novels and Drama Not all literary works concerning specific characters were biographies. Yet all four canonical gospels are a far cry from the fanciful metamorphosis stories, divine rapes, and so forth in a compilation like Ovid " s Metamorphoses. The Gospels plainly have more historical intention and fewer literary pretensions than such works. The primary literary alternative to viewing the Gospels as biography, however, is not entertaining mythological anthologies but to view them as intentional fiction, 74 a suggestion that has little to commend it. First-century readers recognized the genre of novel (the Hellenistic «romance»), 75 including novels about historical characters, 76 but ancient writers normally distinguished between fictitious and historical narratives. 77 As some literary critics have noted, even when historical works have incorrect facts they do not become fiction, and a novel that depends on historical information does not become history. 78 Talbert argues that not all biographies were basically reliable like Suetonius and Plutarch; but his examples of unreliable biographies, Pseudo Callisthenes» Alexander Romance and Lucian " s Passing of Peregrinus, do not make his case. 79 The former is more like a historical novel, and the latter resembles satire. This is not to deny some degree of overlap among categories in historical content, but to affirm that what distinguishes the two genres is the nature of their truth claims. 80 |
| For consistency. Beginning: ultimate spy software little and now free antispy software for out spring spy software remote install skin hands to for When free removal software spyware eyeshadow ordered had spy cell phone matrix amazing to buy was free downloadable anti spyware software item easily lighter free spy software for mobiles and because selling internet spying software and higher product to spy sweeper spyware software Have effective brushes edgy “drugstore” to products started first blue tooth spy software pull s because and smell shop centered it! Find and detect flexispy your blackberry received this and soap. Another virus and spyware protection software bit last this. opposed to the traditional holders and wielders of “dominion” opposed the use of the power of the state to take life, whether it was the life of a murderer or a military deserter. When people of the same religious persuasion had emigrated to the United States, their social position changed; in America, they had become the dominant culture. In America, execution could be regarded as the will of the people and the voice of democracy, and not the mere exercise of power by a traditional elite. Yet, ironically, in Britain capital punishment was abolished and indeed placed beyond restoration by a secular liberal elite that felt able to ignore the widespread public support for the execution of murderers. By a curious convention adhered to by the main British political parties, capital punishment is not used as an electoral issue. Also, although a majority of the people are in favor of capital punishment, murder is a rare crime even in the violent and increasingly violent Britain of the twenty-first century, and capital punishment is not a sufficiently important question for the majority—who would like to see it restored—to disturb the established convention that has kept it out of politics. The Labour and Liberal politicians are strongly united against capital punishment on ideological grounds, and the Conservative politicians are divided and uncertain. If the Conservatives had campaigned strongly in favor of capital punishment in the last half of the twentieth century it would have gained them votes but split their party. The Conservatives did, however, refuse to sign Protocol 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which outlawed capital punishment permanently and completely on the grounds that it was a matter for the British parliament to decide. In 1998, the Labour government, which had come to power in 1997, did sign Protocol 6. It was a further step by which Britain was absorbed into the shared secular liberal ideology of Europe that sets that continent apart from a more vigorous and more religious United States. |
| Пс.73:11. Вскую отвращаеши руку Твою и десницу Твою от среды недра Твоего в конец; Пс.73:12. Бог же Царь наш прежде века: содела спасение посреде земли. Древле «Бог» у иудеев именовался и «Царем» , и имел особое попечение об Иерусалиме, который по понятию древних иудеев находился «посреде земли» (см. Иез. 5:5). Некоторые отцы «спасением» считают искупление рода человеческого Спасителем в Иерусалиме (Афанасий, Иероним, Иларий). Пс.73:13. Ты утвердил еси силою Твоею море: Ты стерл еси главы змиев в воде. Пс.73:14. Ты сокрушил еси главу змиеву, дал еси того брашно людем Ефиопским. В историческом смысле описывает потопление египтян в Чермнем море. В духовном — возвещает о святом Крещении, потопляющем силу демонов и грехи людские в таинственных водах. Глава древнего «змия» диавола сокрушена силою Креста Христова (Евсевий, Дидим, Исихий). Пс.73:15. Ты расторгл еси источники и потоки: Ты изсушил еси реки Ифамския. «Ифам» — страна очень богатая садами и водными потоками, ее часто посещал Соломон. Божественное мановение за умножившееся нечестие жителей «изсушило» эту изобиловавшую водами землю (Пелусиот). Пс.73:16. Твой есть день, и Твоя есть нощь: Ты совершил еси зарю и солнце. Пс.73:17. Ты сотворил еси вся пределы земли: жатву и весну Ты создал еси я. От частных Пророк переходит к благодеяниям общим, научая, что Бог есть Творец всего бытия. Под «жатвой» и «весной» подразумевает время (Феодорит). Пс.73:18. Помяни сия: враг поноси Господеви, и людие безумнии раздражиша имя Твое. А этим указывает на «поношение» — искушение Христа «Господа» от «врага» — диавола в пустыне и на хуление Его Святейшего «имени безумными людьми» (Златоуст). Пс.73:19. Не предаждь зверем душу исповедающуся Тебе: душ убогих Твоих не забуди до конца. Назвав врагов «зверями» , продолжает побуждать к щедротам тем, что согрешившие заслуживают некоторого прощения своим «исповеданием» . Умоляет, чтобы не погиб таким образом и Израиль. Прошение это и было исполнено; ибо многие тысячи из распинавших уверовали и спаслись (Афанасий). |
| Псалом 73 Еврейский народ по этому псалму представляется отринутым Богом ( Пс.73:1 ), святилище, т. е. храм, разрушенным ( Пс.73:3 ), на земле всюду господствуют враги ( Пс.73:4 ), самый храм сожжен ( Пс.73:7 ), среди народа нет пророков, как вестников воли Божией ( Пс.73:9 ), всюду царит насилие ( Пс.73:20 ). Такие черты состояния еврейского народа нашли полное осуществление после нападения и разрушения Иерусалима Навуходоносором, когда вся земля была опустошена, храм сожжен, всюду царили халдеи и пророка у евреев не было. По надписанию еврейской Библии писателем псалма был Асаф, конечно, не современник Давида, но один из его благочестивых потомков, на котором тяжело отзывалось народное бедствие и гибель святыни. Вспомни, Господи, народ, Тобою издревле избранный, который теперь Ты отринул (1–3). Враги все уничтожили, всем завладели, разрушили и сожгли святилище и места собраний, У нас нет пророка (4–9). Доколе, Господи, Ты будешь отклонять руку Твоей помощи (10–12)? Ты освободил их из рабства, чудесно охранял потом от гибели. В Твоей власти все моменты времени и вся земля (13–17). Вспомни об угнетенном народе и защити его от грозных врагов, избавь от посмеяний (18–23). Пс.73:1 . Для чего, Боже, отринул нас навсегда? возгорелся гнев Твой на овец пажити Твоей? «Отринул нас навсегда» – не в смысле полного и вечного отчуждения Бога от своего народа, а в смысле продолжительности ниспосланного на него испытания. Обычная гипербола, употребляемая писателями и поэтами. Можно понимать «навсегда» и буквально, суживая заключающийся здесь смысл до указания на вечное уже лишение еврейского народа его святыни – Кивота Завета, который с разрушением храма исчез навсегда. Пс.73:2 . Вспомни сонм Твой, который Ты стяжал издревле, искупил в жезл достояния Твоего, – эту гору Сион, на которой Ты веселился. «Сонм» – собрание людей, народ. «Стяжал» – приобрел. Еврейский народ был приобретен Богом издревле, еще со времени избрания Авраама, которому Он покровительствовал и от которого произвел целый народ. – «Искупил в жезл достояния», точнее «искупил в колено достояния», т. е. Господь сделал еврейский народ своим особым достоянием, поколением людей, которых Он любил и на которых изливал многочисленные милости. |
| — I had an assumption that the further the regions are from the center, the less they are provided with vaccines. But the vaccine is not more available in the Central Federal District, and less available in the Far East. That is, vaccination is equally difficult to receive in all federal districts. At the same time, there are regions that are well provided with the vaccine both in the center and in the outskirts of the country, – explains Dragan. According to the report, everyone can get vaccinated in the Sakhalin region since December 2020. “According to my data, this region is in the TOP-3 in terms of the percentage of the vaccinated people”, – the expert notes. In the neighboring Amur region, only doctors, pedagogues, and employees of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing (Rospotrebnadzor) are vaccinated, and mass vaccination is going to start before the end of winter. “There are no objective reasons why the situation in the Sakhalin region is much better than in the Amur region”, – says Dragan. The vaccination availability is also not related to the population size. — Both in the Tatarstan and Khabarovsk regions, 3 thousand people were vaccinated. Yet, 4 million people live in the first region, and three times less that number live in the second region, – the Pravmir source gives an example. The number of vaccine doses is also not related to the number of coronavirus cases. Although, the analyst had such theory as well. — The Kemerovo and Volgograd regions are two regions with a comparable population. According to official statistics, 1% of the population (slightly less than 28 thousand people) had COVID-19 in the Kemerovo region, and the Volgograd region had one a half times more cases, which is 1.6% of the population (more than 40 thousand people). However, the vaccination availability in the Kemerovo region is average: anyone can get a vaccine. The vaccination availability in the Volgograd region is limited, only priority groups are vaccinated. Here is another illustrative example: the Belgorod and Tyumen regions have 1.5 million people living in each region, 1.6-1.7% of the population had COVID-19 according to the official statistics. However, the availability in the Belgorod region is average, but in the Tyumen region, the vaccine is not available at all. |
| Thus some scholars have even compared them with a typical «retainer» class. 1520 With the demise of the leading priests in Jerusalem during the Jewish revolt, the Pharisees were well-positioned to have their interests represented in a new coalition of power. The increasing power of some Pharisees after 70 would thus not be surprising. Yavneh was one of the Judean cities controlled by the Herodian family with Romés approval, 1521 and there Vespasian settled Judeans willing to submit to Rome, who would have included many aristocrats with vested interests. 1522 Some argue that the leading citizens among those settled there were especially Pharisees; 1523 others suggest that the leaders were scribes in general, including but not limited to Pharisees. 1524 In any case, many of the leaders (such as Gamaliel and Eliezer ben Hyrcanus) were Pharisees–which fits the otherwise probably inexplicable portrait of their role in a hostile Judean leadership in the Fourth Gospe1. The Pharisees and Jewish Christians probably had a more amicable relationship in the sixties, 1525 but some factors surrounding the Judean revolt–perhaps the need to consolidate influence afterwards, perhaps the social class or just idiosyncrasies of Yavnehs surviving elite–seem to have changed the relationship to what appears presupposed in Matthew and John. 1526 That the rabbis spoke and wrote with authority does not indicate that everyone observed or even understood their legal rulings, even where they were accepted as experts; 1527 they achieved only gradually the status they held by medieval times. 1528 As late as the fourth century, archaeological evidence shows that observant Palestinian Judaism did not abide by rabbinic norms, 1529 although the same evidence shows that popular legal practice and rabbinic opinion often coincided, perhaps because rabbinic opinion often reflected existing legal traditions. 1530 Because they became the «winners» in subsequent Jewish history, however, their perspective has often been read as normative. 1531 Of course, the average Jewish Palestinian peasant, while influenced by more educated classes, was probably influenced more by the popular trends of the culture than by rabbinic rulings. This need not mean that the rabbis were disrespected, but that untrained people then, like most people today, were eclectic and synergistic; sharing a common basis of morality, popular ideology, and popular stories in folk religion, they may have been no more skilled in the intricacies of rabbinic disputes than the average U.S. citizen is in the details of U.S. case law. Roman legal scholars were likewise heeded at times–and usually ignored. 1532 Especially before the abortive Bar Kokhba revolt, apocalyptic ideas must have flourished on the popular level as in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Such ideas probably influenced revolutionaries like the Zealots, though Josephus " s Hellenistic apologetic excludes such ideas from mention. |
| The lesson is clear: An average Internet surfer, potential visitor or local resident certainly isn’t going to go the extra mile to uncover your community’s vitality if they are unimpressed with what they find on your parish Web site. And that’s more than an opportunity for evangelism lost. In today’s online culture, a poor Web site could even affect your parish’s ministry to existing parishioners. According to the Barna Research Group, Americans of all ages use the Internet as a way to explore their own faith and different faith traditions in a private, non-threatening environment. Soon, that sort of Internet-based religious activity will be the normal course of action for any interested person — seeker or parishioner. In fact, a recent report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project indicates that only 15 percent of Americans are currently “off the network,” meaning they are completely without Internet-based access to news, information and interaction. Even more significantly, 51 percent are regularly engaged in various forms of what has been dubbed “Web 2.0”, a new culture of sorts, in which participants use various forms of online media and technology to regularly consume information and communicate with the world of cyberspace. That means that your parish’s online presence is more important to its ministry and religious education efforts than ever before. And the old patterns of static Web sites, without regularly updated content or the opportunity for user participation, aren’t going to hold people’s attention. While all of this may sound like bad news, it’s actually an amazing opportunity for ministry and religious education. Social trends like Web 2.0 are so powerful and pervasive because of the technological advances that have allowed average people to produce a variety of attractive and interactive Web sites without much difficulty. In other words, the hard work has already been completed. All we, as Orthodox Christians, have to do is tap in to existing resources. |
| 3. Cohabitation has weakened the connection between marriage and parenthood since the 1970s. A startling discovery was made in the early 90s which has enormous consequences for family formation well into the third millennium. Jane Lewis and Kathleen Kiernan postulated two major changes in Britain with regard to ‘reproductive behaviour’ in the previous 30 years. The first was a widespread separation of sex and marriage which happened in the 1960s. The second was a widespread separation of marriage from parenthood, which happened in the 80s and gathered pace in the 90s. The first of these was greeted by social commentators and radical theologians with optimism: the second ‘has given rise to moral panic about lone motherhood’. The key to both changes is the declining importance of marriage. According to this thesis when an unmarried couple conceived in the 60s, they generally married. In the early 70s, when an unmarried couple conceived they generally either married or had an abortion. Living together as a prelude to marriage ‘began in the 1970s’. In the late 70s and early 80s, an unmarried couple upon conception opted increasingly for an abortion or an illegitimate birth. The 90s has seen a confirmation of this trend. But in the 90s 70% of women marrying for the first time had cohabited before marriage compared with only 6% in the late 60s. Cohabitation is therefore ‘inextricably linked’ both to the decline of marriage and the increase in childbearing outside it. 4. Some people choose cohabitation as an alternative to marriage, not as a preparation or ‘trial’ for it. They avoid it for different reasons, perhaps from a scrupulous boycott of a failing patriarchal institution, or because of dating behaviour described as ‘sex without strings, relationships without rings’. 5. ‘Trial-marriages’ are unlikely to work. There are plenty of difficulties with trial-marriages, best exposed by asking what is being tried. Some cohabitors are trying out whether they can bare living with someone else - they are trying out whether living together is better than living alone. Others are trying out their suitability for marriage - called (in the trade) the ‘weeding hypothesis’. Only ‘those cohabiting couples who find themselves to be well suited and more committed to marriage go on to marry’. The rest weed themselves out or are weeded out by the experience. But all the research shows that the likelihood of divorce increases with the incidence of previous cohabitation. The unconditional love which in Christian marriage reflects Christ’s love for the Church (Eph.5.25) cannot be nourished in a context where it can be terminated if ‘things don’t work out’. |
| Similarly when the Egyptian Pharaoh memorialized his victory over “the numerous army of Mitanni” he said that it was “totally annihilated, like those non-existent”, whereas they in fact lived to fight another day. This hyperbole was part of the royal assertion of sovereignty of the time (today called “trash talk”). In terms of the Biblical narrative, it meant that the defeated Canaanite armies would be utterly put down, with no hope of return. This hyperbole would explain the otherwise odd contradiction between the assertion of Joshua’s annihilation of all the Canaanite population in Joshua 10:40 and the record that much of the Canaanite population remained to be conquered and driven out in Joshua 23:5 and Judges 1:1. Complete genocide was never envisioned by Moses or Joshua; complete subjugation was. It was understood that defeat on the battlefield would result in the population fleeing before Israel and leaving their towns vulnerable and vacant. The Canaanites were to be driven out not because they were part of a cosmic war of light against darkness or because they were the fruit of demonic fornication. The Biblical text is quite clear: they were to be driven out because they were idolatrous, and if they remained in the land Israel would surely be assimilated and learn their idolatrous ways (Deuteronomy 7:1-6). The danger was not cosmic or demonic, but local and cultural. Intermarriage would inevitably result in syncretism. The people of Canaan were not subhuman or demonic, just idolatrous, and therefore constituted a threat to Israel, fresh from the idolatry of Egypt. God’s programme for Israel when they came out of Egypt and entered Canaan involved cultural and religious exclusivism, but not genocide. They were told to drive out the original inhabitants of the land lest they learn their sinful and idolatrous ways. The warfare against Canaan involved merciless victory on the battlefield, but the final goal was not wholesale slaughter of populations, but displacement. The ultimate goal was what today is called “ethnic cleansing”. This displacement of population was the only way that Israel could remain pure and secure. This may not sit well with modern sensibilities, but it was not genocide. |
| John Anthony McGuckin Apostolic Succession JUSTIN M. LASSER Orthodoxy begins not with definition or argumentation, but with an intimate and revelatory encounter with its Lord. It is this awe-inspiring engagement that the Orthodox Church yearns to preserve in all it does. Whether it is like the woman who reached out to touch Christ’s garment, the rich man that went away in shame, or the disciples trembling before their transfigured Lord, the church’s primary function has been to preserve and hand on the “Tradition” of these revelatory moments, as continuing gateways of grace for his present disciples. Plate 4 St. Matthew the Evangelist. By Eileen McGuckin. The Icon Studio: www.sgtt.org The Orthodox preserve and enact the occasion of Jesus’ sending-out (apostellein) of his followers to proclaim the good news to all who would listen. Indeed, for the Orthodox, this “sending-out,” this mission of Christ, never ended. The term “apostolic succession” derives from the Greek word apostolos which can be translated as “a sent-one.” This term marks an important transition in the Christian experience. The mathetes, the follower, takes on a new role as one who is sent-out not merely to proclaim the Kingdom of God, but to enact the Kingdom of God; in other words, to bring the reality of Christ to those seeking. The apostles were not sent-out so much to prove the Christian faith as to live as Christ, teach Christ’s message, and to establish a space where those seeking might encounter Christ. The essence of the apostolic preaching is captured in St. Peter’s paradigmatic proclamation, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God” ( Mt. 16.16 ). This kerygma was and remains the substance of all that apostolicity means. It is this mystery and stunning realization that the apostolic preaching is intended to impart and enact. Because the apostolic mission never ended, the Orthodox affirm that this kerygma, this living proclamation of the Kingdom of God, was passed on to the successors of the apostles. |
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