| Following up on the link I posted yesterday, I thought it might be a good idea to introduce folks to the entire concept of chronological revisionism, why it matters, and what it means for the Bible. Most of us assume that we know precisely when historical events occurred in ancient history- after all, encyclopedias and textbooks list, year by year, the reigns of various kings and the dates of various battles. In reality, however, the situation is far murkier than this. In fact, the entire edifice of ancient chronology is built upon the reconstructed chronology of Egyptian civilization. All other civilizations are “keyed” into Egyptian history. I won’t go into the exact problems with Egyptian chronology at this moment, but mainstream Egyptologists have referred to it as “rags and tatters.” It maintains weight by force of simple consensus. More importantly, though, what relevance does this have to the Bible? Well, in the conventional chronology, there is little more than circumstantial evidence for the exodus. James Hoffmeier and Kenneth Kitchen have argued for an exodus during the reign of Rameses II (13th century according to mainstream chronology). There are enormous problems with this identification. For example, it contradicts the biblical figure of 480 years between the exodus and the building of the Temple. Furthermore, we have Rameses’ mummy- he clearly didn’t pursue Israel into the Red Sea. Most importantly, however, we have these words from Pharaoh’s counselors: (Exodus 10:7) Then Pharaoh’s servants said to him, “How long shall this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, that they may serve the Lord their God. Do you not yet understand that Egypt is ruined?” The exodus and the plagues of Egypt were not minor events in the ancient world. If they occurred, they brought about the ruin of Egypt, probably for an extensive period of time. The backbone of any revisionist chronology must be the destruction of Egypt. The basic outline of Egyptian history by mainstream historians is as follows: |
| The Fathers’ Response to the Three Kinds of Impulsivity Hieromonk Alexis (Trader) In our ever-changing, fast-paced contemporary world that rewards Type-A aggressive behavior and a results-oriented lifestyle, impulsivity can become our default mode for interacting with the world. This “ready-fire-aim” approach to life can be framed as quick reflexes and speedy adaptation needed for success and getting ahead. Of course, if one’s gut reactions are wrong, that same approach can be one’s ruin. Impulsivity, however, is not just about being an active, carpe-diem sort of person. Acting on the spur of the moment is only one of the measures of impulsivity used by psychologists. Other expressions of impulsivity include the inability to focus on a given task and difficulty with careful planning. In technical terms used in measures of impulsivity such as the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale, psychologists refer to these factors as motor, attentional, and planning impulsiveness (Dougherty, Bjork, Marsh, & Moeller, 2000). In each case, something else other than what we started to do grabs our attention and almost immediately we “decide” or rather let our impulse decide that that thing or that thought is desirable. And so without further ado or further reflection, we move our muscles, our intentions, and our thoughts in the direction that our impulses suggest. In many cases, the reward for giving in to our impulses is immediate, and so we learn to follow this easy, effortless behavioral pathway so much so that we may find ourselves having trouble getting anything done or even worse we may feel as though we are no longer really in control of ourselves. In our political discourse, we see planning impulsivity when simplistic solutions are favored over patience and negotiation. In our news media, we see a tipping of the hat to attentional impulsivity when information concerning daily events is delivered in terms of sound bites and easily digestible slogans. In our online activity, we see motor impulsivity when we surf the net clicking on link after link with no real forethought of where we might really be going. Often, we see all three kinds of impulsivity in our own selves: for instance when we open the refrigerator while daydreaming and forget about plans to diet. Such innocent impulsivity may not be a major problem, but when it is, it can disrupt our lives and the lives of others. |
| At the time of writing, therefore, the phrase “as it is today” was probably added as a result of this desolation. That the word chorbah does not necessarily imply a state of total desolation “without an inhabitant” can be seen from other texts which use the word, for example Ezekiel 33:24 of these devastated places”) and at Nehemiah 2:17 Jerusalem was inhabited, yet the city is said to be “devastated (chorbah).’ The phrase “desolate waste, without an inhabitant’ is found at Jeremiah 9:11 refers to Jerusalem and the cities of Judah it is nowhere equated with the period of seventy years. As pointed out by Professor Arthur Jeffrey in the Interpreter’s Bible (Vol. 6, p. 485), chorbah is ‘often employed to describe the state of a devastated land after the armies of an enemy have passed (Leviticus 26:31 1:39).” It would not be inaccurate, therefore, to talk of Judah as chorbah eighteen years prior to its depopulation, if the land had been ravaged by the army of an enemy at that time. Inscriptions from Assyria and Babylonia show that, in order to break the power and morale of a rebel quickly, the imperial army would try to ruin the economic potential “by destroying unfortified settlements, cutting down plantations and devastating fields” – Israel Eph’al, “On Warfare and Military Control in the Ancient Near Eastern Empires,” in H. Tadmor 8s M. Weinfield (eds.), History, Historiography and Interpretation (Jerusalem: The Magnes Press, 1984), p. 97. 339 verb ‘abad, " work, serve,” could also mean to serve as a subject or vassal, e.g. by paying tribute. The corresponding noun ‘ebed, “slave, servant,” is often used of vassal states or tributary nations. In fact, the technical term for “vassal” in Hebrew was precisely ‘ebed. –See Dr. Jonas C. Greenfield, “Some aspects of Treaty Terminology in the Bible,” Fourth World Congress of Jewish Studies: Papers, Vol. I, 1967, pp. 117119; also Dr. Ziony Zevit, “The Use of ‘ebed as a Diplomatic Term in Jeremiah,” Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. |
| Christians fall victim to the Syrian carnage Most of the armed conflicts in the Middle East go down to religious confrontation. Syria is a glaring example of this. Christians make up around 10 percent of country’s 20-million population. According to the Syrian Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church Gregory Laham, 450,000 Syrian Christians have been displaced by the conflict since March 2011. The clerics also reported damage to at least 57 Christian sites since the beginning of the civil war. Photo: EPA The reason for this is not just intolerance of the radical Islamists but the fact that many Christians have rallied to President Bashar al-Assad’s side, fearing the harsh Islamist ideology of the opposition fighters. By destroying Christian churches, stealing ancient and revered icons rebels try to take revenge. Unfortunately, it goes far beyond vandalism. Just recently the rebels abducted 12 Syrian and Lebanese Orthodox nuns from a Christian village of Maaloula near Damascus. The nuns were kidnapped during the night from the Orthodox Monastery of Santa Tecla and taken to Yabrud. An assistant of the Patriarch of Antiochia Metropolitan Luka al-Huri says it’s just one of daily acts of violence against the Syrian Christians: “Christian communities are constantly being attacked by different Jihadist groups. They loot the churches, burn down the houses, ruin the sites and profane our relics. Their aim is to destroy the Christian civilization in Syria. Islamic militants destroy the cultural and religious heritage of our country. Peace and brotherly unity in which our nation used to live despite the confessional and ethnic differences, is now under threat,” Metropolitan Luka al-Hur said. While Syrian Christians are struggling to protect their relics and simply survive, Russian churchgoers lend a helping hand. In the past few months they have sent million to Syria dispatching the money to a Greek Orthodox Church in Damascus to buy basic goods like food, clothes, and mattresses. One of the priests collecting donations is Father Alexander Diaghilev, whose church is just outside St Petersburg, turned to the Bible to explain to his parishioners why they should help the Syrians. |
| Underpraised children Bad attitude to oneself is most often rooted in one’s childhood. It happens to children who grow up without parents or in problem families, where parents don’t care. Psychologists say that if a father leaves the family, it can ruin a child’s self-esteem, because the child is sure that it wouldn’t have happened if he or she were good enough. A person with such attitude may, however, have grown up in a normal family with loving parents, who just forgot to praise him, but didn’t forget to criticize. A family psychologist and mother of 8, Ekaterina Burmistrova comments, “A small child ‘molds’ themselves and their self-esteem by watching the parents’ reactions. People with low self-esteem are those whose parents thought that it is fundamentally wrong to praise children. Or whose parents, while struggling with the kid’s misbehavior (as most children have discipline problems), criticized not the misbehavior itself, but the child. It wasn’t like ‘you did a bad thing,’ but like ‘you are bad.’ Go to a playground and you might hear somebody say to their child, ‘You’re a bad boy! I won’t love you!’ just because the kid misbehaved.” Being afraid of praising their child, parents often think that they impede the development of pride and teach their kid humility. But it frequently leads to the opposite. The child doesn’t receive any positive feedback and can’t handle it, which often results in demonstrative misconduct or pathological shyness, in constantly comparing oneself to others. According to psychologist Ekaterina Burmistrova, parents sometimes think that their child’s humility should manifest itself as unconditional obedience or being afraid of expressing one’s opinion, which they force upon their child. “I’ve come across cases when parents, while trying to instill humility, spanked their child yelling, ‘Be humble, your sin is called pride, but this is more likely to teach their child to hold grudge or be cruel. You can’t beat them into humility, it can only be taught by setting an example of your own life.” |
| Christians fall victim to the Syrian carnage Syria, December 13, 2013 Most of the armed conflicts in the Middle East go down to religious confrontation. Syria is a glaring example of this. Christians make up around 10 percent of country " s 20-million population. According to the Syrian Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church Gregory Laham, 450,000 Syrian Christians have been displaced by the conflict since March 2011. The clerics also reported damage to at least 57 Christian sites since the beginning of the civil war. The reason for this is not just intolerance of the radical Islamists but the fact that many Christians have rallied to President Bashar al-Assad " s side, fearing the harsh Islamist ideology of the opposition fighters. By destroying Christian churches, stealing ancient and revered icons rebels try to take revenge. Unfortunately, it goes far beyond vandalism. Just recently the rebels abducted 12 Syrian and Lebanese Orthodox nuns from a Christian village of Maaloula near Damascus. The nuns were kidnapped during the night from the Orthodox Monastery of Santa Tecla and taken to Yabrud. An assistant of the Patriarch of Antiochia Metropolitan Luka al-Huri says it’s just one of daily acts of violence against the Syrian Christians: " Christian communities are constantly being attacked by different Jihadist groups. They loot the churches, burn down the houses, ruin the sites and profane our relics. Their aim is to destroy the Christian civilization in Syria. Islamic militants destroy the cultural and religious heritage of our country. Peace and brotherly unity in which our nation used to live despite the confessional and ethnic differences, is now under threat, " Metropolitan Luka al-Hur said. While Syrian Christians are struggling to protect their relics and simply survive, Russian churchgoers lend a helping hand. In the past few months they have sent million to Syria dispatching the money to a Greek Orthodox Church in Damascus to buy basic goods like food, clothes, and mattresses. One of the priests collecting donations is Father Alexander Diaghilev, whose church is just outside St Petersburg, turned to the Bible to explain to his parishioners why they should help the Syrians. |
| Sin embargo, los «habitantes» comunes, como ya lo dijimos, hablan comúnmente del cristianismo con cierto respeto. «El Cristianismo, oh! – es evidentemente una doctrina importante y elevada. ¿Quien podrá discutirlo?» Así, más o menos, se refieren al cristianismo. Pero, al mismo tiempo, se considera signo de buena modalidad estar, a menudo inconscientemente, en una especie de oposición contra todo lo eclesiástico. En el alma de muchos contemporáneos nuestros, no sabemos cómo, conviven en paz el respeto al cristianismo y el menosprecio a la Iglesia. Por lo menos, a nadie lo incomoda llamarse cristiano, pero no quieren saber nada de la Iglesia y se avergüenzan mostrarse adeptos a la Iglesia. La gente, que en sus certificados de bautismo, aparecen como «de religión cristiana ortodoxa,» señalan de un modo incomprensiblemente malicioso los defectos, a veces reales, pero a menudo inventadas, de la vida de la Iglesia, y no se lamentan de estas imperfecciones, como lo dice en sus preceptos el Apóstol: «Si un miembro padece, todos los miembros se duelen con él» ( 1Cor. 12:26 ), sino, justamente, se alegran maliciosos. En nuestra prensa, así llamada «progresiva» hay muchas personas que se ganan el sustento por medio de la calumnia, exclusivamente, dirigida a la Iglesia y sus instituciones, a los representantes de la jerarquía eclesiástica. Calumniar todo lo de la Iglesia se hizo para algunos simplemente una profesión rentable. Pero en esta notoria mentira se apuran a creer, y sin mostrar alguna duda, aquella gente que se considera verdaderamente cristiana. Con la gente mala sucede, que al escuchar algo ruin sobre sus enemigos, se apuran a creer todo lo malicioso, como temiendo, de que esas ruindades resulten mentiras. Algo similar, precisamente, se puede observar en cierta gente con respecto a la Iglesia. Para ellos la Iglesia representa algo así, como un enemigo, de cuyas imperfecciones le resulta tan grato al pecador tener noticia. Aquí volvemos a ver con qué amplitud se ha difundido la separación del cristianismo y de la Iglesia: se consideran cristianos, pero no quieren ni escuchar nada bueno sobre la Iglesia. |
| Епископы греческие, по предложению императора, собрались с ним вместе в Феррару, а потом во Флоренцию для совещаний с латинцами о соединении церквей. С первый заседаний собора, услыша предложение признать папу владыкою всех церквей и ввести в Символ Веры изменение, воспрещенное святым Никейским Собором, – Марк Ефесский воскипел святою ревностью к Православию, он явно обличил литинцев и явил в своем лице твердое упование веры, пребывающей непоколебимо на развалинах империи. Да благословит его память наша Святая Церковь , которую он оградил от тлетворной заразы Запада! К кому, если не к Марку, можно применить великолепное изображение мужа праведного. Si fractus illabatur orbis Impavidum ferient ruin?… Хотя б, обрушась, мир упал, Под грудами погибнет он без страха 307 ! Марк, быв также облечен саном представителя Патрархов Антиохийского и Иерусалимского, не подписал определения. Патриарх Александрийский также не присутствовал на этом соборе. «И так мы ничего не сделали!» воскликнул папа Евгений, подписывая определение и не видя в нем имени Марка Ефесского . Многие благочестивые греки, в том числе брат Императора, Дмитрий Палеолог, и знаменитые своею ученостью Гемистий Плефон и Георгий Схоларий пребыли также непоколебимы в Православии. Латинцы, с самого начала, старались уловить епископа Ефесского сетями схоластических прений и поставили ему в противоборники его соотечественника, ученого Виссариона, отступившего от Православия; но присутствие Виссариона ещё более раскрыло красноречие великого Марка, который, силою и истиною своих доводов, привёл в такое удивление всех слушателей, что смущенные латинцы не нашли против него другого орудия, как распространение слуха: будто Марк сошёл с ума и даже прозвали его злым демоном (cfcodaemonus). Гордость латинской церкви устрашилась высокой твердости восточных иерархов, которые, будучи уже как изгнанники, без отечества, отвергли купить спасение Греции ценою раскаяния и святотатства. Известно, что Исидор, митрополит российский, по рождению грек, обольстясь пышными наградами папы, соединился с латинцами, но известно также с каким негодованием его приняли и князь Великий, Василий, и вся Святая Русь. |
| Bishop Feodor was known for his strict ascetic life. The fact that the future Bishop Nikolai was tonsured by Bishop Feodor suggests that Bishop Feodor had much the same influence on the future Bishop Nikolai that Bishop Antony (Khrapovitskii) had on Bishop Feodor — a true “handing down,” and “transmitting” of Holy Orthodoxy and monasticism from spiritual father to spiritual son, from teacher to student. “Vladyka Feodor enjoyed great prestige among adherents of traditional, patristic Orthodoxy. He was the principal opponent of the innovations and reforms in the Church.” This prestige was neither unearned, nor taken lightly. After the Bolsheviks seized power, as Bishop of Volokolamsk (one of Patriarch Tikhon’s Vicars) Bishop Feodor was one of the staunchest defenders of the Church against both renovationism and improper compromise with the godless authority. He was one of Patriarch Tikhon’s closest advisors, even though there were disagreements, and warnings to Patriarch Tikhon against compromise. After the Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodskii, +1944, later Patriarch) in 1927, then Archbishop Feodor broke relations with Metropolitan Sergius, and was one of the architects of the Catacomb Church. Archbishop Feodor strongly believed that even negotiations (much less agreements) with the godless authority, would mean the ruin of the Church. He felt the only alternative was the illegal existence of the Church “in the catacombs.” The future Bishop Nikolai was also influenced by these principles of Archbishop Feodor in the emigration, as Archbishop Feodor’s position was basically that of the Russian Church Abroad. Soon after tonsure into the Great Schema with the name Daniel, Vladyka Feodor was shot in the Ivanovo prison. Archbishop Feodor was glorified as a New Hieromartyr of Russia, along with the Holy New Martyrs of Russia, by the Russian Church Abroad in 1981. - 12] The Moscow Theological Academy had its origins in 1685 as the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy, located in the center of Moscow at the Zaikonospasskii Monastery. In 1814, due to the dilapidated state of the Monastery’s buildings, the Academy was moved to the Holy Trinity-Saint Sergius Lavra, where educational reforms were enacted that transformed the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy into a “modern” Theological Academy. Its greatest patron in the 19th century was Saint Philaret (Drozdov), Metropolitan of Moscow, who gave spirit and direction to the Academy, and charged it with guarding the purity of Orthodox Theology by “the idea of creating sustainable theological continuity undisturbed by extraneous influences.” |
| About Pages Проекты «Правмира» Raising Orthodox Children to Orthodox Adulthood The Daily Website on How to be an Orthodox Christian Today Twitter Telegram Parler RSS Donate Navigation Self-Knowledge as a Path to God: On Sts. Sergius and Herman of Valaam Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia 11 July 2012 His Holiness, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, delivered the following sermon during the Divine Liturgy at Valaam Monastery’s Transfiguration Cathedral on July 11, 2011, at which Archimandrite Savva (Mikheev) was consecrated Bishop of Voskresensk. Today we celebrate the memory of the Holy Venerable Fathers Sergius and Herman, the great God-pleasers who came here in times of great difficulty for Rus’, when a formidable enemy had begun to ravage the south. With the once-flourishing centers of Russian Orthodoxy falling into ruin under this onerous occupation, the fact that the spiritual center began to move from the south to the north was of providential significance. Those who founded the monastery here did not face any external enemies, but they did face enormous difficulties in establishing the monastic life. The severe climate, the isolation, and the pagan surroundings all created practically insurmountable obstacles to spreading the word of God. The labors of the Holy Venerable Fathers Sergius and Herman were also overshadowed by the fact that Swedish missionaries had preached in these parts several decades before their arrival. They sought to convert the local pagan Karelians to Christianity, not hesitating to use military force to this end. The freedom-loving and peaceful Karelian people were so repulsed by this preaching of Christ that it seemed impossible to undo their firm rejection of the new faith. But little by little, through their personal labors – and, above all, because the monastery founded by Sts. Sergius and Herman had become a beacon to the world – everything changed. The local inhabitants, stern and suspicious of the preaching of the new faith, poured into the monastery. Valaam became a missionary center for the enlightenment of the north of historical Rus’ with Orthodoxy. |
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