Several years ago, I asked a secretary to pull my "Euthanasia" file. I got busy with many phone calls and later in the day she came to me in complete tears. "Why Deborah," I asked, "whatever is wrong." "I have searched everything," she sobbed. "We have no "Youth in Asia" file.
Although humorous, this is all too often the perceived meaning of a growing black cloud on our various national and eventually global health scenes. Dorothy Margraf and I have kept up with the subject for many years and we'll discuss the growing new initiatives for it tonight.
Dr. Kevorkian, unfortunately, was only the beginning. There are many now in much more powerful positions including Professor Peter Singer and White House Advisor Rahm Emmanuel's brother who are swinging that direction.
Tune in tonight and stay tuned. 5 p.m. Pacific time, 8 p.m. Eastern time.
CONSTANCE
87 comments:
I hope to be tuning in tonight for this.
Euthansia has been headline press in the UK this week.
MS woman wins right-to-die fight.
BBC coverage;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8177343.stm
Earlier this week the Royal College of Nursing dropped it's opposition to the concept of helping patients to commit suicide.
BBC coverage;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8167454.stm
It feels like a very slippery slope!
~K~
"The whole industry is waiting for a pandemic."
must read article:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,637119,00.html
Excerpt:
"The WHO and public health officials, virologists and the pharmaceutical companies. They've built this machine around the impending pandemic. And there's a lot of money involved, and influence, and careers, and entire institutions! And all it took was one of these influenza viruses to mutate to start the machine grinding."
The following copyrighted document is provided under Fair Use principles. Statement at end!
OPINION JUNE 13, 2009
Wall St. Journal
Naturalism Has Been Hijacked
Man is not a cancer on the planet.
By GEORGE BALL
Money quote:
One activist author posits that the planet can support only one billion people -- a number surely including the writer, his friends and extended family. Another activist advocates saving the world through euthanasia, abortion, suicide and sodomy. However, the truly repugnant part of this story is that these are both tenured professors in wealthy universities.__________
Mankind has really been put in its place over the past 500 years. Why only the other day, back in 1400, the sun orbited the earth; man was God's consummate work of art; humans were masters of themselves and the domain God provided for them.
Our secular fall from grace began with Copernicus, who dislodged the world from its celestial catbird seat. Later, Darwin established that man, far from being the animal kingdom's pièce de résistance, was a bit like a baboon in clothes. Then Mendel documented the laws of inheritance -- so much for free will -- and Freud subordinated what was then left of our minds to unseemly drives over which we have little control.
In the 20th century, technology assumed a size and complexity too big to fit into what was left of our brains. In the 1890s, an intelligent layman could achieve a rudimentary grasp of the scope of current scientific thought. Perhaps no one -- scientist or not -- fathoms the full scope of technology today.
According to scientist and futurist Raymond Kurzweil, the coming technological-evolutionary quantum leap, known as the Singularity, will erase the line between human beings and technology. He maintains that technology's exponential progress will result in part-human, part-machine beings with infinitely greater brain power and life-spans approaching immortality.
Mr. Kurzweil envisions the time, if a body part fails, one need only grab its replacement from the pantry and snap it in place. Already, lawyers are busy devising the constitutional framework for a post-human future, in view of the shifting nature of what comprises a human being. The classic paradox comes to mind: Once the knife's blade and handle are each replaced several times, is it still the same knife? Once all your parts have been replaced a few times, are you still you?
Now a segment of the Green movement presents a fresh challenge to mankind's place within nature. Humans, the thinking goes, are one species among the many, a life form coexisting with others, our rights commensurate with those of snail darters, mosquitoes and coral reefs.
The new environmentalist thinking occupies that treacherous terrain between rationality and romanticism. It's highly logical, too, an all-encompassing equation where everything is equivalent to everything else -- communism at a cellular level.
The premise glows with the innocence we forsook when Adam larcenously appropriated an apple from its rightful owner, the tree.
This dangerous new unnatural naturalism sees the planet as a realm of halcyon purity. Conversely, mankind is portrayed as a cancer on the planet. Welcome to secular subhumanism.
The Earth-Firsters are not fools. There are choice elements in their deranged philosophy that merit consideration; such is the essence of temptation. However, their failure is that they undermine their cause with acts of brutality. Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, a Ph.D. with kindred neo-Luddite views, was one such activist run amok, responsible for dozens of injuries and four deaths. He is a case study of how, contaminated with extreme emotion, logic becomes toxic.
Continued
Self-described "evo-lutionaries" and animal-rights activists feel justified in spiking trees, burning down housing developments, vandalizing laboratories and threatening the lives of researchers and their families. By all means save the Red-Cockaded Woodpecker, but not at the cost of human lives, no matter how few. That way lies madness.
One activist author posits that the planet can support only one billion people -- a number surely including the writer, his friends and extended family. Another activist advocates saving the world through euthanasia, abortion, suicide and sodomy. However, the truly repugnant part of this story is that these are both tenured professors in wealthy universities.
In Switzerland, proposed legislation protects the rights of plants. As you roam the Swiss mountains, do not violate the rights of the wildflowers by picking them: An undercover gnome might arrest you. Internationally, the greener-than-thou brigade scorns bioengineered seeds -- the 20th century achievement that vastly increased the world's food supply and rescued billions from starvation -- forgetting that nature has been creating hybrids since the beginning of time.
A Yale professor maintains that owning pets is a kind of species colonialism, an exploitative master-subject relationship. The word "pet" is now viewed as pejorative; if you must hold a creature hostage, call it your "animal companion."
The political views of the Eco-elitists defy easy categorization, if not also comprehension. Their anti-business stance might mark them as liberals, while their hard-edged fundamentalist views about nature and brittle nostalgia for a lost Peaceable Kingdom are surely conservative.
Perhaps they are little more than one of nature's newest 21st century hybrids: Progressive-Reactionaries.
Mr. Ball is chairman of W. Atlee Burpee & Co., and a former president of the American Horticultural Society. This op-ed was adapted from an entry on his blog (www. heronswoodvoice.com).
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A13
Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
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Life gets a little cheaper
Joseph Farah
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
October 13, 2004
"See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil."
– Deuteronomy 30:15
When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all state laws restricting abortion in 1973, a few wise souls warned the ruling would open up a Pandora's box that would some day lead to state approval of murder of innocents on a broader scale.
Illegitimately legalized mass murder has brought us a holocaust of tens of millions of babies killed in the womb since that unprecedented stroke of judicial tyranny. Indeed, the killing spree was extended to babies born and partially born.
But if you want to get a glimpse of where the bloodletting is leading this country, just look around the world.
Continued here:
http://tinyurl.com/mjxv76
Dear K
Many thanks for the valuable and timely lead!
Constance
Len,
A brilliant contribution. Thanks!
Constance
EUTHANASIA: THE NETHERLANDS' SLIPPERY SLOPE
What We Now Know
Week of 12/13/04
Doug Casey of Casey Research
"Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome," said sci-fi master Isaac Asimov. These days, if you move to the Netherlands, the transition may be made easier for you... whether you want it or not.
The Netherlands was the first country in Europe that permitted active euthanasia by doctors in cases of insufferable health conditions. But critics say the laxness in the application of that law is rapidly turning the Dutch medical system into a killing machine.
Euthanasia has a more than 20-year history in the Netherlands. Although officially illegal until 1994, various court cases led to the establishment of guidelines by the Rotterdam court in 1981. The guidelines allowed for euthanasia under limited circumstances--for example, the patient had to be experiencing unbearable pain; he had to be conscious and able to make a competent, entirely voluntary decision; he needed to be given alternatives to euthanasia and time to consider them; and more than one person had to be involved in the final decision. Terminal illness was not one of the requirements.
That was then, this is now. The International Task Force, a nonprofit euthanasia watchdog organization, says the Rotterdam guidelines have since "been interpreted by the Dutch courts and Royal Dutch Medical Association (KNMG) in ever-broadening terms." In a 1986 decision of the Hague Court of Appeal, for example, the term "unbearable pain" was extended to include "psychic suffering" or "the potential disfigurement of personality", making severely depressed, mentally retarded or Alzheimer's patients also eligible for death by doctors.
A 1990 government report on euthanasia in the Netherlands, dubbed the "Remmelink Report", showed that of the 130,000 annual deaths in that country (total population 15 million), 11,840 people died from euthanasia-- nearly ten percent. And that number doesn't even include medical interventions like "pulling the plug" on patients on life-support... which would likely add a few thousand casualties per year.
Of those euthanized, 2,700 patients died of active, voluntary euthanasia or doctor-assisted suicide. 8,100 patients died of an intentional overdose of morphine or other pain-relieving medication, administered by a physician... 3,159 with the patient's consent, 4,941 without. Another 1,040 patients died from involuntary euthanasia by other means, killed by a doctor without their knowledge or consent. Makes 5,981 murders.
"14% of these [1,040 patients]", states the International Task Force, "were fully competent. 72% had never given any indication that they would want their lives terminated. In 8% of the cases, doctors performed involuntary euthanasia despite the fact that they believed alternative options were still possible." In 45% of the involuntary euthanasia cases, the patients' families were not informed that the doctors had decided to do away with their loved ones.
Continued
Reportedly, the Dutch Patients' Association, a disability rights organization, encourages their members to carry wallet-size cards stating that, if the cardholder is admitted to a hospital, "no treatment be administered with the intention to terminate life." A German company has proposed to open a nursing home just across the Dutch-German border where the elderly can find a safe haven in a country with strict anti-euthanasia laws. And in a 1993 survey (which didn't include questions about euthanasia) by the Protestant Christian Elderly Society, 10% of Dutch seniors mentioned that they are afraid of hospitalization because their lives may be terminated without their consent.
Not an unreasonable assumption, especially if you live in a country with a total of two hospices where cost containment is one of the main health care policies and where euthanasia training is part of the curriculum in medical and nursing schools. "What happens to vulnerable people is a particularly sharp issue in a continent where birthrates have declined, populations have aged and five nations have more old than young," stated an article by Knight Ridder Newspapers. "Euthanasia opponents fear that as costs increase for long-term intensive care and health-care budgets become more strained, financial reasons could creep into euthanasia debates."
Further stretching the limits, the Dutch are now about to cross the line from adults and teenagers to children, including infants. 2001 legislation made euthanasia legal only for consenting adults and children over 12 years of age; yet a new proposal is calling for the official elimination of both age restrictions and the need for consent from patients who are unconscious or unable to make the decision for themselves.
It seems that, even though the proposal is new, the practice isn't. The Groningen Academic Hospital admitted that it had been euthanizing severely deformed or handicapped infants since at least 2000; and the British Medical Journal revealed that, in 1997, 8% of all infant deaths were due to euthanasia. Consent of the parents is of minor importance--it's ultimately up to the physicians to decide whether a baby's predicted quality of life calls for euthanasia or not. 57% of Dutch physicians admitted to have performed euthanasia in the past, 31% said they killed infants before.
Conclusion:
Wesley Smith, American attorney and author of Forced Exit: The Slippery Slope from Assisted Suicide to Legalized Murder, commented that "the slippery slope in the Netherlands has descended already into a vertical cliff." And Bishop Elio Sgreccia, VP of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said with the implementation of this latest policy, "the final boundary will have been crossed."
The Dutch Health Ministry is preparing a response to the proposal that should come out this December. And Belgium has a similar bill ready to be signed, sealed and delivered.
Can't happen here, you say? Think again. In the 1997 2nd edition of his book Practical Ethics, philosopher and university professor Peter Singer posited that a woman with two children, one normal and one with hemophilia, needn't have qualms about eliminating the latter to ‘make space' for another, healthy child: "[T]he main point is clear: killing a disabled infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Very often it is not wrong at all." As a measure for the quality of life, he explains, "We cannot expect a child with Down syndrome to play the guitar, to develop an appreciation of science fiction, to learn a foreign language, to chat with us about the latest Woody Allen movie or to be a respectable athlete or basketball or tennis player." (Ed. note: If those are the criteria for a worthy life, some of your WWNK editors need to be euthanized a.s.a.p.)
In 1999, Singer was appointed Professor of Bioethics at the Princeton University Center for Human Values... where he is now, the International Task Force states with concern, "molding and shaping the views of future leaders in medicine, law, education and business."
While we don't have a problem with individuals being allowed to choose euthanasia to end their own unhappy life, or to leave instructions stating the conditions under which they can and should be helped to shed their mortal coil, a trend that has such decisions made without patient consent or instructions is disturbing and worth keeping an eye on.
About Not Dead Yet and The Resistance
Since 1983, many people with disabilities have opposed the assisted suicide and euthanasia movement. Though often described as compassionate, legalized medical killing is really about a deadly double standard for people with severe disabilities, including both conditions that are labeled terminal and those that are not.
Disability opposition to this ultimate form of discrimination has been ignored by most media and courts, but countless people with disabilities have already died before their time. For some, a disabled person's suicidal cry for help was ignored, misinterpreted, or even exploited by the right-to-die movement. For others, death came at the request of a family member or other health care surrogate. This is not compassion, it's contempt.
Not Dead Yet was founded on April 27, 1996, shortly after Jack Kevorkian was acquitted in the assisted suicides of two women with non-terminal disabilities. In a 1997 Supreme Court rally, the outcry of 500 people with disabilities chanting "Not Dead Yet" was heard around the world. Since then, eleven other national disability rights groups have joined NDY in opposing legalized assisted suicide and euthanasia, chapters have taken action in over 30 states, and we helped put Jack Kevorkian behind bars in 1999.
People already have the right to refuse unwanted treatment, and suicide is not illegal. What we oppose is a public policy that singles out individuals for legalized killing based on their health status. This violates the Americans With Disabilities Act, and denies us the equal protection of the law. Some bioethicists have even started to argue that intellectually disabled people are not persons under the law. That hasn’t happened since slavery was legal.
Legalized medical killing is not a new human right, it's a new professional immunity. It would allow health professionals to decide which of us are "eligible" for this service, and exempt them from accountability for their decisions. Killing is not just another medical treatment option, and it must not be made any part of routine health care. In these days of cost cutting and managed care, we don't trust the health care system, and neither should you.
NOT DEAD YET * 7521 Madison St * Forest Park, IL 60130
Voice/TTY: 708-209-1500 * Fax: 708-209-1735 * TTY: 708-209-1826
Euthanasia is a serious moral issue, and one not totally unconnected to other, vastly more significant threats to the population.
Since 2001 the Federal Government has spent an estimated $50 billion dollars on expansion of bioweapons labs and research facilities, creating a twelve fold increase in the number of Level 3 and Level 4 bio-containment facilities.
An accidental or intentional release of any number of a variety of pathogens and/or their genetically enhanced offspring temporarily "contained" in the hundreds of labs that now handle these organisms across the United States, could provide an immediate answer for all those skeptics who dismiss the last days plagues prophesied in the Bible.
During 2007 hearings before Congress' Committee on Energy and Commerce's Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, committee Chairman Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) said:
"These BSL–3 and 4 labs are the facilities where research is conducted on highly infectious viruses and bacteria that can cause injury or death. Some of the world's most exotic and most dangerous diseases are handled at BSL–3 and 4 labs, including anthrax, foot-and-mouth disease and Ebola fever. The accidental or deliberate release of some of the biological agents handled at these labs could have catastrophic consequences. Yet, as we will hear from the Government Accountability Office, GAO, no single Government agency has the ultimate responsibility for ensuring the safety and securing of these high-containment labs. However, GAO states there is a major expansion of the number of BSL laboratories is occurring both in United States and abroad but the full extent of that expansion is unknown."
("Germs, Viruses and Secrets: The Silent Proliferation of Bio-Laboratories in the United States," Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, U.S. House of Representatives, October 4, 2007, Serial No. 110-70, pp. 1-2)
""The hearings revealed that no one "in the Federal Government even knows for sure how many of these labs there are in the United States, much less what research they are doing or whether they are safe and secure.""
Source article by Tom Burghardt
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14568
With Prof. Singer it isn't just euthanasia that makes him kooky.
Singer's Bestial Ballad
http://www.tysknews.com/Depts/society/bestial_ballad.htm
SECOND OPINION
"Adultery, incest, sex with children, sex with animals — arguing against any such sexual behavior becomes much more difficult once we decide that the notion of self-restraint is incoherent." —Alan Keyes
Peter Singer, Princeton's DeCamp Professor in the University Center for Human Values, was the recipient of our annual "Cultural Devolution" Award in the Federalist 00-19 Op-Ed, "Singer's Sanctimonious Song," for his position on killing children with birth defects. "Killing a disabled infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Very often it is not wrong at all," claimed Singer.
Last year, Singer expanded on that murderous theme, announcing that Americans have a "moral obligation" to kill the aged and infirm because they consume far too many of our medical resources.
Singer's abortion and euthanasia "logic" descends from a rather convoluted set of rules which, when reduced to their simplest form, imply that personhood is a function of self-consciousness and awareness. Thus, he concludes, those who advocate for the unborn should be equally concerned with the lives of calves, pigs, and chickens, "for on any fair comparison of morally relevant characteristics, like rationality, self-consciousness, awareness, autonomy, pleasure and pain, and so on, the calf, the pig and the much-derided chicken come out well ahead of the fetus at any stage of pregnancy—while if we make the comparison with a fetus of less than three months, a fish would show more signs of consciousness."
Singer argues that to suggest any position to the contrary constitutes "speciesism," the idea that human life is somehow more sacred than other animal life. (Undoubtedly he is an honorary chairman of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.)
Singer does not, however, offer any argument for potentiality. After all, calves, pigs and chickens have the capacity to develop into, well, calves, pigs and chickens. Unborn children have the capacity to develop into, well, utilitarian academicians, who can expound on the properties of personhood at the nation's higher institutions of learning.
Moving on to Singer's argument for euthanasia, a multitude of lower life forms also have a greater degree of thus defined "personhood" than victims of Alzheimer's disease, who have largely lost their sense of self-awareness.
Continued
But then comes the rub. As it turns out, Singer, heralded in a recent interview with the New Yorker as the "greatest living philosopher," has a mother who suffers from Alzheimer's disease. She is, by his definition, no longer a "person." Yet he has, at great personal expense, hired round-the-clock health care workers to care for her. Questioned about the fact he does not practice what he preaches, Singer declared: "I think this has made me see how the issues of someone with these kinds of problems are really very difficult. Perhaps it is more difficult than I thought before, because it is different when it's your mother."
"Perhaps it is more difficult than I thought before, because it is different when it's your mother"? Feel free to re-read the preceding quote until you fully grasp its implications! Sometimes a single comment categorically betrays the boundless hypocrisy of the Left's most celebrated illiterati. One can infer from Singer's position on euthanasia that killing "defective" children is also different when it is your child!
Dr. Peter Berkowitz, a professor at George Mason University Law School and author of Virtue and the Making of Modern Liberalism, says of Singer's revelation, "Although he strenuously denies that from the ethical point of view we ought to treat friends and family differently, Singer's actions seems to proclaim that what is right and what is rigorous applies only to other people's mothers."
Now, Singer is back, claiming that "mutually satisfying activities" (such as sex) with animals, should be OK. (Has PETA seen this latest of Singer's "ethical findings" — or maybe that is where Singer got the idea?) In his review of the book, Dearest Pet: Bestiality, after a detailed description of sex with chickens, Singer writes that "our physical similarities with other mammals...are so strong that the taboo on bestiality stems not from physical differences but from our desire to differentiate ourselves...from animals. Who has not," he opines, "been at a social occasion disrupted by the household dog gripping the legs of a visitor and vigorously rubbing its penis against them? [I]n private not everyone objects to being used by her or his dog in this way, and occasionally mutually satisfying activities may develop."
In the vein of Singer's hypocritical stand on euthanasia — "it is different when it's your mother," we are left wondering, "is it different when it's your puppy?"
Am I the only one with hair standing on the back of my neck?....A foreign general is in charge of NATO troops
in Virgina!
***********************************
French General Takes Over NATO Command in Virginia
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 29, 2009
Filed at 4:40 p.m. ET
BRUSSELS (AP) -- In an unprecedented move, a French general will take over a key NATO command in Norfolk, Virginia, charged with transforming the Europe-centered Cold War alliance to tackle today's global challenges, NATO said Wednesday.
Gen. Stephane Abrial of the French Air Force will take over from U.S. Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis as NATO's commander in charge of military modernization, the alliance said in a statement.
The position has traditionally been held by a four-star U.S. general. Abrial's appointment marks the first time in NATO's 60-year history that a non-American officer has been appointed to fill the position.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/07/29/world/AP-EU-NATO-Norfolk-Command.html?_r=2
They're making the vaccinations as available as they can. Let's see, today I need to go to WalMart get some groceries, do a little banking and oh yeah, get vaccinated! How nice ;-)
*********************************
Wal-Mart weighs role in U.S. H1N1 vaccination plans
By Barbara Liston
ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc is discussing with U.S. health officials the possibility of putting vaccination sites at some of its stores for an H1N1 swine flu inoculation campaign this fall, a company official said on Thursday.
Federal officials met with Wal-Mart executives on Wednesday in Arkansas to discuss the issue, Dr. John Agwunobi, president of health and wellness for Wal-Mart U.S., told public health leaders at a conference in Orlando.
http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-SwineFlu/idUSTRE56T4I220090730
Jaclyn--
This doesn't surprise me. Around here most of the grocery stores (with pharmacies) and pharmacy stores already have specific dates set for people to get the flu vaccine each year.
Maybe it is the unspoken plan to help with the Social Security funding problem. Retire at 62 and take the blue pill at 70....
7/31/2009
Jaclyn wrote: "They're making the vaccinations as available as they can. Let's see, today I need to go to WalMart get some groceries, do a little banking and oh yeah, get vaccinated! How nice ;-)"
I have gotten regular flu vaccinations at CV. They are administered by outside health personnel, not store employees.
The following copyrighted document is provided under Fair Use principles. Statement at end!
OPINION
Wall St. Journal
JULY 30, 2009, 11:23 P.M. ET
Health Reform and Cancer
The danger is that ObamaCare will stifle medical innovations that could save patients like me.
By MYRNA ULFIK
I have been battling non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, an incurable blood cancer, for the past nine years. Last year, I was also diagnosed with uterine cancer.
I didn’t run to Canada for treatment. Medicare took care of my needs right here in New York City. To endure, I just need the freedom to choose my insurance, my doctors, and get the diagnostic scans and care I need. And one more thing: I need hope that a treatment will be developed that can control my diseases the way insulin controls diabetes.
Every cancer patient needs these things, especially hope. But the government’s plan to reform the health-care system in this country threatens all of this—particularly the development of new treatments.
When I was first diagnosed in 2000 I had chemotherapy. It put me in remission, but nearly killed me.
Three years later the lymphoma was back and I faced more chemo. This is so often the pattern of cancer: recurring disease and repeated chemo. In the end patients often die not from the disease, but from the treatments.
I took a different path, seeking a cancer vaccine. One had been developed at Stanford University 12 years earlier that had given 90% of patients very long remissions and cured some entirely. Unlike chemotherapy, there were no severe side effects.
But I couldn’t get the vaccine because the Food and Drug Administration required another trial that would take nine more years. Over-regulation has kept this treatment from patients for 21 years, as some 24,000 lymphoma patients died each year.
My husband and I searched the Internet and found another vaccine being tested at Freiburg University in Germany. That vaccine has helped me avoid chemotherapy for years. My oncologist says he’s never seen another patient do so well with the type of lymphoma I have.
I am still here because my care was managed by doctors—not a government agency. My doctors do what the bureaucracy can’t: They see me as a human being.
Patient-as-person will be a lost concept under the new health-care plan, where treatments will be based not upon individual patient needs, but upon what’s best for everyone. So cancer drugs for seniors might take second place to jungle gyms and farmers’ markets—so-called preventive care—which are covered under both the House and Senate versions of the health bill.
The stimulus package passed earlier this year allocated $1.1 billion for hundreds of “Comparative Effectiveness Research” studies. This project will compare all treatment options for a host of diseases in order to develop a database to guide doctors’ decisions. Research of this sort typically takes years. But the data will likely be hastily drawn conclusions that reflect the view of the government agencies that fund the studies: Cheap therapies are just as good as expensive ones.
In order to finance health-care reform, Democrats in Congress have proposed cutting $500 billion from Medicare over the next 10 years. Yet in his press conference last Wednesday, President Barack Obama denied that Medicare benefits would be cut. He has surrounded himself with advisers who believe otherwise.
Tom Daschle, Mr. Obama’s original pick to head Health and Human Services, argues in his book “Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis,” that we should accept “hopeless diagnoses” and “forgo experimental treatments.” Mr. Daschle blames the “use and overuse of new technologies and treatments” for runaway health-care costs. He suggests a Federal Health Board modeled after the British “NICE” board to make decisions on health-care rationing.
Continued
But the British system is infamous for denying state-of-the-art drugs to cancer patients. Thus cancer-survival rates in Britain are far below those in America, just as they are in Canada.
Canadian cancer patients told to wait months for treatment and diagnostic scans frequently go south and pay out-of-pocket for care in the United States. A number of Quebeckers even sued their government for violating their “right to life and security” under the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Canada’s Supreme Court has acknowledged the pervasive rationing that occurs. In the 2005 case Chaoulli v. Quebec (Attorney General) , the majority opinion stated: “The evidence in this case shows that delays in the public health care system are widespread, and that, in some serious cases, patients die as a result of waiting lists for public health care.”
Despite such evidence, the Obama plan is likely to target various treatments—including radiology scans—in order to cut costs. I survived this long because my radiologist examines each of my scans with me in detail.
One of those scans also saved my life by picking up unsuspected uterine cancer. The congressional majority seems blissfully unaware that all cancer patients need those scans to monitor their diseases.
Also uneasy with the cost of medical progress is Dr. David Blumenthal, Mr. Obama’s new head of Health Information Technology. It is not reassuring that he stresses that two-thirds of the annual increases in health spending result from medical innovation, as he has written in The New England Journal of Medicine.
Cancer patients need nothing more than such innovation. Yes, developing more effective, less toxic treatments is expensive. The prices of new cancer therapies reflect the billion-dollar cost of developing each new drug. But such treatments can be life-saving, as they have been for me.
Despite its warts, our system works. Carelessly tinkering with it will have a world-wide penalty—the stifling of new drug development. What company would spend a billion dollars to develop a drug that will not be reimbursed by the new health plan? This would be a direct, devastating blow to the most vulnerable Americans.
In spite of the president’s assurances, there is every sign that this plan will be financed by deep cuts to Medicare, which, like the public option, will limit payments for specialists, radiology scans, and cutting-edge cancer drugs. These are prime targets because they are more expensive than other services. But are we really expected to forgo new medical technology and return to the cancer care of the 1970s?
When members of Congress are asked if they will opt for the public plan, they say no. That’s for the rest of us.
The number of Americans who have cancer exceeds 10 million. It’s time for cancer patients and their families to remind those on Capitol Hill that health-care reform is a matter of life and death for us.
Ms. Ulfik is a writer in New York.
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This message contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making the material available for news reporting, criticism, comment, and teaching purposes in an effort to advance understanding of international, political, human rights, economic, democracy, social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material herein is distributed non-commercially, i.e., without profit, to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for educational and research purposes. For more information go to:
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After listening to the ridiculous prattle on tonights "show", which included (no big surprise here) some foolish sounding housewife (Dorothy, and you claim to be some sort of educated and published academic, here's a clue for you, your "sources" are rubbish) cite wikipedia as a reference about the dire progress of euthanasia around the globe, I feverently pray to Isis that the New World Order arrives quickly.
One can but only pray to Isis and bow to Osiris that the Swine Flu vaccine will indeed allow some other "vector" to infect the vaccinated individuals. We will, for the sake of discussion purposes call this "vector" - sanity.
Readers of this blog should rush out for the vaccine if Isis is so merciful.
Baal,
You've had your 15 minutes of fame, now just move on.
Dorothy
Heads up- tonight on the Fri/Sat Coast to Coast radio show an interview with Benny Creme
Let/s see - if I remember mythology -
isis and osiris had a child - a horned little demon - pan wasn't it? or am I mistaken and it is baal?
7/31//2009
Baal wrote: "One can but only pray to Isis and bow to Osiris"
I would get better results praying to my running shoes.
How can you say otherwise?
ISIS = INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY OF INSTITUTIONALIZED STUPIDITY
BAAL = BULLCRAP ALL ABOUT (and by) LIARS
Is "Baal" a would be spokesman for all this crap? Looks like it!
Hope "Baal" can save him in the wicked days ahead. Doubt it!
Thanks Len, and thanks Jaclyn,
Very interesting reading this morning.
It strikes me that any de population scheme is naturally going to be elitist. What else could it be?
And elites are very often poor physical specimens.
I guess it's different when it's your body; asthmatic,
overweight, poor vision, fallen arches, scoliosis, alcoholic, poor circulation and all...
Imagine a utopia where everyone is an academic.
There's a scenario for you.
And once again baal has weighed in with the usual
pointless, unedifying slander.
The Boll Weevil; smartest of all the parasites.
Paul,
The depopulation scheme will be carried out with our own tax dollars.
In regards to comments from previous thread....
The whole idea of person to person transmission of infectious disease is just so "old school".
Much better to use insects:
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=99552&page=1
Of interest to me is that the professor who is warning about insects being used to transmit weaponized pathogens works at KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY.
The FEDS recently awarded $650 million to the State of Kansas for a new Level 4 biohazard/bioweapons research facility to be built at KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY. While Homeland Security approved the project, the GAO continues to insist that operating such a facility in TORNADO ALLEY could imperil us all.
http://www.kansascity.com/105/story/1349759.html
I’ve got news for the GAO… forget Kansas, there’s a NEW BIOWEAPONS LAB coming to a town near you.
Proposed new HOT ZONE labs in the United States:
http://www.utwatch.org/archives/backyardbioweapons.html
The rate such facilities are springing up all around the world is truly astonishing.
Dorothy, Dorothy, Dorothy:
"Baal,
You've had your 15 minutes of fame, now just move on.
Dorothy"
I have been looking into your fame.
Some free advice from me to you on you activities on the internet and in your reporting, researching and activism. It appears to have some defects, which I fear, make you seem less than credible.
Your fight against Antisemitism is laudable and your contention, poorly refuted by some bloggers on rather immature right wing sites you apparently read, that the phrase Anti-Zionist or Anti-Zionism is simply code for "I hate Jews" is quite correct. In fact, one can trace the modern day emergence of the term in the Muslim press, and more generally in the European press. As in the phrase "I have nothing against Jews, I am just opposed to Zionism" which can be found frequently employed by critics of Israel.
Any logical analysis of the idea of being "Anti Zionist" leads to the inevitable conclusion that the person has "issues" with Jews as the phrase "Anti Zionist" essentially means "opposed to Jews having a homeland". Quite Antisemitic and offensive put that way.
Rather like saying "I am opposed to blacks having their own communities. Harlem is an ethnic atrocity."
Put this way, you see, your critics would have shrunk from their arguments.
But Dorothy, your tactics are rather crude. A bit analogous to the skills of Michael Jackson's various plastic surgeons. You care little for "collateral" damage in you ceaseless fight and never ending vigilance against Antisemitism.
For you, if some good person or people get tarred in the process of your crusade so be it.
This is a poor tactic, flawed strategy, and just plain not nice.
Stick to legitimate sources, not Wikipedia (see the following for the problems in this regard: http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/MediaNews/2009/05/11/9424006-ap.html ) and refrain from branding people Antisemitic by inference.
"The whole idea of person to person transmission of infectious disease is just so "old school"."
It seems like the greatest reason any vaccinations are used is precisely that - person-to-person transmission.
?
Yeah, why vaccinate, if not to protect against person-to-person transmissions?
Baal, you've offered nothing in the way of solid information in all of your posts. Obviously you feel no need to document anything. You just slather on words like others slather mayonnaise on bread.
Dorothy
Dorothy,
Here is the man you vilify, in his own words, on how we should lead our lives and conduct ourselves every day, I even fail to live up to this standard. No, he he his not talking about religion as such. But here is the philosophy of the man you are so horrified about:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=badlTArRTcY
Baal, you appear goofier as the days go by. Are you really saying someone should be impressed because Hall would make a good Hallmark card writer? He said absolute nothing in that video about human relations as the word love can mean whatever the speaker wants it to mean until it is spelled out in relation to a specific application.
Dorothy
Jeremiah 5:21
Hear now this, O foolish people, and without understanding; which have eyes, and see not; which have ears, and hear not
Baal,
What is it now? Are you trying to convince us you own a copy of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations? If so, good for you!
Dorothy
Dorothy,
So you are saying that the meaning of the word love is relative and situational? Tsk., Tsk., Tsk.
Therefore, for instance, a lesbian may experience the same love of her partner as a heterosexual woman does of hers?
Or that, in another vein, a Jewish person's love of God may be different from and more or less true and legitimate than a Christian's or a Hindu's.
Or that the love of God may, given the situation, be a perverted form of idolatry rather than love?
Oh Dorothy, I think you have fallen down a rabbit hole alongside Alice.
In any case, Hall covered all of that. Try actually listening next time.
If I had harbored the delusion that you might ever be illuminated I am now disabused of that notion. I will pray for your Rabbi for he must be tormented by you.
ANONS 12:47, 12:55...
You missed the point entirely.
True, I was being a little sarcastic, but also pointing out that person to person transmission pales in comparison to other methods of transmission, some of which are truly innovative. Read the research, check the links, then maybe you could make an informed comment.
I'll post this here too as a response to your constant slander seeing you saw fit to double post the last as well:
Dorothy,
So you here assert that there are no insane people who speak "several foreign languages"???
I must admit to being amused at the fact that you feel opposed by "mouthy little trolls" and not a little bit satisfied as well. It is especially ironic as three separate bloggers have referred to you as a troll. You might try learning up on "Karma".
Would you like me to provide links to them, or would you count that as persecution?
Well here is one:
http://carrietomko.blogspot.com/2008/03/former-commenter-here-moved-on-to.html
Or perhaps this bit from the same blog:
"ZUUKIE ISN'T HAPPY
It seems that I have upset Dorothy, who commented in my blog under the name Zuukie. She is complaining about me in Constance Cumbey's comments boxes. She has accused me of being anti-semitic because I object to Athol Bloomer's heretical Catholicism. Shows rather a significant lack of discernment on her part.
Interesting that she has concluded she is the only one who has been banned on my blog, as though that is some sort of singular achievement. Ah no, not quite. There are 32 entries on my banned list. I don't announce who has been banned. It's not something I consider worth blogging. I ban people who attack with ad hominem comments. Somehow Dorothy has failed to comprehend that even though I've said it several times, and issue a warning before I enforce the ban.
# posted by Carrie : Friday, August 03, 2007"
And who is it then who trolls the internet to hurl ad hominem attacks at people who have different views? Who was busy attack a Catholic blogger expressing her opinion? Who dragged you to her blog Zukkie??
Zukkie???
Zukkie???
Zukkie sounds sort of anonymous doesn't it?
Too bad Constance spilled the beans.
Getting banned from a Catholic Blog?
Bad Zukkie.
MANLY P. HALL 101
THE MANLY P. HALL ARCHIVE
Manly Palmer Hall (March 18, 1901 - August 29, 1990) was a Canadian-born author and mystic. He is perhaps most famous for his work The Secret Teachings of All Ages: An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy, which is widely regarded as his magnum opus, and which he published at the age of 25 (or 27, 1928)
He has been widely recognized as a leading scholar in the fields of religion, mythology, mysticism, and the occult.
Carl Jung, when writing Psychology and Alchemy, borrowed material from Hall’s private collection.
In 1934, Hall founded the Philosophical Research Society (PRS) in Los Angeles, California, dedicating it to an idealistic approach to the solution of human problems. The PRS claims to be non-sectarian and entirely free from educational, political, or ecclesiastical control, and the Society’s programs stress the need for the integration of philosophy, religion, and science into one system of instruction. The PRS Library, a public facility devoted to source materials in obscure fields, has many rare and scarce items now impossible to obtain elsewhere.
In 1973 (47 years after writing The Secret Teachings of All Ages), Hall was recognized as a 33º Mason (the highest honor conferred by the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite), at a ceremony held at PRS on December 8th, despite never being initiated into the physical craft.
http://www.manlyphall.org/
MPH BIOGRAPHY
http://www.prs.org/mphbio.htm
Here is Manly P. Hall's book online so that people can read it and judge for themselves if Mr. Hall's books are compatible with ANY of the authentic Abrahamic faiths - as opposed to their esoteric/gnostic variations which often contradicted the Old and New Testaments of the Bible as well as the Qur'an.
The point is that we are not questioning a person's honesty and sincerity if he chooses to worship pagan deities. But we are questioning the honesty and sincerity of a person if he secretly tries to smuggle his pagan beliefs into any of the three Abrahamic faiths by deliberately failing to call things by their right names.
For example.....failing to make the proper distinction between religion and magic by way of an improper use of the word "mysticism." With magic and esotericism, we are not talking about "mysticism" (a.k.a. the "way of prayer"). We are talking about "gnosticism" which is something entirely different insofar as the gnostic seeks to COMMAND deity rather than supplicate deity - and often goes so far as to even claim that he IS deity..... whereas the true mystic does not.
SECRET TEACHINGS OF ALL AGES
http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/sta/index.htm
Here is what BOING BOING's Gareth Branwyn had to say about Manly P. Hall in a recent book review......
"MYSTERIES" MAGICAL TOUR
Posted by Gareth Branwyn, February 11, 2009 3:41 AM
Manly Palmer Hall has been called the America Madame Blavatsky, which probably isn't far from the truth. Like the controversial Russian-born founder of Theosophy, Hall seemed dedicated to quantity over quality in his writing (authoring more than 50 books on esoterica and self-help), and like Helena, the troubling smell of snake oil swirled in his rotund wake. Manly P Hall is one of the people principally responsible for the birth of the New Age religious movement in the United States, first in LA, starting in the '20s, and then beyond, through his writings and endless lecturing. While some of his lesser works, like Questions Answered on the Problems of Life by Manly P Hall, Philosopher, may have proven less than influential, his occult encyclopedia The Secret Teachings of All Ages was a bedrock influence on New Age thought then, and to some extent, remains so today (Secret Teachings still sells well, as is now in its 16th edition).
LA Times staff writer Louis Sahagun's biography, Master of the Mysteries: The Life of Manly Palmer Hall (Process Media) is an engrossing look inside, not only the life of this self-taught philosopher and spiritual teacher, but the growth of the often bizarre alternative religious movements that were busting out all over Southern California in the first half of the 20th century. This is Hollywood Babylon in Egyptian ankhs and yoga pants. Actors, artists, musicians, politicians, and scientists of the time flocked to hear Hall lecture on the mysteries of East, self-help psychology, and secret societies. Allegedly blessed with photographic memory, Hall was capable of absorbing huge amounts of information and then reformatting it into his own books, frequently under suspicions of plagiarism and playing fast and loose with facts and legitimate sources (another dubious distinction he shared with Blavatsky).....read more......
http://boingboing.net/2009/02/11/mysteries-magical-to.html
MANLY P. HALL, 33°
CEREMINIAL MAGICK AND SORCERY
An Holy Excerpt from his Great Alchymeckal Worke of 1928:
The Secret Teachings of All Ages:
An Encyclopaedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy
1988 by Manley P. Hall
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/bb/book_eight06.htm
This is Manly P. Hall's Introduction to.......
BLAVATSKY AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE
by Max Heindel
Cover
http://rosicrucianzine.tripod.com/blavatsky.htm
Introduction
http://rosicrucianzine.tripod.com/introductionhpb.htm
MANLY PALMER HALL- ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP CONNECTION
A place of adventure and change was not what Manly Palmer Hall was
looking for when he stepped off a train in downtown Los Angeles in
the fall of 1919. For Hall, the lure of Southern California was the
chance to reunite with his mother, who had abandoned him in infancy.
The 18-year-old Canadian immigrant, who never knew his father, had
spent a confused and insecure childhood bouncing from town to town
with his maternal grandmother, Florence Palmer. They had been living
in new york City when she died suddenly, leaving Hall with little
choice but to quit his clerk’s job at a Wall Street firm, leave the
city, and move into his mother’s home in the beachside community of
Santa Monica.
Louise Hall, who had worked for 15 years as a chiropractic healer
in the Alaskan gold fields, shared the modest house with her second
husband, Charles Hall, a jack-of-all-trades who took her last name.
If there were hard feelings between Hall and his mother, he never
spoke of them.
Hall was raised from age 16 to 19 by a Rosicrucian group, he was
associated with a myriad of other societies, including Freemasonry,
he was also familiar with most every mystical and esoteric practice
that was ever known in the past several thousand years, and probably
some that weren’t so well known.
One of the most prolific writers within the broader theosophical
movement was Max Heindel, a Christian mystic and Danish immigrant who
established a spiritual commune in 1907 on a scenic bluff called Mt.
Ecclesia in Oceanside, about 80 miles south of Los Angeles.
Dedicated to Christ Jesus, Astrology, the power of prayer and
providing an explanation for the origin, evolution and future
development of the world and man, Max Heindel’s Rosicrucian Fellowship soon became a favorite vacation spot for young Hall and his mother. Their first trip to Mt. Ecclesia was in 1920, a year after Max Heindel’s death. His widow, Augusta, was struck by Manly’s talent as a writer, his youthful pastoral work at the Church of the People, his graciousness and his intense interest in her husband’s complex books, which essentially taught that earth is a great school to which ever-volving individuals come by way of reincarnation, life after life.
At Mt. Ecclesia, Manly Palmer Hall grew so attached to Heindel’s
temperamental heavy-set widow that he started calling her “mother.”
Augusta Foss Heindel and her followers taught him astrology and the
fundamentals of typesetting, printing and binding.
From them, he also learned to avoid writing in longhand with an ink
pen because it siphoned off one’s vitality, an admonishment he obeyed
for most of his life, preferring instead to dictate his books.
He showed her how to play backgammon, and was her connection to
prospective younger converts. together, they wrote numerous articles
for the Fellowship’s newsletter, Rays from the Rosy Cross, which
compared life on the bluff to heaven on earth.
“Why does this spot seem so beautiful?” Hall wrote under the title
“Echoes from Mt. Ecclesia” in mid-1921. “There are many other places
where the stars may be seen and studied, and thousands of people
see the same glorious sunsets, and enjoy the same wonderful climate.
But there is something here that is not to be found in any other part
of the world. There is something here that is restful and different;
it seems almost like holy ground. It is because of the love that is
sent here by thousands of members and the lives of self-forgetting
service that the workers are living day by day, that makes this the
beauty spot of the earth.”
cont.....
cont.....
On March 17, 1923 Mr. Hall was ordained a minister in the "Church of the People."
A few days later, he was elected permanent pastor of the
church, and the congregation honored him with a rosicrucian-style
cross that was based on a design of his own and made of diamonds,
platinum, gold and white enamel. etched with emblems and symbols of
astrology and ancient religious schools, it represented the ideals
shared by all spiritual quests. As minister he invited Mrs. Augusta Foss Heindel to do a lecture in the Church of the People which had a great audience .
Dangling from a chain around his neck, Hall proudly wore the flashy
fist-sized cross as a symbol of spiritual authority in a state where
alternative spiritual movements were becoming significant cultural
forces.The belief in reincarnation had become especially popular.
He published at the age of 27, 1928 his work The Secret Teachings of
All Ages: An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic
and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy, which is widely regarded as
his magnum opus.
As a fair friend of Mrs Heindel and The Rosicrucian Fellowship he
wrote the introduction of Max Heindel’s book Blavatsky and the
Secret Doctrine published in 1933 fourteen years after Max Heindel’s death.
“Max Heindel was a pioneer in Christian mysticism and Madame
Blavatsky was a pioneer in Oriental occultism. Both established
systems of thinking which spread rapidly throughout a soul-hungry
humanity. Not only did they leave organizations of their own, but the
seeds which they planted in the hearts of men have sprouted forth and
borne fruit in many parts of the world, where other organizations
have been established along similar lines.” (M.P.H.).............
http://www.manlyphall.org/
P.S.
The preceding collection of data on Manly P. Hall was, to the best of my knowledge, Wikipedia-free.
Nice summary Blue.
Baal,
I'll stay with what I wrote about love. What an individual will do in the name of love varies from individual to individual. The body rush a person might feel physically as a result of an aroused emotion has little to do with what their actions might be in such a state. What a person does to another has to do with the moral disciplines that they live by.
I posted for a long time at Carrie's blogspot. Being a believer in Orthodox Catholicism she began being attracted to some fringe individuals who were antisemitic. I refused to stop correcting the distorted information she started posting and she didn't like that. So for a while I was kicked off the blog. After a while she dropped connecting with those individuals and I was able to post on the threads again. Carrie recently died. She was on my email list for a long time and didn't ask to be taken off. Carrie used her real name and didn't hide behind an anonymous label or a false name.
It's no problem if you post the other two labels. Probably djinn and redcake over at Israel Forum, two who should be ashamed of themselves for acting like angry little two year olds embarrassing the Jewish community in the process, while everyone else there acted like responsible adults.
Dorothy
When I was doing CPE studies (Clinical Pastoral Work) in a famous cancer hospital, I watched how terminal patients were effectively euthanized, by upping the morphine drips until they 'went to sleep'. I had to critically stand in the gap for a patient who was being treated this way, so that his family could join him at his bedside to pray with him and to be able to speak their own words to him. The nurses were furious, because 'the room had to be made ready for someone else.' I felt as though I were in a vet clinic where dogs and cats were euthanized...and when the grateful family arrived, he was bright and cheery and they had wonderful words and time together, and prayed together." Anoymous cleric
Several years ago, a friend of mine drove her friend up to a motel where Dr. Kevorikian administered the
"dose" or, he watched as she administered it to herself..and she died. I felt such grief, that there was no Christian who could have prayed with her, no Christian who could have given her the Good News of her salvation and her non-need to end her own life, that in trusting Christ, Who knows her as she is, Who would be with her in life and death, and in life to come...it was a terrible grief. The woman who took her there, has led a horrible life eversince. Oh, Lord, have mercy.
Dear Baal
I have to admit, your blog name gave me quite
Astarte.
Paul,
Alright...I'm laughing!
Blue God Buster,
You give a very accurate summary of Hall's life. Louis Shagun's biography is excellent, and at times hard to put down. I very much disagree that he ever tried to "introduce" anything into Christianity.
To quotes from "The Mystical Christ":
"In Christian mysticism, Christ is the revelation of the love of God. It is difficult to decide whether love bestows faith or faith justifies love. Perhaps faith must come first. It is not easy to love that which we do not know or which is remote and majestic. If faith bestows the power to know God in the heart, it is inevitable that we shall love that which we have come to know as beautiful and good. In the very process of worship, we instinctively bestow our love upon the object of our adoration. Faith, having known the fact of God, instinctively interprets that fact through the emotion of adoration. The word adoration means divine love or affection on the level of the spiritual substance" Pg 16
"The 13th chapter of I. Corinthians is one of the most beautiful parts of the New Testament and powerfully substantiates the mystical content in the Christian Communion. Paul the apostle address the Church of Corinth, exhorting the congregation to be united in faith, saying to them 'Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?' Paul then devoted much consideration to the mystery of charity...Paul therefore, was not primarily preaching charity as good will to the poor, but as the love of God manifesting through the natural inclination to serve those who are in need" Pg. 21
The book goes on at length like this treating, very well, the mystical tradition that developed in Christianity. The list of famous Christian mystics covers nearly 2000 years of church history. Whether or not you in particular like it, it has existed, and does exist an Hall's is one of the books that explores the subject.
Masonry:
The Supreme Council of the Scottish Rong
Albert Pike;
The Exalted Master of Stupid
Bafomet;
The All-Purpose god of Vapid
The Skull&Bones:
A Cult of Death; No Grils Alowd... or Blaks.
Illuminati:
The elite, top echelon of Lost
Paul:
A man is stumbling through the woods, totally drunk, when he comes upon
a preacher baptizing people in the river. He proceeds to walk into the
water and subsequently bumps into the preacher. The preacher turns
around and is almost overcome by the smell of alcohol, whereupon he asks
the drunk, "Are you ready to find Jesus?" The drunk answers, "Yes, I
am." So the preacher grabs him and dunks him in the water. He pulls him
up and asks the drunk, "Brother have you found Jesus? "The drunk
replies, "No, I haven't found Jesus." The preacher shocked at the
answer, dunks him into the water again for a little longer. He again
pulls him out of the water and asks again, "Have you found Jesus my
brother?" The drunk again answers, "No, I haven't found Jesus." By this
time the preacher is at his wits end and dunks the drunk in the water again --- but this time holds him down for about
30 seconds and when he begins kicking his arms and legs he pulls him
up. The preacher again asks the drunk, "For the love of God have you
found Jesus?"
The drunk wipes his eyes and catches his breath and says to the
preacher, "Are you sure this is where he fell in?"
Jesus was hanging on the cross and St Peter was skulking around at the bottom of Golgotha, a bit ashamed about pretending he didn't know Jesus. Then Jesus, nigh unto death, calls out: "Peter!"
Peter looks looks around for Romans and starts up the hill. A centurion appears and chops off his right leg. Peter's down on the ground moaning when he hears another plaintive cry from up on the hill: "Peter! Come here!".
So off Simon Peter hops, further up the hill, when who should he see but the guy he sliced the ear off in Gethsemane. Chops his other leg off, smiling ear to cheek.
Peter crashes to the ground, he's in a lot of pain now, but he hears Jesus up on the cross calling out for him: "Peter! Come here! I've something to tell you!" Swearing under his breath but still feeling guilty about the whole thing in Gethsemane, Peter starts to pull himself up the hill with his arms.
Up comes another Roman soldier, chops off one of his arms. Peter by now is pretty fed-up, but again Jesus calls out for him: "Peter! Come here!" Curses to himself. "Jesus!" He's got to hear the last words of his master, though, for he truly is the son of god. He uses his one remaining arm to drag himself up. He can just about see the foot of the cross when a big Roman centurion (John Wayne?) comes up and chops off his other arm.
He can see Jesus dying on the cross now, looking into the distance: "Peter! Come quick!" Using his teeth, Peter finally gets himself up to the foot of the cross.
Peter: "Yes Lord? I have come unto thee, your humble servant!"
Jesus: "Peter.....look, you can see our house from here!"
Baal,
This is the last comment I'll address to you.
Your Bob Guccione humor isn't funny.
You're a nasty man.
I, and most Christians, can laugh at myself and
and even laugh at some of our religious foibles.
Making jokes about the crucifixion of the Lord is
the furthest thing from funny.
Goodbye.
Paul,
I have read your comments on this site (as well as those of many others) and it is clear that not only are you a spiritually careless individual, you are also no Christian. There a many more Jesus jokes just like that for people like you, who are false Christians to feign outrage at.
So not being a Christian, what was it exactly that offended you? It is pretty clear from looking at the posts you make and the way you talk you wouldn't blow a gasket over a Mohammad joke, or a Buddha joke.
So if those, as a non Christian, would not offend you, why the Jesus joke. Hypocrite.
Baal,
I recall you critiquing the grammar and writing styles of various individuals here. I thought it prudent, therefore, to inform you of your erroneous use of the term 'slander' as you accused Dorothy of a few posts up. The correct term is 'libel' (although I'm not saying Dorothy is guilty of it). 'Slander' is for the spoken word; 'libel' is for the written. Constance and I both used this term (libel) describing your words to Constance on another thread.
Craig,
Thank you for correcting my error. You are quite correct, the slander occurred as she fabricated and or passed on phony information about a variety of individuals and organizations on Constance's "show" the other night.
You just want your 15 minutes to go on forever, don't you Anonymous Guy. You hide behind your mask and throw lies about like popcorn. Everything I said on the show was the truth. Why don't you want people to know what is going on?
You don't come out of the shadows because you claim to be afraid of the people who read or post here. Just a little 'fraidy cat aren't you. Or maybe something that likes to slither and hiss around in the dark...one or the other.
Obviously you don't have the courage to publicly support your convictions so why should anyone take you seriously.
Dorothy
Getting the bed ready for the next patient. Yes, that's how they treated my husband and me after he passed. I was at home packing to take him to hospice, but they probably upped his morphine and let him go to sleep, as you put it. But on top of that, my son, when delivering the news to me at home, told me to hurry up and decide on an undertaker, since they wanted to get the bed ready for the next person. My son asked if I wanted to go see his body, and I said no, but then I received a call from the "hospitalist" who sounded very irritated and ready to "deal with me." Before she could "deal" I told her the name of the funeral director I had selected. As it turned out, that director was already in the hospital, champing at the bit, because he is often there waiting, with his wife who is an infusion room nurse whom I know well, from my many trips to the infusion room, where I got treated.
I already realized this was our best "buy", and money had become a BIG object to us. So I was OK with that funeral director.
My husband died in the same bed where I was pushed out before I could walk when I had shingles a few months earlier. They wanted to know at that time if I felt good about going home on the bus (all the transport available). I said no. The discharge person came in a tizzy and asked why I would not go on the bus. I said I WOULD go on the bus, if I could hoist myself into it with a walker and a dragging left leg, but I had just replied that I did not feel good about it; it took my leg six weeks more to be able to walk on it.
Well, they finished off my husband but it did save money for them and me. Thank God I at least had NO part of it; I was packing for the hospice with one hand and juggling overdue bills with the other one when he died.
The problem is, I can't recover from that knowledge of what happened, nor can I be happy with the pastor who told me it was "routine" and good. My brother in law got the same pastoral directive, and HIS wife is apparently happy with it. Oh to be less able to see what is going on.
But the bottom line is that we truly can't afford our present medial care. Probably we could afford it if we had not put ourselves into endless debt for the
bailout. So many people I know think what's going on is fine.
Mariel
Dorothy,
That hallmark card remark you made about Manly P. Hall seems to be one of the insults you keep ready when you want to attack a belief you don't like. Like Islam. Your would rather insult them then be polite. Pot meet Kettle:
"-----Original Message-----
From: Dorothy
Sent: Sunday, 25 April 2004 1:49 a.m.
To: 'ULTRA BLAST IT!'
Subject: Mailings
Sensitivity: Confidential
Over the past several months I've been receiving mailings from the Islamic community even though I never asked to be put on the list. I've asked to be taken off various Islamic lists with no success. My overall response is that the sentiments in these mailing do not represent a religious view of life. They are examples of nice Hallmark card poetry, pleasant to read. It appears to me that they are merely self-serving propaganda hoping to make the Islamic religion look beautiful to those who know nothing of Islam. You send them out to those outside of your group, hoping they will cast a beautiful cover over the sins being promoted and lived by Muslims these days.
I write the following not knowing whether you are a manipulator or one being used. Monotheistic religion has two components, one's relationship to God and one's relationship to the community of humans. It is easy to be kind to those who think as one thinks. It is much harder to live one's moral beliefs and actions when the facing members of the human community not like oneself. It is a weakness of human thinking not limited to any monotheistic belief system. It is here that the Islamic community is failing and where the downfall of the Islamic community seeds are being planted.
If you are being manipulated you should know the following: It is well known that those promoting the New Age movement mean to destroy monotheism by turning monothesists against each other, and they are succeeding. In the political process followers of Islam are being perceived as fundamentalist barbarians. Right now Muslims are being used to destroy Judaism and Christianity. In turn, because of the image being promoted, the occultic pagan New Age followers plan to use secularists to regulate Islam out of existence once Muslims have been used to stifle the two other monotheistic religions.
If you are attempting to be a manipulator, know that not everyone is being taken in.
I am requesting to be taken off this mailing list as I prefer to dialogue with others rather than being bombarded with Hallmark card sentiments."
You don't seem to be very constructive in this exchange. You know, insulting the Islamic Community and their faith is very little different than praying for "the Perfidious Jews" on Good Friday.
But back to the hallmark card thing. Perhaps its time to retire it.
Your Lord Baal
Oh and Dorothy:
There is not enough irony in the world to account for this little gem:
"It is easy to be kind to those who think as one thinks. It is much harder to live one's moral beliefs and actions when the facing members of the human community not like oneself."
Especially in an insulting email to someone who is not like you.
ANONYMOUS GUY,
I know I'm being followed. I've know it since the days of the fight against the ERA. It means I'm doing a lot of good against the New Age movement and am in somebody's sights. It looks as if you are part of a group following people who oppose your support of New Age ideas. That's what your fascist like intimidation tactics are all about.
This should be a lesson to those who think the New Age movement is some sort of revival of the hippie movement. The fight against New Age is a very serious thing.
Over the years I've tried to inform members of the Muslim community of the dangers to them of the New Age movement. If there are any Muslims reading these blogs, they can see I was warning them of how they were being used by New Age leadership.
Are you afraid that some of them might be listening Anonymous Guy?
How strange that I should be reading a book about life in Nazi Germany and how people were being watched then also.
Dorothy
Now, now Dorothy, there you go again. But before I get into that I want to analyze some of my findings about you, understanding of course this to be just my opinion, derived from the material with which I am being provided.
"I know I'm being followed."
A classical statement of someone suffering from some degree of paranoia.
"It is well known that those promoting the New Age movement mean to destroy monotheism by turning monotheists against each other, and they are succeeding."
This is, of course, a claim which is not sourced: to whom is it well known? Further it contains your opinion "...and they are succeeding."
So you suffer from some degree of paranoia, believe that people are watching you, and believe that these people have been doing so since at least 1971 when the Era passed the House. Further you believe the conspiracy to involve the destruction of the idea of monotheism and that it is succeeding.
A dark existence indeed in which you exist. I would suspect you also suffer from bouts of depression over the horrific assault you see on "your religion" Judaism the most prominent of the monotheistic religions.
And yet, the world still contains in excess of 3 billion monotheists so this is a formidable battle. And some of the groups you believe are in on the conspiracy are rabid monotheists. The Freemasons will not admit someone who does not believe in a monotheistic God. But somehow they are in your rather confused fantasy.
This "surveillance" is admittedly useful to those of us looking to dispel the world of conspiracy in which you dwell.
"It is easy to be kind to those who think as one thinks. It is much harder to live one's moral beliefs and actions when the facing members of the human community not like oneself."
This appears as a window into your soul. You seem to have difficulty relating to people not like you and are, perhaps both frightened by their beliefs, and tormented by the cognitive dissonance you can not reconcile. They seem as perfectly nice people to you, but the dialectic which obsesses your mind says that because of their beliefs they must be evil or deceived.
And finally, fascist tactics? Simply responding to your comments about me with incriminating emails from you that have been posted on the internet for 5 years or more and have had thousands of hits?
And finally, your old habit, which I will reveal more and more of as time goes on:
"How strange that I should be reading a book about life in Nazi Germany and how people were being watched then also."
Implying that because I oppose your ideas I am a Nazi and, I suppose by extension antisemitic.
"Are you afraid that some of them might be listening Anonymous Guy?"
I will deal with that in my next post and another email that has been sent to me.
Dorothy,
"Are you afraid that some of them might be listening Anonymous Guy?"
Not really, you are very hostile in dealing with people who have differing spiritual beliefs than you do. The response from the recipient of your email (demonstrating far more charity that yours)your email addree has been removed as I do not wish to see you receive belligerent email from nuts:
I have deleted this email address: ... out of the group’s mailing list as this is the only email address that is close enough to yours – would I be correct in assuming this?
I personally did NOT add you to my list and no one else is able to do this as I have made it that only the Moderator (myself) can do this and I NEVER do, I respect every human for their belief, whether it be in One God, Statues and/or Themselves, who would I be to judge anyone for their belief system, I am only the Servant of Allah (SWT) in true Islam we advise anyone “you to your belief and me to mine” so that is what I say to you, I DO respect your opinion as your own and in no way was this group created (by myself) intended to upset anyone, it was only made to portray the “truth” of what Islam is made up of, also it is here for any Non-Muslims to safely converse with “True” Practicing Muslims to at least learn more of our way of life and for educational reasons.
Islam is “A way of life” the true practicing Muslim is not of those whom harass others for what they believe, nor do we blow people up and commit suicide (It is said that our body is on loan to us to protect and nurture and it is owned by Allah (SWT) alone and on the Day of Judgment we will be judged upon how we took care of it) but there are those whom have nothing left to defend, their families have been killed, raped and robed so in their hearts and belief, they have nothing else to defend themselves with except with their own soles, so they do what pretty well anyone would do if their lives are on the line…defend themselves to the death. (Most True Practicing Muslims) do not accept those out there whom prey on others through hatred, this is NOT accepted in Islam, you must do what you can to leave those whom are evildoers and trouble to the mass alone, especially if they the evildoers are not harming them.
Like what is going on around the World currently, yes, there is such a thing in Islam called “Jihad” and that is only used in very extreme cases, like if you are fighting in the cause of Allah (One God & The Same One God That Christians & Jews Believe in) and those days have gone, gone with the Crusades, although in Palestine it is essential for anyone whom is being taunted and harassed, whether they are of Islam or of any such belief in Allah (SWT) to “defend” their families and fellow Brother/Sister to fight in their personal belief and for One God only.
Contd.
Like any such Religion, we all have those who openly take it too far and hurt others whom had nothing to do with what had been originally done, just to hurt the actual person(s) whom were originally responsible - all Humans, even myself have sinned and sinned again – Allah (SWT) knows that we have the ability to sin, but it is up to us with our minds and hearts to aim at being better then the sinner, may Allah (SWT0 help us to learn from not only our own sins but the sins of others so not to put ourselves into the Hellfire…Shaitan…is only using Humans to turn as many away from Allah (SWT0 for Shaitan is the loser and those who turn (with clear signs and knowledge) and run from Allah. (SWT)
At this stage you do not know me, I ask kindly that you get to know me before not only judging me by my Religion, but also by what my Islamic group slashes out at you - why don’t you use a positive manner by conversing with fellow members, just to get a getter insight into what “True” Islam is honestly about, I advise that you read the Holy Quran and maybe approach an Imam at the local Mosque, If you wish I can help you get a copy of the Holy Quran if you wish, provided you respect it and read it with an open mind and heart and know that it does NOT contain ingredients for making bombs and brainwashing children into thinking weirdly, actually it is the “true” word of Allah (SWT) and if you really want to read the “Truth” of what Islam is…read! And let not what the Media portrays Islam to be…a question for you is why is it that more and more people are turning to Islam then any other Belief known to Humans, I again ask of you with an open heart to read and study the Holy Quran.
I would send to you my Reversion to Islam story which has captured thousands of Muslims & Non-Muslims hearts around the Globe, but I think you would use my True” Islamic experience against me, I Pray that this would not be the cause, Astagfirullah. If it is not the case, my humble apologies for judging you before I have got to know you, I feel this only by how you have portrayed yourself through your scripture.
Would you trust me enough now to send me your photograph so that I know whom it is I am talking with? I have attached my personal photograph as I want you to know that I have nothing to hide from you and anyone, I consider myself a “True Practicing Muslim” and I am not scared of anyone except Allah (SWT) for it is to Him alone that I shall return for Judgment one day.
In regards to your letter to myself - All you really needed to do in this particular case was to kindly ask why you have been added to my mailing list, regardless of what my personal belief is and what the Groups belief and honest aim is…and I would have deleted your email address immediately from our listing, please accept my humble thoughts toward your case here and know that this particular Islamic group is not of what you speck so harshly of…we pride ourselves with the Nur (Light) of Allah (SWT) and we aim NOT to upset anyone and cause obvious frustration like you have toward not only this “Islamic” group and by being added to many others around the globe.
Thank you once again for your email, if you should get anymore emails from: http://au.groups.yahoo.com/group/Giving_Help_To_Muslims_In_The_Pacific/ Please give it a little time for Yahoo Groups to automatically delete your address from the database of this group, but be assured that I HAVE deleted: ... from the groups mailing list.
Warm Regards,
Salim Muhammad Bilal Butler.
You see, a very polite and thoughtful response. More flies with honey Dorothy, more flies with honey.
Dorothy,
"At this stage you do not know me, I ask kindly that you get to know me before not only judging me by my Religion"
Here is clearly expressed the problems resulting from your paranoia, conspiracy fantasies, difficulty relating to people who do not think like you do, an the torment you feel being unable to reconcile the apparently decent people you encounter with your view that their beliefs make them agents of evil.
In the process you attack and libel and slander many good people.
It is my opinion, and my opinion only that you suffer from paranoia and perhaps some form of bi-polar disorder, based on the admittedly limited material I have so far be given on you. It might be of great help for you to begin seeking out counseling for this, and if you dislike psychology or psychiatry, perhaps you might start with your Rabbi.
This appears as a window into your soul. You seem to have difficulty relating to people not like you and are, perhaps both frightened by their beliefs, and tormented by the cognitive dissonance you can not reconcile. They seem as perfectly nice people to you, but the dialectic which obsesses your mind says that because of their beliefs they must be evil or deceived.
Baal,
I have been following this thread for some time now and have only recently decided to comment.
Perhaps you might like to consider laying off Dorothy and explain to everyone why Allah (the all Merciful) is NOT a pagan deity, but rather the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob!!!!
Respectfully,
Blue God Buster
ANONYMOUS GUY,
You are still acting spooky and saying nothing.
If I was so against individual Muslims as you say I am, I wouldn't have warned them of what was happening. I went out of my way to meet Muslims on other occasions. Since you're checking up on me, I'm sure you know about those occasions. I think I brought some of them up to date.
By the way, ERA stands for Equal Rights Amendment. Don't jump to conclusions.
You are extremely weird. How's that for a value judgment! I'm not intimidated by spooky people. Frankly I like calling you ANONYMOUS GUY. It's certainly more realistic than the dramatic BAAL.
Dorothy
Blue God Buster,
I will let biblical scholars of several backgrounds answer that question. As you are no doubt aware, in theology there are no absolutes and everything is open to argument. Which is part of what has made religions so historically violent toward each other.
"An argument can be mounted that since monotheism means that there is only one
God, no monotheist can ever accuse anyone—certainly not another monotheist—of
worshiping another god, only (at most) of improperly identifying the one God that both
seek to serve. This is all the more the case with the three religious traditions that claim to
worship the God of Abraham, since these exhibit complex patterns of dependence and
reciprocal influence. The charge that the two other traditions have seriously misidentified
the God of Abraham—a charge made by each in various ways and times—is not
necessarily the same as the claim that they worship another god."
"In the last analysis, the Christian and the Muslim conceptions of the one God have
enough in common to make a productive comparison possible, but as in any responsible
comparison, the contrasts must not be sugared over. Were a modern Elijah to devise an
empirical test to determine which tradition knows God best and worships him most
appropriately, the test would, alas, quite fail to convince the members of the other
tradition. The dialogue and dispute between Christians and Muslims, which goes back to
Muhammad’s own lifetime, will surely continue. One hopes it will do so without
terrorism, demonization, political correctness or underestimation of the diversity internal
to each religion."
excerpt from Jon D. Levenson is professor of Jewish studies at Harvard University.
"We have looked at examples of descriptions of God that the Qur’an and Bible hold in common but which also turn out to be different on closer examination. Now we turn to descriptions that are clearly different. These include the New Testament portrayal of a divine triunity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We need to remember that Jews who have not followed Christ also reject these beliefs; yet most Christians would say that they worship the same God but have incomplete knowledge of him. Thus, to return to the original question, Christians, Muslims and Jews as monotheists refer to the same Being when they refer to God -- the Creator God of Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac and Jacob. But in significant ways they do not have the same understanding about him, even though they also agree in significant ways.
We have framed much of the comparison of the understanding of God around "the most beautiful names" of God used in Muslim devotion, but which for the most part express aspects of God that Jews, Christians and Muslims hold in common. This phrase is found on the eastern gate of the Muslim shrine called the Dome of the Bock, located on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, a place sacred to all three faiths. It is on Mt. Moriah where Abraham took his son to sacrifice him before God provided a substitute -- a story that lends meaning to those names in all three traditions.
Beneath the Rock of the shrine is a cave with a hole in the top, which is almost undoubtedly the foundation of the Altar of Burnt Offering of the Jewish Temple -- the cave being "the hollow or pit . . . under the altar" which gathered the blood from the sacrificed lambs together with the water from ablutions. This further enriches the meaning of these names in two of the three faiths.
Beside that hill is another hill called Calvary, beneath which is an empty tomb. These facts add a profound new dimension of meaning for one faith to the names that the followers of all three faiths use in worshiping the God of Abraham."
J. Dudley Woodberry teaches at Fuller Theological Seminary. This article appeared in The Christian Century, May 18, 2004, pp. 36-37. Copyright by the Christian Century Foundation
contd.
ISLAM MEANS...
The word Islam means “submission,” as in submission to
the Will of Almighty God. God is referred to as Allah* in the
Qur’an (the Holy Scripture). Muslims worship the same one God
that Abraham, Moses and Jesus worshiped. Muslims believe in all
the prophets that Christians and Jews believe in. According to the
Muslim belief, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him & his
progeny) was the last prophet in the long line of prophets which
started with Adam and included Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, David,
Solomon, Moses, John the Baptist and Jesus (peace be upon them
all), to name a few. Muslims regard Prophet Muhammad as a
human being with a divine mission; they do not worship
Muhammad.
Thus, Islam is not a new religion. According to the Qur’an, it was
the religion of all the prophets, peace be upon them all. They all
submitted to God and they were all Muslims. They brought the
same central message: to worship God alone, to not join any other
deity with God, and to do good deeds.
1
* The Arabic name Allah translates as “The God” in English. It is the formal name of God in
Arabic, just as Jehovah in Latin or Yahweh in Hebrew.
“In the name of God, the Beneficent, the Merciful”
(The Qur’an)
A concise overview presented in simple language
Author Dr. Syed H. Akhtar First edition : Jan 2006
contd.
"3. The church has also a high regard for the Muslims. They worship God, who is one, living and subsistent, merciful and almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth,1 who has also spoken to humanity. They endeavor to submit themselves without reserve to the hidden decrees of God, just as Abraham submitted himself to God's plan, to whose faith Muslims eagerly link their own. Although not acknowledging him as God, they venerate Jesus as a prophet; his virgin Mother they also honor, and even at times devoutly invoke. Further, they await the day of judgment and the reward of God following the resurrection of the dead. For this reason they highly esteem an upright life and worship God, especially by way of prayer, alms-deeds and fasting."
Nostra Aetate
DECLARATION ON THE RELATIONSHIP OF THE CHURCH TO NON-CHRISTIAN RELIGION
Second Vatican Council
And our times are filled with lots of things on which theological comments is absolutely critical. The Chicago Tribune contacted me on Friday for an editorial on Lt. General William Boykin and the storm of protest that has broken out about the general’s comments that he’s fighting Satan. The general has said that when he fought in Somalia against a Muslim warlord, “I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol.” Boykin views the war on terrorism as a religious war, a war between Judeo-Christian values and “Satan”.
We might also consider the general’s theology for a moment. The general has asserted that the Christian God is “real” and the Muslim God is an “idol”. Actually, the God worshipped by Muslims is the same God as the one worshipped by Christians. Christianity, Judaism and Islam are all religions that have grown from a common source of texts and traditions. That is why they are, all three together, called “the Abrahamic faiths”. So the general is not only misguided in his ability to do complex military planning, he is missing the boat theologically. We worship the same God.
Confounded by Idols and Lies
by Rev. Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite. Ph.D.
President, Chicago Theological Seminary
contd.
"Here's what I mean: Abraham, the ur-monotheist, represents the shared history, and shared God, of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Many Christians and Jews are aware of this common past, but seem to have a tough time internalizing it. Lt. Gen. William Boykin, a deputy under secretary of defense, made headlines last year suggesting that Allah is not "a real God" and that Muslims worship an idol. Last month in Israel, Pat Robertson said that today's world conflicts concern "whether Hubal, the moon god of Mecca known as Allah, is supreme, or whether the Judeo-Christian Jehovah, God of the Bible, is supreme."
Never mind that Hubal was actually a pre-Islamic pagan god that Muhammad rejected. Mr. Robertson's comments, like those of General Boykin, illuminate a widespread misconception — one that the news media has inadvertently helped to promote. So here's a suggestion: when journalists write about Muslims, or translate from Arabic, Urdu, Farsi or other languages, they should translate "Allah" as "God," too. A minor point? Perhaps not.
Last August the Washington Post Web site posed this question to readers: "Do you think that Muslims, Christians and Jews all pray to the same God?" One Muslim respondent wrote yes, each of the three major monotheistic faiths "pray to the God of Abraham."
Christian respondents, however, were equivocal or hostile to the notion. "Jews pray to Yahweh," one Virginia woman wrote. "As a Christian, I pray to the same God." But she insisted that "Muslims pray to Allah. Allah is not the God of Abraham." This woman might be surprised that Christian Arabs use "Allah" for God, as do Arabic-speaking Jews. In Aramaic, the language of Jesus, God is "Allaha," just a syllable away from Allah.
Still, who can blame her? Earlier that month, NPR reported Palestinian demonstrators in Gaza City intoning, "there is no God but Allah." Last week, The Los Angeles Times mentioned mourners for a slain Baghdad professor reciting, "there is no God but Allah" at the university campus. In September, The New York Times reported an assassinated Palestinian uttering, "there is no God but Allah" before he died.
"There is no god but God" is the first of Islam's five pillars. It is Muhammad's refutation of polytheism. Yet to today's non-Muslims, the locution "there is no God but Allah" reads as an affront, a declaration that inflammatory Allah trumps the Biblical God. This journalistic rendition distorts the meaning of the Muslim confession of faith.
Of course, there are distinctions to be made between religions, which the press shouldn't shy away from. But there is no need to augment these differences artificially, especially at the cost of an accurate understanding of the origins of the Abrahamic faiths."
By JOHN KEARNEY
Second Foundational Bridge to the Common Ground: Could Allah & God be the Same Deity?
Every chapter of the Qur’an except one begins with: “In the Name of Allah the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.”
This is one of the most painful misunderstandings among Christians. Polls indicate that the vast majority of Christians universally feel that Allah is not the same God as the God of the Hebrews, or Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Ishmael.
Many noted US Christian preachers have reinforced this idea by stating that "The God of Islam is not the same God.” Televangelist Benny Hinn also commented, “This is not a war between Arabs and Jews. It's a war between God and the devil."
I recall speaking to an assembly of seminary students in Lancaster Bible College in PA a few years ago. When questioned, their view was unanimous that Allah was a false god and in fact, derived from a Moon-god of ancient East.
The Apostle Paul faced similar challenges with the Greek pagans as described in Acts 17. Paul used an idol to reflect the true God. While “some mocked…many followed and surrendered” to God. The point being, that the origins of a name do not always reflect on the later application.
Is the English, Greek & Latin “god” Pagan?
For example, the origin of the English word “God” has more historic baggage than Semitic words, such as Allah. “God” is derived from a proto-Germanic pagan word for a water god (pronounced “gut”).
Moreover, “Theos” (where we derive theology, theologian, etc.) has a heathen Greek origin with Indo-European root “dhes”.
Finally the popular Latin words in Spanish “dios” and French “dieu” is totally pagan based on the Greek god Zeus. It has its origin in the early Latin Vulgate version of the Bible.
So, while thousands of years ago, the ancient origin of Allah may have been perhaps based on a Moon-god, the real question is: “What does the present use of the word mean today?”
For over 500 years before the Prophet Mohammed, Arab Christians and even some Jews in the Arabian Peninsula used the word “Allah” for God. How about the nearly 20 million of Christian Arabs who use Allah every day as their Arabic word for God? Do they remotely consider that they are praying to a Moon -god?
What About the Hebrew Name of “God”?
The general Hebrew term for God is “El.” It is a shortened version or root of Elohim10. It is used throughout the Old Testament over 2,300 times. El was an ancient Canaanite name for a pagan deity.11
The Aramaic Name for “God”
The Aramaic word for God is “Elahh,” or “Alaha,”12 also derived from the root “El.” Jesus, an Aramaic speaker, would naturally use Alaha just as all the other nearly five million Aramaic speakers do today.
It would surprise many people to know that even Jesus used this form for God in Matt. 24:47 when he cried out in the Aramaic language, “El-i, El-i”, meaning “my God, my God.”
The Arabic Name for “God”
The Arabic word for God Allah is also derived from the Aramaic/Hebrew root word, El. It is a contraction of Al and Ilahi, which literally means “the God.” So, the Arabic Allah is rooted in the same Semitic word for God as the Hebrew and Aramaic. In fact, if one were to remove all the vowel markings (Semitic languages are all consonants and use markings to make vowels) from the Arabic Al-Ilahi and Hebrew El-ohm, they both mean “the God”. Remove the plural of the words and they are transliterated nearly identically as Al-Alh.
Lecture
Overcoming the Muslim Western Divide
Seven Bridges to the Common Ground
Presented to Regent's Park College, Oxford University
November 28, 2006
By Mark D. Siljander, Ph.D.
I could go on an on with scholars who believe and argue that Muslims and Christians worship the same God. You could look up numerous refutations. However, I believe the scholarship as a whole leans toward the idea that they do, albeit that Christians and Muslims have differing understandings about some aspects of God.
Baal,
Thank you. That was a good explanation.
In a push for ecumenism many ‘Christian leaders’ are finding commonalities among the “Abrahamic” faiths. Certainly, there are some commonalities between Judaism and Christianity since the Old Testament/Tanakh is in common; but, Judeo-Christian ideals have more differences than commonalities with Islam. The bases for each faith are their individual Holy Books: Christianity has the Bible including Old and New Testaments, Judaism has the Tanakh, while Islam has the Qu’ran/Koran.
The Christian faith hinges on the belief that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the one and only Son of God and part of the Holy Trinity. Judaism awaits the coming Messiah not recognizing Jesus as the Christ/Messiah. Muslims recognize Jesus as a prophet and nothing more - Muhammad is their Prophet (capital P) - while awaiting the coming Imam Mahdi.
The god of the Qu’ran/Koran is very different from the God of Judaism and Christianity no matter the etymology of the name of ‘Allah.’
I’ve written about “A Common Word Between Us and You” written by Muslim clerics with its response by ‘Christian leaders’ in the third part of a series I wrote on the NAM/NWO. It was posted on a couple blogs. Here’s a link to one of the blogs: http://tinyurl.com/nyyscc.
And, for those who've not seen this, here is the 'Christian response' to "A Common Word"
http://www.acommonword.com/lib/downloads/fullpageadbold18.pdf
You can do a search on "A Common Word" to find the original document. I reference this (and all other references) at the bottom of my article in my previous comment above.
I see the linky above is too long. Since I don't know how to edit comments, I'll post the tinylink here: http://tinyurl.com/2jx36l
8/3/2009
Baaql wrote an essay on divine names. If anyone wants the sccop from a Jewish pov please go here:
http://tinyurl.com/nzvgh4
Islam is a self-described monotheistic religion and, in this sense, it is closer to Judaism than either is to Christianity. I own two Qur'ans and can vouch for the fact that the God of the Qu'ran is theoretically at least, the same as the God of the Tanakh; the Jewish Bible. Islamic prophets are mostly the same as the Jewish prophets; Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses etc.
However, Judaism placees a higher priority on deeds than belief. While it was not always the case, today Judaism has lots more in common with Christianity.
Peace and blessing,
Len
This blog is no longer about New Age and fighting New Age. I come here and read and usually I don't post because what is the point of answering people who are hostile to monotheist religion? They do not belong here, because their paganism is what we are against. I have had too much experience with such people to think that they can be "led" gently to a faith in our God. Their enmity is deep. In a free country we do uphold the right to speak out. But his is not a blog for speaking out as a committed pagan.
And this blog has too long been misused, too, as a forum to debate among us monotheists. Among Christians, Jews, and varieties of those. We cannot win if we infight.
Looks like only Jehovah will win. Indeed, the endtimes prophesies tell us that only Jehovah will win, after taking out of the way his own, who will not be subject to the 'wrath of God". Our feeble efforts to fight Satan are going to fail, and God's glory will then be shown forth, He who is our only Savior.
Mariel
Mariel
Len:
Christianity IS a monotheistic religion. The Trinity of God the Father, Jesus Christ the Son and Holy Spirit does not make this Triune God polytheistic.
I have a question for you: in the Qu'ran who are identified as 'infidels?'
Mariel,
I agree with you. The problem is too few writing here know the details of the New Age movement. They know a lot about Christianity, so that's what they write about. They pick from what others write about the New Age movement and then say, "Yes, it fits in with Christian end times prophecy. Told you so."
Or, Joyce style, they will post a link to some New Age organization and tell everyone else to "check it out" after which they post 20 feet of missionizing for their beliefs. Since there is no end to New Age organizations these days, that takes little effort.
Len will post about Judaism in response to distortions of Jewish religious sources. I don't push Judaism on anyone nor does he.
I've posted serious information on the New Age movement, but it gets swept away in the tide of support for some branch or other of Christianity. So what's the point of working hard to develop a theme when no one appreciates the hard work involved or is willing to pitch in to further information on it.
It would be good if many others would gather information, analyze it and show it's connection to the New Age movement. It takes a lot of hard work, but in the long run it would benefit all of us. However, this is Constance's blog, and if she wants to use it to affirm Christianity as the main theme on the threads after she does her main article, so be it.
I have huge amounts of material on the New Age movement that I could post, but why bother. Thank you's from scattered individuals are nice but after a while it would be nice if there was more on the other side of the equal sign as in "I post information = then someone does something equivalent."
Dorothy
Great wisdom for you all:
"The moment is more opportune than ever for the review of old philosophies. Archæologists, philologists, astronomers, chemists and physicists are getting nearer and nearer to the point where they will be forced to consider them. Physical science has already reached its limits of exploration; dogmatic theology sees the springs of its inspiration dry.
Unless we mistake the signs, the day is approaching when the world will receive the proofs that only ancient religions were in harmony with nature, and ancient science embraced all that can be known .
Secrets long kept may be revealed; books long forgotten and arts long time lost may be brought out to light again; papyri and parchments of inestimable importance will turn up in the hands of men who pretend to have unrolled them from mummies, or stumbled upon them in buried crypts; tablets and pillars, whose sculptured revelations will stagger theologians and confound scientists, may yet be excavated and interpreted.
Who knows the possibilities of the future? An era of disenchantment and rebuilding will soon begin — nay, has already begun. The cycle has almost run its course; a new one is about to begin, and the future pages of history may contain full evidence, and convey full proof that"
"If ancestry can be in aught believed, Descending spirits have conversed with man, And told him secrets of the world unknown." (Isis Unveiled I 38, published 1877)
VACCINATION - MYTHS AND TRUTHS
http://www.infowars.com/vaccination-myths-and-truths/
Mariel,
Amen.
It's all about The Lord.
The victory belongs to God, as does all the glory.
I have a personal belief that that's the reason why He so often lets great leaders fall in ignominy. It's because great leaders always spawn followers of themselves, who put the great leader on a pedestal,
which is idolotry, no less foolish than the worship of long destroyed pagan gods.
But pagan gods are easy ( for most people) to see through. It's not always so easy to see through a sage of super high intelligence, or an Isaac Newton
who read, studied and believed the words of the Bible in a very deep way, yet became a Freemason.
Isaac Newton may have been the most intelligent man that ever lived. But high intelligence is a funny thing; we see that even Soloman, the wisest man who ever lived, turning to idolotry in his later years.
At some point the intelligent person begins to worship himself, since no one around can understand the things he or she understands.
They forget about the one true God who gave them the intelligence, or the wisdom.
Make no mistake the Bible preaches wisdom and encourages everyone to seek it and hold onto it like gold or silver.
Just don't forget who gave it to you.
Oh yes, The Lord of Hosts will get the glory.
Jehovah is he; eternal One of Jacob, King of Kings.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
8/4/2009
Paul wrote: "we see that even Soloman, the wisest man who ever lived, turning to idolotry in his later years."
Solomon never committed idolotry himself but several of his 300+
wives did. Because he did not stop them and even facilitated their idolatry by building sites for them, God criticized him as if he had committed idolatry himself.
But for the sake of David, who kept God's commandments and statutes (1 Kings 11:34f), God did not interrupt Solomon's reign. Instead God took the kingdom away from Solomon's son who was left with only the tribes of Judah and Benjamin.
Len
Len,
Yes you're right, to be really technical.
But I'm not sure what the practical difference is between committing idolotry and building temples for
idols.
He put his many wives and their idolotry ahead of the Lord.
My point: The wisest and probably the richest man in the world turned his back on God, who gave him the wisdom and the riches.
George Monbiot says we must get rid of farming in Ireland. For the sake of The Rewilding. 33 mins in.https://www.ukcolumn.org/video/uk-column-news-10th-august-2022
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