By What Right Have Super-Secularist Opinion Makers Elevated Themselves To Be Only Spokespeople For Western Values?

 

If nothing's sacred then we are in trouble

• by: ANGELA SHANAHAN
• From:The Australian
• September 29, 201212:00AM

IN June I had the privilege of moderating the 10th Abrahamic faiths conference in Sydney. The theme of the conference was the family. We were a pretty mixed lot of Jews, Christians and Muslims, and, interestingly, all the speakers were women.

Naturally, as mothers and grandmothers we found some very strong unifying ideals. We all acknowledged the social function of the family; but because this was a conference based on our common faith heritage, we also strongly confirmed that for Christians, Muslims and Jews alike the family belongs not just in the realm of the everyday but in the realm of the sacred. It is the image of the eternal bond between God the Father and man, his creature.
One of the most moving and strongly expressed addresses on this topic came from the keynote speaker, Maha Abdo, a highly respected Muslim female activist and executive officer of the United Muslim Women Association.
Thinking back on the conference, I realised that perhaps one of the worst aspects of what occurred in Sydney and across the world in the past few weeks is the loss of respect for decent, ordinary people.

In the rush to condemn the violence and analyse its causes, not only have we ignored many of the things we have in common with Australians of the Islamic faith but some of the opinionated have started to condemn all faiths. Atheists and the superficial secularists have seen an opportunity to weigh in and condemn all religion, and particularly what sparked all this: the idea of blasphemy.
We in Australia are used to ignorance about religion, but this reaction is almost as extreme as that of the Muslims in Hyde Park. It is a kind of reverse intolerance. It declares, by some perverse logic, such as that of US political scientist Emanuele Ottolenghi, that the shocking Muslim reaction to blasphemy justifies further trampling on the intimation of the sacred, an intimation that all religions, not just Muslims, have in common.
Accordingly we get the puerile and quite revolting notion that pornographic images and blasphemy are equated with freedom of speech. Liberty is not merely being unconstrained by blasphemy laws, as in Australia, but we must deliberately go out of our way to insult, to commit blasphemy, so that, to quote one correspondent, Islamists can "catch up with the rest of the world on freedom of speech and freedom of religion".
Does one need further proof that some commentators simply don't get the problem Islam has with the West at all?
Another aspect of the fallout from the riots in Sydney is that although it has complex origins, we have fallen into two glib camps. You are either a proponent of "Western values" and secular "freedom" or else you are naively on the side of the "mad Islamists", a victim of "moral relativism".
By what right have the super-secularist opinion makers, who despise the sense of sacredness common to all religious people, elevated themselves to be the only spokespeople for "Western values"? Meanwhile, the religious traditions that attempt to put themselves into the public square on social issues with coherent, ancient, common philosophies are derided as irrelevant and narrowly religious.
Our understanding of our origins, particularly of the Judeo-Christian moral tradition, is so pathetically weak. How can we attempt to combat the real clash of cultures that Islamo-fascism presents to the West when we don't really understand or respect our own tradition? Hence we have no real yardstick to judge freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
Blasphemy? Who cares? That is the message from those for whom religion, the numinous, the spiritual in general, is a no-go area in the great democratic-values free-for-all. And what values would those be, exactly? The values that allow 100,000 abortions every year, the values that try to equate any sexual relationship with the sacred relationship that can of itself generate children, the very nucleus of the family? And what about that "value" of free speech? A great value, to be sure - unless you are Cory Bernardi.
And where do these values come from? The opinionistas usually identify them with great pomposity and certitude as Enlightenment values. Was that the Enlightenment that produced the United States of America, or the Enlightenment that produced the Terror and then the Directoire? What of the values that produced the Decalogue? They are beyond the ken of many of the opinionists.
We will never understand the human in each other unless we understand what other human beings hold sacred. What is more, we cannot understand others' sense of the sacred unless we take the time and make the effort to understand what we should hold sacred.
The problem is we have lost that sense. We are completely cut off from our Judeo-Christian roots, so we know nothing about how to argue about religion. What relevance can Pakistani blasphemy laws have for us, even if they are abhorrent? We point the finger at others but it is partly an attempt to compensate for our own intolerances. Anti-blasphemy laws make more sense than the "hate speech" laws we have at present, which can cause a person to be quite arbitrarily hauled up before "human rights" tribunals, the secular equivalent of blasphemy tribunals.
I, for one, am fed up with having to put up with anti-Christian blasphemy. I can't see how Enlightenment values are helped by this. Paul Kelly touched on this; it stems from the notion that there are no sacred domains.
Today's secularism is merely disdain for religion. In fact, there is a growing body of opinion that religion is dangerous. The voices of religion do have to compete in the same arena as every other idea - no matter how lacking in philosophical depth - but respect all around, especially for dearly held beliefs, is not such a bad thing.
I have lived among Jews in the eastern suburbs and Muslims in southwest Sydney. I have often sat with Muslims and Jews, intelligent people with strong religious and secular ideals, keen to co-operate with and understand one another. It is very wrong to characterise all Muslims as nutters.
However, as some imams have pointed out, there are plenty of ignorant ones, and there are plenty of young and unemployed ones. The mean Muslim birthrate is four times the national average and, especially in southwest Sydney, Muslim unemployment rates are more than double the average.
Surely this combination, as the English experience shows, leads to a drift towards crazy fundamentalist do-it-yourself garage mosques. Whether the drift continues is partly up to us.
The marginalisation of young Muslims is not the reason for the recent outbreak. It is being fomented by extremists taking advantage of the large numbers of Muslim youth. But neither is marginalising them the answer.
We can't trivialise, insult and stamp on things that people hold sacred and, at the same time, expect to have our own vague ideas held sacred.
The only answer to this is for all the people who do still have some reverence for real values, not just of the Enlightenment but perhaps those contained in the Decalogue that preceded it by thousands of years, to speak out.
...

Taken from: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/if-nothings-sacred-then-we-are-in-trouble/story-fn562txd-1226482843571



Restoring the Integrity of Medicine



Catholic Medical Association to Meet in Midst of Change





Share by Elenor K. Schoen, Register Correspondent Saturday, Sep 18, 2010 9:24 PM ....

SEATTLE — The initial inspiration for the 79th Educational Conference of the Catholic Medical Association comes from Psalm 8: “What is man that you are mindful of him?”

“‘What is man?’ [is a question that] should be answered before any student or practitioner of medicine approaches a patient,” according to Dr. Jan Hemstad, the president-elect for the association.

He is overseeing CMA’s annual gathering, held in Seattle this year Oct. 28-31. Its theme is “Restoring the Integrity of Medicine: An Imperative for a Christian Anthropology.”

“Our primary focus for these conferences is always the proper formation of physicians, the topics [arising] from the critical issues of the day,” he explained.

This year there is an added incentive in discussing the ethical practice of medicine, given the passage earlier this year of the massive health-care reform bill, according to Hemstad.

“President Obama’s direction has exacerbated these issues for us, by choosing a course almost diametrically opposed to an authentic Christian model,” Hemstad remarked. “Obamacare is looming over us as a dark cloud — a very dark cloud,” he suggested.

“Now, more than ever, there is as an absolute imperative for our profession to first answer this question [What is man?]” from a proper Christian anthropology based in truth, he explained.

Without knowing that truth about man, we cannot “practice an authentic vocation as physicians. We must re-integrate these first principles into our way of thinking and knowing,” Hemstad emphasized.

Bishop Robert Vasa, episcopal adviser for the CMA, agrees. He told the Register: “Being a Catholic physician requires proper information, but it also requires proper formation, and it requires a support system to help assure that the mission of Christ, who healed body and soul, continues.”

The original Catholic physician guild system, begun cooperatively by clergy and physicians in this country 98 years ago, was established for that very purpose.

Educating Physicians

In 1912, Archbishop William O’Connell of Boston founded the first Catholic Physicians Guild in that city, educating physicians in Church doctrine related to the practice of medicine.

Fifteen years later, a guild began in New York City, holding an Ignatian retreat for physicians. Gradually, Catholic physician guilds began to spread throughout the eastern United States.

By 1932, the National Federation of Catholic Physicians Guilds (NFCPG) was formed in New York City. Guilds met for the celebration of the Mass, spiritual retreats and seminars dealing with medical ethics. The feast of St. Luke, patron saint of physicians, became a focal point of the new organization, introducing the celebration of a “White Mass” (referring to the physician’s white coat).

The Linacre Quarterly, a medical journal of the NFCPG, was initiated to inform physicians about how Catholic principles are applied to pertinent medical and scientific issues. It is named after Thomas Linacre, a Catholic priest and physician to King Henry VIII who also founded the Royal College of Physicians in England. The quarterly journal is a part of the ongoing educational effort by the Catholic Medical Association.

Gradually, the NFCPG increased in 1960 to 6,110 members in 92 member guilds established in the United States, Puerto Rico and Canada, growing to more than 10,000 members by 1967.

But the growth of the organization halted following the publication of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae, on July 25, 1968, with its teaching on morally appropriate means for regulating fertility, which became a very divisive issue among Catholics. It also became “a major turning point for the NFCPG at the time,” according to former CMA President Dr. Thomas Pitre.

Reform and Growth

The organization supported the encyclical, causing many members of the National Federation to leave, with only a small core group remaining, Pitre explained.

At this same time, Pitre was seeking like-minded physicians who “brought their faith into their personal practice of medicine” as he opened a practice in Oregon. But Oregon was also becoming “the first jurisdiction in the world to allow assisted suicide,” he recalled.

He decided to develop a Catholic physician’s group on the West Coast, particularly the Pacific Northwest. When he sought help from the national organization, he realized that it was so diminished “that it didn’t have the administrative resources to do very much,” Pitre recalled.

Cardinal Francis George, who was archbishop of Portland, Ore., at that time, encouraged the formation of a Catholic physicians’ organization in the state, urging Pitre and his wife, Dr. Lynne Bissonnette-Pitre, to get involved nationally.

As board members of the NFCPG, the Pitres helped to reconfigure the organization, its administration, bylaws, and everything necessary “to build the organization to a point where it could grow,” Pitre stated.

Newly ordained Bishop Robert Vasa of the Baker Diocese in eastern Oregon became episcopal advisor for the National Federation. “Bishop Vasa has become an incredibly powerful and encouraging influence,” Pitre said.

In 1997, the guild’s name was changed to the Catholic Medical Association, reflecting a membership consisting more of individuals than guilds.

Since 2006, with more than 50 new guilds created, the CMA has developed a closer working relationship with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. They have increased the staff and have a full-time director and medical ethicist, John Brehany.

Brehany explained that the CMA national office provides consultation on ethical topics to CMA members and tools that allow members to contact and support one another. Many of the guilds sponsor educational programs on a local basis, he said.

“The CMA strives to create a culture of life in health care by helping physicians and others to grow in their relationship to God, to learn and to teach Catholic medical ethics, and by finding new ways to serve the Church, the medical profession and society,” Brehany said.

It has become “a more significant influence in presenting Catholic health-care perspectives, keeping the debate front and center,” Pitre added. The CMA also tries to work with other Catholic organizations, including the National Catholic Bioethics Center, the Catholic Health Association and others.

“The well-formed and conscientious Catholic physician literally brings the healing ministry of Christ to the workplace,” said Bishop Vasa. “Whether he or she works in a Catholic setting or in secular employment, they give witness to Christ and the values and virtues of the Church. I believe that these Catholic physicians … are the heart of Catholic health care. It is not possible for institutions to be Catholic unless the men and women who serve in them have at heart a commitment to something greater than the physical health of the patients entrusted to their care.”

So, besides the need for excellence in medical skill, Bishop Vasa stated, there must also be “a firm conviction about the value of the immortal soul and the inherent dignity of the human person.”

Without this conviction, “the care may be excellent, but if it does not ultimately benefit the soul of the suffering person, then something tremendously important has been lost,” he stressed. “The Catholic Church exists to bring people to Christ, to evangelize. This too is the ultimate purpose of Catholic institutions.”

Elenor Schoen writes from Shoreline, Washington.



INFORMATION





For more information on the CMA’s annual educational conference, visit:
http://cathmed.org



Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/site/article/restoring-the-integrity-of-medicine/#ixzz26PkXa9YC

The Cross: True Alchemy, The Philosopher's Stone and The Fifth Essence



....

Taken from Friends of the Cross,
by St. Louis Grignion de Montfort

….


The mystery of the Cross is a mystery unknown to the Gentiles, rejected by the Jews, and despised by heretics and bad Catholics. But it is the great mystery you must learn to practice in the school of Christ, and which can only be learnt from him. You will look in vain in all the schools of ancient times for a philosopher who taught it; in vain you will appeal to the senses or to reason to throw some light on it. It is only Jesus, through his all-powerful grace, who can teach you this mystery and give you the ability to appreciate it.

Strive then to become proficient in this all-important science under your great Master, and you will understand all other sciences, for it contains them all in an eminent degree. It is our natural and supernatural philosophy, our divine and mystic theology, our philosopher’s stone, which by patience transforms the basest metals into precious ones, the bitterest pains into delight, poverty into riches, the most profound humiliations into glory. The one among you who knows best how to carry his cross, even though in other things he does not know A from B, is the most learned of all.

The great St. Paul returned from the third heaven, where he learned mysteries hidden even from the angels, and he proclaimed that he did not know, nor did he want to know anything but Christ crucified. Rejoice, then, you ordinary Christian, man or woman, without any schooling or intellectual abilities, for if you know how to suffer cheerfully, you know more than a doctor of Sorbonne University who does not know how to suffer as you do.

….

[End of St. Louis quote].

St. Bonaventure considered Jesus Christ to be the ‘Metaphysician par excellence’.

“Identifying metaphysics as the task of unifying all of finite reality to one first principle who is origin, exemplar, and final end, Bonaventure perceived the quest of the philosopher to be fulfilled when the exemplar of all else is identified with the one divine essence. For Bonaventure, the exemplar is Jesus Christ, and only in light of exemplarity is the deepest nature of created reality unlocked for the philosopher. Without Christian revelation the philosopher is unable to reduce reality to a first principle”. See:

Taken from:

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst;jsessionid=LVLcpSRndDkPyt6phGlnwZQV4j3pryhLhQ9TQTMpt6zpzkyNwJWx!-778806350?docId=5001267432

Something More on the Six Days of Genesis One



Reply to reader who asked for “something more on the Six Days”:


....

Thank you ... for the information brochure pertaining to the recent lecture tour of Australia by Dr. Hugh Owen of The Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation [KCSC]. .... This information prompted me to refresh myself regarding the KCSC site. Whilst I believe that it contains some highly interesting articles, on a variety of topics, the site gives a bit of a different slant from the AMAIC on e.g. the subject that you have raised: the “SIX DAYS”. I think that KCSC still prefers the more common view of a creation occupying a six-day period. To my mind, KCSC takes an approach that is in line with typical “Creation science”. The problem that I have with this is that it reads early Genesis as if it were a modern scientific magazine rather than an ancient Middle Eastern document. In Cowboy terms, it hitches up the wagon to go West (California), when it might be more appropriate here to take a smooth train ride Eastwards (to New York).


The KCSC articles that appeal to me the most are those by the likes of the Polish professor Maciej Giertych, and by Dean Kenyon, for instance, that use hard science to refute evolution. That is something that could impress both those who have faith and those who do not.


As to the Hexaëmeron, I think that the “something more on the Six Days”, as you have requested in your letter, is sorely needed today. I, although very happy with Air Commodore P. J. Wiseman’s explanation of the “Six Days” - especially in conjunction with his thesis on the toledôt structure of the entire Book of Genesis - have come to think in recent times that there must be more to it all than just that. That what Wiseman has provided us with, so superbly, is an account of the structure of Genesis One, as well as his restoration of, as he put it, “a common-place truth to its first uncommon lustre” by his reviving of what you have rightly attributed to Saint Augustine: namely, the notion of “a progressive revelation” [as opposed to a progressive creation]. That explains the - to us - peculiar nature of this most ancient book (cf. Septuagint Genesis 2:4: “This is the BOOK of the origins of the heavens and the earth”), with its catch lines and parallelistic structure. Seemingly strange to us all of this, but perfectly reasonable when one considers that this is an ancient document written on tablets, with a typical colophon ending.


Perhaps a beginning towards our arriving at “something more on the Six Days” was the insight of Professor John Walton (included in a MATRIX), based on his appreciation of ancient thinking, that the document is more about functionality than about material origins:


It is my belief that when we read Genesis 1 as the ancient piece of literature that it is, we will find new understanding of the passage that will result in a clearer understanding of how the initial audience would have heard it. In the process, we will also find that many of the perceived conflicts with modern science will be able to be resolved. I have explored this in a recent book titled The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate (IVP) and the technical aspects of ancient Near Eastern literature and the Hebrew text will be explored in greater depth in a forthcoming monograph, Genesis One As Ancient Cosmology (Eisenbrauns).


By John H. Walton

Professor of Old Testament

Wheaton College

March 2010


Genesis 1 is Ancient Cosmology

The Bible was written for everyone, but specifically to Israel. As a result we have to read all biblical texts, including (and maybe especially) Genesis 1 in its cultural context—as a text that is likely to have a lot more in common with ancient literature than with modern science. This does not result in claims of borrowing or suggestions that Genesis should also be read as “mythology” (however defined), but that ancient perspectives on the world and its origins need to be understood.

Ancient Cosmology is Function-oriented

In the ancient world and in the Bible, something existed not when it had physical properties, but when it had been separated from other things, given a name and a role within an ordered system. This is a functional ontology rather than a material ontology. In this view, when something does not exist, it is lacking role, not lacking matter. Consequently, to create something (cause it to exist) means to give it a function, not material properties.

“Create” (Hebrew Bara’ ) Concerns Functions

The Hebrew word translated “create” should be understood within a functional ontology—i.e., it means to assign a role or function. This is evident through a word study of the usage of the biblical term itself where the direct object of the verb is always a functional entity not a material object. Theologians of the past have concluded that since materials were never mentioned that it must mean manufacture of objects out of nothing. Alternatively, and preferably, it does not mention materials because it does not refer to manufacturing. Bara’ deals with functional origins, not material origins. …

[End of quote]

That is not to endorse everything that Professor Walton has to say on the subject, but I think that it has relevance for what I am leading to later on in this letter.

Then there was:

The Temple Symbolism in Genesis

by Ernest L. Martin, Ph.D, 1977

http://www.askelm.com/temple/t040301.htm

that we also used in a MATRIX, in which the author showed that Cain and Abel were in the vicinity of a Temple-like structured Paradise to where their offerings were seasonally brought. The “Creation science” type of erasure of the ancient world by the Noachic Flood, which I think KCSC would also embrace, destroys the necessary geographico-topological link between Paradise and later Jerusalem (of which Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich was aware, e.g. the Agony in the Garden occurring in a hollow to where Adam and Eve had formerly been expelled), and this mind-set then disallows for Abel to have been slain by ‘Jerusalemites’ (Matthew 23):

35 That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.

36 Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.

37 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem ….

Now Wiseman, Walton and Martin (were) are all good Protestants, which may not impress some Catholics. For I had found that it was hard generally to get Catholics interested in the alternative theory of the “Six Days” (Wiseman’s) until I began to include Saint Augustine (already part of Wiseman’s package) and Sts. Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas.

Anyway, here now is a recent Catholic interpretation of the meaning of the Six Days, written by Jeff Morrow of Seton Hall University, who I think may have nailed the whole important matter, basically with Genesis One focussing, as he reads it, upon man as Homo Liturgicus.

....

Creation as Temple-Building and Work as Liturgy in Genesis 1-3

(http://ocabs.org/journal/index.php/jocabs/article/viewPDFInterstitial/43/18),

…. Genesis 1-3, in its account of creation, presents the cosmos as one large temple, the Garden of Eden as the Holy of Holies, and the human person as made for worship. The very content and structure of Genesis 1-3 is in a very real sense liturgical; the seventh day is creation’s high point. ….















The Sevenfold Structure of Creation in Genesis 1









The number seven is important for the form and content of Genesis 1 as the number of perfection in the ancient Near East, the number relating to covenant, and of course, the number of the day known as the Sabbath, the pinnacle of creation. ….









Genesis 1:1 contains seven words: běrē’šît bārā’ ’elōhîm ’ēt hašāmayim wě’ēt hā’āreṣ. Genesis 1:2 has fourteen words, seven times two.









Furthermore, significant words in this passage occur in multiples of seven: God (35 times, i.e., seven times five), earth (21 times, i.e., seven times three), heavens/firmament (21 times), “and it was so” (7 times), and “God saw that it was good” (7 times). ….









The heptadic structure is sufficiently apparent and scholars from Umberto Cassuto to Jon Levenson have commented upon it. 5 Gordon Wenham observes, “The number seven dominates this opening chapter in a strange way.” 6 Wenham notes further that Genesis 2:1-3 makes reference to the seventh day three times, in three separate sentences composed of seven words each. This focus on seven highlights the unique status of the seventh day. 7 Moreover, although we find ten divine announcements and eight divine commands in Genesis 1:1-2:3, there are three nouns that occur in the first verse and express the basic concepts of the section, viz God [’Elōhīm] heavens [šāmayim], earth [’ereṣ], are repeated in the section a given number of times that is a multiple of seven: thus the name of God occurs thirty-five times, that is, five times seven…; earth is found twenty-one times, that is, three times seven; similarly heavens (or firmament, rāqīaʽ) appears twenty-one times….The ten sayings with which, according to the Talmud, the world was created…that is, the ten utterances of God beginning with the words, and…said—are clearly divisible into two groups: the first group contains seven Divine fiats enjoining the creation of the creatures…; the second group comprises three pronouncements that emphasize God’s concern for man’s welfare….Thus we have here, too, a series of seven corresponding dicta….The terms light and day are found, in all, seven times in the first paragraph, and there are seven references to light in the fourth paragraph….









Water is mentioned seven times in the course of paragraphs two and three….In the fifth and sixth paragraphs forms of the word ḥayyā…occur seven times….The expression it was good appears seven times (the seventh time—very good)….In the seventh paragraph, which deals with the seventh day, there occur the following three consecutive sentences (three for emphasis), each of which consists of seven words and contains in the middle the expression the seventh day: And on THE SEVENTH DAY God finished His work which He had done, and He rested on THE SEVENTH DAY from all His work which He had done. So God blessed THE SEVENTH DAY and hallowed it….









…















The Garden of Eden as the Inner Sanctuary and the Human Person as Created for Worship









So far we have seen a poetic heptadic structure that portrays the creation of Genesis 1 as related to the construction of a temple. This has both canonical parallels—as with Moses’ construction of the Tabernacle at Sinai and Solomon’s construction of the Temple on Zion—as well as extra-biblical ancient Near Eastern parallels, such as the Gudea Cylinders. What remains to be seen is the implications of this on understanding humanity. Genesis 2-3 depicts the Garden of Eden as the Holy of Holies, and this has implications for our understanding of humanity’s purpose. In this section, I will first discuss Eden’s image as an Inner Sanctuary and then discuss human beings as homo liturgicus, liturgical humanity made for worship. 46









Gregory Beale notes that the distinction of regions of creation described by Genesis are similar to those of the Temple. The heavens represent the holy of holies, the earth the inner sanctuary, and the sea the outer court. 47 Other indications of this similarity appear in the text. In Genesis 3:8, for example, God walks back and forth (using a form of hlk) in Eden, which is also how God’s presence is described in the tabernacle in Leviticus 26:12 and Deuteronomy 23:14. 48









In examining the rest of the canon, we find other evidence that points to intentionality in these parallels that make creation appear as a temple. The Temple, and Mount Zion in general, are frequently associated with Eden, and in some instances actually identified with Eden. Ezekiel 28’s discussion of the king of Tyre is the most famous example where Mount Zion, and the temple, are associated with Eden. 49 Sirach also associates Eden with the Temple and tabernacle, where the Temple is the new Eden. 50









Moreover, the Temple was often described with garden-like elements, further associating it with Eden and creation in general. 51 Eden in turn was seen as a prototype of the Temple. 52 As Lawrence Stager remarks, “the original Temple of Solomon was a mythopoeic realization of heaven on earth, of Paradise, the Garden of Eden.” 53 Some of the other elements important in this connection include the presence of cherubim and the eastward-facing entrance. One might mention in addition that the tabernacle and temple menorah was stylized as a symbol of the tree of life. Wenham concludes: “Thus in this last verse of the narrative there is a remarkable concentration of powerful symbols that can be interpreted in the light of later sanctuary design….These features combine to suggest that the garden of Eden was a type of archetypal sanctuary, where God was uniquely present in all his life-giving power.” ….















Conclusion









If Eden is the Holy of Holies in God’s Temple of creation, the implication is that humanity, created for this inner sanctuary, is best understood as Homo liturgicus. Living in the Holy of









Holies, humanity is called to give worship to God in all thoughts, words, and deeds. When we look at the Genesis account of Eden, we find other instances of people portrayed as created for worship. Adam, for example, is told to “till” (from the root ‘bd) and “keep” (from the root šmr). When šmr and ‘bd occur together in the OT (Num. 3:7-8; 8:25-26; 18:5-6; 1 Chr. 23:32; Ezek. 44:14) they refer to keeping/guarding and serving God’s word and also they refer to priestly duties in the tabernacle. And, in fact, šmr and ‘bd only occur together again in the Pentateuch in the descriptions in Numbers for the Levites’ activities in the tabernacle. 55 Such an association reinforces the understanding of Adam as a sort of priest-king, or even high priest, who guarded God’s first temple of creation, as it were. 56 In light of this discussion, therefore, what we find in Genesis 1-3 is creation unfolding as the construction of a divine temple, the Garden of Eden as an earthly Holy of Holies, and the human person created for liturgical worship.









[End of quote]









Whilst the ‘Go West Young Man’ approach yields artificiality in my opinion, those who follow the ‘Go [Middle] East’ approach have managed to uncover the very structure of the ancient Book and the fact that it involves a revelation to Adam (Wiseman), that it is about functionality, not western science, and that it pertains to a cosmic liturgy (Walton, Martin).









Jeff Morrow seems to have built upon this type of approach (though he may not have followed the same path as outlined above), culminating in his most helpful notion of “human beings as homo liturgicus, liturgical humanity made for worship”.









....









[We] hope that this is of some use .... [AMAIC]

Imhotep: Father of Western Civilisation



[The AMAIC is of the opinion that Imhotep, to be re-dated to the mid 2nd millennium BC,

was the biblical Joseph, a Hebrew, a man of profound wisdom, genius and holiness]

Imhotep and Medical Science – Africa’s Gift To the World – By- Jide Uwechia

Ancient African Medicine, Egypt (Khemit) and the World

By
Jide Uwechia

It is now official! The western propaganda press and its scholarly co-conspirators in the academia have finally admitted that African Kemit gave the world the gift of medical sciences as opposed to previously peddled lies which identify Greece as the origin of medicine. Imhotep, the Prince of Peace, the Egyptian inventor of medicine and healing was a real historical African genius who received the book of healing from the mysterious forces of ancestral Africa.

This book was later given to the world and it forms the basis of modern medicine and surgery.

The entire ancient world, including the ancient Greeks celebrated this venerable old man of wisdom who was synonymous with ingenuity. Even Hippocrates so called Greek Father of modern medicine was a devotee of Imhotep the Prince of Peace.

Scientists examining documents dating back more than 3,500 years have confirmed that the origins of modern medicine lie in ancient Egypt and not with Hippocrates and the Greeks. The medical papyri was written in 2,500BC – 1,000, thousands of years before Hippocrates was born.

The medical documents were first discovered in the mid-19th century but then suppressed because it demonstrated facts which were antithetical to the official but hypocritical racist attitudes which then prevailed.

According to one of the scientists, Dr Jackie Campbell:

“Classical scholars have always considered the ancient Greeks, particularly Hippocrates, as being the fathers of medicine but our findings suggest that the ancient Egyptians were practising a credible form of pharmacy and medicine much earlier,”.

“When we compared the ancient remedies against modern pharmaceutical protocols and standards, we found the prescriptions in the ancient documents not only compared with pharmaceutical preparations of today but that many of the remedies had therapeutic merit.”

“Many of the ancient remedies we discovered survived into the 20th century and, indeed, some remain in use today, albeit that the active component is now produced synthetically.”

Imhotep:

Imhotep was the world’s first named physician, and the architect who built Egypt’s first pyramid. He is indisputedly the world’s first doctor, a priest, scribe, sage, poet, astrologer, a vizier and chief minister, to Djoser (reigned 2630–2611 BC), the second king of Egypt’s third dynasty.

An inscription on one of that king’s statues gives us Imhotep’s titles as the “the prince of peace,” “chancellor of the king of lower Egypt,” the “first one under the king,” the “administrator of the great mansion,” the “hereditary Noble,” the “high priest of Heliopolis,” the “chief sculptor,” and finally the “chief carpenter”.

As a builder, Imhotep is the first recorded master architects. He was the first pyramid architect and builder, and among his works one counts the Djoser’s Step Pyramid complex at Saqqara, Sekhemkhet’s unfinished pyramid, and possibly the Edfu Temple. The Step Pyramid remains today one of the most brilliant architecture wonders of the ancient world and is recognized as the first monumental stone structure.

Imhotep was also the first known physician, medical professor and a prodigous writer of medical books. As the first medical professor, Imhotep is believed to have been the author of the Edwin Smith Papyrus in which more than 90 anatomical terms and 48 injuries are described. He also founded a school of medicine in Memphis, possibly known as “Asklepion, which remained famous for two thousand years. All of this occurred some 2,200 years before the Western Father of Medicine Hippocrates was born.

According to Sir William Osler, Imhotep was the:

“..first figure of a physician to stand out clearly from the mists of antiquity.” Imhotep diagnosed and treated over 200 diseases, 15 diseases of the abdomen, 11 of the bladder, 10 of the rectum, 29 of the eyes, and 18 of the skin, hair, nails and tongue. Imhotep treated tuberculosis, gallstones, appendicitis, gout and arthritis. He also performed surgery and practiced some dentistry. Imhotep extracted medicine from plants. He also knew the position and function of the vital organs and circulation of the blood system. The Encyclopedia Britannica says, “The evidence afforded by Egyptian and Greek texts support the view that Imhotep’s reputation was very respected in early times. His prestige increased with the lapse of centuries and his temples in Greek times were the centers of medical teachings.”

Along with medicine, he was also a patron of architects, knowledge and scribes. James Henry Breasted says of Imhotep:

“In priestly wisdom, in magic, in the formulation of wise proverbs; in medicine and architecture; this remarkable figure of Zoser’s reign left so notable a reputation that his name was never forgotten. He was the patron spirit of the later scribes, to whom they regularly poured out a libation..”

Imhotep was, together with Amenhotep, the only mortal Egyptians that ever reached the position of full gods. He was also associated with Thoth, the god of wisdom, writing and learning, and with the Ibises, which was also associated with Thoth.

Devotees bought offerings to his medical and spiritual school in Saqqara, including mummified Ibises and sometimes, in the hope of being healed.

He was later even worshipped by the early Christians as one with Christ who was made to adopt one of the titles of Imhotep, “the Prince of Peace”. The early Christians, often apropriated those pagan forms and persons whose influence through the ages had woven itself so powerfully into tradition that they could not omit them.

He was worshiped in Greece where he was identified with their god of medicine, Aslepius. . He was honored by the Romans and inscriptions praising Imhotep were placed on the walls of Roman temples. Most surprisingly, he even managed to find a place in Arab traditions, especially at Saqqara where his tomb is thought to be located.

Materia Medica:

The ancient Egyptian physicians treated wounds with honey, resins (including cannabis resin) and elemental metals known to be antimicrobial. This practice is still a valid medical protocol even today.

Again, just like in this modern times, the prescriptions for laxatives included castor oil and colocynth and bulk bran and figs were used to promote regularity.

Other references show that colic was treated with hyoscyamus, which is still used today, and that cumin and coriander were used as intestinal carminatives.

Musculo-skeletal disorders were treated with rubefacients to stimulate blood flow and poultices to warm and soothe similar to the practices of modern practitioners of sports medicine .

Interestingly, certain remedies prescribed by Egyptian physicians were way ahead of modern anticipation. For instance, celery and saffron which were used for rheumatism, are currently hot topics of pharmaceutical research, and pomegranate was used to eradicate tapeworms, a remedy that remained in clinical use until 50 years ago.

Acacia is still used in cough remedies while aloes forms a basis to soothe and heal skin conditions. The knowledge and the uses of essential oils and resins were introduced to the world by the ancient Egyptians.”

The early Egyptians appear to have been the first to recognize that stress could contribute to illness. They established sanitariums where people would undergo “dream therapy” and treatments with “healing waters.

Altogether, around 50 percent of the plants used in ancient Egypt remain in clinical use today. Many of the medical and surgical instruments such as knives and forceps have not changed their design since the ancient Africans first sent out this knowledge to the world. Today, researchers are still discovering “new” cures based on old Egyptian remedies, such as eating celery to help curb inflammation associated with arthritis.

Roots of Kemitic Knowledge

The study further conducted genetic and chemical analysis on plant remains and resins, with the goal of identifying trade routes, which species were used and how these plants might have been cultivated outside their natural growing ranges.

After detailed facts gathering and anlysis the scientists proposed that the African Egyptians obtained their medical knowledge from nomadic African tribes that united to form ancient Egypt, as well as from neighbouring African people in Kush and beyond.

Current medical practices by the living African societies and traditions still show similarities to Pharaonic medicine. The continued use by African natural Doctors of medicinal herbs and animal products, and practices such as cosmetic dental filing, brain trepanning,orthopeadic procedures, known to ancient Egyptians suggest sustained scientific and religious interaction in the past.

Alas, current studies are revealing that the knowledge of medicine was transfered from central west Africa to Egypt, just like everything else that was gifted from Kush to Kemet.

This is very significant since it is widely known that the foundations of modern western medicine came from Egypt. Around 50 percent of the plants used in ancient Egypt remained in clinical use. Medical tools like forceps, scissors and surgical blades, were lifted unchanged from ancient Egyptian medical science into modern westen medicine. Medical practices, and knowledge of human anatomy, also found their way into the body of scintific knowledge underlying western medicine.

Since the knowledge of Egyptian medical science was from inner Africa, more precisely central and western Africa, the world owes this continent and its children a belated tribute, a sound recognition for having bequeathed the science of healing and hygiene to later cultures and civilizations who still owe the unrequitted debt of appreciation for Africa’s beneficience.

Jide Uwechia

June 8, 2007

Sources:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-05/uom-eng050907.php

 

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/02/28/egyptiandrug_arc.html?category=animals&guid=20070228104530

Chronicle of the Pharaohs (The Reign-By-Reign Record of the Rulers and Dynasties of Ancient Egypt) Clayton, Peter A. 1994 Thames and Hudson Ltd ISBN 0-500-05074-0

Complete Pyramids, The (Solving the Ancient Mysteries) Lehner, Mark 1997 Thames and Hudson, Ltd ISBN 0-500-05084-8

Dictionary of Ancient Egypt, The Shaw, Ian; Nicholson, Paul 1995 Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers ISBN 0-8109-3225-3

History of Ancient Egypt, A Grimal, Nicolas 1988 Blackwell None Stated

Monarchs of the Nile Dodson, Aidan 1995 Rubicon Press ISBN 0-948695-20-x

Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, The Shaw, Ian 2000 Oxford University Press ISBN 0-19-815034-2

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Posted in Articles, News Reports, Prophet, Rastas.

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By Don Jaide – June 8, 2007

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Taken from: http://www.africaresource.com/rasta/sesostris-the-great-the-egyptian-hercules/medical-science-africas-gift-to-the-world-by-jide-uwechia/

Were Dinosaurs Included in Noah's Ark?



Taken from (but slightly adapted): http://www.oldearth.org/flood.htm

Dinosaurs

... creation science proponents are quick to use dinosaur graveyards as evidence of Noah’s Flood. They claim the dinosaurs herded together, and then were quickly buried. However, this explanation is not feasible.

The dinosaur graveyards referred to are mostly in North America, in sediments in Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, and Canada. However, looking at the positioning of the rock layers, there are thousands of feet of sediment below these layers that the young earth theorists claim were deposited by the Flood.

To make this more understandable, let’s look at the Grand Canyon. Steven Austin, in his book Grand Canyon: Monument to Catastrophe, claims the Canyon rocks represent those which were deposited during the rising waters phase of the Flood (Figure 4.1). The “Late Flood”, or receding water rock deposits, are the Mesozoic sediments.

It is interesting to note that all the dinosaur fossils, including the mass graves, are Mesozoic in age. This means that all the dinosaurs died in the receding water phase of the flood. However, it is clear from Genesis 7:21-23, that all life was killed during the first 40 days of the Flood. Some young-earth theorists will argue that the bodies floated around, and eventually sank, based on various factors as body size, density, and so forth. However, this cannot be true, because the dinosaur footprints all exist in the same Mesozoic rock layers, as do all the dinosaur coprolites (fossilized dinosaur poop), and fossilized dinosaur eggs. Clearly, the dinosaurs were alive and well, after the declaration in Genesis 7:21-23 that all living things were killed during the first forty days of the flood.

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