What Newt and Golda have in common
Why Newt Gingrich Is Right on Palestine
Benyamin Korn
What do Golda Meir, lifelong socialist and prime minister of Israel, and Newt Gingrich, lifelong conservative and current presidential candidate, have in common? The courage to tell the truth about ”Palestine.”
Gingrich stirred up a hornet’s nest last week when he remarked that “The Palestinians are an invented people.” Golda made the same point when she told the London Sunday Times on June 15, 1969 that “There is no such thing as a Palestinian people.”
What could have possessed the Prime Minister of Israel and the former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives to say such a thing?
Simple: an appreciation of history. Gingrich has a Ph.D. in the subject. Golda lived it.
Golda left her home in Milwaukee in 1921 and moved to a country that had been known since biblical times as the Land of Israel. The Roman occupation forces, in 135 CE, had begun calling it “Palaestina” in the hope of snuffing out its Jewish connection. But that was never more than the equivalent of a nickname. Nobody ever created a state called “Palestine.” Even the Muslims, who conquered the region 500 years later, never considered it “Palestine.” They called it southern Syria.
The idea that there was a native “Palestinian” people in the land when Golda and other Jewish pioneers arrived in the early 1900s was laughable. The country wasn’t empty, but to say that the local Arab population was sparse is putting it mildly. Mark Twain and other visitors in the late 1800s described traveling for miles and miles through the center of the country without seeing a single person. In 1850, the area’s largest city, Jerusalem, had a population of 25,000, the majority of whom were Jews. The Arabs who lived in Palestine did not speak “Palestinian”; they spoke Arabic. Their religion, culture, and history were not “Palestinian”; they were identical to that of the surrounding Arab countries–because that’s where many of them came from.
Perhaps Newt has been reading Golda’s autobiography. “The Arab population of Palestine had doubled since the start of Jewish settlements there,” she wrote of the 1920s, when Jewish development was creating a thriving local economy. “[A]ttracted by the new opportunities, hordes of Arabs were emigrating to Palestine from Syria and other neighboring countries all through those years.” (p.149)
An Israeli magazine recently profiled a Jerusalem Arab chef, Sufian Mustafa, who is bent on demonstrating that there is a uniquely “Palestinian” cuisine. But after much blustering about his ”exclusively Palestinian” creations (“real Palestinians would never cook with such a bland ingredient as cream,” he insisted) Mustafa grudgingly acknowledged that “the Palestinian kitchen is definitely a continuation of the Greater Syrian kitchen, and bears a lot of resemblance to Lebanese, Syrian, and Jordanian cuisine.” I wonder why!
In the parlance of the 1920s-1930s-1940s, the term “Palestine” referred to the Jews, not the Arabs. The Jerusalem Post newspaper was named the Palestine Post. The United Jewish Appeal was called the United Palestine Appeal. Arab spokesmen vehemently denied that Palestine deserved to be a separate country. Philip Hitti, historian and spokesman for the Arab cause, testified to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry (a U.S.-British commission trying to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict) in 1946: “Sir, there is no such thing as Palestine in history, absolutely not.”
After Israel’s establishment (1948), the Arabs and their supporters began casting about for new lines of argument. In the mid-1960s one finds the first appearance of claims by Arab advocates that there was a separate, distinct “Palestinian” people with deep roots in the land. (The UN first used the term in 1970.) How can this claim be established? Simple: by inventing–yes, inventing–a history that predates the arrival of the Jews. According to Palestinian Authority spokesmen and school textbooks, the Palestinian Arabs are descendants of the Canaanites, Jebusites, Hittites and other pre-Israel tribes.
True to form, Palestinian spokesman Nabil Adu Rodeineh was all over the news yesterday, denouncing Newt Gingrich on the grounds that “the Palestinians have been in the country for thousands of years.”
Archaeologists and historians know very well that the tribes of ancient Canaan died out many centuries before Muhammad and the Muslims (precursors of today’s Palestinian Arabs) arrived in the area. There is no connection between the Canaanites and the Arabs. But when was the last time an archaeologist or historian was given time on a national television broadcast to explain that Palestinian nationalism is an invention? The answer is never–until Newt Gingrich, the first presidential candidate since Woodrow Wilson with a Ph.D. in history, came along.
Benyamin Korn is former executive editor of the Miami Jewish Tribune and the Philadelphia JewishExponent.
Well a unique source is that of the Australian/British Armies from World War I. They encountered some arabs, a lot of nomadic bedu, and Jewish villages. They experienced exceptionally good support from the Jewish villages, had a very difficult relationship with the Bedu (feeling that the majority were in the pay of the Turks) and nothing but bad blood, theft and murder from the Arabs (culminating in the Surafend Affair – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surafend_affair) after the murder of a New Zealand Sergeant by an arab after the end of the war.
There is no mention of some separate “Palestine” identity or “Palestinian” people in any of the literature from that period, it is merely seen as an outpost of the Turkish Empire, peopled by Jews, Bedu and Syrian/Levantine (Lebanese) Arabs. It is quite interesting just how prominent the Jewish villages are and how regularly they are mentioned. It is conceivably, based upon this first-hand evidence, possible to argue that if there was a distinctly “Palestinian” character from that period (discounting the Bedu who were given Jordan), then there is an even money chance they were Jewish.
Aside from that, and what our arab brethren would prefer to forget, is that the arabs chose to support the Turkish Empire (to the extent the shiftless sods supported anyone) in the Great War. That is the fundamental underpinning of the Balfour documents, in return for their support of the British, the Bedu received Transjordan and the Jews, for their support, would receive the rest. It is all very well to suggest that is ancient history and of no account, but the world is built on such things. What arabs there were in “Palestine” at that time, were ignored because they had chosen to back the wrong horse in the war to end all wars. As such they were ignored and what proprietary interests they may have held were nullified, as a result of that choice (they were far from the only people to lose more than they could afford in that period as a result of backing the wrong side). To suggest that they remained entitled to anything in the post war British mandate is to ignore the promises made by Balfour during the war and to withhold payment for support received (that this is precisely what happened up until the end of the mandate, does not overturn the original promise or the entitlement flowing therefrom – so let the British work out where to resettle the “Palestinian Arabs” they dispossessed).
But Newt Gingrich is by far the best Presidential Candidate that I can see at the present time. Articulate, educated, a fervent nationalist who is a strong supporter of Israel (it’s a long time since someone ticked all those boxes). He’s also had an extended period in a powerful office, if there were any major skeletons or strange habits (or if his immediate family did), they’d be out already (even longer since those ones were ticked as well), at least by a potential front-runner. His recent statements on Pakistan (a nascent danger to Israel, the only nuclear weapon equipped muslim state and one that is in the process of ostracising itself from the western world and is evidently going to play to the muslim ratbag crowd in the future) are insightful and show an apparent disregard of, independence of and contempt for, the strong pro-muslim, pro-Pakistan lobby. The world could do a LOT worse (leaving the incumbent in power for instance)
I’ll take Newt over Romney any day. Bolton is my choice for Secretary of State as it is Newt’s.
Then put Palin in as the secretary of Energy if there is such a post. Palin would bring a lot of support to Newt from the social conservatives and thus she could write her own ticket. Its a win win all around.
Even if the invented “Palestinian Arabs” were descendants of the extinct (non-Arabic)Canaanites, which they are not and their claims to the land legitimate, which too is not, what of those Jews displaced from their homes in Arab counties where they had lived since before the days of the Canaanites and their properties and citizenship confiscated? Those Jews that outnumbered the displaced Arabs we hear not a word!
Attention Ted Belman,
Newt has made the most eloquent, clear, coherent, unapologetic and intelligent remarks re the palestinians that I have ever heard from a senior American political figure. He has also made statements re his desire to move the US embassy to Jerusalem. For all I care, he’s more pro-Israel than all of Kadima, Labor and Meretz put together!
At this point, and especially given the excessive, obsessive and sometimes irrational support that you have expressed for Sarah Palin in the past, I would expect you, Ted, to immediately throw your full blown support for someone who is vastly superior to Palin in every possible respect (except for looks). Newt’s rhetoric has been vastly more supportive of Israel than Palin’s, vastly more intelligent than Palin’s and more importantly, he has emerged as a true potential leader, whereas Palin never did. Even with Newt’s baggage lurking as a possible liability, I find him quite capable of dealing with it, based on his performance in the Republican debates.
Every time Palin opened her mouth, every comedian, Hollywood patron and political commentator would destroy her. Not with Newt. They may not like him, but they can’t make fun of him like Palin, they can’t dismiss him outright like Palin. In other words, he’s a serious candidate, unlike Palin.
He deserves your full blown support. So does Romney.
Newt already backtracked on the 2-state issue yesterday. Wake up, people. Gingrich is as horny a RINO as they come.
Good luck, America.
Where did the Muslims come from? What is their origin?
How about Allen West as Secretary of Defense along with the other two?
Everyone knows they came from the Freemasons and the Illuminati.
Oh – and the Vatican.
/nyuk
Are you asking this question seriously? Islam originated in Arabia (beginning around the year 610 CE), and quickly spread by armed conquest across North Africa and the Middle East. Muslims constitute a religious/political community, not an ethnic one.
You obviously don’t like Palin. Why sound off so much now that she isn’t running?
Dir you know that Newt is a great friend of Norquist who is pro Islamist and Sharpton who is antisemitic. He is also a globalist and supports the New World Order.
Romney is mealy mouth about the Palestinians and the Muslims.
I disagree.
The Muslims mentioned above, as “precursors of today’s Palestinian Arabs”, are Arabs. They descend from nomadic Arabian tribes that spread out from the deserts of Arabia, covering an area that includes parts of modern-day Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. With the exception of Egypt (which was historically not Arab, prior to being conquered and occupied by Arabs in the Islamic conquest of the mid-8th century CE), the first of these countries are artificial creations of England and France when they divided up the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire after its defeat at the end of World War I. Saudi Arabia is also a 20th century invention, resulting from the conquest of Arabia following World War I by a violent opportunist named Ibn Saud, who took advantage of the power vacuum left by the defeat of its former ruler/absentee landlord, the Ottoman Turks.
Historically, there are no Arab “Palestinians”–it’s a stolen name for a made-up political entity whose existence is solely for the purpose of eradicating Israel.
Alexis: Thank you. I am interested in Anthropology in respect to where Noah’s sons and other descendants went. Are the Arabs from Shem or Ham?
Added to which, Mo wanted to be recognised as a Jewish prophet and gain the support of the Jewish families in Medina. When they refused to accept him as a Jewish prophet, he began his own religion loosely based thereon. He also co-opted the Jewish prophets and the history and added the Christians to it (including JC himself). Violent lunatics who try and get recognised as a prophet of a known religion and set up their own religion when they fail are kind of frowned on in polite society. David Koresh, etc. spring to mind.
Arabs are from Shem. [The original Egyptians--the ones who built the pyramids--, from whom the Coptic Christian Egyptians descend, are from Ham.] Linguisticallly, Arabic is a close cousin of Hebrew; both are Semitic (“from Shem”) languages, as are also Syriac, Aramaic, and several now-disappeared languages like Akkadian and Ugaritic.
We also know that Arabs are our cousins because they are the children of Abraham through Hagar and her son Ishmael, Isaac’s older half-brother.
By the way, if you will look at the blessing Abraham, at the end of his life, gives to his son Ishmael, you will see that nothing has changed for Ishmael and his descendants from that day to this.
aaron:
I see little or nothing in Islam that makes it like Judaism. Islam, started by the Roman Catholic Church which also started Freemasonry, goes back to Baal worship and is not based on the Bible. See this link: Global Babylonian paganism; a short introduction in names & symbols
Alexis: Thanks for that. Ishmael must not have believed Gen. 12:3.
See what I meant now?
One Landed in the Cuckoo’s Nest.
Waiting for a big copy and paste from Yamit.
Yishmael himself did Teshuvah in his latter years. You do know what Teshuvah is, don’t you?
Aaron, you are correct. Muhammad co-opted–that is exactly the right word–Biblical history and fractured or distorted it. According to the Qur’an, for example, Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac was not of Isaac (“this is a Jewish lie!” according to Muhammad) but rather–of Ishmael. And he says that it happened not at Mount Moriah, but at Mecca.
The Qur’an says that Adam and Eve were the first Muslims, and that upon their expulsion from the Garden of Eden they made a pilgrimage to Mecca, where Eve’s block-long tomb may be visited at nearby Jidda today; and that Abraham, and Noah, and Moses, and Jesus, were Muslims. The Qur’an also confuses Miriam, sister of Moses (Miriam is “Maryam” in Arabic), with Mary (which is also “Maryam”) the mother of Jesus. According to the Qur’an, these two (who are actually separated in time by some 1000 years or so) are the same person.
There are many more examples. Muhammad claimed (and perhaps believed) that the revelations he received were identical to both the Old and the New Testaments, about which he had only a very vague idea. When this turned out not to be the case, he tried to destroy all those–Christians and especially Jews– who actually knew the difference.
Teshuvah, someone has given you some wildly inaccurate information. Islam was started by an Arab named Muhammad, who was born in Mecca in 570 CE. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the Catholic Church.
I need to make a correction on my post. The conquest of Egypt by the Muslims was in the mid-7th century CE.
Shy: Yes, I do. How many did he murder in his lifetime? Or were the murders left to his descendants? I doubt Teshuvah covers murder because you must ask forgiveness of the one you offended and short of resurrecting the dead, you can’t ask their forgiveness. No murderer has eternal life.
I give up. You tell us.
You’re not mixing up Yishmael with Eisav, are you?
Then you don’t know what Teshuvah is. Any transgression can be repented for in this life. Any.
But we’re not talking about lip service.
Alex: How the Vatican started Islam. The widow of Alberto Rivera and those who knew him claim he was murdered by the Catholics for releasing this information.
The Islam & Catholic Connection 1/11http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nvj_Rp-UuKo
Full lecture: 216 – The Islamic Connection. The Roman Catholic Church is excellent at historical revisionism.
Alexis: My comment went to Moderation.
Teshuvah, Sorry if I misunderstood. Can you explain?
Alexis: I put links in my previous comment and it went to Moderation for Ted to clear. In the meantime Google “Vatican started Islam” and also on Youtube. Also google “Alberto Rivera” and “Walter Veith”. I’m trying to point you to a DVD lecture by Prof. Walter Veith that talks about this subject. It is called The Islam Connection. Rivera is an ex-Jesuit priest and his wife and friends claim he was murdered when he tried to release this info.
Technically that is true and untrue. Technically Balfour agreed to give “Palestine” to the Yishuv in return for support and services rendered. The beduoin were to receive Transjordan and the Arabs who lived in the province of Syria (which included later day “Palestine”) were given Syria. So, technically, you are correct – under accrued obligations, the whole of Palestine was reserved for the Jews (and a mere failure to fulfill an obligation does not clear one of the obligation, if that were the case, our system of commerce would collapse). Legally, the area was earned by the Jews through their support of the British Empire in WWI.
However, the fuckup imposed by the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, the delineation of a line of control between the French (who got Syria and Lebanon) and the British (who got Palestine) and the British unwillingness to do anything which upset the Arabs (for fear of the consequences in India), led them to allow the Arabs to remain in “Palestine”. What would have happened if Lt. Gen. Monash had been appointed (as had been suggested) to be the first Military Governor of the Mandate is interesting to consider. As it was, the mandate made a name for itself (Allenby started the toadying to Arabs during the war) by running after Arabs and allowing them to get away with murder literally. So you are incorrect in that, they are literally still in the area, despite being in breach of the original agreement.
But does that make them “Palestinian”? Of course not, Zimbabwe is Zimbabwe, we don’t call it Rhodesia just because that is what it was called by the British when they ran it, do we? The term “Palestinian” means from “Palestine”, as “Palestine” only existed for 30 years, under a mandate at that, whilst undergoing a transition from an Ottoman Province to a Sovereign nation (1918-1948), it is ludicrous to try and hang onto the term. If the Arabs who chose to stay in the area illegally want to term themselves something, they can call themselves Syrian (but of course they won’t).
I can tell you this much. I live near the fence which divides Kiriat Arba from the mostly Arab part of Hevron. In the 1980s my Arab neighbors would tell us unhesitatingly about their families having come from all over the Middle East. Only later, after Shimon Peres and his buddies got this “palestinian” stuff into their heads, did they start singing “min abui” (I got it from my father.)
And by the way, Ted, I don’t mind Gingrich having anti-Semitic friends. I have plenty of them right here in Israel.
And by the way, Alexis, the Arabs who are mentioned in the Tora may have been from Shem. But Mohammed and his followers converted people from all over and they got all mixed together. Haven’t you seen Turkish-looking Arabs in Hevron? And some of them are Black Africans, descendants of slaves from the days (not too long ago but at least as recently as the 1950s) when the Bedouin (and perhaps other Arabs here) used to keep slaves. And of course there are those blondies from the good times the British soldiers had during the Mandate, and on and on and on.
Best to all,
Yeruham
Not so fast.
Common though the claim may be, Arabs are not, in fact, ethnically or genetically semites. They do, it’s true, have some semitic ancestry — but they are primarily hamites, not semites. They are descendants, that is, of Ham, not Shem (the progenitor of the Jews).
The confusion lies in the fact that, as you noted, Alexis, Arabs speak a semitic language: i.e., a language which is linguistically allied to the other semitic languages, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, Phoenician, Ancient Assyrian, Ancient Babylonian, etc. However, ethnically & racially, Arabs are far more closely related to the hamitic peoples, like the ancient Hittites & Egyptians, than they are to the Jews. And I’ll tell you why. (It’s interesting, if you’re inclined to explore it.)
Remember, however, that this is about genetic composition — not about recogntion in religious law, which formulaically assigns communal religious designation by recourse to one side or another of one’s parentage (matrilineal descent for Jews; patrilineal for Muslims, etc.) Non-linguistic application of the “semitic-hamitic-yaphetic” nomenclature pertains not to religious affiliation but, rather, to concrete genetic composition — and that necessarily and inescapably receives contributions from both sides of one’s parentage.
It’s true that the Arabs do indeed share with the Jews (and with other peoples as well) a common semitic ancestor: in the person of the first Hebrew patriarch, Avraham [Abraham, Ibrahim, etc] — who lived during the early part of the Middle Bronze Age, ca. 2150-1900 BC. However, Ishmael [Isma’il] — the eldest son of Abraham, and the one through whom the Arabs are understood to have descended — had a hamitic mother: Hagar Ha-Mitzri, Hagar the Egyptian. [The Egyptians, as you've noted, were hamites, not semites.]
Therefore Ishmael himself would have been half semitic and half hamitic.
Hagar, in turn, took for her son, Ishmael, a wife also from amongst her own people, HaMitzrim — from amongst the Egyptians. Thus, Isma’il’s own 12 sons and (at least) one daughter were all genetically one-quarter semitic and three-quarters hamitic. And you can see the direction this is headed.
Now, to shift focus:
Yitzhak, on the other hand — i.e., Isaac, the second-born of the eight sons of Abraham, and the ONLY son, indeed, though whom the Jews descend — is, moreover, also the only son who, we know, had not only a semitic father but also a semitic mother: Sarah, who was a cousin, or possibly a niece (or even, perhaps a half-sister) of Avraham’s when she married him back in Ur Chasdim, located in Aram Naharayim, [“Aram between the rivers” --- i.e., between the Tigris & Euphrates Rivers; in other words, Chaldea, Sumeria, Mesopotamia, Ancient Babylon, Modern Iraq], before they even made the journey to Cana’an, the Promised Land.
[This all, of course, in an era characterized by a far shallower gene pool, infected as yet by few mutations, and therefore one in which many fewer classes of relationships would have been viewed as incestuous.]
Furthermore, when the time comes for Abraham to find a wife for his son, Yitzhak/Isaac, Abraham sends his servant, Damesek Eliezer — Eliezer of Damascus, his faithful family retainer — back to the city of Nakhor in Aram Naharayim, adjuring him at the time — making Eliezer swear at the time (just in case the elderly Avraham should die before Eliezer returns) — to find Yitzhak a wife not from among the C’na’anim [the Canaanites], where Avraham now lives, but, rather, from amongst Avraham’s own kindred, back in Aram Naharayim. Tracking with me?
[In fact, until Abraham’s arrival in Cana’an with his wife & orphaned nephew, Lot, it’s safe to say that there were likely few (if any) semites in the Promised Land --- only, or mostly, hamites until then. The very burial plot in Hebron that Abraham chooses for his departed Sarah --- and where he likewise {and indeed three generations of the Hebrew Patriarchs & Matriarchs}—will subsequently be interred --- will be purchased: at its fair market value, 400 shekalim {about 160 ounces of silver} from Ephron, son of Tzohar the Hittite, and in the presence of all the city elders of what was then a Hittite colony.]
Presently, Eliezer comes back from Mesopotamia/Chaldea, bringing with him in tow, Rivka [Rebecca], his master Abraham’s grand niece, and therefore also a semite, for his master’s son, Isaac. This is running long. I’ll continue the other half on another post.
Okay, here’s Part Two of my Semite/Hamite post. (The first half went into limbo when I hit “Post” — so it may appear out of order, but this is the second part of the post where I maintain that Arabs are largely Hamitic, rather than Semitic — from a purely genetic perspective.)
To Isaac & Rebecca will be born fraternal twins, Ya’acov v’ Esov [Jacob & Esau]. Ya’acov, whose name will be changed to “Israel” — and through whom the Jews will directly and solely descend — will be sent (indeed, will be driven: by collateral circumstances of urgent import) to seek refuge with the family of his mother, Rivka, and there also to find for himself a mate. Like his father, Isaac, he will maintain the line of “Promise” by taking a wife not from among the Canaanite locals but rather from his grandfather Abraham’s extended family.
There, after indenturing himself, for what turns out to be some 20 years, to his mother’s brother, Lavahn [Laban], Jacob will marry Le’ah v’ Rakhel [Leah & Rachel] — both young women, daughters of Lavahn: and therefore Jacob’s cousins, once removed — thus also semites. Now, with Leah & Rachel, and with also their two handmaidens, Vilhah v’ Zilpah [Bilha & Zilpa] — who, as local to a semitic region, would themselves have also been semites — with these four women, Ya’acov will proceed to father a dozen sons & a daughter.
Their children will intermarry and, with time, form the twelve tribes of Israel — this, ca. 1750-1650 BC. The roots of the Jews are thus seen clearly to be almost entirely, or very densely, semitic.
Esov/Esau, i.e., Jacob’s fraternal twin brother, through whom the Edomites [or Idumeans] would descend, will — unlike Jacob, and contrary to his parents’ wishes — marry two local, Hittite women, Adah & Ahalee-vah’mah, and subsequently, also a third, Bahss’maht [aka Mah-khalaht], a daughter of Ishmael and the latter’s Egyptian wife.
Then, with these three hamitic wives, Esau will leave Cana’an, eyver haYardenn, crossing the River Jordan, mih-keddem, to the East, and settling there [in the region of Mount Se’ir], where his five (or more) children will presumably intermarry with the partly semitic, Moabite & Ammonite descendants of Abraham’s nephew Lot — since that’s who lived there — and, as well, with the descendants of Abraham’s six other sons: by Keturah, the probably local and thus Cana’anite [hamitic], woman Abraham had married after Sarah’s death and lived with for the remaining 35 years of his lfe — and which sons, upon coming of age, were also sent to live east of Cana’an.
This loose admixture of the descendants of Ishmael, Lot & Esau is obviously far more HAMITIC than semitic by genetic & ethnic composition; but there’s more.
A thousand years on, at the time of the Babylonian Captivity [sixth century BC], the Arab tribe of Nabateans [Isma’ili, Edomite and Yemeni (through Temahn, grandson of Esau)] pushed northward out of the arid Arabian Peninsula and into what had been the Land of Edom east of the Jordan, establishing their capital at Petra, some 60 miles south of the Dead Sea. And while, in response to that pressure, the intermarried Edomites withdrew yet further north, into southern Judah, it is certainly possible that some intermarriage may have occurred between the already only slightly still semitic Edomites and the now largely hamitic Nabateans — neither of which groups (in contrast to the Jews) displayed any substantial disinclination toward intermarriage.
To be sure, one cannot overlook the possiblity that there may also be some Arabs from the Mesopotamian region — Abraham’s birthplace — who may actually have a trifle more semitic DNA than most other Arabs.
That being said, however, it would appear inevitable that the ethnic & genetic Arab patrimony would have to be overwhelmingly hamitic — not semitic.
God is the giver; God, likewise, the forgiver.
He is correct, Teshuvah. Any. And in this life.
King David committed murder.
I’m not talking about killing other men in combat.
I’m not talking about judicial executions he ordered for crimes committed.
I’m talking about the deliberate, cold-blooded murder — and the intentional, organized conspiracy to commit murder — of an innocent man whom David KNEW to be innocent of any wrongdoing.
“Murder, and murder most foul.”
Yet we are told that David was a man after God’s own heart.
Regardless of all the arguments, it’s good to see this issue revealed in the light of day. It’s about time this “debate” took place.
Shy and dweller:
Let’s say you plan to murder your wife in a grizly way. You accomplish the task with Premeditation and it is Aggravated and then do Teshuvah and are forgiven? Aw, come on! Is that justice for the murdered wife? What message does it send to the community?
Ex 34:5 And the LORD descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD.
6 And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,
7 Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.
TSK: that will by no means clear the guilty. The Hebrew nakkeh lo yenakkeh, has been rendered “Acquitting him who is not innocent.” Nothing can more strongly express the goodness of God to frail mortals than this declaration, “which has been misunderstood and misinterpreted by all our translators.”
Ex 23:7 Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked.
Ex 23:21 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him.
Na 1:2 God is jealous, and the LORD revengeth; the LORD revengeth, and is furious; the LORD will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies.
Na 1:3 The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the LORD hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.
shy & dweller: Shy said “Any.” I actually think it is presumptuous to continue sinning and expect G-d to wipe the slate clean. The highest duty is to live a life where one does not sin. It is possible, although most people consider themselves helpless prisoners of their own lusts while the serpent says, “Yeh, hath G-d said?” Gen. 3:1. Your G-d/god is the one you obey. dweller look up Rom. 6:16.
Nu 15:30 But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously, whether he be born in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the LORD; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. 31 Because he hath despised the word of the LORD, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly be cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him.
There is false doctrine in the Christian churches called “Once Saved~Always Saved.” I think John Calvin had something to do with it. I rather think that unless they repent and live a righteous life, they aren’t saved at all. Here is a good article on this subject. Forgiveness on the Cheap. It deals with when and how we should forgive others, but first how G-d forgives us. Excerpt:
CR. If you want me to release your comments, stop writing them in bold.
You make Repentance sound like something formulaic. “Say three Hail Mary’s & two Our Father’s and make an Act of Contrition; see you next week. Oh, and be sure to leave by the door that has the box sitting on the pedestal.”
If one is not genuinely sorry for what he’s done — and sorry, moreover, because he sees for himself that it is wrong — then whatever contortions he puts himself thru, it is not T’shuvah, not Repentance. And accordingly there is no forgiveness. Maybe no forgiveness even if it’s a sin that calls for restitution, and he makes restitution. In the absence of sincerity, there may even be a most severe punishment for the PRESUMPTION, for the game-playing where God is concerned.
And part of the punishment may be the increased difficulty to give up the sin.
“God is not mocked.”
Until he repents, he continues to BE guilty.
“Wicked” is not a synonym for “evil”; it’s a synonym for unrepentant.
Its opposite is not “good” but “righteous” — which is a synonym for repentant.
Strictly speaking, human beings are never Good or Evil
— only righteous or wicked.
Presumptuous INDEED to expect it as long as the sinning continues.
Yes, I mentioned it to you myself, some time ago.
Not in the absence of repentance, no.
I don’t know what you are ranting about. Ted said he does support Newt.
I wasn’t aware of this and find it disturbing. But at least those relations haven’t shaped Newt’s thinking on the Middle East. I just don’t see what choice we have at this point. The preferable candidates Bachmann and Sentorum don’t stand a chance.
Palin was never interested in the Presidency.
Give it a rest.
I haven’t found a perfect candidate yet. There are better ones as I mentioned, but who have no chance of getting the nomination. At this point I think we need to back Newt.
Ephraim and the half tribe of Manasseh are there in the mountains over against the city of Mecca… They are strong of body and of iron heart. They are horse-men… They are mighty men of war. One is a match for a thousand.” said Eldad the Danite, in the 9th century, of one of the Jewish communities he had seen on his travels.
The interactions between Jews and Arabs were always complex, with politics influencing the participants as much or more than religion. Thus, while there were instances of horrible enmity, it also seems that the Muslim armies of Mohamed were supported by large alied armies of Jews.
The Jews of Yemen also have a story about the aliance of the Jewish community and the armies of Mohamed.
The Yemenite Jewish community has, or had, at least into the nineteen fifties, a document of protection which is purportedly from the time of Mohamed, and was written at his command.
A few years after Islam overran North Africa and the Middle East, in the later seventh century, the Berber Jewish Warriors of North Africa learned of the oppression of the Jews in the Visigoth Christian kingdoms of Spain . In an attempt to rescue them, a Berber Jewish army invaded Spain in aproximately 694 CE. The invasion was unsuccessful. Instead, a Moorish, Muslim army defeated the Visigoths in Spain a few years later (711 – 715 CE). Under Moorish rule, the Jews of Spain were liberated and returned to their rightful position in Spanish society.
Long after the death of Mohamed, after Islam had become a world religion, during the upheavals of the Crusades, Jewish mountain warriors in Arabia continued as valuable allies. Benjamin of Tudela, traveling in the 12th century wrote about the Hashishim (the Arab warriors feared by the Crusaders):
[They] live on high mountains, and worship the Old Man of the land of the Hashishim. And among them there are four communities of Israel who go forth with them in war time. They are not under the rule of the king of Persia, but reside in the high mountains… and none can overcome them.”
Another post disappeared! Like the Texas 2 step. Every comment is suspenseful.
Funny, You don’t look Jewish
The Joke with this punchline is usually set in Asia, China or Japan.
However, the material quoted below is the account of a real event — the first encounter, in 1868, of Joseph Halevy, the emisary from “the Jewish Alliance”, with the Jews of Ethiopia. Actually, the first time, in likely two thousand years, that the Ethiopian Jewish Community encountered a Jew from the outside.
On my arrival they saluted me, and surrounded me, though at a considerable distance…
After hesitating for a few minutes, the Falashas* broke silence: “Gueta” (Sir), said they, “doubtless you require a knife (gara) or sword (shotel): you should buy them in a large town, for the instruments we make are of too rough a workmanship to suit a European.”
“Oh, my brethren,” I replied, “I am not only a European; I am, like you, an Israelite. I come, not to trade in Abyssinia, but to inquire into the state of my co-religionists, in conformity with the desire of a great Jewish Association existing in my country. You must know, my dear brethren, that I also am a Falasha! I worship no other god than the great Adonai, and I acknowledge no other law than the law of Sinai!”
These words, uttered slowly, and in distinct tones, that all might understand them, had a striking effect on the Falasha. Whilst some appeared to be satisfied, others shook their heads doubtfully, and looked at each other as if to inquire how I should be answered.
At last several voices exclaimed,
“What! You a Falasha! A white Falasha! You are laughing at us! Are there any white Falashas?”
The only ‘baggage’ to mark bears the imprimatur ‘nihil obstat’(‘nothing hinders’):
to a two-state solution – the PLO and the Vatican.
I wrote a response to Yeruham before reading dweller’s detailed exposition, which requires me to modify my response. Dweller, I don’t dispute your arguments. If Ishmael is taken to be the sole, or main, progenitor of the Arabs, then they would correctly be understood to be genetically more hamitic than semitic.
Ethnographic and linguistic evidence suggest that Arabs descend in the main from tribes of nomadic pastoralists who wandered into the Syrian and Arabian deserts from Mesopotamia, home of Shem.
Hamites–with whom many Semitic tribes have intermixed over millenia–originate in north and central-north Africa (thus, including Egyptians, Cushites, Berbers).
My original comment to Yeruham: you are talking about people of mixed or non-Arab lineage (who may, through intermarriage or simply by joining groups of Arabs, have adulterated the designation).