Intention and the Written Word

My neighbor in Nashville, TN, the irrepressible Reverend Terry Jones has reared his ugly views again.
He has an axe to grind and he would like to use it on the Quran to be more specific.  Of course, he is also protesting the building of a mosque in Murfreesboro, TN.  Sad to say, because of his and his followers' shenanigans, they have made the national news.  Once again, focusing on the proverbial woman with the curlers and moo-moo to become a 15 minute celebrity.

I find it curious that the reverend is so against the Quran.  I read somewhere that the only difference between the Bible and the Quran was that a vast array of people share stories about God and Jesus where the Quran is narrated by one entity:  God.  And, it is written in first person.  I'm certainly not an expert on the Quran but what is so troubling about this revelation?  Has he read it?  Does he disagree with it?  Does he not believe in freedom of speech?  I'm beginning to wonder.  Is it, "Freedom of Speech as long as you believe as I do?"

I've known ministers that stand behind every word of the Bible.  I wonder about that too.  Who should have the final word on supremacy of belief?  Fundamentalist Christians scare the hell out of me.  Why?  Because they believe the Bible to be interpreted literally.  You can't tell me that the hundreds of scribes that wrote the Bible in Aramic, thousands of years after the fact wrote a completely factual account free of bias or prejudice.  How many times has the Bible been translated into other languages?  How do the translations hold up?  C'mon....for example:

"Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property." (Leviticus 25:44-45)

Really?  Slaves?  Burning the Quran? Hating a race of people for the actions of a few?  I believe Reverend Jones has read the Bible.  I just think he's never understood it.

 
More Musings Later-

The Uncanniness of Theosophy

I've always considered myself a Theosophist rather than Christian or a subset of religion such as Methodist, Baptist etc. For those who wonder what the heck a "Theosophist" is, it is one who embraces all religions and feel that each has a truth. It's always made more sense to me.

It's funny, I've been on this earth 46 years and counting and it just dawned on me for some reason. I asked Alan Solomon, my co-writer what my name would look like in Chinese and what it meant. I always wonder about that. Hey, Kevin Costner wanted to know what his name was in Native American tongue, didn't he?

Well, it made me think back to my mother telling me the story of how she knew she was going to become pregnant with me. She hadn't even been pronounced pregnant yet by her doctor! She had been praying for a child for a long time and during her prayers, she said she heard a voice that shook her to the soul. "Thou shalt have a Deborah."

At that time, (early 60's) she had never heard of a woman called Deborah in the Bible. Her and my grandmother scoured the Bible and finally found a mention of her. Actually, I found a great site that gives more info about her. Here is a snippet:

The popular prophet Deborah is one of the few female role models in the Tanakh, where she exemplifies a Hebrew woman possessed of respect, authority, leadership and decisiveness. To some of the rabbis such strong character in a woman was very threatening. Rabbi Nahman, in his dislike of "strong women" twists the true translation of her name from "bee "to "wasp" (Genesis Rabbah 18:1).

This resistance to women in an active role by male commentators is one factor that makes it difficult to uncover the true memory and significance of the first biblical Deborah. Let us proceed to examine this first, decidedly overshadowed, Deborah.

And Dvorah, the nurse of Rivka died, and she was buried below Beth-el- underneath the oak, and he called the name of it the Oak of Crying. (Genesis 35:8) Here is the webpage for more info: The First Deborah

Here is what is interesting; the Chinese version of my name and meaning is similar to the Bible's meaning of "Deborah". See below for the actual Chinese spelling and explanation from Alan Solomon:

My New Name: 辛 丽军
I had wondered about the Chinese writing that appeared next to Alan's name one day and I asked him, "Hey, what would my name look like?

What does 'Taryn' mean in Chinese?"Ask and you shall recieve as I always say. For some reason, I can't post the Chinese writing into this post, but at least it is showing in the title.

Xin is my surname and LiJun is my first name. Taryn is seen here as being a young pretty soldier, so your first name is LiJun which means beautiful army .... Xin is the nearest meaning to Simpson.

Don't even get me started about numerology, black holes, dimensions and the like.

God, there is so much we don't know...

More Musings Later-