I am thankful for the many intelligent posts and authors that populate this
newsgroup. I'm a little surprised at the voracity with which regular posters
would pursue this mormon vs. virian thing we've had going the past few days-
did anyone imagine minds would be changed? This is an old argument that
should be relegated to alt.messaianic, at best it is recycled pop philosophy
and at worst it descends towards a flame war.
My apologies to the well-intentioned writers, I know the weather has been hot
and it's easy to jump into the fray- I blame El Nino, if not the El Nino
meme...
Sorry if this next part is condescending, and I am posting in publicly only so
that no one else has to- Johnny Rea, you need to understand the reality of
newsgroups. In the last several days, I've received 20 + messages from you in
my mailbox, all off topic for the group. If you have clever little retorts,
you can send them directly to their intended recipients, and not clog the
mailboxes of the hundreds (?) of subscribers. It makes sense that you wanted
to clear up misconceptions about LDS, and you've done that, but this newsgroup
has a purpose and that is not it. Feel free to mail me directly, and can we
bring this discussion back on topic?
I'm surprised no one else has written yet about the Torah! The "Torah" is the
name for the first five books of the "Bible"- Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The tradition is that these books were either
handed to or dictated to Moses when he was up on the mountain, and so are also
called "The Five Books of Moses". Together with the rest of the "Old
Testament" and the books of accompanying commentary (The Talmud), they make up
the backbone of Jewish thought. The standard translation is that of the
Jewish Publication Society, first in 1917 and again in 1962. It is a great
companion book to a "standard" "Bible", because it renders the original Hebrew
much more idiomatically than does the King James, which is more word-for-word-
you get things like Exodus 20:13- commonly rendered as "Thou shalt not kill",
rendered by the JPS as "You shall not murder" (!). All the difference in the
world...
I am emphatically NOT trying to start a discussion of the relative "truths" of
one version over another (I mean, 3 days ago I wouldn't have felt the need to
qualify...), although the cultural assumtions inherent in different
translations (did "Virgin" refer to a woman who had never had sex, or just a
young woman?) make for pleasant and sardonic discussion. Anyway, there's the
basic skinny on the Torah, and I can only hope the tangible information in the
later part of my post makes up for the ranting in the earlier... Thanks for
all the good clean fun!
X-day right around the corner!
Love, Ian