Is CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) A Hypocritical Organization Regarding Jews?

1. Introduction of the Issue

The dictionary definition of "hypocritical" is:

Dictionary.com :
      

"1.

of the nature of hypocrisy, or pretense of having virtues, beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually possess:

The parent who has a “do what I say and not what I do” attitude can appear hypocritical to a child.

2.

possessing the characteristics of hypocrisy :

Isn't a politician hypocritical for talking about human dignity while voting against reasonable social programs?"

 CAIR's stated principles are:

CORE PRINCIPLES

1. CAIR supports free enterprise, freedom of religion and freedom of expression.
2. CAIR is committed to protecting the civil rights of all Americans, regardless of faith.
3. CAIR supports domestic policies that promote civil rights, diversity and freedom of religion.
4. CAIR opposes domestic policies that limit civil rights, permit racial, ethnic or religious profiling, infringe on due process, or that prevent Muslims and others from participating fully in American civic life.
5. CAIR is a natural ally of groups, religious or secular, that advocate justice and human rights in America and around the world.
6. CAIR supports foreign policies that help create free and equitable trade, encourage human rights and promote representative government based on socio-economic justice.
7. CAIR believes the active practice of Islam strengthens the social and religious fabric of our nation.
8. CAIR condemns all acts of violence against civilians by any individual, group or state.
9. CAIR advocates dialogue between faith communities both in America and worldwide.
10. CAIR supports equal and complementary rights and responsibilities for men and women.

We can see than that in general CAIR's stated principles are that in general it is a defender of all religions against discrimination and specifically a defender of American Muslims against discrimination.

What is CAIR's attitude than towards the Jewish religion in general and specifically American Jews?

2. Discussion

 

On the following page:

CAIR Positions Around The World 

CAIR has 6 pages of its positions on countries around the world, including Afganistan, Iraq and Syria. 3 of the pages are on Israel. CAIR states:

"the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, that are the main source of anti-American feeling in the Muslim world."

All 3 pages consist entirely of criticism of Israel. There is no mention of any criticism of the Palestinians, even though the US, multiple other countries and now even CAIR (in press releases not on this page) all agree that Hamas is a terrorist organization. We have also seen that the Palestinian Authority and Fatah themselves now meet the definition of Terrorist Organizations in this prior article:

Is The Palestinian Authority a Terrorist Organization Under International Law?  

For those not familiar with the Palestinian government, Hamas + Palestinian Authority = Palestinian government.  

There is currently no shortage of incidents of Palestinian Terrorism:

2/3 of Palestinians support stabbings  

Official PA TV to kids: Israel will cease to exist

PA school honors two terrorist stabbers with football tournament in their names  

Mahmoud Abbas: Murdering Israelis is “popular peaceful uprising” 


Terrorists who butchered 5 rabbis exemplified the meaning of heroism 

CAIR has a page condemning specific terrorist attacks here:

CAIR’s Condemnation of Terrorism 

with the most recent condemnation 11-16-15 yet there are no mentions of the multiple Palestinian terrorist attacks in the last two months. 

Now let's go to the CAIR Search page and see what we can find:

CAIR Search Page 

Type in "CAIR" = 121 results

Type in "Israel" = 54 results

Type in "AIPAC" (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) = 50 results.

For an organization that claims to be primarily about American Muslims these search results seem to indicate that CAIR is also very concerned about Israeli Jews and American Jews (which makes up the large majority of Jews in the world). 

CAIR claims in their principles:

"CAIR opposes domestic policies that limit civil rights, permit racial, ethnic or religious profiling, infringe on due process, or that prevent Muslims and others from participating fully in American civic life."

"CAIR advocates dialogue between faith communities both in America and worldwide."

So CAIR claims that they have an important principle of avoiding negative attitudes towards other religions. Just the same as their primary purpose of trying to prevent other religions from having negative attitudes towards American Muslims and Muslim countries. Looking at these many articles though on CAIR's website about Jews (In contrast CAIR has 16 search results for Hinduism, 52 results for Christianity = most of these articles describe multiple religions and are not specific to Hinduism or Christianity or critical of them. How many Hindus/Christians are there compared to Jews?) we've already seen that CAIR is highly critical of Israel, what is their attitude towards American Jews?

CAIR search for "AIPAC":

1st article = "
would make American Muslims and Arab-Americans "second class citizens" who could legally be subject to Israel's policy of ethnic and religious profiling"

 2nd article = "upcoming trial of former AIPAC lobbyists Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman"

3rd article = "A federal judge went too far when he ruled that two pro-Israel lobbyists charged with trafficking in classified information were entitled to present certain secret information in court to mount their defense, prosecutors argued in a new brief filed with a federal appeals court."

4th article = "While almost all federally financed programs were denied any funding increase for the coming year, aid to Israel from the United States will increase thanks to a legislative loophole and some deft maneuvering by pro-Israel lobbyists."

5th article =  "
If there's any doubt about AIPAC being the belle of Washington, check out next week's ball."

Most, if not all, articles at CAIR about Israel and AIPAC are critical/negative. 

3. Conclusion

Webster's Dictionary

Simple Definition of discrimination

• : the practice of unfairly treating a person or group of people differently from other people or groups of people

We've seen that CAIR has a primary purpose of trying to prevent discrimination against American Muslims and Muslims in general. We've also seen that CAIR discriminates against American Jews and Jews in general. What should we do?:

1) In return discriminate against Muslims? No.

2) In return discriminate against American Muslims? Uh uh.

3) Create an organization that publicly presents CAIR in the worst possible way? Of course not.

What we should do is point out to CAIR that currently they are a hypocritical organization. 

If they really want a positive dialogue with other religions and not just be seen as advocates for Muslims than they need to condemn current Palestinian Terrorism and not just present/mostly present articles that are critical/negative of Jews. 

 

 

The Best of "Proofs That Jesus Existed"

 1. ARGUMENT FROM TWITTER 
(1) Received Tweet "I existed#HJ Jesusomeg@lpha.netbible"
(2) Tweet sent by Jesus
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

2. ARGUMENT FROM YHWH IS A MAD GENIUS
(1) YHWH knew his son would get crucified and sent him for that purpose
(2) You can't make this stuff up
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

3. ARGUMENT FROM THE CRUCIFIXION
(1) Crucifixion was a really, really, really, really horrible way to die
(2) Nobody would make up a story about a god who dies a horrible death
(3) Previous stories about gods who died horrible deaths were just myths
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed.

4. ARGUMENT FROM UNIVERSITY CLASS
(1) Dr. James McGrath, University Professor, teaches a course on The Historical Jesus
(2) Universities only offer Historical courses on historical people
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

5. ARGUMENT FROM GREEK
(1) I know Greek.
(2) You don't know Greek.
(3) The New Testament was written in Greek.
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed.

6. ARGUMENT FROM MOSES ANALOGY
(1) The Christian Bible claims repeatedly that Jesus was the new Moses.
(2) Jesus was just as real as Moses.
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

7. ARGUMENT FROM THIS LIST
(1) MJs have no arguments that Jesus did not exist.
(2) All MJs can do is try to make fun of arguments that Jesus existed.
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed.

8. ARGUMENT FROM JEDI MIND TRICK
(1) The evidence for Impossible Jesus is basically the same as the evidence for possible Jesus.
(2) (Voice accompanied by hand-waving) "This isn't the argument you are looking for".
(3) This isn't the argument I was looking for.
(4) (Voice accompanied by hand-waving) "The Jesus existed argument can move along".
(5) The Jesus existed argument can move along.
(6) Therefore, Jesus existed.

9. ARGUMENT FROM SIMON SAID
(1) Simon said: "You are the Christ".
(2) Jesus did not exist.
(3) Simon diidn't saay.
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed

10. ARGUMENT FROM OH SNAP
(1) Oh no he di-int.
(2) Oh yes he di-id.
(3) Oh snap! (accompanied by snapping motion)
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed.

11. ARGUMENT FROM INTERVIEW WITH SATAN
(1) Satan: "Ya know, I'm sick and tired of Atheists going around telling people that Me and Jesus didn't exist and I would really like to show them a thing or two except I can't, because I don't exist."
(2) Therefore, Jesus existed.

12. ARGUMENT FROM COUSIN IT ANALOGY
(1) Put the original Gospel on a pedestal.
(2) Cut out all of the Impossible.
(3) Cut out all of the implausible and unlikely.
(4) Cut out all of the contrived and contradicted.
(5) Cut out all of the paralleled to The Jewish Bible, Paul and Josephus.
(6) There's an equally famous episode of The Addams Family where Cousin It gets a haircut and when they finish there is nothing left.
(7) According to The Addams Family Cousin It still existed.
(8) Therefore, Jesus existed.

13. ARGUMENT FROM LIAR, LORD OR LUNATIC ARGUMENT 
(1) Jesus was either a liar, lord, or lunatic 
(2) Hey, we've exhausted the options.
(3) If Jesus was a liar, by considering if he was a liar, you show he existed.
(4) If Jesus was a lunatic,... he existed.
(5) If Jesus was a lord,... he existed.
(6) What can I say? Whichever way you go, he existed.
(7) Therefore, Jesus existed.

14. ARGUMENT FROM "GOOD NEWS"/BAD NEWS
(1) I've got some good news and bad news regarding Jesus existing
(2) First, the bad news. There is no good news
(3) Now the good news. I won't tell you the bad news
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed.

15. ARGUMENT FROM ANCIENT STANDARDS
(1) Modern standards of proof generally require multiple, confirming, independent, credible first-hand witnesses.
(2) We don't have that for HJ.
(3) Ancient standards of proof accepted a lower standard.
(4) We should use a lower standard of proof for HJ because HJ was ancient.
(5) Therefore, Jesus existed

16. ARGUMENT FROM RICK PERRY
(1) I have three independent Gospel agencies that are evidence for Jesus' baptism.
(2) The first is "Mark".
(3) The second is "John" who is independent from "Mark" because no one knows who "Mark" was.
(4) The third is independent from "John" because no one knows who "John" was.
(5) The third one is, uhm, lessee...the Department of Energy? No, that's not it.
(6) Zzz...(wake up Rick), huh, oh yeah, let's see, ahhh...(shrug and lift hands) oops.
(7) Therefore, Jesus existed

17.  ARGUMENT FROM HATE
1. Atheists hate Jesus.
2. You can't hate something that doesn't exist.
3. Therefore Jesus exists.

18. ARGUMENT FROM CRUCIFIXION
(1) Pontius Pilate cruciified Jesus
(2) Pilate is unlikely to have crucified a mythical man
(3) Therefore, Jesus existed. 

19. ARGUMENT FROM THE MATRIX TIME TRAVEL
(1) 2011 - No qualified professional believes in MJ.
(2) 2012 - No qualified professional believes in MJ except for 1 PhD student with a Bible related degree.
(3) 2013 - No qualified professional believes in MJ except for 1 University professor with a Bible related degree.
(4) 2014 - No qualified professional believes in MJ except for 2 University professors with Bible related degrees.
(5) 2015 - No qualified professional believes in MJ except for 3 University professors with Bible related degrees.
(6) On Fight Club's longest possible time line, belief in HJ than goes to -0-.
(6) Therefore, Jesus existed.

Arguments From Silence for Mark 16:8 as Original Ending - The Gospel of Matthew

1. Introduction of the Issue

A previous post here The Original Ending of the Gospel of Mark - 2nd Century Patristic Witness - "Matthew"   demonstrated that the Gospel of Matthew is evidence that 16:8 was the original ending of the Gospel of Mark. But how good is this evidence?

2. Discussion

 

And the People Bowed and Prayed, to (the) Theon god they Made

The related Wikipedia article indicates that the following are good criteria for the Argument From Silence:

The evidence in question:

1) Would have been accessible to the author.

2) Would be of general interest to the author.

3) Would have been considered authoritative to the author.

4) Would have been useful to the author.

Because Arguments from Silence than are based on the implicit which is subjective compared to arguments based on the explicit, they are normally not strong evidence. In order to rise to the level of any type of evidence, all four criteria above must be strong. On the other hand, if you have a connected string of Arguments from Silence from a logical grouping of authors which than gives the argument Scope, the argument becomes progressively stronger.

As the Argument from Silence applies to the question of the likely original ending of the Gospel of Mark (GMark), it is generally agreed for the second century that as the century progresses, the evidence gets progressively better that second century Christian authors were aware of the LE. The primary argument for proponents of LE as original (generally fundamentalists) is that the earliest positive evidence for either ending are second century Patristics who support the LE. The earlier second century Patristics who show no or little evidence of being aware of the LE will be ignored/denied as evidence by Fundamentalists invoking "Argument from Silence".

It's generally agreed that the next significant Christian writing after GMark is the Gospel of Matthew (GMatthew). For GMatthew, let's examine the four criteria above for level of strength:

1) Would have been accessible to the author.

It's generally agreed that GMark was GMatthew's primary source = Strong

2) Would be of general interest to the author.

For the same reason as 1) = Strong

3) Would have been considered authoritative to the author.

For the same reason as 1) = Strong

4) Would have been useful to the author.

As far as we know, GMark was the original Gospel narrative and at the time GMatthew wrote, there were not any others. Almost all the stories in GMark are also in GMatthew. The only two action stories missing in GMatthew are the healing at Bethsaida and the widow at the Temple. GMatthew copies GMark's resurrection predictions almost word for word. Presumably, the most important story as far as GMatthew was concerned was a story showing witnesses to a resurrected Jesus. If the LE was in GMatthew's source of GMark it would have been very useful to GMatthew = Strong

3. Conclusion

All of the above criteria than test strong = GMatthew is evidence for 16:8 as original. By itself, not strong evidence, but it is evidence that should be inventoried.

 

The Original Ending of the Gospel of Mark - 2nd Century Patristic Witness - The Gospel of Peter

1. Introduction of the Issue

Aha!

  Continuing with an examination of 2nd century witness to the original ending of GMark. We have just seen that GMatthew and GLuke are the earliest Patristic witness for original ending of GMark, testifying for 16:8 due to closely following GMark to 16:8 and than, for GMatthew, largely ignoring 16:9-20, and for GLuke, while having some specific parallels to and generally following the LE, showing a noticeable change in copying style immediately after 16:8. The Gospel of Peter  likewise looks to have GMark as a source through 16:8:

2. Discussion

 

Who is Mary Schtuppsucker?!

 

And now, a close examination of The Gospel of Peter. First, a comparison up to 16:8:

  It's clear that GPeter follows GMark reMarkably well for 16:1-8. Most of the additions in GPeter here are commentary on GMark's basic narrative.

  We've seen that GPeter follows GMark remarkably well for 16:1-8. But, it's generally thought that GPeter was written after GMatthew. We've already seen that GMatthew also follows GMark remarkably well for 16:1-8 so the question is, who was GPeter following, GMark, GMatthew or both?

Let's do a comparison than of the three:

  If you can not see the two above images they can be seen here:

Comparison of Peter 50-57 to GMark 16:1-8/GMatthew 28:1-8


We can see than from the above that to 16:8 GPeter follows GMark better than it follows GMatthew = GMark 16:1-8 was likely the main source for GPeter 50-57.

And now a comparison of the LE with post-resurrection narrative in The Gospel of Peter (the part that is extant):

  If you can not see the above image it can be seen here:

Comparison of Peter 58-60 to the LE 

The big difference here is the timing. In GPeter, the eight days of Passover are over when the narrative continues. Note that if there was a post-resurrection appearance in GPeter, it came later than post-resurrection appearances in the LE. For a subsequent author to GMark, who wants a post-resurrection reunion, this is a more gradual edit to one than the LE. GPeter accepts the ending of its base, 16:8, where the women do not tell. The author needs to add an entire pericope just to explain the supposed circumstances of how the disciples did learn that Jesus was resurrected.

Also related to GPeter's acceptance of 16:8 as the ending is that since it is accepted that the women did not tell anyone, the author needs a supposed witness to tell, hence GPeter is written in the first person (Peter). GPeter accepts that Peter had totally given up on Jesus including not believing that he would be resurrected.

Another difference is that GPeter refers to the twelve disciples while the LE refers to eleven. 

3. Conclusion

Now we are getting somewhere!

 Summary of points indicating that GPeter's source of GMark did not have the LE:

1) GPeter follows GMark remarkably well to 16:8.

2) The timing of the post-resurrection narrative in GPeter is completely different from the timing of the LE.

3) There are no significant parallels here between GPeter and the LE.

4) GPeter is more of a reaction to 16:8 than the LE is.

Conclusion = GPeter is evidence for 16:8 as original.

Psalm 22:17, Hebrew Text, "Like A Lion". Determining Who's Original And Who's Lion? Nahal Hever Fragment

1. Introduction of the Issue

Ya know BerNIVdo, I try, I really try

      Most Christian Bible translations present Psalm 22:17 (22:16 in the Christian Bible) as:

Dogs(A) surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce[a](B) my hands and my feet. (NIV).

NIV adds the following note:

 [a]Psalm 22:16 Dead Sea Scrolls and some manuscripts of the Masoretic Text, Septuagint and Syriac; most manuscripts of the Masoretic Text me, / like a lion

Every assertion in this note is wrong:

1) The Dead Sea Scrolls do not have a Hebrew word for "pierced"  here.
2) No Manuscripts of the Masoretic Text have a Hebrew word for "pierced" here.
3) The "Septuagint" (this word is commonly used to refer to Jewish Greek translations of the Jewish Bible but it's difficult to distinguish an early Jewish translation from an early Christian translation) transmission evidence shows that "pierced" was not original to it.
4) The Syriac evidence for the original word is unclear. 

What everyone does agree on is that the overwhelming majority of Hebrew texts have "like a lion" here.

Here is Psalm 22:17 written in modern Hebrew and English:

Chabad.org 

The offending word is highlighted in Hebrew and English. The related Textual Criticism question is if the Hebrew word for "pierced" is not found anywhere in Manuscripts, Rabbinic Commentary and Scribal comments for 22:17 than why are most Christian English translations using it?

2. Discussion

 

One Long Yod Writes Away 

First, let's take a look at the exact same word that the Masoretic Text has for Psalm 22:17, "like a lion", at Isaiah 38:13:

This is from the The Great Isaiah Scroll:

"Pieces of the Isaiah Scroll have been carbon-14 dated at least four times, giving calibrated date ranges between 335-324 BC and 202-107 BC; there have also been numerous paleographic and scribal dating studies placing the scroll around 150-100 BC.^[2]"

Note that the Hebrew letter yod here, the last letter, is about the same length as the letter before it. Everyone agrees that here the letter is a yod and the meaning of the word here is "like a lion". 

Christian translations claim that an important piece of evidence supporting "pierced" as likely original to Psalm 22:17 is that a Hebrew fragment including the offending word of Psalm 22:17 from Nahal Hever has the same letters except for the final letter being a vav instead of a yod, which word these Christian translations than translate as "pierced". 

  Here is the fragment from Nahal Hever, Discoveries in the Judaean Desert XXXVIII, Plate XXVII Fragment #9 which is the official photograph:

 Unfortunately the text of the fragment is as faded as it looks here.

Now here is the word in question from the fragment plus the following word:

 Although all letters are difficult to read, everyone would agree on the first three letters, reading Hebrew right to left, kof which looks like a backwards c, aleph which looks like two intersecting diagonal lines and resh which looks like a backwards r. 

The fourth letter from the right is the letter in question. Everyone agrees that it is the final letter of the word consisting of it and the three letters to its right. Even though all letters here are badly faded, that fourth letter does looks remarkably similar to the fourth letter above for "like a lion" from The Great Isaiah Scroll (and again, everyone agrees that that word is "like a lion"). In both words this letter is primarily a vertical line which is about the same length as the letter resh to its right. Both letters also tilt some to the left but letters as a whole vary in tilting in these fragments without any apparent intentional design. 

These two sources are both ancient with The Great Isaiah Scroll c. 200 BC and Nahal Hever c. 75. Continuing with the best source of evidence, our own eyes, if you are able to read Hebrew you will notice that for the Nahal Hever fragment above, the length of the yod seems to have some relationship to its position in the word. When it is the first letter of a word it tends to be shorter. When it is the last letter it seems to be longer. You can see this in my image above of the offending word and the word that follows. The following word consists of a yod, a daled and a yod. Note that the first yod is relatively short while the final yod appears to be just as long as the final letters of the offending word and what appears to be the exact same word above in Isaiah 38:13 from The Great War Scroll.

The next best source of evidence is the eyes of others. Regarding the length of yods circa the Nahal Hever fragment, every claimed expert on both sides that I'm aware of explains/confesses that at this time yods were longer, were sometimes about the same length as vavs and were difficult to distinguish from vavs:

Moshe Schulman (counter-missionary) = A characteristic of a yod at that time was that it was elongated, especially when the last letter of a word.

Fred Miller (Christian DSS scholar) = "The second variation is the scribe's interchange of waw and yod. This is frequent. Where one expects to find a yod a waw is written and where one expects to find a waw a yod is written. We will not cite these but these occurrences, because of their frequency, can be seen by a general reading of the text."

Brent Strawn (Christian) = ""...the picture of it [the fragment]...is so faint as to be unreadable. Comparison of other fragments from XHev/Se4 on photographs of PAM 42.190 reveals that Y and W are quite similar, though generally distinguishable in this manuscript."

Kristin Swenson (Christian)  =  ""4 By Vall’s admission, Aquila’s Vorlage may well have been very close to the MT; the instances in which it differed commonly involved “the confusion of similarly shaped letters” such as w and y (Vall, “Psalm 22:17B,” 56). This supports retaining the MT and undermines Vall’s argument"

F. M. Cross (Christian DSS scholar) = "the leading expert on DSS palaeography, has discussed waw/yod confusion many times. In his article, "Palaeography and the Dead Sea Scrolls" in vol. 1 of Flint and Vanderkam ("The Dead Sea Scrolls after 50 Years"), he discusses how the two characters were virtually indistinguishable during the early Herodian period but in the late Herodian period were increasingly distinguishable. In the back of the book are some nice plates showing the evolution of the script. Plate 10 line 9 shows the biblical hand from the Nahal Hever Psalms scroll. The waw is somewhat longer than yod" 

And lastly, scholarly commentary on the relative quality of transmission of the Hebrew Bible text:
 
Fred Miller (Christian DSS scholar) = "The Qumran texts that I have translated (1QaIsa) and (1QpHab) are dialects of Hebrew and not the Hebrew of the Tanach. Preservation of the original Hebrew letter for letter text was the role played by the Rabbis of the "main stream" in Jerusalem and Babylon (Sura, Nahardea and Pumbidita) and they had a special class, an office called Scribes, who carefully copied manuscripts then kept the new and destroyed the old. The Essenes were not and did not claim to be copyists of the same genre." 

3. Conclusion

But when I see deliberate mistranslations of the Hebrew Bible...I just go beserk!

The main points from the above are:

1) For the word in question from Psalm 22:17 everyone would agree that the Hebrew Manuscript tradition shows a dominant reading of a final letter of yod which gives an English translation of "like a lion". 

2) Christian translations of Psalm 22:17 mostly reject the final letter as yod and claim as a key piece of support for doing so that the Nahal Hever fragment had instead a final letter of vav. 

3) All Bible scholars cited above agree that regarding ancient Hebrew script, at times yods and vavs were indistinguishable, generally they were about the same length, gradually vavs were a little longer and sometimes yods and vavs were mistakenly substituted for each other.

4) Per F.M. Cross above:
"the two characters [yod and vav] were virtually indistinguishable during the early Herodian period but in the late Herodian period were increasingly distinguishable." The Nahal Hever fragment appears to be contemporary to this period.

5) The Nahal Hever fragment is very faint. The combination of similar sized yods and vavs at the time and specifically in this fragment, especially with final letters, and the problem with legibility create uncertainty as to what the final letter of the offending word was intended to be written as. 

6) The Nahal Hever fragment was part of a Transmission process that was inferior to the official scribal process in the major cities.

7) In the late Herodian period copyists would have had exemplars from the early Herodian period with yods and vavs that looked identical.

8) The earliest known Greek translations of the Jewish Bible sometimes confused yods and vavs.

  We have two possibilities for the last letter of the offending word at Nahal Hever:

1 - The last letter is a yod. Conclusion = Supports "like a lion" as likely original to Psalm 22:17.

2 - The last letter is a vav. Considerations:

A) This would be contradicted by the superior Masoretic transmission text. 

B) The meaning of the resulting Hebrew word would be unknown and this word is not found anywhere else.

C) Yods and vavs of the time were very similar and some exemplars of the time probably had identical yods and vavs. A reasonable possibility is that the Nahal Hever fragment mistakenly, either intentionally or unintentionally, had a vav written, where the tradition previously had a yod. 

D) The Nahal Hever fragment in general and specifically for this letter is very difficult to read. 

Choosing between the two possibilities, whether the last letter here was a yod or a vav, considerations A), B), C) and D):

1) The superior Masoretic transmission clearly prefers yod.

2) The meaning of the word with a vav would be unknown.

3) Yods and vavs of the time were very similar in script

4) The fragment is very difficult to read

indicate that it is more likely that the Nahal Hever fragment was written with a yod as the final letter of the offending word. 

Even if the final letter of this word here is vav, a reasonable explanation for all of the same reasons above, is that the author mistakenly confused a vav for a yod due to vavs and yods being indistinguishable in exemplars. Conclusion = Evidence against "like a lion" as likely original to Psalm 22:17 but not strong enough to outweigh the Masoretic tradition due to a reasonable explanation for use of the vav here in error.

 

 

Is The Palestinian Authority a Terrorist Organization Under International Law?

1. Introduction of the Issue

The Specter of Terrorism

Palestinian Media Watch  which is generally considered a credible news source:

Use by mainstream press

International media regularly cite and quote PMW translations as accurate representations of Palestinian Arabic-language media. News organizations that cite PMW as a source include: Chicago Sun-Times^[12][13] the Associated Press,^[14][15] The Telegraph^[16][17] and The Washington Post.^[18]

has recently documented multiple terrorist attacks against Israel promoted at the highest levels by the Palestinian Authority:

Fatah official: Murdering Israelis is Palestinian "right"  

PA TV song: “Nothing is sweeter than Martyrdom”  

Songs promoting violence become Palestinian hits  

Most would agree that this is an organized effort by the Palestinian Authority to create a campaign of terrorist acts against Israel. Does this make the Palestinian Authority a terrorist organization under International Law? 

  2. Discussion

 

"I came here to kill you." "No, you came here to die."

The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1566 (2004) defined Terrorism as:

"criminal acts, including against civilians, committed with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury, or taking of hostages, with the purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons, intimidate a population or compel a government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act, which constitute offences within the scope of and as defined in the international conventions and protocols relating to terrorism, are under no circumstances justifiable by considerations of a political, philosophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or other similar nature," 

The above has the following key points:
  
1) Actions against civilians.

2) Intent to cause death or serious injury.

3) Purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public.

4) Or intimidate a population or compel a government to do or abstain from any act.

and explicitly notes that the above is never justified by political,  ideological, racial, ethnic or religious reasons. 

We can easily find the Palestinian Authority currently guilty of all the above by their own admission courtesy of  Palestinian Media Watch.

 3. Conclusion

The Palestinian Authority meets the definition of a Terrorist Organization as defined by The United Nations.

 

 

The Original Ending of the Gospel of Mark - 2nd Century Patristic Witness - "Luke"

1. Introduction of the Issue

Luukee! Ya got sum splainin ta do.

  Continuing with an examination of 2nd century witness to the original ending of GMark. We have just seen that GMatthew is the earliest Patristic witness for original ending of GMark, testifying for 16:8 due to closely following GMark to 16:8 and than largely ignoring 16:9-20. GLuke likewise looks to have GMark as a source through 16:8:

2. Discussion

 

Package those sources Luukee

 

 

 

  Note that GLuke follows GMark closely to 16:5 although not as closely as GMatthew. More amazing though than the characters' reactions here is that for 16:6 GLuke's angels remind the women of Jesus' resurrection prediction. So per GLuke it is the angels who remember what Jesus predicted and not the women, who have to be reminded. Let the Reader understand here that it is the Reader of GMark, in this case "Luke", who remembers the prediction of Jesus because it is given at the Sub-text level. "Luke" understands that as GMark is written the characters at the Text level do not remember what Jesus predicted. Also note that GLuke while following the rest of 16:1-8 fairly closely, has no reference to 16:7 (or 14:28). Yet more evidence for its forgery! GLuke than uses 16:8 as a source but flips it, just like GMatthew, from the women telling no one to the women telling everyone.

The great Irony is that GLuke as supposed witness here for HJ is completely backwards. The post-resurrection story (only the most important story to Christianity) here has as a source of what the supposed historical witness did = what GLuke wrote rather than GLuke's source for what she wrote = historical witnesses here.

Now that we have established that GLuke's source was GMark to 16:8 the next step is to look at the parallels between 16:9-20 and GLuke.

Bonus material for Solo. Note that GMatthew and GLuke both retain GMark's disbelief that Jesus was resurrected. Now the characters believe the angels (which they considered more believable) and the disbelief is transferred to what mere humans say. Paul, look out!

We have seen that GLuke closely follows GMark to 16:8. Let's see how well she than follows the LE:

 

3. Conclusion

Luukee, you ended up making a mess

The number of significant parallels are similar to the number of significant differences. In total GLuke is somewhat more similar than different than GMark here. The big difference though is comparing how well GLuke parallels to GMark to 16:8 versus how well GLuke parallels to GMark for the LE (16:9-20). For 16.1-8 GLuke uses most of the same/similar words for her corresponding verses with relatively little editing. For 16:9-20, "Luke" uses significantly less of the same/similar words with significant editing.

The question is if the LE was part of GLuke's source of GMark, why would GLuke use 16:1-8 as a base and than stop using it as a base for ALL of the LE (no question Mark as this is asked and answered).

A summary of the key points here:

1) For the LE GLuke has significantly more significant differences than it has for 16:1-8.

2) For the LE GLuke has significantly fewer of the same/similar words than it has for 16:1-8.

3) For the LE GLuke has significantly more editing than it has for 16:1-8.

Conclusion = The LE was not attached to GLuke's source of GMark. Therefore, GLuke, like GMatthew, is evidence against the LE being original.

 

The Israeli/Arab Conflict - The McMahon–Hussein Correspondence - 1916

1. Introduction of the Issue

How bout no Jewish State

     Again, the background to 1916 is that the Ottoman Empire controls Israel. At the time Israel is overwhelmingly Arab and Jerusalem is overwhelmingly Jewish. In the bigger picture the Ottomans control the Middle East. 
     Britain is fighting the Ottomans in WW1. Britain seeks the Arabs in the Middle East as allies there and in exchange offers the Arabs some form of independence with conditions.

2. Discussion

 

Ya just don't get it (State of Israel)

        
     Per Wikipedia McMahon–Hussein Correspondence :

     The McMahon-Hussein Correspondence consisted of communications in 1915-6 between Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner in Egypt, and the Sharif of Mecca, Husayn bin Ali. The Arabs under Ali agree to fight against the Ottomans. 
    The most important related letter is dated October 24, 1915 and does not mention "Palestine" and says that some areas of the Middle East will not be part of an independent Arab State. None of the McMahon-Hussein correspondence explicitly mentioned "Palestine".
     Subsequently, the British and Arabs argued regarding whether the agreement included Palestine in the Arab nationalist area, with the British saying no and the Arabs saying yes. There is internal evidence, prior to 1916, that at times the British did consider Palestine to be part of the Arab nationalist State offered.

3. Conclusion

No Israel unless...

 Related conclusions:

1. By allying with the British and helping to defeat the Ottomans, the Arabs did earn a national Arab State in the Middle East.
2. The British promise/agreement to the Arabs for an Arab State preceded any such agreement with the Jews for a Jewish State in Israel. 
3. The British were clear that not all of the Middle East would be an Arab State and never formally communicated to the Arabs that Palestine would be part of an Arab State. 
4. While there never has been an Arab and or Muslim State approximating the area of Israel and under the Ottomans there was no "Palestine" entity or governing area approximating Israel, the British did use the name "Palestine" to refer to the area. 

  Next, The Balfour Declaration of 1917.

 

The Original Ending of the Gospel of Mark - 2nd Century Patristic Witness - "Matthew"

1. Introduction of the Issue

The Parallels of Pauline

  The argument for LE is generally based on quantity and supposed 2nd century Patristic evidence. I assume, as does authority, that GMark was written first and that GMatthew used GMark as a primary source. GMatthew often follows GMark closely. Metzger does not mention GMatthew as evidence against LE as he generally avoids arguments from silence. Modern arguments against LE generally do. The potential strength of GMatthew as evidence here is the quality of age (GMatthew is commonly thought to have been written late first century). This would not only be the earliest known Patristic evidence but the earliest External evidence. This is especially applicable to arguments for LE as their primary claimed evidential quality is age, specifically, early Patristic references.

  The only known significant Christian author before GMark was Paul. In one disputed passage, mostly thought to be likely original, Paul says that a resurrected Jesus appeared to disciples apparently in the same way he appeared to Paul. But Paul does not provide any other description such as the setting. GMark goes beyond Paul to provide a narrative of Jesus' supposed resurrection. An ending of 16:8 does not show any resurrection appearance. The LE does but does not agree with Paul/Fake Paul regarding the order and the witnesses.

 

2. Discussion

 

If you want the women to sing out, sing out

The weakness of GMatthew here as evidence is it is indirect but this is offset by the width (scope) of the evidence:

1. Generally follows GMark closely.
2. Specifically follows what comes before LE (16:1-8) closely.
3. Does not follow 16:9-20.

This is evidence that GMatthew did not follow the LE because it was not there at the time GMatthew copied from GMark. And now a look at GMark 16:1-8 compared to GMatthew 28:1-8 verse by verse:

 

  GMark to 16:8 sure looks like GMatthew's source to 28:8. Most of the content and nouns are the same or at least similar and both have the strong emotion of fear/amazement for flavor. The only significant difference is the last line of each where GMatthew's women run to tell as opposed to GMark's woman who run not to tell.

We have the following reasons to think that GMatthew, did not have the LE in his copy of GMark:

1. GMark in general is GMatthew's source. There is little of the LE in GMatthew.
2. GMatthew closely follows GMark to 16:8 (see 1).
3. GMatthew flips the key assertion of 16:8, "ran and told no one", to "ran and told everyone", to change the expectation of what follows.

We have seen that GMatthew closely follows GMark to 16:8. Let's see how well it than follows the LE. I've flipped the last column to "Significant Parallels":

 

3. Conclusion

 

Who's been messing with the ending of GMark?

 Note that for 16:9-20, there is only one good parallel in GMatthew. Also note that GMatthew's ending is consistent with 16:1-8 (after editing the women telling rather than not telling) but not 16:9-20:

1) The biggest individual story in 28:9-20 concerns The Empty Tomb. This is the dominant story of GMark 16:1-8.

2) GMatthew has the disciples meet Jesus in Galilee. Just as "Mark's" angel of 16:7 instructed.

Conclusion = The LE was not a source for GMatthew and the ending GMatthew had to work with from GMark was dominated by The Empty Tomb. GMatthew is a witness (the earliest) against LE.

 

 

Israel Before The British Mandate

1. Introduction of the Issue

Apologists Now! God I love the sound of Psalms in the morning.

                   Over at Neil Godfrey's blog, Vridar, Neil currently has a feature series entitled Expulsion of the Palestinians. The first thing one should know about Neil is that when I sent him a list of Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israel his response was to create a supposed related link on his home page,

Response to ADL propaganda, “Major Attacks Against Israel”

                    So Neil's response to a straight forward list of Palestinian terrorist  attacks was to prominently display a heading of ADL propaganda on his home page with "Major Attacks Against Israel" in scare quotes which than links to a page where he is an Apologist for the Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israel. By doing so Neil has not done anything to change Palestinian terrorist attacks from being Palestinian terrorist attacks. What he has successfully done though is make himself a Palestinian Apologist.  Thus he has no credibility on the subject of Jews and Arabs in Israel. Everything he says has to be confirmed with an objective source.
     The purpose of this blog series is to give the side of the story regarding movement of Arabs in Israel that Neil is not presenting. Neil claims he is primarily presenting the Arab side because the Media is either not or doing so unfairly so Neil would be the first to agree than that it is only fair that I present the other side of Neil's related blogs. But again, even though Neil would say it, we would still need objective confirmation that he would say it. 
     The best way to fairly present Arab movement in Israel is to start at the beginning.      

2. Discussion

  Zohan versus Phantom "Palestinian"

The beginning of the Arab/Jewish conflict in Israel has its starting point in the Ottoman Empire (which controlled Israel before the British):

Ottoman Syria 

Note carefully the title of the Wikipedia article, "Ottomon Syria". The geographical area was as follows:

For the hundreds of years that the Ottomon Empire controlled Israel, there never was an area called "Palestine". Prior to that there has never been a Muslim/Arab country approximating where Israel is now. 

The British took over control from the Ottomons and created:

British Mandate for Palestine (legal instrument) 

The preamble to the mandate states:

Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.^[37]

Thus the Mandate explicitly mentioned the establishment of a Jewish National State in "Palestine". The British geographical boundaries of what they called "Palestine" approximate Israel today.

3. Conclusion

Don't Mess With History

     The question than, is if there has never been a country approximating Israel that was a Muslim/Arab country, and the original usage of the word for a geographical area "Palestine" by the British explicitly provided for a Jewish State, than why are Arabs in Israel now and since the British Mandate referred to as "Palestinians" as if they are the original citizens of a country called "Palestine"? 
     Also, regarding Neil Godfrey's series "Expulsion of the Palestinians", even forgetting about how exactly all/most/a lot of Arabs in Israel could have been "expelled" in the last 70 years since they currently are mostly in Gaza and the West Bank just like they were mostly for the last 70 years, why describe them in the context of the Israeli/Arab conflict as "Palestinians"? Shouldn't they be better described as non-Israeli Arabs living in Israel?
    The next post in this series will consider the situation in Israel before the British takeover.