R. Gmirkin: Berossus and Genesis (2006)—Review

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Though there are a few reviews of Gmirkin’s book it deserves a revisit today, over a decade after publication. Priced at $180, it’s unlikely that many of you have read this important tome. I did so only because the nearby University of Oregon Library possesses a copy. This is not a thoroughgoing review of Berossus and Genesis, Manetho and Exodus: Hellenistic Histories and the Date of the Pentateuch (New York: t & t Clark 2006), but rather a series of excerpts (see below) presenting its essential thesis and argument. For more details, see Neil Godfrey’s 2012 analyses (here, here, and here), and also Laura Knight Jadczyk’s fine customer review on Amazon.com. At 332 pages, the book contains eleven chapters and … Continue reading →

Checking in

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This is my first post since “going dark” 10 months ago, following the apocalyptic election of President Donald Trump. In those months I drafted a few posts and put them aside. I will upload them over the next few weeks. One reason is today’s decision by Trump’s FCC to abandon net neutrality. Folks, we don’t know how long controversial content such as this website will exist freely on the Web, and we need to get our opinions out there while we can do so in an unfettered way.   On a personal note, I’ve managed to read a few of the books in my library (as planned)—but nowhere near as many as hoped. I then succumbed, during the summer, to … Continue reading →

Blog on furlough…

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I’ve decided to use 2017 as an opportunity–long overdue–to actually read the scores of books in my library that are still unread, and also to cross-reference the hundreds of articles in my bulging file cabinets. All this is preparatory to formulating a (hopefully) comprehensive view of Christian beginnings, a view I’ve been tentatively working towards for years. Eventually, I hope to write a long-envisioned book, “A New Account of Christian Origins.” Being almost 65 years old, little precious time may be left to waste… Stepping back like this feels surprisingly good, and it may also be a natural development of the changed political climate that is taking up so much of our attention these days. I’ve given up the Internet … Continue reading →

Into the night: Why Trump’s presidency is illegitimate—Pt. 3

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It’s not about ethics We all know Trump is a ‘bad’ man—as in immoral, perhaps even amoral. If you’re in any doubt whatsoever on this rather elementary observation, you might refresh yourself on what the most revered religious figures and philosophers through history have said: lying is bad, stealing is bad, bedding down with your neighbor’s wife is bad, even looking upon her with lustful eyes is bad (Jesus, Mt. 5:28)… But poverty is fine (Lk. 6:20), giving away what you possess is fantastic (Mt. 19:21), and worldly riches are bogus (Mt. 6:19). So, yes, Trump is a bad man. But he probably glories in his misdeeds. Certainly, the Donald is neither the first nor the last thief to get … Continue reading →

The 2016 election: Yes, this really happened—Pt. 2

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As late as 7:20 PM Eastern Time on election day, November 8, 2016, The New York Times rated Clinton’s chances of winning the presidency at 85%. That was less than four hours before Florida was called for Trump at 10:53 PM—the first surprise of the evening, as we saw in the previous post. North Carolina followed for Trump about twenty minutes later—a surprise that was similarly against all the polling. A little later in the evening, the results in the three critical Rust Belt states proved even more surprising. Wisconsin finally put Trump over the 270 electoral vote threshold, though Trump had been given virtually no chance in that state—five out of nine polls had Clinton’s chances there at over … Continue reading →

The 2016 election: What really happened?—Pt. 1

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Joe Biden: “IT IS OVER” I hope you all witnessed the scene a few days ago as Joe Biden’s gavel descended on the Senate proceedings, bringing a desperate (and uncertain) element of closure to this bizarre 2016 election, and placing a metaphorical fig leaf of legitimacy over the incoming Trump administration’s privates—a shaky fig leaf put there by the Democrats, of all people. In fact, Joe’s gavel descended multiple times as four members of the House of Representatives, all Democrats, voiced their objections to the official tally of the Electoral College in a last gasp, one final attempt to reverse the official election tally that Congress had convened to certify. https://youtu.be/ROft6RXtDM4 One objector, Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz), claimed that ten of … Continue reading →

An immodest proposal: Lock ’em up!

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Some good friends recently sent me the following recommendation: We the People of these United States—319 million of us, give or take a few hundred thousand—should locate the 500 richest Americans and gather them into one place. That shouldn’t be too hard. A single large room will be sufficient to seat those 500 persons. Once they are together, we can ask those wealthiest individuals a few questions. The first is: Why should I work for you? It’s a simple question. Not complicated. The People can listen attentively to the reply from the super-rich, some of whom might, however, respond boorishly: “If you don’t work for me, I’ll cut off your head.” Such a response, of course, would not be a … Continue reading →

Activists Urge Racist Presidential Election Results Should Not Be Certified

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Note: This post contains a summary of election irregularities/illegalities that I’ve been reporting on over the last month on this website. As Steven Rosenfeld of AlterNet reports in the important article excerpted below, those irregularities were far more than sufficient to nullify Trump’s victory and hand the presidency to the rightful winner, Hillary Clinton. Rosenfeld’s article appeared on January 3 and can be read in full here. Emphasis (in italics and bold) has been added.—René Salm An intense women-led lobbying effort on Capital Hill spent Tuesday seeking two representatives and one senator to challenge Friday’s certification of 2016’s Electoral College vote, saying the nation needs to hear how Donald Trump’s margin of victory was built on racist tactics targeting black … Continue reading →

Will the U.S.A. eventually break up?

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A little history In 1991 the Soviet Union broke up. Historians are to this day baffled by that cataclysm, which some consider to have been the most significant political event in the twentieth century. The experts declare that the U.S. was not responsible. Yet—in both East and West—a pervasive suspicion exists that foreign subterfuge was at least complicit. Leaving that interesting angle aside, let’s note an aspect of Russian society that preceded the Soviet breakup. As we read in one article: To Gorbachev’s prime minister Nikolai Ryzhkov, the “moral state of the society” in 1985 was its “most terrifying” feature: [We] stole from ourselves, took and gave bribes, lied in the reports, in newspapers, from high podiums, wallowed in our … Continue reading →

Green Party petitions DOJ to investigate this ugly election—NOW!

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Twenty-four days until Trumpmageddon. Twenty-four days—and counting. Not everybody, though, says that Trump’s presidency is a done deal. Not everybody even says that the election is over. Michael Moore “isn’t ruling out the possibility that [Trump] won’t be sworn in at all.” If he is indeed sworn in, Moore is urging “national protest” and is planning on “non-violently disrupting” the inauguration. I don’t think I’d be able to bring myself to watch. How could I watch Trump put his hand on the Bible and swear to defend the Constitution? That’s not even a bad joke. Remember, Trump is the man whom the Huffington Post routinely describes thusly: “Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, … Continue reading →