Mail Condemns Guantanamo Abuses

[Carrera]

Let's tackle the Aramaic question first as you claimed I'm wrong on that score.
Looking through the internet, what strikes me is the amount of fabrication that's being churned out by both Moslems and Christians who run websites. Sometimes Jews distort information too. I've found sites such as askmoses dot com which makes you positively shudder.
None of them seems to have a clue about how secular historians have recorded events.
I quote the following from the net although I don't trust the net as much as standard history sources but this seems to agree with most what I was taught. Except I don't known why he's placing Ezra after the return from Exile as Ezra is a later prophet I seem to recall. The lack of consonants or tenses in Hebrew is correct, though and the song of Deborah was attributed to the Judges period by scolars like Grant and others.

"During the seventy years the Jews were in captivity in Babylon (604 B.C., 586 B.C.), they lost the knowledge of their original Hebrew tongue. The ancient Hebrew text consisted only of consonants, since the Hebrew alphabet had no written vowels."
"Most of the OT is written in Hebrew, but after the return from exile, Hebrew gave way to Aramaic (square Aramaic script), which can be seen in the OT (Ezra 4:8-7:18; 7:12-26 "written in the Syrian tongue"; Dan. 2:4-7:28). The Old Hebrew script was replaced by the Hebrew-Aramaic square script a century before Christ. However, since the Samaritan Pentateuch is in the old cursive script, the square letters must not have been used until after the schism between Judea and Samaria about 432 B.C. (Neh. 13:28)."
http://www.mazzaroth.com/ChapterThree/HistoryOfTheBible.htm

Hamas did not exist in 1948.
Fatah didn't exist in 1948.

Zionism existed in 1948.

Zionism is a political movement based upon religion.

Who invoked religion to justify their actions.
The Zionists.

The Arabs agreed to the UN mandate for Palestine containing a holemand for Jews (in Palestine) and a homeland for Arabs (in Palestine).
Two entities in one state.

The problem occured when the Zionists decided to secede from that arrangement and put it's sole claim on Jerusalem to the exclusion of all others
in 1948.

That's the genesis of the current situation.

 

[Carrera]

Picture the scene 30 years from now if I've not been banned of course. A pot-smoking grey Boogers sitting in a London flat typing insults on a P.C. A grey-haired Lim with a bottle of whiskey in Ireland, sending off another angry mail and a bent-backed Fred C with acheing knees, calling Carrera a bigot e.t.c. All by e-mail.
Meantime, Carrera continues to affirm Aramaic has fewer past tenses than liturgical Hebrew and gets ready to pick up his pension. He posts and prepares his next defence: This time it concerns Moses and the parting of the Red Sea that Boogers insists was actually a river in Iran.
Meantime, the forum members yawn and ask:
"Are they still at it? Will they ever quit debating about Jews and Moslems and the Holy Land? And will Fred wish Carrera a happy new year this time round or will Carrera once more be exempt?"

Anyone interested in the original topic?Perhaps it's time to start a new thread,to be called "Lim,Fred and Carrera endlessly debate the Middle East."

 

[limerickman]

Er, you provided me with a link that backs up your own view Hebrew originated from Aramaic. So what does that prove? It proves there is somebody else writing articles on the internet that endorses your view.
I'm now entitled to ask how credible your source is. Because everything I read so far puts Aramaic in the fourth century B.C. within Israel. Syria goes back before that, maybe 800 B.C. according to most. It was only at the time 400 B.C. you had duel texts composed of Hebrew and Aramaic by the side in Israel. That's according to archeologists at any rate.
I could quote you a site that claims men didn't land on the moon and the whole thing was all a set-up but mainstream scientists (the Russians included) know people landed on the moon.
My sources tend to be established historians such as Michael Grant, Robert Graves, Richard Pipes, the Greek writer Herodotus, e.t.c. e.t.c.
You claim you've proven me wrong. Let me tell you I've found the biggest hotch-potch of disinformation on Jewish history on the internet that's imaginable, according to whether Jews, Christians or Moslems are writing the articles. There is all sorts of baloney being written which is why I'd like to know who your source is exactly, and for my part, here is a summary of Michael Grant who also knows Greek, Latin and Hebrew. Incidentally he certainly doesn't endorse your views in his history of Israel.
"Michael Grant was born in 1914. Educated at Harrow, he went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1933 to read classics. After graduating, he took up a research fellowship to write the thesis that he would publish as his first book, From Imperium to Auctoritas, in 1946. Perhaps surprisingly, he began his writing career in academic numismatics. Grant’s work ethic was prodigious; rarely two years went by without a new volume appearing, and as he grew older, so his remit widened."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,60-1306228,00.html

If I was to link every single website that states Hebrew derived from Aramaic,
I would be here for a long time.

If I recall correctly, it was you who introduced the issue of language to this discussion to try to bolster your claim about the Jewish right to occupy land.
It was noticed at the time that you listed a number of languages but completely disregarded Aramaic.
For someone who allegedly studied ancient history and liguisitics - as you have claimed - it is incomprehensible that someone with the background that you claim would "forget" to refer to Aramaic.

The fact of the matter is that baloney is written everywhere.
But it is an accepted fact that Aramaic preceeded Hebrew.
That is a fact whether you wish to acknowledge this or not.

 

[stevebaby]

Picture the scene 30 years from now if I've not been banned of course. A pot-smoking grey Boogers sitting in a London flat typing insults on a P.C. A grey-haired Lim with a bottle of whiskey in Ireland, sending off another angry mail and a bent-backed Fred C with acheing knees, calling Carrera a bigot e.t.c. All by e-mail.
Meantime, Carrera continues to affirm Aramaic has fewer past tenses than liturgical Hebrew and gets ready to pick up his pension. He posts and prepares his next defence: This time it concerns Moses and the parting of the Red Sea that Boogers insists was actually a river in Iran.
Meantime, the forum members yawn and ask:
"Are they still at it? Will they ever quit debating about Jews and Moslems and the Holy Land? And will Fred wish Carrera a happy new year this time round or will Carrera once more be exempt?"

By then I will be able to afford Mavic Ksyriums for my carbon fibre framed wheelchair.The us will have faded back into the obscurity of subsistence farming.I will probably be ranting about indian and chinese imperialism.
Britney spears will have a cleft palate and a goatee beard due to the huge number of facelifts she will have had.

 

[Colorado Ryder]

The commission report appropriated blame to the organs of the US goverment.

The commission report never said that Bush was complicite in 9/11. This is what Wurm has stated as fact yet you haven't called him on it.

You were unable to rebutt Wurms evidence :

I believe that the posters here are smart enough to tell truth from political BS. Unfortunately you don't think the other posters here are capable of that.

And by the way - what was the last sentence in my reply to you last week?
Oh yeah, I told you that i cannot be aware of the content of every single post throughout the site and that I am largely dependent upon members to tell me if there is something which may cause offence.
Remember??

Why? Are you only able to find offense in Carrera's posts? You're the moderator. That is your job. If you can't do the job properly perhaps you should let someone who can.

Now if you don't like the way I do my job - you can leave here. Otherwise, you just have to live with it.

Will you still believe the same way when most leave here because of your draconian rules?

 

[limerickman]

Why? Are you only able to find offense in Carrera's posts? You're the moderator. That is your job. If you can't do the job properly perhaps you should let someone who can.

That is my job - and I moderate when needed.
Like when you needed me to moderate last week.
Remember?

Will you still believe the same way when most leave here because of your draconian rules?

The volume of traffic on the s/box thread contradicts your statement above.

 

[Carrera]

Yes, there is all sorts of stuff being printed on the internet and frankly it's worrying that standardised history is being twisted by the three religions. I've found huge discrepancies between all accounts published on Jewish, Christian or Moslem sites.
I don't think it's a good idea to just grab material from any old website. After all, I could myself list hundreds of websites that claim the lunar landing wasn't a historical fact.
Here is what one of our female members posted on my other website with regard to Aramaic so please note you are disagreeing with her and not just me. This particular lady speaks several languages, ancient included:
"Aramaic flourished from about 700 BC to 700 AD and was spoken first in Arama which is now Syria and gradually "replaced" Phoenician and Hebrew in the Middle East but slowly petered out itself to Arabic. Aramaic can still be heard today in a small Syrian settlement of about a thousand Christians living in the hills outside Damascus, Syria."

If I was to link every single website that states Hebrew derived from Aramaic,
I would be here for a long time.

If I recall correctly, it was you who introduced the issue of language to this discussion to try to bolster your claim about the Jewish right to occupy land.
It was noticed at the time that you listed a number of languages but completely disregarded Aramaic.
For someone who allegedly studied ancient history and liguisitics - as you have claimed - it is incomprehensible that someone with the background that you claim would "forget" to refer to Aramaic.

The fact of the matter is that baloney is written everywhere.
But it is an accepted fact that Aramaic preceeded Hebrew.
That is a fact whether you wish to acknowledge this or not.

 

[Carrera]

My Classics website published that Jews adopted Aramaic from the second temple period. Michael Grant places the adoption of Aramaic as later than this. Although Aramaic was spoken in Syria (probably around 800 B.C.-900 B.C., it's agreed by all conventional sources to date that Jews adopted Aramaic far later on. Most of the OT is written in Hebrew, includingh the song of Deborah dated by some around the time of the Judges.
Here is further food for thought:
"Canaanite languages that include Hebrew, Phoenician, and Punic, were spoken in Palestine, Syria, and in scattered communities around the Mediterranean. All these languages are extinct, except Hebrew, which was revived as a spoken language only in the 19th and 20th centuries."
http://www.nvtc.gov/lotw/months/august/SemiticLanguages.html
"The Hebrews started using the Aramaic script for everyday use, reserving the Old Hebrew script for religious use only. The Aramaic script adopted by the Hebrews quickly became known as the Jewish script. Because of the shape of the letters, it was called the "square script"."
http://www.nvtc.gov/lotw/months/august/SemiticLanguages.html

If I was to link every single website that states Hebrew derived from Aramaic,
I would be here for a long time.

If I recall correctly, it was you who introduced the issue of language to this discussion to try to bolster your claim about the Jewish right to occupy land.
It was noticed at the time that you listed a number of languages but completely disregarded Aramaic.
For someone who allegedly studied ancient history and liguisitics - as you have claimed - it is incomprehensible that someone with the background that you claim would "forget" to refer to Aramaic.

The fact of the matter is that baloney is written everywhere.
But it is an accepted fact that Aramaic preceeded Hebrew.
That is a fact whether you wish to acknowledge this or not.

 

[limerickman]

Yes, there is all sorts of stuff being printed on the internet and frankly it's worrying that standardised history is being twisted by the three religions. I've found huge discrepancies between all accounts published on Jewish, Christian or Moslem sites.
I don't think it's a good idea to just grab material from any old website. After all, I could myself list hundreds of websites that claim the lunar landing wasn't a historical fact.
Here is what one of our female members posted on my other website with regard to Aramaic so please note you are disagreeing with her and not just me. This particular lady speaks several languages, ancient included:
"Aramaic flourished from about 700 BC to 700 AD and was spoken first in Arama which is now Syria and gradually "replaced" Phoenician and Hebrew in the Middle East but slowly petered out itself to Arabic. Aramaic can still be heard today in a small Syrian settlement of about a thousand Christians living in the hills outside Damascus, Syria."

There is a lot of stuff on the internet which is incorrect.
With regard to Aramaic preceeding Hebrew though, the internet is correct.

Initially I didn't rely on the internet as my source for confirming that Aramaic
is older than Hebrew.
Our school history books covered the ancient world - that was what I had in mind when I took you up on that point about language at the outset.
The fact that history books told us this at school was my starting point.

Then when you started going on about what was ancient and what wasn't ancient, I quickly realised that you hadn't got a clue and that you weren't prepared to listen and accept that what you posted, was wrong.

So I scrolled through the internet to locate the relevant links.

I realise that no matter how many sources I provide, you will still not understand that you're incorrect.

Let's look at what you posted above - something about a woman speaking several languages and supporting your point of view.
How credible is that?

 

[Carrera]

Then I fear your old school teacher was teaching material that other historians don't agree with.
Mainstream Classics teaches the Canaanites inhabited the Jewish homeland first and that there existed a language called proto-Canaanite. From this (the root I referred to before, arose Phoenician, Hebrew and Aramaic but Aramaic wasn't adopted by Jews till later on.
In the first Temple period, the elite Jewish Court could understand Aramaic but it wasn't commonly spoken amongst the people. Just one piece of evidence: Around 715 BC Assyria sent an envoy to Jerusalem to declare war on Israel (2 Kings)and the said envoy was asked to speak in Aramaic, not ancient Hebrew so the common people standing on the city wall wouldn't understand. Only the Jewish scribes understood the Aramaic of the envoy. The Assyrian narrative of the war against Judah has also survived.

There is a lot of stuff on the internet which is incorrect.
With regard to Aramaic preceeding Hebrew though, the internet is correct.

Initially I didn't rely on the internet as my source for confirming that Aramaic
is older than Hebrew.
Our school history books covered the ancient world - that was what I had in mind when I took you up on that point about language at the outset.
The fact that history books told us this at school was my starting point.

Then when you started going on about what was ancient and what wasn't ancient, I quickly realised that you hadn't got a clue and that you weren't prepared to listen and accept that what you posted, was wrong.

So I scrolled through the internet to locate the relevant links.

I realise that no matter how many sources I provide, you will still not understand that you're incorrect.

Let's look at what you posted above - something about a woman speaking several languages and supporting your point of view.
How credible is that?

 

[Carrera]

I can't find a better example than this straight from the Old Testament, Kings 18 v 17 - 26. Here it is. The link to this online Bible is huge so you'll have to edit it to the address bar or simply pick up a printed OT:
"26: Then Eli'akim the son of Hilki'ah, and Shebnah, and Jo'ah, said to the Rab'shakeh, "Pray, speak to your servants in the Aramaic language, for we understand it; do not speak to us in the language of Judah within the hearing of the people who are on the wall."
There are dozens of amounts of evidence to prove Jews were not speaking Aramaic as a common language till the period of the Second Temple. But if you argue that all these sources and the OT as well are wrong, how come the common people by the wall couldn't understand Aramaic?
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbi...odeng/parsed&tag=public&part=18&division=div2

There is a lot of stuff on the internet which is incorrect.
With regard to Aramaic preceeding Hebrew though, the internet is correct.

Initially I didn't rely on the internet as my source for confirming that Aramaic
is older than Hebrew.
Our school history books covered the ancient world - that was what I had in mind when I took you up on that point about language at the outset.
The fact that history books told us this at school was my starting point.

Then when you started going on about what was ancient and what wasn't ancient, I quickly realised that you hadn't got a clue and that you weren't prepared to listen and accept that what you posted, was wrong.

So I scrolled through the internet to locate the relevant links.

I realise that no matter how many sources I provide, you will still not understand that you're incorrect.

Let's look at what you posted above - something about a woman speaking several languages and supporting your point of view.
How credible is that?

 

[Carrera]

Check this one out too: The continuation of the narrative in the Old Testament. If Aramaic was spoken in Israel before Hebrew and Hebrew was derived from Aramaic, how come the everyday Jewish folks sitting on that wall couldn't understand Aramaic and they had to be addressed in their own tongue. The fact is only the Jewish scribes understood since Aramaic hadn't yet become a vulgar language within Israel.
KINGS 18, 26
"Then Eli'akim the son of Hilki'ah, and Shebnah, and Jo'ah, said to the Rab'shakeh, "Pray, speak to your servants in the Aramaic language, for we understand it; do not speak to us in the language of Judah within the hearing of the people who are on the wall."
27: But the Rab'shakeh said to them, "Has my master sent me to speak these words to your master and to you, and not to the men sitting on the wall, who are doomed with you to eat their own dung and to drink their own urine?"
28: Then the Rab'shakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in the language of Judah: "Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria!"

 

[Carrera]

On the link I provided above the passage comes out as verse 26 a bit further down.

 

[FredC]

Then I fear your old school teacher was teaching material that other historians don't agree with.
Mainstream Classics teaches the Canaanites inhabited the Jewish homeland first and that there existed a language called proto-Canaanite. From this (the root I referred to before, arose Phoenician, Hebrew and Aramaic but Aramaic wasn't adopted by Jews till later on.
In the first Temple period, the elite Jewish Court could understand Aramaic but it wasn't commonly spoken amongst the people. Just one piece of evidence: Around 715 BC Assyria sent an envoy to Jerusalem to declare war on Israel (2 Kings)and the said envoy was asked to speak in Aramaic, not ancient Hebrew so the common people standing on the city wall wouldn't understand. Only the Jewish scribes understood the Aramaic of the envoy. The Assyrian narrative of the war against Judah has also survived.

I know where Lim went to school,and he had the finest education one can possibly have.
What about the Sumerians then? Don't they count?
Aramaic yes. Hebrew was not a language, it was a tribe, it only became known as a liturgical language latterly, and was filched from Aramaic, but used a block letter system. Read 'The Dead Sea Scrolls'. If Hebrew? was the predominate language why were Essene sect using Aramaic as the primary language?

 

[FredC]

Anyone interested in the original topic?Perhaps it's time to start a new thread,to be called "Lim,Fred and Carrera endlessly debate the Middle East."

Nobody's stopping anyone from joining in. I've noticed that the Americans are ill equipped educationally to function on the topic of the Middle East, even if the Senate is one third Jewish, the taxpayer stumps up $14 billion per annun for Israel, and US Tv is censored on the topic.

 

[Carrera]

Hold yer horses and let's address the actual point I made. I've been taken to task on many occasions and informed I'm dead wrong so it's fair I should be allowed to defend myself in these debates.
Yes, I concede Lim obviously has had a good education, otherwise I wouldn't be debating with him.
You mention the Sumerians but this distracts from the specific point we're discussing - namely Aramaic and its use in ancient Israel. I know there are more ancient societies than Israel but I feel obliged to make some defence over this issue.
Fred, the points you've just raised appear top be in the wrong time-zone. You appear to be confusing Aramaic in latter day Israel (or even the Christian period) with the period of 700 B.C.
We all accept Hebrew was later influenced by Aramaic script but again, I point to the fact that the envoy described in the book of Kings wasn't understood by the commoners in Aramaic at that time. And the Bible account if confirmed by another ancient source.
All mainstream students accept Aramaic was adopted by the Jews as a lingua franca later on (my own personal estimate being around 400 B.C.)

I know where Lim went to school,and he had the finest education one can possibly have.
What about the Sumerians then? Don't they count?
Aramaic yes. Hebrew was not a language, it was a tribe, it only became known as a liturgical language latterly, and was filched from Aramaic, but used a block letter system. Read 'The Dead Sea Scrolls'. If Hebrew? was the predominate language why were Essene sect using Aramaic as the primary language?

 

[Carrera]

The girl whose comments on Aramaic I quoted lives in the U.S. (a Christian I suspect) and I've know her online for some years. We have a majority of members from the U.S. and one or two of them are total eggheads (they know much more than I do as I don't know Greek or Hebrew).
The U.S. has some very good universities and research facilities.

Nobody's stopping anyone from joining in. I've noticed that the Americans are ill equipped educationally to function on the topic of the Middle East, even if the Senate is one third Jewish, the taxpayer stumps up $14 billion per annun for Israel, and US Tv is censored on the topic.

 

[stevebaby]

Nobody's stopping anyone from joining in. I've noticed that the Americans are ill equipped educationally to function on the topic of the Middle East, even if the Senate is one third Jewish, the taxpayer stumps up $14 billion per annun for Israel, and US Tv is censored on the topic.

I was kidding...I actually enjoy reading the posts.
As for joining in...I have found a new vocation and it's called....."DO-DO problems" 3290.

Just as I was beginning to doubt my faith,the lord has delivered a prize bumpkin to Craggy Island!

 

[Carrera]

I figure it's more exciting than Coronation Street. Spectators must now be wondering what's gonna happen next. This is better than Big Brother. Could you imagine myself, Fred, Lim, Boogers and Colorado Rider in the Big Brother House.

I was kidding...I actually enjoy reading the posts.
As for joining in...I have found a new vocation and it's called....."DO-DO problems" 3290.

Just as I was beginning to doubt my faith,the lord has delivered a prize bumpkin to Craggy Island!

 

[stevebaby]

I figure it's more exciting than Coronation Street. Spectators must now be wondering what's gonna happen next. This is better than Big Brother. Could you imagine myself, Fred, Lim, Boogers and Colorado Rider in the Big Brother House.

Deathmatch 2006...