Que le bon dieu vous garde... = That the good God be with you...

God's Wife Edited Out of the Bible -- Almost: God's wife, Asherah, was a powerful fertility goddess, according to a theologian.
By Jennifer Viegas | Fri Mar 18, 2011 07:00 AM ET
--discovery.com--

God had a wife, Asherah, whom the Book of Kings suggests was worshiped alongside Yahweh in his temple in Israel, according to an Oxford scholar.

In 1967, Raphael Patai was the first historian to mention that the ancient Israelites worshiped both Yahweh and Asherah. The theory has gained new prominence due to the research of Francesca Stavrakopoulou, who began her work at Oxford and is now a senior lecturer in the department of Theology and Religion at the University of Exeter.

Information presented in Stavrakopoulou's books, lectures and journal papers has become the basis of a three-part documentary series, now airing in Europe, where she discusses the Yahweh-Asherah connection.

"You might know him as Yahweh, Allah or God. But on this fact, Jews, Muslims and Christians, the people of the great Abrahamic religions, are agreed: There is only one of Him," writes Stavrakopoulou in a statement released to the British media. "He is a solitary figure, a single, universal creator, not one God among many ... or so we like to believe."

"After years of research specializing in the history and religion of Israel, however, I have come to a colorful and what could seem, to some, uncomfortable conclusion that God had a wife," she added.

Stavrakopoulou bases her theory on ancient texts, amulets and figurines unearthed primarily in the ancient Canaanite coastal city called Ugarit, now modern-day Syria. All of these artifacts reveal that Asherah was a powerful fertility goddess.

Asherah's connection to Yahweh, according to Stavrakopoulou, is spelled out in both the Bible and an 8th century B.C. inscription on pottery found in the Sinai desert at a site called Kuntillet Ajrud.

"The inscription is a petition for a blessing," she shares. "Crucially, the inscription asks for a blessing from 'Yahweh and his Asherah.' Here was evidence that presented Yahweh and Asherah as a divine pair. And now a handful of similar inscriptions have since been found, all of which help to strengthen the case that the God of the Bible once had a wife."

Also significant, Stavrakopoulou believes, "is the Bible's admission that the goddess Asherah was worshiped in Yahweh's Temple in Jerusalem. In the Book of Kings, we're told that a statue of Asherah was housed in the temple and that female temple personnel wove ritual textiles for her."

J. Edward Wright, president of both The Arizona Center for Judaic Studies and The Albright Institute for Archaeological Research, told Discovery News that he agrees several Hebrew inscriptions mention "Yahweh and his Asherah."

"Asherah was not entirely edited out of the Bible by its male editors," he added. "Traces of her remain, and based on those traces, archaeological evidence and references to her in texts from nations bordering Israel and Judah, we can reconstruct her role in the religions of the Southern Levant."

Asherah -- known across the ancient Near East by various other names, such as Astarte and Istar -- was "an important deity, one who was both mighty and nurturing," Wright continued.

"Many English translations prefer to translate 'Asherah' as 'Sacred Tree,'" Wright said. "This seems to be in part driven by a modern desire, clearly inspired by the Biblical narratives, to hide Asherah behind a veil once again."

"Mentions of the goddess Asherah in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) are rare and have been heavily edited by the ancient authors who gathered the texts together," Aaron Brody, director of the Bade Museum and an associate professor of Bible and archaeology at the Pacific School of Religion, said.

Asherah as a tree symbol was even said to have been "chopped down and burned outside the Temple in acts of certain rulers who were trying to 'purify' the cult, and focus on the worship of a single male god, Yahweh," he added.

The ancient Israelites were polytheists, Brody told Discovery News, "with only a small minority worshiping Yahweh alone before the historic events of 586 B.C." In that year, an elite community within Judea was exiled to Babylon and the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. This, Brody said, led to "a more universal vision of strict monotheism: one god not only for Judah, but for all of the nations."

U.S. pushing for air strikes, no-fly zone in Libya
Thu Mar 17, 2011 4:49pm GMT
--REUTERS--
* U.S. now pushing for air strikes against Gaddafi forces

* U.S. wants Arab League to play active role in any plan

* Burns: Actions short of boots on the ground (Adds more details)

By Steve Holland and Susan Cornwell

WASHINGTON, March 17 (Reuters) - The United States, in a sharp shift in tone, wants the United Nations to authorize not just a no-fly zone to aid Libyan rebels but also air strikes against Libyan tanks and heavy artillery, U.S. officials said on Thursday.

The move toward a tougher stance in favor of military action comes after an extended internal debate within the Obama administration over how to stop Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's battle to put down a rebellion that has threatened his 30-year reign.

The Libyan opposition has appealed for immediate assistance to prevent the rebel capital of Benghazi from falling to forces loyal to Gaddafi, and the question facing President Barack Obama and other world leaders was whether the action they planned to take would come in time. [ID:nLDE72G0UF]

The U.S. Defense Department voiced concerns about a military engagement in Libya, echoing recent comments from Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

"I think you could safely say there would be a concern about conducting military operations inside Libya," said Colonel David Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman. [ID:nN17220104]

U.S. officials said the United States has concluded a no-fly zone should be adopted and other measures that go well beyond a no-fly zone, should be taken, including air strikes against Libyan tanks and heavy artillery.

The United States is also seeking U.N. authorization for other steps under consideration, including diverting frozen Gaddafi assets to Libyan rebels for buying weapons and tightening a Libyan arms embargo.

U.S. officials believe the measures could be implemented rapidly to have an immediate impact.

NO "BOOTS ON THE GROUND"

The United States supports international measures in Libya that are "short of boots on the ground," Undersecretary of State William Burns said on Thursday.

Burns also told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that a no-fly zone over Libya could have "an important, positive, practical" effect, but it was still necessary to consider other measures.

He said Washington is concerned Gaddafi could "return to terrorism and violent extremism" and create turmoil in the Middle East.

Pentagon officials have made clear their wariness of instituting a no-fly zone with U.S. forces already engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan and a massive relief operation under way in Japan.

Any military plan adopted must have active participation by Arab League nations.

"They have to do more than just support it," a senior official said.

Obama has been under pressure from Britain and France to join together in taking tough action against Gaddafi before the moment to do so slips away.

The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, said on Twitter that urgent negotiations were continuing at the U.N. Security Council about a Libya resolution.

"US view -- need to take steps beyond no-fly zone to protect civilians," she wrote.

Separately, the U.S. mission to the United States said on its Twitter account that the vote would likely come at 3:30 p.m. EDT (1930 GMT). A council diplomat said that the vote could come later.

French U.N. Ambassador Gerard Araud had said he wanted a vote by 6:00 p.m. EST (2200 GMT) on Thursday.

The former Libyan ambassador to the United States, Ali Aujali, who backs the rebels, appealed for immediate help in a CNN interview.

"President Obama, please, I am asking you for the second or third time, you know Gaddafi, you know what he will do," he said. (Additional reporting by Jackie Frank and Andrew Quinn; Editing by Jackie Frank and Eric Beech)

© Thomson Reuters 2011 All rights reserved

U.S. backs Arab states' call for Libya no-fly zone
Sun Mar 13, 2011 4:42am GMT
--reuters--
By Michael Georgy and Tom Perry
RAS LANUF, Libya/CAIRO (Reuters) - The United States backed a call by the Arab League for a United Nations no-fly zone over Libya, as government troops backed by warplanes fought to drive rebels from remaining strongholds in western Libya.

Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa said the League, meeting in Cairo Saturday, had decided that "serious crimes and great violations" committed by the government of Muammar Gaddafi against his people had stripped it of legitimacy.

Washington, which would play a leading role in enforcing any no-fly zone, called the declaration an "important step"; but it stopped short of commitment to any military action and made no proposal for a swift meeting of the U.N. Security Council.

It was not clear if the League's call for a no-fly zone would provide the unequivocal regional endorsement NATO required for military action to curb Gaddafi.

Diplomats in New York said they could not rule out a weekend meeting of the U.N. Security Council to vote on the issue, but added it was unlikely.

On the ground, Gaddafi marshalled his forces to defy a tide of reform that has led to the overthrow of autocratic rulers in Tunisia and Egypt and unprecedented protest elsewhere.

However, a mutiny slowed the advance of a crack Libyan brigade commanded by Gaddafi's son Khamis as it advanced on Misrata, with 32 soldiers joining the rebels holding the city, a rebel there said. He said one defector was a general.

Rebel spokesman Gamal added that the brigade, stalled about 10-15 km south of the city, broke out in a fire fight after dozens of troops balked at the idea of killing innocent civilians in the impending attack.

The events could not be confirmed independently. Journalists have been prevented from reaching the city by the authorities.

Earlier Saturday, the feared 32nd Brigade tried but failed to take Misrata, the last major rebel holdout in western Libya.

ZAWIYAH SCENARIO

Mussa Ibrahim, a government spokesman in Tripoli, could neither confirm nor deny a military operation was under way in Misrata.

"There is a hard core of al Qaeda fighters there," he said. "It looks like a Zawiyah scenario. Some people will give up, some will disappear ... Tribal leaders are talking to them. Those who stay behind, we will deal with them accordingly."

It took a week of repeated assaults by government troops, backed by tanks and air power, to crush the uprising in Zawiyah, a much smaller town 50 km (30 miles) west of Tripoli.

The death toll in Zawiyah was unknown but much of the town was destroyed, with buildings around the main square showing gaping holes blown by tank rounds and rockets. Gaddafi's forces bulldozed a cemetery where rebel fighters had been buried.

The rebels in Misrata were heavily outgunned.

"We are bracing for a massacre," said Mohammad Ahmed, a rebel fighter. "We know it will happen and Misrata will be like Zawiyah, but we believe in God. We do not have the capabilities to fight Gaddafi and his forces. They have tanks and heavy weapons and we have our belief and trust in God."

Further east, Gaddafi's troops pushed insurgents out of Ras Lanuf, a day after making an amphibious assault on the oil port and pitting tanks and planes against rebels armed with light weapons and machineguns mounted on pick-up trucks.

Dozens of soldiers waved posters of Gaddafi and painted over rebel graffiti at a deserted housing complex for oil industry workers as foreign journalists arrived from Tripoli on a government-run visit to the recaptured city.

Smoke billowed from an oil storage facility near the refinery east of the town. Local officials brought to meet the media party said the retreating rebels had bombed it.

Libya's flat desert terrain favours the use of heavy armour and air power. The Libyan army is also better trained and more disciplined than the rag-tag, though enthusiastic, rebel force.

ALL CONTINGENCIES

Moussa told a news conference after the Arab League meeting in Cairo talks: "The Arab League has officially requested the U.N. Security Council to impose a no-fly zone against any military action against the Libyan people."

It was not immediately clear how Russia and China, who have veto rights in the Security Council and have publicly opposed a no-fly zone, would react.

The White House responded by welcoming League decision, calling it and "important step" and saying it was preparing for all contingencies.

"The international community is unified in sending a clear message that the violence in Libya must stop, and that the Gaddafi regime must be held accountable," it said.

Britain, in the forefront of states advocating preparation for a possible no-fly zone, welcomed the Arab League appeal as significant, but not enough by itself to trigger action.

"We've said all along that one of the conditions for a no-fly zone must be broad support in the region," Foreign Secretary William Hague told BBC television.

"Clearly this is one indicator that there is broad support in that region," he said. "It's not the only condition, it's also necessary to have even broader international support and it's also necessary for it to be clearly legal."

The terms of any no-fly zone would have to be agreed carefully and time may be working against the rebels. Its aim would be to stop Gaddafi using his air force in attacking rebel forces and civilians, transport and reconnaissance.

Crowd in NYC rallies against hearing on US Muslims
--ajc.com--
They have heard from the imam who was an initial key supporter of plans to develop a mosque near ground zero. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf says the real enemy isn't Muslims or Islam, it's extremism.

The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Peter King, says affiliates of al-Qaida are radicalizing some American Muslims and that he plans to hold hearings on the threat they pose to the U.S.

Another group held a rally in support of King's hearing.A coalition of over 100 interfaith, nonprofit and governmental organizations plans to rally in New York City Sunday March 6, 2011 against a planned congressional hearing scheduled by U.S. Rep. Peter J. King of New York on Muslims' role in homegrown terrorism.

___

March 06, 2011 04:04 PM EST

Copyright 2011, The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Libyan invasion possibility
--arabnews.com--
“Let’s just call a spade a spade. A no-fly zone begins with an attack on Libya to destroy the air defenses ... and then you can fly planes around the country and not worry about our guys being shot down,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a congressional hearing.

(cont...)

Westboro Baptist Church targeted by Anonymous

Hacker group Anonymous appears to have singled out its next target - the controvesial anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church in the US.

An open letter, purporting to be from Anonymous, accused the church of bigotry and fanaticism.

It warned that Westboro's websites would be attacked if the congregation did not stop its public protests.

In a defiant response, the church said it would not be silenced, and urged Anonymous to "bring it".

Westboro Baptist Church has been widely condemned for its aggressive anti-gay campaigning.

A number of US states have passed legislation, banning Westboro's members from protesting close to military funerals.

The church's leader, pastor Fred Phelps, was banned from entering the UK by the Home Office in 2009.

Activist hackers

Anonymous is known for its "hacktivism", targeting individuals, companies and governments whose behavior it objects to.

The group recently crashed a number of Egyptian government websites, in support of the country's pro-democracy protests.

It also attacked several online companies that it believed had helped clamp down on Wikileaks' activity, including Paypal and Amazon.

Pastor Fred Phelps was banned from travelling to the UK in 2009.
Laying out its case against Westboro Baptist Church, the letter said: "We have always regarded you and your ilk as an assembly of graceless sociopaths and maniacal chauvinists & religious zealots, however benign, who act out for the sake of attention & in the name of religion".

Despite being posted on an Anonymous news site, there was some uncertainty surrounding the provenance of the letter.

Further messages on the same website questioned its authenticity.

The confusion is understandable, according to Graham Cluley from security firm Sophos.

"Anonymous is a headless organisation," he said.

Mr Cluley warned that its followers could potentially be led into mounting a major hack under false pretenses.

"There are dangers in future that someone may pose as Anonymous and say that they want an attack".

The Westboro Baptist Church issued a statement, branding Anonymous "a puddle of pimple-faced nerds".

It called the threat a "bad miscalculation", and appeared to goad Anonymous to action, with the phrase "bring it!".

The church's website, godhatesfags.com was unavailable.

To target Fox News over 'Nazi' label, rabbis make use of Murdoch's other media

By Paul Farhi
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 26, 2011; 11:40 PM


A coalition of rabbis wants Fox News chief Roger Ailes and conservative host Glenn Beck to cut out all their talk about Nazis and the Holocaust, and it's making its views known in an unusual place.

The rabbis have called on Fox News's owner, Rupert Murdoch, to sanction his two famous employees via a full-page ad in Thursday's editions of the Wall Street Journal - one of many other media properties controlled by Murdoch's News Corp.

The ad is signed by the heads of the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements as well as Orthodox rabbis.

"We share a belief that the Holocaust, of course, can and should be discussed appropriately in the media. But that is not what we have seen at Fox News," says the ad, signed by hundreds of rabbis and placed by the Jewish Funds for Justice, a nonprofit advocacy group. Earlier this month, the group organized a letter-writing campaign asking Murdoch to remove Beck from the air.

The rabbis were prompted by Beck's three-part program in November about liberal billionaire philanthropist George Soros, whom Beck described as a "Jewish boy helping send the Jews to the death camps" during World War II.

Soros was a young teenager in Nazi-occupied Hungary during the war and hid with a Christian family to escape the Holocaust. He once described accompanying his surrogate father while he confiscated property from Jews deported by the Nazis.

The Jewish Funds group has received financial support from Soros's Open Society Foundations.

Ailes, in a November interview with the Daily Beast Web site, called NPR executives "Nazis" for their decision to fire Juan Williams, also a Fox commentator. He later apologized to the Anti-Defamation League, but not to NPR, saying, "I was of course ad-libbing and should not have chosen that word, but I was angry at the time because of NPR's willingness to censor Juan Williams for not being liberal enough."

But Ailes, in the same interview, defended Beck's frequent use of Nazi references to describe his political opponents by attributing outrage over such remarks to "left-wing rabbis who basically don't think that anybody can ever use the word 'Holocaust' on the air."

In the Journal ad, which is also appearing in the Jewish Daily Forward newspaper, the rabbis write that they are "deeply offended" by Ailes's dismissal of those who object to such language.

"It is not appropriate to accuse a 14-year-old Jew hiding with a Christian family in Nazi-occupied Hungary of sending his people to death camps," says the ad. "It is not appropriate to call executives of another news agency 'Nazis.' And it is not appropriate to make literally hundreds of on-air references to the Holocaust and Nazis when characterizing people with whom you disagree.

"We respectfully request that Glenn Beck be sanctioned by Fox News for his completely unacceptable attacks on a survivor of the Holocaust and that Roger Ailes apologize for his dismissive remarks about rabbis' sensitivity to how the Holocaust is used on the air."

Thursday is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, an observance established by the United Nations in 2005.

"This is not an issue for liberal or conservative rabbis, but an issue for all," said Mik Moore, chief strategic officer of Jewish Funds for Justice. "After all the calls for civility following the shootings in Arizona, we all think this is the wrong approach." Moore declined to specify the cost of the ad, saying only that it cost "six figures."

A Fox News spokesman did not return calls seeking comment.

2:256 The Cow - There shall be no compulsion in [acceptance of] the religion. The right course has become clear from the wrong. So whoever disbelieves in Taghut and believes in Allah has grasped the most trustworthy handhold with no break in it. And Allah is Hearing and Knowing.
--Quran--

IHMN

A man who had spent many years trying to puzzle out meanings went to see a Sufi and told him about his search.

The Sufi said, 'Go away and ponder this –IHMN
The man went away. When he came back, the Sufi was dead.

'Now I shall never know the truth!' moaned the puzzler.

At that the moment the Sufi's chief disciple appeared. '

If,' he said, 'you are worrying about the secret meaning of IHMN, I will tell you. It is the initials of the Persian phrase 'In Huruf Maani Nadarad' – which means, 'These letters have no meaning.''

France: to deprive of citizenship for polygamy?
Tatyana Gonik
--bbcrussian.com--, Paris
Friday, June 11, 2010, 11:13 GMT 15:13 MCK

French Interior Minister Brice Hortofe promises to change the Civil Code of the country and make more flexible the deprivation of French nationality. "I will not allow any cheaters insulted all those who honestly works, pays taxes and social really wants to become a Frenchman," - said Minister of Internal Affairs. The statement was made immediately after the French began an investigation into Lesa Hebbadzhi, famed throughout the country due to the number of wives, children and the amount received Socio benefits.

35-year-old native of Algeria won the French passport 10 years ago, entered into a formal marriage with a resident of Nantes. It appears, however, that in addition to the legal spouse have Hebbadzhi there are three civilian wives who live nearby, and a total of - 13 children. Today the situation has changed somewhat: in June with many children his father was born the 14th child. (cont...)

Khufiyya movement - a Chinese form of the Arabic "Khafiyya", i.e. "the silent ones" - refers to its adherents' emphasis on silent dhikr (invocation of God's name). The Khufiyya teachings were characterized by stronger participation in the society.

Ma Laichi (Chinese: 马来迟) (1680's-1760'a), also known as Abu 'l-Futūh Ma Laichi, was a Chinese Sufi master, who brought the Khufiyya movement to China and created the Huasi menhuan (Sufi order) - the earliest and most important Naqshbandi (Islamic Spiritual) order in China.

Yes--- We are tired of being lynched physically in Misssissippi, and we are tired of being lynched spiritually and economically in the North. We have also come here today to remind Chicago of the fierce urgency now. This is no time to engage in luxury of cooling off or to take the 'tranquilizing drug of gradualism'. We have also come here today to affirm that we will no longer sit idly by in agonizing deprivation and wait on others to provide our Freedom... Freedom is never voluntarily granted by the oppressor. It must be demanded by the oppressed.

This day--- Henceforth and forever more, we must make it clear that we will purge Chicago of every politician, whether he be Negro or White, who feels he owns the Negro vote rather than earns the Negro vote.

- Martin Luther King. Jr., Soldier Field July 10th, 1966 -

Former South African Judge and Grandfather Forced to Not Attend Grandsons Bar Mitzvah
--Al Jazeera--
THURSDAY, APRIL 15, 2010
23:47 MECCA TIME, 20:47 GMT


"There is a belief amongst right-wing Zionist organisations that defaming and humiliating Jewish critics of Israeli policy, will set an example that would intimidate others into silence," Isaacs, co-ordinator of a community-based education NGO, said. (cont.)

Shma Y'sroel, Hashem Elokainu, Hashem Echad

Thoughts from a Practicing Catholic on the Roman Catholic Sex Scandal

by Sander Hicks April 6, 2010 04:23 PM
--HuffingtonPost--

The Church is "under attack" and the Pope needs our unqualified support and prayers. Jesus was a warrior, and Easter was a "battle victory." At the Vatican that same day, Cardinal Sardano turned the Easter Mass into a pep rally for Pope Benedict. Sardano claimed that pedophilia cover-up claims were nothing but "petty gossip."

This is insane, it is not strategic, and it is not in keeping with Catholic teaching. We Catholics do not believe that the Pope is perfect, or "infallible," most of the time. Our Pope is a man and a sinner, not a king. He messed up. He needs to show empathy with the victims.

While he was still Cardinal in Germany, Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict-to-be) signed off on an "untreatable" pedophile, Father Peter Hullerman, and let him return to work with kids from 1979 to 2010. That's 31 years of child sexual abuse from one guy. How many more Hullermans were there?

The more I learn about Pope Benedict, the more I realize that the Church needs a revolutionary period of deep renewal. Amidst the darkness of this damaging scandal, the light of the "Vatican III" Conference had better be around the corner.

I've been reading Betty Clermont's new book, The Neo Catholics a devastating history of the rise of the NeoCon Right. Turns out that rise paralleled that of a swing to the right inside the Vatican, as Reagan built up US-Vatican ties.

From age 14 to 16, Ratzinger was a Nazi in the Hitler Youth. So the Vatican's claim last week that their plight was akin to that of the Jews in the Holocaust was just ... weird. What a tasteless lack of empathy with the Jews. As reported by an Italian newspaper, "certain Catholic circles" in Rome blame the entire outcry on "a New York Jewish lobby" out to get the Pope.

In five short years, Pope Benedict reversed much of the interfaith work of Pope John Paul II. He brought back ornate, gilded ceremonial robes with 20-foot trains and decorated with the coat of arms of the House of Medici -- the wealthy Italian banking family that got four of its own elected pope over the course of four centuries. They presided over the peak in the Church's power, from the Dark Ages to the Counter-Reformation to Church's resistance to the Enlightenment. (cont.)

Tolstoy and Islam, Russia in Denial
28 March 2010, 17:55
--KavkazCenter--

West analysts drew attention to the fact that the Russian writer, Leo Tolstoy, became a "nonperson" in Russia according to George Orwell. Mentioning his name is now a sign of political incorrectness in Russia.

The Moscow correspondent of Daily Telegraph Andrew Osborn in his report from Moscow said that Russia now is being accused of abandoning its literary past in case of the outstanding Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, because Russia ignores the 100-year anniversary of his death.

"Such emerged that the Kremlin has no plans to mark the centenary of Leo Tolstoy's death, and an acclaimed film of "Anna Karenina" has failed to find distributors", Andrew Osborn reports.

"The Kremlin has maintained a steely silence on the anniversary", the English journalist is surprised and continuing: "The director of a new film based on Tolstoy's masterpiece "Anna Karenina", starring top Russian actors, told the Ekho Moskvy radio station, he failed to find a distributor more than a year after it was made. "I do not understand", said the director.

Andrew Osborn notes that countries as disparate as Cuba and Mexico have already organized Tolstoy-related festivals this year ahead of the centenary of his death on Nov 20. New translations of Tolstoy's work are being published in Germany and the US.

"Dame Helen Mirren and Christoper Plummer were both nominated for Oscars for their starring roles in the acclaimed English-language film The Last Station, which examines the last two years of Tolstoy's life, and was released last month in Britain", Andrew Osborn reports in his report from Moscow.

It is to be mentioned that that in the end of January 2010, it became known that by a decision of a court in the Rostov region dated September 11, 2009, the writer Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, male, born in 1828, Russian, married, place of residence: Yasnaya Polyana, Shchekin district, Tula Region, was proclaimed extremist at an anti-extremist process in Taganrog.

The decision of a commission of experts placed in Internet, testified the extremist ideology of Leo Tolstoy, who aroused religious hatred according to Article 282 of the Russian Criminal Code, in particular in the following words:

"I convinced myself that the doctrine of the [Russian Orthodox] church is in theory a cunning and harmful deceit, and in practice a collection of the grossest superstitions and sorcery, which completely overlaps the whole meaning of the Christian teaching".

The Court ruled that this expression of Leo Tolstoy formed negative attitude to the Russian Orthodox Church and, based on this, the article citing this expression was proclaimed an extremist material".

It is to be mentioned that Tolstoy is not just an extremist, but an relapsed extremist.

In 1901, Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy, male, born in 1828, Russian, married, place of residence: Yasnaya Polyana, Shchekino district, Tula Region, have been alread formally convicted of seditious thoughts with regards to the Russian Orthodox Church, excommunicated and anathematized.

In addition, the tsarist, and then the Bolshevik and the current democratic authorities of Russia still carefully conceal the fact that Leo Tolstoy converted to Islam at the sunset of his life.

Meanwhile, just a few days ago Leo Tolstoy was proclaimed extremist in Russia by a court for the third time. On March 18, 2010, at a Kirov court in Yekaterinburg during one of the multiple anti-extremist processes that are currently taking place across Russia an expert on extremism Paul Suslonov testified:

"In the leaflets by Leo Tolstoy's "A preface to instructions to a soldier" and "Instructions to an officer", which were addressed soldiers, sergeants and officers, there direct calls to form a religious hatred against the Orthodox Church according to Article 282 of the Russian Criminal Code".

Department of Monitoring,
Kavkaz Center

A remarkable site on Gnostic lineage in all faiths, a unique history that traces its roots along the Silk Road between Mount Carmel and Mount Kailash, a true site dedicated to the study of Philosophical Pluralism...

Nathan the Prophet
--wiki--

(fl. c. 1000 BC) was a court prophet who lived in the time of King David and Queen Bathsheba. He came to David to reprimand him over his committing adultery with Bathsheba while she was the wife of Uriah the Hittite whose death the King had also arranged to hide his previous transgression. His actions are described in the Books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles (see especially, 2 Samuel 7:2-17, 12:1-25.) Nathan wrote histories of the reigns of both David and of Solomon (see 1 Chronicles 29:29 and 2 Chronicles 9:29), and was involved in the music of the temple (see 2 Chronicles 29:25).

The "Settlers" and "Aborigines" of the Chittagong Hill Tract
by Habib Siddiqui
(Saturday, March 6, 2010)
--mediamonitor.net--

"The genocidal campaign by the Buddhist king led to a mass scale forced eviction and exodus of hundreds of thousands of people of Arakan to the nearby territories of British India, esp. to Chittagong and CHT districts of today's Bangladesh. Nearly a hundred thousand people, mostly Muslims, were killed by the Burmese extermination campaign. The Mahamuni statue of Buddha itself was stolen away from the Arakan. Many Muslims were taken as slaves and forced to live elsewhere, e.g., in places like the Karen State of Burma."

The subject of minorities is a very touchy one in any country, especially in nation-states where a national heritage or culture or identity (often dictated by the majority population) defines the characteristic of the state. Such modern concepts of states get complicated if there are other minorities that live in the state, each claiming to be a separate “nation” by virtue of its religion, language, culture, etc.
Bangladesh has about 12% religious minorities, including approximately 10% Hindus, the remainders being Buddhists, Christians, agnostics, atheists and animists. Roughly one percent of the population lives in the high hills, e.g., Jayintia, Garo Hills and Chittagong Hill Tract (CHT) districts. Historically the Bengal delta was husbanded by people who resorted to wet cultivation while the people in the hills, who were outside tax collection from ruling authorities, resorted to dry cultivation for their staple food. In the olden days of the Mughal rulers the authority of the state sometimes ended where the hills began. As we all know it was the marauding attacks from the Maghs (Arakanese Buddhists) and Portuguese pirates, which were sponsored by the Buddhist Kings of Arakan, that led to Shaista Khan's campaign to re-conquest Chittagong and its hilly districts, ensuring these territories' sovereignty within the Mughal rule. His campaign stopped shy of the present-day Arakan that demarcated itself from Bangladesh by the Naaf River. During the subsequent Nawabi rule of Bengal and British Raj the territorial boundary remained the same, i.e., both those districts remained integral to Bengal and outside Buddhist rules of Arakan, Burma and Tripura.
Unlike the Mughal and Muslim Sultanates of Bengal, the British Raj (esp. during the Company era) was more interested about collection of revenue and had little concern about the goodwill of the local people and their legitimate grievances whether or not such taxes were burdensome. It was their heavy handedness that led to the horrible famine of 1769-1773 (corresponding to Bangla Year 1176-1180, and more commonly therefore known as “Chiatturer monontor”) killing some 15 million people of Bengal (that included Bihar and Orissa). One in every three person perished in that great famine.
During the British Raj a more drastic and concerted effort was taken to reclaim hilly areas under taxation. In order to increase revenue collection, the Raj created local tribal chiefs in the Hilly districts, Rajas, who would ensure payment of such revenues. For the planes, it had by the 19th century already instituted a similar scheme of collecting revenues from the zamindars (not to be forgotten in this context the Sunset Law), who essentially became the enforcer of collecting such revenues in the form of money or kind (e.g., paddy) from the raiyats - peasants, and petty merchants. That is, the role of the zamindars was similar to a revenue collector in modern times.
The CHT districts with their deep forests, much like many other hilly parts of pre-modern era India, often became refuges to rebels and revenue- and tax-evaders who would settle (without its true connotation) there to escape from being hunted down by the ruling authority. In 1784 in the nearby Arakan there was a massive genocidal campaign that was steward-headed by the racist Buddhist king of Burma -- Bodaw Paya -- who had invaded the independent state. Arakan - the land of poets Alaol and Dawlat Kazi - had a significant population of Muslims (commonly known as the Rohingya people) who had lived in the other side of the Naaf River for centuries. [As shown elsewhere by this author, the origin of the Rohingya people of Arakan pre-dates the settlement of the Tibeto-Burman people there.]. The genocidal campaign by the Buddhist king led to a mass scale forced eviction and exodus of hundreds of thousands of people of Arakan to the nearby territories of British India, esp. to Chittagong and CHT districts of today's Bangladesh. Nearly a hundred thousand people, mostly Muslims, were killed by the Burmese extermination campaign. The Mahamuni statue of Buddha itself was stolen away from the Arakan. Many Muslims were taken as slaves and forced to live elsewhere, e.g., in places like the Karen State of Burma.
Those Rohingya Muslims who were able to save themselves from Burmese annexation of Arakan, like many Magh Arakanese, settled mostly in the Chittagong and CHT districts. The Muslim refugees and their descendants that had lived and settled in those places came to be known by the local name Ruhis, depicting their Rohingya/Arakan origin. During the Anglo-Burmese War of 1824-26, Arakan and subsequently the vast territories of Burma came under the British Rule. The exiled Rohingya/Ruhi Muslims and Maghs of Arakan, and their descendants, were allowed and encouraged to resettle in those territories south of the Naaf River. While many did return, others remained behind in Chittagong and CHT districts. The British policy and the subsequent process of return of the Arakanese exiles, esp. the hard-working wet cultivating Rohingya people, facilitated the cultivation of vast territories within Burma, which had hitherto remained barren and uncultivable. This enriched the coffer of the British Government through collection of revenues and taxes. Many descendants of the exiled Rohingyas (or Ruhis of Chittagong) would also become seasonal laborers in Arakan.
Today, the bulk of the ethnic minorities that live in the Chittagong Hill Tract districts are the descendants of those fleeing refugees from Arakan who fled the territory during Bodaw Paya's extermination campaign. They are our Chakma and Marma people. (There are two other ethnic minority groups living in the CHT - the Kukis and the Tripuras. The former are also known as the Chins in Burma and Mizo in India; while the latter lives mostly in the Tripura state of India.) [1] Their history to the territory cannot be traced with any authenticity before that historical event of 1784. This does not mean that there was no migration of people over the hills; in fact, there was migration in those days of porous borders where geography was not often attached with politics, state and administration. Like any nomadic people, the hilly people had no permanent settlement to the territory - they moved to and fro between porous borders of today's Bangladesh, Tripura (India) and Burma. Their migration from outside, much like the Ruhis of Chittagong and CHT, cannot be traced before 1784.
Since the British rule of the territories dating back to 1826, many Bengali Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims have moved to the CHT for a plethora of reasons, including administrative jobs, logging, trade and commerce, a trend that was to continue well unto the Bangladesh period with development of industrial infrastructure there.
After the emergence of Pakistan in 1947, the CHT was made part of East Pakistan. During the War of Liberation, its Raja (Tridib Roy) openly aligned itself with the Pakistan regime, thus leaving a strong sense of betrayal and mistrust between the local Bengali or Chittagonian people and the Hilly people. During the war of liberation and in the post-liberation era, many Bengalis were kidnapped and killed by the extremist elements of the Hilly people. [A close relative of mine was one such casualty who was kidnapped and later presumably killed, never to be found later.] Crimes of this nature continued unabated making the territory unsafe and insecure. Outside the towns, there was virtually no functioning of the government. The territory became impassable and unlivable for most Chittagonian and Bengali speaking people. They would be kidnapped, and often times killed, even when ransom money had been paid to the kidnappers.
The so-called Shanti Bahini comprising of armed hilly bandits and extremists demanded autonomy and they were aided and armed by anti-Bangladeshi forces from outside. With the assassination of Bangabandhu Sk. Mujib, as the political scene changed drastically inside Bangladesh, the Shanti Bahini had a new sponsor - India - to destabilize the country. This led to tense situation between the government of Bangladesh and the Hilly people, leading to the deployment of the BDR and Army. The era of instability persisted during the military-supported governments of Zia and Ershad when hundreds of soldiers and officers died fighting against the criminal hilly terrorists.
After the overthrow of the military dictatorship, the situation improved somewhat, especially with the signing of peace treaty in 1997 under the first Hasina administration which stipulated total and firm loyalty towards the country’s sovereignty and integrity for upholding the political, social, cultural, educational and economic rights of all the people living in the hilly region. Unfortunately because of its demography and geography, the region continued to see infiltration of arms from outside, which inevitably have gone to forces that are destabilizing the region. Thus, even to this day, criminal hilly gangs who are opposed to the peace treaty and armed by anti-Bangladeshi governments and NGOs continue to harass the local police, BDR and military outposts, and kidnap and kill Bengali-speaking population, including members of the local and foreign NGOs that work on various projects aiming to improve the economic and social condition there.
In the last two decades, the CHT has also seen the incursion of narcotics and harmful drugs from Burma and India. Outside drug-traffickers, the territory has also become a natural hideout for many refugees and secessionist groups from Burma that are opposed to the SPDC oligarchy. As noted elsewhere, some of the Arakan National Congress (ANC) member parties are terrorist organizations (e.g., ALP) and are heavily involved in drug trafficking. [2] It is worth noting that ANC is a racist, chauvinist, ultranationalist Rakhaine organization that opposes to Rohingya human rights. In the past they have carried armed excursions from the CHT against the hated SPDC regime ruling in Burma.
In recent years some NGOs have emerged with ulterior motives that are at odds with aspirations of the people and territorial integrity of Bangladesh. No place offers them a better venue than the Hilly Districts where a sizable number of ethnic minorities live. They want withdrawal of Bangladesh Army that has preserved the territorial integrity. They want enactment of fascist ghettoization laws that would confine a particular ethnic or religious group into living in enclaves or reserves. They want forced removal of Bengali Muslims and Hindus from the hilly districts. It goes without saying that such demands are unrealistic and are sure recipes for dismemberment of Bangladesh. Their anti-Bangladesh activities are also bolstered by some human rights activists with foreign affiliations whose agenda includes weakening the sovereignty of Bangladesh. Not to be forgotten in this context are also some local players that are opposed to the current government. The latest unrest in the CHT may well fall into their scheme to destabilize the government.
As Bangladesh government renews its pledge for harmony, territorial integrity and stability, it cannot afford to appear weak against forces that threaten its very existence. Any measure that offers exclusion over inclusion, ghettoization over pluralism, discrimination over equal opportunity is undesirable and must be avoided.
As hinted earlier, economics has been a key driver shaping the demography within our planet. And Bangladesh (whose GDP owes much to the foreign remittance of her economic labors working overseas) with scarcity of land is no exception to that grand rule. In the post-liberation period, with the sharp growth of job opportunities within the hilly districts, some Bangladeshis have settled into the CHT. Many hilly people likewise have found jobs in the planes of Bangladesh, away from their traditional homes in the hills. This is quite natural for a country whose constitution allows for pursuit of freedom of movement, employment, economic prosperity and happiness for all. With a high fertility rate among Bengalis and Ruhis, it is no accident that they are a majority in some Hilly districts today.
The Hilly people are aware of these trends and have immensely benefited from the overall economic prosperity of the region. Most of them are against the extremists within their community. They also understand that they are the best protectors and preservers of their language and heritage, something that is becoming rather difficult for small minorities in a global economy of our time. In that balancing act between preserving cultural heritages and ripping the benefits of economic prosperity they would be better advised to follow the American/Canadian Amish example as opposed to that of the Native Americans living in the Indian reservations. [3]
In closing, to qualify as an aborigine a member of an indigenous people must exist in a land before invasion or colonization by another race. More stringent definitions require that the aborigines have resided in a place from time immemorial; i.e., they are the true sons and daughters of the soil. [4] From this definition, the Koori, Murri, Noongar, Ngunnawal, Anangu, Yamatji, Nunga and other aboriginals in Australia, the Maori of New Zealand, the Uyghurs of Xinjiang Autonomous Region in China, the Chechens in Chechnya of Russia; the Siberian Tatars, Khanty, Mansi, Nenets and Selkup people of Siberia in Russia; the Native Indians of the USA and Canada, Eskimos of Canada and few other races in Central and South America are the true aborigines (or more correctly, aboriginals) of our world.
It is not difficult to understand why the British anthropologist T.H. Lewin (1839-1916) did not consider the tribal people living in CHT as aborigines. [5] The brief analysis above also confirms that view. Thus, the Mongoloid-featured hilly people are as much settlers to the CHT as are the Chittagonians/Ruhis and other Bangladeshis living there. Calling these latter people “settlers” while calling the Mongoloid featured Hilly people as the “adibashis” or aborigines would be false and insincere! Simply put: all the people living in the CHT are the adhibashis (residents) there.
Notes:
[1]. A Kuki website claims: “There are eleven ethnic multi-lingual minorities in the greater CHTs. They are Bawm, Pangkhua, Lushai, Khumi, Mro, Khyang, Chakma, Marma and Tripura. They have been divided in to three groups. The Bawm, Pangkhua, Lushai, Khumi and Mro, Khyang are Kuki-Chin or Kuki group. The Tripura, Riang are Tripura group and the Chakma, Marma, Tonchangya, Chak are Arakanese group. These groups differ from each other in terms of languages, customs, religious belief and patterns of social organization. The population of the hill people in the CHT is divided into as many as 3 groups who the numerically superior ones are Arakanese group and the second are the Tripura group. The Kuki group are the third in numerical strength. According to Prof. Bessaignet, among the Arakanese group, the Marma came in the CHT leaving the plain areas in 1826. The Tripura came in the CHT from the Tripura state of India. Kuki group, are called themselves as Tlangmi or hill people (they are Bawm, Pangkhua, Lushai, Khumi, Mro, Khyang). They are known as Chin in Burma and Mizo in India. The Kuki group linguistically and culturally differed from other valley-living people or Jumma (Arakanese and Tripura groups). They belong to the Kuki-Chin branch of the Tibeto-burman language family. They are unbriddled freedom nation. They live on the ridge of hills. They even used to choose different habitats for themselves for living from the early days of their community-life. So British administrator Captain T.H.Lewin designates them as ‘Tongtha’ (child of hill). According to Dr. Shelly - The Bengali movement into the CHT date back to the 17th century when braving the natural disadvantages, a small number of Bengal’s made their abodes in the inhospitable terrain of the region on an invitation of the Chakma chief.”
[2]. http://tinyurl.com/yaozwew
[3]. For American reservations, see, e.g., http://tinyurl.com/yaz3kd2 and http://tinyurl.com/y93u7mr. For life as an Amish, see, e.g., http://tinyurl.com/6kc9v5 and http://tinyurl.com/pjqj3
[4]. See, e.g., http://tinyurl.com/yekg826, and the article by A. M. Serajuddin – The Chakma Tribe of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in the 18th Century, Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, No. 1 (1984), pp. 90-98, http://tinyurl.com/yda95aj.
[5]. According to T. H. Lewin (1839-1916), British ethnologist and anthropologist, the Chakmas and Mongoloid people of CHT are not aborigines. His famous book is: Wild Races of the Eastern Frontier of India, http://tinyurl.com/yenzfyr; http://tinyurl.com/yeuohev.

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by courtesy & © 2010 Habib Siddiqui