"Poets recalled with horror the memory of the Babylonian troops rushing through the Temple courts and the sickening sound of their axes hacking away at the cedar panels. They longed for vengeance and dreamed of smashing the heads of Babylonian babies against rocks."
-This passage was sickening. There are only a few things that represent pure innocence in this world and one of those is babies. Also, I work at a children's hospital here in Columbus which makes me even more bothered by such an act.
"Even in their evocation of despair, however, the lamentations had gone beyond the point of blaming the Babylonians. The authors knew that Yahweh had destroyed the city because of the sins of the people of Israel."
- This statement makes me feel uneasy. That's like saying the 9/11 attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center towers and damaged the Pentagon were caused by the sins of the people of United States. Last time I checked, it was the fundamentalist crazies that made those claims.
"Despite the pain of their uprooting, the deportees had an easier time. They [the Jews] were not persecuted in Babylon."
- Thank God (no pun intended).
"Yet Ezekiel was not simply clinging to the past but shaping a new vision for the future."
- These are the golden words. If you stay focused on the past, you can't concentrate on the future.
"...the Temple would be rebuilt and Jerusalem restored to them. Yet it remains true that when they finally had the chance to return to Jerusalem, most of the exiles elected to stay in Babylon. They did not feel that their physical presence in Jerusalem was necessary, since they had learned to apprehend the values of Zion in a new way. The religion that we know as Judaism originated not in Judea but in the diaspora..."
- That's really interesting. I didn't know that.
"Consequently, instead of bringing peace to the country, the new Jerusalem became a new bone of contention in the Holy Land."
- Surprise!
"In his second term of office, which began in about 432 [BCE], Nehemiah also made new legislation to prevent members of Golah from marrying the local people....Nehemiah's legislation was not designed to ensure the purity of the race in the 20th century sense but was an attempt to express the new sacred geography developed in exile..."
- I don't like this. So it's LOVE vs. PRIDE? You can't legislate restrictions on love and marriage...Why does this sound so familiar now-a-days?
CHAPTER 6
"Some Jews instinctively recoiled from the culture of the Greeks and wanted to cling to the old dispensation; others found Hellenism congenial and saw it as profoundly sympathetic to their own traditions."
- I love identity wars.
"Hellenistic culture was secular."
- Was it?
"The Greeks were materialistic and sometimes shocking, but many of the local people found this new culture seductive."
- Hahaha Is this how foreigners feel towards American culture?
"In the old days, the Zion cult had insisted that Jerusalem be a refugee for the poor; but now...Jerusalemites considered poverty a disgrace and the poor were pushed callously to one side in the stampede for wealth."
- Sell-outs.
"Many of the Jews of Jerusalem were attracted by the Greek ideal of world citizenship."
- I feel that. I hope it makes a comeback.
"Antiochus issued an edict which left an indelible impression on the Jewish spirit and made it emotionally impossible for many Jews to accommodate the gentile world. This decree revoked the charter of 200 and outlawed the practice of the Jewish faith in Judah. This was the first religious persecution in history."
- why? Why?! WHY?!?! So now the precedent has been set for future generations. I think we should have a classroom "wall-of-shame" and make the face of Antiochus be the first on the wall.
CHAPTER 7
"Archelaus sent his troops into the Temple courts just after the first paschal lambs had been sacrificed. 3,000 people were killed. Yet again the shrine had been desecrated, but this time not by a pagan symbol but by Jewish troops shedding Jewish blood."
- A government turning on its own people. Is there anything more pathetic? More corrupt?
"Any threat to the Temple, especially during the crowded and emotional festival of Passover, was likely to lead to violence, which, in turn, could result in dreadful reprisals. Jesus was a risk that the Jewish people could not afford."
- Somehow the broader picture was omitted from Sunday school, Catholic teachings, and The Passion of Christ (haha the last one is a joke). But serious now, it's interesting seeing the story of Jesus Christ in a broader perspective.
"It was at Antioch that the followers of Jesus were first called "Christians" because of their assertion that Jesus had been the Christos, the Anoited One, the Messiah."
- I never knew this. I fail as a Christian.
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