Yesterday’s Gone
March 24, 2008 6:50 am > MAUI TODAY, > Maui Yesterdays |
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Easter Monday
HAWAIIAN WORD OF THE DAY — Aohiohi: Resistance PIDGIN WORD OF THE DAY— Daunim: Overcome HAWAIIAN PROVERB OF THE DAY — “Do not believe all that is told you.” HAOLE SAYING OF THE DAY — “I will surrender to the Divine — to nothing else.” (Emerson) WEB SURF SPOT OF THE WEEK — Support Tibet Against Chinese Atrocities WEB VIDEO OF THE WEEK — Ken Kesey Across the Border PODCAST OF THE WEEK — Global Podcasting Directory BLOG OF THE WEEK — The Daily Kos God Screws Up Again
It is worth noting that Bart D. Ehrman has come out with a new book — God’s Problem, How the Bible fails to answer our most important question: why we suffer. Ehrman is the James A Gray distinguished Professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is on the religious radar now because of his previous book, a best seller called Misquoting Jesus. In that book, he skewers the Bible and Christians who believe in it, particularly those who take the Bible as the Word of God. His painstakingly detailed research has revealed more than 90,000 major errors in today’s Bible and more than 200,000 minor errors in transcription. So complete and devastating was his work that Christians mounted a defense which they published in the book called Misquoting Ehrman. It is almost comical that in fact the title is very appropriate. By Ehrman’s own account, the book makes more than 500 errors just in describing his point.
The new book — God’s Problem - details how the Bible makes flimsy inexcusable claims for why humanity suffers. The problem can be presented in an 11 word syllogism: God is all-powerful, God is all loving, There is suffering. All three cannot be true at once. The simplest explanation — there is no God — solves the problem and in fact any problem associated with the syllogism. Christians refused this explanation but can present no viable, logical, common sense solution to the challenge. What makes Ehrman so delightful is his clean writing, his commonsense approach, and his ability to get facts right.
Several Christian publications have called him God’s enemy and has made his disreputation their number one priority. Their attempts have backfired.
– Maui Curmudgeon
EVENTS ON THIS DAY — March 24th
- 1629: The first game law is passed in the American colonies (by Virginia)
- 1664: Roger Williams is granted a charter to colonize Rhode Island
- 1765: Britain enacts the Quartering Act
- 1832: Mormon Joseph Smith is beaten, tarred & feathered in Ohio
- 1924: Greece becomes a republic
- 1930: The first religious services are telecast in U.S. (W2XBS in NYC)
- 1958: Elvis Presley is inducted into Army in Memphis, TN
- 1967: The first “Teach-in” is held at University of Michigan after US bombing of North Vietnam
- 1976: Argentine President Isabel Peron is deposed by country’s military
- 1989: The Exxon tanker “Valdez” spills 240,000 barrels of oil (11.3 mil gallons) into Alaska’s Prince William Sound (the worst U.S. oil spill)
- 1999: For the first time in its 50-year existence, NATO attacks a sovereign country, launching airstrikes against Yugoslavia
BORN ON THIS DAY — March 24th
- 1494: Georgius Agricola, mineralogist
- 1814: Galen Clark, U.S. naturalist,
- 1834: John Wesley Powell, geologist/explorer/ethnologist
- 1834: William Morris, England, designer/craftsman/poet/socialist
- 1871: Sir Ernest Rutherford, nuclear scientist
- 1874: Harry Houdini, magician and escape artist
- 1887: Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, actor
- 1897: Wilhelm Reich, psycho analysis
- 1909: Clyde Barrow, bank robber
- 1911: Joseph Barbera, animator
- 1930: Steve McQueen, actor
- 1944: Patti Labelle, singer
- 1949: Nick Lowe, vocalist/producer
- 1951: Tommy Hilfiger, designer
- 1960: Kelly LeBrock, actress
- 1970: Lara Flynn Boyle, actress
- 1976: Peyton Manning, NFL quarterback
- 1990: Keisha Castle-Hughes, actress (”The Whale Rider”)
