Burka Babes

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Oh he can definitely change his mind. Examples are all over both Testaments if you look for them, and really exceedinly obvious if you compare the Old and New Testament. If we're going to do a side-by-side comparison, the Hebrew and Christian gods have very little in common: one decides to kill almost his entire creation because of a handful of criminals while the other one loves all his creation; one asks his faithful to sacrifice his son to test his faith, while the other one sends his son to die for all mankind's sins; one preaches love of other men (and women) no matter what, while the other burns the ones he doesn't like and sends rains of frogs and other oddities at them; one has his Chosen People while to the other all of mankind are his chosen. And I'm only picking the very obvious ones.

That doesn't stop most Christians from saying that they're both the same god, just because Christ said so, and even though many Jews will disagree. Likewise most Muslims will readily tell you their god is the same as the other two, just because the Quran says so, even though many Christians will disagree. I don't see why in both cases Christians should be automatically right.

Now, God actually lying? I don't remember an instance of this in any of the three books. And changing his mind from one book to another, or even within the same book, doesn't really count, when you consider they were written by different people who may have had different interpretations of how God should be. They'll all pretty much agree on the fundamental basics anyway (at least on the nature of God).

 

Actually, at times, they did own those. That they failed to keep them, or that God later took them away, is a seperate issue.

Actually, it was true. Tyr was a sort of double-city, with both an island portion and a mainland portion. Nebuchadnezzar broke through the walls of the mainland portion and razed it to the ground. He never conquered the island portion. The complete destruction is never directly associated with Nebuchadnezzar, but only placed in the context of it, which is actually a shift in the language styles (from Nebuchadnezzar will to I will).

Accually, my Bible Study recently finished covering this. The area described is not all of Egypt, but rather a prominent subset of Egypt (the area defined in an earlier verse), and it was laid desolate and stayed that way under Nebuchadnezzar (or was it his successor, not sure) for decades (at least 40 years, maybe longer). The people were taken to Babylon as slaves and scattered among the sub-nations of Babylon, as was it's practice.[/QUOTE]

It is described that Noah was the "only righteous man in all the land". That's hardly "handful of criminals".

One asks someone else to sacrifice his son, the other sacrifices His own Son. You may almost think the two are related.

One preaches love and forgiveness for transgressions repented, while the other preaches love and forgiveness for the repentant and punishment for the unrepentant. Not really very different, are they?

The Calvanists would strongly disagree with the "all of mankind" part. Also, the Bible never says God didn't show favor to non-Jews, in fact there are several times where He specifically blesses gentiles. You may need to re-review those.

All in all, if you want a very clear succession from Judaism to Christianity, I suggest you read Hebrews. It's pretty clear cut and covers much more of the Old Testament than just the controversial areas.

 

NOG, I have no desire to debate this, other than to mention that I feel that where you aren't employing a priori reasoning to come to those conclusions, you are ignoring key archaeological evidence or playing semantics. Given that you likely feel the same way about me and my arguments, though, it is probably better that we just agree to disagree.

That said, I don't feel that it is a challenge to Christianity to acknowledge that God can and has changed his mind or that the God of Abraham as depicted was by his own admission both jealous and vengeful; traits which run quite counter to the depiction of God in the new testament.

 

I presume you mean assuming the conclusion before looking at evidence? In this case, as many, I don't necessarily feel that's a bad thing, so long as blatant contradictions to the conclusion are recognized. Looking for confirmation for a claim can lead you toward interpreting uncertain data in a way others may ignore. In other words, it helps to filter through irrelevant possibilities to one that may specifically support your position. If all you're looking for is a possible explanation of something, it works.

One of the fundamental ideas of Christianity is that our God is eternally faithful and fulfills His promises. Any claim that counters this is a challenge to Christianity, intended or not. As to the differing traits between the Old Testament God and the New Testament God, again I'd refer you to Hebrews. They're not so much different traits as different focuses.

Actually, I missed that, but I think that's even worse. You're saying I couldn't wear a cross in the open if I wanted to in France? What about a T-Shirt making written references to God? What about one criticizing belief in God? Basically, what you're saying is that France may as well have banned all public discussion of religion?

 

It only applies to schools as far as I know, and yes the ban includes crosses and while I can't say for sure I think it also applies to such T-Shirts and similar items. France is a very secular country and this is an attempt to further exclaim that.

 

This is slightly , but it does bear mentioning. I'd have to say that most immigrants - legal or illegal - and regardless of whether you are talking about Europe or America, do not integrate into society. At least in the US though, the children of immigrants usually do. I can look at my own family to see this. My grandparents did not fully integrate into society, even though they arrived in the US as children. My great-grandparents didn't integrate at all - they never even learned to speak a lick of English! (I am amused when my father tells me he never had a conversation with any of his grandparents, because none of his grandparents learned to speak English, and he never leared how to speak Italian or Slovak.)

You still see the same thing happening in the US today. While it's somewhat of a stereotype, it seems like 75% of all convenience stores and doughnut shops are owned and operated by people of Indian heritage. It's always a family run operation, and you can tell how easy of a time you are going to have communicating with the person at the counter based on their age. If the person behind the counter is over 50, chances are they are going to speak in very broken English and be very difficult to understand - that's because they are the immigrants. However, if the person behind the counter is in their 20s, chances are they are the immigrant's kids, who were born here, and can speak English as well as I do.

It's the same thing with the Latino community. While the immigrants themselves speak only Spanish, their kids learn how to speak both Spanish and English. Unless the non-integration issue in Europe continues down into the 1st and 2nd generation of people who are born there, then I don't think it's concerning or particularly unusual.

 

In the Latino community it can be more troublesome, as they tend to form more isolated and insular communities. There are many third and even fourth generation Latinos in parts of the US who still don't speak any (or much) English. In cultures that form isolated and insular communities, as opposed to cultures that scatter out and immerse themselves, such problems can readily form.

 

Personally, I see this as a fault within our educational system, though. A well funded and properly supported ESL program goes a long way. Of course, I don't really care about "integration", anyway. As long as we're making sure that the children of our immigrants speak English so that they are capable of functioning productively within society, I could care less about how "integrated" they are. Since every American already enjoys the freedom to don a pink robe, become vegetarian and hand out copies of the Baghavad Gita at airports and it hasn't caused us any real problems so far, I see no reason to change that now, nor do I see any reason to start holding our immigrants and naturalized citizens to a different set of rules. Asking them to learn English and obey the law is enough.

 

Ah, but the two (or three?) kind of go together. The problem is that many of them don't view themselves as Americans, but as immigrant children, even if they were born here. They're part of their community, not ours. This all too often means they honestly don't want to learn English, because they see that as us trying to force our culture on them and steal theirs. That usually leads to poverty, which leads to crime, which leads to more isolation from the outside community (especially when most cops are white or something).

 

Sure, NOG, but I think we can both agree that instances in which second generation immigrants fail to learn English are rare. As to whether a kid wants to learn English, well, I didn't want to learn Math. Despite my stubbornness, I still ended up learning it. ESL is key. If you keep a kid in ESL for a few hours a day, make him speak English there, and conduct his regular classes in English, too, the kid will learn English whether he wants to or not.

 

To be honest, I'm not as concerned about this, either. I have no problem with people speaking their mother tongue whenever they get the opportunity.

A proper ESL program focuses on more than just comprehension, so while a student may not speak English often, his English would only be broken if he didn't follow through with his ESL work. Since a proper ESL program has an oral requirement and doesn't allow a student to advance until his English does -- and our law doesn't allow anyone to drop out of school until they are at least 16 -- the vast majority of these students will get with the program eventually. For those that won't, well, you can lead a horse to water...

 

Well, the Latino population of Maryland is only 6%, so perhaps I'm just not as exposed to it as you. I, however, have not seen any instances of a child refusing to learn a new language. In fact, if the child attends school, it's almost impossible to refuse to learn a new language - you're going to pick it up simply through exposure. My grandparents learned English by going to school - and they didn't have any fancy ESL programs back then. They learned English by being exposed to it on a daily basis. (And it was almost exclusively through school, because they still spoke their native language at home as their parents did not speak English.)

By non-integration do you mean cultural/social integration as well? I was talking specifically about language. I don't care if immigrants speak their native tongue within their insular communities and do not integrate to the cultural norms of the host country.

I agree that similarity of langauges would provide a dis-incentive to learn a new language. We don't really have that issue with the Latino community. Spanish and English are different enough that unless one of the people in the conversation have some bi-lingual skills, the two people will be unable to effectively communicate.

On the other hand, if the languages are similar, it would also seem that it would be fairly easy to learn a new language. I knew a woman in college whose family immigrated from Italy, and so she spoke fluent Italian. She had a double major in college - Biology and Spanish. The reason she majored in Spanish was she said that it was very easy for her to learn because of the similarity of the two languages.

However, I would think that even if they go back to their native country frequently that their kids would learn whatever language they teach at school. I'm quite surprised that this evidently does not happen. Then again, I do not have the exposure that others have. The only significant minority in Maryland are African Americans, and other than some problems I have with ebonics, there isn't really any language barrier there.

 

Burqa Bombers! Run for your lives!!!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32022510/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/

 

I don't consider this any kind of a problem. Most European countries have actual native minorities that do the same anyway. It's obvious that communicating with your native language will allways be better than any other languages you'll learn, therefore I think it's quite obvious you'll be using your native language whenever possible. I use both Finnish and Swedish (and English to a much lesser degree) daily, but Finnish is clearly the language I know best and the one I'd prefer to use whenever possible.

 

I'm not so sure I agree with you on this. They want to speak it when they're among themselves as a group? Sure. I do it all the time and wouldn't stay a second longer in a country that didn't let me do that. But speaking it when you're in a social situation with other people? I think that's pretty rude. Interrupting other people's conversations to speak with one of them in your native tongue, which the others who were participating in the conversation don't understand? Beyond rude. Refusing to go to a shop unless you can speak to the shopkeeper in your native language, or trying to get employment with immmigrants from your country (or just general area) because you don't want to speak the country's language? I think that's a good indication of integration problems. If you're the shopkeer, being curt and rude to local customers because you can't be bothered speaking the language of the country you have immigrated to (doubly worse if you actually do know it and can speak it)? I think that's the line past which you should pack and go back to your own country.

If you think some of these examples are too far-fetched or unrealistic, I must point out that multiple example have happened to me or in front of me. I have repeatedly said and always will that I believe people should be able to do whatever they want in a free society (and all Western societies at least consider themselves to be) but there is a limit. As immigrants the very least we can do is actually talk to people in their language. I don't think there's anything wrong with us speaking our language when we're among each other (and I think Tal and NOG will agree with me), but that doesn't mean we can create our own state within a state and pretend that the "other" country doesn't exist.

 

Nor did I claim that they were, however the fact that they manage to keep their language and still participate in society goes to show that it's not a major obstacle that can't be overcome. Ofcourse this also depends on the minority. Europe is also filled with separatist minorities seeking an independent nation for themselves. That though has a lot do with how they have been treated in the past and how they are treated today.

 

Most shopkeepers I've seen desperately want to succeed, so they strive to communicate with their clients, and even if their language skills fail, their body language and demeanor are almost always pleasant as long as the customers are being pleasant as well.

Refusing to enter a shop because it doesn't speak your foreign language? Well, tough luck for you -- you're the one who's missing out, and I don't know of many immigrants who are that stupid. Now, demanding that you be served in your language? That's a different matter.

If I were on the bus and saw a group of immigrants speaking their language, I wouldn't care too much as long as their affect was not hostile or it was really clear that they were being crude and hiding it behind their language, but hey, we've got plenty of rude English speakers here!

At work, though, it is reasonable to expect workers to communicate in English and not enclave up while at work. What they do on their breaks, though, is up to them, really.

I see the burka issue as one of respect for the society -- here in Canada, most of us don't feel the need to conceal our faces when in public. We may have the legal right to do so, and so do the Muslims who feel the need to obscure their features, but that won't make us trust them -- nothing and no law can do that. They will forever have a pretty serious roadblock to their comfortable integration in society, and "education" won't solve that roadblock either. It's just too much of a deviation from our cultural norm for us to accept, especially since in many cases it is used as a virtual leash on the women.

Revealing the face while keeping the head covered is a perfectly acceptable compromise that every Muslim I have ever taught has been able to accept (and I've taught hundreds by now). Those who refuse are not putting forth sufficient efforts to meet Canadian society halfway -- God knows we've made an effort, so should they.