by ProfDave, ©2022 (Apr. 12, 2021) — Sunday was Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week for Christians. On the day foretold by the prophet Daniel (9) centuries earlier, and as described by Isaiah 62 and Zechariah 9, Jesus presented himself to Jerusalem as the “Anointed Prince,” the Messiah, riding on a donkey and cleansing […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Apr. 7, 2022) — Good morning, ladies and gentlemen! I could hardly sleep last night for excitement! Today we are learning about Chinese history! China seems far away to us Westerners – and very alien, too. Sources can’t even agree on how to spell the names. But if this is going to […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Apr. 5, 2022) — [Editor’s Note: Please see the previous installments in this series here.] We are attempting to absorb the whole of Asian experience in the middle period of history, about 300 to 1500 AD – with flashbacks to centuries before the “Common Era.” If you are not on information overload, […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Mar. 23, 2022) — [See previous installments in this series here.] Remember Diocletian last week? He divided the Roman Empire into four Praefectures, taking Dacia (the Balkans) and the East for himself and building a new capital at Byzantium (renamed Constantinople, and today Istanbul) on the European side of the straits between […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Mar. 15, 2022) — 1278 years after the legendary founding of Rome, the British monk Dionysis Exiguus devised a dating system based on the conception [“incarnation”] of Jesus of Nazareth (± 4-6 years). Instead of using the brief reigns of earthly Kings and Consuls, years after the incarnation would be called “the […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Mar. 12, 2022) — [See previous articles in this series here. — Ed.] Someone has said that Western Civilization is founded on two cities: Athens and Jerusalem. Any historical generalization can only be about 60% true (Heughins’ Second Law of History. The first law being, “There are no laws in history”), but […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Mar. 7, 2022) — [See the previous article in this series here. — Ed.] Last week we looked at the cradles of civilization in the great river valleys of the Middle East, South Asia and China and only mentioned Europe in passing. But in ancient times, the center of European civilization was […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Mar. 3, 2022) — Welcome to the history of World Civilization! Are you civilized yet? So what were things like three thousand years ago and what do you need to know about it? First, just a little bit of humility: history was already half over! Second, more humility: we do not know […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 22, 2022) — How does division end discrimination? CRT and its cousins and predecessors divide the world into overlapping and crisscrossing layers of the oppressed and the oppressors. Because the R stands for race, we set black against white. Historically, Karl Marx turned Hegel’s dialectic of ideas into a dialectic of […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 17, 2022) — Where do all these disasters come from? The Coronavirus has been particularly egregious, though no comparison to the Plague of the 15th century. Someone on the news was remarking that we have a hundred-year storm every couple of years and blamed global warming. Others blame the wrath of […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 15, 2022) — Fourteen years ago, presidential candidate Barack Obama declared that the “Culture Wars” were over. Do you remember? In the same spirit two years ago, candidate Joe Biden (Obama’s VP) promised to unite the nation. Obama symbolized this unity in his “debate” at Rick Warren’s church. Except, if you […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 10, 2022) — Is religion, particularly Christianity, dangerous? Is it “the source of all the war, ignorance and intolerance in history,” as the New Atheists are so fond of telling us? Do we need to be afraid of religious people in public office? (Since John F. Kennedy they have been assuring […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 8, 2022) — Since 1939 Alcoholics Anonymous has set the template for successful addiction recovery by bringing together people in the process of recovery to understand and support each other. Therapy in itself, whether medical or psychiatric or spiritual was not enough. The sufferer needed a spiritual experience and the support […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 3, 2022) — To have a life-changing encounter with the Living God is as simple as ABC (though it may not be easy). No special ceremonies, formulas or professionals are required. You don’t have to learn anything, understand everything, or clean up your act. All that comes later, as needed. Start […]
by ProfDave, ©2022 (Feb. 1, 2022) — The fourth fundamental question that every worldview must answer is the question of destiny. Life, any human life, requires a beginning – a past. It needs meaning and morality – a present. It also needs a destination – a future. This future, whether light or dark, robust or […]
