All Quotes By Tag: Egypt

“For some of us a war was being fought; there must have been many who had no idea what this war was, whose it was or why it was. Like some theatrical lion it roared off-stage while the actors got on with their business. And all the while the extraordinary backcloth eerily reflected the juxtapositions – that scenery in which the lush vegetable borders of the Nile ended so abruptly that you stepped from fields to desert in one pace; in which a crumbling monument might be Greek, Roman, pharaonic, medieval, Christian, Muslim; in which illiterate peasants with a life expectancy of thirty lived in shanty houses set up between the soaring columns of temples inscribed with the complex mythologies of three thousand years before. There was no chronology to the place, and no logic.”

“The fervor and single-mindedness of this deification probably have no precedent in history. It’s not like Duvalier or Assad passing the torch to the son and heir. It surpasses anything I have read about the Roman or Babylonian or even Pharaonic excesses. An estimated $2.68 billion was spent on ceremonies and monuments in the aftermath of Kim Il Sung’s death. The concept is not that his son is his successor, but that his son is his reincarnation. North Korea has an equivalent of Mount Fuji—a mountain sacred to all Koreans. It’s called Mount Paekdu, a beautiful peak with a deep blue lake, on the Chinese border. Here, according to the new mythology, Kim Jong Il was born on February 16, 1942. His birth was attended by a double rainbow and by songs of praise (in human voice) uttered by the local birds. In fact, in February 1942 his father and mother were hiding under Stalin’s protection in the dank Russian city of Khabarovsk, but as with all miraculous births it’s considered best not to allow the facts to get in the way of a good story.”

“Is it possible that the Pentateuch could not have been written by uninspired men? that the assistance of God was necessary to produce these books? Is it possible that Galilei ascertained the mechanical principles of ‘Virtual Velocity,’ the laws of falling bodies and of all motion; that Copernicus ascertained the true position of the earth and accounted for all celestial phenomena; that Kepler discovered his three laws—discoveries of such importance that the 8th of May, 1618, may be called the birth-day of modern science; that Newton gave to the world the Method of Fluxions, the Theory of Universal Gravitation, and the Decomposition of Light; that Euclid, Cavalieri, Descartes, and Leibniz, almost completed the science of mathematics; that all the discoveries in optics, hydrostatics, pneumatics and chemistry, the experiments, discoveries, and inventions of Galvani, Volta, Franklin and Morse, of Trevithick, Watt and Fulton and of all the pioneers of progress—that all this was accomplished by uninspired men, while the writer of the Pentateuch was directed and inspired by an infinite God? Is it possible that the codes of China, India, Egypt, Greece and Rome were made by man, and that the laws recorded in the Pentateuch were alone given by God? Is it possible that Æschylus and Shakespeare, Burns, and Beranger, Goethe and Schiller, and all the poets of the world, and all their wondrous tragedies and songs are but the work of men, while no intelligence except the infinite God could be the author of the Pentateuch? Is it possible that of all the books that crowd the libraries of the world, the books of science, fiction, history and song, that all save only one, have been produced by man? Is it possible that of all these, the bible only is the work of God?”

“[Dialogue between Solon and an Egyptian Priest]In the Egyptian Delta, at the head of which the river Nile divides, there is a certain district which is called the district of Sais […] To this city came Solon, and was received there with great honour; he asked the priests who were most skilful in such matters, about antiquity, and made the discovery that neither he nor any other Hellene knew anything worth mentioning about the times of old. On one occasion, wishing to draw them on to speak of antiquity, he began to tell about the most ancient things in our part of the world-about Phoroneus, who is called “the first man,” and about Niobe; and after the Deluge, of the survival of Deucalion and Pyrrha; and he traced the genealogy of their descendants, and reckoning up the dates, tried to compute how many years ago the events of which he was speaking happened. Thereupon one of the priests, who was of a very great age, said: O Solon, Solon, you Hellenes are never anything but children, and there is not an old man among you. Solon in return asked him what he meant. I mean to say, he replied, that in mind you are all young; there is no old opinion handed down among you by ancient tradition, nor any science which is hoary with age.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3718 And [they] saw him from afar, and before [he] came close to them [they] plotted [against] him to put him to death. 19 And [they] said – [each] man to his brothers – “Behold: The possessor of the dreams – this one comes! 20 And now: Come and [let’s] kill him, and [we] will cast him in[to] one of the ground-pits, and [we] will say, ‘An evil living [creature] ate him’, and [we] will see what will be [of] his dreams!”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3721 And Reuven (Reuben) heard and [he] saved him from their hand, and [he] said, “[We] will not hit him [killing his] soul!” 22 And [he] said to them – Reuven (Reuben) – “Don’t spill blood! Cast him to this ground-pit that [is] in the desert, and a hand do not send [forth] against him!” in order [to] save him from their hand [in order] to return him to his father.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3723 And [it] was when Yosef (Joseph) came to his brothers, and [they] stripped Yosef (Joseph) [of] his tunic – the striped tunic – that [was] upon him. 24 And [they] took him, and [they] cast him to the ground-pit, and the ground-pit [was] empty – there [was] not within it water.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3725 And [they] sat to eat bread, and [they] lifted [up] their eyes, and [they] saw, and behold: A caravan of Ishmaelites [was] coming from Gil’ad and their camels bearing spices, and balsam, and myrrh going to bring down to Mitzraim (Egypt). 26 And Yehudah (Judah) said to his brothers, “What gain [is there] that [we] will kill our brother and [by our] covering [up] his blood? 27 Come, and [let’s] sell him to the Ishmaelites, and our hand [let] not be [up]on him because [he is] our brother – our flesh [and blood] he [is].” And [they] heard – his brothers – [and heeded].”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3728 And [they] passed – Midianite people (merchants) – and [they] pulled, and [they] raised Yosef (Joseph) from the ground-pit, and [they] sold Yosef (Joseph) to the Ishmaelites for twenty [pieces of] silver, and [they] brought Yosef (Joseph) to Mitzraim (Egypt). 29 And [he] returned – Reuven (Reuben) – to the ground-pit, and behold: There [was] no Yosef (Joseph) in the ground-pit, and [he] tore his clothes.30 And [he] returned to his brothers, and [he] said, “The child [is] not there! And I – where do I go?!” 31 And [they] took the tunic of Yosef (Joseph), and [they] slaughtered a hairy-goat, and [they] dipped the tunic in the blood.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3712 And [they] went – his brothers – to shepherd the flock of their father in Shechem. 13 And Israel said to Yosef (Joseph), “Are not your brothers shepherding in Shechem? Go and [I] will send you to them.” And [he] said to him, “Behold: [here] I [am]!”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 3714 And [he] said to him, “Go, please, see [to] the peace of your brothers, and [to] the peace of the flock, and return to me a word, and [he] sent him from the valley of Ḥevron (Hebron), and [he] came to Shechem. 15 And a man found him, and behold: [He was] mistakenly [wandering] in the field, and [he] asked him – the man – saying, “What [do you] request [to find]?”16 And [he] said, “My brothers I request [to find] – Say, please, to me: Where [are] they shepherding?”17 And [he] said – the man – “[They] journeyed from this [place] because [I] heard [them] saying, ‘[We] will go to Dothan.’” And [he] went – Yosef (Joseph) – after his brothers, and [he] found them in Dothan.”

“Chapter 8: Genesis 45 1 And Yosef (Joseph) could not control himself for all the posted-persons upon him, and [he] called [out], “Remove every man from upon me!” And a man did not stand with him in the confessing of Yosef (Joseph) to his brothers. 2 And [he] gave his voice in crying, and [they] heard – [all of] Mitzraim (Egypt) – and the house of Pharaoh heard. 3 And Yosef (Joseph) said to his brothers, “I [am] Yosef! Does my father still live?!” And his brothers could not answer him because [they] were terrified from his face.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 371 And Ya’akov (Jacob) sat in the land of the residence of his father in the land of K’na’an (Canaan). 2 These are the [descendents in the] genealogy of Ya’akov (Jacob): Yosef (Joseph) [was] seventeen years old, [he] would shepherd with his brothers among the flock [of animals], and he [was merely] a youth with the sons of Bilhah and with the sons of Zilpah (the women of his father), and Yosef (Joseph) brought their slander – [it was] evil – to their father”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 373 And Israel loved Yosef (Joseph) [most] from all his sons because a son of his old-age he [was] to him, and [he] made for him a striped tunic. 4 And [they] saw – his brothers – that their father loved him [most] from all his brothers, and [they] hated him, and [they] could not speak [of] him for peace.”

“Chapter 1: Genesis 379 And [he] dreamt again – a different dream – and [he] told it to his brothers, and [he] said, “Behold: [I] dreamt a dream again, and behold: The Sun and the Moon, and eleven stars [were] prostrating [themselves] to me. 10 And [he] told [the dream] to his father and to his brothers, and [he] rebuked him – his father – and [he] said to him, “What [is] this dream that [you] dreamt? Will [we most assuredly] come – I, and your mother, and your brothers – to prostrate [ourselves] to you to the ground?” 11 And [they were] jealous of him – his brothers – and his father guarded the matter [in his heart].”