World History
Kingdom of Heaven. I finally saw this movie the other day on DVD. I liked it. It was a well done film with many good battle sequences.
I was a bit put off by the politically correct feel of the movie. This film shows the fall of the Crusader state of Jerusalem. Despite this, the whole theme is of all religions being equal and how no one except a few evil Christians wanted the war. I doubt this was the prevailing feeling at the time the actual war happened. And I am certain there were some Muslims who eyed Jerusalem and wanted to reclaim the city and needed only an excuse to attack the weakened Kingdom of Jerusalem.
I did like this quote given by Balian to the Christian defenders of Jerusalem before the fall of the city. He said, "It has fallen to us, to defend Jerusalem, and we have made our preparations as well as they can be made. None of us took this city from Muslims. No Muslim of the great army now coming against us was born when this city was lost. We fight over an offence we did not give, against those who were not alive to be offended."
We fight over an offence we did not give, against those who were not alive to be offended.
And therein lies the key to much of the conflicts in world history, isn't it? The genocides and ethnic cleansings of history are often people fighting over offenses committed by the dead against those who are also dead. This leads to new injustice and a continuance of the violence and hatred.
We can see it in the world today. All the trouble in the Balkans was started by men fighting over grievances that originated centuries ago. How far does the injustice go back in Palestine on both sides of the conflict? How about Rwanda? How about those demanding slave reparations in the USA for those who were never slaves from those who never owned them?
Wouldn't it be nice if people would judge people based on the actions they have taken rather than the actions of their ancestors? What is important is not our DNA or our religion but each of us our own individual character. We are not responsible for the actions of the dead in times before we were alive and we are not owed anything because of injustices taken against the dead before we were born.
OK, that is the end of the sermon. I wish for a world that probably will never be. Except in the Kingdom of Heaven...
- When Did The American Civil War End? Disney Does Not Know
I watched the Disney movie National Treasure: Book of Secrets the other day. It was a good (but not great) film I enjoyed watching. However, it had a major historical inaccuracy that was not in any way needed to advance the plot which I found annoying....
- The Last King Of Scotland
I finally had a chance to the see The Last King of Scotland last night. This movie was released last year. It won Forest Whitaker an Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. The movie follows the adventures of Scottish...
- The History Of Plumbing - Jerusalem
The History of Plumbing - Jerusalem. This is an interesting history of the holy city from the perspective of plumbing. It describes the construction of the water system of the ancient city, from 1200 BC through the Herodian era. It also covers ancient...
- Where Are You In The Seven Billion?
From Freetech4teachers.com, I found this fun site that shows you where you lie in terms of how many people were alive when you were born. I hold the distention of being the 3,230,700,582nd person alive on earth when I was born and the 77,053,916,357th...
- Dead Sea Scrolls Online
Above is a video briefly detailing the dead sea scrolls and Google's successful job of getting them online. Below is part of a post by Google explaining what you can see. If you are interested, here is the entire post. Written between...
World History
Kingdom of Heaven
Kingdom of Heaven. I finally saw this movie the other day on DVD. I liked it. It was a well done film with many good battle sequences.
I was a bit put off by the politically correct feel of the movie. This film shows the fall of the Crusader state of Jerusalem. Despite this, the whole theme is of all religions being equal and how no one except a few evil Christians wanted the war. I doubt this was the prevailing feeling at the time the actual war happened. And I am certain there were some Muslims who eyed Jerusalem and wanted to reclaim the city and needed only an excuse to attack the weakened Kingdom of Jerusalem.
I did like this quote given by Balian to the Christian defenders of Jerusalem before the fall of the city. He said, "It has fallen to us, to defend Jerusalem, and we have made our preparations as well as they can be made. None of us took this city from Muslims. No Muslim of the great army now coming against us was born when this city was lost. We fight over an offence we did not give, against those who were not alive to be offended."
We fight over an offence we did not give, against those who were not alive to be offended.
And therein lies the key to much of the conflicts in world history, isn't it? The genocides and ethnic cleansings of history are often people fighting over offenses committed by the dead against those who are also dead. This leads to new injustice and a continuance of the violence and hatred.
We can see it in the world today. All the trouble in the Balkans was started by men fighting over grievances that originated centuries ago. How far does the injustice go back in Palestine on both sides of the conflict? How about Rwanda? How about those demanding slave reparations in the USA for those who were never slaves from those who never owned them?
Wouldn't it be nice if people would judge people based on the actions they have taken rather than the actions of their ancestors? What is important is not our DNA or our religion but each of us our own individual character. We are not responsible for the actions of the dead in times before we were alive and we are not owed anything because of injustices taken against the dead before we were born.
OK, that is the end of the sermon. I wish for a world that probably will never be. Except in the Kingdom of Heaven...
- When Did The American Civil War End? Disney Does Not Know
I watched the Disney movie National Treasure: Book of Secrets the other day. It was a good (but not great) film I enjoyed watching. However, it had a major historical inaccuracy that was not in any way needed to advance the plot which I found annoying....
- The Last King Of Scotland
I finally had a chance to the see The Last King of Scotland last night. This movie was released last year. It won Forest Whitaker an Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. The movie follows the adventures of Scottish...
- The History Of Plumbing - Jerusalem
The History of Plumbing - Jerusalem. This is an interesting history of the holy city from the perspective of plumbing. It describes the construction of the water system of the ancient city, from 1200 BC through the Herodian era. It also covers ancient...
- Where Are You In The Seven Billion?
From Freetech4teachers.com, I found this fun site that shows you where you lie in terms of how many people were alive when you were born. I hold the distention of being the 3,230,700,582nd person alive on earth when I was born and the 77,053,916,357th...
- Dead Sea Scrolls Online
Above is a video briefly detailing the dead sea scrolls and Google's successful job of getting them online. Below is part of a post by Google explaining what you can see. If you are interested, here is the entire post. Written between...