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The effect of religion on culture
Essay the book of revelation
The effect of religion on culture
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Harry O. Maier begins chapter three in From Every People and Nation by stating: “the truism that ‘you get out of something what you put into it’ is for biblical texts, nowhere more apt than in the Book of Revelation.” This appeals and invites readers of the Book of Revelation to ask “in what ways is truism associated with the biblical texts, specifically the Book of Revelation?” Such a question can be raised by a non-Christian reader of the Bible and/or a new convert to Christianity, wanting to know why and how he or she should consider the Book of Revelation to be an undoubted truth. This further implicates the understanding of the question “what is truth?,” moreover leaving the reader to deduce its meaning with respect to his or her cultural, …show more content…
This resonated with me, because I identify as a Christian in Pakistan, and as a Pakistani among American Christians. Not only has my identity been seen negatively in both regions of the world, but it has had caused me significant times of feeling out of place. Pakistan is an Islamic country that does not value Christians because of their belief in the Trinity. Christians are considered to worship three gods, whereas American Christians do not think of a Pakistani Christian as one of them because I do not match the standards and accent of American English or American cultural values. One of the dominant differences that I find between the Pakistani and U.S. perspectives, is seeing a person as “the other,” which in the U.S. exists in the form of racial discrimination and prejudice. Historically, both Pakistan and the U.S. have experienced genocides in different forms, Pakistan in 1947 at the time of its independence, and the U.S. during the World Wars. Yet today, persecution against Christians in Pakistan increases yearly. Personally, I see the Book of Revelation with a different lens than Maier. This is to say that the “social location” ]makes me read the Book of Revelation in a particular way claiming
Dinesh D’Souza constructs an argument in his essay “What’s so great about America” that is convincing to the average reader. His essay was published 15 years ago and American culture has seen some changes since then. However, nothing that he mentions specifically in the essay has changed drastically. His extrinsic ethos is strong because he is from India and the audience may perceive that he can compare his knowledge of living elsewhere to an immigrant’s knowledge. This view of looking at America from an outsider’s point of view and how others view living in America is essential in D’Souza’s fundamental argument. He compares living in America to living in other less developed countries and appeals to the common citizen in his style, logic, and development of his essay. His arguments are sound and he convinces the average citizen that America is the best place to live, although his lack of facts and statistics to back up his statements could be seen as a weakness.
I felt like the author could clearly show the true contributing factors of the civil war. As an admirer of history, I could use utilize his book for references later on in my academic studies. The book is 127 pages chronicling the events that led to the civil war. Holt gives novices history readers a wonder firsthand look into the world of young America pre-civil war. His book brought out new ways to approach the study of pre-civil war events. The question whether the Civil War was inevitable or could have been derailed was answered in The Fate of Their Country. Holt places the spotlight on the behaviors Politicians and the many congressional compromises that unintendedly involved the actions of the residents of American. These factors at hand placed the Civil war as inevitable. Most of the politician’s views in The Fate of Their Country were egotistical and shortsighted which left gaps in American’s social future. To consider the subject of why, first we need to understand the contributing causes, America’s great expansion project, the Manifest Destiny the driving factor behind the loss of virtue and political discord.
Much of Revelation is the source of debate. Many passages are symbolic in nature, and the exact meaning of the symbols can be difficult to determine. Some passages can be interpreted in various ways. The identity of the Four Horsemen, the 144,000, and Babylon the Great in particular are points of contention. Nevertheless, proper hermeneutics and careful study can illuminate these difficult passages.
In, “True and Living Word”, Gomes introduces the readers to a variety of topics and attempts to explain how the Bible relates to them. These topics are: The Bible and...The Good Life, Suffering, Joy, Evil, Temptation, Wealth, Science, and Mystery. The Good Life is a slightly more detailed repetition of Gomes’ main point. This section again explains how the Bible is a living text, as it withstands the test of time and applies to all those who read it, and how people are scared of admitting their Biblical illiteracy. Gomes makes a broad statement in this section that everyone feels drawn towards the Bible, subconsciously know it is holy, and want to read it but do not know how. He also states that the Bible is difficult to read and requires great analysis to truly understand it’s message. The other seven sections discuss how the Bible connects to each of them. These seven section are essentially a “crash course” on the Bible’s
A People’s History of the United States, written in 1980 by Howard Zinn, approaches history from a new perspective. Aware that the conquerors write the history books, Zinn wants to show history from the point of view of the victims, those who did not come out as winners. Chapter one covers Columbus, the Indians, and Human Progress. He writes about the native people on the Bahama Islands saying, “[they] were remarkable (European observers were to say again and again) for their hospitality, their belief in sharing” (Zinn 1). He quotes Columbus saying, “‘[the Indians] are so naïve and so free with their possessions that no one who has not witnessed them would believe it. When you ask for something they have, they never say no. To the contrary,
The books starts out with someone writing a journal, he states that it is a sin to write what he is writing because it is a sin to have any thoughts that any of the others do not think. His name is Equality7-2521 and he always refers to himself as “we” or “us”. He explain how he and his “friend”, even though preference of one person over another is not permitted by the Council, find an old tunnel wile doing there job sweeping the street behind the theater. He tells Internationl4-8818 (his friend) to promise not to tell anyone about the tunnel. In this journal he tells how he was different growing up because he was smart, and would question things until his teachers forbade it. He explained how he wanted to be assigned to the Home of Scholars, who developed all the technology for the society, which would be his job for the rest of his life. Instead he was assigned to the House of Street Sweepers.
Each man trying to correct from within were pushed further and outward away from the goal of unity. We would have a different story if it were only one man who rejected the idea of the Church being one with the world. The individual would have been marked as the antichrist. Instead, we see a few men take a stand for what they felt was the truth, which we had strayed. Noted, Campbell has seen the destruction with takes place when man messes with God’s desire for gathering of the Church. Campbell states, “What awful and distressing effects have those sad divisions produced! What aversions, what reproaches, what backbitings, what evil surmisings, what angry contentions, what enmities, what excommunications, even persecution!!!” (Campbell and Thomas) Campbell’s biggest fight was pulling back the reigns of the world. Campbell extends ejecting all human creeds that cause divisions among Christians. He states, “… for their faith must not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power and veracity of God. Therefore, no such deductions can be made terms of communion, but do properly belong to the after and progressive edification of the Church. Hence, it is evident that no such deductions or inferential truths ought to have a place in the Church’s confession.” (Campbell and Thomas) Reaching out to across all divisions, Campbell has to be unprejudiced. “That although the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are inseparably connected, making together but one perfect and entire revelation of the Divine will, for the edification and salvation of the Church, and therefore in that respect cannot be separated.” “From the nature and construction of these propositions, it will evidently appear, that they are laid in a designed subserviency to the declared end of our association; and are exhibited for the express purpose of performing a duty of pervious necessity, a duty loudly called for in
Howard Zinn’s main point in chapter one of A People’s History of the United States is that history is more accurate through the eyes of the oppressed. Zinn states that choosing to ignore the oppressed in history is “...more than technical, it is ideological” (Zinn 5). This is because in not paying attention to the subdued, one also chooses to ignore the majority of history. If the champion is the only one who gets to tell the story it is more often than not missing key details and glorified in favor of the oppressor. An example of this is Columbus’ descriptions of the Arawak people. He describes them as ignorant, naive, and even compares them to animals. In reality the Arawaks were a developed people with advanced laws and traditions. Also
Our other work for comparison is the Bible. Briefly summarized, the Bible’s message is truth about this world we live in. We are told our world is controlled by evil powers in high, spiritual places; “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 6:12). However, the earth and the universe were created by God; “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). The world system was created by man, but inspired by Satan; “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the Gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Corinthians 4:4). This world is full of deception and contains every imaginable lie in the form of philosophies and religions, but persecutes the truth. The people who trust in the world are not willing to be “unplugged” in order to see the truth, and the truth is revealed to those who are searching for it.
N.T Wright (2008) stated that “When we read the scriptures as Christians, we read it precisely as people of the new covenant and of the new creation” (p.281). In this statement, the author reveals a paradigm of scriptural interpretation that exists for him as a Christian, theologian, and profession and Bishop. When one surveys the entirety of modern Christendom, one finds a variety of methods and perspectives on biblical interpretation, and indeed on the how one defines the meaning in the parables of Jesus. Capon (2002) and Snodgrass (2008) offer differing perspectives on how one should approach the scriptures and how the true sense of meaning should be extracted. This paper will serve as a brief examination of the methodologies presented by these two authors. Let us begin, with an
The Birth of a Nation (1915) is one of the most controversial movies ever made in Hollywood, some people even consider it the most controversial movie in the long history of Hollywood. Birth of a Nation focuses on the Stoneman family and their friendship with the Cameron’s which is put into question due to the Civil War, and both families being on different sides. The whole dysfunction between the families is carried out through important political events such as: Lincoln’s assassination, and the birth of the Ku Klux Kan. D.W. Griffith is the director of the movie, and him being born into a confederate family in the South, the movie portrays the South as noble and righteous men, who are fighting against the evil Yankees from the North, who have black union soldiers among them, whom overtake the town of Piedmont, which leads the KKK to take action and according to the movie become the savior of white supremacy. During this essay, I would focus on the themes of racial inequality, racism, and the archetypical portrayal of black people in the movie, which are significant especially during the era when the film was released.
...nature of God, the world, and human beings, the Bible is a source from which a reasonably comprehensive worldview may be constructed. Many narratives or teachings of Scripture speak directly to the various elements of a worldview” (Palmer, pp 93) .
... Aside from power, the recurrent leitmotif is the constant comparisons that Changez makes between America and Pakistan. (‘Lahore, the second largest city in Pakistan, home to as many people as New York...’) Also, he resents the grouping of Islamic identity as one by symbols such as the beard, burqa, etc. Yet, he too homogenizes the American identity to an extent. He frequently describes other Americans as ‘not unlike yourself’ and their actions as ‘just as you are doing now.’
Literalist fundamentalists read Revelation’s multivalent visions as predictions of doom and threat, of punishment for the many and salvation for the elect few. Scholarly scientific readings seek to translate the book’s ambiguity into one-to-one meanings and to transpose its language of symbol and myth into description and facts. In Elisabeth Schûssler Fiorenza’s The Book of Revelation: Justice and Judgment, a third way of reading Revelation is depicted. The collection of essays in this book seeks to intervene in scholarly as well as popular discourses on the apocalypse from a liberationist feminist perspective.
Why do nations fail? This is a topic of popular debate with many economists and a question many scholars have struggled to find an answer to. Global poverty is an issue that economists Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson investigate and provide an alternative insight for in their book: ‘Why Nations Fail’. Acemoglu and Robinson investigate inequalities that exist across countries and why nations are an epitome of success and others, failure. They come up with an alternative explanation for why standards of living differ across countries, and why a gap exists between the rich and poor. The book introduces an example of two cities that are separated by a border: Nogales, Arizona and Nogales, Sonora. On the American side of the border, the income of the average household is $30,000, the population is relatively healthy, and the citizens live prosperously (Acemoglu & Robinson, 2012). On the opposite side of the border in Mexico, majority of the population do not own a high school degree, poor health conditions exist, poor infrastructure and unfortunately, high infant mortality rates (Acemoglu & Robinson 2012). How can situations on opposite borders be so different? The basis for Acemoglu and Robison’ s thesis for this phenomenon is that of institutions. They propose that that there is a strong correlation between economic and political institutions. That is, inclusive political institutions support inclusive economic institutions, and extractive political institutions support extractive economic institutions (Acemoglu & Robinson, 2012). Democratic institutions generally allow opportunities for the majority, leading to positive economic growth. Political institutions that look after a narrow elite is reinforced with stag...