:) This is one reason I like Canada

Canadian Affirms Oath of Citizenship on Pagan 'Holy Book'

There is no act more political in nature than making an oath of citizenship to a nation. On Tuesday, Melissa Gold, a Pagan living in Canada did just that. Like many new Canadian citizens, she did so with her hand resting on a book containing stories, poems, and hymns sacred to her religion. What makes this event extraordinary, and possibly a first in North America, is that the book wasn’t a Bible, a Torah, or a Koran – it was a text containing Hesiod and Homer.

In a comparative religion mood, I guess

I've been listening to Jesus Christ, Superstar at work (I had to put it on today--a student was watching an old VHS tape with one of our former doctors on it and his voice was soothing to the point of hypnotic. Rock opera can counteract this immensely.) I had noticed one of my recommended books for the Kindle was an Interlinear Latin-English Vulgate New Testament. It was nice that they credited Jerome as the author. I saw a few New Testaments for the Kindle that had God as the author.

In the interest of being ecumenical, I looked for a good Tanakh (the Jewish scriptures, which are (mostly) the books the Christians call the 'Old Testament'). There were several, although I couldn't find an interlinear Hebrew one (that would have been great). I did find a version of one that we used in class (I was a Judaic Studies minor.) It is considered one of the best modern translations out there.

Next I found a copy of the Qu'ran that was quite reasonable and highly rated. I've never read it (unlike the other two).

I have several of the Indian texts such as the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana, etc. (that collection even came with the Kama Sutra). :) I also have Babylonian, Greek, and Aegyptian texts. So I've got a nice collection of religious texts on the Kindle, most of which were very little price-wise. I love having this sort of thing at my fingertips.

Okay, I'm going to check the news and then do some reading. If I don't get back here tonight, good night.

Great news for scholars

World's oldest Christian Bible goes online

More than 160[0] years ago, a scholar named Constantine Tischendorf came upon a Bible in the Monastery of St. Catherine in the Sinai desert. Recognizing its significance, he took some of the pages away with him to have them published in Germany. He returned again, and again, to take more pages, which wound up scattered in Germany and Russia. Later, some of the pages were purchased by the British Library.

Now the Codex Sinaiticus Project has brought the various pieces of the over 1,600 year-old text together in digitised form online through partnerships with the British Library, the National Library of Russia, St. Catherine's Monastery, and the Leipzig University Library.


Oldest known Bible goes online

World's oldest Christian Bible digitized