A review of “Hinduism” (audiobook)

There are over one billion Hindus in the world. This is more than triple the number of Buddhists. Surprisingly to many Americans, this makes Hinduism the most popular of the world’s Eastern religions. It is surpassed by Christianity and Islam, and even by those who identify (in one way or another) as “non-religious.” But, even when these “non-religious” folks are included, Hinduism would still be the fourth largest religion in the world. That’s part of why I wanted to listen to this audiobook – to hear about this major world religion.

How America and Russia became bitter Cold War enemies

“There are, at the present time, two great nations in the world which seem to tend towards the same end, although they started from different points: I allude to the Russians and the Americans. Both of them have grown up unnoticed; and whilst the attention of mankind was directed elsewhere, they have suddenly assumed a most prominent place amongst the nations; and the world learned their existence and their greatness at almost the same time.”

“Their starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same; yet each of them seems to be marked out by the will of Heaven to sway the destinies of half the globe.”

– Closing two paragraphs of the 1835 portions of Alexis de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America,” Book 1, Conclusion (again, written in 1835)

What are the roots of the rivalry between America and Russia during the Cold War?

In 1700, a war began in Northern and Eastern Europe. It was called the “Great Northern War.” Russia was one of a number of participants in that war. This war lasted for more than twenty years, and only ended in 1721. Its “Treaty of Nystad” is often marked as the beginning of the “Russian Empire.” The Russian Empire was then officially proclaimed later in that same year: 1721. In many ways, this war had facilitated the rise of Russia. In 1722, Russia’s “Peter the Great” introduced the “Table of Ranks.” As Wikipedia puts it, this was “a formal list of positions and ranks in the military, government, and court of Imperial Russia” (see source). This would last for nearly two centuries. In 1776, the United States declared its independence from the British Empire. This independence was then recognized by the mother country in 1783. Thus, the Russian Empire and the United States were born in the same century: the eighteenth century – although the nation of Russia (obviously) had been around for much longer than this massive Empire. The American War of Independence had seen a young John Quincy Adams dispatched to the court of Russia’s “Catherine the Great,” as a secretary to the American diplomat Francis Dana. But the two countries’ histories would soon become parallel in the Napoleonic Wars, which would have a great effect upon both nations.

Peter the Great of Russia

Things to consider if you’re wanting to learn Biblical languages

“If any man speak in an unknown tongue, let it be by two, or at the most by three, and that by course; and let one interpret.”

– The New Testament, “The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians,” Chapter 14, Verse 27 (as translated by the King James Version of the Bible)

This might seem a strange way to begin a blog post about Biblical languages … but most versions of contemporary Islam require their adherents to learn Classical Arabic. This is because they are expected to read the Quran in the original. To Muslims, translations of the Quran are not even the “Quran” at all. Reading the “Quran” in English would thus be unsatisfactory to them. Some versions of Judaism have a similar reverence for the Hebrew language, with even the characters of the Hebrew alphabet being considered sacred. By contrast, most Christian religions would be totally fine with their members reading the Bible in translation. More to the point, reading the Bible in translation does indeed count as “reading the Bible” in most Christian denominations.

The caves at Qumran, where the famous Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered

Is college right for me? (It depends)

Which things are best learned in a classroom? Which are best learned somewhere else?

It’s an all-too-common refrain today: “college is good for everyone.” Some tell us that “everyone” should go, and that people are “failing” in life … if they choose not to go. But, if “everyone” is going, it seems to mean a little less if someone does have a degree. Even when the degree is a real one, rather than the fake kind sold by diploma mills, college degrees have nowhere near the value that they once held. More to the point, college is not inherently better for everyone. It is indeed good for some people, but it is not good for others. There are other ways to realize your potential besides going to college. And, although college might be best reserved for people who are unusually smart (as well as academically inclined), many smart people have never set foot in a college classroom. There are other ways to do smart things, and do some great deeds to boot. Some of the greatest minds of history were self-taught, and moved forward on their own willpower without the aid of a formal classroom. Thus, there is certainly a role for self-education. That being said, there may be some other things that can only be learned in a classroom. Laboratory science might be one of these things. You can read about biology and physics, and see videos of chemists using beakers and test tubes. But, unless you perform some laboratory science for yourself, you won’t really learn much about how it actually works. Self-education, although very valuable, can only go so far.

A Crookes tube in chemistry (two views): light and dark

Why I would like to learn Biblical Aramaic

“The king [Nebuchadnezzar] answered and said to the Chaldeans, The thing is gone from me: if ye will not make known unto me the dream, with the interpretation thereof, ye shall be cut in pieces, and your houses shall be made a dunghill. But if ye shew the dream, and the interpretation thereof, ye shall receive of me gifts and rewards and great honour: therefore shew me the dream, and the interpretation thereof.”

– The Hebrew Bible, “The Book of Daniel,” Chapter 2, Verses 5 and 6 (as translated by the King James Version of the Bible) – one of the few parts of the Hebrew Bible to be written in Aramaic, rather than Hebrew

Religious schools are among the most prominent schools (usually at the college level) to offer entire programs in Bible Studies. For example, BYU has a major in “Ancient Near Eastern Studies” (more about that here), which is basically the same thing. Usually, such programs require you to take either Greek, or Hebrew, or both. Hebrew is the primary language of the Old Testament, while Greek seems to be the original language of the New Testament. Many of them will offer a class or two in Aramaic. However, very few of these programs will require their Bible Studies students to take such classes. I should acknowledge that this is perfectly understandable – and maybe even reasonable. This is because Aramaic makes up only 1% of the Old Testament – and far less than 1% of the entire Christian Bible. This, it is often offered as an elective, but is seldom required.

Aramaic inscription from Tayma, containing a dedicatory inscription to the god Salm

What should I study to become a writer?

“Learning to write by trial and error not only calls for patience on the writer’s part, it also taxes the patience of wives, landlords, and creditors. Whenever someone, especially a young person, tells me of an ambition to become a writer, my heart goes out to him or her immediately—and my spirits sink. There is seldom a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, even for those who become established writers eventually—and a lot can happen between now and eventually, like broken marriages, eviction for non-payment of rent, and the like.”

– The economist Thomas Sowell, in “Some Thoughts on Writing” (2001)

Being a writer may have been my most-stubbornly-held childhood ambition. I had this dream from a very early age. I wanted to be a professional writer, and sell popular novels that I hoped would make me a fortune. At that time, I tended to imagine myself writing a science fiction novel of some kind. It’s not unusual for kids to have dreams like this, but it is unusual for people to ever realize such ambitions. Certainly I have never made any significant money from my writings, and I’ve been blogging for more than a decade now.

My interests have largely shifted since I was a kid, since I now tend to write more about history and politics. Readers of this blog are likely to notice this quickly after visiting my blog. It’s possible that my efforts (successful or otherwise) to write good fiction stories as a kid may have helped me in my later efforts to write non-fiction, even though these two genres (obviously) have very different writing styles. The sorts of things that you want to write … may influence your decisions about college. That is, your decisions about what to study in depth, what to study in passing, and even whether to be attending college in the first place. Many different kinds of programs can help you in this endeavor – or, at least, they’re fairly likely to do so if you study them in the right kinds of schools.

So, without further ado, I will now give my thoughts on what college majors (or minors) are most appropriate for aspiring writers. To be clear, there is no guarantee here that you’ll make any money with any of these majors – let alone that you’ll do so as a successful professional writer. But, if you’re interested in writing for a living, here are a few college majors to consider:

Ernest Hemingway, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature

What languages did our Founding Fathers know?

“I was educated at William and Mary college in Williamsburg. I read Greek, Latin, French, Italian, Spanish, and English of course, with something of it’s radix the Anglo-Saxon.”

– Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Joseph Delaplaine (12 April 1817) – which seems to show that Jefferson thus studied what is now known as “Old English” (or, as he calls it here, “Anglo-Saxon”)

Our Founding Fathers were quite a knowledgeable group, who knew many foreign languages

The Founding Fathers of the United States are among the most brilliant collection of individuals in all of world history. Seldom, if ever, has there been such a remarkable collection of talent anywhere else. Our Founding Fathers were particularly well-versed in things like history – particularly that of Ancient Greece (including Athens), the Roman Republic, the Roman Empire, the British Isles, and our own Colonial America. They also studied the greatest Greek and Roman philosophers, as well as relatively modern philosophers from Britain and France, with great skill. They studied prior laws from the British Isles (such as the Magna Carta), and the great British jurists who expounded on those laws. And, if I may offer an opinion, they helped to create the most successful Constitution that the world has ever known. Nonetheless, many of them were also accomplished polyglots, who attained fluency in a notable variety of foreign languages. Here, too, their genius shines through – with both ancient and modern languages.

Thomas Jefferson

To save time here, I’ll be focusing on some of the most prominent of our Founding Fathers

I have covered their accomplishments in these other spheres elsewhere. Thus, I will instead be focusing here on their attainments in the realm of foreign languages. Here as elsewhere, the Founding Fathers’ record can speak for itself, since I will be trying to use their own words here as much as possible. To shorten this discussion, I will focus entirely on some of the most prominent of our Founding Fathers. This will help to keep our discussion to a more manageable length. It will also help to showcase the knowledge of our Founding Fathers, which stands up well to any reasonable standard.

Thomas Jefferson