Ha!

Worth saying though, even the "biblically accurate angel" meme (funny as it is) is generally wrong. The weird things covered in eyes are not called "angels" in the bible, they're variously called .. (deep breath) .. seraphim, cherubim, ophanim, chayot ha kodesh, erelim, or hashmallim. English translations generally call these "heavenly creatures".

Messengers ("angels") in the old testament look like regular people too.

[-] FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world 35 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

So, probably not quite what you meant but I find annoying nonetheless.. Bible translation

It's almost impossible to find an English translation that doesn't allow tradition to seriously skew how ideas are presented. And I say this as a secular scholar (and someone who recognises that the oldest greek text we have is very very very old). Messing with the translation just leaves it open to criticism unnecessarily.

Here are some examples...

An "angel" in the new testament is not a distinct thing. The word simply means "messenger" and was the mundane, every day, word for messenger. It was the word used if someone came from the next town over to tell you something in person. Without any of our cultural baggage added on top the angel Gabriel appearing to Mary is - on face value - Mary being surprised to encounter a man who told her things. Same for Zechariah (both in Luke 1). It's only when you get to the shepherds the field that the messenger is accompanied by a heavenly glow. But this idea that they're perfect beings clad in white with wings is completely absent from the text and, imho, promulgated by the persistent use of the word "angel" when it should simply say "messenger". (The NT itself goes on to say people have had such messengers as guests in their homes without realising, implication being they often look and sound like regular people. Hebrews 13:2)

Same for "baptism". This is also a traditional translation of the completely mundane word "immersion". It's translated that way to retain the idea of baptism as a distinct church idea. But the text literally says "John the Immerser" not John the Baptist. And he stood in the river Jordan immersing people. Which gives a very plain mundane view of what was happening - he was dunking people in the water as a purification rite - something that already existed in Judaism. The traditional translation is used so that churches can wedge in their own view of what baptism is - say, a delicate sprinkling of water from a font or some such.

Even the word "church" itself. The church in the new testament is never a building. It means "assembly" (of people). So the "church" can meet anywhere, and in fact met in houses or sitting on the ground in the temple courts. Allowing a special Christianised word like "church" to be used instead of the mundane translation "assembly" let's people think whatever they want to picture church as instead of what the text is directly saying.

While we're on that, Jesus' name is actually Joshua (if we want to be consistent) and his mum is Miriam. Names that are far too obviously Jewish and connected to the old testament, so we get a traditional rendering of "Jesus" and "Mary" and so on which makes them all sound a lot more white Anglo Saxon.

In a similar vein "testament" is just a weird translation of "covenant" which itself is just a religious way of rendering the word "pact" or "agreement". The old testament is a pact between God and the Jewish people made through Moses. When the plain meaning is made clearer then other meanings shine through more clearly, namely, the behaviour standards of the old testament "pact" were exactly that, requirements of a pact between God and the Jews. They were never universal requirements that the Jews were supposed to go out and make the rest of the world follow. This translation choice is used by the modern church to obscure the fact that the old testament moral codes were a distinctly Jewish thing - because the modern church would like to piggy back on Leviticus when it suits its narrative.

Finally, the word "Bible" itself doesn't appear in the bible. Bible means "library" or collection of writings. It doesn't appear in the any of the writings because none of the Bible writings are self-aware that they're going to be compiled into such a collection. The word "scripture" is used (literally "writing") when Peter's talking about things Paul's written but that's about it. When translated straightforwardly it takes the "holy" shine off things and it's clearer to see these are people making "writings" to communicate with each other or remember things that have happened. A far cry from the "inerrant word of god" that the church traditionally turned the new testament into.

I could go on, but rant over..

(Edit: to be fair the Greek new testament writes Jesus' name as "ee-soo-ss" which sounds closer to Jesus than Joshua but at any rate they're the same name and if old testament Joshua had been around he'd have been called "ee-soo-ss" too. No doubt about Mary though, in the Greek it's written "Mariam", that is, "Miriam", like Moses' sister)

[-] FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world 23 points 12 hours ago

I have never seen so much money spent on something so boring and predictable. Don't get me started on Avatar 2, that was a 3 hour water simulation that still somehow managed to be naff because of annoying cartoony characters.

My pet (very) silly theory is that both were a cover for military investment in fluid dynamics simulations and they had to hide hours of 3d renders and water simulations in plain sight.

[-] FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world 24 points 12 hours ago

That awkward moment when your "public square" turns out to be on private land

[-] FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

I suspect like many basements it doesn't have full head height. Probably requires excavation + foundation work etc.

[-] FourPacketsOfPeanuts@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Fitted out as a one bed / studio this would sell in the low end of £200-300k If you're a property developer 30k for the land actually seems cheap.

(Streatham Rail is about 25 mins from the city of London)

If you sleep with your mouth open, statistically this will happen at least once during your life time

Just select yourself to chat with in Teams (top option in contacts) and put a battery on the delete key like a professional..

Agree. But mine is a question about style as much as anything. It's use in 80s ballads is distinctive. Same key throughout song then a singular upshift for the last verse / chorus. I'm not referring to music that modulates throughout the whole piece, or makes a change near the end having done it in several other places.

Every client I've ever had in the UK has required my service company to have indemnity insurance.

It's even more important if you're a sole trader because your liability is not limited. If you royally screw something up and get sued, all your assets are on the line.

Indemnity insurance covers you to a certain amount (usually 1,5, or 10 million). And working through a limited company further limits you to losing only what's in the company, not your personal assets like your home.

Ah come on, everyone loves to belt out that last verse!

75

Modulation / key changes have been used in music for ages but the style I'm talking about is the distinctive last verse (or chorus) sudden key change up to power through to the end. Seems to have come about sometime in the 60s/70s and was everywhere in the 80s onwards.

Examples:

Heaven is a place on earth - Belinda Carlisle

I will always love you - Whitney Houston

But who popularised it? What was the first big song to do it and set the style for the genre?

27

I seem to be completely failing to work out how to do this? See the reply in your inbox in the context of the original conversation?

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FourPacketsOfPeanuts

joined 1 year ago