Monthly Archives: June 2006

The following is a documentary produced by a group of students Multimedia University Cyberjaya, Malaysia, featuring opinions from various Muslim women about how they feel about the hijab (or the tudung as it is known in Malay) and streamed from YouTube. It portrays a very good side of Islam that is rarely shown to a Western audience. We feel that this documentary does a good job of dispelling the misconception that Muslim women are “oppressed” when the donn the hijab.

Most of the conversation was done in Bahasa Melayu, but it is subtitled in English….Read More

Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, authors of The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception, argue that a pacifistic Jesus was very unlikely. As the authors point out, Qumranian phrases flowed from his lips, sometimes word for word. Traditionally, scholars concede that at least some Zealots made up Jesus inner circle. The Bible itself reveals him acting in a Zealot-like way, driving the money changers out of the Temple. He states in the gospels: “I am come not to bring peace, but a sword”. In the same vein, when a cohort of Roman soldiers comes for him in Gethsemane, Peter raises his sword against them, hardly the act of a meek Christian. As revealing is the number of soldiers in a Roman cohort, six hundred. Why send six hundred soldiers except in anticipation of armed resistance? And crucifixion, remember, was the method of execution for rebels, not rabbis. These biblical events, in conflict with Christian tradition, do not conflict with the Qumran context. On the contrary, they fit….Read More