The Myth of Exodus Essay -- Holy Bible Essays

The Myth of Exodus There be many themes running through the Old Testament myth of Exodus slavery, rescue and redemption, guidance, commandments on how to live, the creation of a nation, and Gods power over other gods. In this paper I will seek what appears to be the chief reasoning behind the creation of the Exodus myth the explanation of the creation of a monotheistic religion and the similarities of the Exodus myth to the old-fashioned myths, as well as how one should approach the reading of the myth.First of all, we need to understand what a myth is. William Bascom says in his essay, The Forms of Folklore Prose Narratives, Myths are prose narratives which, in the bon ton in which they are told, are considered to be truthful accounts of what happened in the remote past (Dundes 9). Trying to prove the elements in the myth as factual are contrary to the very existence of the myth. In reading Old Testament Bible myth, the question of divine inspiration versus historical truth is often debated. A myth makes a valid statement about the origins of the world, of society and of its institutions, about the gods and their relationship with mortals, in short, about everything on which human existence depends (Graf 3). Further, the context in which the myth was written must be taken into account when reading the story. Bronislaw Malinowski in his essay The Role of Myth in Life says that The text, of course, is extremely important, scarce without the context it remains lifeless (Malinowski 201). The context that needs to be addressed when reading the myth are the cultural and sociological components that surround a fab text. This context, consisting of the understanding of the culture in which the myth exte... ...map of proper behavior for the new society that has been liberated from slavery. Within the context of history, the myth offers future generations a glimpse of a new religions beginnings. As the new code of laws is set into place, a new and more powerful god emerges a god of great strength, a god that supersedes all other gods, one god above all others. Works Cited Coogan, Michael D., ed. The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 3rd Ed. New York Oxford University Press, 1991. Dalley, Stephanie. Myths from Mesopotamia. New York Oxford University Press, 1989. Dundes, Alan, ed. Sacred Narrative Readings in the Theory of Myth. LA University of California Press, 1984. Graf, Fritz. Greek Mythology An Introduction. Maryland The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987. Segal, Robert A. Theorizing About Myth. Amherst University of Massachusetts Press, 1999.

California Missions †Monuments or Tombstones? Essay -- Exploratory Es

California Missions Monuments or Tombst nonpareils?Most Californians are introduced to the California Mission system in one of two ways in their early education, or when they first visit a mission. Unfortunately, both methods are prone to simplification or bias in conveying the bill of the missions. What this has led to is Californians who are ignorant of the history of the land they walk on. Consequently, visitors to the missions treat them as mere tourist attractions, instead of trying to wring and understand the complex issues the missions represent.The issue was brought sharply into focus for me recently, when I was in the cemetery of Mission Santa Barbara. It was a sunny afternoon and the tiny graveyard was herd with stack. I stood in that respect and took in the scene around me. I saw children eating candy bars and dropping the wrappers on the ground. A group of populate were shouting across the cemetery to their companions, something about a tour bus. I could hear the hu mming of the soda machines on the other side of the wall. A cleaning woman was having a loud conversation on a cell-phone about her lunch. A man knocked me aside in his rush to get a photo of himself stand next to a statue of St. Francis.And there I stood, in the middle of it all, with the bodies of nearly four thousand Chumash beneath my feet. I didnt know whether to scream or cry. Dont you people know what you are walking on? Dont you know there are no grave markers because people were dying too fast for individual sculpt? I could almost feel the souls of the Chumash and the padres crying out. Dont these people know what this place is? The sad truth is, they dont know. And how could they?Californian kids usually study the missions in the third or... ...the soldiers and rancheros who lived there as well. The missions arent unless sugar cube churches. They are the place where one people had a sincere, yet terribly misguided goal of helping and integrate another people. Instead of helping and including them, they dominated and destroyed them. It is crucial for us to treat the missions as more than buildings to visit. We must envision the inhabitants thoughts, feelings and lives. We do this not just because it is history, but because it is our history. This is what happened on the land we walk on when we visit the Missions. We shouldnt keep walking in ignorance.Elementary schools and the missions themselves need to present more of the actual history to people. It is only with that knowledge that visitors will truly appreciate and respect the missions for the valuable lessons and grave costs they represent.

Incest in Kings Row :: essays research papers

Shady characters permeate this film, but they can be easily forgotten under the thick melodrama that sweeps you into the storyline. Perhaps the most disturbing character to me was Dr. lift. I mean, really, who is this guy? From the beginning I could detect a kind of strange combat-ready between Cassie and her father. After she and Parris swim together as children, she says that if her father finds out shes been swimming with Parris, he would "take a switch" to her. At branch I thought maybe he was strict nearly her coming straight home from school or something, but as soon as I heard nigh the mother staying in the home all of the time, it became more clear. Cassies mother was not insane or ill but a victim of a possessive man. By confining his wife and daughter to the home, he isolated himself, making himself unknown to anyone else in the town. As in either small town people talked in Kings Row, and Dr. Tower avoided a lot of this gossip by not allowing anyone into or out of his home. Even at Cassies birthday party, the guests were all outside, and when Parris enters the house to thank Dr. Tower, he is quickly shooed away to go home. Did anyone else think of Forrest Gump here? I had to think of Forrest and Jenny as children and how much their interactions were resembling that of Cassie and Parris. Both little girls had dark and deep secrets they were victims of incest. Cassie is pulled out of school and is not allowed to leave the house. She is timid, skiddish, and cannot look Parris in the eye when he visits their home. Dr. Tower would like us to believe that she has gone insane, as he claims his wife was, and even Parris buys this. I almost wanted to scream when Parris says, "He mustve known about us," commenting on Dr. Tower murdering his daughter and commiting suicide in order to prevent Parris from living a life with a psychotic wife. Yes, Dr. Tower did know about Parris and Cassie. He knew they had a sexual relationship, and that is why he killed Cassie. Perhaps the biggest clue was when Cassie comes screaming to Parris in the middle of the night for help and then refuses his entreat to walk her home. She probably knew that if Parris came home with her, her father, knowing about their relationship, would kill him as well.