This blog is famed for the cordiality of its discourse, a reputation somewhat marred with some of our heated political discussion. I think our political debates are better than those at most sites, but I recognize the concern. Don’t insult the commentator you are debating. No name calling. No viciousness. It’s hard for me to monitor all of the comments, but I’ll start deleting comments I come across that are not up to our standards.

This weekend Cranach will be a political-free zone. No posts on politics. (If you want to discuss the VP debate, feel free. I posted something on that late last night that invites your comments. If you want to talk about the impending bailout, do that too on yesterday’s posts.) We will get back at it next week in discussions that generate light and not just heat.

Well, the Cubs and the Brewers are both one game away from elimination.

My team, the Brewers, lost to the Phillies 5-2 after super-pitcher C. C. Sabathia gave up those five runs in the second inning. That was only his third loss in his half-season for the Brewers. This was his fourth consecutive start on only three days rest.

I have this against my team: They did not treat Sabathia ethically. Yes, they just “rented” him in a desperate and successful move to get to the playoffs. They picked him up from Cleveland because after this season he is a free agent and neither team would be able to afford him. Arguably the best pitcher in baseball right now, he may bring around $150 million on the open market. If that is, he doesn’t blow out his arm.

If he does, that wouldn’t matter much to the Brewers, who only have him for this season. So the Brewers had him pitch a league-leading 253 innings and a league-leading 7 complete games. And then for the playoff run the Brewers started him on only three days rest four times in a row.

Yes, Sabathia was both willing and eager to do so, which only shows his heroic stature. But his team did not show his class. We are not supposed to use people up and then throw them away.

Feel free to bring up other playoff-related thoughts this weekend. . . .

The London Telegraph reports that as part of a new crackdown on Christianity, China is banning public performances of classical music that carries a Christian theme:

Musicians and tour organisers have told The Daily Telegraph that a series of significant performances have been affected amid a tightening of political control over the arts and Christianity.

Among the victims are the Academy of Ancient Music, one of Britain’s leading orchestral and choral groups, which was invited to sing The Messiah at the Beijing International Music Festival in October.

The performance will go ahead but has been made “by invitation only” to get round the ban.
Ironically, among the invitees are members of the Politburo and other senior government leaders.

The Sinfonica Orchestra di Roma has dropped plans to play Mozart’s Requiem in the Sichuan earthquake zone in honour of the dead and to raise money for survivors. It will play a programme of smaller, mostly non-religious works instead.

At least one other performance of The Messiah has been cancelled and one of Verdi’s Requiem is under threat.

Zondervan is promoting the NIV with a bus that is going around getting people to write out a verse by hand until the whole Bible is written out in the handwriting of ordinary people. Then the result will be published. From Publisher puts ‘NIV’ Bible in Americans’ handwriting:

Now Americans coast to coast will have a chance to hand-copy a verse of Scripture to appear in a special edition of the New International Version of the Bible, known as the NIV.

To mark the 30th anniversary of the NIV, which has sold 300 million copies worldwide, publisher Zondervan launches a campaign today to create the unique edition, which will include its 31,173 verses, each handwritten by a different person.

A huge blue RV with the logo “BibleAcrossAmerica.com” splashed on its side and “Inspiration at every turn” on its back takes off on a five-month journey bringing “writing stations” to 90 stops in 44 states at churches, landmarks and popular settings such as NASCAR races.

“Before the Gutenberg (the first Bible printed on a printing press), they were all handwritten,” says Zondervan’s Steve Sammons. “In our digital age, we lose sight of what it means to have a tangible product we create by our hands. This will truly make the NIV America’s Bible.”

But. . .but. . .the hand-copied Bibles before the printing press were beautiful acts of devotion and praise! Here is a project that is more like it.

Do you see any problems with Zondervan’s hand-written-by-the-people Bible? Will you buy it, read it, and use it in your devotions?

Archeologists have discovered two clay seals bearing the names of two courtiers mentioned in the Bible who opposed the prophet Jeremiah. From Clay seal connects to Bible :

“It is not very often that archaeologists have surprises that bring them so close to the reality of the biblical text,” said Eilat Mazar, whose pinpoint dig in a relatively small site this summer led her to a clay bulla whose ancient Hebrew script identifies its owner as Gedalyahu ben Pashhur.

Speaking to an enthusiastic audience of 1,500 Israelis who converged on the Palestinian-Arab Silwan quarter, known as Kfar Hashiloah, or Siloam in the Bible, Mrs. Mazar said, “One could not have asked anything more than this.”

Ben Pashhur’s name is cited in the Book of Jeremiah 38:1 together with that of Yehuchal ben Shelemayahu, whose bulla was discovered at the same site two years ago.

The two were ministers in the court of King Zedekiah, the last king from the Davidic dynasty to reign in Jerusalem. His reign, from 597 to 586 B.C., ended with the Babylonians’ destruction of the First Temple on nearby Mount Moriah.

Because both bullae were perfectly intact and their inscriptions easily legible by anyone familiar with the ancient Hebrew script, Gabriel Barkay, one of Mrs. Mazar’s veteran colleagues, surmised they were attached to documents that were burned, possibly during the Babylonian siege, but that they survived because they were made of clay.

“They were baked and thereby preserved in mud and silt, which could be dissolved in water,” he said. The two bullae resemble each other except for the names they bear.

Mrs. Mazar said the two courtiers opposed the prophet Jeremiah’s pleas to Zedekiah that Judea surrender to the Babylonians.

“They wanted him executed,” she said, “but the king refused.” Jeremiah was imprisoned twice and confined to a pit. Ultimately, they asked him to pray for the kingdom.

It is the first time in the annals of Israeli archaeology that two 2,600-year-old clay bullae with two biblical names that appear in the same biblical verse have been unearthed in the same location, she said.

The legislature of Iran is considering a bill that would the death penalty on Muslims who convert to Christianity or other religions. From EU Pressures Iran to Drop Apostasy Bill:

The draft apostasy bill being debated in Iran was initially approved at a first stage vote by the Iranian parliament on Tuesday, September 9, with 196 votes for, seven against, and two abstentions. The bill, named the Islamic Penal Code, is currently due to be sent back to the Legislative Commission for amendments before being brought before the Iranian parliament for a further vote.

For more details go here.