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+====== History and My Life ... ======
-Monday, Oct 25, 2019.
+Monday, Nov 25, 2019. How important is history for my life? Is it really important what
+happened 150 years ago? Is it important for me what happened 140 years ago? What about things
+which took place much longer ago, about 1000 AD, or perhaps 1900 AD?
+Let us have a look at the meaning of history to us today. History is important for
+several reasons. Of course, not everyone needs to have his or her main focus on history.
+Still, it is good to see how the things which we use today on a daily basis came into
+being.
 {{2019:2019_11_25.jpg }}
-**  ... **
+**  Events which bear Meaning ... **
+There are events which still have a meaning today, since they are the origin of things which
+are important to us. For example, in about 1870 the German engineer Siegfried Marcus built the
+first gasoline powered combustion engine, and after similar inventions by Nicolaus August Otto
+and Rudolf Diesel, in 1885, Karl Benz developed a petrol or gasoline powered automobile and created
+several copies. The beginning of the automobile industry, which is covering the whole globe
+today. When you see a car, the question of how this car was invented - and perhaps also
+why it is as it is, is quite natural.
+We all use mobile phones today. The electromagnetic waves, which are the basis of the
+whole communication, have been discovered 1886 by Heinrich Hertz in Karlsruhe, Germany. After
+their mathematical prediction by the Scottish Mathematician James-Clerk Maxwell about 20 years
+before. When I plan my own action, it is good to know how things have developed.
+About 1000 AD is the start of the reign of king David in ancient Israel. About 1900 was
+the time when Abraham traveled from Ur in Mesopotamia to Canaan, the country where today
+you find Palestine and modern Israel. These dates are also important to us, since David
+is one of the most popular figures of history, and Abraham is known as father of three
+big world religions.
+"Where do I come from" is one of the key human questions. We are trying to make sense of
+our life, we try to understand the patterns and lines of development of our world and
+ourselves. Thus, history is one of the core lines of exploration of mankind. It is our
+curiosity which makes us ask the question: where does this come from? How did it evolve?
+History and its exploration is one of the core human needs!
+{{ 2019:2019_11_25_2.jpg}}
+** Bible and History ... **
+The historical questions are also important when it comes to the biblical texts. The bible,
+this old book, also asks questions of history. It wants to know where the world came from.
+It tries to understand the development of mankind. And it asks where Jesus came from -
+this special human, who is the center and focus of the whole New Testament. The New Testament
+starts with a historical line of reasoning:
 <color #aa0000>
-This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham
+This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham.
 </color> (Matthew 1,1)
-{{ 2019:2019_11_25_2.jpg}}
+Jesus is the Messiah. This refers to the prophetic books of the Old Testament, which talk
+about the coming of a special human, who is filled with God's holy spirit. But before there
+is more about this Jesus, the gospel of Matthew starts with history.
-**  ... **
+Jesus is the son of David. He is the son of Abraham. When you read on, you will find the
+natural line from Abraham to David, and from David to Joseph, the husband of Mary, who
+was the mother of Jesus. We are taken into a real historical line, with real historical
+people. The New Testament starts with history, with reality, with human birth, sons
+and daugthers.
+We need to remark here, that "son of David" is more than a term with respect to the
+line of descendants. It is also a title, the title of this special man the prophets talk
+about - the title of him who is the center of human history. Also "son of Abraham" bears
+a lot of meaning. It is about him who lives in the spirit of Abraham, the spirit of
+faith and trust.
+It is worth to note that history is important for the biblical writers. They aimed to be
+historically correct. History is a core subject of the bible - with all its historical
+books and historical parts in basically each and every book. History is also the framework
+of the biblical books. They do not want to be separated from history. When they talk about
+spiritual things, they see the spirit in the middle of history.
+Of course, since the beginning of the 18th century, a large flood of
+investigations and texts have been published basically questioning each and every statement
+of the biblical texts. This criticism is part of the enlightenment and the development
+of criticism and science in all parts of human life. This needs careful treatment, since
+clearly something is not wrong just because it is investigated or criticised. It can be
+wrong, but it can also be right. Just an accusation does not mean that someone is guilty.
+So it is good to be critical in the original sense, which means to distinguish. We should
+be critical to the topic itself, but also to the critics who claim this and that, which might
+be right or wrong as well. Here, criticism starts to be good and full of fun. Something
+which went through a careful investigation can be the stronger, after being challenged,
+when it survived the heat.
 (Roland Potthast)
-[[http://www.jesusnetwork.eu/en/topics_collection_ix|... further texts]]
+**This is part of the trilogy project "Faith of a Scientist".**
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