Pastoral Bible Institute News

Internet Web Page

Today global communication has become fast and cheap. Researchers in every corner of the world can study any topic in depth using the resources of institutions large and small and a network of global communication links known as the World-wide Web. Most religious institutions maintain their own "home page" providing information on their beliefs and practices, together with fast and easy ways to ask questions or make comments.

The Pastoral Bible Institute has just brought up its own "home page" on the web so brethren and others can use our resources in their personal study. Those experienced in using the Internet should point their web browser to:

http://www.heraldmag.org

This is a new activity area for us and we expect to learn more as we gain experience. We begin of course by providing the content of past issues of THE HERALD and other publications we already have in electronic form. We also provide point-and-click access to other Bible Student "home pages" that contain material of interest to those who want to know more about Bible Students.

We invite you to visit us on the web. Send us your comments via e-mail to ThePBI@aol.com or use our toll-free number: 1-888-7-THE-PBI.

New Booklets

The PBI continues to distribute special booklets we think may be of interest to our readers. Two new ones are now available: When Pastor Russell Died published by the Dawn Bible Students Association and Comfort & Consolation published by the Chicago Bible Students.

When Pastor Russell Died recounts the events within the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society following the death of Bro. Russell. Truths he taught were soon changed, then changed again as control over the Bible Student ecclesias became centralized at Society headquarters in Brooklyn.

Comfort & Consolation offers hope to the bereaved who may not know why we die, the state of the dead, or how God's love and mercy will heal broken hearts.

Both booklets are free and are available now.

Special Holiday Promotion

This issue we are announcing our first-ever discount policy for gift subscriptions. Send us three gift subscriptions at the usual cost of $5 each and your own subscription will be extended one year free. Think about those who would enjoy the bi-monthly visits of THE HERALD. Your thoughtfulness will be remembered all through the coming year.

Letters

The articles in THE HERALD are sources of much encouragement and knowledge along my way. How blessed it is to know that the Kingdom is near and the promised blessings will come to the troubled world. May God bless all of you as you dispense praise to the name of our Loving God and His beloved son.

Lois Adams, Idaho

Around the World

For decades, The Middle East has been dominated by oil. But most of the excitement lately has been over natural gas. Middle East countries, some of them facing dwindling crude-oil reserves, are placing huge bets on gas-export plans to replace oil revenues. "In the 80s, we learned our lesson, not to put all our eggs in one basket," says Abdulla Al-Attiyah, Qatar's minister of energy and industry. The growing competition over gas could increase Middle East tensions. Worries include political struggles over the gas fields. Countries directly competing for financing and customers are considering multi-billion dollar projects, and they are undercutting each other by sacrificing relationships. Gas deals tightly bind selling and buying countries because it is difficult for buyer's factories and power plants to find an alternate source if supply is disrupted.

Wall Street Journal, 8/11/97

Continued violence in Kenya has threatened the stability of the currency on world markets. International Monetary Fund officials blamed the breakdown on the government's failure to take adequate measures to tackle corruption. Land shortage and ethnic rivalries have led to some of Kenya's worst political violence. In 1991, in the run-up to the country's first multi-party elections, some Kanu politicians began calling for what amounted to ethnically pure homelands and so-call Kanu zones. The result was a spate of clashes involving firearms, spears, arrows and machetes. Over 1,500 died.

Financial Times, 8/19/97

The U.S. is making inquiries in Moscow about seismic indications that Russia might have set off a nuclear device. Underground nuclear tests were banned under an international treaty. While indications suggested an underground explosions was touched off near the island of Novaya Zemiya, earthquakes or volcanic activity have not been ruled out.

Associated Press 8/28/97

Israel

The Forrest Garb Associates in Dallas, Texas, a firm of international petroleum experts which assists over 120 energy companies and governmental agencies, among them Exxon, Mobil and the U.S. Department of Justice, has determined that the Givot Olam Oil Company in Israel has discovered an area in central Israel which belongs to the same petroleum system found in Syria, Saudi Arabia and Algeria.

In an exclusive interview with THE JEWISH PRESS last week, the directors of Givot Olan, Shmuel Becker, an Israeli lawyer, and Mr. Tovia Luskin, a noted geologist, said that based on previous drills which produced good quality oil, and based on a comprehensive geological review of the area, "We are now going to drill a second well. We will then test the geological structure . . . [to determine how much oil and gas it contains]."

The Jewish Press, 9/18/97

Israel and Iran are conducting secret talks to reduce military tensions and to resolve Israel's debt of as much as $1 billion to Tehran. The election of Mohammed Khatami as Iran's president has improved chances of a successful dialogue, sources say. A change is about to take place in the way the government is thinking about Israel, said a source close to Khatami. Israel would repay the funds in the form of private investment.

Jerusalem Post, 9/6/97

The founder of the radical Islamist movement Hamas, Abdel-Aziz Rantisi, defended the recent double suicide-bomb attack on a Jerusalem market which killed sixteen by saying "It was against the occupiers of our country." Mr. Rantesi's views on Israel have hardened over the years since he founded Hamas in 1987. Along with 412 other Hamas supporters, he was deported to the south Lebanese border in 1992 and later held for more than three years in Israeli administrative detention. Rantisi said, "We want to cooperate with Arafat but not under the umbrella of the Oslo accords. The Palestinian Authority are our brothers." Civil war within Palestinian controlled areas could erupt if the peace process does not produce results.

Financial Times, 8/29/97

German companies are employing historians to lay before the world their Nazi pasts in the hope of earning the kind of public relations reprieve managed by the company that was a Hitler favorite—Volkswagen. Hugo Boss was the latest company to come under scrutiny when it was forced to acknowledge that it was responsible for designing the black uniforms of Hitler's SS. Marketing analyst Thomas Niedert said that the company must acknowledge its involvement in the Third Reich if they want to avoid being associated with the Nazis. Multi-billion dollar lawsuits are being brought by Nazi victims against companies that supported and profited by the activities of the Third Reich. Historian Hilmar Koppar said it is no coincidence that the change is coming on the heels of a $20 billion lawsuit brought against Switzerland's biggest bank for hoarding assets taken away from Jews during World War II.

Bloomberg Business News, 9/7/97

Baruch Cohen has no interest in getting a job even though he has a wife and eight children at home. He and other men belong to the haredim–ultraorthodox Jews of many sects. They are the fastest-growing segment of Israel's population and its biggest class of welfare recipients. "We are serving God through study," Cohen explains. "He will provide so long as we continue to do his will. There is no reason to worry." Other Israelis do worry, however, because it's not just God who is being asked to support Cohen and his family. According to a study just released by Hebrew University, no developed nation between 1970 and 1993 had a smaller share of 25-to-54-year-old males in the work force than did Israel. The study found nearly 15 percent of Israeli children living in homes where prime-aged males did not work. Haredi growth outstrips the government's ability to help. The resentment [over welfare payments to the Haredi] is an important element in a religious-secular conflict over what kind of country Israel should be.

U.S. News & World Report, 7/28/97

Ha'aretz newspaper reported that Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli Prime Minister assassinated in 1996, agreed to negotiate a complete return to Syria of the territories Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war. The understanding would have involved Israel giving up land in exchange for full peace, and Syria's acceptance of Israeli demands on security arrangements. Talks between Israel and Syria were held in January 1996. Current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has resisted Syria's demand that talks should be resumed from the point at which they left off.

UPI 8/28/97

Islam

Demands by ethnic Albanians for greater rights erupted into conflict in July after the government sent special forces to take down flags flying outside the town hall. Police shot dead two young people and a third man was beaten and later died from injuries. The Moslem Albanians say they live in a regime of terror. Growing inter-ethnic violence create an atmosphere similar to Bosnia. "I am convinced that if what is happening in Albania today happens in Macedonia, the Balkans will go up in flames," said Kiro Gligorov, Macedonia's president.

Financial Times, 7/22/97

Attackers massacred at least 300 people in an Algerian village, slitting their throats, decapitating them and burning their bodies in the worst such attack since an Islamic insurgency began five years ago. The attackers were described as hooded and armed with knives and axes, and spent five hours in the village of Rais in the Sidi Moussa region. They placed the decapitated heads of some of the victims on the doorsteps of their homes. Authorities have attributed such attacks in the past to the Armed Islamic Group, the most violent of the Muslim militant factions. The group is seeking to establish an Islamic regime in Algeria. Since then, about 1,500 people have been slain.

Bloomberg News, 8/29/97

Hundreds of Bosnian Muslims who had returned to their prewar homes in the town of Jajce were forced to flee again as Croatian crowds threatened violence. Although the leaders of the two factions have attempted to stop ethnic violence, little success has been achieved.

Bloomberg News, 8/7/97

Christendom

The Supreme Court struck down a federal law intended to protect religious practices from government interference. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act, passed with broad bipartisan support and the backing of the President, said governments can infringe on religious practices only if they have a health, safety or other interest in doing so. Since its passage, the law has been invoked in a broad range of emotional disputes. Within hours of the ruling, congressional and religious leaders vowed to fight the decision. The law could have impact on minority faiths. People could be prohibited from praying Arabic, Kikh Little League players could be required to remove their turbans, evangelical students could be obliged to attend classes on evolution. "It'll first start happening to minority faiths," said Oliver Thomas, counsel on religious liberty for the National Council of Churches. Before the act was passed, Hmong families in Rhode Island were unable to prevent autopsies of dead relatives, although they believe such a procedure destroys the possibility of everlasting life.

Washington Post, 6/26/97

The nation's largest Lutheran church lifted Reformation-era condemnations against the Roman Catholic Church, and decided to try again to establish closer ties with the Episcopal Church. Delegates to the biennial Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to approve a statement declaring that both Catholics and Lutherans agree all persons depend on the grace of God–and not human merit–for their salvation. The church overwhelmingly endorsed a Lutheran-Catholic declaration on justification by faith alone. The church said 16th century condemnations of Catholic teachings in Lutheran confessions no longer apply. Delegates voted against a pact that would closely link the Episcopal Church. They decided to pursue a two-year process of discussion instead.

Washington Post, 8/20/97

Science

Experts fear floods and drought will make its way across the globe this coming year. The disastrous recent flooding in central Europe and the worsening drought in North Korea and central China may both be due to what scientists are calling the "climate event of the century." Climate experts attending a three day international conference on climate research said that the "El Nino" phenomenon that began in early summer could surpass that of 1982-83 which claimed nearly 2,000 lives and damaged crops and property worth $20 billion dollars. "El Nino" is a term given to the Christ Child, and now refers to the irregular appearance of warm surface water in the pacific off the western coast of South America that affects global wind and rainfall patterns. In July, the water temperature was 4 to 5 degrees above normal. Although scientists have made huge strides in predicting the occurrence and climatic effects of El Nino, they still do not know what triggers its appearance, or influences its strength. However, it appears to be increasing in frequency and dimension, raising suspicions that they may be related to global warming.

Financial Times, 8/28/97

Leading scientists are being pressured to pin down the threat of climate change to specific parts of the world. Scientific uncertainty is the crux of an international dispute over what should be done to tackle the problem. Scientists fear that increasing emissions of gases including carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels are causing damaging changes in temperature and rainfall. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has estimated that temperatures could rise by 1 to 3.5 degrees centigrade over the next century if the world carries on emitting greenhouse gases at the current rate. Consequences could range from increased drought in some countries to increased flooding in others.

Environmental News, August, 1997

Book Review

The Bible Code, Michael Drosnin, Simon & Schuster, 1997

[Note: Most book reviews that appear here are from the News & Views editor. However, because of the popularity of this book even among Bible Students, we thought it appropriate to publish this extract from reviews by Ronald S. Hendel and Shlomo Sternberg published in the August 1997 Bible Review.]

This book is based on a paper published in the journal Statistical Science describing a computer program to search for words hidden in the traditional Hebrew text of Genesis. What would happen if the text was considered as a string of letters with no breaks between words? Would the names of famous medieval rabbis be spelled out by letters an equal number of letters apart? In fact they were. The authors claimed that the number of matches found was much greater than what could be expected by chance alone.

Drosnin takes this work further by expanding his search to all five books of Moses. He attempts to show that by this system one can see predictions of future events. Featured on the cover is one of these: the assassination of Israeli prime minister Yitzak Rabin. In this example the computer found that if you take every 4772^nd letter in the Hebrew text, the name Yitzak Rabin can be found. The letters appear in Deuteronomy. Drosnin claims that Rabin's name is crossed with the words "assassin that will assassinate" but in fact the verse says nothing about assassins or assassinations. It deals with cities of refuge where those guilty of accidental manslaughter may flee. Drosnin mistranslates Deuteronomy 4:41,42, which reads, "a slayer who happens to have killed" as "assassin that will assassinate." With this method, it is pretty clear you can predict anything.

The claim is made that the biblical text being used is "?the original Hebrew version of the Old Testament, the Bible as it was first written." More than this, Drosnin states that "all Bibles in the original Hebrew language that now exist are the same letter for letter." This statement is false. We do not have the original Hebrew version of the Old Testament and all ancient manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible that we do have differ in the number of letters. This is a fatal problem for a computer program that relies on the manipulation of exact numerical sequences of letters. Which manuscript or edition should be used?

Because the Bible in Drosnin's computer is not the original text, is not in "God's own handwriting," these claims are based on false assumptions and are, in short, a hoax.