Brit-Am Now 52

"Brit-Am Now"-52

Date: Wed Jul 10, 2002 4:20 am

                 Contents:
                 1. Thank you
                 2. look forward to your web mailings
                 3. Vikings in America
                 4. The German Perspective
                 5. France
                 6. Bible
                 7. Assistance

                 1. Thank you
                 From: Ryno Opperman
                 Greetings Yair
                 Thank you for all your hard work in searching and finding the lost sheep of
                 Yisrael, how rightly such are called the good shepherds of Yisrael

                 2. look forward to your web mailings
                 From: Rusty
                 Subject: G-d Bless Yair

                 Man you have done a lot of work. I look forward to your web mailings
                 everyday. They are the most interesting articles I have ever read. The
                 articles have it all from religious , historical, current events, and
                 scientifical. The article about genes and names was fasinating. G-d has
                 definitly given you a great mind for information and research. Maybe you
                 don't hear this enough but G-d bless you for all your efforts. I have been
                 reading a great book and maybe some of your new comers to Brit-Am may like
                 this book for learning about Israelism. It is Biblical Literacy by Rabbi
                 Joseph Telushkin. Its great for people starting to get into the nut's and
                 bolts of Israels great religion. Rabbi Telushkin has many quotes from great
                 Rabbi's and insightful reflections about people and events in the Bible. It
                 has made me look at the Bible with far more insight then ever before. Fast
                 note. G-d bless Yair, G-d bless

3. Vikings in America
 Extracts:
 Geraldine Barnes, Viking America: The First
 Millenium. Woodbridge, Suffolk: D. S. Brewer, 2001.
 Pp. xx, 187. $70.00. ISBN 0 85991 608 1.
 Reviewed by Jens Ulff-Moller
 University of Copenhagen
 ulff@h... or ulf@h...

                 The legendary Viking expeditions to the mythical Vinland
                 around the year 1000 are, without doubt, the most exciting
                 of all the Icelandic saga literature, magnificent tales of
                 'derring-do', recounting a series of violent conflicts
                 between Norsemen and the native peoples of Northern America.
                 Historians have debated the sagas at length and with
                 passion--and, indeed, continue to do so. One burning issue
                 has been the precise intention and nature of the saga texts.
                 Do they present a historical reality or are they instead
                 mere fiction, of little or no intrinsic worth? The
                 discovery, in 1960, by Helge and Anne Ingstad, of a
                 settlement of Norse houses at L'Anse-aux-Meadows at the
                 northernmost tip of Newfoundland, confirmed a Viking
                 presence--but this location was, however, not Vinland, which
                 has never been found.

                 Geraldine Barnes, Associate Professor at the University of
                 Sydney, is a specialist of Middle English and Middle French
                 whose particular areas of interest focus on the literary
                 intentions of those who composed the Vinland sagas, and the
                 post-Medieval reception of these sagas over the past two
                 hundred years.

Barnes debates briefly whether the
 Vinland expeditions qualified as a 'discovery'. As long ago
 as 1929, Dewey in Experience and Nature disqualified
 the Norse expeditions as 'discoveries' on the grounds that
 they lacked global cultural consequences. Considered in
 such stringent terms, only the expedition of Columbus to
 America in 1492 would constitute a discovery, yet the
 discovery of America has continued to be a controversial
 issue, particularly at the centennial anniversaries of this
 event in 1892 and 1992. In contrast to this opinion, the
 archaeological evidence, ignored by Barnes, reveals the
 importance of Norse influence on Eskimos in the extreme
 Arctic who entered a proto-Iron Age, stimulated by the trade
 in iron with the Norse. As Robert McGhee has stated, "The
 relationship between the Norse and aboriginal North
 Americans was clearly more enduring, complex and significant
 than hinted by the few, brief mentions of hostile Scraelings
 in the sagas and annals of Norse exploration" (Scientific
 American Discovering Archaeology, Sept.- Oct. 2000).
 Urs Bitterli, moreover, in Cultures in Conflict,
 considers that "the history of relations between Europe and
 Canada begins with the Viking voyages around AD1000."

After this, Barnes examines the more eccentric fringes of
 Vinland literature. In The Discovery of the Ancient City
 of Norumbega (1889), the archaeologically-aware Eben
 Norton Horsford claimed to have found Vinland in Norumbega
 county west of Boston, and erected a memorial tower in a
 park off South Street, south of Brandeis University. In
 contrast, the interests of J. P. MacLean, and Marie Shipley
 were driven by an ethnic and religious bias, an aversion to
 Viking culture and preference for things Roman, also
 determining how they demonstrated their distaste for native
 peoples. Likewise, Henry Wheaton's History of the
 Northmen (1831) and John S. C. Abbot's The History of
 Maine (1882) also condemn the behavior of the Norsemen
 as worse than that of savages. On the other hand, Charles
 Kingsley, Works (1885), favored the Vikings despite
 their brutality, while Charles Morris in The Aryan
 Race (1892) attributed their brutality to the innate
 nature of the master race.
 The exploration of Vinland in British literature began in
 1819 with the publication of Greenland by the
 Scottish poet, James Montgomery. This work inspired by
 David Crantz's The history of Greenland (London,
 1767), contains one episode which featured the Vinland
 voyages. The publication of R. M. Ballantyne's The
 Norsemen in the West (1872) coincided with the rise of
 competition from the European powers, combined with the
 first stirrings of British anxiety over colonialism.
 Ballantyne, in fact, saw England as the legitimate heir to
 the Viking virtues, in contrast to those he referred to as
 "grotesque, ursine, and infantile Eskimos".

For the
 centennial celebrations, Sydney Lanier wrote The Psalm of
 the West (1892), followed later by Ottilie
 Liljencrantz's The Thrall of Leif the Lucky (1904).
 Barnes might have included the cartoon, Hagar the
 Horrible, details of the Kensington Stone, the supposed
 Viking settlement in the Midwest, a discussion of the
 Vinland Map and much recent historical scholarship on
 Vinland that raises the issue of Vinland in myth and
 reality.
 It may be of interest to add that, while the book was in
 press, the following titles have been published on the
 Vinland question.
 Erik Ingvar Thurin, The American Discovery of the Norse:
 an Episode in Nineteenth-Century American Literature
 (1999).
 Andrew Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians:
 Inventing the Old Norse in Nineteenth-Century Britain (2000).

                 4. The German Perspective
                 According to Brit-Am findings people of Israelite descent at one stage were
                 once numerous in Germany but left in several waves
                 beginning at early times and culminating in the early 19th century.
                 After that time people of Israelite descent remained only a relatively
                 small percent of the German population but some did remain.
                 At the end of World War II Germany needed to survive as part of the western
                 world. Germany needed to adopt a veneer of Western values
                 and to mitigate the bad impression left by the Nazi legacy. For this
                 purpose Germany had need of leaders of appropriate outlook.
                 The leaders at both the political and cultural levels had to both represent
                 Germany as a western nation and to believe in what they were representing.
                 The leaders who were chosen may well have therefore been genuine and may
                 have represented a small remnant of Israelite origin.
                 Adenauer for instance in his youth had led a movement advocating that the
                 Ruhr region leave Germany and attach itself to France.
                 The leaders in question were not necessarily reflective of German sentiment.
                 Churchill once said: "The German is either at your feet or at your throat".
                 At present the German establishment on the one hand is usually pro-Western
                 and pro-Israel. Germany has assisted Israel at several levels.
                 On the other hand the Germans are more anti-Jewish than any other western
                 people. Levels of anti-semitic sentiment are not so far behind what they
                 were in the past. German firms provide Iraq and Iran with the ability to
                 produce biological weapons and these nations have declared that they wish
                 to use these weapons against Israel.
                 The European Union, of which Germany is a dominant partner, funds the PLO
                 and provides money for terrorist attacks against Jewish people whose
                 primary "sin" is being Jewish.
                 There are elements within The European Union that would wish to take
                 control of the Land of Israel under the guise of enforcing an international
                 settlement.
                 The European Union pays the salaries of a few corrupt but prominent Israeli
                 politicians and activists who endeavor to weaken belief in God and the
                 Bible and to turn the country over to the hands of Arab Nazis.
                 Behind the scenes it appears that Germany is the pusher for the European
                 Union to take a more independent anti-American stance on the international
                 scene.
                 Germany in this has the backing of the smaller nations like Spain and even
                 Italy. Germany is able to express itself through the European Union.
                 At present Germany has problems of its own: Its population is diminishing
                 and its people appear tired and not inclined to do anything that could
                 threaten
                 their every-day comforts but you never know.

                 5. France
                 France is another story. Not only does France have a large Moslem element
                 but also the demographic constitution of the "native" French has been
                 changing drastically for some time and more work needs to be done on this.

                 6. Bible
                 We have been working through the Bible. We have now reached the Book of
                 Ezekiel and shortly will begin sending out a Brit-Am commentary on this work.
                 We have been giving an overall commentary while highlighting aspects
                 connected with the Lost Ten Tribes and their present-day identity.
                 We will continue along the same path but may also begin sending out
                 frequent Bible studies on Brit-Am themes.

                 7. Assistance
                 Please assist us to function and expand through your own efforts (telling
                 others about us, etc) and also through contributions.

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