Reblogged from SettledInHeaven.org:

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Kidron was a valley that lay east of Jerusalem dividing Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives.  Through this valley flowed the brook of Kidron, a brook which is mentioned several times in God’s Holy Word.  Why is Kidron known as “the death valley of the Bible”?   What can I learn from this “death valley”?

We will be opening the Scriptures to find the answer to our questions….

Read more… 2,703 more words

What I like about the Settled in Heaven is the effort its author makes to help us gain a scholarly understanding of the Bible. Rob Barkman is not trying to find something new in the Bible. He is just trying to explain what is already known. He works to help the average layman (myself being one such) overcome his ignorance of the Bible. With Kidron: the Death Valley of the Bible, Barkman takes a word (a place really), and he lists its references in the Bible, using the Bible to provide the historical significance of the Kidron Valley in the land of Israel. From that point, he uses a prophecy in the Book of Jeremiah to explain significance of the Kidron Valley to us. Is his interpretation exactly correct? Frankly, I am not entirely certain, but I think it is more than reasonable. Even though Barkman does not mention that the Kidron Valley and the Valley of Jehoshaphat (Joel 3) are thought by some to be one and the same, that omission does not weaken his interpretation. After all, the Valley of Jehoshaphat is a valley of death. Here in The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death, for example, is a differing interpretation of the significance of the Kidron Valley that relates that valley to Psalm 23. The Valleys Where Yeshua Walked provides some interesting maps. This link provides various Bible commentaries on Jeremiah 31:40, but Barkman's commentary is definitely easier to understand.

Over the course of my lifetime, I went from believing in Jesus Christ to doubting the existence of any God. Now I find myself believing in Jesus Christ once again. So I must admit to being something of a fickle creature. What I find comforting is the fact that better men than I have admitted to the same flaw.

Benjamin Franklin, then 81, had the following read at the end of the Constitutional Convention. James Madison’s notes tell the story.

The engrossed Constitution being read,

Docr. FRANKLIN rose with a speech in his hand, which he had reduced to writing for his own conveniency, and which Mr. Wilson read in the words following.

Mr. President

I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them: For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or fuller consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise. It is therefore that the older I grow, the more apt I am to doubt my own judgment, and to pay more respect to the judgment of others. Most men indeed as well as most sects in Religion, think themselves in possession of all truth, and that wherever others differ from them it is so far error. Steele a Protestant in a Dedication tells the Pope, that the only difference between our Churches in their opinions of the certainty of their doctrines is, the Church of Rome is infallible and the Church of England is never in the wrong. But though many private persons think almost as highly of their own infallibility as of that of their sect, few express it so naturally as a certain french lady, who in a dispute with her sister, said “I don’t know how it happens, Sister but I meet with no body but myself, that’s always in the right-Il n’y a que moi qui a toujours raison.”

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution. For when you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an assembly can a perfect production be expected? It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded like those of the Builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another’s throats. Thus I consent, Sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best. The opinions I have had of its errors, I sacrifice to the public good. I have never whispered a syllable of them abroad. Within these walls they were born, and here they shall die. If every one of us in returning to our Constituents were to report the objections he has had to it, and endeavor to gain partizans in support of them, we might prevent its being generally received, and thereby lose all the salutary effects & great advantages resulting naturally in our favor among foreign Nations as well as among ourselves, from our real or apparent unanimity. Much of the strength & efficiency of any Government in procuring and securing happiness to the people, depends, on opinion, on the general opinion of the goodness of the Government, as well as well as of the wisdom and integrity of its Governors. I hope therefore that for our own sakes as a part of the people, and for the sake of posterity, we shall act heartily and unanimously in recommending this Constitution (if approved by Congress & confirmed by the Conventions) wherever our influence may extend, and turn our future thoughts & endeavors to the means of having it well administered.

On the whole, Sir, I can not help expressing a wish that every member of the Convention who may still have objections to it, would with me, on this occasion doubt a little of his own infallibility, and to make manifest our unanimity, put his name to this instrument.-

He then moved that the Constitution be signed by the members and offered the following as a convenient form viz. “Done in Convention by the unanimous consent of the States present the 17th. of Sepr. &c-In Witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names.” (from here)

For additional information, check What Franklin thought of the Constitution.

Like American history? blogsense-by-barb has a post worth reading. Check out Sons of Liberty: Patriots or Terrorists?

Curious about the start of WW I? rogueoperator acquainted me with something I did not know. In Tyranny and Crisis: The Rise of American Militarism, he points out that according to the “rules of war” the Germans had every right to sink the Lusitania.

Curious about that secret war fought by the CIA and the Hmong tribes of Laos against the North Vietnamese. thatmrgguy posts The Secret War…Video.

Curious about the latest on the current action. In Senseless Jerry Fuhrman posts a link to an AP story, NATO convoy bomb adds urgency to protecting Kabul.

Curious about the future of war? In Alternative Futures to 2028 for the U.S. Army, James Atticus Bowden observes that the Army provides a curiously open and intellectually honest environment.

• Here from Wikipedia is a brief history of the French Constitution.
• Social Liberty is defined here in the Urban Dictionary and here in Wikipedia. I think the Wikipedia definition better approximates the usage below.
• “paid terrorists” — Here at NewsMax and here at the Daily Mail we have some explanations of how the Palestinian Authority spends the money other nations give it.

INJUSTICE The Weapon of the Left by Ms Wells The Left has many weapons. There are crazies, criminals, terrorists, communists, addicts, perverts, liars, psycho shrinks, to name a few. But, the most powerful weapon in the Left’s arsenal is Injustice. To identify the Left, one must study Libertarianism i.e. “social liberty”. “Social Liberty” was coined in France decades ago and it led to one of the overthrows of the French Constitution. The French C … Read More

via The Mad Jewess With Breaking News By Donna Spellbound

 William Whipple, from New Hampshire,  was an original signer of the Declaration of Independence. He was a merchant, a judge, a Revolutionary War General and a member of the Continental Congress. from Yahoo.com: Whipple freed his slave, Prince Whipple, who had fought with him in the war and was one of a group of slaves who had petitioned the Legislature for their freedom. Prince Whipple also is buried in the Old North Cemetery. … Read More

via Diary of a Mad Conservative