MSM IGNORED FACTS ABOUT PALMYA!

Donald Hank authors:

The last link below is a report by Gilber Doktorow on the concert held a few days ago in Palmyra, the city liberated from ISIS by Russia and the Syrian army. But the main take-away is the amazing way the entire Western press managed to belittle this earth-shaking reconquest of Palmyra and the bravery of the participants in this concert.

I believe that much of our Russophobia is religious in origin.

The religious war on Russia is completely ignored everywhere but it is real. I am constantly hearing from people who have bought the old myth that Russia is mentioned in the Bible as an adversary of Israel. This is pure Russophobic fantasy going back almost a century to the beginnings of the Cold War. It has been skilfully debunked, for example, here: http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/the-truth-about-gog-and-magog/. BTW, a while back I found and downloaded a translation of the ancient Assyrian court records containing the mention of Magog, which has been identified as a place in Turkey, nowhere near Russia.

The arguments presented when this myth first surfaced in fundamentalist circles were all material, not spiritual. The argument was that Magog must be Russia because many years after the prophecy was made, the Scythians supposedly settled there and centuries later, they migrated to the Caucasus and the region around the Caspian Sea, which today are mostly Muslim: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Russia.

The material (as opposed to spiritual) argument is that the Scythians suggest a Russian identity.

The probem is, they were not Slavic peoples. They were Iranic peoples, ie, of Persian ethnicity and language. And although they later settled in what is today Russia, they are not nor ever were Russians, nor are the people living in that region of Russia majority Russians. It is hard to say who the descendants of the Scythians were because they were largely absorbed by the Proto-Slavs. However, no historian, archeologist, anthropologist, archeologist or ethnologist would state that Russians are descended from Scythians or that there ever was a known relationship between the inhabitants of Magog and today's Russians. Therefore, even if Magog was inhabited by Scythians (which is not known), there is no ethnic, cultural, historical or linguistic tie between them and today's Russians.

Thus, the whole material foundation of this myth is shattered and it is time for Christians to acknowledge this and stop hating on Russians.

Also helpful: http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/8267/where-are-gog-and-magog-located

Don Hank

 

Doktorow's article on the remarkable Palmyra concert:

http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/civilization-returns-palmyra-while-west-scoffs/ri14250?utm_source=Russia+Insider+Daily+Headlines&utm_campaign=a5658ed5c9-Russia_Insider_Daily_Headlines11_21_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c626db089c-a5658ed5c9-179866425&ct=t(Russia_Insider_Daily_Headlines11_21_2014)&mc_cid=a5658ed5c9&mc_eid=ca023753e8