Researchers find surprising difference between human and chimp genomes

Old news, but FWIW:

Despite sharing 99 per cent of our DNA with chimpanzees, a certain key genetic process tends to occur at totally different places on human and chimp chromosomes. A study by Oxford statisticians and US and Dutch geneticists, published in Science, compared recombination in humans and chimpanzees and found a surprising difference between the species....

Why these hotspots occur, and what triggers the swapping of DNA at those particular points, is a mystery. One theory was that the DNA code either side of hotspots controlled the activity. However, comparing chimps and humans showed that despite being so genetically similar, the species have totally different recombination hotspots....

'If chimps and humans do not share these recombination hotspots, then it means something other than the surrounding DNA code must be controlling the process of recombination - because the surrounding DNA code in chimps and humans is pretty much identical. This means that recombination is even more mysterious than we already thought: what is controlling it, and why does it occur so often at these particular places?

'The findings also tell us something else important: that the recombination landscape must be evolving extremely quickly. In humans and chimpanzees, the genome as a whole is very similar but the recombination hotspots totally different - so hotspots must be evolving much, much faster than the rest of the genome. That adds extra mystery to what drives these hotspots: why do they evolve so quickly?'

I believe this is the paper in question.

Are mutations random?

According to James Shapiro (2011, Evolution: A View from the 21st Century, p. 82):

There is one last area where the traditional assumptions about genetic change have been shown to be unrealistically restrictive. That is the question of targeting changes to specific regions in the genome. Conventional wisdom and the vast majority of evolutionists assert that there is no way natural genetic engineering functions can "choose" where to operate within the genome. This was a topic of active debate in 1988 when some adaptive mutation experiments were initially overinterpreted in neo-Lamarckian terms [2, 669, 670].

Despite interpretive errors in the Lamarck vs. Darwin debate, a priori denials of the capacity for functional targeting of biochemical changes to DNA should be jarring to molecular biologists. We have over 50 years of investigation into the molecular basis of how cells regulate transcription, and all biologists agree that the transcription apparatus can be directed to specific, functionally appropriate sites in the genome. The reason for the denial in the case of mutation probably has to do with a continuing influence of the late 19th Century philosophical notion that "germ plasm" inheritance has to be isolated from the soma [671]. But in the 21st Century, when we know about transcriptional regulation, signal transduction from the cell surface to the genome, and the operation of natural genetic engineering in the germline, it is time to abandon this mistaken doctrine.

It is difficult (if not impossible) to find a genome change operator that is truly random in its action within the DNA of the cell where it works. All careful studies of mutagenesis find statistically significant nonrandom patterns of change [emphasis mine], and genome sequence studies confirm distinct biases in location of different mobile genetic elements. These biases can sometimes be extreme, as in the targeting of S. cerevisiae LTR retrotransposon insertions into regions just a few base pairs upstream of RNA polymerase III transcription start sites [672–674]. In many cases, we have some understanding of the molecular mechanisms and/or functional significance of the observed preferences (see Table II.11).

References

2. Sniegowski, P.D. and Lenski, R.E. Mutation and adaptation: The directed mutation controversy in evolutionary perspective. Annu Rev Ecol Systematics 26, 553-578 (1995).

669. Cairns, J., Overbaugh, J. and Miller, S. The origin of mutants. Nature 335, 142-5 (1988).

670. Maenhaut-Michel, G. and Shapiro, J.A. The roles of starvation and selective substrates in the emergence of araB-lacZ fusion clones. Embo J 13, 5229-39.

671. Weismann, A. The Germ-Plasm: A Theory of Heredity, (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1893) (1994).

672. Bushman, F.D. Targeting survival: integration site selection by retroviruses and LTR-retrotransposons. Cell 115, 135-8 (2003).

673. Devine, S.E. and Boeke, J.D. Integration of the yeast retrotransposon Ty1 is targeted to regions upstream of genes transcribed by RNA polymerase III. Genes Dev 10, 620-33 (1996).

674. Bolton, E.C. and Boeke, J.D. Transcriptional interactions between yeast tRNA genes, flanking genes and Ty elements: a genomic point of view. Genome Res 13, 254-63 (2003).

Your cheatin' heart

Ham is alluding to John Loftus:

http://blogs.answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2013/08/13/the-chutzpah-of-unethical-atheists-but-we-actually-understand-why/

Chris Pinto the "Kevin Bacon" of King James Onlyists

Peter Gomes' dog is associated with Peter Gomes -->
Peter Gomes is associated with Harvard Divinity -->
Harvard Divinity is associated with Alan Kurschner -->
Alan Kurschner is associated with James White -->
James White is associated with Chris Rosebrough -->
Chris Rosebrough is associated with Brannon Howse -->
Brannon Howse is associated with Chris Pinto -->
Chris Pinto is associated with Chris Pinto's dog -->

Chris Pinto's dog must be promoting homosexual Christianity!

“Cultural Catholicism” and the End of Life: “You Earned It”

I’ve mentioned that Roman Catholicism is so onerous because it puts its hooks in you at various times in your life – from baptism as a child, to “first confession” and “first holy communion”, then Confirmation as an early teen, then marriage, baptism of your own children, etc. It’s a programmatic cycle.

There is another point at which Rome is prominent, and that is at death. As the “Baby Boom” generation continues to age and die, people will continue to be focused on this phase of life, either as people focused on the end of their own lives, or that of their aging parents.

Paul Moses, a journalism professor at Brooklyn College/CUNY”, has written a piece for the Wall Street Journal this morning entitled “A Liberal Catholic and Staying Put”, which puts this in view.

Law and miracle

Debates about the scientific status of miracles have been going on for a long time, and often involve competing paradigms of natural law. For instance:

In his classic Adventures of Ideas (140-59), A. N. Whitehead describes two contrasting views of nature's laws as they obtained in much of the seventeenth and eighteen centuries:  

(1) Theological voluntarism is the metaphysical idea that an omnipotent God endowed matter and nature with principles of motion that are passive and therefore completely dependent on God's volition; that since the properties of matter (atoms) are extension, impenetrability, and inertia, the motion of matter originates in God, the prime mover; that an active principle sustains motion and activity in nature by counteracting resistance; that this active principle is the source of gravity; finally, that the causes or laws of nature are therefore superimposed from the outside and are completely dependent on an omnipotent deity, who can abrogate or suspend these natural laws at will (miracles) to modify their course. 

(2) Immanence is the view that activity and motion are inherent principles in matter and nature, that all movement in nature is governed by autonomous laws that constitute the interdependence of all activity in nature; that these immanent laws are so embedded in the structure of nature that they cannot be disrupted, that any disruption of the laws of nature (miracles) is impossible because it contradicts the principles of reason, order, and perfection–the attributes of God. Essentially voluntaristic, Newtonianism gave way in the eighteeth century to the view of immanent activity in nature that was essentially mechanistic, which is to say Cartesian. For according to Rene Decartes, the laws of nature were decreed by God and are–like his volition–immutable and universally efficient. That is why miracles contradicted God's immutable will–unless (perhaps) they were embedded in God's grand scheme from the beginning. 

Cotton Mather's Biblia Americana: America’s First Bible Commentary, A Synoptic Commentary on the Old and New Testaments. Vol. 1: Genesis. Edited with an Introduction and Annotations by Reiner Smolinski (Mohr Siebeck and Baker Academic, 2010), 85-86n22.

In six days the Lord made heaven and earth

8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy (Exod 20:8-11).

This text often crops up in debates over the days of Gen 1. Appeal is made to this text to establish two related points. The days in Exodus 20:8-11 are 24-hour days. And the days are consecutive. By parity of argument, so are the days of Gen 1. An uninterrupted sequence of 7 24-hour days. This is called the calendar-day interpretation. 

There's obviously some merit to this argument from analogy. After all, this isn't just a reader's inference. The text itself invites that comparison. 

However, there's also a danger of a modern reader unconsciously recasting the issue in provincial and anachronistic terms:

i) Ancient Israelites didn't think in terms of 24-hour days. That represents clock time. They didn't have clocks.

ii) Likewise, subdividing a day into 24 equal units of time is artificial rather than natural. 

iii) There's an equivocation about the "day." It's not as if Israelites labored 24 hours a day, 6 days a week, before knocking off work. The workday actually stands for daylight hours. As a matter of fact, you took breaks between one day and the next day. You labored during daylight hours, and rested at night. 

You were largely dependent on sunlight to be able to see. That could be supplemented a bit by firelight–or moonlight (a full moon on a clear night). 

Folks who traveled by foot had to allow for enough time to arrive at their destination before they ran out of light. 

iv) Moreover, day and night aren't like flipping a light switch, where it becomes instantly light at sunrise and instantly dark at sunset. First light precedes sunrise. Especially on a clear day, the sky brightens well before sunup, and darkens sometime after sundown. So the boundaries between day and night are fuzzy.

v) In addition, unlike clock time, which cuts across the natural divisions of day and night, sunrise and sunset undergo seasonal change. They vary every day. The daylight hours lengthen in the summer and shorten in the winter. 

vi) Not only is this sensitive to the temporal orientation (i.e. time of year), but spatial orientation (latitude). If you live in Alaska, there are times of the year when you have continuous sunlight, and times of the year when you have continuous night. When the sun never dips below the horizon or rises above the horizon. One day blends into another day. One long day. A "day" that's longer than a week. So the duration of a day is not invariable. It depends on where you live, as well as when you live. So the duration of a "day" is variable both internally and externally. When a day naturally begins or ends is quite different from clock time or calendar time. 

Of course, the Decalogue was originally addressed to people in the Mideast, but imagine applying it to someone living near the North Pole before the advent of electrical lighting. And Christian missionaries would have to make allowance for that contingency. Exod 20 does, indeed, draw a parallel between the ordinary workweek and the creation week. But the ordinary workweek doesn't necessarily map onto the creation week the way some modern readers routinely assume. 

Secularism Without Atheism

Many apologists and apologetic organizations put a lot of focus on responding to atheism. They place a lot of emphasis on presenting arguments for the existence of God, arguing that miracles occur, etc. Doesn't that make sense in a society that's been growing increasingly secular?

Exhuming dead theories

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bibleandculture/2013/08/25/jesus-the-zealot-retredding-ground-already-buried/

Darwinian evangelicals: a love–hate relationship

What's not to love?

"There are a number of good books available on reconciling science and Christian theology, particularly creation and evolution. The value of such books to various audiences depends, of course, on some shared assumptions. Carlson and Longman's book [Science, Creation and the Bible: Reconciling Rival Theories of Origins] is especially important for anyone who perceives conflict between evolutionary theory and Scripture. While sharing a commitment to scriptural infallibility and a generally literalist reading, they nonetheless show that none of the multiple creation stories in the Old Testament precludes the acceptance of contemporary science. I recommend it highly." 

—Nancey Murphy, professor of Christian philosophy, Fuller Theological Seminary 

http://www.ivpress.com/cgi-ivpress/book.pl/review/code=3889

Ten things I hate about you!

But at the heart of liberalism is the denial of purpose in nature. Historically, the key turning point was Charles Darwin. The central elements in Darwin's theory -- random variations, sifted by the blind, automatic process of natural selection -- were aimed specifically at getting rid of the concept of purpose or design in biology. As historian Jacques Barzun says, "This denial of purpose is Darwin's distinctive contention." 

Today we are seeing the real-world results of this denial. Transgenderism treats the scientific facts of human biology as having no intrinsic purpose or significance. It treats the body as nothing but a piece of matter that gives people no clue about who they are as persons. It is a self-alienating worldview that teaches people that their identity as male or female has no inherent purpose or dignity. (For more, see chapter 3 in my book Saving Leonardo.) 

This article is adapted from Saving Leonardo, by Nancy Pearcey, director of the Francis Schaeffer Center for Worldview and Culture at Houston Baptist University and editor at large of The Pearcey Report.  

http://www.pearceyreport.com/archives/2013/07/nancy_pearcey_transgender_politics_vs_facts_of_life.php

Discordia

"Lutheran Insulter"

The music of life

Oxford don Denis Noble is another one of those insider critics of the standard evolutionary paradigm:

http://www.musicoflife.co.uk/pdfs/The%20Music%20of%20Life-sourcebook.pdf

Calvinism and the First Sin

"Calvinism and the First Sin" by Prof. James Anderson.

Cut out the middleman

From a recent WSJ article:

Most people are unaware that if they don't use insurance, they can negotiate upfront cash prices with hospitals and providers substantially below the "list" price. Doctors are happy to do this. We get paid promptly, without paying office staff to wade through the insurance-payment morass.

Read the rest here.

Who's redefining what?

I'm going to comment on this post:

http://teampyro.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-gift-of-parbar.html

So look, here's my modest proposal: If we aren't going to start with sound exegesis of the Bible and be content with that…

Well, when is Dan actually going to start with sound exegesis? We keep getting his token reverence for the sufficiency of Scripture, absent the exegesis to back up his claims. Less genuflecting and more spadework would be appreciated. 

Same thing for all their other redefinitions. If they wanted some holy status for their errant feelings and hunches and "leadings," they should never have assaulted the well-known and well-defined Biblical phenomenon of prophecy, and embarrassed themselves by trying to redefine it to suit their experiences. 

i) First of all, notice that Dan doesn't tell us what the definition of the this "well-defined" phenomenon is. This is yet another example of Dan's routinely perfunctory performance. Make pious gestures towards the authority of Scripture, but don't follow that up with the goods. 

ii) Also, let's compare his claim to David Aune's conclusion in his standard scholarly monograph on prophecy:

Prophetic sayings and speeches preserved in early Christian sources exhibit a wide variety of forms and styles. Even though we have somewhat overconfidently proposed a typology of six types of basic forms of prophetic speech and three kinds of complex forms, it is apparent that only the presence of formal framing devices betrays the possible presence of Christian prophetic speech…There is therefore no such thing as a distinctively characteristic form of Christian prophetic discourse that is recognizable apart from the presence of formal framing devices. The only real exception to this generalization is the apocalyptic vision report, a literary form which we have not considered in any detail and which requires careful study in its own right. D. Aune, Prophecy in Early Christianity and the Ancient Mediterranean World (Eerdmans 1991), 337-338.

Hmm. Seems like the phenomenon is far less monolithic than Dan purports to be the case. 

See, that's where the modern inventors of Charismaticism/"continuationism" went wrong. Parham and his poor dupes were originally seeking the Biblical gift of tongues. That is, they expected to be able to speak in unlearned human languages supernaturally. And when they started babbling and gobbling, they were convinced it had to be that, that Biblical gift, that falsifiable gift with defined contours and edges. So they went off to mission fields, expecting to be understood by the Chinese... but, yeah, you know how that went. Natives shrugged and, in effect, made little circular gestures by their temples. Incomprehensible babble.
So here's where the first-gen errorists went afield. They were sure their experience was valid (Charismaticism 101), so then took some large hammers and saws to the Bible, and eventually changed the interpretation of what "tongues" meant from, well, what it meant, to what they were doing. They took a well-understood gift and invented something that gave cover to their experience.

As with prophecy, Dan dictates a received definition of glossolalia–which he equates with xenoglossy. He then accuses Pentecostals of redefining the phenomenon to retrofit their actual practice. Let's compare Dan's claim with some standard scholarship on the issue:

The ambiguous evidence regarding the exact nature of tongues raises the question of whether even Paul himself or the other earliest Christians knew the exact nature of the phenomenon. R. Ciampa & B. Rosner, The First Letter to the Corinthians (Eerdmans 2010), 586. 

From the way Paul speaks of this phenomenon [tongues] in the rest of this chap. [12] and in chap. 14, however, it seems best to recognize it as some form of noncommunicative utterance or incoherent babbling.
The phenomenon cannot mean speaking in foreign tongues…it denotes here [14:2] some sort of utterance beyond the patterns of normal human speech. J. Fitzmyer, First Corinthians (Yale U. Press 2008), 470, 510. 

Second, Paul understands these utterances to be addressed to God (14:2,14,28) and not to humans (14:2,6,9). It is not a language of normal human discourse, but something mysterious and "other," which may give it its appeal. It consists of "mysteries in the Spirit" that are unintelligible to humans (14:2 ) and that benefit only the speaker (14:4). It communicates with God through prayer and praise (14:15) in ways that analytical speech do not…This rules out the view that tongues refer to the miraculous ability to speak in unlearned languages or to speak in one's native language. D. Garland, 1 Corinthians (Baker 2003), 584. 

Edwards declares: "It is evident that the Corinthians did not use their gift of tongues to evangelize the heathen world. They spoke with tongues in their Church assemblies, and not once does the Apostle urge them to apply the power to the purpose for which it would be so eminently serviceable." 
If there were any hint of this use, Paul could not have said "the person who speaks in a tongue speaks not to people but to God" (14:2), let alone, "the person who speaks in a tongue builds up only himself (14:4). But we saw that insofar as Chrysostom, Cyril, Thomas, and most especially  Theodoret and Calvin were concerned, the whole point of using foreign languages was strictly to serve the proclamation of the gospel as part of the mission to the world. But if we decontextualize the gift from mission (as Paul clearly does in 1 Cor 14), the basis for the gift has disappeared. 
Tongues may then be viewed as "the language of the unconscious" because it is unintelligible (unless it is "interpreted") not only to others but also to the speaker, A. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Eerdmans 2000), 977, 988. 

The weight of the textual evidence, however, does not support this understanding of tongues as real human languages. The Pentecost story does emphasize the intelligibility of the tongues spoken, but a careful reading indicates that the miracle occurred in the hearing rather than in the mode of speaking. The bystanders do not ask, "How can they all be speaking our native languages?" but rather, "Since all who are speaking are Galileans, how is it that we hear them in our own native languages" (Acts 2:8).
As for Paul,he could hardly emphasize more strongly that in his view–and he was a speaker in tongues himself (14:18)–glossolalia is an intrinsically noncommunicative form of utterance (1 Cor 13:1; 14:2,4,7-9,16-17,23).
In summary, the convergence of evidence suggests that glossolalia is a verbal expression of a powerful emotional state. It is not a real language but a kind of structured or ordered babbling, "Glossolalia and the Embarrassments of Experience," L. T. Johnson, The Princeton Seminary Bulletin (1997), 117-118, 121.

Now, it's not the purpose of this post to give my own definition of glossolalia. I don't quote these scholars to endorse their interpretation. Rather, I quote them to document the patent falsity of Dan's assertions.

i) To my knowledge, not one of the scholars I quoted is Pentecostal or charismatic. Therefore, Dan can't say they were motivated to reject the foreign language interpretation to ex post validate their personal commitment to contemporary Pentecostal practice.

ii) In addition, their analysis gives the lie to Dan's claim that there's a received definition of tongues, such that anyone who rejects the foreign language definition is "redefining" the NT phenomenon. 

And frankly, it's examples like these which raise questions about Dan's integrity. He makes willfully ignorant public claims. For some reason, he feels no duty to make a good faith effort to inform himself before he sallies forth about the Bible or people who disagree with him. As a pastor, he ought to have more sense of responsibility. Don't tell your people what the situation is before you've done some basic fact-checking. 

Every time we're trying to talk God's Word, someone is sure to ask, "So, what about when X happens? or when Y happened in 1843? How do you explain that, huh?" As if this is what really should consume the Christian, because we already have so well mastered all that actually-in-the-Bible stuff.

Questions like that are quite germane when Dan and other MacArthurites deny that things like that ever happen. Does Dan really think his sweeping historical claims should be immune to empirical falsification? If he said something never happens, his denial invites potential counterexamples. Why does Dan imagine that he's entitled to operate with a double standard which allows him to issue blanket denials, but exempts him from ever having to consider any evidence to the contrary? What does that say about his character? 

But then again, really, since the whole point is that we've got this imperative (we must validate the Charismatic's experience and his special powers)…

I agree with Dan that that's a problem in Pentecostalism. Problem is, Dan has the same methodology. Dan is the mirror image of what he faults in Pentecostalism. Dan also begins with experience. He's a disguntled former Pentecostal. He had a bad experience. And because his experience with Pentecostalism left him emotionally damaged, he automatically rejects charismatic claims, as well as "contiuationist" interpretations. In Dan's case, you can take the Pentecostal out of Pentecostalism, but you can't take the Pentecostalism out of the Pentecostal. Because Dan burned his fingers playing with strange fire, he's now a crusader against matches. 

Finally, a word about the commenters at Pyromaniacs. They are very quick to recognize cult personality psychology on the part of folks who hang onto every word of some TBN televangelist, but oblivious to their own personality cult psychology when their MacArthurite heroes come under scrutiny. 

A Better Way to Honor Dr. King's Dream

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324165204579027071654840280.html#printMode

Biblical longevities

Apostate Ed Babinski emailed me. 

Caught your article about biblical genealogies. 
I also ran across this... 
Creation Research Society Quarterly, "Biblical Longevities: Some Questions and Issues"http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/2011/PSCF12-11Huebner.pdf

And what does Huebner say?

The author also ignores the clear lack of expected randomness in many of the entries of Table 1. In the best example, Noah (ordinal 10) was 500 years old when his sons were born and the Flood followed 100 years later when he was 600. His son Shem (ordinal 11) became a father when he was 100 years old and he lived 500 more years, dying at the age of 600. The chance of this being anything other than a fabricated, symbolic use of special numbers is miniscule.

Well, yes and no. I agree with Huebner that the chances of that pattern randomly popping up are miniscule. However, it hardly follows that the numbers are fabricated. Rather, these are round numbers. Has it never occurred to Huebner that Bible writers sometimes use round numbers? Does he equate round numbers with fabrication?

And, no, I don't think the numerical parallels between Shem and Noaha are random. Rather, the narrator rounded the figures up or down to equalize them so that readers would notice a parallel between Shem and Noah. That's intentional rather than random. But the logical alternatives aren't random selection or fabricated symbolism. Rather, the narrator is using round numbers to create symbolic patterns. The figures are schematized, but that doesn't make them fabricated. Stylized history is still historical. Round numbers are real numbers: just approximations. They have a basis in fact. Sorry if Ed is too dense to grasp these nuances. 

You asked what signs we would need to be able to judge a person's age at death if all we had was the skeleton. 

No, Ed. that's not what I said. Basic reading comprehension has never been Ed's strong suit. This is what I actually said:

Youngblood doesn't bother to explain how paleoanthropologists would be able to determine the age of prediluvians from skeletal remains. If, say, they aged very slowly, could you tell that from skeletal remains? 
Don't we generally determine age of death from skeletal remains by comparison with normal lifespans?
So what would be the frame of reference in the case of prediluvians? By definition, they fall far outside normal standards of comparison. 

Notice how Ed blows right past my carefully qualified statements. Ed then says:

But when you're talking about people who allegedly lived way past 100 some basic considerations come to mind such as the fact that tooth enamel does not grow back but continues to wear out. So do the inside of joints, where the surfaces touch one another, literally wearing down the joint surfaces over time, even in a young healthy person who overuses their joints.  It's true that tortoises can live for 200 years but they have beaks that continue to grow slowly, and they either move slowly, or swim in water which probably slows the deterioration process, but they probably suffer broken down joints all the same once they reach that age.  One could hypothesize that the patriarchs were blessed with genes for growing multiple sets of teeth for as long as they lived, though very few humans are blessed with those same genes today (a few today are blessed with some extra teeth that come in after the second set, but we don't grow teeth as easily as sharks do). As for joints, even young healthy people can wear those out, so people living past 100 would probably have increasingly more trouble with their joints. 

Which totally disregards the qualifications I gave in my original response to Youngblood. Ed has the attention span of a Tweeter. 

I don't doubt that forensic anthropologists can judge roughly how old the decedent was. However, that's based on the normal aging process. Comparing skeletons of 20-somethings with other 20-somethings. Having a large sample from the same age groups. 

The question at issue is what would supply the frame of reference if someone died at 900. Does that mean they mature and age very slowly? Does that mean they mature at a normal rate, but remain in their prime for centuries before senescence sets in? 

Even if we just consider this from a hypothetical standpoint, I'm unclear on how a forensic pathologist would determine the age at death of someone who died at 900. What's the standard of comparison? What's their equivalent of an index fossil in this situation?  

How The Apostles Died

The subject of the martyrdom of the apostles came up during William Lane Craig's August 26 Reasonable Faith podcast. He addressed the issue as it relates to evidence for Jesus' resurrection. He emphasized the point that the apostles' willingness to suffer is more important than whether they died as martyrs. He didn't say much beyond that. For those who are interested, I address the death of the apostles in several posts linked here.

The Nephilim

http://butthesethingsarewritten.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-nephilim.html

Genesis and genealogies

http://butthesethingsarewritten.blogspot.com/2013/08/genesis-and-genealogies.html