Diamond Rings and More

Posts Tagged ‘history’

It has been worked out that around 80% of the world’s population believe in one religion or another (and there are lots of them), but about 70% of those are adherents to the big four. The four biggest religions are: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism. Judaism is the forerunner of both Islam and Christianity.

The Hebrew Bible recounts the history of the world and the story of the passage of the people from creation, through the flood to the arrival in the Promised Land, or from Mesopotamia to Canaan, led by Abraham.

The descendants of Abraham and his people were enslaved by the Egyptians and did not manage to escape until Moses led them out of captivity. During this expedition, Moses received the Ten Commandments from God and they went on to become the bedrock of Jewish law and custom although there is no doubt that the Jewish way of life has developed from this era in the Tenth Century before Christ.

The sacred writings of the Hebrew Bible or Masorah are divided into twenty-four books. However, the same texts are divided up into thirty-nine books in the Christian Bible’s Old Testament. The Torah or The Law was being written at this time but it was altered and updated between the Tenth and Fifth Centuries before Christ.

In addition to the Hebrew scriptures, there is a rich tradition of ancient oral commentary known as the Talmud, which is a huge compilation of the Oral Law. The Talmud is the accepted authority for Orthodox Jews.

Judaism is the most ancient monotheistic religion known to the West. Jews believed in one God whilst all of the known world believed in pantheism or many gods like the Ancient Greeks. The name of God in the Jewish language is Yahweh and they believe that Yahweh agreed a covenant with His people to take care of them for ever as long as they remained devoted exclusively to him.

In the Jewish belief, sin is the unashamed disregard of God’s will and that is punishable by God in a comparable fashion to the Buddhist belief in karma.. The purpose of following God’s Law is being welcomed into His Kingdom.

Jews worship in synagogues in congregations led by Rabbis who are considered Teachers or Masters (as in the old manner of calling teachers, ‘masters’) rather than as monks or vicars. The Jewish Sabbath is not the Sunday as in Christianity, but is observed from sunset Friday until sunset Saturday night.

The most significant holidays or holy days in the Jewish calendar are: Rosh Hashanah (New Year); Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement); Hanukah (Festival of Lights) and Pesach (Passover). The Jewish nation does not celebrate Christmas because they believe that the Son of God is still yet to be born. They see Jesus as a prophet in the same manner as the Muslims do.

There are three main branches of modern Judaism which are: Orthodox Judaism; Reform Judaism and Conservative Judaism. Some of these branches of Judaism are more prevalent in some countries than others.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece writes on many topics but is at present concerned with Easter.If you would like to read more, please go over to our website entitled Celebrating Easter

Stock car racing was really born out of the desire of owners of modified stock (meaning: ‘off the sales lot’) cars to show off their vehicles, handimanship and driving expertise. The desire to ’soup up’ these stock cars came from the wish to escape the law enforcement agencies pursuing them when they were running moonshine or said another way, bootlegging.

During Prohibition, a lot of moonshine whiskey was being produced in remote regions of the Appalachians and in particular the Allegheny Mountains, from where it was transported by private carriers in their own stock cars often to the southern states. Many of these drivers tuned up their vehicles in order to have more chance of getting away.

When Prohibition was repealed in 1933, this bootlegging continued in order to circumvent paying duty, but it slowly died out. However, the fire had already been lit and the drivers of these cars liked to race them in their spare time for pride and reward, particularly in the southern states and particularly in North Carolina, where most of the stock car teams are still to be found.

NASCAR was founded by Bill French in 1947 when he crafted the first set of uniform rules and a championship scoring system so that an overall winner of all the season’s races could be worked out.

However, the conditions in the early days were pretty crude. The cars were usually second-hand and worn and the track was just dirt and dust. Under these circumstances the cars rapidly fell apart, so NASCAR allowed competing cars to be modified or strengthened. Safety aspects for the drivers were also brought in. Nowadays, the NASCAR handbook clearly defines all the modifications that are permissible on competing cars.

These days it is a mistake to call NASCAR cars ’stock cars’; they are anything but stock cars. NASCAR cars are hand made. The frames are different from stock cars in that they are manufactured from tubes for strength; the tin is sheet steel and the engine blocks start as just that – a bare block. What the engineers do with it after that is a closely guarded secret.

The safety of the driver is also taken very earnestly. The driver is shielded from harm by a heavy roll cage. Strong round and square tubes make up the car’s framework, while thinner tubing is employed at the front and back ends to absorb the impact of crashes by crushing gradually. These are called clips and the front clip will also permit the engine to fall away under the car, rather than be pushed straight back into the driver.

The bodies of NASCAR cars are not straightforward to make, often taking ten days to finish. However, NASCAR rules encompass the general body shape and they provide thirty templates to make constructing a NASCAR car a bit easier.

But it does not stop there. There are different regulations and templates for different sorts of races on different tracks, because the cars that compete on superspeedways are not the same as those used for short tracks or endurance races.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece writes on quite a few topics, but is at present concerned with thinking about the Poconos Raceway in Pennsylvania. If you would like to know more or check out some great offers, please go to our website at Poconos Vacations.

The West Indian people are the settlers of the Caribbean islands.It is composed of several countries and islands that lie between the border of the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean.It’s location made is a tropical shoreline region endowed with beautiful beaches and lush greenery.But the region is not just plain scenic.The people of the Caribbean also stand proud with a great West Indian history that shaped them into what they are today.

The West Indies attract all kinds of people from different countries.The region is renowned for its sun kissed shores as world famous tourist spots.Beaches in the Caribbean are always included in the list of top beaches in the world.West Indian history shows just how the islands have captivated so many settlers.

Various nomadic tribes were the first to settle in the West Indian nations.Then during the age of exploration, a lot of European voyagers set foot on the islands and also made their settlements there.A lot of the natives were forced into slavery by the European conquerors.These relationships lead to the merge of the various cultures including food, music and language.Among these settlers are the Spaniards, the Britt, the French and the Dutch.

Aside from sightseeing, guests also indulge in the warm hospitality and fun-loving spirit of the West Indian people.The food in the region is a delectable fusion of the various cuisines that come from the various settlers of the West Indies.You can taste a combination of European, Asian and African dishes in the Caribbean.

When it comes two music, the Caribbean is known for Calypso and Reggae.The two are also influenced by the West Indian ancestry.The sound of the drums and the melody are suited to the tropical climate and the beach scenes.

The influence of West Indian ancestry to the modern Caribbean culture is very evident.A combination of these various influences gave birth to a new and interesting Caribbean culture.

Do you want to learn more on the West Indian people?Click on this link. West indian ancestry and West indian history

We are all being encouraged to get out more frequently, so many people are looking for a reason for doing it. You could choose a spectator sport like football, but that is not really going to do your body much good, you should be looking for a participation sport.

If you are younger, then play football by all means, but if you are getting on a little, you will most likely be looking for a sport that is not quite so taxing. Men like to aim and shoot things even if not kill them. Golf is an option, but I want to suggest that you give archery a try.

Archery has the advantage over shooting a gun because it requires some physical fitness. It is not just a question of pulling, sorry, squeezing a trigger. If you take up archery, you will most likely want to acquire some more upper-body strength, especially if the most strenuous work you have done for the last twenty years is pick up a pen.

Archery is an rounded sport in many ways, depending on how much you get into it. Most beginners will start out by going to an archery club and joining in for the day. People will lend them a bow and teach them the safety aspects and the proper way to hold a bow and shoot an arrow. This should give you a good idea of which sort of bow you would like.

After a week or two, you may purchase your own bow and you may move from indoor target archery to outdoor target archery or even field archery, which is virtual hunting. From there, you will almost certainly meet people who take archery a step further. You will meet competition archers, bow hunters and people who assemble their own equipment.

You might find one of these aspects of archery enthralling. You may take up bow hunting or even bow fishing. This will lead you off at a tangent, because you will have to learn about the animals that you hunt. You will have to learn where they live and what their lifestyles are. This means research.

Or you can take up the archery counterpart to clay pigeon shooting, which is known as field archery. In field archery, the archers walk around a course and model animals or standard targets will become visible at diverse distances. This is fun.

You will also meet people who like to make their own arrows or even their own bows. This is another interesting feature of archery. You can purchase the various components that go to make up an arrow and you can buy a kit to make a bow or you can start from scratch with an axe, a knife and a lathe. Again you will need to do a lot of research, in order to get your archery equipment just the way you want it.

This will take you down yet another tangent to archery, but it will improve your understanding of archery, augment your pleasure in the sport and, as they say, add another string to your bow.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece writes on various topics, but is presently concerned with longbows for sale. If you would like to know more or for special deals, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

It will come as a surprise to those who have not learned the history of cricket, but it is now thought that Cricket really originated in Saxon or Norman times as a children?s game played by children living in the region called the Weald of Kent in what is today Kent and Sussex in South East England . It was not taken up as an adult game until the beginning of the 17th century.

The first known reference to the game in the history of cricket is to be found in the records of a 1598 court case concerning a disagreement over a school’s ownership of a plot of land. A 59-year old coroner, John Derrick, testified that he and his school friends had played ‘creckett’ on the site fifty years earlier.

The school was the Royal Grammar School, Guildford, and Mr Derrick’s account proves beyond acceptable doubt that the game was being played in Surrey around 1550.

The first mention of it being played as an adult sport was in 1611, when two men in Sussex were prosecuted for playing cricket on Sunday instead of going to church. This was in the same year that a dictionary defined cricket as a boys’ game and this implies that adult participation was a recent development.

With all the current press coverage of the pressure of gambling upon the result of cricket matches, it is astonishing that historically, gambling played a very large part in the development of the game in England. Cricket had definitely become a serious gambling sport by the end of the 17th century.

There is a newspaper account of a “great match” played in Sussex in 1697 which was 11-a-side and played for the high stakes of 50 guineas a side. 50 guineas would be the equal of GBP5,000 to GBP 6,000 in today?s terms.

The present day arrangement of County teams came about as a result of wealthy gamblers forming their own teams in order to fortify their bets and started to employ local experts from village cricket as the first professionals. It is believed that the first ?County? game took place in 1697 between Sussex and another county.

Cricket was introduced to North America via the British colonies in the 17th century, and in the 18th century it spread to other regions of the British dominated world. It was introduced to the West Indies by colonists and to India by the British East India Company in the first half of the century.

The first colonists took it to Australia soon after 1788 followed by New Zealand and South Africa in the first years of the 19th century.

It might come as a surprise to lots of people that the very first International cricket match took place between the United States and Canada in 1844 (Canada won by 23 runs) and the very first overseas tour was by a party of leading English professionals who toured North America in 1857.

The first English tour of Australia was in 1862, with the first Australian tour of England being by a team of Australian Aborigine players in 1868.

In 1877, an England touring team in Australia played two games against full Australian XIs that are now regarded as the very first Test matches. The following year, the Australians toured England for the first time and were a magnificent success.

No Tests were played on that tour but more soon followed. At The Oval in 1882, there was played what was to be the most well-known match of all time which gave rise to The Ashes.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on lots of topics, but is at present concerned with the London 2012 Olympics mascot. Click a link if you are interested in the 2012 London Olympics Volunteers.