וַיִּקְרָא אֱלֹהִים לָאוֹר יוֹם וְלַחֹשֶׁךְ קָרָא לָיְלָה

וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם אֶחָד.

وَدَعَا اللهُ النُّورَ نَهَارًا، وَالظُّلْمَةُ دَعَاهَا لَيْلاً.

وَكَانَ مَسَاءٌ وَكَانَ صَبَاحٌ يَوْمًا وَاحِدًا.

Y llamó Dios á la luz Día, y á las tinieblas llamó Noche: y fué la tarde y la mañana un día.

And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

Moses 2:5
And I, God, called the light Day; and the darkness, I called Night; and this I did by the word of my power, and it was done as I spake; and the evening and the morning were the first day.

Abraham 4:5
And the Gods called the light Day, and the darkness they called Night. And it came to pass that from the evening until morning they called night; and from the morning until the evening they called day; and this was the first, or the beginning, of that which they called day and night.

There’s a new blog offering snarky commentary on LDS bloggers.  It’s called Trash Calls.   Many LDS blogs (including this one) have already gotten some attention.

Some thoughts, folks.  Trash Calls needs to get a better template, perhaps something with a little bit of color (but don’t follow Snarkernacle’s example and go hot-pink).  Also, one of these days, a snarker blog should be a little more serious - take a brave, giant step away from blogspot - and pay for it’s own url and hosting.

Trash Calls will be added to the Blognitive Dissonance aggregator shortly.

I was searching for commentaries on Genesis and came across a syllabus for a semester course taught at Emory University where a professor named David R. Blumenthal taught on Genesis chapters 1 and 2.

The course also was focusing on commentaries from Rashi, Rashbam, Ramban (also known as Nahmanides) and Ibn Ezra.

Some resources associated with the same site:

Reading Genesis

The Traditional Translation With Renderings According to Rashi and Rashbam

The Traditional Translation With Renderings According to Ibn Ezra and Ramban

I don’t know yet what to think of the “renderings” of the creation story written by Rashi, Rambam, Ibn Ezra and Ramban, but if a person scrolls all the way down on each, there are footnotes that contain interesting information.

I’m simply impressed that a Bible course would focus on one or two chapters (and associated commentaries) for an entire semester.

I have been doing some research on the Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan al-Muslimeen) for some time and am still a little bit unsure about whether to classify them as a moderate or radical group. They may belong to a special category or even to more than one category - after all, this is a group of largely autonomous Muslim Brotherhood organizations that exist in many countries (some say as many as seventy countries). Also, the groups in different countries have gone through phases of violence and non-violence, depending on the disposition of leaders and the organization’s relationship with the government. Also, Muslim Brotherhood organizations don’t always work under the official name of the international organization that inspires them. The Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood happens to call itself by another name: HAMAS - hardly a moderate group.

Thanks to a blog post by Patrick Poole, a number of recent articles on the subject of the Muslim Brotherhood have come to my attention. Poole is actually being critical of at least three sources that encourage U.S. engagement with the Muslim Brotherhood. I’m currently holding back on answering the question in the title of this post - but I’ll admit I’m a bit of a skeptic when it comes to this group. Rather than try and tell people what to think (at least for now), I’ll just link to some papers and articles. It might be interesting to hear what others think on the subject.

“Mainstreaming the Muslim Brotherhood” by Patrick Poole at Frontpage Magazine (March 26, 2007)

“The Moderate Muslim Brotherhood” by Robert Leiken and Steven Brooke in Foreign Affairs March/April 2007

“The Little Explored Offshore Empire of the International Muslim Brotherhood” by Douglas Farah (April 18, 2006)

“Islam is only place to turn” by Mitch Potter in the Toronto Star (March 24, 2007)

“Hear out Muslim Brotherhood” by Joshua Stacher and Samer Shehata in the Boston Globe (March 25, 2007)

“A More Islamic Islam” by Geneive Abdo in the Washington Post (March 17, 2007)