Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

General Christian Theology
Falco Underhill
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Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

Falco Underhill wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 11:45 am
Psalm 12

12 Help, Lord; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.

2 They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.

3 The Lord shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things:

4 Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?

5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.

6 The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.

7 Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.


8 The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.
Love this Psalm.
"When you see the arrogance of the crowd and evil spreading everywhere so that there seems to be no one left who is pleasing to God take refuge in the Lord and say Psalm 12."

-- Athanasius, On the Interpretation of the Psalms
"Do you see the solicitude of the inspired author, how he prays for them? The remark is not against them, no but on their behalf. He did not ask for them to be destroyed, note, but for the evil to be done away with. He did not say "the Lord will destroy them," note, but the "deceitful lips." Again he asks for the destruction not of their being but of their tongue, their folly, their deceit, and for an end to be put to their arrogance."

-- John Chrysostom, Commentary on the Psalms
My thoughts are about the words I highlighted in blue.

The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
Thou wilt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever.


If we put our trust in the Lord's promises even as we're going through the experience described by the psalmist, we come to know God who reveals himself to us in his words. We grow in faith and in knowledge.

Why knowledge? Because the "pure words of the Lord" are "tried" (tested) and if we come to know God's faithfulness to us by being faithful when we are tested, then his words are tested, too, and found to be true.

One of the things that puzzled me as someone interested in philosophy is why Plato regarded belief as "opinion" and as something unreliable, that had to be tested to find real knowledge, in a process he called dialectics. Well, the Greeks didn't have the word of God to put their trust in, only men and "appearances." So for them, belief (trust) was not reliable, could not lead to knowledge.

Whereas for believers in the Judeo/Christian tradition, belief (faith) can be a kind of reliable knowledge. Why? Because the pure words of the Lord are tried (tested) in "a furnace," "purified seven times."

That's why "science" (as that word is understood today) can never shake a believer's faith.

Today's scientistic skeptics insist that knowledge can only be gained by experimental methods. If an experiment is testable and repeatable, and the results are always similar, we can say we have gained some knowledge.

Well, the promises of the Lord are just that, the Bible tells us.

That's why the psalmist can assure us " Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.." Because he has learned through being tested!

Another important truth to consider:
"The "flawless" character of Yahweh's word, refined like the finest silver seven times, is more than an illustration of the ultimate effectiveness of the divine word. The point of the psalm is not just that God will have the last word. The purity of the divine word also illumines a certain transparency in God. What Yahweh says reveals his true character. God does not dissemble or deceive. he says what he means and he does what he says. Therefore, not only can one trust Yahweh, one can also understand who god is by attending to his words."

-- Psalms Volume 1 (NIV Application Commentary)
https://happycatholic.blogspot.com/2021 ... -pure.html

Just something for us all to ponder!
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Falco Underhill
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

Franklin wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 2:15 pm
Law (torah, used 25 times in Psalm 119): “Its parent verb means ‘teach’ or ‘direct’; therefore coming from God it means both ‘law’ and ‘revelation.’ It can be used of a single command or of a whole body of law.” (Derek Kidner)
Yes its parent verb means teach, therefore it means teaching. The Old Testament is a book of teaching, not a book of law. Jesus obviously understood this, but Paul was ignorant and did not understand this which is why he kept complaining about "the Law".
Statutes (huqqim, used 21 times): The noun is derived from the root verb “engrave” or “inscribe”; the idea is the written word of God and the authority of His written word: “…declaring his authority and power of giving us laws.” (Matthew Poole)
English is a verbose language full of synonyms. Hebrew is not. "Statute" and "law" are synonyms. "hok" is the Hebrew word for law, not "torah". In the Old Testament, "hok" is always used in the plural, never "the law" (Hebrew "ha hok").
Word (dabar, used 24 times): The idea is of the spoken word, God’s revealed word to man. “Proceeding from his mouth and revealed by him to us…” (Matthew Poole)
"Dabar" means word or idea or thing. This reflects a fundamentally different worldview, the idea that from a human perspective all we have is what is in our mind as a result of sensory input, and therefore a thing, idea, and word are all basically the same.

In addition:

Truth (emet): The Western concept of truth comes from Plato. There is no such concept in the Old Testament, no concept of absolute truth. This word would be better translated as "trustworthiness". Philosophically this is related to "dabar" and is a total rejection of western philosophy.

Heart (lev): This also means brain/mind. There is no distinction between heart and mind in Hebrew, but Christians always translate to "heart" presumably to avoid any idea that they have to use their mind/brain.

LORD (Yhvh): This is God's name and doesn't mean "lord" at all. There is another word, "adoniah", which means lord. Talmudic Jews are to blame for this mistranslation, but Christians have kept it.

Of the Christian translations, only King James even comes close to the original meaning, and the translation in the original post in this thread is not King James.
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Falco Underhill
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

Franklin wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 2:15 pm
Law (torah, used 25 times in Psalm 119): “Its parent verb means ‘teach’ or ‘direct’; therefore coming from God it means both ‘law’ and ‘revelation.’ It can be used of a single command or of a whole body of law.” (Derek Kidner)
Yes its parent verb means teach, therefore it means teaching. The Old Testament is a book of teaching, not a book of law. Jesus obviously understood this, but Paul was ignorant and did not understand this which is why he kept complaining about "the Law".
Franklin, thanks for the comments. Very interesting observations. However, I'm not expert enough to know whether or to what extent Jesus agreed or whether and to what extent Paul misunderstood it, but it's interesting to me that the parent verb means to direct or teach.

However, I will say that praying (especially the Psalms) is often portrayed as going to court before a Judge, even by Jesus, in parables. I do believe we can pray for justice, in accordance with God's Law. However, the New Testament shows us we are sinners, too, and so have to keep in mind the good of the person sinning against us, which God desires, too. We have to pray for justice, while praying for the trespasser, leaving it in God's hands, knowing that His justice is always tempered with perfect love. (And keeping in mind our opponent may have a good point, too!)

No matter how tempting, we cannot lash out in anger because "the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God."

We have to follow the rules.

Nonetheless all this is often portrayed as going to court in the Bible, with God being the only lawgiver and judge, especially in the New Testament.

Now, I cannot help but feel this conception must somehow have its roots in the Torah. Am I wrong on this?

Interestingly, in Biblical times there was no separation of government powers as in modern times. There was no separation of the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of government as in our constitution. So we'll look in vain for a "courtroom" found anywhere in the Old Testament.
The LORD reigns forever; he has established his throne for judgment. Psalm 9:7
In Biblical times, the king exercised judgment (or the judicial authority) from the throne. (Think of Solomon and the baby.)

Anyways, on to another question:
Truth (emet): The Western concept of truth comes from Plato. There is no such concept in the Old Testament, no concept of absolute truth. This word would be better translated as "trustworthiness". Philosophically this is related to "dabar" and is a total rejection of western philosophy.
This is something I've never looked at closely. The word truth used by Jesus in the New Testament was "aletheia" which etymologically means "not concealing" and therefore "disclosure."

https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=aletheia

Now I've got to do some looking up on this word to see how it developed philosophically. It would also be interesting to see how it was understood by middle age philosophers like Augustine, Aquinas, etc.

Whether or not the idea of "absolute truth" can be traced to Plato is doubtful to me. He used the word truth (aletheia) in its meaning as "disclosure" but to the best of my knowledge, "absolute truth" meaning something like an "undeniable fact" is something attributed to Plato by interpreters. That interpretation became widespread and accepted but it's an erroneous interpretation, imo. The phrase "absolute truth" never occurs anywhere in Plato's works, AFAIK. Now I'm wondering where it first occurred. I never looked it up.

I do agree with you that everywhere in the Old Testament the word "truth" is used it would be more accurately translated as the Lord's "faithfulness" or "kindness." Maybe the interpreters were trying to tie Jesus's saying "I am the way the truth (aletheia) and the life" to together with the meaning of "faithfulness" and the meaning just got lost somehow? I don’t know, I'm just guessing.

There was a reason Biblical interpreters used the word "Lord" instead of the name YHWH though I can't recall it at the moment. Maybe I can find this later and get back on it.
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Neto
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Neto »

Falco Underhill wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 6:01 pm
There was a reason Biblical interpreters used the word "Lord" instead of the name YHWH though I can't recall it at the moment. Maybe I can find this later and get back on it.
Some commentators maintain that it was already a practice of the Jews to avoid using the Name before the time of The Christ. Others date the change to the period directly after the destruction of the Temple in 70 Ad, or even later. Personally I am not at all convinced about this change being before (or during) the lifetime of Jesus on earth. I think that there are some signs in the Greek of the NT that signal when Yahweh is meant, and when Adonai or Ha'adon is the Hebrew or Aramaic word being represented.

The other question or disagreement deals with the Why question - Why did they stop using God's Name, when He clearly says repeatedly that "This is my name, and by this name the ethnic peoples of the earth will know me." I personally suspect that their reason was not so holy as that "The Name is so holy, that we dare not speak it". I think that it is more likely that just as they would swear by the temple, but forbid to swear by the gold of the temple, it was a way to (in their minds) avoid using the Name in vain, while still doing the same swearing.

If I am correct in following the commentators who point to a late date for this change, then another question comes up: Why did the translators of the OT (into Greek) not transliterate Yahweh, but instead use some form of Kurious, which they also used for forms of Adonai or Ha'adon. I don't have an answer for this question.

In our work in Bible translation, when I came to the book of Job, I went off on a study of this, and concluded that I should use Yahweh where ever it occurred in the text, instead of using the word we were using for "Lord". (In Banawa, I still struggled with the choice between the transliterated options Yahewe or Yawei, and discussed this with the Banawa translation assistants. Either would work, but I preferred the latter, except that it is a verb in their language, meaning "be angry'. The Banawa men thought it was still fine to write it that way, possibly because it very commonly appears with a 'ka' prefix, and in that usage means 'to be angry on behalf of'. In fact, the nominalized form, Kakayawa, means "Protector", and they use it to refer to God already. But in the end, the mission translation department opposed me using it at all, because they felt that it would be confusing to "introduce another name for God".)
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Franklin
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Franklin »

Falco Underhill wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 6:01 pm Franklin, thanks for the comments. Very interesting observations. However, I'm not expert enough to know whether or to what extent Jesus agreed or whether and to what extent Paul misunderstood it, but it's interesting to me that the parent verb means to direct or teach.
Thanks for your comments. Of course I am not Christian so please keep that in mind. I am giving my understanding of the Old Testament.
However, I will say that praying (especially the Psalms) is often portrayed as going to court before a Judge, even by Jesus, in parables. I do believe we can pray for justice, in accordance with God's Law. However, the New Testament shows us we are sinners, too, and so have to keep in mind the good of the person sinning against us, which God desires, too. We have to pray for justice, while praying for the trespasser, leaving it in God's hands, knowing that His justice is always tempered with perfect love. (And keeping in mind our opponent may have a good point, too!)
I mostly agree. Of course if the trespasser harms other, for example by stealing, then we need laws and punishments to deal with this.
No matter how tempting, we cannot lash out in anger because "the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God."
I am not sure. I know that this is the Christian position but the Old Testament seems ambiguous here. For example in Numbers 25:7 Phinehas seems to lash out in anger and God approves.
We have to follow the rules.
I eat shellfish in spite of a rule against this. I follow the principle behind the rule rather than the rule itself. I think the principle is avoid foods that are likely to become rotten.
Nonetheless all this is often portrayed as going to court in the Bible, with God being the only lawgiver and judge, especially in the New Testament.
God is the only judge that counts in the end. As for laws, the Torah provides an example of laws that worked for that time and place, but we must apply the same principles to our circumstances and make our own laws. Mennonites effectively do this by making rules for their churches.
Truth (emet): The Western concept of truth comes from Plato. There is no such concept in the Old Testament, no concept of absolute truth. This word would be better translated as "trustworthiness". Philosophically this is related to "dabar" and is a total rejection of western philosophy.
This is something I've never looked at closely. The word truth used by Jesus in the New Testament was "aletheia" which etymologically means "not concealing" and therefore "disclosure."

https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=aletheia

Now I've got to do some looking up on this word to see how it developed philosophically. It would also be interesting to see how it was understood by middle age philosophers like Augustine, Aquinas, etc.

Whether or not the idea of "absolute truth" can be traced to Plato is doubtful to me. He used the word truth (aletheia) in its meaning as "disclosure" but to the best of my knowledge, "absolute truth" meaning something like an "undeniable fact" is something attributed to Plato by interpreters. That interpretation became widespread and accepted but it's an erroneous interpretation, imo. The phrase "absolute truth" never occurs anywhere in Plato's works, AFAIK. Now I'm wondering where it first occurred. I never looked it up.
I don't know anything about Greek. I have read Plato and his concept of ideal forms seems to constitute an absolute truth. I interpret the gospel of John as integrating the Hebrew and Greek perspectives. So I think Christians should accept the idea of truth even if it isn't in the Old Testament. If you want to understand all this you can read The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture.
There was a reason Biblical interpreters used the word "Lord" instead of the name YHWH though I can't recall it at the moment. Maybe I can find this later and get back on it.
The real reason is come complicated Jewish history. And in fact this directly violates Exodus 3:15.
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Falco Underhill
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

Addendum 1.
Today's scientistic skeptics insist that knowledge can only be gained by experimental methods. If an experiment is testable and repeatable, and the results are always similar, we can say we have gained some knowledge.
I just realized that one of the conditions of knowledge is that it be "verifiable" too. Spiritual truth is considered nothing more than "opinions" by modern scientistic ideologues because they say it is not "verifiable." This is not entirely true. God's truth can be "tested" and verified by experience to those willing to put their faith in God's promises. Those who do and have discovered the truth can speak to one another confidently about those truths in peaceful dialogue. Of course, to a person who is unable, or pretends to be unable, to have faith, or to be open to the experience, what can science say? This science (in the classical Christian tradition) can only speak to those who do have faith, or who are at least willing to try.

Addendum II

Just to confuse matters even more I looked up the etymology of "truth." Guess what it means?

"faith, faithfulness, fidelity, loyalty; veracity, quality of being true; pledge, covenant"

https://www.etymonline.com/word/truth

Truth, in the Biblical sense, actually does mean "faithfulness."

I find this stunning!
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Falco Underhill
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

To Franklin's point, however, "aletheia," which is translated as "truth," does seem more in line with the Greek meaning.
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temporal1
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by temporal1 »

Falco:
I find this stunning!
i can’t describe what it means to me to be stunned, to be in awe, to be in gratitude, in scriptures and faith.
until i was 40-ish, the Bible “just escaped” me, no matter how hard i tried to dig in.
i had a sense the Bible had something for me, but, i just could not grasp it.

then, something changed. fairly suddenly, i began to find Light and Truth on those pages. it wasn’t a moment i can recall, but, suddenly, i began to find .. Light. honestly, i imagined i saw Light coming out of the pages! i can’t believe it myself, but i remember the experience. it lasted for years, i think. and there was thrill and excitement in reading. what a change from all those years of finding .. nothing. i’m ashamed to say. how could i find nothing? (no, i’ve not abused drugs or alcohol.)

that’s how it unfolded for me.
my only understanding is that i could not see, until the Holy Spirit decided i would see.

it is stunning.
i feel sorry for anyone who cannot be thrilled when reading scriptures. i believe it’s a gift that cannot be fully understood.
nor is it meant to be.

i want to add this here, i hope not a distraction:
temporal1 wrote: Fri Jul 09, 2021 5:35 pm
Falco Underhill wrote: Fri Jul 09, 2021 10:08 am C.S. Lewis believed God created man by evolution and then gifted man with a soul.
For long centuries God perfected the animal form which was to become the vehicle of humanity and the image of Himself [….] Then, in the fullness of time, God caused to descend upon this organism, both on its psychology and physiology, a new kind of consciousness […] In perfect cyclic movement, being, power and joy descended from God to man in the form of gift and returned from man to God in the form of obedient love and ecstatic adoration. (Lewis, Problem of Pain 65)
C.S. Lewis also upheld a view called methodological naturalism,
:arrow: the view that the methods of science can only arrive at naturalistic explanations.
He wrote,
Science works by experiments. It watches how things behave. Every scientific statement in the long run, however complicated it looks, really means something like, ‘I pointed the telescope to such and such a part of the sky at 2:20 a.m. on January 15th and saw so and-so,’ […] Do not think I am saying anything against science: I am only saying what its job is [….] But why anything comes to be there at all, and whether there is anything behind the things science observes-something of a different kind-this is not a scientific question. (Mere 22)
http://www.cslewis.org/journal/cs-lewis ... -design/3/

I suppose these views are similar to my own.

I might quibble with C. S. Lewis's view that questions about God are not a matter for science though. The modern idea that only studies that use the experimental methods in its investigations qualify as science is erroneous, in my view. Plato's dialectics is a real science that can address that, imo. But I won't address that here further cause that would bunny trail.
Falco Underhill wrote: Fri Jul 09, 2021 5:27 pm St. Augustine on the Creation narrative —
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
Gen. 1:1-2
1. in the Beginning, that is, in the divine Wisdom, the divine Word of God, Who is the Beginning, as He tells us in Jn 8:25, in answer to the question Who are you? - (I am) the Beginning. Also, Collosions 1:18, "He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent." Also, John 1:1-3.

Augustine does not hesitate to affirm a reference to the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity in these first two verses of Genesis: "For, where Scripture says, In the beginning God made heaven and earth, we understand the Father in the name of God, and the Son in the name of the Beginning, Who is the beginning (Colossians 1:16, John 1:3) ... and, where Scripture says, and the Spirit of God moved over the waters, we see a full commemoration of the Trinity.

2. Augustine believed all that was created was created in a moment, in the Beginning. Thus the "days" of creation are for narrative purposes only.

3. The Biblical account references form and matter and light. Augustine does not believe there was a pre-existent formless matter because everything was created at once. The narrative does separate form and matter and light has the preeminent place. John 1:9

"But if the light which first was ordered to be made and was made is also to be understood as holding the pre-eminent place in creation, this is intellectual life, which, unless it should be turned to the Creator in order to be enlightened, would fluctuate formlessly."

Augustine believed the light of the first 3 days was a spiritual light.

Reference: https://www1.villanova.edu/villanova/ar ... logy0.html
Falco,
i’m glad, in spite of some early bumps, you decided to contribute here/this forum. all topics. :D

i’m intrigued with C.S. Lewis’ ideas about the limitations of science.
in my mind, this aligns with what i’ve thought about human science, that it’s ever restricted to “running behind God;”
by definition, science can never be ahead of God. God creates, science attempts to analyze and understand.

so, i don’t fear science. i appreciate great scientific minds. i’m amazed with men who “go so far,” then are honest enough to acknowledge, God is greater. this also stuns me.

human reasoning becomes scary when trying to manipulate science/facts for earthly agenda.
that’s the failure. it’s not science, it’s corruption.

have patience with me. :P
it’s the only way to endure me, so far as i know. :-|
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Most or all of this drama, humiliation, wasted taxpayer money could be spared -
with even modest attempt at presenting balanced facts from the start.


”We’re all just walking each other home.”
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temporal1
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by temporal1 »

Falco Underhill wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 9:31 pm To Franklin's point, however, "aletheia," which is translated as "truth," does seem more in line with the Greek meaning.

Life on earth did not begin with Jesus Christ. Jesus came to offer salvation to the fallen world.
He did not come to “nothingness” on earth. The world He met, full of human reasoning and human law, was too much like today’s world. Shouldn’t we be doing better with what He gave us? :?

Open Yale courses:
“CLCV 205: Introduction to Ancient Greek History”
https://oyc.yale.edu/classics/clcv-205/lecture-1

Open Harvard courses:
“Harvard Offering Free Distance Learning Class on the Ancient Greek Hero; More Than 40,000 People Have Registered”
https://pappaspost.com/harvard-ancient- ... ro-course/
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Most or all of this drama, humiliation, wasted taxpayer money could be spared -
with even modest attempt at presenting balanced facts from the start.


”We’re all just walking each other home.”
UNKNOWN
Falco Underhill
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Re: Distinguishing Faithfulness (Kindness) and Truth in the Bible

Post by Falco Underhill »

temporal1 wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 10:08 pm Life on earth did not begin with Jesus Christ.
Yes it did!
For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him.
2 Cor. 2:16
:lol:

However, I think I know what you meant. He came into a fallen world and would affect people of different cultures, right?
Jesus came to offer salvation to the fallen world.
He did not come to “nothingness” on earth. The world He met, full of human reasoning and human law, was too much like today’s world. Shouldn’t we be doing better with what He gave us?


Yes, but are you trying to make a point about "aletheia" here?
Open Yale courses:
“CLCV 205: Introduction to Ancient Greek History”
https://oyc.yale.edu/classics/clcv-205/lecture-1

Open Harvard courses:
“Harvard Offering Free Distance Learning Class on the Ancient Greek Hero; More Than 40,000 People Have Registered”
https://pappaspost.com/harvard-ancient- ... ro-course/
Thanks, I'll try to take a look at them later. Harvard and Yale, wow! Must be heady stuff! (and my brain is already tired tonight.)
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