King James Version
9 He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.
10 He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.
11 But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes.
ST UnWoked & UnVaxxed! 
Something about ‘Light vs the Dark’ seems to be what the cosmos is whispering ever louder to me.
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Ben Watson spoke at a pro-life dinner I attended last week, and he spoke in terms of light and darkness. He acknowledged that Massachusetts is a place of darkness when it comes to abortion-and lots of other things as well, but he said, “How much brighter does a light shine in the darkness?” It brought tears to my eyes when he said that. It still does.
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Interesting nakrap Thanks so much for this.
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“We may have heard the joke Bob Hope once made about religion. He said he was on an airplane when the left engine quit. People began to gasp, then suddenly the right engine quit. The lady next to him screamed, “Do something religious.” Bob Hope said, “So I did. I got up and took a collection.” While this remark may be facetious, it nevertheless illustrates what some people think about those who “get religion.” Many have doubts about anyone who takes religion seriously.”
from:
https://www.bethelcog.org/handling-personal-problems/all-of-a-sudden-he-got-religion/
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“The lady next to him screamed, “Do something religious.” Bob Hope said, “So I did. I got up and took a collection.”
LOL 🙂
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Great article, Simon. Thank you!
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vivo ut serviam
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2 things: why is darkness bad? I mean, God created the days,AND the nights, right?
And: who IS one’s brother? Is it just our co-religionists? Even Jesus referred to the Samarians, f’rinstance, as”dogs”.
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I suspect darkness in how the Bible uses it here represents evil.
I believe brother is larger than co-religionist. Perhaps defined as people who are genuinely happy when something good happens to you.
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I always thought our brothers and sisters are any and all other humans. Jesus tells us to love our enemies and our brothers and those who persecute us. Seems pretty all encompassing.
I don’t believe that Jesus actually thought of the Samarians as dogs. I always thought that he was just trying to illustrate a point.
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“It is not meet to take the children’s food, and give it to the dogs”? Harsh!
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Yes, but I don’t believe that He meant that literally. It is harsh, I cannot claim to totally understand why Jesus said that, but being that He is Jesus, and given the way that exchange ended up working out, I believe that Jesus loved Samarians every bit as much as He loved Jews.
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This very short piece explains it better than I can: https://www.gotquestions.org/Canaanite-woman-dog.html
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A tough challenge, see if the woman was serious, that she trusted Him. She was. Therefore he healed her daughter.
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Perhaps he thought they were ‘barking ‘ mad??
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I think you mean Canaanites. Part anagram of Canaanites is ‘canines’ meaning dogs.
As regards darkness, well for one thing it is a full anagram of ‘Dr snakes’. This explains the problems today with medical Nazis, vaccines etc.
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Yes but WHY should darkness be evil? Night is good, right,,we NEEd it.
“ People who are happy when something good happens to you”—who would NOT love those people?
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I think there are studies that too much night (as in the Scandanavian countries) causes depression leading to suicides. I suspect darkness is evil because, who really wants to go out unarmed without a light to find out what made that thump in the darkness?
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“—who would NOT love those people?”
The point, I think, is not that they are easy to love but that they know who we are and love us anyway. That sounds something like a righteous fraternity to me.
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WAAAIT a minute! Cue “Atlas Shrugged”: who, knowing us, would NOT love us?
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Any saintly person?
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Saints love everyone, otherwise, they would not be saints 🙂
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Shows how smart I am.
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You are a genius 🙂
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So they keep telling me while emptying my bank account.
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You will prevail.
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I got into a big argument on L2 for defending the darkness! Fun, but there’s no point in going any farther with it, really. We are predators and we don’t have such great senses of smell and hearing, not like, say, wolves, so eyesight is it for us, and it dont work so good in the dark. So we feel safe in the light and feel scared and vulnerable in the dark. C’est ça!
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