In his book, God’s Undertaker, John Lennox says, “[Astrophysicist] Arno Penzias used the space platform of earth to make the brilliant discovery of the ‘echo of the beginning,’ the cosmic background of microwave radiation, for which he was awarded a Nobel Prize. In contrast to the increasingly belligerent New Atheists, Penzias has said, ‘Astronomy leads us to a unique event—a universe that was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide the exact conditions to permit life and one which has an underlying (one might say) supernatural plan.’”
Within Judaism, the New Year, which occurs in the fall for them occurs in the fall of the year, is more than a turning of the calendar. It is a time of renewing their faith and focus on G-d. One of the prayers is, "May it be Your will, Eternal our God, that this be a good and sweet year for us." Not all who are of Jewish decent believe in God; some are agnostic or atheists, and yet, many of those participate in the celebrations as part of their family traditions and also hope for "a sweet year" for themselves and their families. But for those who are G-d fearing, there is more going on, as Menachem Posner points out in Shana Tova, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur Greeting:
“The Jewish new year is not just a time to renew our resolve to lose another fifteen pounds. Rather, it’s the time when our fate stands in the balance as G‑d reviews our past year and decides whether or not to renew our lease on His planet. As such, Jewish greetings for this time of year (the Jewish New Year is in the fall) reflect our prayers for a good, sweet year up ahead.”
Their eternal fate is hopeful but somewhat unknown. After G-d's review, will they remain and be in the Book of Life? Posner explains and gives the full meaning of their greeting to one another, “A good inscription and sealing [in the Book of Life].” He also points out something additional:
“From noon on Rosh Hashanah, when our fates are already written, until Yom Kippur, when our fates for the coming year are to be sealed, we wish each other “Gemar chatimah tovah” (גמר חתימה טובה), “A good final sealing.”
It is different for those who are in Christ. In Ephesians 4 Paul talks about how we should live toward one another and includes two reasons, "And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption." (Ephesians:4:30And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.
See All...) Living badly toward other members of the Body of Christ grieves God, AND we are "sealed for the day of redemption." We are not up for an annual review to see if we are kept in the Book of Life for another year. Instead, we can praise and thank G-d that we have "a good final sealing" and pray for all of those who do not, whether they are Jews or Gentiles. "A good final sealing" is guaranteed to all who call on Yeshua for salvation. (Romans:10:9-13 [9] That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
[10] For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
[11] For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.
[12] For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him.
[13] For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
See All...)
https://mailchi.mp/b0ef5c8210e5/the-week-of-new-year-tidings?e=169825fd77
One of the greatest astrophysicists of the twentieth century, Sir Arthur Eddington, frankly confessed, “We have learned that the exploration of the external world by the methods of the physical sciences leads not to a concrete reality but to a shadow world of symbols.”8 In agreement, great mathematician and astronomer Sir James Jeans declared, “The most outstanding achievement of twentieth-century physics is not the theory of relativity . . . or the “theory of quanta . . . or the dissection of the atom . . . it is the general recognition that we are not yet in contact with ultimate reality.” Sir Karl Popper, one of the most influential philosophers of science in the twentieth century, stated that the theory of evolution is not science but “a metaphysical research programme.”
British outlet The Telegraph reported that the Freedom From Religion Foundation pulled the article "Biology is not Bigotry" from its site following backlash from pro-trans individuals. In turn, Dawkins resigned.
In his resignation letter to the foundation, Dawkins called the removal of the piece "an act of unseemly panic" and accused the foundation of having "caved in to hysterical squeals from predictable quarters and retrospectively censored that excellent rebuttal."
Biologist and fellow FFRF member Jerry Coyne composed the "censored" article as a rebuttal to non-binary author and FFRF fellow Kat Grant’s November article titled, "What is a Woman?"
The biologist’s piece argued that "any attempt to define womanhood on biological terms is inadequate."
Coyne’s follow-up challenged Grant’s point directly, arguing "the biological definition of ‘woman’" is based on gamete type.
Shortly after FFRF published Coyne’s piece, board co-presidents Dan Barker and Annie Laurie Gaylor unpublished it and released a statement explaining their decision.
"Publishing this post was an error of judgment, and we have decided to remove it as it does not reflect our values and principles. We regret any distress caused by this post and are committed to ensuring it doesn’t happen again," they wrote.
Following the move, both Coyne and US-Canadian psychologist Prof. Steven Pinker resigned from the foundation. Pinker blasted the group, saying it’s "no longer a defender of freedom from religion but the imposer of a new religion, complete with dogma, blasphemy, and heretics."
In an email to FFRF leadership, Coyne wrote, "That is a censorious behavior I cannot abide. I was simply promoting a biological rather than a psychological definition of sex, and I do not understand why you would consider that ‘distressing’ and also an attempt to hurt LGBTQIA+ people, which I would never do."
He added, "The gender ideology which caused you to take down my article is itself quasi-religious, having many aspects of religions and cults, including dogma, blasphemy, belief in what is palpably untrue (‘a woman is whoever she says she is’), apostasy, and a tendency to ignore science when it contradicts a preferred ideology."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/richard-dawkins-leaves-atheist-foundation-185849168.html
After more than a year of pro-Palestinians telling Jews that their historical and biblical links to Israel were irrelevant (in an attempt to delegitimise the Jewish state) it turns out that historical and biblical links really are important, so long as they don’t involve Jews. Now Jesus is Palestinian, the theory goes, it’s completely fine to argue that “some” of those who inhabited the region 2,000 years ago do have a claim on the land after all. Placards at marches read “Jesus is Palestinian” or “Jesus, the most famous Palestinian”.
There is, of course, a deeper precedent for this, in that Jesus’ Jewishness has been played down since the third century, when “Christianity” proliferated into Roman society. Then, even more so when his death became an excuse for anti-Semitism in the Middle Ages. In that sense, this attempt to politicize him is nothing new. There was also a certain German group you may have heard of from the 1930s and 40s who were very keen to eliminate any link between Jesus and his Jewish identity. It’s in this long, troubled context that we should see the potential harm this idea possesses.
If you leave aside the theological and historical absurdity – equating a Jewish man from 2000 years ago with a political identity that didn’t exist – this is the nub of the problem. It promotes the idea that Jews are systematic baby killers. This is the sort of thing that is screamed at elderly people on the streets of London, Glasgow and Brighton. That’s not something Jesus would have approved of. He was Jewish, after all.
—George Chesteron (English writer, UK Telegraph, Senior Writer, noted for his stand against Anti-Semitism, and correcting the use of History against the Jews and Israel).
And when we come to the question of origins, the lips of science are tightly sealed. Science can’t explain the origin of either matter or life. We have merely substituted new words to cover our ignorance and pretend we’ve made an advance. As far as ultimate reality is concerned, however, we are still where primitive man was before “science” deluded us with false hope.
[Humanity has often put forth the idea that our current generation is far more intelligent than those of previous centuries. Yet, it seems that with every new discovery of something done by ancient man, it is greeted with comments such as, “We can’t even figure out how ancient people did a lot of the brilliant things they did, such as the Egyptians building the pyramids, and other monumental architecture scattered around the world.” And that’s not the end of the search to answer the “how” of what was accomplished without power equipment equal to the task.]
Human intelligence 'peaked thousands of years ago and we've been on an intellectual and emotional decline ever since'
Is the human species doomed to intellectual decline? Will our intelligence ebb away in centuries to come leaving our descendants incapable of using the technology their ancestors invented? In short: will Homo be left without his sapiens?
This is the controversial hypothesis of a leading geneticist who believes that the immense capacity of the human brain to learn new tricks is under attack from an array of genetic mutations that have accumulated since people started living in cities a few thousand years ago.
Professor Gerald Crabtree, who heads a genetics laboratory at Stanford University in California, has put forward the iconoclastic idea that rather than getting cleverer, human intelligence peaked several thousand years ago and from then on there has been a slow decline in our intellectual and emotional abilities.
Although we are now surrounded by the technological and medical benefits of a scientific revolution, these have masked an underlying decline in brain power which is set to continue into the future leading to the ultimate dumbing-down of the human species, Professor Crabtree said.
His argument is based on the fact that for more than 99 per cent of human evolutionary history, we have lived as hunter-gatherer communities surviving on our wits, leading to big-brained humans. Since the invention of agriculture and cities, however, natural selection on our intellect has effective stopped and mutations have accumulated in the critical “intelligence” genes.
“I would wager that if an average citizen from Athens of 1000BC were to appear suddenly among us, he or she would be among the brightest and most intellectually alive of our colleagues and companions, with a good memory, a broad range of ideas and a clear-sighted view of important issues,” Professor Crabtree says in a provocative paper published in the journal Trends in Genetics.
“Furthermore, I would guess that he or she would be among the most emotionally stable of our friends and colleagues. I would also make this wager for the ancient inhabitants of Africa, Asia, India or the Americas, of perhaps 2,000 to 6,000 years ago,” Professor Crabtree says.
“The basis for my wager comes from new developments in genetics, anthropology, and neurobiology that make a clear prediction that our intellectual and emotional abilities are genetically surprisingly fragile,” he says.
https://creation.com/why-christianity-not-atheism-is-the-only-rational-foundation-for-ethics
[TBC: It is instructive that Crabtree’s “wager” on those of “2,000 to 6,000 years ago” comes comfortably close to Scripture’s dating.]
In fact, the “spontaneous arising by chance of the first heredity molecule” is not just improbable but impossible. This is one of those ingredients lying in wait in the impassable swamps and impossible cliffs that must be conquered before even reaching the base of Mount Improbable. Evolutionists/atheists are now telling us that the law of biogenesis isn’t really a law. It has been violated not just once but millions of times all over the universe! To accept Darwinism is tantamount to rejecting the very foundations of science itself. Everything is up for grabs.