Thoughts

The North also had the Northeastern Industrialized Corridor, the only effective challenge mounted at that point anywhere in the world to the British Industrial Machine. Lincoln may have grown up in ruralia, but that long belt in the Northeast consisted of mechanized factories that could churn out equipment far faster than the South--assuming the South was even interested, which wasn't, since the culture found mechanization abhorrent.

The South also had the likes of Jackson, the Hills, the Johnsons, Longstreet, Hood (who, whatever his massive psychological problems, was a superb tactical general), Stuart (who remained the only effective mounted calvary leader until relatively late in the War), and plenty of other talent that rose immediately to the top of the new CSA army. The problem for the North concerning effective military leadership wasn't that it was lacking, but that the bureaucratic peacetime army structure was already in place, and worked unintentionally against the promotion of just those types of people necessary to win a war.

Each side was also helped and hindered by the respective experience and inexperience of their political leader. Davis was initially a very positive force, a former military commander and hero who knew the army intimately, and what it needed. But in the end, he tried to manage the War himself, bypassing his generals, and using his favorites. Lincoln, on the other hand, was completely inexperienced, and knew it. He trusted people who in retrospect did not deserve a nod of his head, much less his support; but he learned quickly. And eventually, his talent for recognizing quality allowed him to pick the proper men to fight the battles, while his sense of reality kept him for making decisions for them.

 

Yes, Stonewall Jackson was THE best general on the planet. I could go on and on about great Confederate generals, trust me. In fact I'm one of the descendants of General Benjamin Taylor, and I'm dead serious. If Stonewall would have lived the South would have won , no doubt about it. The Union troops were alot less expirenced. Me, having been born and raised in the South, held my first rifle as soon as I was physically able. I got my first pistol when I was twelve. When that happened I then had four guns. Seriously. I hunt pretty much everything, Ducks and Squirrls mainly. As for the reason of the war, the South wanted to expand slavery to the West. President Abraham Lincoln was not going to let that happen. So the Southern states secceded from the Union. Benjamin Taylor warned that this would bring war, but few listened to him. Then, wudda ya know, war starts. To stop Great Britin from supporting the the glorious Confederacy he stated that the reason for the war was to abolish slavery. Everything seemed good for the Confederacy until General Stonewall Jackson died of Phenmonia. After that, was Gettisburg, which I'll not go into detail. But, NO, labyrinthian, they were not equal. Forgive all my spelling errors and whatnot.

Both.

 

I don't know that the Federal army wasn't any less experienced. Certainly towards the end of the war it had a greater percentage of inexperienced soldiers compared to the CSA, but that was due to the fact that Davis couldn't raise any more troops, while the more populous North (with a stronger federal branch) could and did. But at the start of the war the sides had roughly the same level of, shall we say, inexperience, and each paid for it in a single large fiasco where over-confidence led to rout.

Really, the big chance for the South was over by mid-1863, no matter how it looked on the ground. They needed diplomatic recognition in Europe like a body needs to breathe; and I'm convinced that would have caused the North to find some face-saving measure and back off before Grant and Sherman ever started their series of relentless victories. Lacking that recognition, the conflict only waited for somebody to realize that the North could win by relentlessly pounding the Southern armies--which was Grant's strategy. Blunt, horrifying and undistinguished, but damn, it was effective.

 

I prefer Lee to Jackson. The true measure of a general is found only in adversity. The more a general could do with less, the better I believe he was. By that standard the best general of the 19th century was Lee, & Romell was the best of the 20th.

If one rebel could take on 5 yanks, it didn't realy matter. 5 immigrants landed in the north for each soldier killed in the war. Enlist only 2 of them, & the war is over sooner or later. They did, it was.

As for Europe, the only things the south exported were cotton & indigo. England wanted those items, so England ran the blockade. Even if the other European nations had a negative oppinion of the Union, they traded with it, not the south.

Dark Elf, the north had the best strategy but almost no tactics. The south had vastly superior tactics, but niether the manpower nor the materials for a chohrent strategy. They also had a divided command. Each state had its own army, its own commander, & there was no real unifining force in the southern TO.

 

I don't. I like Lee, but not near as much as I like Jackson. Even the Yankees cheered Jackson. In my opinion Jackson was more respectable than Lee. Jackson was a very christian person. Not that Lee wasn't, but I doubt that Lee had half the faith Jackson had. If you don't know why he's called Stonewall, it's because when other men fled in terror Jackson stood "like a stone wall". Jackson was in battle and was shot in the hand while holding it up and all he did was wrap a hankercheif aroud it and continued on. Now, if that not a sign of strong faith, what is?

 

What part of "Thou shall not kill" are christian generals immune to anyway?

Jackson was a great general, but by my personal standard of doing the most with the least, he just did not have the opportuinity to prove himself the way Lee did. Perhaps Montgomery was a better general than Romell, but by that standard, we will never know.

I call that courage, not faith.

 

I call it the courage that faith gives you. And If you didn't know, Jesus had people kill other people in the Bible.

 

It actually isn't though. Getting shot in the hand and going on with the battle has nothing to do with faith and everything to do with determination and discipline. If that's your argument for saying he was a great man, fine I wholeheartedly agree with you, but having balls doesn't mean you have faith. One of the kids at my school, his name's Mike, he's really big, plays football, lacrosse, and he boxes, he got into a fight once with some kid over a girl. The kid knocked him down the steps and into a soda machine. But then Mike got up and beat the hell out of the kid until some of the teachers stopped him. Now, Mike's the most irreverant bastard that ever lived, he once told me if Jesus was alive today he'ld smack the shit out of the little commie punk, so what do you atribute his fighting too?

EDIT: Actually God did, Jesus didn't. None of the apostles were hit men, sorry.

 

Actually, the Bible is often misquoted on that one because it is often mistranslated on that. The original actually reads and is most accurately translated as "Thou shalt not do murder." The Bible frequently records incidents of God directing his people to go to battle and kill people, so I would say there is plenty of evidence that Christians are not prohibited from fighting in a war. I am not condoning or endorsing holy wars! I'm just trying to things straight.

 

Not exactly. As I understand it the Hebrew root encompasses both killing (simple taking of life) and murder (illegal taking of human life). The translation as "kill" can be seen as an attempt both to acknowledge this wider meaning and to take into account the Jewish philosophers who argued that any taking of human life is wrong and illegal, a thread which underlies the virtual elimination of capital punishment in Rabbinic law.

As for what Christians are allowed to do, keep in mind that the Ten Commandments were written for the Jews, not the Christians, and that the Old Testament god was often, well, brutal and sinful.

(Anyone with more Jewish studies experience than me, feel free to offer corrections.)

 

No, Canis, you're right.

There is also no part of the bible that says God has to follow his own commandments. And he most certainly didn't. Though sinful isn't quite accurate, as "sin" translates as "miss the mark" from Hebrew. Missing the mark in the context we usually use it means not doing what the Yah-man wants us to do. However, presumably, he is always doing what he wants himself to do, whether or not it is according to his law. However, in Joshua and Judges, God often orders the Hebrews to make war. And so there is a paradox: does he want us to kill or not? Presumably, he can contradict his own law, though this is strange, as the Law, in rabbinic Judaism, is considered the very nature of God. Weird shit like this is why we have the Talmud.

Jesus, though, is considered (by Paul, and thus everybody after Paul) as the embodiment of the New Law. And, according to Jesus, violence is never acceptable -- rage, maybe, in the instance of the money changer -- but never violence. Turn the other cheek, anybody? And so, anybody who considers himself Christian can never justifiably resort to violence of any kind. Or capitalism, for that matter, but that's another story.

As far as the best part about being Jewish, Shady, I'd have to vote for no afterlife and thus valuing this life, shortly followed by lox and bagel, kugel, and cheese blintzes.

 

If you want to get technical with the Bible...

http://pw1.netcom.com/~rogermw/square_earth.html


Of course then I have to ask you, how do you pick and choose what to keep Mr. Vorak? Or does Mr. Sinbad have an answer?

In the Old Testament it says that Soddom and Gomorrah were destroyed because they were filled with heathenous gays. But when Jesus came he washed away everything that God had done before. So now God likes heathenous gay? Well, I suppose gays aren't even heathenous, they're friggin priests! Damn. This is making far too much sense. I have to stop now.

EDIT: No Noble, you're wrong, so very, very wrong.

 

First, the commandment does indead mean murder, not just taking a life. The actul meaning means to dash to peices. It's the context that makes it murder.

Second, the "turn the other cheek" refers to the eye for an eye law, wich was an civil law. If you where to knock out someones eye, you lost one of your. Basically, if you wronged someone they paid a equal cost. The turn the other cheek was a statement, that if you wronged another person, you should make ammends by force, but be willing to do what it takes to make it right.

Nowhere in the bible does it say that voilance is against the law, just that it should be a last resort.

 

yes of course, the bible stipulates that "violence is a last resort" in those exact words. congratulations. WWJD you ask? jesus was a mystic pacifist (i think someone pointed that out a while ago in one of these threads but whatever, its an accepted term) meaning he forsook all worldly possessions and desires and turned towards his religion for inner piece, and never raised a hand against anyone in violence. Chasing money lenders out of a temple with angry words is much different than tossing a flashbang into said temple and spraying the area with depleted uranium shells. Jesus never physically attacked an enemy, because in his view he had no enemies, only companions on his journey through this world.

You must be completely idiotic if you think the bible is the dircet word of god, the old testament should be viewed a collected history of fables, not an example of acceptable behaviour. In the new testament jesus should be looked upon as an example of how we should strive to live our lives, not an excuse to oppress other cultures, or quelch opinions opposed to your own. The first 20 pages of genesis is not an explanation of all science, and jesus would not have stopped jews from worshipping how they saw fit.

Matachuah, your opinion on whether or not jackson had more faith in god than lee is comepletly useless to everyone. As if anyone but a psychotic civil war buff like yourself would give a fuck. (no offense) It is pretty interesting that you are a desendant of benjamin taylor (ahhh yes, "the desendants" ...greatest punk band ever...("milo goes to college" is the greatest album ever as well)) but i still dont understand your love for the confederacy? how would we be better off with a confederal system of government? every state would be at war with each other, or under the heel of the most powerful state.

 

LOL, he didn't chase the people out of the temple, he drove them out with a weapon of the day, a leather chord laced with shards of pottery.

And if he didn't have enemies, who killed him?

I wish people would actually do some actual research on these things before quoting some idiotic preacher...

If you want verses, and hebrew/greek translations, I'll be glad to comply.

 

Sleek_Jeek your opinion on punk bands is completely useless to anyone other than a psychotic punk band buff would give a care. Frankly, Sleek, I don't care if you understand. I'm not going to try to explain it to you if you're just going to blab about how stupid I am.

 

Only in John, I think. Check the other gospels, that detail is absent. Or do you, like every pther religious zealot, only pick and choose the Bible verses that fit your end?

Given that you have previously enlightened us with this:

...you'll forgive me if I remain skeptical of your qualifications as a walking Talmud. I always say, if you're going to study the Hebrew Bible, you should listen to what the Jewish philosophers and academics have had to say about it over the centuries, and not simply rely on what you heard on TBN last night.

 

Canis, I'm not sure that's fair. My ancient Hebrew, though very rusty, is still existent, and I think he's right about the dash to pieces thing. Though to what context he's referring, I'm at a loss. There really isn't much context. The commandments (not just the 10, the 600+ 613? somehting like that) are pretty much just a list. Not much for context. The last part of Exodus, and almost all of Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, are bloody boring accounting ledgers. Uh.

But you're damned right about the John thing. John is by far the furthest from the original "ur-gospel," and likely by far a very inaccurate post facto justification for the divinity of Jesus. According to most (non-fundamentalist) bible historians, it was written around 150 C.E., losng after anyone whose grampa ever knew Jesus was dead.

Now the Gospel according to James, and of course Magdalene, those are intersting reads. One point about those: for you Protestants who think you aren't Catholics: it was the pope who threw out these (and more) other gospels, as they disagreed with the DECISION OF A SLIM MAJORITY OF VOTERS (between 1 and 3 votes, depending on the source) at the Council of Nicaea that Jesus was divine. This was in 325 C.E. So for 300 years, and more, really, "Christians," a good number of them, did not even accept the divinity of Jesus. It was the Church of Rome that demanded they do so.