changed 5 years ago
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Are the Statements Made in "God in Ancient China" True?

Video from YouTube

Apology for big part of data being referenced from Wiki lol. But it should be correct. FWIW the historial events are aligned with what I'd been taught in history class back in school. Danny.

Claim: "We have very clear historical records. For the first 2,000 years Chinese a singular supreme God, and not dozens or millions of deities"

4:20~4:36

It does NOT state that Chinese ONLY worship one God per Wikipedia. In the contrary it said Polytheism. The first sentence in the paragraph for Religion for Shang dynasty (in Chinese) in Wikipedia says, "From
archaeological data, people in Shang worship various deities", literally, in translation.

Claim: The "Quote" Confirms what the Old Testament Says

7:14~7:47

Quote from "Shiji (史記)" by Sima Qian (司馬遷)

Conclusion: Misleading from what I found. Timeline of the events is NOT correct and interpretation of the quote is WRONG.

  1. The quote that the pastor used is NOT in the original version of Shiji that Sima Qian wrote from the chapter, but the commented version by Zheng Xuan (鄭玄) (Ref)
  2. The history events are MISPLACED by lots: The translator said "Sima Qian wrote something about scholar, Zheng Xuan, in Shiji. Sima Qian, 145-90 ca. BC, is from Xi-Han (西漢) dynasty, but Zheng Xuan, 127-200 AD, is from Dong-Han (東漢) dynasty
  3. The quote that the pastor used, "上帝者,天之別名也。神無二主。", did NOT end up in "神無二主". The full COMMENT is "上帝者,天之別名也。神無二主,故異其處,避后稷也。". And it is for commenting 上帝 in "周公既相成王,郊祀后稷以配天,宗祀文王於明堂以配上帝。自禹興而修社祀,后稷稼穡,故有稷祠,郊社所從來尚矣。"
  4. Given the complete context, the comment should merely mean "'Shang Di (上帝)' is the alias for 'Tian (天)', but there is only one God in Tian. So Sima Qian changed the title of '(the Great) Zhou Gong (周公)' to 'Wen Wang (文王)'."
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