Mu

Mu is the name of a hypothetical continent that allegedly existed in one of Earth's oceans, but disappeared at the dawn of human history.

The concept and the name were proposed by 19th century traveler and writer Augustus Le Plongeon, who claimed that several ancient civilizations, such as those of Egypt and Mesoamerica, were created by refugees from Mu — which he located in the Atlantic Ocean.This concept was popularized and expanded by James Churchward (1851–1936), who asserted that Mu was once located in the Pacific.

The existence of Mu was disputed already in Le Plongeon's time. Today, scientists dismiss the concept of Mu (and of other lost continents like Lemuria) as physically impossible, since a continent can neither sink nor be destroyed by any conceivable catastrophe, especially not in the short period of time required by this premise. Moreover, the weight of all archaeological, linguistic and genetic evidence is contrary to the claim that the ancient civilizations of the New and Old Worlds stemmed from a common ancestral civilization. So, the very "facts" that the theory was conceived to explain are now seen to be false. Mu is today considered to be a fictional place.
History of the concept

Augustus Le Plongeon

The idea of Mu first appeared in the works of Augustus Le Plongeon (1825–1908), after his investigations of the Maya ruins in Yucatán. He claimed that he had translated the ancient Mayan writings, which supposedly showed that the Maya of Yucatán were older than the later civilizations of Greece and Egypt, and additionally told the story of an even older continent.

Le Plongeon actually got the name "Mu" from Charles Étienne Brasseur de Bourbourg who in 1864 mistranslated what was then called the Troano Codex using the de Landa alphabet. Brasseur believed that a word that he read as Mu referred to a land submerged by a catastrophe. Le Plongeon then identified this lost land with Atlantis, and turned it into a continent which had supposedly sunk into the Atlantic Ocean:

"In our journey westward across the Atlantic we shall pass in sight of that spot where once existed the pride and life of the ocean, the Land of Mu, which, at the epoch that we have been considering, had not yet been visited by the wrath of Homen, that lord of volcanic fires to whose fury it afterward fell a victim. The description of that land given to Solon by Sonchis, priest at Sais; its destruction by earthquakes, and submergence, recorded by Plato in his Timaeus, have been told and retold so many times that it is useless to encumber these pages with a repetition of it".: ch. VI, p. 66

Le Plongeon claimed that the civilization of ancient Egypt was founded by Queen Moo, a refugee from the land's demise. Other refugees supposedly fled to Central America and became the Mayans.

James Churchward

Le Plongeon's lost continent was later popularised by James Churchward (1851–1936) in a series of books, beginning with Lost Continent of Mu, the Motherland of Man (1926), re-edited later as The Lost Continent Mu (1931) . Other popular books in the series are The Children of Mu (1931), and The Sacred Symbols of Mu (1933).

Churchward claimed that "more than fifty years ago," while he was a soldier in India, he befriended a high-ranking temple priest who showed him a set of ancient "sunburnt" clay tablets, supposedly in a long lost "Naga-Maya language" which only two other people in India could read. Having mastered the language himself, Churchward found out that they originated from "the place where [man] first appeared—Mu." The 1931 edition states that “all matter of science in this work are based on translations of two sets of ancient tablets:” the clay tables he read in India, and a collection 2,500 stone tablets that had been uncovered by William Niven in Mexico.: p. 7

Churchward gave a vivid description of Mu as the home of an advanced civilization, the Naacal, which flourished between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago, was dominated by a “white race,": p. 48 and was "superior in many respects to our own" [7]: p. 17 At the time of its demise, about 12,000 years ago, Mu had 64,000,000 inhabitants and many large cities, and colonies in the other continents.

Churchward claimed that the landmass of Mu was located in the Pacific Ocean, and stretched east-west from the Marianas to Easter Island, and north-south from Hawaii to Mangaia. He claimed that according to the creation myth he read in the Indian tablets, Mu had been lifted above sea level by the expansion of underground volcanic gases. Eventually Mu “was completely obliterated in almost a single night”: p. 44: after a series of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, "the broken land fell into that great abyss of fire" and was covered by "fifty millions of square miles of water.": p. 50

Churchward claimed that Mu was the common origin of the great civilizations of Egypt, Greece, Central America, India, Burma and others, including Easter Island, and was in particular the source of ancient megalithic architecture. As evidence for his claims, he pointed to symbols from throughout the world, in which he saw common themes of birds, the relation of the Earth and the sky, and especially the Sun. Churchward claims the king of Mu was Ra and he relates this to the Egyptian god of the sun, Ra, and the Rapanui word for Sun, ra’a, which he incorrectly spells "raa.": p. 48 He claimed to have found symbols of the Sun in “Egypt, Babylonia, Peru and all ancient lands and countries – it was a universal symbol.”: p. 138

Churchward attributed all megalithic art in Polynesia to the people of Mu. He claimed that symbols of the sun are found “depicted on stones of Polynesian ruins,” such as the stone hats (pukao) on top of the giant moai statues of Easter Island. Citing W.J. Johnson, Churchward incorrectly describes the cylindrical hats as “spheres” that “show red in the distance”, and asserts that they “represent the Sun as Ra.”: p. 138 He also incorrectly claimed that some of them are made of "red sandstone" : p. 89 which does not occur in the island. The platforms on which the statues rest (ahu) are described by Churchward as being “platform-like accumulations of cut and dressed stone,” which were supposedly left in their current positions “awaiting shipment to some other part of the continent for the building of temples and palaces.”: p. 89 He also cites the pillars “erected by the Maoris of New Zealand” as an example of this lost civilization’s handiwork.: p. 158 In Churchward's view, the present-day Polynesians are not descendants of the dominant members of the lost civilization of Mu, responsible for these great works, but survivors of the cataclysm that adopted “the first cannibalism and savagery” in the world.: p. 54
Underwater structures claimed to be remnants of Mu, near Yonaguni, Japan

Modern claims

Churchward's concept of Mu was elaborated upon by other writers. Graham Hancock claimed that the destruction of Mu occurred around 10,000 B.C.[citation needed], whereas James Bramwell and William Scott-Elliott claimed that the cataclysmic events began 800,000 years ago[8]: p. 194 and went on until the last catastrophe, which occurred precisely in 9564 BC.[8]: p. 195

Michel Desmarquet's 1993 book Thiaoouba Prophecy contains a detailed description of the continent Mu, allegedly experienced by the author while under the instruction of extraterrestrials.

Masaaki Kimura has suggested that certain underwater features located off the coast of Yonaguni Island, Japan (popularly known as the Yonaguni Monument) are ruins of Mu (or "ruins of the lost world of Muin" according to CNN).

Criticisms

Geological arguments

Modern geological knowledge rules out "lost continents" of any significant size. According to the theory of plate tectonics, which has been extensively confirmed over the past 40 years, the Earth's crust consists of lighter "sial" rocks (rich in aluminum silicates) that float on heavier "sima" rocks (richer in magnesium silicates). The sial is generally absent or a few kilometres thick at the bottom of the oceans, while the continents are huge solid blocks tens of kilometers thick. Since continents float on the sima much like icebergs float on water, a continent cannot simply "sink" under the ocean.

It is true that continental drift and seafloor spreading can change the shape and position of continents, and occasionally break a continent into two or more pieces (as happened to Pangaea). However, these are very slow processes that occur in geological time scales (hundreds of millions of years). Over the scale of history (tens of thousands of years), the sima under the continental crust can be considered solid, and the continents are basically anchored on it. It is all but certain that the continents and ocean floors have retained their present position and shape for the whole span of human existence.

There is also no conceivable event that could have "destroyed" a continent, since its huge mass of sial rocks would have to end up somewhere—and there is no trace of it at the bottom of the oceans. The Pacific Ocean islands are not part of a submerged landmass, but rather the tips of isolated volcanoes.
Map of Easter Island showing locations of the ahu and moai

This is the case, in particular, of Easter Island, which is a recent volcanic peak surrounded by deep ocean (3,000 m deep at 30 km off the island). After visiting the island in the 1930s, Alfred Metraux observed that the moai platforms are concentrated along the current coast of the island, which implies that the island's shape has changed little since they were built. Moreover, the "Triumphal Road" that Pierre Loti had reported ran from the island to the submerged lands below, is actually a natural lava flow [12]. Furthermore, while Churchward was correct in his claim that the island has no sandstone or sedimentary rocks, the point is moot because the pukao are all made of native volcanic scoria.

As a local catastrophe

The geological arguments that rule out "lost continents" do not rule out local catastrophes which may have changed the course of human history, such as the 80 m rise in the sea level over the last 12,000 years, the flooding of the Black Sea 7,600 years ago, and the eruption of Santorini 3,600 years ago. However, if Mu was anything less than a full-size continent, it could not fulfill its claimed role in the spread of civilization across the oceans.

Archaeological and genetic evidence

The historical details and implications of the Mu theory, which from the start were even more controversial than the physical ones, have been thoroughly discredited by archaeological and genetic research.

The weight of evidence is that the civilizations of the Americas and the Old World developed independently of each other; and, in fact, agriculture and urban societies probably first developed, after the end of the Ice Age, somewhere in the Levant some 10,000 years ago and gradually spread outwards from there to the rest of the Old World. The development of the oldest known cities, such as Çatalhöyük, can more easily be attributed to local and gradual evolution than to the coming of refugees from a "superior civilization". Finally, genetic studies of the indigenous peoples of America, the Pacific Islanders, and the ancient peoples of the Old World are quite incompatible with the Mu theory.

As for Easter Island, there is no evidence of human presence in the land before 300 AD; and the Pukao on the Moai are typically regarded as ceremonial headdress.

Map of Easter Island showing locations of the ahu and moai

Underwater structures claimed to be remnants of Mu, near Yonaguni, Japan

The Powerful

	Angelina Jolie
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'Kung Fu,' 'Bill' Star David Carradine Dies, Was Found Hanged In His Bangkok Hotel

I remember as a youngster, the Kung Fu T.V. series quite well. Although David Carradine played the leading role, my friends and I knew that Bruce Lee was originally slated for that same role. What struck us was how well David Carradine did in this role we knew 'belonged' to Bruce Lee. Of course many of us tried to watch every episode and we told each other to try to snatch the marble young "Grasshopper".
When I heard of David Carradine's death a few strange thoughts came to mind, "How the hell could David Carradine die?", "Was it possible for him to die?", and "How old was he anyway?''.
Then when I heard that he was found hanging in his hotel room I was in total shock. What way to end what seemed to be a wonderful life.

'Kung Fu,' 'Bill' Star David Carradine Dies

Reports Emerge That Actor Was Found Hanged In His Bangkok Hotel

Kung fu movie legend David Carradine, who recently revamped his career in Quentin Tarantino's 'Kill Bill' movies, has died at the age of 72.

Exclusive: David's 'Kill Bill' Co-Star Vivica Fox Reacts

Carradine was found dead in his hotel room in Bangkok, where he was set to shoot a new movie titled 'Stretch.' The Nation newspaper, citing Thai police sources, is reporting that Carradine was found hanged in his hotel closet and that it may have been a suicide. There's been no other confirmation of that report so far, and Carradine's agent told KABC that he believed the actor died of natural causes.

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Thai police also told the BBC that Carradine was found by a hotel maid "with a rope around his neck and body."

The Nation report claims that a preliminary police investigation found that Carradine hanged himself with a curtain cord, and that he was dead for at least 12 hours when he was found. The report also states that there were no signs of assault or foul play.

A rep for Carradine, however, tells TMZ that his camp "can confirm 100% that he never would have committed suicide. It was an accidental death. Everybody is in shock."

Carradine's manager, Chuck Binder, is calling the news "shocking." He said that Carradine "was full of life, always wanting to work," and that he was "a great person."

Carradine's career is a vast one, with over 200 movies and TV shows to his credit, including the hit '70s show 'Kung Fu' and years later, more than 80 episodes of 'Kung Fu: The Legend Continues.' His breakout film role came in 1976, when he played Woody Guthrie in the biopic 'Bound for Glory.'

Younger fans will likely know him as title character 'Bill' in Tarantino's 2003-04 'Kill Bill' movies, where he played the leader of a group of assassins and was eventually killed by one of his own disciples.

In a 2004 interview with the Associated Press, he praised Tarantino for taking a chance by casting him in the films.

"There isn't anything that Anthony Hopkins or Clint Eastwood or Sean Connery or any of those old guys are doing that I couldn't do," he said. "All that was ever required was somebody with Quentin's courage to take and put me in the spotlight."

David Carradine's Showbiz Moments

Carradine also dabbled in production and directing, and had roles in many television commercials. He also had a passion for Oriental herbs, exercise and philosophy, and starred in numerous instructional videos on tai chi and other martial arts. His memoir, released in 1993, was called 'Spirit of Shaolin.'

The Carradine name has had a long history in Hollywood. David's father John Carradine and his brother Keith have also had show business success.

Keith Carradine's daughter, actress Martha Plimpton, released a statement on behalf of her family, saying, "My Uncle David was a brilliantly talented, fiercely intelligent and generous man. He was the nexus of our family in so many ways, and drew us together over the years and kept us connected. I adored him as a child, and as an adult I admired and respected him."

She continued, "We will all miss him terribly, and are so grateful for everyone's condolences. The passing of someone so loved is extremely difficult under any circumstances."

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Son of Man

The phrase 'son of man' is a primarily Semitic idiom that originated in Ancient Mesopotamia, used to denote humanity or self. The phrase is also used in Judaism and Christianity.

Ancient languages

In Sumerian, child of (a) man is:

• DUMU.LU.A (?)

In Akkadian, son of man is:

• mar awelim

In Hebrew, son of man is either:

• בן אדם [ben 'adam] (Adam)
• בן אנוש [ben 'enosh] (Enos)

In Aramaic, son of man due to spelling variants and morphological shifts is either:

ברנש [barnash] ברנשא [barnasha'] בר נש [bar nash] בר נשא [bar nasha'] יליד נשא [yelid nasha'] (lit. "Born of a Human")

בר אנש [bar 'anash] בר אנוש [bar 'anowsh] בר אנשא [bar 'ansha'] ברה דאנשא [breh dansha'] (and a few others)

Ancient Semitic literature

The most common use is similar to that of the English word "human." For example:

1QapGen

1QapGen. XXI.13: MT שיא (Gen. 13.16)

ואשגה זרעך כעפר ארשא די לא ישכח בר אנוש לממדיה
And I will multiply your seed like the dirt of the earth which no son of man (בר אנוש : [bar 'anowsh]) can count. (Aramaic)

In the Hebrew of Genesis 13:16, the word translated as בר אנוש (son of man) was איש (man).

Book of the Laws of the Countries

This is the oldest general discussion of mankind in the Aramaic language, and we can see that ברנשא bar nasha is used in a general form for humanity:

Bardaisan, The Book of the Laws of the Countries, p. 559, lines 11-14:

כינה דברנשא הנו דנתילד ונתרבא ודנקום באקמא ודנולד ודנקש כד אכל וכד שתא וכד דמך וכד מתתששעיר ודמות
This is the nature of the son of man (דברנשא : [debarnasha']), that he should be born and grow up and reach his peak and reproduce and grow old, while eating and drinking and sleeping and waking, and that he should die.

Numbers

Within the Hebrew Bible, the first place one comes across the phrase son of man is in Book of Numbers 23:19:

לא אישׁ אל ויכזב ובן־אדם ויתנחם ההוא אמר ולא יעשׂה ודבר ולא יקימנה

God is not a human being (איש : ['iysh]), that he should lie,

or a mortal/son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]), that he should change his mind:

Has he promised, and will he not do it?

Has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

Job

In the Book of Job, we see son of man used a total of three times (all of which, interestingly enough, fall within poetry):

Job 16:18-21

18 ארץ אל־תכסי דמי ואל־יהי מקום לזעקתי׃

19 גם־עתה הנה־בשׁמים עדי ושׂהדי במרומים׃

20 מליצי רעי אל־אלוה דלפה עיני׃

21 ויוכח לגבר עם־אלוה ובן־אדם לרעהו׃

22 כי־שׁנות מספר יאתיו וארח לא־אשׁוב אהלך׃

¹⁸ "Earth, don’t cover my blood,

Let my cry have no place to rest.

¹⁹ Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven.

He who vouches for me is on high.

²⁰ My friends scoff at me.

My eyes pour out tears to God,

²¹ That he would maintain the right of a man (גבר : [gabar]) with God,

Of a son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]) with his neighbor!

²² For when a few years are come,

I shall go the way from whence I shall not return."

Job 25

1 ויען בלדד השׁחי ויאמר׃

2 המשׁל ופחד עמו עשׂה לום במרומיו׃

3 הישׁ מספר לגדודיו ועל־מי לא־יקום אורהו׃

4 ומה־יצדק אנושׁ עם־אל ומה־יזכה ילוד אשׁה׃

5 הן עד־ירח ולא יאהיל וכוכבים לא־זכו בעיניו׃

6 אף כי־אנושׁ רמה פ

¹ Then Bildad the Shuhite answered,

²"Dominion and fear are with him;

He makes peace in his high places.

³ Can his armies be counted?

On whom does his light not arise?

⁴ How then can man be just with God?

Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean?

⁵ Behold, even the moon has no brightness,

And the stars are not pure in his sight;

⁶ How much less man (אנוש : ['enowsh]), who is a worm!

The son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]), who is a worm!"

Job 35:6-8

6 אם־חטאת מה־תפעל־בו ורבו פשׁעיך מה־תעשׂה־לו׃

7 אם־צדקת מה־תתן־לו או מה־מידך יקח׃

8 לאישׁ־כמוך רשׁעך ולבן־אדם צדקתך׃

⁶ If you have sinned, what effect do you have against him?

If your transgressions are multiplied, what do you do to him?

⁷ If you are righteous, what do you give him?

Or what does he receive from your hand?

⁸ Your wickedness may hurt a man (איש : ['iysh]) as you are;

And your righteousness may profit a son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]).

Psalms

Within the Book of Psalms we find the same classical forms employed within Numbers and Job wherewith son of man is used in parallel with man to describe humanity as a whole.

Psalms 8:4-5(5-6)

5 מה־אנושׁ כי־תזכרנו ובן־אדם כי תפקדנו׃ 6 ותחסרהו מעט מאלהים וכבוד והדר תעטרהו׃

⁴ What is man (אנוש : ['enosh]), that you think of him?

The son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]), that you care for him?

⁵ For you have made him a little lower than God,

And crowned him with glory and honor.

This passage is also quoted in Hebrews chapter 2; see below.

Psalms 80:14-18(15-19)

15 אלהים צבאות שׁוב־נא הבט משׁמים וראה ופקד גפן זאת׃ 16 וכנה אשׁר־נטעה ימינך ועל־בן אמצתה לך׃ 17 שׂרפה באשׁ כסוחה מגערת פניך יאבדו׃ 18 תהי־ידך על־אישׁ ימינך על־בן־אדם אמצת לך׃ 19 ולא־נסוג ממך תחינו ובשׁמך נקרא׃

¹⁴ Turn again, we beg you, God of hosts.

Look down from heaven, and see, and visit this vine,

¹⁵ The stock which your right hand planted,

The branch that you made strong for yourself.

¹⁶ It’s burned with fire.

It’s cut down.

They perish at your rebuke.

¹⁷ Let your hand be on the man (איש : ['iysh]) of your right hand,

On the son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]) whom you made strong for yourself.

¹⁸ So we will not turn away from you.

Revive us, and we will call on your name.

Psalms 144:

3 יהוה מה־אדם ותדעהו בן־אנושׁ ותחשׁבהו׃ 4 אדם להבל דמה ימיו כצל עובר׃

³ YHWH, what is man (אדם : ['adam]), that you care for him?

Or the son of man (בן–אנוש : [ben-'enosh]), that you think of him?

⁴ Man (אדם : ['adam]) is like a breath.

His days are like a shadow that passes away.

Psalms 146:

1 הללו־יה הללי נפשׁי את־יהוה׃ 2 אהללה יהוה בחיי אזמרה לאלהי בעודי׃ 3 אל־תבטחו בנדיבים בבן־אדם ׀ שׁאין לו תשׁועה׃ 4 תצא רוחו ישׁב לאדמתו ביום ההוא אבדו עשׁתנתיו׃

1 Praise Yah!

Praise YHWH, my soul.

2 While I live, I will praise YHWH.

I will sing praises to my God as long as I exist.

3 Don’t put your trust in princes,

Each a son of man (בן–אדם : [ben-'adam]) in whom there is no help.

4 His spirit departs, and he returns to the earth.

In that very day, his thoughts perish.

Isaiah

Isaiah 51:11-13

11 ופדויי יהוה ישׁובון ובאו ציון ברנה ושׂמחת עולם על־ראשׁם שׂשׂון ס ושׂמחה ישׂיגון נסו יגון ואנחה׃ 12 אנכי אנכי הוא מנחמכם מי־את ותיראי מאנושׁ ימות ומבן־אדם חציר ינתן׃ 13 ותשׁכח יהוה עשׂך נוטה שׁמים ויסד ארץ ותפחד תמיד כל־היום מפני חמת המציק כאשׁר כונן להשׁחית ואיה חמת המציק׃

¹¹ The ransomed of YHWH shall return, and come with singing to Zion; and everlasting joy shall be on their heads: they shall obtain gladness and joy; and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. ¹² I, even I, am he who comforts you: who are you, that you are afraid of man (מאנושׁ : [me'enosh]) who shall die, and of the son of man (ומבן־אדם : [umiben-'adam]) who shall be made as grass; ¹³ and have forgotten YHWH your Maker, who stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and fear continually all the day because of the fury of the oppressor, when he makes ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor?

Isaiah 56:1-2

ה אמר יהוה שׁמרו משׁפט ועשׂו צדקה כי־קרובה ישׁועתי לבוא וצדקתי להגלות׃ 2 אשׁרי אנושׁ יעשׂה־זאת ובן־אדם יחזיק בה שׁמר שׁבת מחללו ושׁמר ס

¹ Thus says YHWH, Keep you justice, and do righteousness; for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness to be revealed. ² Blessed is the man (אנושׁ : 'enosh) who does this, and the son of man (ובן־אדם : [uben-'adam]) who holds it fast; who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and keeps his hand from doing any evil.

Jeremiah

Ezekiel

The Book of Ezekiel is unique within the tradition of the Tanakh, in that as the story unfolds, the phrase son of man is used approximately 94 times by a divine being to refer to the author. For example:

Ezekiel 2

¹ He said to me, Son of man (בן־אדם : [ben-'adam]), stand on your feet, and I will speak with you. ² The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me. ³ He said to me, Son of man (בן־אדם : [ben-'adam]), I send you to the children of Israel, to nations that are rebellious, which have rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day. ⁴ The children are impudent and stiff-hearted: I do send you to them; and you shall tell them, Thus says the Lord YHWH. ⁵ They, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear, (for they are a rebellious house,) yet shall know that there has been a prophet among them. ⁶ You, son of man (בן־אדם : [ben-'adam]), don’t be afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns are with you, and you do dwell among scorpions: don’t be afraid of their words, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house. ⁷ You shall speak my words to them, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear; for they are most rebellious. ⁸ But you, son of man (בן־אדם : [ben-'adam]), hear what I tell you; don’t be you rebellious like that rebellious house: open your mouth, and eat that which I give you. ⁹ When I looked, behold, a hand was put forth to me; and, behold, a scroll of a book was therein; ¹⁰ He spread it before me: and it was written within and without; and there were written therein lamentations, and mourning, and woe.

Son of man here appears to be a title referring to the humanity of the author, much how the word "human" may suffice in English. It is not a respectful appellation, but a humbling one (in some cases, an arguably abject one), and this use is a consistent pattern throughout Ezekiel.

All uses of son of man within Ezekiel are:

2:1,2,6,8; 3:1,3,4,10,17,25; 4:1,16; 5:1; 6:2; 7:2; 8:5,6,8,12,15,17; 11:2,4,15; 12:2,3,9,18,22,27; 13:2,17;

14:13; 15:2; 16:2; 17:2; 19:10; 20:3,4,27,46; 21:2,6,9,12,14,19,28; 22:2,18,24; 23:2,36; 24:2,16,25;

25:2; 26:2; 27:2; 28:2,12,21; 29:2,18; 30:2,21; 31:2,5; 32:2,18; 33:2,7,10,12,24,30; 34:2;

35:2; 36:1,17; 37:3,9,11,16; 38:2,14; 39:1,17; 40:4; 43:7,10,18; 44:5; 47:6;

Daniel

The Book of Daniel's use of the phrase son of man is different because it describes an event of eternal significance.^[1] Parts of the text originally written in Aramaic, this portion of the volume deals with a vision attributed to the author about "the times of the end":

Daniel 7:13-14 (WEB)

13 חזה הוית בחזוי ליליא וארו עם־ענני שׁמיא כבר אנשׁ אתה הוה ועד־עתיק יומיא מטה וקדמוהי הקרבוהי׃ 14 ולה יהיב שׁלטן ויקר ומלכו וכל עממיא אמיא ולשׁניא לה יפלחון שׁלטנה שׁלטן עלם די־לא יעדה ומלכותה פ

¹³ I saw in the night-visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of the sky one like a son of man (כבר אנש [kibar 'anash]), and he came even to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. ¹⁴ There was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

Daniel 8:16-18

16 ואשׁמע קול־אדם בין אולי ויקרא ויאמר גבריאל הבן להלז את־המראה׃ 17 ויבא אצל עמדי ובבאו נבעתי ואפלה על־פני ויאמר אלי הבן בן־אדם כי לעת־קץ החזון׃ 18 ובדברו עמי נרדמתי על־פני ארצה ויגע־בי ויעמידני על־עמדי׃

¹⁶ I heard a man's voice (קול–אדם) between the banks of the Ulai, which called, and said, "Gabriel, make this man to understand the vision." ¹⁷ So he came near where I stood; and when he came, I was frightened, and fell on my face: but he said to me, "Understand, son of man (בן–אדם) ; for the vision belongs to the time of the end." ¹⁸ Now as he was speaking with me, I fell into a deep sleep with my face toward the ground; but he touched me, and set me upright. ...

Within the context of these passages, the use of son of man is more consistent with the concept of self-reflection. It has been argued that "there came with the clouds of the sky one like a son of man" describes one "like a human being" or "one like [himself]." By extension, this may have later led to the idea of "the son of man," an eschatological Messianic figure, within Judaism.

New Testament

In the Koine Greek of the New Testament, the term "the son of man" is invariably "ὁ υἱὸς τοὺ ἀνθρώπου", which might be rendered more literally "the son of the human being"; however, due to conventions of interpreting the definite article in Greek, "the son of man" most scholars believe is a better translation.

The expression occurs 82 times in the four Gospels, and is used only in the sayings of Jesus. It only occurs four times in other New Testament books.^[2]

Synoptic Gospels

Due to the nature of the Synoptic Gospels and how their sources are intertwined, son of man sayings here are broken down into pericopes, comparing parallel stories between Mark, Matthew and Luke.

The Foxes have holes...

Matthew 8:20, cf. Luke 9:58

Jesus said to him, "The foxes have holes, and the birds of the sky have nests, but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head."

The Foxes have Holes pericope represents a poem that probably existed first in oral tradition before it was recorded in the hypothetical source document Q. Various reconstructions of this short piece in Aramaic, from the proper period, show possibility of puns and wordplay associated with this particular array of comparisons, which appear to portray the phrase son of man as a general reference to mankind.^[3] The phrasing seems to tie in with the Old Testament prophetic expressions used by such prophets as Ezekiel, and it shows Jesus understanding of himself as the "man" that God has singled out as a friend and representative.^[2]

Lost sheep

Matthew 18:11 (KJV)

For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost.

In this verse, "son of man" is clearly used in reference to Jesus, within the common use of humble self-reference (see the Story of Haninah ben Dosa above) rather than referring to generic humanity.

This verse appears in the KJV in the parable of the lost sheep (cf. Luke 15.3–7); however, it does not appear in the oldest existent manuscripts of the New Testament. Due to that and other reasons, some scholars believe it is a later addition to the Gospel tradition and is not included in newer, more critical translations, such as the RSV, NIV or Scholars Version.

Lord of the sabbath

Mark 2:27-28, cf. Matthew 12:8, Luke 6:5

And he [Jesus] said unto them [the Pharisees], "The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: so that the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath."

Christians commonly take the phrase "son of man" in this passage to refer to Jesus himself. Alternatively, many scholars believe the passage may be more accurately rendered as "a man" or "humanity" in this pericope. This is due to the sequence of "man" → "son of man" as a common literary device in semitic writing as demonstrated earlier.

Request for a sign

Matthew 12:38-42, Mark 8:11-13, Luke 11:29-32

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here. The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here. (NKJV, emphasis added)

Most scholars and theologians agree that the use of son of man in this pericope is consistent with that of self-reference. See also Typology (theology).

Parable of the Weeds

In explaining the Parable of the Weeds: Matthew 13:37,41-42

He answered and said to them: “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.... The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Christians commonly take the phrase "son of man" in this passage to refer to Jesus himself, rather than humanity in general.

Predicting His Death and Resurrection

Luke 18:31-34, Mark 10:32-34, Matthew 20:17-19

Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished. For He will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. They will scourge Him and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again.” But they understood none of these things; this saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were spoken.

Christians generally interpret this passage as referring to Jesus' own imminent death and resurrection.

Return of the Son of Man

Mark 8:38-9:1 (NRSV), Matthew 16:27-28, Luke 9:26-27

Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’ And he said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.’

Mark 14:62 (ESV), Matthew 26:64 (at his Trail before the Sanhedrin)

And Jesus said, ‘I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.’

John

John 1:49-51 (NKJV)

Nathanael answered and said to Him, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” Jesus answered and said to him, “Because I said to you, ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ do you believe? You will see greater things than these.” And He said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, hereafter[j] you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.” (emphasis added)

This passage may be an allusion to Jacob's Ladder. In any case, the implication is that seeing the angels ascending and descending on the "son of man" (i.e. the speaker, Jesus) would be a great wonder.

John 5:25-27 (NKJV)

Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man (emphasis added).

John 8:28

When you see the Son of Man lifted up, then you shall know I am.

John 12:34-36 (NRSV)

The crowd answered him, ‘We have heard from the law that the Messiah remains for ever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?’ Jesus said to them, ‘The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.’ After Jesus had said this, he departed and hid from them.

Acts

Acts 7:54-57(NRSV)

When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen. But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. "Look," he said, "I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!" But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him.

It is thought by Christian scholars that the author of Acts (also believed to be the author of Luke) includes this reference to "the Son of Man" as a direct reference to Jesus and his previous ascension. They would purport that in Daniel 7, "the Son of Man" refers to his ascending back to his rightful throne and this is the precise picture of him fulfilling such a role as he receives the spirit of Stephen and judges the Pharisees who stoned Stephen, although the complete Judgment will occur at the "Great White Throne" judgment at the end of the age.

Hebrews

Hebrews 2:6-9

But one testified in a certain place, saying:

"What is man that You are mindful of him,

Or the son of man that You take care of him?

You have made him a little lower than the angels;

You have crowned him with glory and honor,

And set him over the works of Your hands.

You have put all things in subjection under his feet."

For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.

Here we see a quotation from the Psalms in which "son of man" appears to refer to humanity in general, but which the author of Hebrews appears to interpret as referring specifically to Jesus.

Revelation

Revelation 1:12-18

Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire; His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters; He had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death....

Christians believe that "the Son of Man" described in this passage is the person Jesus.

Revelation 14:14

Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and on the cloud sat One like the Son of Man, having on His head a golden crown, and in His hand a sharp sickle. (NKJV)

In the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha

The phrase "Son of Man" appears in the Book of Parables, the second section of the Ethiopic Book of Enoch (1 En. 37-71), a Second Temple Jewish text probably composed around the turn of the era.^[4] Here the phrase is used in reference to an eschatological protagonist with heavenly attributions, who is also called “Righteous One,” “Chosen One,” and “Messiah”. This character was expected to preside over the final judgment, pronouncing the sentence against the unrighteous and the sinners (1 En. 61:8-9) and delivering them “to the angels for the punishment “ (1 En. 62:11). He was also supposed to be worshipped by the “kings and the mighty,” (1 En. 62:9), identified throughout the entire Book of Parables with the wicked, who would ask for his mercy during the eschatological judgment. The ending of the Book of Parables, which some scholars view as a later addition,^[5] claims that the "Son of Man" is Enoch himself.

The Book of Enoch claims also the pre-existence of the Son of Man: before the sun and the signs were created, before the stars of the heaven were made, His name was named before the Lord of Spirits (1 En. 48:3) and narrates that from the beginning the Son of Man was hidden, and the Most High preserved him in the presence of His might, and revealed him to the elect ones (1 En. 62:7). The Messianic attributes of Isaiah 11:2-5 are referred to him: in him dwells the spirit of wisdom, and the spirit which gives insight, and the spirit of understanding and of might...(1 En. 49:3). The Son of Man is often said to be sitting on a throne of glory.

As no evidence of the Book of Parables resurfaced among the Dead Sea Scrolls, Jozef Milik suggested in 1976 that the document could be a later Christian text,^[6] but this hypothesis is now rejected by most specialists.^[7] The third meeting of the Enoch seminar at Camaldoli in 2005 was entirely devoted to academic discussion on the Messiah "Son of Man" in the Book of Parables of Enoch.^[8]

Theological interpretation

Christian interpretation

Some argue that the phrase son of man took on Messianic significance within the Christian movement primarily due to the Jewish eschatology during the time of its early conception. These people originate the phrase in the book of Daniel, in a vision, one like a son of man is described coming upon the clouds of the sky to unite the world. Contenders point out that the phrase "the son of man" and "one like a son of man" are not the same and that in Daniel 8 the phrase "son of man" is translated as merely "mortal" therefore the eschatology is added later.

As a result, some Christians believe that the New Testament's, primarily the Gospels, usage of the son of man eighty-three times represents an apocalyptic title of Jesus.^[9] Some scholars and Christians have argued that the apocryphal tradition of this phrase even goes back to Jesus, himself, though not necessarily as a phrase Jesus used as a reference to himself but rather another figure alluded to in Daniel 7:13.^[10] Other scholars and Christians believe Jesus did not use the phrase, originally, as a title at all and that he used it primarily to refer to humanity generally. The phrase then became reworked toward an apocryphal slant^[11] Later, especially during the medieval ages, Christians interpreted it as Jesus showing humility^[12] Still other Christians believe the title is meant to signify Jesus upholding his identification with his humanity and fellowship with mankind, perhaps also conveying the idea that Jesus is the man par excellence. In this last context it serves as putting humans and Jesus on the same level.

Jewish interpretation

1. As generally interpreted by Jews, denotes mankind generally, with special reference to their weakness and frailty (Job 25:6; Psalms 8:4; 144:3; 146:3; Book of Isaiah 51:12, etc.).
2. It is a title frequently given to the prophet Ezekiel, probably to remind him of his human weakness.

Additionally, the Biblical book of Daniel mentions the prophet's vision of the coming of one 'like a son of man'; possibly implying that this is not actually a man but a divine figure.^{[citation needed]}

When interpreting the Bible, one cannot exclusively rely on English translations. Son of man in Job 25 is ben adam (Hebrew: בן־אדם‎), and "son of man" in Psalms 144 is ben enosh (Hebrew: בן־אנוש‎).

Other interpretations

Jesus Seminar

According to the Jesus Seminar, the phrase "son of man" (or "son of Adam") sometimes refers to a heavenly figure that is to come, but when Jesus uses this phrase he is not referring to himself. When he uses the term to refer to one who will suffer, die, and rise, he seems to be referring to himself. In other verses, such as those referring to the "lord of the sabbath," he is referring to human beings.^[13]

Geza Vermes

Geza Vermes, professor emeritus of Jewish studies at Wolfson College, Oxford, has argued that "the son of man" in the Gospels is unrelated to these Hebrew Bible usages. He begins with the observation that there is no example of "the" son of man in Hebrew sources. He suggests that the term originates in Aramaic — bar nasha. Based on his study of Aramaic sources, he concludes that in these sources and in the Christian Bible, "son of man" is simply a synonym for man, and a substitute for the indefinite pronoun ("one"). Based on context, he claims that one should translate "bar nasha" as someone, anyone or I. He further argues that "son of man" is in no way a title.

Bibliography

• Randall Buth, "A More Complete Semitic Background for bar-enasha 'Son of Man'" in Craig A. Evans and James A. Sanders, eds. The Function of Scripture in Early Jewish and Christian Tradition (JSNT Suppl 154) Sheffield Academic Press, 1998: 176-189.
• Hugh J. Schonfield, The Passover Plot: A New Interpretation of the Life and Death of Jesus. Harper Collins - UK, first published October 1965 (Hutchinson & Co.): Part Two, The Sources and Growth of the Legend, Chapter 3 "The Suffering Just One and the Son of Man"
• Maurice Casey. (1998). Aramaic Sources of Mark's Gospel. Cambridge University Press.
• Robert W. Funk et al.. (1997). The Five Gospels: What Did Jesus Really Say? HarperSanFrancisco.

References

1. ^ New Catholic Encyclopedia: “There can be little doubt that Daniel is here speaking of an event that is of eternal significance at the end of time.”
2. ^ ^{a b} Dunn, Edited by James D.G.; McKnight, Scot (2005), The historical Jesus in recent research, Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, pp. 337, ISBN 1575061007, http://books.google.com/books?id=37uJRUF6btAC&pg=PA349&dq=A+New+Perspective+On+Jesus:+What+The+Quest+For+The+Historical+Jesus+Missed+(Acadia+Studies+in+Bible+and+Theology)&ei=6nJoSauTJaDkzQSgitkS&client=firefox-a#PPA337,M1
3. ^ See Bibliography: Funk, et al.; Casey
4. ^ George W.E. Nickelsburg, Son of Man, ABD 6:137-50; Sabino Chiala`, Libro delle Parabole di Enoc (Brescia: Paideia 1997 ISBN 8839405550); David Suter, Tradition and Composition in the Parables of Enoch (Missoula Mont.: Scholars 1979).
5. ^ James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseaudepigrapha and the New Testament (Cambridge 1985).
6. ^ Jozef Milik, The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976); see also E.P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism (Philadelphia 1977).
7. ^ George W.E. Nickelsburg and James C. VanderKam, The Book of Enoch: A New Translation (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004); George W.E. Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001).
8. ^ Gabriele Boccaccini (ed.), Enoch and the Messiah Son of Man: Revisiting the Book of Parables (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007).
9. ^ Hurtado, Larry W. Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity.Grand Rapids: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2005 pp. 293, see section on Son of Man.
10. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc. 1999.
11. ^ See The Jesus' Seminar's Fifth Gospel and the work of Helmut Koester, and Crossan's Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography. It should also be pointed out that despite the consensus that Jesus was not apocalyptic in his teachings, the method for getting there varies a good deal.
12. ^ Burkett, Delbert. The Son of Man Debate: A History and Evaluation. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
13. ^ Funk, Robert W., Roy W. Hoover, and the Jesus Seminar. The Five Gospels. HarperSanFrancisco: 1993. p. 76-77.

Last Survivor of Titanic Dies in England Death Comes on 98th Anniversary of Launch of Famous Ship

Last Survivor of Titanic Dies in England

Death Comes on 98th Anniversary of Launch of Famous Ship

LONDON (May 31) -- Millvina Dean, who as a baby was wrapped in a sack and lowered into a lifeboat in the frigid North Atlantic, died Sunday, having been the last survivor of 1912 sinking of the RMS Titanic.

She was 97 years old, and she died where she had lived — in Southampton, England, the city her family had tried to leave behind when it took the ship's ill-fated maiden voyage, bound for America.

Skip over this content

The End of an Era

Millvina Dean, the last survivor of the sinking of the Titanic, died in southern England Sunday at the age of 97. Traveling with her family, she was just 2 months old when the ship hit an iceberg on the night of April 14, 1912, sinking within three hours.

She died in her sleep early Sunday, her friend Gunter Babler told the Associated Press. It was the 98th anniversary of the launch of the ship that was billed as "practically unsinkable."

Babler said Dean's longtime companion, Bruno Nordmanis, called him in Switzerland to say staff at Woodlands Ridge Nursing Home in Southampton discovered Dean in her room Sunday morning. He said she had been hospitalized with pneumonia last week but she had recovered and returned to the home.

A staff nurse at the nursing home said late Sunday that no one would comment until administrators came on duty Monday morning.

Dean just over 2 months old when the Titanic hit an iceberg on the night of April 14, 1912. The ship sank in less than three hours.

Dean was one of 706 people — mostly women and children — who survived. Her father was among the 1,517 who died.

Babler, who is head of the Switzerland Titanic Society, said Dean was a "very good friend of very many years."

"I met her through the Titanic society but she became a friend and I went to see very every month or so," he said.

The pride of the White Star line, the Titanic had a mahogany-paneled smoking room, a swimming pool and a squash court. But it did not have enough lifeboats for all of its 2,200 passengers and crew.

Dean's family were steerage passengers setting out from the English port of Southampton for a new life in the United States. Her father had sold his pub and hoped to open a tobacconists' shop in Kansas City, Missouri, where his wife had relatives.

Initially scheduled to travel on another ship, the family was transferred to the Titanic because of a coal strike. Four days out of port and about 600 kilometers (380 miles) southeast of Newfoundland, the ship hit an iceberg. The impact buckled the Titanic's hull and sent sea water pouring into six of its supposedly watertight compartments.

Dean said her father's quick actions saved his family. He felt the ship scrape the iceberg and hustled the family out of its third-class quarters and toward the lifeboat that would take them to safety. "That's partly what saved us — because he was so quick. Some people thought the ship was unsinkable," Dean told the British Broadcasting Corp. in 1998.

Wrapped in a sack against the Atlantic chill, Dean was lowered into a lifeboat. Her 2-year-old brother Bertram and her mother Georgette also survived.

"She said goodbye to my father and he said he'd be along later," Dean said in 2002. "I was put into lifeboat 13. It was a bitterly cold night and eventually we were picked up by the Carpathia."

The family was taken to New York, then returned to England with other survivors aboard the rescue ship Adriatic. Dean did not know she had been aboard the Titanic until she was 8 years old, when her mother, about to remarry, told her about her father's death. Her mother, always reticent about the tragedy, died in 1975 at age 95.

Born in London on Feb. 2, 1912, Elizabeth Gladys "Millvina" Dean spent most of her life in the English seaside town of Southampton, Titanic's home port. She never married, and worked as a secretary, retiring in 1972 from an engineering firm.

She moved into a nursing home after breaking her hip about three years ago. She had to sell several Titanic mementoes to raise funds, prompting her friends to set up a fund to subsidize her nursing home fees. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, the stars of the film "Titanic," pledged their support to the fund last month.

For most of her life Dean had no contact with Titanic enthusiasts and rarely spoke about the disaster. Dean said she had seen the 1958 film "A Night to Remember" with other survivors, but found it so upsetting that she declined to watch any other attempts to put the disaster on celluloid, including the 1997 blockbuster "Titanic."

She began to take part in Titanic-related activities in the 1980s, after the discovery of the ship's wreck in 1985 sparked renewed interest in the disaster. At a memorial service in England, Dean met a group of American Titanic enthusiasts who invited her to a meeting in the U.S.

She visited Belfast to see where the ship was built, attended Titanic conventions around the world — where she was mobbed by autograph seekers — and participated in radio and television documentaries about the sinking.

Charles Haas, president of the New-Jersey based Titanic International Society, said Dean was happy to talk to children about the Titanic. "She had a soft spot for children," he said. "I remember watching was little tiny children came over clutching pieces of paper for her to sign. She was very good with them, very warm."

In 1997, Dean crossed the Atlantic by boat for the first time, on the QEII luxury liner, and finally visited Kansas City, declaring it "so lovely I could stay here five years." She was active well into her 90s, but missed the commemoration of the 95th anniversary of the disaster in 2007 after breaking her hip.

Dean had no memories of the sinking and said she preferred it that way. "I wouldn't want to remember, really," she told The Associated Press in 1997. She opposed attempts to raise the wreck 4,000 meters (13,000 feet) from the sea bed.

"I don't want them to raise it, I think the other survivors would say exactly the same," she said in 1997. "That would be horrible."

The last survivor with memories of the sinking — and the last American survivor — was Lillian Asplund, who was 5 at the time. She died in May 2006 at the age of 99. The second-last survivor, Barbara Joyce West Dainton of Truro, England, died in October 2007 aged 96.

The Obama Effect/Race & Law! Real or Not? Part1

Study Sees an Obama Effect as Lifting Black Test-Takers

By SAM DILLON

Published: January 22, 2009

Educators and policy makers, including Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, have said in recent days that they hope President Obama’s example as a model student could inspire millions of American students, especially blacks, to higher academic performance.

Now researchers have documented what they call an Obama effect, showing that a performance gap between African-Americans and whites on a 20-question test administered before Mr. Obama’s nomination all but disappeared when the exam was administered after his acceptance speech and again after the presidential election.

The inspiring role model that Mr. Obama projected helped blacks overcome anxieties about racial stereotypes that had been shown, in earlier research, to lower the test-taking proficiency of African-Americans, the researchers conclude in a report summarizing their results.

“Obama is obviously inspirational, but we wondered whether he would contribute to an improvement in something as important as black test-taking,” said Ray Friedman, a management professor at Vanderbilt University, one of the study’s three authors. “We were skeptical that we would find any effect, but our results surprised us.”

The study has not yet undergone peer review, and two academics who read it on Thursday said they would be interested to see if other researchers would be able to replicate its results.

Dr. Friedman and his fellow researchers, David M. Marx, a professor of social psychology at San Diego State University, and Sei Jin Ko, a visiting professor in management and organizations at Northwestern, have submitted their study for review to The Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Dr. Friedman said.

“It’s a very small sample, but certainly a provocative study,” said Ronald F. Ferguson, a Harvard professor who studies the factors that have affected the achievement gap between white and nonwhite students, which shows up on nearly every standardized test. “There is a certainly a theoretical foundation and some empirical support for the proposition that Obama’s election could increase the sense of competence among African-Americans, and it could reduce the anxiety associated with taking difficult test questions.”

Researchers in the last decade assembled university students with identical SAT scores and administered tests to them, discovering that blacks performed significantly poorer when asked at the start to fill out a form identifying themselves by race. The researchers attributed those results to anxiety that caused them to tighten up during exams in which they risked confirming a racial stereotype.

In the study made public on Thursday, Dr. Friedman and his colleagues compiled a brief test, drawing 20 questions from the verbal sections of the Graduate Record Exam, and administering it four times to about 120 white and black test-takers during last year’s presidential campaign.

In total, 472 Americans — 84 blacks and 388 whites — took the exam. Both white and black test-takers ranged in age from 18 to 63, and their educational attainment ranged from high school dropout to Ph.D.

On the initial test last summer, whites on average correctly answered about 12 of 20 questions, compared with about 8.5 correct answers for blacks, Dr. Friedman said. But on the tests administered immediately after Mr. Obama’s nomination acceptance speech, and just after his election victory, black performance improved, rendering the white-black gap “statistically nonsignificant,” he said.

“It’s a nice piece of work,” said G. Gage Kingsbury, a testing expert who is a director at the Northwest Evaluation Association, who read the study on Thursday.

But Dr. Kingsbury wondered whether the Obama effect would extend beyond the election, or prove transitory. “I’d want to see another study replicating their results before I get too excited about it,” he said.

Sotomayor’s Focus on Race Issues May Be Hurdle

Conservatives say Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s race-based approach to the law is grounds for her to not be a Supreme Court justice.
WASHINGTON — The selection of Judge Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court has opened a new battle in the fight over affirmative action and other race-conscious remedies for patterns of inequality, with each side invoking the election of the first black president in support of its cause.

Judge Sotomayor, whose parents moved to New York from Puerto Rico, has championed the importance of considering race and ethnicity in admissions, hiring and even judicial selection at almost every stage of her career — as a student activist at Princeton and at Yale Law School, as a board member of left-leaning Hispanic advocacy groups and as a federal judge arguing for diversity on the bench.

Now conservatives say her strong identification with such race-based approaches to the law is perhaps the strongest argument against her confirmation, contending that her views put her outside an evolving consensus that such race-conscious public policy is growing obsolete.

“The American ideal is that justice should be colorblind,” said Senator John Cornyn, a Texas Republican on the Judiciary Committee. “As we see people like Barack Obama achieve the highest office in the land and Judge Sotomayor’s own nomination to the highest court, I think it is harder and harder to see the justifications for race-conscious decisions across the board.”

Mr. Cornyn added, “This is a hot-button issue and one that needs to be confronted head on.”

Gary Marx, executive director of the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network, said he saw a playbook for the campaign against Judge Sotomayor in the successful attacks on Lani Guinier, whose 1993 nomination to a top Justice Department post was withdrawn after an outcry over her writings arguing for alternative voting systems intended to better represent minorities.

“We will see ‘racial quotas’ become a much bigger issue than they might have been had another nominee been brought forward,” Mr. Marx said.

But civil rights advocates, including Ms. Guinier, say times have changed in their favor, also citing Mr. Obama’s election. In an interview, Ms. Guinier said she saw the debate over Judge Sotomayor’s nomination in part as an opportunity for civil rights advocates to push back against the kind of criticism that had thwarted her own nomination.

“It is easy to understand the idea of viewing an individual on the content of their character rather than the color of their skin,” Ms. Guinier said, but race also is a social phenomenon of politics, history and economics that demand deliberate policy responses.

Americans often see the issue in an either-or way — “ you are race-conscious or race-neutral,” she said. “But the election of Barack Obama has served as an emancipatory moment, and people are ready to discuss and listen to more nuanced arguments.”

Having Mr. Obama as a spokesman is different as well, said Hilary O. Shelton, director of the Washington bureau of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. “The American people chose change — symbolically, but in policy as well,” Mr. Shelton said. “The American people see things differently now.”

What is more, many civil rights groups say, Judge Sotomayor’s confirmation could provide an anchor against the current direction of the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has led the more conservative bench toward a sweeping re-examination of government reliance on racial classifications, whether in school desegregation plans or landmark voting rights laws.

“The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote in 2007, summing up his approach in one of the most memorable lines of his opinions.

Samuel Issacharoff, a professor at New York University Law School, said, “There is a tendency to say ‘The time has run, things are different, change has happened,’ ” adding, “It is an emerging theme of the Roberts court.”

Judge Sotomayor is not known to have identified herself as a beneficiary of affirmative action, but she has described her academic struggles as a new student at Princeton from a Roman Catholic school in the Bronx — one of about 20 Hispanics on a campus with more than 2,000 students.

She spent summers reading children’s classics she had missed in a Spanish-speaking home and “re-teaching” herself to write “proper English” by reading elementary grammar books. Only with the outside help of a professor who served as her mentor did she catch up academically, ultimately graduating at the top of her class.

She became the outspoken leader of a Puerto Rican student group, leading other Hispanics to file a complaint against Princeton with the federal government to force the hiring of Hispanic faculty members and administrators. “She was very passionate about affirmative action for women and minorities,” said Charles Hey, another Puerto Rican student.

At Yale Law School, she was co-chairman of a group for Latin, Asian and Native American students — a catchall group for nonblack minorities. There she led fellow students in meetings with the dean to push for the hiring of more Hispanic faculty members at the law school. And, friends say, she shared the alarm of others in the group when the Supreme Court prohibited the use of quotas in university admissions in its 1978 decision Regents of the University of California v. Bakke.

As a lawyer, she joined the National Council of La Raza and the board of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, two Hispanic civil rights groups that advocate for vigorous affirmative action. As a judge, she has repeatedly argued for diversity on the bench by alluding to the insights she gleaned from her Latina background.

In one of the few cases dealing with the subject that she helped decide on the federal appeals court, Ricci v. New Haven, she ruled in favor of the city’s ’s decision to discard the results of an exam to select firefighters for promotion because too few minority firefighters scored high enough to advance. White firefighters who had scored well on the discarded test sued, and the Supreme Court heard arguments on the case in April.

“Her nomination and the Ricci case have brought racial quotas back as a national issue," said Mr. Marx of the Judicial Confirmation Network.

The public response, however, is hard to foresee. Few groups conducted public polls on the issue as it faded in recent years, and the results from those that did reveal a consistent ambivalence, said Michael Dimock, a pollster with the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.

When asked a question about “affirmative action or preferential treatment for minorities,” the public has consistently opposed the idea by a margin of two to one. But when asked about “affirmative action programs designed to help women and minorities,” an even bigger majority has supported them.

And, Mr. Dimock said, the election of Mr. Obama does not appear to have changed either result.