NO FEAR OF THE EVIL EYE: THE TENTH COMMANDMENT & FINGERNAIL CLIPPINGS AND UGLY BABIES
[These are the next two short chapters of Part I: Envy of my forthcoming book NO FEAR OF THE EVIL EYE: Key to Freedom, Peace, and Prosperity. Previous sections and chapters can be accessed here. I will really appreciate any feedback you have.]
THE TENTH COMMANDMENT
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, nor thy neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor's. Exodus 20:17
This is the King James Version (KJV) translation of the Tenth Commandment of Yahweh not to envy. The Living Bible (TLB) translation is more accurate:
“You must not be envious of your neighbor’s house, or want to sleep with his wife, or want to own his slaves, oxen, donkeys, or anything else he has.”
The original word in Hebrew translated as “covet” is chamad. The word can be used in different contexts, referring to sexual lust for example. But for thousands of years, Jewish tradition has considered the 10th as a proscription not to envy other people.
Not surprising considering that according to the Old Testament, the first crime ever committed, Cain killing his brother Abel in Genesis 4:3-8, was an act of envy.
FLASHBACK FRIDAY THE BAMIAN BUDDHA
Bamian, Afghanistan 1973. I spent some time in the Bamian Valley north of Kabul 50 years ago. What you see is the largest of the Bamian Buddhas carved into to sandstone cliffs in 600 AD by a Central Asian people who revered Buddha and called themselves Ebodai. It stands 180 feet tall. The Bamian Valley was a Buddhist pilgrimage site, with thousands of monks in monasteries and temples from roughly 100 AD until 800 AD, the time of the Moslem conquest of Afghanistan.
It was left untouched until the Moslem Emperor of India, Aurangzeb (son of Shah Jehan, builder of the Taj Mahal), blew off the statue’s legs with artillery in 1700. Then in 1890, the Moslem Afghan King of Afghanistan, Abdur Rahman Khan, ordered the Buddha’s face above the nose sliced off. The same Islamic practice of literal de-facing conducted upon ancient Egyptian statues including the Sphinx.
It was in 2001 that the Afghan Taliban blew up the entire statue you see here along with others as anti-Islamic “idols.” I consider myself immensely fortunate to witness this extraordinary work of historic art while it still existed.
(Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #260 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
WHEN YOU KNOW
HALF-FULL REPORT 01/24/25
And what a Golden Family – there’s Tiffany. Eric, Ivanka, Donald Jr. and Barron, with First Lady Melania holding the Bibles (Trump’s and Lincoln’s). Class, beauty, masculinity, and patriotism are back in style. As is entrepreneurship and meritocracy, epitomized by Elon right behind the First Family.
What a moment, what a picture to treasure. There’s even the counterpoint of Joe and Kamala looking on in bitterness, knowing the woke lunacy they inflicted upon their country is in history’s grave as America returns to being Normal once again.
And forget the traditional focus point on a new presidency’s First 100 Days. This has been the First 100 Hours for the history books. Talk about shock, awe, and overwhelm. This has been a week – barely more than 100 hours since 12 Noon last Monday January 21 to this writing (6pm Friday January 24). It’s been beyond breathtaking. Why don’t we begin with Melania?
THE HIDDEN NORTH FACE OF KANCHENJUNGA
This is one of the truly great mountain sights on earth yet never seen – except for professional mountaineers and those on our Himalaya Helicopter Expeditions. Kanchenjunga at 28,169 feet (8,586 meters) is the world’s 3rd highest mountain (after Everest and K2), with a drop from summit (the peak on the left in front of the cloud) to the glacier at it base of 12,000 feet straight down.
You can be awed by such a picture, but to actually physically be here, to witness this magnificence personally so that it is forever a part of your life, is to feel a depth of awe that has to be experienced to be understood. Kanchenjunga is part of the Himalayas, now on the border of Nepal and Sikkim, once an independent kingdom now absorbed into India. We fly right up the North Face, and into the Amphitheatre of the Southwest Face as well.
We’ll be here once again in late October. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #31 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
LEGAL CHALLENGES TO TRUMP’S ENDING BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP FOR ILLEGALS ARE DOOMED TO FAIL
President Donald Trump was so busy on his first day in office that it’s been a challenge to cover everything that he did.
The best way to know which are the best ones to discuss is to look at the way Democrats are reacting to them. His pardon of J6 prisoners was a big one; they’re really up in arms about that.
Another one was his executive order ending birthright citizenship for children born to illegal immigrants in the United States. Now, Democrat attorneys general from 22 states are suing over the executive order.
The Democrat attorneys general and immigrant rights advocates say the question of birthright citizenship is settled law and that while presidents have broad authority, they are not kings.
“The president cannot, with a stroke of a pen, write the 14th Amendment out of existence, period,” New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin said.
These challenges are doomed to fail.
TRUMP TO COMBAT SENATE DEMS SLOW-WALKING HIS CABINET APPOINTMENTS
Senate Democrats who are considering holding up the confirmations of President Donald Trump’s cabinet appointments might want to rethink that course of action.
The president recently threatened to adjourn Congress so he can make recess appointments for some of his nominees.
This move would be unprecedented and would likely meet with a chorus of wailing and gnashing of teeth from the left. However, it appears Trump is willing to make this gambit, according to CBS News.
The president has been eager to get the members of his cabinet confirmed. So far, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been the only official confirmed. The Senate is still set to vote on Pete Hegseth for Defense Secretary, Kristi Noem for Homeland Security, and John Ratcliffe for CIA Director.
Democrats have been slow-walking the process for Ratcliffe and could do the same for the other two nominees, according to CBS News.
There are questions as to whether Trump has the authority to adjourn Congress.
THE REMOTEST CHURCH
Baihanluo Catholic Church is the remotest Christian Church on earth. The isolated village is in a roadless region high on a Himalayan mountain ridge deep in “The Great River Trenches of Asia” – one of our planet’s most dramatic geological features where four major rivers – the Irrawaddy, Salween, Mekong, and Yangtze all spill off the Tibetan Plateau coursing south in tight parallel for 100 miles.
In the late 1800’s, French Catholic missionaries made their way far, far up the Mekong from the French colony of Laos to befriend the Nu and Lisu tribespeople up here. They responded by building this beautiful wooden church that has been lovingly cared for by the local parishioners ever since.
I led an expedition traversing all three of the great trenches twenty years ago (2001). We were welcomed so warmly by the devout villagers. It’s hard to get more remote than this, yet they have retained their faith for at least four generations now. You can imagine how powerful and experience it was to be with them. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #138 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
TIME TO ADMIT IT: TRUMP IS A GREAT PRESIDENT
Back at the Resolute Desk, the President signs Executive Orders
Back at the Resolute Desk, the President signs Executive Orders
[This essay is stunningly remarkable as it is written by the founding editor and global editor-in-chief of one of the most Woke Anti-Trump media outlets in Washington, POLITICO. It was published on politico.com yesterday (1/21) under his own name. He is neither groveling nor abusive. His is an honest recognition of reality. It is stunning nonetheless. –JW]
Donald J. Trump in his second inaugural address was everything his supporters hoped he would be:
In one light, it was all quite familiar. But the second occasion of Trump taking the oath of office also put him in an entirely new light.
For the first time, he is holding power under circumstances in which reasonable people cannot deny a basic fact: He is the greatest American figure of his era.
Great in this context is not about a subjective debate over whether he is a singularly righteous leader or a singularly menacing one. It is now simply an objective description about the dimensions of his record.
In other words, he is now a force of history.
DONALD TRUMP IS OUR PRESIDENT AND THE DEMOCRAT PARTY HAS NO IDEA WHAT TO DO
Democrats are in freefall.
As of Monday January 20, Donald J. Trump is officially the 47th president of the United States. He starts his second term in the Oval Office with a bang – rolling out dozens of executive orders fulfilling promises made to American voters -- and more popular than he has ever been.
Democrats have no idea how to respond. Their party is currently earning its lowest approval ratings ever, for good reason. It is guilty of perpetrating the greatest political scandal of our lifetimes -- pretending President Joe Biden was OK to run for another four years.
Their efforts to brand Donald Trump a threat to Democracy were a bust and their leadership is in disarray. They deserve every minute they serve in political purgatory.
A former communications director for Kamala Harris says Democrats "have got to burn down our image." He’s right. But then what?