Farsi Beyond Driven - Iranian Heavy Metal

Photo Credit: Danesh Sarouie

The BBC World Service's Freedom Songs programme profiles Iranian metal musicians and the challenges they face in a country where women are banned from singing in public, and rock music is seen by the authorities as Satanic. You can listen via iPlayer here.

If you got the pun in the post title, it's worth a listen!

Tom Holland on the Evidence for Jesus and Muhammad

Photo: Wikipedia

One problem with mythicism is that while mythicists  love to claim that the evidence for Jesus' existence is weak, if you actually take the time to compare the sources we have on Jesus to those we have for comparable historical figures such Muhammad or the Buddha, it's hard to escape the conclusion that the evidence for Jesus as is at least as good, if not better.

One person who is well equipped to make such a comparison is journalist and historian Tom Holland, who has written extensively about the ancient world and the origins of Islam.

In this interview on Australian radio, Holland (who says he is sure that Muhammad existed) points out that:

The gospels you have in the New Testament are actually much closer in time to the life of Jesus than the earliest biography of Muhammad is to the life of the prophet.

Holland goes on to say:

Jesus is elusive, but in a way you'd expect him to be, because he's a criminal in an obscure corner of the Roman Empire, so in a sense it's amazing that we have anything about him at all. We have Paul's letters, which start to be written within twenty years probably of the crucifixion, and Paul clearly thinks that Jesus existed. So in a sense, the evidence for Jesus is kind of stronger than for Muhammad.

 Many thanks to Neil Godfrey for drawing my attention to this.

First Sikh Guards Buckingham Palace in Turban

A solider who is the first Sikh to join the Grenadier Guards features in today’s Mail on Sunday after wearing his turban rather than the Guards’ famous bearskin. According to the Mail, Jatinderpal Singh Bhullar has been given permission to wear a turban while on guard duty outside Buckingham palace.

The British army allows the 25 or so Sikhs currently serving to keep their turbans, except where a hard helmet is required for safety reasons. You can read a little more about Sikh and Muslim soldiers in the British army here.

In a religiously diverse modern Britain, should the Army make allowances for the different faiths of its soldiers? Or should those who volunteer to join up put Queen and country before their religion?