I'm sure that millions of Mondial watchers saw the Star of David for the first time in their life when defender John Paintsil waved the flag of Israel after Ghana's 2-0 win over the Czech Republic
Of course, he and his team were vilified in the Arab press for brandishing the Star of David, after scoring goals against the Czech Republic. Indeed, some hostile papers even suggested he might be a Mossad agent. Ghana was forced to apologize for any offence caused by waving the flag.
Paintsil hid the flag in his socks and IMHO he opened a new business opportunity for his colleagues: to get money for commercial campaigns; after the next time a soccer player will pull out a banner from his socks the Mondial administrators will surely come up with a new law threatening to punish the whole team.
Saturday, June 24, 2006
Simon Wiesenthal
Magen David on Simon Wiesenthal Stamp
Recently there was a ceremony at Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal grave. Six small stones were put on his tombstone against the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust; each stone carved with a Magen David.
Over Translation
E. R. Goodenough claims in his book Jewish Symbols during the Greco-Roman Period (1953-1968) That translating the term Magen David into Shield of David is an over translation; for a regular translation the word protection should suffice.
It is important to understand that in Hebrew "Magen" means both "protection" and "shield". It is a homonym. This is quite an insight. It is so simple that nobody I read seemed to notice it. The meaning of the Magen David is as old as the book of Psalms that was written according to Jewish tradition by King David, who called the lord "my shield". Goodenough's insight adds another theory to the origin of the Star of David. Sometime after the writing of Psalms somebody started spreading the concept of the Shield of David and people liked the new poetic twist so much that they built a legend around it. No wonder that archeologists didn't find any evidence for the physical Shield of David.
It is important to understand that in Hebrew "Magen" means both "protection" and "shield". It is a homonym. This is quite an insight. It is so simple that nobody I read seemed to notice it. The meaning of the Magen David is as old as the book of Psalms that was written according to Jewish tradition by King David, who called the lord "my shield". Goodenough's insight adds another theory to the origin of the Star of David. Sometime after the writing of Psalms somebody started spreading the concept of the Shield of David and people liked the new poetic twist so much that they built a legend around it. No wonder that archeologists didn't find any evidence for the physical Shield of David.