World's First Church

Jordanian archaeologists have uncovered what they believe to be the world's first church dating from 33 to 70 AD.

"We have uncovered what we believe to be the first church in the world, dating from 33 AD to 70 AD," the head of Jordan's Rihab Centre for Archaeological Studies, Abdul Qader al-Husan, told reporters according toThe Age.

He said it was uncovered under Saint Georgeous Church, which itself dates back to 230 AD, in Rihab in northern Jordan near the Syrian border.

"We have evidence to believe this church sheltered the early Christians, the 70 disciples of Jesus Christ," Husan said.

These Christians, who are described in a mosaic as "the 70 beloved by God and Divine," are said to have fled persecution in Jerusalem and founded churches in northern Jordan, Husan added.

He cited historical sources which suggest they both lived and practised religious rituals in the underground church and only left it after Christianity was embraced by Roman rulers.

The bishop deputy of the Greek Orthodox archdiocese, Archimandrite Nektarious, described the discovery as an "important milestone for Christians all around the world."

Researchers recovered pottery dating back to between the 3rd and 7th centuries, which they say suggests these first Christians and their followers lived in the area until late Roman rule.

Inside the cave there are several stone seats which are believed to have been for the clergy and a circular shaped area, thought to be the apse.

There is also a deep tunnel which is believed to have led to a water source, the archaeologist added.

Rihab is home to a total of 30 churches and Jesus and the Virgin Mary are believed to have passed through the area, Husan said.

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History of Pakistan

Pakistan was created on the 14th of August 1947. The founder was Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah and was helped by a number of prominent Muslims all over India. Some of the men were, Nistar from the Frontier, Qazi Isa and Jogezai from Balochistan, Sir Abdullah Haroon from Sindh, Mamdot, Hyat, and Daultana from the Punjab, Liaqat Ali khan and the Rajah of Mahmudabad from the United Provinces, Nizamuddin, Suhrawardy and Ispahani from Bengal, and Bahadur Yar Jung from Hyderabad, Allama Iqbal, Chawdri Rehmat Ali, and many more.

Quaid -e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah at first backed the idea of one separate India free from the British rule, Muslims and Hindus living together and side by side. However, his views changed when the Hindu Congress party dominated by Hindus were not fair towards the Muslims and seeing this Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah left the Congress Party and joined the All-India Muslim League. He felt that when India would gain independence from the British, the British raj would be replaced by Ram raj, and Muslims would have no voice left and would be defenseless. Then he decided that the only way for Muslims and Hindus to live peacefully was separately as seperate nations, and this idea was first dreamt by Dr. Allama Iqbal. As a result the Pakistan plan emerged and this was declared at Lahore on 23rd March 1940 that Pakistan would be created for the Muslims. This declaration was called the Lahore Resolution or better known as Pakistan movement. Thus the struggle for Pakistan began.

When the time came for dividing the land between Pakistan and India it was decided that the Muslim majority areas would become Pakistan, and the Hindu majority areas India. The plan for the territories had been made and agreed upon by both parties, but Viceroy Lord Louis Mountbatten teamed up with Jawarlal Nehru and changed the map and gave India the areas which were supposed to go to Pakistan causing millions of people to migrate from Pakistan to India and also from India to Pakistan. Also, Mountbatten and Nehru played foul by making the Kashmiri ruler sign backdated and fake papers, which allowed India to land its forces in Kashmir and take control.

Pakistan had been betrayed repeatedly, and if Quaid would have objected to the new plan, Pakistan wouldn't have been able to materialize, and on top of that, Mountbatten had brought the date of independence forward causing the Muslims many of problems.The Hindus and the British were determined to destroy Pakistan in its early stages. They (the Hindus and the british) even withheld the assets which Pakistan was supposed to get, but Gandhi came to Pakistan's rescue and got those assets released. This was one reason why he was assassinated by the Hindus themselves, as they thought he was being soft towards the Muslims.

Jinnah's main force came from the students of Aligarh University, which was built by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan in Aligarh to help the Muslims of India achieve something in their lives.

When the partition took place millions of lives were lost in the bloody partition as the Muslims migrated from India to Pakistan (not all Muslims migrated to Pakistan from India), and the Hindus migrated to India. Raids were conducted by all the parties in retaliation to the ones which had already occurred. Hundreds of people lost their lives when the trains were sacked and pillaged and all the passengers killed.

Pakistan has fought three wars against India who was determined to destroy Pakistan from the start. Two of the wars were fought for Kashmir in which Pakistan only could reclaim a part of Kashmir, now called Azad Kashmir. But in the third war in 1971 Pakistan lost its land, East Pakistan, now called Bangladesh. Bangladesh gained its independence from Pakistan with India's help.

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History of India

One of the great early civilizations made its home in the Indus River Valley around 2500 BC along the Indus River valley. Its great cities were Mohenjo-daro and Harappa. Nobody is quite sure what caused their decline. Then between 1500 and 200 BC, Aryan invaders from Central Asia came to India and pushed the original Dravidian inhabitants south.

Over the next few centuries, several kingdoms rose and fell in different parts of the country, including the Maurya kingdom and the Gupta empire. India was invaded by various people including the Huns and the Mongols. Most notable were the Muslim Ghurs in 1192, who brought the entire Gangetic basin under their control within 20 years. In the south, the mighty Hindu kingdom of Vijayanagar, and the fragmented Bahmani Islamic kingdom came to power.

The Mughal emperors defeated the Sultan of Delhi in 1525, and ushered in another artistic golden age. The Maratha Empire grew during the 17th century and gradually took over more of the Mughals' domain. The Marathas consolidated control of central India until they fell to the last great imperial power, the British.

The British established their power over India by 1803 and started using the country as a place to make money. Unlike the Mughals, they did not assimilate into the culture, nor did they think of the country as their own. The treated the local Indian people as ‘natives’. The Uprising (also known as the War of Independence) in northern India in 1857 was the first mark of protest.

By the turn of the 20th century, Indians had started opposing foreign rule in earnest. The struggle for freedom was fought on many fronts by many people across the country, most significant of them being Gandhi who adopted a policy of passive resistance, or satyagraha.

India finally attained independence on 15 August, 1947. Muslim parties had fought for a separate country all along and so the country was also divided to form the separate nation of Pakistan. When the dividing line was announced, the greatest exodus in human history took place as Muslims moved to Pakistan and Hindus and Sikhs relocated to India. Over 10 million people changed sides and even the most conservative estimates calculate that 250,000 people were killed.

In the years after independence, India struggled to grow its economy but finally started doing that only as recently as five years ago.

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Michael Jackson History Of Life

1958-1975: Early life and The Jackson
All the world is in great sorrow on the death of this great personality. Here is my another post on Life History Of Michael Jackson to keep him alive in all of us mind. He will be always be alive in all minds whether they know the a,b,c of Pop song or not. Really he was a great personality. My last post on him was Michael Jackson’s Unexpected Death Stuns World.
Michael Joseph Jackson was born in Gary, Indiana (an industrial suburb of Chicago, Illinois) to a working-class family on August 29, 1958.[3] The son of Joseph Walter “Joe” and Katherine Esther (née Scruse),[3] he was the seventh of nine children. His siblings are Rebbie, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, La Toya, Marlon, Randy and Janet.[3] Joseph Jackson was a steel mill employee who often performed in an R&B band called The Falcons with his brother Luther.[3] Jackson was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness by his devout mother.

1976 – 1984: Move to Epic and Off the Wall
The Jackson 5 signed a new contract with CBS Records in June 1975, joining the Philadelphia International Records division, later Epic Records. As a result of legal proceedings, the group was renamed The Jacksons.[15] After the name change, the band continued to tour internationally, releasing six more albums between 1976 and 1984. From 1976 to 1984, Michael Jackson was the lead songwriter of the group, writing hits such as “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)”, “This Place Hotel” and “Can You Feel It”. 
In 1978, Jackson starred as Scarecrow in the film musical The Wiz. The musical scores were arranged by Quincy Jones, who formed a partnership with Jackson during the film’s production and agreed to produce the singer’s next solo album Off the Wall. In 1979, Jackson broke his nose during a complex dance routine. His subsequent rhinoplasty surgery was not a complete success; he complained of breathing difficulties that would affect his career. He was referred to Dr. Steven Hoefflin, who performed Jackson’s second rhinoplasty and other subsequent operations.
1986-1990: Tabloids, appearance, Bad, autobiography and films
In 1986, the tabloid press ran a story claiming that Jackson slept in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to slow the aging process; he was pictured lying down in a glass box. Although the claim was untrue, Jackson disseminated the fabricated story himself. The singer was promoting his upcoming movie Captain EO and wanted to promote a science fiction image of himself. Jackson had a fourth rhinoplasty and, wanting masculine features, had a cleft put in his chin. Then he starred in the Francis Ford Coppola-directed 3-D film Captain EO. It was the most expensive film produced on a per-minute basis at the time, and was later hosted in Disney theme parks. Disneyland featured the film in its Tomorrowland area for nearly 11 years, while Walt Disney World screened the film in its Epcot theme park from 1986 to 1994.
1991-1993: Dangerous and Super Bowl
In March 1991, Jackson renewed his contract with Sony for $65 million; a record breaking deal at the time, displacing Neil Diamond’s renewal contract with Columbia Records. Jackson released his eighth album Dangerous in 1991. As of 2008, Dangerous has shipped 7 million copies in the US and has sold 32 million copies worldwide; it is the most successful New Jack Swing album of all time. In the US, the album’s first single “Black or White” was the album’s biggest hit, reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and remaining there for seven weeks, with similar chart performances worldwide. The album’s second single “Remember the Time” spent eight weeks in the top five in the US, peaking at number three on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. In 1993, Jackson performed the song at the Soul Train Awards in a wheelchair, saying he had suffered an injury in rehearsals. In the UK and other parts of Europe, “Heal the World” was the biggest hit from the album; it sold 450,000 copies in the UK and spent five weeks at two in 1992
1993-1994: Sexual abuse accusations and marriage
Jackson gave a 90-minute interview with Oprah Winfrey in February 1993, his first television interview since 1979. He grimaced when speaking of his childhood abuse at the hands of his father; he believed he had missed out on much of his childhood years, admitting that he often cried from loneliness. He denied previous tabloid rumors that he bought the bones of theElephant Man or slept in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. The entertainer went on to dispel suggestions that he bleached his skin, admitting for the first time that he had vitiligo. The interview was watched by 90 million Americans, becoming the fourth most-viewed non-sport program in US history. It also started a public debate on the topic of vitiligo, a relatively unknown condition before then. Dangerous re-entered the album chart top 10, more than a year after its original release..
1995-1999: HIStory, second marriage and fatherhood
In 1995, Jackson merged his Northern Songs catalog with Sony’s publishing division creating Sony/ATV Music Publishing. Jackson retained half-ownership of the company, earned $95 million upfront as well as the rights to even more songs. He then released the double album HIStory: Past, Present and Future, Book I. The first disc, HIStory Begins, was a 15-track greatest hits album, and was later reissued as Greatest Hits – HIStory Vol. I in 2001, the second disc, HIStory Continues, contained 15 new songs. The album debuted at number one on the charts and has been certified for seven million shipments in the US. It is the best-selling multiple-disc album of all-time, with 20 million copies (40 million units) sold worldwide. HIStory received a Grammy nomination for best album
2000-2002: Label dispute, Invincible and third child
In 2000, Jackson was listed in the book of Guinness World Records for his support of 39 charities, more than any other entertainer or personality. At the time, Jackson was waiting for the licenses to the masters of his albums to revert back to him; this allowed him to promote his old material how he liked and prevented Sony from getting a cut of the profit. Jackson expected this to occur early in the new millennium, however, due to the fine print and various clauses in the contract, this revert date is still many years away. Jackson began an investigation, and it emerged that the attorney who represented the singer in the deal was also representing Sony, creating a conflict of interest. Jackson was also concerned about another conflict of interest. For a number of years, Sony had been pushing to buy all of Jackson’s share in their music catalog venture. If Jackson’s career or financial situation were to deteriorate, he would have to sell his catalog. Thus, Sony had something to gain from Jackson’s career failing. Jackson was able to use these conflicts as leverage to exit his contract early.Just before the release of Invincible, Jackson informed the head of Sony Music Entertainment.
2003-2007: Documentary, trial and business ventures
In 2003, Sony put out a compilation of Jackson’s hits on CD and DVD. In the US, the album peaked at number 13 and was certified platinum by the RIAA; in the UK it was certified for shipments of at least 1.2 million units.In a Granada Television documentary titled Living with Michael Jackson, the singer was seen holding hands and discussing sleeping arrangements with Gavin Arvizo, who would later accuse him of child sexual abuse.In the same documentary Jackson was observed spending large amounts of money in an apparently frivolous manner, when he spent $6 million in a single store. Shortly after the documentary aired, Jackson was charged with seven counts of child sexual abuse and two counts of administering an intoxicating agent in order to commit that felony; all charges regarded the same boy, Gavin Arvizo, who was under 14 at the time of the alleged crime.
2009: Death
On the morning of June 25, 2009, Jackson reportedly collapsed at a rented home in Holmby Hills in Los Angeles. After he collapsed, Jackson’s personal physician, who was with him at the time, attempted to resuscitate him. Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics responded to a 911 call at 12:21 pm and arrived nine minutes later. Jackson was reportedly not breathing and CPR was quickly performed. Resuscitation efforts continued both en route to the UCLA Medical Center, and after arrival at approximately 1:14 pm (20:14 UTC), for a further hour. He fell into a coma and died shortly after arrival. The cause of death is as yet unknown, but he was noted to be already in cardiac arrest by the paramedics who attended him. Jackson was pronounced dead at about 2:26 pm local time.

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