Just came back from Kyoto, Japan with my family and had a really great time, thanks to the many grand UNESCO World Heritage sites, the tranquil and Zen ambiance, the organized and efficient running of the city, the tasty food, and the friendly people.
Kyoto is home to 17 UNESCO World Heritage sites, one of which is The Golden Pavilion or Kinkakuji Temple, a Must Visit.
In visiting Kyoto, there is a great abundance of art and culture to take in. One subject I quickly noticed was that of beautifully ornate dragons prevalent throughout the city.
A large dragon watching over the cleansing water at Kiyomizu-dera Temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site, another Must Visit.
Kiyomizu-dera Temple was built in 778, with portions built in 1633 by Shogun Tokugawa Lemitsu. Note the gold leaf dragon adorning the top of a temple roof. The narrow shopping street leading to the temple complex, filled with shops for souvenirs, local delicacies, colorful craft works, green tea ice cream, reminded me of a walk through Venice, Italy.
Why are there so many dragons? Is this merely the work of vivid imagination? Fantasy expressed in art? Why the consistent look? As we went around Kyoto for eight days, it was clear that dragons were indeed a favorite, though images of herons, peacocks, egrets flowers and trees were also abundant, while other subjects include tigers, snakes, otters and even camels. Quite notably, there was no prevalence of mythical beasts like a lion with eagle wings, or an oversized eagle with a lion's rear. The works of art rested mostly on what the ancient people of Kyoto likely encountered. So does that imply that dragons were in the recent, historical and cultural memory of Kyoto?
Nijo Castle, built in 1603, is another UNESCO World Heritage site, and rounds off my Top 3 Must See places in Kyoto. The main building, the Ninomaru, was the residence of the Shogun..
The Ninomaru had floorboards that squeaked hummingbird sounds to warn residences that someone had entered the building
This colorful dragon watches over an entrance, above a carved panel of many fowl.
Dragons have a similar look to dinosaurs. But how could the people of Kyoto have seen dinosaurs?! Didn't dinosaurs only get to be more known in the 1800's? Didn't they die out about 60 million years before people started walking the Earth? At least that's what evolutionists dogmatically teach.
Image from The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! By Ken Ham.
Actually, the word "dinosaur" was only coined in 1841, but way before that, the Bible in the King James Version already used the word "dragon" to describe creatures the writer was familiar with [e.g, The beast of the field shall honour me, the dragons and the owls: because I give waters in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen. (Isaiah 43:20 KJV), Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet. (Psalms 91:13 KJV)]. Learn more about this from the book The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! By Ken Ham.
A wood carved dragon at the entrance to a small temple at The Golden Pavilion or Kinkakuji Temple area.
One might even be tempted to dismiss dragons as a creation of the East. But read this excerpt from The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! Master Books, 2011-03-23. iBooks.
“In a glass case in the British Museum in London lies one of the oldest books of British history — The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles . This book records encounters people had with dragons, and many of the descriptions fit well-known dinosaurs. In fact, the emblem on the flag of the country of Wales is a dragon.
In the film, The Great Dinosaur Mystery, a number of dragon legends are recounted:
“England has its story of St. George, who slew a dragon that lived in a cave.
There is the story of a tenth-century Irishman who wrote of his encounter of what appears to have been a Stegosaurus .
In the 1500s, a European scientific book, Historia Animalium , listed several animals, which to us are dinosaurs, as still alive. A well-known naturalist of the time, Ulysses Aldrovandus, recorded an encounter between a peasant named Baptista and a dragon whose description fits that of the dinosaur Tanystropheus . The encounter was on May 13, 1572, near Bologna in Italy, and the peasant killed the dragon.”
Dragons at the Gion Matsuri Festival in Kyoto.
In researching more, we discover that dragon stories are found all over the world. Check out this interesting Video Dinosaur and Dragon Legends.
See also this article on The Dragons of Peru.
And here's an excellent book Dragons: Legends and Lore of Dinosaurs, that reveals "dragon legends can be found around the world—amazingly similar, compelling, and difficult to simply dismiss as baseless tales or mere lore. This fascinating new book traces the evidence for these creatures throughout Europe, China, the USA, South America, Greece, the United Kingdom, Babylon, and elsewhere."
Here's an article about red blood cells discovered in dinosaur bones, seriously raising questions to the thinking that dinosaurs became extinct 60 million years ago.
And for an animal to become extinct isn't all that mysterious. Especially a fierce and unwieldy creature that lives near a population center.
A Kyoto billboard showing a tiger and a dragon.
Why, even the tigers of Singapore were well-documented in the Raffles Hotel Museum before it closed down. Of course it didn't fit well with the Singaporean community to have wild tigers roaming about the growing metropolis, so they were hunted to "extinction" in Singapore, and now only appear in art and the zoo.
More Gion Matsuri Festival dragons in Kyoto.
What's the significance of all these dragons, that they are part of our recent history, and not millions of years extinct?
If atheistic evolutionists are correct, then we are nothing more than stardust who have managed to clump into stars, then form organic material, then combine into proteins, then fully functioning living cells, then into humans, over the course of billions of years, mathematically, biologically and logically improbable as that may be.
If on the other hand the Bible is true from the start, as dragons and research and operational science confirm more and more, then we people have great value as Jesus has died to save us from eternal punishment to grant us an abundant life (John 3:16, John 10:10), and we have purpose (Micah 6:8), and we need to take God more seriously, thanking and obeying Him.
Kudos to the people and the city of Kyoto for a wonderful visit!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Kyoto is home to 17 UNESCO World Heritage sites, one of which is The Golden Pavilion or Kinkakuji Temple, a Must Visit.
In visiting Kyoto, there is a great abundance of art and culture to take in. One subject I quickly noticed was that of beautifully ornate dragons prevalent throughout the city.
A large dragon watching over the cleansing water at Kiyomizu-dera Temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site, another Must Visit.
Kiyomizu-dera Temple was built in 778, with portions built in 1633 by Shogun Tokugawa Lemitsu. Note the gold leaf dragon adorning the top of a temple roof. The narrow shopping street leading to the temple complex, filled with shops for souvenirs, local delicacies, colorful craft works, green tea ice cream, reminded me of a walk through Venice, Italy.
Why are there so many dragons? Is this merely the work of vivid imagination? Fantasy expressed in art? Why the consistent look? As we went around Kyoto for eight days, it was clear that dragons were indeed a favorite, though images of herons, peacocks, egrets flowers and trees were also abundant, while other subjects include tigers, snakes, otters and even camels. Quite notably, there was no prevalence of mythical beasts like a lion with eagle wings, or an oversized eagle with a lion's rear. The works of art rested mostly on what the ancient people of Kyoto likely encountered. So does that imply that dragons were in the recent, historical and cultural memory of Kyoto?
Nijo Castle, built in 1603, is another UNESCO World Heritage site, and rounds off my Top 3 Must See places in Kyoto. The main building, the Ninomaru, was the residence of the Shogun..
The Ninomaru had floorboards that squeaked hummingbird sounds to warn residences that someone had entered the building
This colorful dragon watches over an entrance, above a carved panel of many fowl.
Dragons have a similar look to dinosaurs. But how could the people of Kyoto have seen dinosaurs?! Didn't dinosaurs only get to be more known in the 1800's? Didn't they die out about 60 million years before people started walking the Earth? At least that's what evolutionists dogmatically teach.
Image from The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! By Ken Ham.
Actually, the word "dinosaur" was only coined in 1841, but way before that, the Bible in the King James Version already used the word "dragon" to describe creatures the writer was familiar with [e.g, The beast of the field shall honour me, the dragons and the owls: because I give waters in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen. (Isaiah 43:20 KJV), Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet. (Psalms 91:13 KJV)]. Learn more about this from the book The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! By Ken Ham.
A wood carved dragon at the entrance to a small temple at The Golden Pavilion or Kinkakuji Temple area.
One might even be tempted to dismiss dragons as a creation of the East. But read this excerpt from The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved! Master Books, 2011-03-23. iBooks.
“In a glass case in the British Museum in London lies one of the oldest books of British history — The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles . This book records encounters people had with dragons, and many of the descriptions fit well-known dinosaurs. In fact, the emblem on the flag of the country of Wales is a dragon.
In the film, The Great Dinosaur Mystery, a number of dragon legends are recounted:
“England has its story of St. George, who slew a dragon that lived in a cave.
There is the story of a tenth-century Irishman who wrote of his encounter of what appears to have been a Stegosaurus .
In the 1500s, a European scientific book, Historia Animalium , listed several animals, which to us are dinosaurs, as still alive. A well-known naturalist of the time, Ulysses Aldrovandus, recorded an encounter between a peasant named Baptista and a dragon whose description fits that of the dinosaur Tanystropheus . The encounter was on May 13, 1572, near Bologna in Italy, and the peasant killed the dragon.”
Dragons at the Gion Matsuri Festival in Kyoto.
In researching more, we discover that dragon stories are found all over the world. Check out this interesting Video Dinosaur and Dragon Legends.
See also this article on The Dragons of Peru.
And here's an excellent book Dragons: Legends and Lore of Dinosaurs, that reveals "dragon legends can be found around the world—amazingly similar, compelling, and difficult to simply dismiss as baseless tales or mere lore. This fascinating new book traces the evidence for these creatures throughout Europe, China, the USA, South America, Greece, the United Kingdom, Babylon, and elsewhere."
Here's an article about red blood cells discovered in dinosaur bones, seriously raising questions to the thinking that dinosaurs became extinct 60 million years ago.
And for an animal to become extinct isn't all that mysterious. Especially a fierce and unwieldy creature that lives near a population center.
A Kyoto billboard showing a tiger and a dragon.
Why, even the tigers of Singapore were well-documented in the Raffles Hotel Museum before it closed down. Of course it didn't fit well with the Singaporean community to have wild tigers roaming about the growing metropolis, so they were hunted to "extinction" in Singapore, and now only appear in art and the zoo.
More Gion Matsuri Festival dragons in Kyoto.
What's the significance of all these dragons, that they are part of our recent history, and not millions of years extinct?
If atheistic evolutionists are correct, then we are nothing more than stardust who have managed to clump into stars, then form organic material, then combine into proteins, then fully functioning living cells, then into humans, over the course of billions of years, mathematically, biologically and logically improbable as that may be.
If on the other hand the Bible is true from the start, as dragons and research and operational science confirm more and more, then we people have great value as Jesus has died to save us from eternal punishment to grant us an abundant life (John 3:16, John 10:10), and we have purpose (Micah 6:8), and we need to take God more seriously, thanking and obeying Him.
Kudos to the people and the city of Kyoto for a wonderful visit!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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