Tapping Into Superior Blood
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Benson C Saili
THIS EARTH, MY BROTHER
Cainite genes validate Sethian claim to royalty
If Adapa was the first human to undertake a space trip, the second was Etana if we are to go by Sumerian accounts. Etana, as we have already related, was Cain’s firstborn son who sadly has been completely ignored by the writers of Genesis when he was quite an epochal figure as monarchical successor to his father and ruler of the city-state Kish.
Exactly when Etana went to Nibiru is not that clear-cut in the Sumerian records, which can be quite difficult to time in some cases given that some of the events were couched in legendary style. Some chroniclers in fact put the advent of Etana after the Deluge, which doesn’t make sense at all.
The Sumerian King List says Etana was one of 23 kings of Kish who together ruled for a total of 24,510 years. The Deluge happened only 13,000 years ago. Etana’s time therefore could not have been post-diluvial. In any case, the Kish dynasty would have ruled for far much longer than that if we take into account the fact that some figures given by ancient historians were substantially reduced by some mathematical factor.
We did at one stage give the example of Noah, in terms of whom the Bible says the Deluge happened when he was 600 years old but which Berossus puts at a time when he was 36,000 years old – a figure clearly arrived at by multiplying 600 by a factor of 60. It is important, therefore, not to be very dogmatic about figures we encounter in ancient history: they are not unassailably conclusive.
Etana’s saga is narrated in a Sumerian text dubbed The Epic of Etana. He’s said to have been a very popular king who united all the city-states of the Edin, Eden in the Bible. Now, Kish was controlled not by Enkites but Enlilites. Thus unlike Cain, who was a diehard Enkite although he ruled in Kish (the Enlilites called him Arwium, meaning “serpent”, in mockery), Etana was very much a protégé of the Enlilites. He was particularly loved by the notoriously sex-crazed Inanna-Ishtar and was highly valued by her twin-brother Utu-Shamash. The Enlilites had such a sway on Etana that Enki, his paternal grandfather, could not hide his resentment.
Etana had a wife he valued greatly but she was unable to sustain conception because of repeated miscarriages. The Enkites in Enki and his genius son Ningishzidda, not to mention Ninmah, would have easily taken care of this handicap given their mastery of genetics and medicine but they were seemingly repulsed by Etana’s disproportionate allegiance to the Enlilites and so simply looked the other way. Etana, however, badly needed a heir and the Enlilites told him on planet Nibiru grew a fruit-of-the-womb plant known as the Plant of Birth. Soon Etana was put on a spaceship to Nibiru.
When the rocket was space-borne and Earth had disappeared from view, Etana like Adapa before him grew cold feet and demanded that the he be returned to Earth forthwith. In the process, there was a glitch and the spaceship found itself headed for a catastrophic plunge into the wall of a waterfalls. When Inanna-Ishtar got the news on radio, she put her space-navigation skills for which she was renowned to use and Etana’s spaceship was diverted into a grove, where it crash-landed but without fatalities. Etana did finally get to have a heir but how this came about is not addressed in the epic.
THE MERGER OF THE CAINITE AND SETHIAN LINES
Since Etana’s line did not lead to the iconic Noah, it does not at all feature in the Old Testament. Instead, it is that of his younger brother Enoch I and that of his cousin Seth that do. GENESIS 4 and 5 talk about the genealogies of the Cainite and Sethian lines. There are two features that are particularly arresting about the two genealogies. The first is that the names are so uncannily similar, an aspect we have already noted and pronounced upon. The second is that the writers of Genesis show a unabashed ambivalence towards the Cainite line. They at once exalt it and scoff at it.
Since the Cainites (the descendants of Cain) were Enkites, they were extraordinarily gifted thanks to Enki’s super genes. Jubal, for example, was a most entrancing musician, like Enki was, and Tubal-Cain was the most accomplished craftsman of his generation – that is, a master metallurgist – like Enki was. This the Levites, the authors of Genesis, duly recognise. On the other hand, they make a point of calling attention to the fact that the Cainites were a wicked lot.
A certain Lamech is recorded as boasting to his wives that he killed two men and that anybody who would be so foolhardy as to exact vengeance on him would earn himself 70 times the wrath of God. What is ironic, though, is that Lamech was of the conjoined Cainite and Sethian (the descendants of Seth) lines, the reason he features on both lists. How did the two lines merge and why? We did touch on this element at some point but did not sufficiently dwell on it. It thus behoves us to flesh out the argument further.
The Levites were Jews and the Jews were Enlil’s chosen people, Enlil being the most prominent Jehovah/Yahweh as he was Earth’s Chief Executive, initially substantively and in due course only in a patriarchal sense as other members of the Anunnaki pantheon also had their chances at being an Enlil (remember Enlil was simply a title for the Anunnaki ruler of Earth: his own name according to some ancient records was Anen).
We have already related that Adapa, Enki’s son with an Earthling woman, was the first Priest-King of the Earthlings, the Sanga-lugal or Melchizedek. When he died, he was succeeded by Cain. Cain was in turn succeeded by his firstborn son Etana. However, Etana’s line did not lead to Noah, the hero of the Deluge. The line that led to Noah was that of Enoch I, Cain’s second-born son. This is the line that in turn led to Shem, whose descendants, the Jewish people, found favour with Enlil.
As such, Etana’s line became obscure and Enoch I’s line became preeminent, just as Esau’s line became obscure and that of Jacob, his younger brother who appropriated the birthright from him, became preeminent. It was all politics at play rather than merit, consistent with the Enlilites’ characteristic divide and rule stratagem.
Meanwhile, Cain’s younger brother Seth began his own line through his firstborn son Enshi, Enosh in the Bible. Seth also had a second-born child, a daughter called Noam. Now, Seth was the favourite of the Enlilites because unlike Cain, who was fathered by Enki, he was fathered by Adapa and so was easier to co-opt into their faction.
The Enlilite thus wanted his offspring to have a genetic stake in the ruling line. That was only possible if his line merged with Cain’s royal line. As such, a uniting intermarriage was orchestrated. Enoch I and Noam came together in holy matrimony. It is the resultant conjoined line that led to Noah and to Shem.
You will now understand why in Genesis the Cainite line and Sethian line for the most part carry identical names. They were the same people. But since Cain was an Enkite, the pro-Enlil authors of Genesis wanted to give the spurious impression that the Jews sprang from Seth alone and had nothing to do with Cain. In order to create and embed this fiction, they gave two separate Cainite and Sethian lines when in truth the two lines did integrate into one bloodline from the very beginning with the marriage of cousins Enoch I from the Cainite line and Noam from the Sethian line.
If Cain hadn’t been the carrier of the royal gene, his name wouldn’t have come into the mix in the genealogical passages. He would have been ignored altogether. But it was essential to feature him because it was he who lent legitimacy to the conjoined line. Sadly, Christendom has missed this most fundamental of truths and simply dismissed Cain as no more than a cold-blooded murderer.
THE INCEPTION OF WORSHIP
Although the Anunnaki were not gods, humans worshipped them anyway and we continue to worship them today, albeit unwittingly for most. Every time a Christian kneels down to worship Jehovah, scarcely is he or she aware that they are worshipping an Anunnaki being, principally Enlil. Other mainstream religions worship the same Anunnaki gods under different names. The world’s most worshipped gods are Enlil and his second-born son Nannar-Sin, who is the god of the most influential religion in the Middle East.
On their part, the ancients did not worship the Anunnaki at all. This is the generation from Adam to Cain I’m talking about. The Anunnaki came to Earth about 445,000 years ago and created mankind about 300,000 years ago. Yet they were not worshipped by Earthlings until about 95,000 years ago. Initially, there was no worship: there was only workship. Humans were created to serve the Anunnaki, to work for them, and not to worship them.
Even when Adapa became Earth’s first Priest-King, none of his obligations entailed worshipping the Anunnaki. A priest was a shepherd or trustee. That is to say, he took care of the human “flock” on behalf of the Anunnaki. This was not a religious role: it was a jurisprudential role, whereby he saw to it that they unfailingly abided by codes of conduct and civilised norms. That role changed 95,000 years ago to become a religious role. Exactly what happened 95,000 years ago to bring about such a seismic shift?
It was the birth of Enosh to Seth and his Anunnaki wife Kalimath. Of the third generation from Adapa, this being Cain’s sons Etana and Seth’s son Enosh, Enosh was the most human in that he had the least amount of Anunnaki blood coursing in his veins. The name Enosh actually means “Human” in Hebrew but in a demeaning sense as it has connotations of one who is frail or mortal, like we sometimes say “I’m only human” when we perpetrate an outrageous act. Thus the name Enosh was a disparagement. Its other connotation was that of a “commoner”. This was to contrast him with the Cainite line, which was an aristocratic line by virtual of carrying much more Anunnaki blood.
Since Enosh was of a lesser standing genetically, the Enlilites decided to turn him into their worshipper. It was during his advent that mankind began to worship the Anunnaki. GENESIS 4:36 underscores that when it says, “To Seth also a son was born, and he called his name Enosh. At that time people began to call upon the name of the LORD.” Worship of the Anunnaki folks was instituted not by Enki but by Enlil.
From the time Enosh became of age at 12 years old, the Enlilites took him under their wing. They based him at Nippur, Enlil’s cult centre in the Edin, where he was taught three things basically. The first were the rites of worship, all the ceremonies and rituals that were required in the worship of Enlil. The second was to prepare the perfumes for anointing humans who would be brought before the presence of Enlil, a task that Enlil entrusted to Nannar-Sin. The third was to prepare a medicinal potion from what was called the Inbu fruit.
This potion was meant to power the libido of the Anunnaki for we learn from the Epic of Gilgamesh that the nymphomaniacal Inanna-Ishtar begged the well-endowed Gilgamesh to “give me of your Inbu fruit”, that is, make love to her. The skill of preparing the Inbu potion was imparted to Enosh by Ishkur-Adad, Enlil’s youngest son.
Be that as it may, the conduct of worship in Anunnaki days was different from that of our day. In Anunnaki times, people went not to a church or temple: they went to the home of the Anunnaki god himself. And once there, they did not process into the house but simply hovered within the wider premises.
The worship itself was not prayer or supplication: it was simply paying homage, like tourists do when they visit Buckingham Palace, and singing praise and thanksgiving songs. Whatever needs the people wanted to present before the Anunnaki god was done through the Priest-King. It was he only who was allowed to enter the house of the god. Even then, he did not do this alone: he was presented before the god by one member of the Anunnaki pantheon.
THE LINE OF ADAPA
From Adapa to Noah, there were ten generations. Adapa (born about 110,000 years ago) fathered Cain (legally, that is, as he was Enki’s biological son), Abel, and Seth. This was the second generation. Cain begot Etana and Enoch I, whereas Seth (born 103,000 years ago) begot Enosh (95,000 years ago). These marked the third generation.
Enoch I married Noam, Seth’s daughter, to integrate the Cainite and Sethian lines. About 92,000 years ago, the couple had a son Kunin (Cainan in the Bible). Kunin marked the fourth generation. “Kunin, He of the Kilns, his name had the meaning,” relates Enki in The Lost Book of Enki. “For by Ninurta in Bad-Tibira he was tutored, of furnace and kiln there he learned. How with bitumens fires to make, how to smelt and refine he was taught; in the smelting and refining of gold for Nibiru he and his offspring toiled. In the 98th shar did this matter come about.”
Approximately 89,000 years ago, Kunin fathered a son with his half-sister Mualit. His name was Malalu (Mahalaleel/Mehujael in Genesis). “He Who Plays, his name meant,” says Enki. “In music and song he excelled. For him Ninurta a stringed harp made, a flute for him he shaped. Hymns to Ninurta Malalu played, with his daughters before Ninurta they sang.” Malalu was the fifth generation Adapite.
Malalu married his paternal cousin Dunna, by whom he had a son called Irid (Jared/Irad in the Bible). This was 85,000 years ago. Jared meant “He of the sweet waters”. Of him, Enki says, “Dumuzi how wells to dig had taught, for flocks in distant meadows water to provide”. Jared marked the sixth generation since Adapa.
Like Malalu, Jared married his paternal cousin Baraka and about 79,000 years ago the couple had a son they named Enkime, known as Enoch in the Bible and the apocryphal books. We may as well dub him Enoch II to distinguish him from Enoch the son of Cain. Enoch II marked the seventh generation.
Just under 71,000 years ago came a eighth generation Adapite, born to Enoch II and his wife Edinni. He was named Matushal (Methuselah in the Bible). His name meant “God’s Helper”. Enoch II was the father of Lumach (Lamech in the Bible), born about 56,000 years ago, when Adapa died. Adapa thus was alive through the first nine generations of his progeny. The name Lumach meant “Mighty Man”.
Finally came the tenth generational, the most famous of Adapa’s offspring. This was Ziusudra, meaning “Wise Man”. In the Bible, Ziusudra is known as Noah, the hero of that infamous globalwide flood that decimated the population of mankind. Noah was born to Lamech and his wife Batanash 49,000 years ago, but there is a biological twist to the circumstances surrounding his conception courtesy of Enki that we will address at the appropriate time.
We see, therefore, that between the birth of Adapa and the birth of Noah, about 61,200 years passed. The progenitor of the line himself, Adapa, lived for about 55,800 years. The year of Cain’s death is not known but since he was alive when Adapa died, he too must have lived for nearly as long as Adapa. As we have long pointed out, the ages we read in Genesis were microscoped by a certain mathematical factor: they were not literal as the Adapite line lived for thousands of years thanks to the ingestion of Star Fire.
NEXT WEEK: THE OTHER MAN WHO WENT TO “HEAVEN”
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GONE FISHING
In recent years, using personal devices in working environments has become so commonplace it now has its own acronym, BOYD (Bring Your Own Device). But as employees skip between corporate tools and personal applications on their own devices, their actions introduce a number of possible risks that should be managed and mitigated with careful consideration. Consider these examples:
Si-lwli, a small family-run business in Wales, is arguably as niche a company as you could find, producing talking toys used to promote the Welsh language. Their potential market is small, with only some 300,000 Welsh language speakers in the world and in reality the business is really more of a hobby for the husband-and-wife team, who both still have day jobs. Yet, despite still managing to be successful in terms of sales, the business is now fighting for survival after recently falling prey to cybercriminals. Emails between Si-Iwli and their Chinese suppliers were intercepted by hackers who altered the banking details in the correspondence, causing Si-Iwli to hand over £18,000 (around P ¼ m) to the thieves. That might not sound much to a large enterprise, but to a small or medium business it can be devastating.
Another recent SMB hacking story which appeared in the Wall Street Journal concerned Innovative Higher Ed Consulting (IHED) Inc, a small New York start-up with a handful of employees. IHED didn’t even have a website, but fraudsters were able to run stolen credit card numbers through the company’s payment system and reverse the charges to the tune of $27,000, around the same loss faced by Si-Iwli. As the WSJ put it, the hackers completely destroyed the company, forcing its owners to fold.
And in May 2019, the city of Baltimore’s computer system was hit by a ransomware attack, with hackers using a variant called RobinHood. The hack, which has lasted more than a month, paralysed the computer system for city employees, with the hackers demanding a payment in Bitcoin to give access back to the city.
Of course, hackers target governments or business giants but small and medium businesses are certainly not immune. In fact, 67% of SMBs reported that they had experienced a cyber attack across a period of 12 months, according to a 2018 survey carried out by security research firm Ponemon Institute. Additionally, Verizon issued a report in May 2019 that small businesses accounted for 43% of its reported data breaches. Once seen as less vulnerable than PCs, smartphone attacks are on the rise, with movements like the Dark Caracal spyware campaign underlining the allure of mobile devices to hackers. Last year, the US Federal Trade Commission released a statement calling for greater education on mobile security, coming at a time when around 42% of all Android devices are believed to not carry the latest security updates.
This is an era when employees increasingly use their smartphones for work-related purposes so is your business doing enough to protect against data breaches on their employees’ phones? The SME Cyber Crime Survey 2018 carried out for risk management specialists AON showed that more than 80% of small businesses did not view this as a threat yet if as shown, 67% of SMBs were said to have been victims of hacking, either the stats are wrong or business owners are underestimating their vulnerability. A 2019 report by PricewaterhouseCoopers suggests the latter, stating that the majority of global businesses are unprepared for cyber attacks.
Consider that a workstation no longer means a desk in an office: It can be a phone in the back of a taxi or Uber; a laptop in a coffee shop, or a tablet in an airport lounge. Wherever the device is used, employees can potentially install applications that could be harmful to your business, even from something as seemingly insignificant as clicking on an accidental download or opening a link on a phishing email. Out of the physical workplace, your employees’ activities might not have the same protections as they would on a company-monitored PC.
Yet many businesses not only encourage their employees to work remotely, but assume working from coffee shops, bookstores, and airports can boost employees’ productivity. Unfortunately, many remote hot spots do not provide secure Wi-Fi so if your employee is accessing their work account on unsecured public Wi-Fi, sensitive business data could be at risk. Furthermore, even if your employee uses a company smartphone or has access to company data through a personal mobile device, there is always a chance data could be in jeopardy with a lost or stolen device, even information as basic as clients’ addresses and phone numbers.
BOYDs are also at risk from malware designed to harm and infect the host system, transmittable to smartphones when downloading malicious third-party apps. Then there is ransomware, a type of malware used by hackers to specifically take control of a system’s data, blocking access or threatening to release sensitive information unless a ransom is paid such as the one which affected Baltimore. Ransomware attacks are on the increase, predicted to occur every 14 seconds, potentially costing billions of dollars per year.
Lastly there is phishing – the cyber equivalent of the metaphorical fishing exercise – whereby cybercriminals attempt to obtain sensitive data –usernames, passwords, credit card details –usually through a phoney email designed to look legitimate which directs the user to a fraudulent website or requests the data be emailed back directly. Most of us like to think we could recognize a phishing email when we see it, but these emails have become more sophisticated and can come through other forms of communication such as messaging apps.
Bottom line is to be aware of the potential problems with BOYDs and if in doubt, consult your IT security consultants. You can’t put the own-device genie back in the bottle but you can make data protection one of your three wishes!
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“I Propose to Diana Tonight”
About five days before Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed landed in Paris, General Atiku, a certain Edward Williams was taking a walk in a woods in the Welsh town of Mountain Ash. Williams, then 73, was a psychic of some renown. He had in the past foretold assassination attempts on US President Ronald Reagan, which occurred on March 30, 1981, and Pope John Paul II, which came to pass on May 13, 1981.
As he trudged the woods, Williams had a sudden premonition that pointed to Diana’s imminent fate as per Christopher Andersen’s book The Day Diana Died. “When the vision struck me, it was as if everything around me was obscured and replaced by shadowy figures,” Williams was later to reminisce. “In the middle was the face of Princess Diana. Her expression was sad and full of pathos. She was wearing what looked like a floral dress with a short dark cardigan. But it was vague. I went cold with fear and knew it was a sign that she was in danger.”
Williams hastily beat a retreat to his home, which he shared with his wife Mary, and related to her his presentiment, trembling like an aspen leaf as he did so. “I have never seen him so upset,” Mary recounted. “He felt he was given a sign and when he came back from his walk he was deeply shaken.”
The following day, Williams frantically sauntered into a police station to inform the police of his premonition. The officer who attended to him would have dismissed him as no more than a crackpot but he treated him seriously in view of the accuracy of his past predictions. He took a statement and immediately passed it on to the Special Branch Investigative Unit.
The report read as follows:
“On 27 August, at 14:12 hrs, a man by the name of Edward Williams came to Mountain Ash police station. He said he was a psychic and predicted that Princess Diana was going to die. In previous years, he has predicted that the Pope and Ronald Reagan were going to be the victims of assassination attempts. On both occasions he was proved to be correct. Mr Williams appeared to be quite normal.”
Williams, General, was spot-on as usual: four days later, the princess was no more.
Meanwhile, General, even as Dodi and Diana were making their way to the Fayed-owned Ritz Hotel in central Paris, British newspapers were awash with headlines that suggested Diana was kind of deranged. Writes Andrew Morton in Diana in Pursuit of Love: “In The Independent Diana was described as ‘a woman with fundamentally nothing to say about anything’. She was ‘suffering from a form of arrested development’. ‘Isn’t it time she started using her head?’ asked The Mail on Sunday. The Sunday Mirror printed a special supplement entitled ‘A Story of Love’; The News of the World claimed that William had demanded that Diana should split from Dodi: ‘William can’t help it, he just doesn’t like the man.’ William was reportedly ‘horrified’ and ‘doesn’t think Mr Fayed is good for his mother’ – or was that just the press projecting their own prejudices? The upmarket Sunday Times newspaper, which had first serialised my biography of the princess, now put her in the psychiatrist’s chair for daring to be wooed by a Muslim. The pop-psychologist Oliver James put Diana ‘On the Couch’, asking why she was so ‘depressed’ and desperate for love. Other tabloids piled in with dire prognostications – about Prince Philip’s hostility to the relationship, Diana’s prospect of exile, and the social ostracism she would face if she married Dodi.”
DIANA AND DODI AT THE RITZ
Before Diana and Dodi departed the Villa Windsor sometime after 16 hrs, General, one of Dodi’s bodyguards Trevor Rees-Jones furtively asked Diana as to what the programme for the evening was. This Trevor did out of sheer desperation as Dodi had ceased and desisted from telling members of his security detail, let alone anyone else for that matter, what his onward destination was for fear that that piece of information would be passed on to the paparazzi. Diana kindly obliged Trevor though her response was terse and scarcely revealing. “Well, eventually we will be going out to a restaurant”, that was all Diana said. Without advance knowledge of exactly what restaurant that was, Trevor and his colleagues’ hands were tied: they could not do a recce on it as was standard practice for the security team of a VIP principal. Dodi certainly, General, was being recklessly by throwing such caution to the winds.
At about 16:30, Diana and Dodi drew up at the Ritz Hotel, where they were received by acting hotel manager Claude Roulet. The front entrance of the hotel was already crawling with paparazzi, as a result of which the couple took the precaution of using the rear entrance, where hopefully they would make their entry unperturbed and unmolested. The first thing they did when they were ensconced in the now $10,000 a night Imperial Suite was to spend some time on their mobiles and set about touching base with friends, relations, and associates. Diana called at least two people, her clairvoyant friend Rita Rogers and her favourite journalist Richard Kay of The Daily Mail.
Rita, General, was alarmed that Diana had proceeded to venture to Paris notwithstanding the warning she had given Dodi and herself in relation to what she had seen of him in the crystal ball when the couple had consulted her. When quizzed as to what the hell she indeed was doing in Paris at that juncture, Diana replied that she and Dodi had simply come to do some shopping, which though partially true was not the material reason they were there. “But Diana, remember what I told Dodi,” Rita said somewhat reprovingly. Diana a bit apprehensively replied, “Yes I remember. I will be careful. I promise.” Well, she did not live up to her promise as we shall soon unpack General.
As for Richard Kay, Diana made known to him that, “I have decided I am going to radically change my life. I am going to complete my obligations to charities and to the anti-personnel land mines cause, but in November I want to completely withdraw from formal public life.”
Once she was done with her round of calls, Diana went down to the hair saloon by the hotel swimming pool to have her hair washed and blow-dried ahead of the scheduled evening dinner.
THE “TELL ME YES” RING IS DELIVERED
Since the main object of their Paris trip was to pick up the “Tell Me Yes” engagement ring Dodi had ordered in Monte Carlo a week earlier, Dodi decided to check on Repossi Jewellery, which was right within the Ritz prencincts, known as the Place Vendome. It could have taken less than a minute for Dodi to get to the store on foot but he decided to use a car to outsmart the paparazzi invasion. He was driven there by Trevor Rees-Jones, with Alexander Kez Wingfield and Claude Roulet following on foot, though he entered the shop alone.
The Repossi store had closed for the holiday season but Alberto Repossi, accompanied by his wife and brother-in-law, had decided to travel all the way from his home in Monaco and momentarily open it for the sake of the potentially highly lucrative Dodi transaction. Alberto, however, disappointed Dodi as the ring he had chosen was not the one he produced. The one he showed Dodi was pricier and perhaps more exquisite but Dodi was adamant that he wanted the exact one he had ordered as that was what Diana herself had picked. It was a ploy on the part of Repossi to make a real killing on the sale, his excuse to that effect being that Diana deserved a ring tha was well worthy of her social pedigree. With Dodi having expressed disaffection, Repossi rendered his apologies and assured Dodi he would make the right ring available shortly, whereupon Dodi repaired back to the hotel to await its delivery. But Dodi did insist nonetheless that the pricier ring be delivered too in case it appealed to Diana anyway.
Repossi delivered the two rings an hour later. They were collected by Roulet. On inspecting them, Dodi chose the very one he had seen in Monte Carlo, apparently at the insistence of Diana. There is a possibility that Diana, who was very much aware of her public image and was not comfortable with ostentatious displays of wealth, may have deliberately shown an interest in a less expensive engagement ring. It may have been a purely romantic as opposed to a prestigious choice for her.
The value of the ring, which was found on a wardrobe shelf in Dodi’s apartment after the crash, has been estimated to be between $20,000 and $250,000 as Repossi has always refused to be drawn into revealing how much Dodi paid for it. The sum, which enjoyed a 25 percent discount, was in truth paid for not by Dodi himself but by his father as was the usual practice.
Dodi was also shown Repossi’s sketches for a bracelet, a watch, and earrings which he proposed to create if Diana approved of them.
DIANA AND DODI GUSH OVER IMMINENT NUPTIALS
At about 7 pm, Dodi and Diana left the Ritz and headed for Dodi’s apartment at a place known as the Arc de Trompe. They went there to properly tog themselves out for the scheduled evening dinner. They spent two hours at the luxurious apartment. As usual, the ubiquitous paparazzi were patiently waiting for them there.
As they lingered in the apartment, Dodi beckoned over to his butler Rene Delorm and showed him the engagement ring. “Dodi came into my kitchen,” Delorm relates. “He looked into the hallway to check that Diana couldn’t hear and reached into his pocket and pulled out the box … He said, ‘Rene, I’m going to propose to the princess tonight. Make sure that we have champagne on ice when we come back from dinner’.” Rene described the ring as “a spectacular diamond encrusted ring, a massive emerald surrounded by a cluster of diamonds, set on a yellow and white gold band sitting in a small light-grey velvet box”.
Just before 9 pm, Dodi called the brother of his step-father, Hassan Yassen, who also was staying at the Ritz that night, and told him that he hoped to get married to Diana by the end of the year.
Later that same evening, both Dodi and Diana would talk to Mohamed Al Fayed, Dodi’s dad, and make known to him their pre-nuptial intentions. “They called me and said we’re coming back (to London) on Sunday (August 31) and on Monday (September 1) they are
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RAMADAN – The Blessed Month of Fasting
Ramadan is the fasting month for Muslims, where over one billion Muslims throughout the world fast from dawn to sunset, and pray additional prayers at night. It is a time for inner reflection, devotion to Allah, and self-control. It is the ninth month in the Islamic calendar. As you read this Muslims the world over have already begun fasting as the month of Ramadan has commenced (depending on the sighting of the new moon).
‘The month of Ramadan is that in which the Qur’an was revealed as guidance for people, in it are clear signs of guidance and Criterion, therefore whoever of you who witnesses this month, it is obligatory on him to fast it. But whoever is ill or traveling let him fast the same number of other days, God desires ease for you and not hardship, and He desires that you complete the ordained period and glorify God for His guidance to you, that you may be grateful”. Holy Qur’an (2 : 185)
Fasting during Ramadan is one of the five pillars upon which the structure of Islam is built. The other four are: the declaration of one’s belief in Allah’s oneness and in the message of Muhammad (PBUH); regular attendance to prayer; payment of zakaat (obligatory charity); and the pilgrimage to Mecca.
As explained in an earlier article, fasting includes total abstinence from eating, drinking, smoking, refraining from obscenity, avoiding getting into arguments and including abstaining from marital relations, from sunrise to sunset. While fasting may appear to some as difficult Muslims see it as an opportunity to get closer to their Lord, a chance to develop spiritually and at the same time the act of fasting builds character, discipline and self-restraint.
Just as our cars require servicing at regular intervals, so do Muslims consider Ramadan as a month in which the body and spirit undergoes as it were a ‘full service’. This ‘service’ includes heightened spiritual awareness both the mental and physical aspects and also the body undergoing a process of detoxification and some of the organs get to ‘rest’ through fasting.
Because of the intensive devotional activity fasting, Ramadan has a particularly high importance, derived from its very personal nature as an act of worship but there is nothing to stop anyone from privately violating Allah’s commandment of fasting if one chooses to do so by claiming to be fasting yet eating on the sly. This means that although fasting is obligatory, its observance is purely voluntary. If a person claims to be a Muslim, he is expected to fast in Ramadan.
The reward Allah gives for proper fasting is very generous. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) quotes Allah as saying: “All actions done by a human being are his own except fasting, which belongs to Me and I will reward it accordingly.” We are also told by the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) that the reward for proper fasting is admittance into heaven.
Fasting earns great reward when it is done in a ‘proper’ manner. This is because every Muslim is required to make his worship perfect. For example perfection of fasting can be achieved through restraint of one’s feelings and emotions. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said that when fasting, a person should not allow himself to be drawn into a quarrel or a slanging match. He teaches us: “On a day of fasting, let no one of you indulge in any obscenity, or enter into a slanging match. Should someone abuse or fight him, let him respond by saying: ‘I am fasting!’”
This high standard of self-restraint fits in well with fasting, which is considered as an act of self-discipline. Islam requires us to couple patience with voluntary abstention from indulgence in our physical desires. The purpose of fasting helps man to attain a high degree of sublimity, discipline and self-restraint. In other words, this standard CAN BE achieved by every Muslim who knows the purpose of fasting and strives to fulfill it.
Fasting has another special aspect. It makes all people share in the feelings of hunger and thirst. In normal circumstances, people with decent income may go from one year’s end to another without experiencing the pangs of hunger which a poor person may feel every day of his life. Such an experience helps to draw the rich one’s conscience nearer to needs of the poor. A Muslim is encouraged to be more charitable and learns to give generously for a good cause.
Fasting also has a universal or communal aspect to it. As Muslims throughout the world share in this blessed act of worship, their sense of unity is enhanced by the fact that every Muslim individual joins willingly in the fulfillment of this divine commandment. This is a unity of action and purpose, since they all fast in order to be better human beings. As a person restrains himself from the things he desires most, in the hope that he will earn Allah’s pleasure, self-discipline and sacrifice become part of his nature.
The month of Ramadan can aptly be described as a “season of worship.” Fasting is the main aspect of worship in this month, because people are more attentive to their prayers, read the Qur’an more frequently and also strive to improve on their inner and outer character. Thus, their devotion is more complete and they feel much happier in Ramadan because they feel themselves to be closer to their Creator.