title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 19 October 1976, the Battle of Aishiya took place, when a combined force of PLO and a Communist militia attacked Aishiya, an isolated Maronite village in a mostly Muslim area. The Artillery Corps of the Israel Defense Forces fired 24 shells (66 kilograms of TNT each) from US-made 175-millimeter field artillery units at the attackers, repelling their first attempt. However, the PLO and Communists returned at night, when low visibility made Israeli artillery far less effective. The Maronite population of the village fled. They returned in 1982.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In October 1976, Syria accepted the proposal of the Arab League summit in Riyadh. This gave Syria a mandate to keep 40,000 troops in Lebanon as the bulk of an Arab Deterrent Force charged with disentangling the combatants and restoring calm. Other Arab nations were also part of the ADF, but they lost interest relatively soon, and Syria was again left in sole control, now with the ADF as a diplomatic shield against international criticism. The Civil War was officially paused at this point, and an uneasy quiet settled over Beirut and most of the rest of Lebanon. In the south, however, the climate began to deteriorate as a consequence of the gradual return of PLO combatants, who had been required to vacate central Lebanon under the terms of the Riyadh Accords.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The nation was now effectively divided, with southern Lebanon and the western half of Beirut becoming bases for the PLO and Muslim-based militias, and the Christians in control of East Beirut and the Christian section of Mount Lebanon. The main confrontation line in divided Beirut was known as the Green Line.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In East Beirut, in 1976, Maronite leaders of the National Liberal Party (NLP), the Kataeb Party and the Lebanese Renewal Party joined in the Lebanese Front, a political counterpoint to the LNM. Their militias – the Tigers, Kataeb Regulatory Forces (KRF) and Guardians of the Cedars – entered a loose coalition known as the Lebanese Forces, to form a military wing for the Lebanese Front. From the very beginning, the Kataeb and its Regulatory Forces' militia, under the leadership of Bashir Gemayel, dominated the LF. In 1977–80, through absorbing or destroying smaller militias, he both consolidated control and strengthened the LF into the dominant Maronite force.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In March the same year, Lebanese National Movement leader Kamal Jumblatt was assassinated. The murder was widely blamed on the Syrian government. While Jumblatt's role as leader of the Druze Progressive Socialist Party was filled surprisingly smoothly by his son, Walid Jumblatt, the LNM disintegrated after his death. Although the anti-government pact of leftists, Shi'a, Sunni, Palestinians and Druze would stick together for some time more, their wildly divergent interests tore at opposition unity. Sensing the opportunity, Hafez al-Assad immediately began splitting up both the Maronite and Muslim coalitions in a game of divide and conquer.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The Hundred Days War was a sub-conflict within the Lebanese Civil War, which occurred in the Lebanese capital Beirut between February and April 1978.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The only political person who remained in East Beirut Achrafiyeh all the 100 days was the president Camille Chamoun, and refused to get out of the area. It was fought between the Maronite, and the Syrian troops of the Arab Deterrent Force (ADF). The Syrian troops shelled the Christian Beirut area of Achrafiyeh for 100 days. The conflict resulted in Syrian Army's expulsion from East Beirut, the end of Arab Deterrent Force's task in Lebanon and revealed the true intentions of the Syrians in Lebanon. The conflict resulted in 160 dead and 400 injured.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: PLO attacks from Lebanon into Israel in 1977 and 1978 escalated tensions between the countries. On 11 March 1978, eleven Fatah fighters landed on a beach in northern Israel and proceeded to hijack two buses full of passengers on the Haifa – Tel-Aviv road, shooting at passing vehicles in what became known as the Coastal Road massacre. They killed 37 and wounded 76 Israelis before being killed in a firefight with Israeli forces. Israel invaded Lebanon four days later in Operation Litani. The Israeli Army occupied most of the area south of the Litani River. The UN Security Council passed Resolution 425 calling for immediate Israeli withdrawal and creating the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), charged with attempting to establish peace.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Israeli forces withdrew later in 1978, but retained control of the southern region by managing a wide security zone along the border. These positions were held by the South Lebanon Army (SLA), a Christian-Shi'a militia under the leadership of Major Saad Haddad backed by Israel. The Israeli Prime Minister, Likud's Menachem Begin, compared the plight of the Christian minority in southern Lebanon (then about 5% of the population in SLA territory) to that of European Jews during World War II. The PLO routinely attacked Israel during the period of the cease-fire, with over 270 documented attacks. People in Galilee regularly had to leave their homes during these shellings. Documents captured in PLO headquarters after the invasion showed they had come from Lebanon. Arafat refused to condemn these attacks on the grounds that the cease-fire was only relevant to Lebanon.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Between June and August 1979 the IDF increased its artillery bombardments and air strikes on targets in Southern Lebanon resulting in the killing of around forty people and a mass exodus of civilians. On 27 June four Syrian planes were shot down over Southern Lebanon. One of them reportedly hit by Palestinian ground fire.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The Safra massacre, known as the "Day of the Long Knives", occurred in the coastal town Safra (north of Beirut) on 7 July 1980, as part of Bashir Gemayel's effort to consolidate all the Maronite fighters under his leadership in the Lebanese Forces. The Phalangist forces launched a surprise attack on the Tigers Militia, which claimed the lives of 83 people, most of whom were normal citizens and not from the militia.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The first six months of 1981 brought Lebanon some of the worst violence since 1976. In the South, there was an increase in clashes between the Antoine Haddad’s rebel militia and UNIFIL. This followed an agreement reached in Damascus between Lebanese President Élias Sarkis and United Nations officials on the deployment of Lebanese army soldiers into areas where UNIFIL forces where stationed. The agreement, which was reached in early March, was rejected by Haddad. On 16 March three Nigerian soldiers serving with UNIFIL were killed by artillery fire from Haddad’s forces.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Another factor was political activity in Israel ahead of elections in June which Prime Minister Menachem Begin and his Likud party were expected to lose. Begin publicly acknowledged that Israel had an alliance with Bashir Gemayel’s Phalange militia and would intervene if the Syrian Army attacked them. Defence Minister Rafael Eitan visited Jounieh on several occasions. In South Lebanon there were regular airstrikes around Nabatieh and Beaufort Castle. On the night of 9 April IDF commandos raided five different PLO positions in the South.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In Beirut sniper fire across the Green Line between East and West Beirut increased, climaxing in April with lengthy artillery exchanges. The main combatants were elements of the Lebanese Army and the Syrian ADF.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Across the mountains in Zahleh, the Christian town on the Western edge of the Beqaa Valley, the Phalangist militia had become dominant and were reinforcing outposts with artillery as well as opening a new road to the coast and their heartland. In early April clashes escalated around the town and the Syrian Army imposed a siege. There were also outbreaks of fighting in neighbouring Baalbek.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Meanwhile in the South, on 19 April, Haddad’s militia shelled Sidon, killing sixteen civilians. Some reports stated that the attack was in response to a request from Bashir Gemayel in order to relieve the Syrian pressure on the Phalangists in Zahleh. On 27 April Syrian troops launched an offensive against the Phalagists' mountain outposts. The following day the Israeli Air Force shot down two Syrian helicopters near Zahleh. Despite this intervention the Syrians were able to take control of the mountain road and tighten the siege of the town. In response to the Israeli action the Syrians moved antiaircraft Sam 6 missiles into the Northern Beqaa. In Israel the missiles became a political issue. On 27 May Israeli commandos attacked a PFLP-GC missile site near Damour, South of Beirut. Four Libyan technicians were killed. Two Syrian soldiers were also killed when their truck and a civilian car were destroyed.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Begin later revealed that the United States was informed in advance of the raid. In early July the Syrians ended the three month long siege of Zahleh. The Phalangists’ power in the town had been reduced but their alliance with Israel remained intact. The planned deployment of Government troops into the South was abandoned.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 17 July 1981, Israeli aircraft bombed multi-story apartment buildings in Beirut that contained offices of PLO associated groups. The Lebanese delegate to the United Nations Security Council claimed that 300 civilians had been killed and 800 wounded. The bombing led to worldwide condemnation, and a temporary embargo on the export of U.S. aircraft to Israel.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In August 1981, defense minister Ariel Sharon began to draw up plans to attack PLO military infrastructure in West Beirut, where PLO headquarters and command bunkers were located.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 3 June 1982, the Abu Nidal Organization, a splinter group of Fatah, attempted to assassinate Israeli ambassador Shlomo Argov in London. Israel carried out a retaliatory aerial attack on PLO and PFLP targets in West Beirut that led to over 100 casualties. The PLO responded by launching a counterattack from Lebanon with rockets and artillery, which constituted a clear violation of the ceasefire.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Meanwhile, on 5 June, the UN Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 508 calling for "all the parties to the conflict to cease immediately and simultaneously all military activities within Lebanon and across the Lebanese-Israeli border and no later than 0600 hours local time on Sunday, 6 June 1982".


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Israel launched Operation Peace for Galilee on 6 June 1982, attacking PLO bases in Lebanon. Israeli forces quickly drove into Lebanon, moving into East Beirut with the tacit support of Maronite leaders and militia. When the Israeli cabinet convened to authorize the invasion, Sharon described it as a plan to advance 40 kilometers into Lebanon, demolish PLO strongholds, and establish an expanded security zone that would put northern Israel out of range of PLO rockets. Israeli chief of staff Rafael Eitan and Sharon had already ordered the invading forces to head straight for Beirut, in accord with Sharon's plan from September 1981. The UN Security Council passed a further resolution on 6 June 1982, United Nations Security Council Resolution 509 demanding that Israel withdraw to the internationally recognized boundaries of Lebanon. On 8 June 1982, the United States vetoed a proposed resolution demanding that Israel withdraw.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: By 15 June 1982, Israeli units were entrenched outside Beirut. The United States called for PLO withdrawal from Lebanon, and Sharon began to order bombing raids of West Beirut, targeting some 16,000 PLO "fedayeen" who had retreated into fortified positions. Meanwhile, Arafat attempted through negotiations to salvage politically what was clearly a disaster for the PLO, an attempt which eventually succeeded once the multinational force arrived to evacuate the PLO.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 26 June, a UN Security Council resolution was proposed that "demands the immediate withdrawal of the Israeli forces engaged round Beirut, to a distance of 10 kilometers from the periphery of that city, as a first step towards the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon, and the simultaneous withdrawal of the Palestinian armed forces from Beirut, which shall retire to the existing camps;" the United States vetoed the resolution because it was "a transparent attempt to preserve the PLO as a viable political force," However, President Reagan made an impassioned plea to Prime Minister Begin to end the siege. Begin called back within minutes informing the President that he had given the order to end the attack.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Finally, amid escalating violence and civilian casualties, Philip Habib was once again sent to restore order, which he accomplished on 12 August on the heels of IDF's intensive, day-long bombardment of West Beirut. The Habib-negotiated truce called for the withdrawal of both Israeli and PLO elements, as well as a multinational force composed of U.S. Marines along with French and Italian units that would ensure the departure of the PLO and protect defenseless civilians.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The first troops of a multinational force landed in Beirut on 21 August 1982 to oversee the PLO withdrawal from Lebanon and U.S. mediation resulted in the evacuation of Syrian troops and PLO fighters from Beirut. The agreement also provided for the deployment of a multinational force composed of U.S. Marines along with French, Italian and British units. However, Israel reported that some 2,000 PLO militants were hiding in Palestinian refugee camps on the outskirts of Beirut.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Bachir Gemayel was elected president on 23 August. He was assassinated on 14 September by Habib Tanious Shartouni, affiliated to the Syrian Social Nationalist Party.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 16–18 September 1982, Lebanese Phalangists (allied with the Israeli Defense Force) killed between 460 and 3,500 Lebanese and Palestinian Shiite civilians in the Shatila refugee camp and the adjacent Sabra neighborhood of Beirut. The Israelis had ordered their Phalangist allies to clear out PLO fighters. Soldiers loyal to Phalangist leader Elie Hobeika began slaughtering civilians while Israeli forces blocked exits from Sabra and Shatila and illuminated the area with flares. IDF officials not only failed to act to stop the killings, but also prevented the escapees from fleeing the Phalangists and aided them later by lighting the camps during night at their request.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Ten days later, the Israeli government set up the Kahan Commission to investigate the circumstances of the Sabra and Shatila massacre. In 1983, the commission published its findings that then-Defense Minister Ariel Sharon was personally responsible for the massacre and should resign. Under pressure, Sharon resigned as defense minister but remained in the government as a minister without portfolio.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 17 May 1983, Lebanon's Amine Gemayel, Israel, and the United States signed an agreement on Israeli withdrawal conditioned on the departure of Syrian troops, reportedly after the US and Israel exerted severe pressure on Gemayel. The agreement stated that "the state of war between Israel and Lebanon has been terminated and no longer exists." Thus, the agreement in effect amounted to a peace agreement with Israel, and was additionally seen by many Lebanese Muslims as an attempt for Israel to gain a permanent hold on the Lebanese South. The 17 May Agreement was widely portrayed in the Arab world as an imposed surrender, and Amine Gemayel was accused of acting as a Quisling President; tensions in Lebanon hardened considerably. Syria strongly opposed the agreement and declined to discuss the withdrawal of its troops, effectively stalemating further progress.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In August 1983, Israel withdrew from the Chouf District (southeast of Beirut), thus removing the buffer between the Druze and the Maronite militias and triggering another round of brutal fighting, the Mountain War. Israel did not intervene. By September 1983, the Druze had gained control over most of the Chouf, and Israeli forces had pulled out from all but the southern security zone.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In September 1983, following the Israeli withdrawal and the ensuing battles between the Lebanese Army and opposing factions for control of key terrain during the Mountain War, the Reagan White House approved the use of naval gunfire to subdue Druze and Syrian positions in order to give support to and protect the Lebanese Army, which was under severe duress.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In 1982, the Islamic Republic of Iran established a base in the Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley in Lebanon. From that base, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) "founded, financed, trained and equipped Hezbollah to operate as a proxy army" for Iran. The IRGC organized Hezbollah by drafting members from Shi'a groups resisting the Israeli occupation and from the main Shi'a movement, Nabih Berri's Amal Movement. The group found inspiration for its revolutionary Islamism in the Iranian Revolution of 1979. With Iranian sponsorship and a large pool of disaffected Shi'a refugees from which to draw support, Hezbollah quickly grew into a strong, armed force.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 18 April 1983, a suicide bombing attack at the U.S. Embassy in West Beirut killed 63, beginning a series of attacks against U.S. and Western interests in Lebanon.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 23 October 1983, a devastating Iranian-sponsored suicide bombing targeted the barracks of U.S. and French forces in Beirut, killing 241 American and 58 French servicemen. On 18 January 1984, American University of Beirut President Malcolm H. Kerr was murdered.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Anti-U.S. attacks continued even after U.S. forces withdrew, including a bombing of the U.S. embassy annex in East Beirut on 20 September 1984, which killed 24, including 2 U.S. servicemen.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 1 July 1985, following the hijacking of a TWA aeroplane which eventually landed at Beirut airport, President Reagan issued a ban on all flights to and from Lebanon. The travel ban that was only lifted 10 years later in 1997.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The "February 6 uprising in West Beirut" or the "February 6 Intifada", was a battle where the parties of West Beirut, led by the Amal Movement, decisively defeated the Lebanese Army. The day started with the defection of many Muslim and Druze units to militias, which as a major blow to the government and caused the army to virtually collapse.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Following the uprising, the U.S. Marines' position in Lebanon became untenable, and they were looking ready to withdraw. Syria and Muslim groups had gained the upper hand, and stepped up pressure on Gemayel. On 5 March 1984, the Lebanese Government canceled the 17 May Agreement, and the Marines departed a few weeks later.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Between 1985 and 1989, sectarian conflict worsened as various efforts at national reconciliation failed. Heavy fighting took place in the War of the Camps of 1985–86 as a Syrian-backed coalition headed by the Amal militia sought to rout the PLO from their Lebanese strongholds. Many Palestinians died, and Sabra and Shatila and Bourj el-Barajneh refugee camps were largely destroyed.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 8 August 1985 a summit was held in Damascus with President Amin Gemayel, Prime Minister Rachid Karami and Syrian President Hafez Assad attempting to end the fighting between Christian and Druze militias. There followed a series of car bombs in Beirut which were seen as intended to thwart any agreement. On 14 August a car exploded in a Christian district control by the Lebanese Forces. On 17 August another exploded beside a supermarket, also in a district under LF control. 55 people were killed. Two days later 2 car bombs went off in a Druze and a Shi'ite district of Beirut. The following day another car bomb exploded in Tripoli. An unknown group, the "Black Brigades", claimed responsibility. The violence quickly escalated with extensive artillery exchanges. It is estimated that in two weeks 300 people were killed. On 15 September fighting broke out in Tripoli between Alawite and Sunni militias. 200,000 people fled the city. The harbour district was heavily bombarded. The arrival of the Syrian army a week later ended the violence which left 500 killed.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In late December 1985 an agreement was reached between the Syrians and their Lebanese allies to stabilise the situation in Lebanon. It was opposed by President Amin Gemayel and the Phalangist Party. On 15 January 1986 the pro-Syrian leader of the Lebanese Forces, Elie Hobeika, was overthrown. Shortly afterwards, 21 January, a car bomb killed 20 people in Furn ash-Shebbak, East Beirut. Over the next 10 days a further 5 smaller explosions occurred close to Phalagist targets.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In April 1986, following American airstrikes on Libya, three western hostages were executed and a new round of hostage taking started.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Major combat returned to Beirut in 1987, when Palestinians, leftists, and Druze fighters allied against Amal, eventually drawing further Syrian intervention. On 22 February 1987 eight thousand Syrian soldiers entered West Beirut to separate the rival militias. In the Shia district twenty-three men and four women were taken from a place of worship and shot and bayoneted to death. A crowd of fifty thousand attended their funeral with calls for revenge. Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa forbidding attacks on Syrian forces.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Violent confrontations flared up again in West Beirut in 1988 between Amal and Hezbollah. Hezbollah swiftly seized command of several Amal-held parts of the city, and for the first time emerged as a strong force in the capital.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Meanwhile, Prime Minister Rashid Karami, head of a government of national unity set up after the failed peace efforts of 1984, was assassinated on 1 June 1987. The assassination was accused on Samir Geagea in coordination with the Lebanese army, but the charge could not be proven. President Gemayel's term of office expired in September 1988. Before stepping down, he appointed another Maronite Christian, Lebanese Armed Forces Commanding General Michel Aoun, as acting Prime Minister, contravening the National Pact. Conflict in this period was also exacerbated by increasing Iraqi involvement, as Saddam Hussein searched for proxy battlefields for the Iran–Iraq War. To counter Iran's influence through Amal and Hezbollah, Iraq backed Maronite groups; Saddam Hussein helped Aoun and the Lebanese Forces led by Samir Geagea between 1988 and 1990.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Muslim groups rejected the violation of the National Pact and pledged support to Selim al-Hoss, a Sunni who had succeeded Karami. Lebanon was thus divided between a Maronite military government in East Beirut and a civilian government in West Beirut.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 8 March 1989 Aoun started the blockade of illegal ports of Muslim militias, and this touched off bloody exchanges of artillery fire that lasted for half a year. Six days later he launched what he termed a "war of liberation" against the Syrians and their Lebanese militia allies. As a result, Syrian pressure on his Lebanese Army and militia pockets in East Beirut grew. Still, Aoun persisted in the "war of liberation", denouncing the government of Hafez al-Assad and claiming that he fought for Lebanon's independence. While he seems to have had significant Maronite support for this, he was still perceived as a sectarian leader among others by the Muslim population, who distrusted his agenda. He was also plagued by the challenge to his legitimacy put forth by the Syrian-backed West Beirut government of Selim al-Hoss. Militarily, this war did not achieve its goal, and instead caused considerable damage to East Beirut and provoked massive emigration among the Christian population.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The Taif Agreement of 1989 marked the beginning of the end of the fighting. In January of that year, a committee appointed by the Arab League, chaired by Kuwait and including Saudi Arabia, Algeria, and Morocco, began to formulate solutions to the conflict. This led to a meeting of Lebanese parliamentarians in Ta'if, Saudi Arabia, where they agreed to the national reconciliation accord in October. The agreement provided a large role for Syria in Lebanese affairs. Returning to Lebanon, they ratified the agreement on 4 November and elected Rene Mouawad as President the following day. Military leader Michel Aoun in East Beirut refused to accept Mouawad, and denounced the Taif Agreement.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Mouawad was assassinated 17 days later in a car bombing in Beirut on 22 November as his motorcade returned from Lebanese independence day ceremonies. He was succeeded by Elias Hrawi (who remained in office until 1998). Aoun again refused to accept the election, and dissolved Parliament.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 16 January 1990, General Aoun ordered all Lebanese media to cease using terms like "President" or "Minister" to describe Hrawi and other participants in the Taif government. The Lebanese Forces (LF), led by Samir Geagea, which had grown into a rival power broker in the Christian East Beirut, responded by suspending all its broadcasts. Tension with the LF grew, as Aoun feared that the militia was planning to link up with the Hrawi administration.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 31 January 1990, Lebanese Army forces loyal to Aoun attacked the LF positions in East Beirut, after Aoun had stated that it was in the national interest for the government to "unify the weapons" (i.e. that the LF must submit to his authority as acting head of state). The fighting continued until 8th March when Aoun announced a unilateral ceasefire and called for negotiations. During this period East Beirut saw levels of destruction and casualties that it had not experienced during the entire 15 years of civil war. Aoun’s forces had made no significant inroads on the areas under Geagea’s control.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In August 1990, the Lebanese Parliament, which did not heed Aoun's order to dissolve, and the new president agreed on constitutional amendments embodying some of the political reforms envisioned at Taif. The National Assembly expanded to 128 seats and was for the first time divided equally between Christians and Muslims.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: On 13 October 1990, Syria launched a major operation involving its army, air force (for the first time since Zahle's siege in 1981) and Lebanese allies (mainly the Lebanese Army led by General Émile Lahoud) against Aoun's stronghold around the presidential palace, where hundreds of Aoun supporters were killed. It then cleared out the last Aounist pockets, cementing its hold on the capital. Aoun fled to the French Embassy in Beirut, and later into exile in Paris. He was not able to return until May 2005.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: William Harris claims that the Syrian operation could not take place until Syria had reached an agreement with the United States, that in exchange for support against the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein in the Gulf War, it would convince Israel not to attack Syrian aircraft approaching Beirut. Aoun claimed in 1990 that the United States "has sold Lebanon to Syria."


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In March 1991, parliament passed an amnesty law that pardoned all political crimes prior to its enactment. The amnesty was not extended to crimes perpetrated against foreign diplomats or certain crimes referred by the cabinet to the Higher Judicial Council. In May 1991, the militias (with the important exception of Hezbollah) were dissolved, and the Lebanese Armed Forces began to slowly rebuild themselves as Lebanon's only major non-sectarian institution.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Some violence still occurred. In late December 1991 a car bomb (estimated to carry 220 pounds of TNT) exploded in the Muslim neighborhood of Basta. At least thirty people were killed, and 120 wounded, including former Prime Minister Shafik Wazzan, who was riding in a bulletproof car.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: The post-war occupation of the country by Syrian Arab Republic was particularly politically disadvantageous to the Maronite population as most of their leadership was driven into exile, or had been assassinated or jailed.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In 2005, the assassination of Rafik Hariri sparked the Cedar Revolution leading to Syrian military withdrawal from the country. Contemporary political alliances in Lebanon reflect the alliances of the Civil War as well as contemporary geopolitics. The March 14 Alliance brings together Maronite-dominated parties (Lebanese Forces, Kataeb, National Liberal Party, National Bloc, Independence Movement) and Sunni-dominated parties (Future Movement, Islamic Group) whereas the March 8 Alliance is led by the Shia-dominated Hezbollah and Amal parties, as well as assorted Maronite- and Sunni-dominated parties, the SSNP, Ba'athist and Nasserist parties. The Syrian civil war is also having a significant impact on contemporary political life.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Since the end of the war, the Lebanese have conducted several elections, most of the militias have been weakened or disbanded, and the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) have extended central government authority over about two-thirds of the country. Following the cease-fire which ended 12 July 2006 Israeli-Lebanese conflict, the army has for the first time in over three decades moved to occupy and control the southern areas of Lebanon.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In all, it is estimated that around 150,000 people were killed, and another 100,000 permanently handicapped by injuries. In 1989 AP reported 150,000 dead over fourteen and a half years. Reuters gave a figure of 140,000. These very high figures (200 killed/week for fourteen years) contrast with totals from official figures of 35-40,000 dead.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Approximately 900,000 people, representing one-fifth of the pre-war population, were displaced from their homes. Perhaps a quarter of a million emigrated permanently.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Thousands of land mines remain buried in the previously contested areas. Some Western hostages kidnapped during the mid-1980s were held until June 1992. Lebanese victims of kidnapping and wartime "disappeared" number in the tens of thousands.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: In the 15 years of strife, there were at least 3,641 car bombs, which left 4,386 people dead and thousands more injured.


title: Lebanese Civil War

text: Lebanonization is a pejorative political term meaning the process of a country degenerating into a civil war or failed state in reference to the Civil war, first used by Israeli president Shimon Peres in 1983, referring to Israeli minimization of its presence in Lebanon following the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Kelly Ann Hu (born February 13, 1968 ) is an American actress, voice artist, former fashion model and beauty queen who was Miss Teen USA 1985 and Miss Hawaii USA 1993. Hu starred as Dr. Rae Chang on the American television soap opera "Sunset Beach" and as Michelle Chan on the American television police drama series "Nash Bridges". She has starred in numerous films including "The Scorpion King" (2002) as Cassandra, "Cradle 2 the Grave" (2003) as Sona, "X2" as Yuriko Oyama / Lady Deathstrike (2003), "The Tournament" (2009) as Lai Lai Zhen, and "White Frog" (2012).


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu has had recurring roles as Pearl on The CW series "The Vampire Diaries", as China White on the CW series "Arrow", Hamato Miwa / Karai on "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", Stacy Hirano on the Disney Channel animated series "Phineas and Ferb", and as Adira in "Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure".


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, the daughter of Juanita Perez, an engineering drafter from Honolulu, and Herbert Hu, a salesman and exotic bird breeder. Her parents divorced during Hu's childhood. Her brother, Glenn, is a Resource Manager in the United States Army. She is of Chinese, English, and Hawaiian descent. She attended Maemae Elementary School and Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu, Hawaii.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu has held a lifelong interest in singing and dancing and has also been interested in martial arts since her early childhood. Hu's cousin was a successful model in Japan, and Hu decided to follow her example. Kelly Hu won the title of Miss Hawaii Teen USA and competed in the Miss Teen USA 1985 pageant, becoming the Miss Teen USA pageant's third titleholder in history and its first Asian American winner. Hu has mentioned in interviews that her mother had told her America was not ready for an Asian as such a prominent role model. She discovered after winning that she was prohibited from appearing in non-contest related activities for the year of her reign, though this rule was changed in later years.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu modeled in Japan and Italy, and became well known in the latter as the star of a series of television advertisements for Philadelphia brand cream cheese, playing a young Japanese college student named Kaori.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu won the title of Miss Hawaii USA in 1993, becoming the first former Miss Teen USA to win a Miss USA state title. In the 1993 Miss USA pageant, held in Wichita, Kansas, Hu entered the top ten in second place, after winning the preliminary interview competition and placing second and third, respectively, in swimsuit and evening gown. She then made the top six, ranked second, winning the top ten evening gown competition and placing second in swimsuit. She was eliminated in fourth place after the judges' questions, just 2/100 of a point from the final three.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu moved to Los Angeles and began her acting career in 1987, with a guest starring role as Mike Seaver's Hawaiian love interest on the sitcom "Growing Pains". Hu followed this with appearances on various television series, including "Night Court", "Tour of Duty", "21 Jump Street" and "Melrose Place". Her first film role was in "". In 1995, Hu starred as an undercover police officer in the film "No Way Back". Hu was cast as Dr. Rae Chang on "Sunset Beach" for six months in 1997. Afterwards, she was cast as police officers Michelle Chan in the television series "Nash Bridges", and Pei Pei "Grace" Chen on "Martial Law". Her subsequent film appearances include "The Scorpion King" (2002) and "Cradle 2 the Grave" (2003). In "X2" (2003), she appeared as Yuriko Oyama/Deathstrike, William Stryker's controlled partner.


title: Kelly Hu

text: She was Agent Mia Chen on the last three episodes of the television series "Threat Matrix" in 2004. She also starred in 2005's "Underclassman" alongside Nick Cannon and in 2006's "Americanese", "Undoing" and "Devil's Den". During the first quarter of 2007, she completed filming the film "Stilletto", followed by "Farmhouse".


title: Kelly Hu

text: In January 2007, Hu began appearing in a full-time role on the television series "In Case of Emergency". She played Kelly Lee, a Korean American woman who accidentally reunites with her high school classmates and realizes none of them grew up according to their high school plans. The show did not have a successful run, being cancelled after airing 12 episodes and leaving its season finale un-aired. The same year she appeared in films, "The Air I Breathe" and "Shanghai Kiss." By the same year, Hu recurringly voiced Stacy Hirano in the animated series "Phineas and Ferb" until 2015 when the show ended. In 2020, She would reprise her role in "".


title: Kelly Hu

text: In 2009, she appeared in the film "The Tournament" as Lai-Lai Zhen. In April 2009, Hu developed the character JIA for "". She was the first guest actor to cross over between the television series, "" and "NCIS", playing Lee Wuan Kai in a two-episode arc within both series. In 2010 and 2011, Hu guest-starred as a vampire named Pearl on the CW television series, "The Vampire Diaries".


title: Kelly Hu

text: In 2010, Hu began a recurring role on the CBS television series "Hawaii Five-0". In 2012, Hu was cast in the role of Karai in the animated series "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles". She commented: "It wouldn't quite be the first time I played a ninja, I think. Yeah, I don't know why people think I'm dangerous, but for some reason, I keep getting these roles for the ninja, assassin, bodyguard, bad-girl type." In 2013, she joined the cast of the series "Warehouse 13" as Abigail Cho, the new owner of the Warehouse-connected B&B.


title: Kelly Hu

text: She also provided voice talents in video games including "" as Visas Marr, the Sith woman who joins the Jedi Exile's party, and "" as Lady Shiva, among the eight assassins hired by Black Mask to kill Batman (a role she reprised in the 2021 animated film ""). In a personal first, she lent both her face and voice to the in-game character Khai Minh Dao in "Battlefield Hardline", who partnered alongside the protagonist in roughly half of the game levels.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu has been featured twice in "Maxim" magazine (May 2002 and May 2005). In 2015, she became the face of Viagra, appearing in the commercials.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu is an avid poker fan and has frequently taken part in competitions such as the World Series of Poker and World Poker Tour, including the WPT Celebrity Charity match on March 3, 2008. She was part of HollywoodPoker.com's "Celebrity Poker Night" on May 30, 2006, and in July 2006 placed in the top 200 in the World Series of Poker Ladies Tournament, besting nearly 1,000 other competitors.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu has supported the Center for Asian Americans United for Self Empowerment and in 2004 starred in a public service announcement for them titled "The Least Likely" to encourage young Asian Americans to register and vote.


title: Kelly Hu

text: In 2007, Hu was a driver in the Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race a national fund-raising program supporting children's hospitals throughout the United States. In April 2011, Hu was a celebrity host for Save the Children's "Caring for Japan's Keiki" a benefit for Japanese earthquake and tsunami victims. Also in 2011 she hosted a Celebrity Poker Tournament in support for Best Buddies International, a charity to which she has given support for several years.


title: Kelly Hu

text: In January 2008, Hu participated in a video for Barack Obama produced by will.i.am called "Yes We Can". She campaigned for Obama in Hawaii in the run-up to the February 19, 2008, Democratic caucuses. In February 2008, Hu also appeared in another viral video in support of Obama, "Sí Se Puede Cambiar", written and performed by Andrés Useche, directed by Eric Byler. She was the emcee of the Asian American Action Fund's annual fundraiser on June 10, 2008. She was present at the DNC national convention in 2008.


title: Kelly Hu

text: Hu has been active to protect the Hawaiian ecology. She supported Reef Check Hawaii by running in and successfully completing the Honolulu Marathon to raise awareness for the organization. She also gave support to the Shark Fin Ban which took effect in Hawaii July 2010. This made it illegal to possess, sell, or distribute shark fins in Hawaii.


title: Septuagint

text: The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the ; often abbreviated "70"; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond those contained in the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible as canonically used in the tradition of mainstream Rabbinical Judaism. The additional books were composed in Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic, but in most cases, only the Greek version has survived to the present. It is the oldest and most important complete translation of the Hebrew Bible made by the Jews. Some targums translating or paraphrasing the Bible into Aramaic were also made around the same time.


title: Septuagint

text: The first five books of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Torah or the Pentateuch, were translated in the mid-3rd century BCE. The remaining translations are presumably from the 2nd century BCE.


title: Septuagint

text: The full title () derives from the story recorded in the Letter of Aristeas that the Hebrew Torah was translated into Greek at the request of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285–247 BCE) by 70 Jewish scholars or, according to later tradition, 72: six scholars from each of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, who independently produced identical translations. The miraculous character of the Aristeas legend might indicate the esteem in which the translation was held at the time; Greek translations of Hebrew scriptures were in circulation among the Alexandrian Jews. Egyptian papyri from the period have led most scholars to view as probable Aristeas's dating of the translation of the Pentateuch to the third century BCE. Whatever share the Ptolemaic court may have had in the translation, it satisfied a need felt by the Jewish community, in whom the knowledge of Hebrew was waning. However, the authenticity of Aristeas' letter has been questioned; "[i]t was the English monk Humphrey Hody (1684) who was able to show convincingly that the letter was not by a contemporary of Philadelphus."


title: Septuagint

text: Greek scriptures were in wide use during the Second Temple period, because few people could read Hebrew at that time. The text of the Greek Old Testament is quoted more often than the original Hebrew Bible text in the Greek New Testament (particularly the Pauline epistles) by the Apostolic Fathers, and later by the Greek Church Fathers. Modern critical editions of the Greek Old Testament are based on the Codices Alexandrinus, Sinaiticus, and Vaticanus. These fourth- and fifth-century Greek Old Testament manuscripts have different lengths. The Codex Alexandrinus, for example, contains all four books of the Maccabees; the Codex Sinaiticus contains 1 and 4 Maccabees, and the Codex Vaticanus contains none of the four books.


title: Septuagint

text: "Septuagint" is derived from the Latin phrase "versio septuaginta interpretum" ("translation of the seventy interpreters"), which was derived from the . It was not until the time of Augustine of Hippo (354–430 CE) that the Greek translation of the Jewish scriptures was called by the Latin term "Septuaginta". The Roman numeral LXX (seventy) is commonly used as an abbreviation, in addition to formula_1 or "G".


title: Septuagint

text: According to the Letter of Aristeas, seventy-two Jewish scholars were asked by Ptolemy II Philadelphus, the Greek Pharaoh of Egypt, to translate the Torah from Biblical Hebrew to Greek for inclusion in the Library of Alexandria. This narrative is found in the pseudepigraphic Letter of Aristeas to his brother Philocrates, and is repeated by Philo of Alexandria, Josephus (in "Antiquities of the Jews"), and by later sources (including Augustine of Hippo). It is also found in the Tractate Megillah of the Babylonian Talmud:


title: Septuagint

text: Philo of Alexandria writes that the number of scholars was chosen by selecting six scholars from each of the twelve tribes of Israel. Caution is needed here regarding the accuracy of this statement by Philo of Alexandria, as it implies that the twelve tribes were still in existence during King Ptolemy's reign, and that the Ten Lost Tribes of the twelve tribes had not been forcibly resettled by Assyria almost 500 years previously. According to later rabbinic tradition (which considered the Greek translation as a distortion of sacred text and unsuitable for use in the synagogue), the Septuagint was given to Ptolemy two days before the annual Tenth of Tevet fast.


title: Septuagint

text: According to Aristobulus of Alexandria's fragment 3, portion of the Law were translated from Hebrew into Greek long before the well-known Septuagint version. He stated that Plato and Pythagoras knew the Jewish Law and borrowed from it.


title: Septuagint

text: The 3rd century BCE is supported for the Torah translation by a number of factors, including its Greek being representative of early Koine Greek, citations beginning as early as the 2nd century BCE, and early manuscripts datable to the 2nd century. After the Torah, other books were translated over the next two to three centuries. It is unclear which was translated when, or where; some may have been translated twice (into different versions), and then revised. The quality and style of the translators varied considerably from book to book, from a literal translation to paraphrasing to an interpretative style.


title: Septuagint

text: The translation process of the Septuagint and from the Septuagint into other versions can be divided into several stages: the Greek text was produced within the social environment of Hellenistic Judaism, and completed by 132 BCE. With the spread of Early Christianity, this Septuagint in turn was rendered into Latin in a variety of versions and the latter, collectively known as the "Vetus Latina", were also referred to as the Septuagint initially in Alexandria but elsewhere as well. The Septuagint also formed the basis for the Slavonic, Syriac, Old Armenian, Old Georgian, and Coptic versions of the Christian Old Testament.


title: Septuagint

text: The Septuagint is written in Koine Greek. Some sections contain Semiticisms, which are idioms and phrases based on Semitic languages such as Hebrew and Aramaic. Other books, such as Daniel and Proverbs, have a stronger Greek influence.


title: Septuagint

text: The Septuagint may also clarify pronunciation of pre-Masoretic Hebrew; many proper nouns are spelled with Greek vowels in the translation, but contemporary Hebrew texts lacked vowel pointing. However, it is unlikely that all Biblical Hebrew sounds had precise Greek equivalents.


title: Septuagint

text: As the translation progressed, the canon of the Greek Bible expanded. The Hebrew Bible, also called the Tanakh, has three parts: the Torah "Law", the Nevi'im "Prophets", and the Ketuvim "Writings". The Septuagint has four: law, history, poetry, and prophets. The books of the Apocrypha were inserted at appropriate locations.


title: Septuagint

text: Extant copies of the Septuagint, which date from the 4th century CE, contain books and additions not present in the Hebrew Bible as established in the Jewish canon and are not uniform in their contents. According to some scholars, there is no evidence that the Septuagint included these additional books. These copies of the Septuagint include books known as "anagignoskomena" in Greek and in English as deuterocanon (derived from the Greek words for "second canon"), books not included in the Jewish canon.


title: Septuagint

text: These books are estimated to have been written between 200 BCE and 50 CE. Among them are the first two books of Maccabees; Tobit; Judith; the Wisdom of Solomon; Sirach; Baruch (including the Letter of Jeremiah), and additions to Esther and Daniel. The Septuagint version of some books, such as Daniel and Esther, are longer than those in the Masoretic Text, which were affirmed as canonical by the rabbis. The Septuagint Book of Jeremiah is shorter than the Masoretic Text. The Psalms of Solomon, 3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, the Letter of Jeremiah, the Book of Odes, the Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151 are included in some copies of the Septuagint.


title: Septuagint

text: Several reasons have been given for the rejection of the Septuagint as scriptural by mainstream rabbinic Judaism since late antiquity. Differences between the Hebrew and the Greek were found. The Hebrew source texts in some cases (particularly the Book of Daniel) used for the Septuagint differed from the Masoretic Text. The rabbis also wanted to distinguish their tradition from the emerging tradition of Christianity, which frequently used the Septuagint. As a result of these teachings, other translations of the Torah into Koine Greek by early Jewish rabbis have survived only as rare fragments.


title: Septuagint

text: The Septuagint became synonymous with the Greek Old Testament, a Christian canon incorporating the books of the Hebrew canon with additional texts. Although the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church include most of the books in the Septuagint in their canons, Protestant churches usually do not. After the Reformation, many Protestant Bibles began to follow the Jewish canon and exclude the additional texts (which came to be called the Apocrypha) as noncanonical. The Apocrypha are included under a separate heading in the King James Version of the Bible.


title: Septuagint

text: All the books in Western Old Testament biblical canons are found in the Septuagint, although the order does not always coincide with the Western book order. The Septuagint order is evident in the earliest Christian Bibles, which were written during the fourth century.


title: Septuagint

text: Some books which are set apart in the Masoretic Text are grouped together. The Books of Samuel and the Books of Kings are one four-part book entitled Βασιλειῶν (Of Reigns) in the Septuagint. The Books of Chronicles, known collectively as Παραλειπομένων (Of Things Left Out) supplement Reigns. The Septuagint organizes the minor prophets in its twelve-part Book of Twelve.


title: Septuagint

text: Some ancient scriptures are found in the Septuagint, but not in the Hebrew Bible. The additional books are Tobit; Judith; the Wisdom of Solomon; Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach; Baruch and the Letter of Jeremiah, which became chapter six of Baruch in the Vulgate; additions to Daniel (The Prayer of Azarias, the Song of the Three Children, Susanna, and Bel and the Dragon); additions to Esther; 1 Maccabees; 2 Maccabees; 3 Maccabees; 4 Maccabees; 1 Esdras; Odes (including the Prayer of Manasseh); the Psalms of Solomon, and Psalm 151.


title: Septuagint

text: Fragments of deuterocanonical books in Hebrew are among the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran. Sirach, whose text in Hebrew was already known from the Cairo Geniza, has been found in two scrolls (2QSir or 2Q18, 11QPs_a or 11Q5) in Hebrew. Another Hebrew scroll of Sirach has been found in Masada (MasSir). Five fragments from the Book of Tobit have been found in Qumran: four written in Aramaic and one written in Hebrew (papyri 4Q, nos. 196-200). Psalm 151 appears with a number of canonical and non-canonical psalms in the Dead Sea scroll 11QPs(a) (also known as 11Q5), a first-century-CE scroll discovered in 1956. The scroll contains two short Hebrew psalms, which scholars agree were the basis for Psalm 151. The canonical acceptance of these books varies by Christian tradition.


title: Septuagint

text: The Book of Daniel is preserved in the 12-chapter Masoretic Text and in two longer Greek versions, the original Septuagint version, c. 100 BCE, and the later Theodotion version from c. 2nd century CE. Both Greek texts contain three additions to Daniel: The Prayer of Azariah and Song of the Three Holy Children; the story of Susannah and the Elders; and the story of Bel and the Dragon. Theodotion is much closer to the Masoretic Text and became so popular that it replaced the original Septuagint version in all but two manuscripts of the Septuagint itself. The Greek additions were apparently never part of the Hebrew text. Several Old Greek texts of the Book of Daniel have been discovered, and the original form of the book is being reconstructed.


title: Septuagint

text: It is unclear to what extent Alexandrian Jews accepted the authority of the Septuagint. Manuscripts of the Septuagint have been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and were thought to have been in use among various Jewish sects at the time.


title: Septuagint

text: Several factors led most Jews to abandon the Septuagint around the second century CE. The earliest gentile Christians used the Septuagint out of necessity, since it was the only Greek version of the Bible and most (if not all) of these early non-Jewish Christians could not read Hebrew. The association of the Septuagint with a rival religion may have made it suspect in the eyes of the newer generation of Jews and Jewish scholars. Jews instead used Hebrew or Aramaic Targum manuscripts later compiled by the Masoretes and authoritative Aramaic translations, such as those of Onkelos and Rabbi Yonathan ben Uziel.


title: Septuagint

text: Perhaps most significant for the Septuagint, as distinct from other Greek versions, was that the Septuagint began to lose Jewish sanction after differences between it and contemporary Hebrew scriptures were discovered. Even Greek-speaking Jews tended to prefer other Jewish versions in Greek (such as the translation by Aquila), which seemed to be more concordant with contemporary Hebrew texts.


title: Septuagint

text: The Early Christian church used the Greek texts, since Greek was a "lingua franca" of the Roman Empire at the time and the language of the Greco-Roman Church, while Aramaic was the language of Syriac Christianity.


title: Septuagint

text: The relationship between the apostolic use of the Septuagint and the Hebrew texts is complicated. Although the Septuagint seems to have been a major source for the Apostles, it is not the only one. St. Jerome offered, for example, and , , , and as examples found in Hebrew texts but not in the Septuagint. Matthew 2:23 is not present in current Masoretic tradition either; according to Jerome, however, it was in . The New Testament writers freely used the Greek translation when citing the Jewish scriptures (or quoting Jesus doing so), implying that Jesus, his apostles, and their followers considered it reliable.


title: Septuagint

text: In the early Christian Church, the presumption that the Septuagint was translated by Jews before the time of Christ and that it lends itself more to a Christological interpretation than 2nd-century Hebrew texts in certain places was taken as evidence that "Jews" had changed the Hebrew text in a way that made it less Christological. Irenaeus writes about that the Septuagint clearly identifies a "virgin" (Greek "παρθένος"; "bethulah" in Hebrew) who would conceive. The word "almah" in the Hebrew text was, according to Irenaeus, interpreted by Theodotion and Aquila (Jewish converts), as a "young woman" who would conceive. Again according to Irenaeus, the Ebionites used this to claim that Joseph was the biological father of Jesus. To him that was heresy facilitated by late anti-Christian alterations of the scripture in Hebrew, as evident by the older, pre-Christian Septuagint.


title: Septuagint

text: Jerome broke with church tradition, translating most of the Old Testament of his Vulgate from Hebrew rather than Greek. His choice was sharply criticized by Augustine, his contemporary. Although Jerome argued for the superiority of the Hebrew texts in correcting the Septuagint on philological and theological grounds, because he was accused of heresy he also acknowledged the Septuagint texts. Acceptance of Jerome's version increased, and it displaced the Septuagint's Old Latin translations.


title: Septuagint

text: The Eastern Orthodox Church prefers to use the Septuagint as the basis for translating the Old Testament into other languages, and uses the untranslated Septuagint where Greek is the liturgical language. Critical translations of the Old Testament which use the Masoretic Text as their basis consult the Septuagint and other versions to reconstruct the meaning of the Hebrew text when it is unclear, corrupted, or ambiguous. According to the New Jerusalem Bible foreword, "Only when this (the Masoretic Text) presents insuperable difficulties have emendations or other versions, such as the [...] LXX, been used." The translator's preface to the New International Version reads, "The translators also consulted the more important early versions (including) the Septuagint [...] Readings from these versions were occasionally followed where the MT seemed doubtful"


title: Septuagint

text: Modern scholarship holds that the Septuagint was written from the 3rd through the 1st centuries BCE, but nearly all attempts at dating specific books (except for the Pentateuch, early- to mid-3rd century BCE) are tentative. Later Jewish revisions and recensions of the Greek against the Hebrew are well-attested. The best-known are Aquila (128 CE), Symmachus, and Theodotion. These three, to varying degrees, are more-literal renderings of their contemporary Hebrew scriptures compared to the Old Greek (the original Septuagint). Modern scholars consider one (or more) of the three to be new Greek versions of the Hebrew Bible.


title: Septuagint

text: Although much of Origen's "Hexapla" (a six-version critical edition of the Hebrew Bible) is lost, several compilations of fragments are available. Origen kept a column for the Old Greek (the Septuagint), which included readings from all the Greek versions in a critical apparatus with diacritical marks indicating to which version each line (Gr. στίχος) belonged. Perhaps the "Hexapla" was never copied in its entirety, but Origen's combined text was copied frequently (eventually without the editing marks) and the older uncombined text of the Septuagint was neglected. The combined text was the first major Christian recension of the Septuagint, often called the "Hexaplar recension". Two other major recensions were identified in the century following Origen by Jerome, who attributed these to Lucian (the Lucianic, or Antiochene, recension) and Hesychius (the Hesychian, or Alexandrian, recension).


title: Septuagint

text: The oldest manuscripts of the Septuagint include 2nd-century-BCE fragments of Leviticus and Deuteronomy (Rahlfs nos. 801, 819, and 957) and 1st-century-BCE fragments of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and the Twelve Minor Prophets (Alfred Rahlfs nos. 802, 803, 805, 848, 942, and 943). Relatively-complete manuscripts of the Septuagint postdate the Hexaplar recension, and include the fourth-century-CE Codex Vaticanus and the fifth-century Codex Alexandrinus. These are the oldest-surviving nearly-complete manuscripts of the Old Testament in any language; the oldest extant complete Hebrew texts date to about 600 years later, from the first half of the 10th century. The 4th-century Codex Sinaiticus also partially survives, with many Old Testament texts. The Jewish (and, later, Christian) revisions and recensions are largely responsible for the divergence of the codices. The Codex Marchalianus is another notable manuscript.


title: Septuagint

text: The text of the Septuagint is generally close to that of the Masoretes and Vulgate. is identical in the Septuagint, Vulgate and the Masoretic Text, and to the end of the chapter is the same. There is only one noticeable difference in that chapter, at 4:7:


title: Septuagint

text: The Biblical manuscripts found in Qumran, commonly known as the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS), have prompted comparisons of the texts associated with the Hebrew Bible (including the Septuagint). Emanuel Tov, editor of the translated scrolls, identifies five broad variants of DSS texts:


title: Septuagint

text: The textual sources present a variety of readings; Bastiaan Van Elderen compares three variations of Deuteronomy 32:43, the Song of Moses:


title: Septuagint

text: One of the main challenges, faced by translators during their work, emanated from the need to implement appropriate Greek forms for various onomastic terms, used in the Hebrew Bible. Most onomastic terms (toponyms, anthroponyms) of the Hebrew Bible were rendered by corresponding Greek terms that were similar in form and sounding, with some notable exceptions.


title: Septuagint

text: One of those exceptions was related to a specific group of onomastic terms for the region of Aram and ancient Arameans. Influenced by Greek onomastic terminology, translators decided to adopt Greek custom of using "Syrian" labels as designations for Arameans, their lands and language, thus abandoning endonymic (native) terms, that were used in the Hebrew Bible. In the Greek translation, the region of Aram was commonly labeled as "Syria", while Arameans were labeled as "Syrians". Such adoption and implementation of terms that were foreign (exonymic) had far-reaching influence on later terminology related to Arameans and their lands, since the same terminology was reflected in later Latin and other translations of the Septuagint, including the English translation.


title: Septuagint

text: Reflecting on those problems, American orientalist Robert W. Rogers (d. 1930) noted in 1921: "it is most unfortunate that Syria and Syrians ever came into the English versions. It should always be Aram and the Aramaeans".


title: Septuagint

text: The first English translation (which excluded the apocrypha) was Charles Thomson's in 1808, which was revised and enlarged by C. A. Muses in 1954 and published by the Falcon's Wing Press.


title: Septuagint

text: The Septuagint with Apocrypha: Greek and English was translated by Lancelot Brenton in 1854. It is the traditional translation and most of the time since its publication it has been the only one readily available, and it has continually been in print. The translation, based on the Codex Vaticanus, contains the Greek and English texts in parallel columns. It has an average of four footnoted, transliterated words per page, abbreviated "Alex" and "GK".


title: Septuagint

text: "The Complete Apostles' Bible" (translated by Paul W. Esposito) was published in 2007. Using the Masoretic Text in the 23rd Psalm (and possibly elsewhere), it omits the apocrypha.


title: Septuagint

text: A New English Translation of the Septuagint and the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included Under that Title (NETS), an academic translation based on the New Revised Standard version (in turn based on the Masoretic Text) was published by the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies (IOSCS) in October 2007.


title: Septuagint

text: The "Apostolic Bible Polyglot," published in 2003, features a Greek-English interlinear Septuagint. It includes the Greek books of the Hebrew canon (without the apocrypha) and the Greek New Testament; the whole Bible is numerically coded to a new version of the Strong numbering system created to add words not present in the original numbering by Strong. The edition is set in monotonic orthography. The version includes a Bible concordance and index.


title: Septuagint

text: The "Orthodox Study Bible", published in early 2008, features a new translation of the Septuagint based on the Alfred Rahlfs' edition of the Greek text. Two additional major sources have been added: the 1851 Brenton translation and the New King James Version text in places where the translation matches the Hebrew Masoretic text. This edition includes the NKJV New Testament and extensive commentary from an Eastern Orthodox perspective.


title: Septuagint

text: "Brenton's Septuagint, Restored Names Version" (SRNV) has been published in two volumes. The Hebrew-names restoration, based on the Westminster Leningrad Codex, focuses on the restoration of the Divine Name and has extensive Hebrew and Greek footnotes.


title: Septuagint

text: The "Eastern Orthodox Bible" would have featured an extensive revision and correction of Brenton's translation (which was primarily based on the Codex Vaticanus). With modern language and syntax, it would have had extensive introductory material and footnotes with significant inter-LXX and LXX/MT variants, before being cancelled.


title: Septuagint

text: "The Holy Orthodox Bible" by Peter A. Papoutsis and "The Old Testament According to the Seventy" by Michael Asser are based on the Greek Septuagint text published by the Apostoliki Diakonia of the Church of Greece.


title: Septuagint

text: In 2012, Lexham Press published the "Lexham English Septuagint" (LES), providing a literal, readable, and transparent English edition of the Septuagint for modern readers. In 2019, Lexham Press published the "Lexham English Septuagint," Second Edition (LES2), making more of an effort than the first to focus on the text as received rather than as produced. Because this approach shifts the point of reference from a diverse group to a single implied reader, the new LES exhibits more consistency than the first edition. "The Lexham English Septuagint (LES), then, is the only contemporary English translation of the LXX that has been made directly from the Greek."


title: Septuagint

text: The International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies (IOSCS), a non-profit learned society, promotes international research into and study of the Septuagint and related texts. The society declared 8 February 2006 International Septuagint Day, a day to promote the work on campuses and in communities. The IOSCS publishes the "Journal of Septuagint and Cognate Studies".


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Wilhelm Bodewin Johann Gustav Keitel (; 22 September 188216 October 1946) was a German field marshal and war criminal who held office as chief of the "Oberkommando der Wehrmacht" (OKW), the high command of Nazi Germany's Armed Forces, during the Second World War. In that capacity, Keitel signed a number of criminal orders and directives that led to numerous war crimes.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Keitel's rise to the Wehrmacht high command began with his appointment as the head of the Armed Forces Office at the Reich Ministry of War in 1935. Having taken command of the Wehrmacht in 1938 Hitler replaced the ministry with the OKW and Keitel became its chief. He was reviled among his military colleagues as Hitler's habitual "yes-man".


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: After the war, Keitel was indicted by the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg as one of the "major war criminals". He was found guilty on all counts of the indictment: crimes against humanity, crimes against peace, criminal conspiracy, and war crimes. He was sentenced to death and executed by hanging in 1946.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Wilhelm Keitel was born in the village of Helmscherode near Gandersheim in the Duchy of Brunswick, Germany. He was the eldest son of Carl Keitel (1854–1934), a middle-class landowner, and his wife Apollonia Vissering (1855–1888). At the beginning he wanted to take over his family's estates after completing his education at a gymnasium. This plan failed as his father did not want to retire. Instead, he embarked on a military career in 1901, becoming an officer cadet of the Prussian Army. As a commoner, he did not join the cavalry, but a field artillery regiment in Wolfenbüttel, serving as adjutant from 1908. On 18 April 1909, Keitel married Lisa Fontaine, a wealthy landowner's daughter at Wülfel near Hanover.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: During World War I, Keitel served on the Western Front and took part in the fighting in Flanders, where he was severely wounded. After being promoted to captain, Keitel was posted to the staff of an infantry division in 1915. After the war, Keitel was retained in the newly created "Reichswehr" of the Weimar Republic and played a part in organizing the paramilitary "Freikorps" units on the Polish border. In 1924, Keitel was transferred to the Ministry of the Reichswehr in Berlin, serving with the Truppenamt ('Office of Troops'), the post-Versailles disguised German General Staff. Three years later, he returned to field command.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Now a lieutenant-colonel, Keitel was again assigned to the Ministry of War in 1929 and was soon promoted to Head of the Organizational Department ("T-2"), a post he held until Adolf Hitler took power in 1933. Playing a vital role in the German rearmament, he traveled at least once to the Soviet Union to inspect secret "Reichswehr" training camps. In the autumn of 1932, he suffered a heart attack and double pneumonia. Shortly after his recovery, in October 1933, Keitel was appointed as deputy commander of the 3rd Infantry Division; in 1934, he was given command of the 22nd Infantry Division at Bremen.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In 1935, at the recommendation of General Werner von Fritsch, Keitel was promoted to the rank of major general and appointed chief of the Reich Ministry of War's Armed Forces Office ("Wehrmachtsamt"), which oversaw the army, navy, and air force. After assuming office, Keitel was promoted to lieutenant general on 1 January 1936.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: On 21 January 1938, Keitel received evidence revealing that the wife of his superior, War Minister Werner von Blomberg, was a former prostitute. Upon reviewing this information, Keitel suggested that the dossier be forwarded to Hitler's deputy, Hermann Göring, who used it to bring about Blomberg's resignation.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Hitler took command of the Wehrmacht in 1938 and replaced the War Ministry with the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces ("Oberkommando der Wehrmacht"), with Keitel as its chief. As a result of his appointment, Keitel assumed the responsibilities of Germany's War Minister. Although not officially appointed a "Reichsminister", Keitel was granted cabinet-level rank. When afterward von Blomberg was asked by Hitler (out of respect for him, after his dismissal in 1938) who he would recommend to replace him he had not suggested anyone, and suggested that Hitler himself should take over the job. But he said to Hitler about Keitel (who was his son-in-law's father) that "he's just the man who runs my office". Hitler snapped his fingers and exclaimed "That’s exactly the man I’m looking for". So on 4 February 1938 when Hitler became Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Keitel (to the astonishment of the General Staff, including himself) became Chief of Staff.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Soon after his promotion, Keitel convinced Hitler to appoint Walther von Brauchitsch as Commander-in-Chief of the Army, replacing von Fritsch. Keitel was promoted to "Generaloberst" (Colonel General) in November 1938, and in April 1939 he was awarded the Golden Party Badge by Hitler.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Field Marshal Ewald von Kleist labelled Keitel nothing more than a "stupid follower of Hitler" because of his servile "yes man" attitude toward Hitler. His sycophancy was well known in the army, and he acquired the nickname 'Lakeitel', a pun derived from ("lackey") and his surname. Hermann Göring's description of Keitel as having "a sergeant's mind inside a field marshal's body" was a feeling often expressed by his peers. He had been promoted because of his willingness to function as Hitler's mouthpiece. He was known by his peers as a ""blindingly loyal toady"" of Hitler, nicknamed "Nickgeselle", after a popular metal toy of a nodding donkey, the "Nickesel". During the war he was subject to verbal abuse from Hitler, who said to other officers (according to Gerd von Rundstedt) that "you know he has the brains of a movie usher ... (but he was made the highest ranking officer in the Army) ... because the man’s as loyal as a dog" (said by Hitler with a sly smile).


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Keitel was predisposed to manipulation because of his limited intellect and nervous disposition; Hitler valued his diligence and obedience. On one occasion, asked who Keitel was: upon finding out he became horrified at his own failure to salute his superior. Franz Halder, however, told him: "Don't worry, it's only Keitel". German officers consistently bypassed him and went directly to Hitler.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: On 30 August 1939, immediately prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, Keitel was appointed by Hitler to the six-person Council of Ministers for the Defense of the Reich which was set up to operate as a "war cabinet". After Germany defeated France in the Battle of France in six weeks, Keitel described Hitler as “the greatest warlord of all time”. Keitel conducted the negotiations of the French armistice, and on 19 July 1940 was promoted to "Generalfeldmarschall" (field marshal).


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: The planning for Operation Barbarossa, the 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union, was begun tentatively by Halder with the redeployment of the 18th Army into an offensive position against the Soviet Union. On 31 July 1940, Hitler held a major conference that included Keitel, Halder, Alfred Jodl, Erich Raeder, Brauchitsch and Hans Jeschonnek which further discussed the invasion. The participants did not object to the invasion. Hitler asked for war studies to be completed and Georg Thomas was given the task of completing two studies on economic matters. The first study by Thomas detailed serious problems with fuelling and rubber supplies. Keitel bluntly dismissed the problems, telling Thomas that Hitler would not want to see it. This influenced Thomas' second study which offered a glowing recommendation for the invasion based upon fabricated economic benefits.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In January 1943, just before the final surrender at Stalingrad, Hitler agreed to the creation of a three-man committee with representatives of the State, the Armed Forces High Command, and the Party in an attempt to centralize control of the war economy and over the home front. The committee members were Keitel, (Chief of OKW) Hans Lammers (Chief of the Reich Chancellery) and Martin Bormann (Chief of the Party Chancellery). The committee, soon known as the "Dreierausschuß" (Committee of Three), met eleven times between January and August 1943. However, it had little autonomy, with Hitler reserving most final decisions to himself. In addition, it ran up against resistance from cabinet ministers, who headed deeply entrenched spheres of influence and, seeing it as a threat to their power, worked together to undermine it. The result was that nothing changed, and the Committee declined into irrelevance.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Keitel played an important role after the failed 20 July plot in 1944. He sat on the Army "court of honour" that handed over many officers who were involved, including Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben, to Roland Freisler's notorious People's Court. Around 7,000 people were arrested, many of whom were tortured by the Gestapo, and around 5,000 were executed.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In April and May 1945, during the Battle of Berlin, Keitel called for counterattacks to drive back the Soviet forces and relieve Berlin. However, there were insufficient German forces to carry out such counterattacks. After Hitler's suicide on 30 April, Keitel stayed on as a member of the short-lived Flensburg government under Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. Upon arriving in Flensburg, Albert Speer, the Minister of Armaments and War Production, said that Keitel grovelled to Dönitz in the same way as he had done to Hitler. On 7 May 1945, Alfred Jodl, on behalf of Dönitz, signed Germany's unconditional surrender on all fronts. Joseph Stalin considered this an affront, so a second signing was arranged at the Berlin suburb of Karlshorst on 8 May. There, Keitel signed the German Instrument of Surrender on 8 May 1945. Five days later on 13 May, he was arrested at the request of the U.S. and interned at Camp Ashcan in Mondorf-les-Bains. General Jodl succeeded him as Chief of OKW until the final dissolution of the Flensburg government on 23 May.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Keitel had full knowledge of the criminal nature of the planning and the subsequent Invasion of Poland, agreeing to its aims in principle. The Nazi plans included mass arrests, population transfers and mass murder. Keitel did not contest the regime's assault upon basic human rights or counter the role of the "Einsatzgruppen" in the murders. The criminal nature of the invasion was now obvious; local commanders continued to express shock and protest over the events they were witnessing. Keitel continued to ignore the protests among the officer corps while they became morally numbed to the atrocities.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Keitel issued a series of criminal orders from April 1941. The orders went beyond established codes of conduct for the military and broadly allowed the execution of Jews, civilians and non-combatants for any reason. Those carrying out the murders were exempted from court-martial or later being tried for war crimes. The orders were signed by Keitel; however, other members of the OKW and the OKH, including Halder, wrote or changed the wording of his orders. Commanders in the field interpreted and carried out the orders.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In the summer and autumn of 1941, German military lawyers unsuccessfully argued that Soviet prisoners of war should be treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention. Keitel rebuffed them, writing: "These doubts correspond to military ideas about wars of chivalry. Our job is to suppress a way of life." In September 1941, concerned that some field commanders on the Eastern Front did not exhibit sufficient harshness in implementing the May 1941 order on the "Guidelines for the Conduct of the Troops in Russia", Keitel issued a new order, writing: "[The] struggle against Bolshevism demands ruthless and energetic action especially also against the Jews, the main carriers of Bolshevism". Also in September, Keitel issued an order to all commanders, not just those in the occupied Soviet Union, instructing them to use "unusual severity" to stamp out resistance. In this context, the guideline stated that execution of 50 to 100 "Communists" was an appropriate response to a loss of a German soldier. Such orders and directives further radicalised the army's occupational policies and enmeshed it in the genocide of the Jews.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In December 1941, Hitler instructed the OKW to subject, with the exception of Denmark, Western Europe (which was under military occupation) to the Night and Fog Decree. Signed by Keitel, the decree made it possible for foreign nationals to be transferred to Germany for trial by special courts, or simply handed to the Gestapo for deportation to concentration camps. The OKW further imposed a blackout on any information concerning the fate of the accused. At the same time, Keitel increased pressure on Otto von Stülpnagel, the military commander in France, for a more ruthless reprisal policy in the country. In October 1942, Keitel signed the Commando Order that authorized the killing of enemy special operations troops even when captured in uniform.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In the spring and summer of 1942, as the deportations of the Jews to extermination camps progressed, the military initially protested when it came to the Jews that laboured for the benefit of the Wehrmacht. The army lost control over the matter when the SS assumed command of all Jewish forced labour in July 1942. Keitel formally endorsed the state of affairs in September, reiterating for the armed forces that "evacuation of the Jews must be carried out thoroughly and its consequences endured, despite any trouble it may cause over the next three or four months".


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: After the war, Keitel faced the International Military Tribunal (IMT), which indicted him on all four counts before it: conspiracy to commit crimes against peace, planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Most of the case against him was based on his signature being present on dozens of orders that called for soldiers and political prisoners to be killed or 'disappeared'. In court, Keitel admitted that he knew many of Hitler's orders were illegal. His defence relied almost entirely on the argument he was merely following orders in conformity to "the leader principle" ("Führerprinzip") and his personal oath of loyalty to Hitler.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: The IMT rejected this defence and convicted him on all charges. Although the tribunal's charter allowed "superior orders" to be considered a mitigating factor, it found Keitel's crimes were so egregious that "there is nothing in mitigation". In its judgment against him, the IMT wrote, "Superior orders, even to a soldier, cannot be considered in mitigation where crimes as shocking and extensive have been committed consciously, ruthlessly and without military excuse or justification." It was also pointed out that while he claimed the Commando Order, which ordered Allied commandos to be shot without trial, was illegal, he had reaffirmed it and extended its application. It also noted several instances where he issued illegal orders on his own authority.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: In his statement before the Tribunal, Keitel said: "As these atrocities developed, one from the other, step by step, and without any foreknowledge of the consequences, destiny took its tragic course, with its fateful consequences." To underscore the criminal rather than military nature of Keitel's acts, the Allies denied his request to be shot by firing squad. Instead, he was executed at Nuremberg Prison by hanging.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: On the day of the execution, Keitel told prison chaplain Henry F. Gerecke "You have helped me more than you know. May Christ, my saviour, stand by me all the way. I shall need him so much." He then received Communion and was executed later that day. Keitel was executed by American Army sergeant John C. Woods. His last words were: "I call on God Almighty to have mercy on the German people. More than two million German soldiers went to their death for the fatherland before me. I follow now my sons – all for Germany." The trap door was small, causing head injuries to Keitel and several other condemned men as they dropped. Many of the executed Nazis fell from the gallows with insufficient force to snap their necks, resulting in convulsions that in Keitel's case lasted 24 minutes. The corpses of Keitel and the other nine executed men were, like Hermann Göring's, cremated at Ostfriedhof (Munich) and the ashes were scattered in the river Isar.


title: Wilhelm Keitel

text: Before his execution, Keitel published his memoirs, which were titled in English as "In the Service of the Reich". It was later re-edited as "The Memoirs of Field-Marshal Keitel" by Walter Görlitz (). Another work by Keitel later published in English was named "Questionnaire on the Ardennes offensive".


title: Muddy Waters

text: McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 April 30, 1983), known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-war blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago blues". His style of playing has been described as "raining down Delta beatitude".


title: Muddy Waters

text: Muddy Waters grew up on Stovall Plantation near Clarksdale, Mississippi, and by age 17 was playing the guitar and the harmonica, emulating the local blues artists Son House and Robert Johnson. He was recorded in Mississippi by Alan Lomax for the Library of Congress in 1941. In 1943, he moved to Chicago to become a full-time professional musician. In 1946, he recorded his first records for Columbia Records and then for Aristocrat Records, a newly formed label run by the brothers Leonard and Phil Chess.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In the early 1950s, Muddy Waters and his band—Little Walter Jacobs on harmonica, Jimmy Rogers on guitar, Elga Edmonds (also known as Elgin Evans) on drums and Otis Spann on piano—recorded several blues classics, some with the bassist and songwriter Willie Dixon. These songs included "Hoochie Coochie Man," "I Just Want to Make Love to You" and "I'm Ready". In 1958, he traveled to England, laying the foundations of the resurgence of interest in the blues there. His performance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1960 was recorded and released as his first live album, "At Newport 1960".


title: Muddy Waters

text: Muddy Waters' music has influenced various American music genres, including rock and roll and rock music.


title: Muddy Waters

text: Muddy Waters' place and date of birth are not conclusively known. He stated that he was born in 1915 in Rolling Fork in Sharkey County, Mississippi, but other evidence suggests that he was born in the unincorporated community of Jug's Corner, in neighboring Issaquena County, in 1913. In the 1930s and 1940s, before his rise to fame, the year of his birth was reported as 1913 on his marriage license, recording notes, and musicians' union card. A 1955 interview in the "Chicago Defender" is the earliest in which he stated 1915 as the year of his birth, and he continued to state that year in interviews from that point onward. The 1920 census lists him as five years old as of March 6, 1920. The Social Security Death Index, relying on the Social Security card application submitted after his move to Chicago in the mid-1940s, lists him as being born April 4, 1913. His gravestone gives his birth year as 1915.


title: Muddy Waters

text: His grandmother, Della Grant, raised him after his mother died shortly after his birth. Grant gave him the nickname "Muddy" at an early age because he loved to play in the muddy water of nearby Deer Creek. "Waters" was added years later, as he began to play harmonica and perform locally in his early teens. He taught himself to play harmonica. The remains of the cabin on Stovall Plantation where he lived in his youth are now at the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale, Mississippi.


title: Muddy Waters

text: He had his first introduction to music in church: "I used to belong to church. I was a good Baptist, singing in the church. So I got all of my good moaning and trembling going on for me right out of church," he recalled. By the time he was 17, he had purchased his first guitar. "I sold the last horse that we had. Made about fifteen dollars for him, gave my grandmother seven dollars and fifty cents, I kept seven-fifty and paid about two-fifty for that guitar. It was a Stella. The people ordered them from Sears-Roebuck in Chicago." He started playing his songs in joints near his hometown, mostly on a plantation owned by Colonel William Howard Stovall.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In the early 1930s, Muddy Waters accompanied Big Joe Williams on tours of the Delta, playing harmonica. Williams recounted to Blewett Thomas that he eventually dropped Muddy "because he was takin' away my women [fans]".


title: Muddy Waters

text: In August 1941, Alan Lomax went to Stovall, Mississippi, on behalf of the Library of Congress to record various country blues musicians. "He brought his stuff down and recorded me right in my house," Muddy told "Rolling Stone" magazine, "and when he played back the first song I sounded just like anybody's records. Man, you don't know how I felt that Saturday afternoon when I heard that voice and it was my own voice. Later on he sent me two copies of the pressing and a check for twenty bucks, and I carried that record up to the corner and put it on the jukebox. Just played it and played it and said, 'I can do it, I can do it'." Lomax came back in July 1942 to record him again. Both sessions were eventually released by Testament Records as "Down on Stovall's Plantation". The complete recordings were reissued by Chess Records on CD as "Muddy Waters: The Complete Plantation Recordings. The Historic 1941–42 Library of Congress Field Recordings" in 1993 and remastered in 1997.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1943, Waters headed to Chicago with the hope of becoming a full-time professional musician. He later recalled arriving in Chicago as the single most momentous event in his life. He lived with a relative for a short period while driving a truck and working in a factory by day and performing at night. Big Bill Broonzy, then one of the leading bluesmen in Chicago, had Muddy open his shows in the rowdy clubs where Broonzy played. This gave him the opportunity to play in front of a large audience. In 1944, he bought his first electric guitar and then formed his first electric combo. He felt obliged to electrify his sound in Chicago because, he said, "When I went into the clubs, the first thing I wanted was an amplifier. Couldn't nobody hear you with an acoustic." His sound reflected the optimism of postwar African Americans. Willie Dixon said that "There was quite a few people around singing the blues but most of them was singing all sad blues. Muddy was giving his blues a little pep."


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1946, Muddy recorded some songs for Mayo Williams at Columbia Records, with an old-fashioned combo consisting of clarinet, saxophone and piano; they were released a year later with Ivan Ballen's Philadelphia-based 20th Century label, billed as James "Sweet Lucy" Carter and his Orchestra – Muddy Waters' name was not mentioned on the label. Later that year, he began recording for Aristocrat Records, a newly formed label run by the brothers Leonard and Phil Chess. In 1947, he played guitar with Sunnyland Slim on piano on the cuts "Gypsy Woman" and "Little Anna Mae". These were also shelved, but in 1948, "I Can't Be Satisfied" and "I Feel Like Going Home" became hits, and his popularity in clubs began to take off. Soon after, Aristocrat changed its name to Chess Records. Muddy Waters's signature tune "Rollin' Stone" also became a hit that year.


title: Muddy Waters

text: Initially, the Chess brothers would not allow Muddy Waters to use his working band in the recording studio; instead, he was provided with a backing bass by Ernest "Big" Crawford or by musicians assembled specifically for the recording session, including "Baby Face" Leroy Foster and Johnny Jones. Gradually, Chess relented, and by September 1953 he was recording with one of the most acclaimed blues groups in history: Little Walter Jacobs on harmonica, Jimmy Rogers on guitar, Elga Edmonds (also known as Elgin Evans) on drums, and Otis Spann on piano. The band recorded a series of blues classics during the early 1950s, some with the help of the bassist and songwriter Willie Dixon, including "Hoochie Coochie Man", "I Just Want to Make Love to You", and "I'm Ready"


title: Muddy Waters

text: Muddy Waters's band became a proving ground for some of the city's best blues talent, with members of the ensemble going on to successful careers of their own. In 1952, Little Walter left when his single "Juke" became a hit, although he continued a collaborative relationship long after he left, appearing on most of the band's classic recordings in the 1950s. Howlin' Wolf moved to Chicago in 1954 with financial support earned through his successful Chess singles, and the "legendary rivalry" with Muddy Waters began. The rivalry was, in part, stoked by Willie Dixon providing songs to both artists, with Wolf suspecting that Muddy was getting Dixon's best songs. 1955 saw the departure of Jimmy Rogers, who quit to work exclusively with his own band, which had been a sideline until that time.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In the mid-1950s, Muddy Waters' singles were frequently on "Billboard" magazine's various Rhythm & Blues charts including "Sugar Sweet" in 1955 and "Trouble No More", "Forty Days and Forty Nights", and "Don't Go No Farther" in 1956. 1956 also saw the release of one of his best-known numbers, "Got My Mojo Working", although it did not appear on the charts. However, by the late 1950s, his singles success had come to an end, with only "Close to You" reaching the chart in 1958. Also in 1958, Chess released his first compilation album, "The Best of Muddy Waters", which collected twelve of his singles up to 1956.


title: Muddy Waters

text: Waters toured England with Spann in 1958, where they were backed by local Dixieland-style or "trad jazz" musicians, including members of Chris Barber's band. At the time, English audiences had only been exposed to acoustic folk blues, as performed by artists such as Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee, and Big Bill Broonzy. Both the musicians and audiences were unprepared for Waters' performance, which included his electric slide guitar playing. He recalled:


title: Muddy Waters

text: Although his performances alienated the old guard, some younger musicians, including Alexis Korner and Cyril Davies from Barber's band, were inspired to go in the more modern, electric blues direction. Korner and Davies' own groups included musicians who would later form the Rolling Stones (named after Muddy's 1950 hit "Rollin' Stone"), Cream, and the original Fleetwood Mac.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In the 1960s, Muddy Waters' performances continued to introduce a new generation to Chicago blues. At the Newport Jazz Festival, he recorded one of the first live blues albums, "At Newport 1960", and his performance of "Got My Mojo Working" was nominated for a Grammy award. In September 1963, in Chess' attempt to connect with folk music audiences, he recorded "Folk Singer", which replaced his trademark electric guitar sound with an acoustic band, including a then-unknown Buddy Guy on acoustic guitar. "Folk Singer" was not a commercial success, but it was lauded by critic Joe Kane, and in 2003 "Rolling Stone" magazine placed it at number 280 on its list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. In October 1963, Muddy Waters participated in the first of several annual European tours, organized as the American Folk Blues Festival, during which he also performed more acoustic-oriented numbers.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1967, he re-recorded several blues standards with Bo Diddley, Little Walter, and Howlin' Wolf, which were marketed as "Super Blues" and "The Super Super Blues Band" albums in Chess' attempt to reach a rock audience. "The Super Super Blues Band" united Wolf and Waters, who had a long-standing rivalry. It was, as Ken Chang wrote in his AllMusic review, flooded with "contentious studio banter [...] more entertaining than the otherwise unmemorable music from this stylistic train wreck". In 1968, at the instigation of Marshall Chess, he recorded "Electric Mud", an album intended to revive his career by backing him with Rotary Connection, a psychedelic soul band that Chess had put together. The album proved controversial; although it reached number 127 on the "Billboard" 200 album chart, it was scorned by many critics, and eventually disowned by Muddy Waters himself:


title: Muddy Waters

text: Nonetheless, six months later he recorded a follow-up album, "After the Rain", which had a similar sound and featured many of the same musicians.


title: Muddy Waters

text: Later in 1969, he recorded and released the album "Fathers and Sons", which featured a return to his classic Chicago blues sound. "Fathers and Sons" had an all-star backing band that included Michael Bloomfield and Paul Butterfield, longtime fans whose desire to play with him was the impetus for the album. It was the most successful album of Muddy Waters' career, reaching number 70 on the "Billboard" 200.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1971, a show at Mister Kelly's, an upmarket Chicago nightclub, was recorded and released, signalling both Muddy Waters's return to form and the completion of his transfer to white audiences.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1972, he won his first Grammy Award, for Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording for "They Call Me Muddy Waters", a 1971 album of old, but previously unreleased recordings.


title: Muddy Waters

text: Later in 1972, he flew to England to record the album "The London Muddy Waters Sessions". The album was a follow-up to the previous year's "The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions". Both albums were the brainchild of Chess Records producer Norman Dayron, and were intended to showcase Chicago blues musicians playing with the younger British rock musicians whom they had inspired. Muddy Waters brought with him two American musicians, harmonica player Carey Bell and guitarist Sammy Lawhorn. The British and Irish musicians who played on the album included Rory Gallagher, Steve Winwood, Rick Grech, and Mitch Mitchell. Muddy was dissatisfied by the results, due to the British musicians' more rock-oriented sound. "These boys are top musicians, they can play with me, put the book before 'em and play it, you know," he told Guralnick. "But that ain't what I need to sell my people, it ain't the Muddy Waters sound. An' if you change my sound, then you gonna change the whole man." He stated, "My blues look so simple, so easy to do, but it's not. They say my blues is the hardest blues in the world to play." Nevertheless, the album won another Grammy, again for Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording.


title: Muddy Waters

text: He won another Grammy for his last LP on Chess Records: "The Muddy Waters Woodstock Album", recorded in 1975 with his new guitarist Bob Margolin, Pinetop Perkins, Paul Butterfield, and Levon Helm and Garth Hudson of the Band. In November 1976 he appeared as a featured special guest at The Band's Last Waltz farewell concert, and in the subsequent 1978 feature film documentary of the event.


title: Muddy Waters

text: From 1977 to 1981, blues musician Johnny Winter, who had idolized Muddy Waters since childhood and who had become a friend, produced four albums of his, all on the Blue Sky Records label: the studio albums "Hard Again" (1977), "I'm Ready" (1978) and "King Bee" (1981), and the live album "Muddy "Mississippi" Waters – Live" (1979). The albums were critical and commercial successes, with all but "King Bee" winning a Grammy. "Hard Again" has been especially praised by critics, who have tended to describe it as his comeback album.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1981, Muddy Waters was invited to perform at ChicagoFest, the city's top outdoor music festival. He was joined onstage by Johnny Winter and Buddy Miles, and played classics like "Mannish Boy", "Trouble No More", and "Mojo Working" to a new generation of fans. The performance was made available on DVD in 2009 by Shout! Factory. On November 22, he performed live with three members of British rock band the Rolling Stones (Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood) at the Checkerboard Lounge, a blues club in Bronzeville, on the South Side of Chicago, which was established in 1972 by Buddy Guy and L.C. Thurman. A DVD version of the performance was released in 2012.


title: Muddy Waters

text: In 1982, declining health dramatically stopped his performance schedule. His last public performance took place when he sat in with Eric Clapton's band at a concert in Florida in the summer of 1982.