Topic description and stories

World's oldest Korean Bibles at Cambridge University Library

23 May 2019

The library is home to one of the most significant collections of early Korean bibles anywhere in the world.

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Annular eclipse photographed at sunset in eastern New Mexico.

Oldest recorded solar eclipse helps date the Egyptian pharaohs

30 Oct 2017

Researchers have pinpointed the date of what could be the oldest solar eclipse yet recorded. The event, which occurred on 30 October 1207 BC, is...

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Kony 2012

The Bible as a weapon of war

08 Feb 2017

How do former Lord’s Resistance Army soldiers – men, women and children who have used the Bible as a weapon of war – learn to reread the scriptures...

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Lines of Thought: Communicating Faith

27 May 2016

Some of the world’s most important religious texts are currently on display in Cambridge as part of Cambridge University Library’s 600th anniversary...

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Detail from The Kiss of Judas

Reformation ‘recycling’ may have saved rare painting from destruction

27 Nov 2015

A rare medieval painting depicting Judas’ betrayal of Christ may have survived destruction at the hands of 16th century iconoclasts after being ‘...

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General Sir Edmund Allenby enters Jerusalem in December 1917. The widely-circulated image of him entering the Old City on foot conjured up images of Christ-like humility in the Bible in a calculated attempt to win over hearts and minds.

A conflict of Biblical proportions: How the Bible was used to turn the First World War into a Holy War

08 Nov 2015

The significance of the Bible in the war, and anti-war efforts, of both Allied and Central powers in the First World War are to be examined in a new...

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Skull of Bitus arietans –  or Puff Adder – from the family Viperidae

How snake bites could help prevent heart attacks

28 Oct 2015

The Cambridge Animal Alphabet series celebrates Cambridge's connections with animals through literature, art, science and society. Here, V is for...

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Mrs Gibson on a camel in the Sinai, 1893.

Historic rivals join forces to save 1,000 years of Jewish history

15 Feb 2013

Cambridge University Library and the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Libraries have today announced their first ever joint fundraising campaign to...

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Robert Asher

Can a scientist be religious?

11 Mar 2012

The relationship between science and religion has had its rocky moments. But Dr Robert Asher, author of the newly published book 'Evolution and...

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Extract from the New Testament in Syriac from the sixth century

The riddle of the Syriac double dot: it’s the world’s earliest question mark

21 Jul 2011

Manuscripts written in Syriac, an ancient language of the Middle East, are peppered with mysterious dots. Among them is the vertical double dot or...

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Leonardo Da Vinci's depiction of the Last Supper

The Penultimate Supper?

17 Apr 2011

The Last Supper of Jesus Christ was on the Wednesday, and not the Thursday, before his death, according to a new study which claims to have solved “...

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Scriptural reasoning.

All in the script

05 Apr 2011

The power of “scriptural reasoning” to transform the way in which different faiths understand one another is to be the subject of a major lecture in...

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