Writers’ Symposium

Pictographic writing of numbers was done for record keeping, and began earlier than the idea of writing
itself.

Eschatological discoveries so far suggest that the writing of language began in Sumer in Mesopotamia
around 3100 years before Christ, and in MesoAmerica around 3000 BC. That is because there’s no
record of the systematic writing of language more ancient that those.

Mesopotamia is Greek for “between two rivers,” and is in the middle east region of mostly Iraq and
parts of Syria, Iran and Turkey. Mesoamerica means between the two Americas, and is that region at the
bottom of North America that connects North America and South America. It is largely Mexico down to
Guatemala, Honduras and the others that connect to the USA.

Unrelated writing systems arose in Egypt around 3100 BC and in China around 1200 BC. But the
invention of any writing system in the ancient world was not a one-time event but was a gradual process
– it started as large drawings that were gradually trimmed down to manageable sizes and easier forms.

But generally, it looks like the people of the middle east and asia started writing long before the
Europeans started. How the Europeans overtook everyone in such a short time is a mystery.

Greek alphabet and writing system is the source of all modern scripts of Europe. Even the Romans who
conquered the Greeks, learned writing from the Greeks. The Latins were a people originating from
central Italy who dominated Europe during the Roman empire. They developed the most widespread
system descendent from the Greek language; but Latin as a written language failed to assert its
dominance. The Roman Catholic church, being Roman themselves, stuck to their original language, and
continued writing in Latin.

Greek philosophy in Christian writing

In John 1, we read that in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was
God, and that nothing could exist without him existing first. Through him all things were declared into
being. We see the disciple whom Jesus loved had borrow Greek concepts to explain who Jesus was.
Writings from Heraclitus, Aristotle and Plato depict logos as a universal principle, an idea behind
something, or the wisdom behind observable things, the intangible version of a physical object and the
moral behind societal norms and values. To the Greeks and to human beings in general, a word is a sign
that represents a concept. There is a thing (reality), then its conceptualization (mental capturing of it)
and the word (that pronounces it or writes it down). That way, LOGOS is also the reason/purpose behind
the existence of a thing.

Plato did not exactly say that Logos was the God factor behind created things, but scholars make a
connection between Plato’s writings and Christian conceptualization of creation. The disciples of Christ
saw Christ as the God-factor in created things. To exist was Christ, and to die was to meet Christ, and all
things will sooner or later be restored to perfection by Him.
To me, it is by the revelation of the Holy Spirit, that John is demonstrating to readers that Jesus is that
Logos, the principle that brought all things into being and how all things now makes sense, now that
Jesus has been revealed. In Him we live and move and have our being.

Paul also says in Colossians 1:16-17; through him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on
earth. He made the things we see and the things we cant see. He existed before anything else, and he
holds all creation together.

Hebrew history and philosophy in Christian writing

But to say that in the beginning was the word, and the word was the creator of everything, is to quote
Genesis 1:1. We can trace the history and philosophy of Christian writing back to the books of Moses,
the Prophets, The writings, the Psalms, Jewish records of history etc. They are all quoted there. We find
the history of Christian writing in Jewish philosophy, for it is the Jews who first wrote about the God
whom today we have embraced as the Christian God. John himself was a Jew, Paul, Peter and all the
disciples were Jews. God gave them a more specific revelation of where their Judaism was coming from
and where it was going. It was to produce for the world a savior, one who will unite the world for God
once and for all.

We really do not have a new religious message as Christian writers – biblical revelation about the Cross,
the God of the patriarchs, the words of the prophets, the psalms, gave us an insight into God, so we
better be careful not to add extra data;

but is God silent? No.

What is he saying about where you’re at and where you’re going?

What are the winds of change contemporarily, and what does God say about them?

Do the winds of change blow God’s way or do they blow in the opposite direction of God?

If you’re a Jew, God will reveal himself to you in your society, in your religion, in your culture.

The Bible, translation

These writings of Christians were put together and finally were included with Jewish writings to have a
compillation of what we now call the Bible. And indeed the world biblion means book of many books. I
do not know the full history of the Egyptian religions, Greek, Babylonian religions, Persians and all the
others who wrote and wrote about their religion, but what I see is that without putting things on paper,
the Christian God was going to have a hard time giving people a generally unified message.

When you put thoughts on paper, you’re building, unifying and strengthening not only your thoughts
but the thoughts of many people indeed. You’re setting a standard, and of course be careful of the
standard you’re setting bcos it could work. You could actually write that Paul never went to prison and
many people could believe you…

 Are you aware of the amount of power that you have?

  Are you going to use it?
 Ask God to enable you to use it – to make you use it

My philosophy in life is, whatever God has given you ability and opportunity to do, even if it’s cleaning
the floor, do it to the best of your effort and time… the reset will follow.

If you’ve the opp to be a writer, not everyone has that opp…

Robert Moffat wrote diaries and letters. It’s impossible to study how he translated the Bible without
reading his diaries… Xn writing right there.

I write my sermons word for word. It’s not exactly my plan but 1 day it might be several books put
together.

Killed/senwstenced to death

The Christians are the people who popularized extensive writing of books; how? By translations of the
Bible and by writing sermons and expositions of biblical texts. People were burned alive, beheaded and
all stuff bcos of what they had written. That’s how powerful writing can be. To write is to create, and the
authorities feared that these people were creating a weapon of mass destruction; so they killed them
and by extension killed their creation. Many many translations of the bible exist, if you google the list,
and most old ones were sentenced to death for it – some like John Calvin were never killed because they
escaped to other countries.

Writers

Martin Luther’s most essential writings, 75 of them, six volumes

Calvin’s institutes

Missionaries and Bible societies

Evangelism outreach groups – Gospel tracts

Books by celebrity pastors and Christians today

Poems, devotionals etc

Compilations of sermons
Branding

The need to do

Your ability to do it

The difficulty in replacing you

Marketing is not clever ways. It’s customer values.

Brand is the reason to choose

Design is how it works

Quality is the best business plan

Ppl don’t buy goods they buy ppl, stories & magic

Understand your purpose and produce it

CIPA, intellectual property authority

Patents, trademarks, trade secrets, industrial designs, must register

What is copy right? Protection of literary and artistic works.

Originality, should really be yours, not copied…

Copyright does not only apply to registered work; as long as you’ve created it, it’s copyright protected.
Submit your works with the office for the office’s recognition. Duration of copyright is duration of life
and 50+ years.

While just the concept in your mind. The concept is not protected by law. If there’s proof that your
possession dates earlier than mine, you get the copy right. Unprotected works are those that have fallen
under the public domain.

2 types of rights: economic rights, moral rights. Right of integrity, e.g you don’t want your work
appearing in certain platforms.

Assignments and licensing: it’s to be put in writing if you release permission. Assignments –you give part
or whole rights. You can separate which rights to hand over and which ones to keep. Licensing is for
certain periods.

Enforcement of rights. It’s the respbty of the copyrights owner to enforce the law.

1. Avoid infringing on others

2. Avoid being infringed upon.
BNLS Botswana National Library Services