Good News for Polybibliophiliacs
Ed comments on Bill White's blog:
TS, studies have not shown any correlation between adultery and polybibliophilia (the clinical term for the love of multiple books at the same time). :-D
In response to my comment:
I'm always reading twelve books at once too, and I remember my wife reading one of those "How to Tell If Your Man Will Commit" type of books, and she said that one of the danger signs is a man who is always reading a dozen books. The author wrote "if he can't commit to a book at a time, how will he commit to one woman?". Fortunately I've been faithful and my wife didn't take the book's advice and dump me for a one-book-at-a-time man.
July 12, 2003
Bone, Cal & I went on our annual Golf Outing tonight...
Napled hillocks, shaved close as fairways should, twine themselves around a horizon fading from view as the sun declines. In the middle distance mature trees dot the mercurial fairway, this elusive middle ground. I drive and putt and chip and manage to alternately find and lose this treasured real estate.
On the green I look back over the great distance spanned; the hillocks assemble themselves like graduates to “Pomp & Circumstance” and I’m non-plussed that “Par” claims I should’ve been here sooner; I listen to the bullfrogs and crickets and birds, all those natural things who have no white-ball’d compulsions and notice no distinction between green and fairway. Come to think of it, most of my drives made little distinction also.
Yet the compulsion contines, another flag is reached and conquered and another set of white tees bleat their challenge. Coming from a line of golfers, I feel the lack, as if the DNA got mishandled at conception.
I shrugged it off well enough and we got to relax and catch up at Gatsby’s afterwards. The sign outside triggered memories like an old song. Inside the memories flood; that tiny dance floor where Boris Keymon and I fought to a draw, the clusters of girls and guys clenched or hoping to be clenched, a live band accompanying air thick with second-hand smoke and proliferating pheromones.
Napled hillocks, shaved close as fairways should, twine themselves around a horizon fading from view as the sun declines. In the middle distance mature trees dot the mercurial fairway, this elusive middle ground. I drive and putt and chip and manage to alternately find and lose this treasured real estate.
On the green I look back over the great distance spanned; the hillocks assemble themselves like graduates to “Pomp & Circumstance” and I’m non-plussed that “Par” claims I should’ve been here sooner; I listen to the bullfrogs and crickets and birds, all those natural things who have no white-ball’d compulsions and notice no distinction between green and fairway. Come to think of it, most of my drives made little distinction also.
Yet the compulsion contines, another flag is reached and conquered and another set of white tees bleat their challenge. Coming from a line of golfers, I feel the lack, as if the DNA got mishandled at conception.
I shrugged it off well enough and we got to relax and catch up at Gatsby’s afterwards. The sign outside triggered memories like an old song. Inside the memories flood; that tiny dance floor where Boris Keymon and I fought to a draw, the clusters of girls and guys clenched or hoping to be clenched, a live band accompanying air thick with second-hand smoke and proliferating pheromones.
July 11, 2003
We Have a Visitor...
Nice of ol' Reg of Disputations' fame to stop by and declare my lack of enthusiasm over the Democratic candidate for the Senate! Does Tom know you're out loose?
Nice of ol' Reg of Disputations' fame to stop by and declare my lack of enthusiasm over the Democratic candidate for the Senate! Does Tom know you're out loose?
Ham of Bone Follow-up
Der Bone received a contract from the agent who expressed interest in him. He had someone from the Writer's Guild eyeball it and they said that it has some non-standard things in it, like requiring seven years of servitude from Bone instead of the normal two. So Bone's a lot more wary than he was yesterday and is dampening down expectations.
Der Bone received a contract from the agent who expressed interest in him. He had someone from the Writer's Guild eyeball it and they said that it has some non-standard things in it, like requiring seven years of servitude from Bone instead of the normal two. So Bone's a lot more wary than he was yesterday and is dampening down expectations.
of Friendship & Imagination
Old Oligarch discourses vastly and discursively on why the night is better than the day...And the night, especially after a drink or two, makes us enthusiastic again that we can hop over the walls of modern anonymity and pragmatism and share souls with someone, which I believe was Plato's definition of true friendship.
Fr. Robert Hugh Benson wrote of friendship (how's that for a segue?): "Now the consciousness of this friendship of Jesus is the very secret of the saints. Ordinary men can live ordinary lives, with little or no open defiance of God, from a hundred second-rate motives. We keep the commandments that we may enter into life; we avoid sin that we may escape hell; we fight against worldliness that we may keep the respect of the world. But no man can advance three paces on the road of perfection unless Jesus Christ walks beside him. It is this, then, that gives distinction to the way of the saint - and that gives him his grotesque in the eyes of the unimaginative world than the ecstasy of the lover?)...
Old Oligarch discourses vastly and discursively on why the night is better than the day...And the night, especially after a drink or two, makes us enthusiastic again that we can hop over the walls of modern anonymity and pragmatism and share souls with someone, which I believe was Plato's definition of true friendship.
Fr. Robert Hugh Benson wrote of friendship (how's that for a segue?): "Now the consciousness of this friendship of Jesus is the very secret of the saints. Ordinary men can live ordinary lives, with little or no open defiance of God, from a hundred second-rate motives. We keep the commandments that we may enter into life; we avoid sin that we may escape hell; we fight against worldliness that we may keep the respect of the world. But no man can advance three paces on the road of perfection unless Jesus Christ walks beside him. It is this, then, that gives distinction to the way of the saint - and that gives him his grotesque in the eyes of the unimaginative world than the ecstasy of the lover?)...
The day of the martyrs' victory dawned...
Read some of Eusebius: The History of the Church from Christ to Constantine last night and it served almost as a lectio divina for me. Deliver me, Oh Lord, from words! (Except your words! :) This book is full of acts. Novelists are constantly admonished to "show, don't tell" and reading the Gospels or reading the history of martyrs serves to show instead of telling me.
I recall the ebullient moment I chanced upon the stories of Perpetua and Felicity. Sometimes I find them in the corners of my dreams. The day of the martyrs' victory dawned. They marched from their cells into the amphitheater, as if into heaven...
Read some of Eusebius: The History of the Church from Christ to Constantine last night and it served almost as a lectio divina for me. Deliver me, Oh Lord, from words! (Except your words! :) This book is full of acts. Novelists are constantly admonished to "show, don't tell" and reading the Gospels or reading the history of martyrs serves to show instead of telling me.
I recall the ebullient moment I chanced upon the stories of Perpetua and Felicity. Sometimes I find them in the corners of my dreams. The day of the martyrs' victory dawned. They marched from their cells into the amphitheater, as if into heaven...
Interesting exchange on The Corner
IS FR. RUTLER THERE? [Peter Robinson]
Just about two decades ago Rev. George Rutler received me into the Church of Rome. I adore the man--he's brilliant, witty, and (dare I?) holy--yet since he lives in New York and I in California, it's been ages since we've been in touch. But now? Well, now we're both on the Corner. Up for a question, Father?
You mention that the Church is reforming itself through "the removal of incompetent bishops." But shouldn't the National Conference of Catholic Bishops also issue an apology? I don't mean an apology for the sexual predators they've been harboring--that apology is already on the books. Shouldn't the bishops apologize for their two major pastoral letters of the nineteen-eighties? One, you'll recall, was on the economy. It was an attack on Reaganomics--at the very time when Reagan's tax cuts, restraint on spending, and program of deregulation were launching the most sustained economic expansion in American history, conferring more benefits on poor Americans than any government program could have begun to match. The second represented an attack on Reagan's nuclear policy, in effect granting the full authority of the Church to the nuclear freeze movement--at the very time when Reagan's policies were putting forces in play that would bring the Cold War to a peaceful end.
The American bishops exceeded their authority, meddled in the political life of the nation, caused scandal to thousands of devout Catholics (I have a friend who left the Church as a direct result of these pastoral letters)--and got it all wrong.
RE: IS FATHER RUTLER THERE? [Father George W. Rutler]
I have no objections at all to Peter Robinson's complaints about those defective teaching documents which were exercises in ill-advised clericalism. The pastoral letter on the economy was the work of a committee headed by Archbishop Rembert Weakland. It was thoroughly corrected, though not specifically cited, in the papal encyclical Centesimus Annus. The pastoral letter on nuclear armaments addressed a universe parallel to the real one and, had its indications been followed, there might still be a Soviet Union... I am glad to resume contact with my friend Peter. I hope that nearly two decades ago I instructed him well enough to know that adoration should be given only to God. Humans may only be objects of respect, reverence, and veneration. But if he continues to adore me, I am reluctant to discourage grassroots piety.
IS FR. RUTLER THERE? [Peter Robinson]
Just about two decades ago Rev. George Rutler received me into the Church of Rome. I adore the man--he's brilliant, witty, and (dare I?) holy--yet since he lives in New York and I in California, it's been ages since we've been in touch. But now? Well, now we're both on the Corner. Up for a question, Father?
You mention that the Church is reforming itself through "the removal of incompetent bishops." But shouldn't the National Conference of Catholic Bishops also issue an apology? I don't mean an apology for the sexual predators they've been harboring--that apology is already on the books. Shouldn't the bishops apologize for their two major pastoral letters of the nineteen-eighties? One, you'll recall, was on the economy. It was an attack on Reaganomics--at the very time when Reagan's tax cuts, restraint on spending, and program of deregulation were launching the most sustained economic expansion in American history, conferring more benefits on poor Americans than any government program could have begun to match. The second represented an attack on Reagan's nuclear policy, in effect granting the full authority of the Church to the nuclear freeze movement--at the very time when Reagan's policies were putting forces in play that would bring the Cold War to a peaceful end.
The American bishops exceeded their authority, meddled in the political life of the nation, caused scandal to thousands of devout Catholics (I have a friend who left the Church as a direct result of these pastoral letters)--and got it all wrong.
RE: IS FATHER RUTLER THERE? [Father George W. Rutler]
I have no objections at all to Peter Robinson's complaints about those defective teaching documents which were exercises in ill-advised clericalism. The pastoral letter on the economy was the work of a committee headed by Archbishop Rembert Weakland. It was thoroughly corrected, though not specifically cited, in the papal encyclical Centesimus Annus. The pastoral letter on nuclear armaments addressed a universe parallel to the real one and, had its indications been followed, there might still be a Soviet Union... I am glad to resume contact with my friend Peter. I hope that nearly two decades ago I instructed him well enough to know that adoration should be given only to God. Humans may only be objects of respect, reverence, and veneration. But if he continues to adore me, I am reluctant to discourage grassroots piety.
From the same quote drawer, this from the Sunday NY Times Magazine:
A bit of Dante's 'Inferno'! Is that not rich!? Hi-lair-ious.
I'm incorrigible at attempting to communicate in other languages with strangers. I've tried snippets of Italian on unsuspecting Romans, said "danke schon" when a waitress at the German restaurant in Hermann, Mo. handed me a menu, said "gracias" to the Mexican lady at the local Wendy's, "Dia Duit" to the farmer out standing in his field in Western Ireland, "How!"* to the Cherokee Indian working at a fast food joint just outside an Indian reservation...
* - Disclaimer, did not say "How!". Made that up for humor's sake.
"I was in awe of my father's cerebral prowess. He was always intellectually trigger-happy, plus a bit hard of hearing, and the combination was deadly. If anyone happened to mention it was 'coldish' out, my father would starting bellowing Coleridge: 'Down to the sunless sea....'
During the many times he dragged us through Europe, every inscription on every doorway and pillar had to be decoded, whether from French or German, Latin or Greek. At museums he'd give the guards art history lessons. At a Japanese restaurant he'd correct a waiter's pronunciation. Even at a pizza parlor he'd order in extravagant Italian - a bit of Dante's 'Inferno' thrown in for good measure, complete with rococo arm gestures, kissing his fingers and writing in the air. It was always murder taking him anywhere."
A bit of Dante's 'Inferno'! Is that not rich!? Hi-lair-ious.
I'm incorrigible at attempting to communicate in other languages with strangers. I've tried snippets of Italian on unsuspecting Romans, said "danke schon" when a waitress at the German restaurant in Hermann, Mo. handed me a menu, said "gracias" to the Mexican lady at the local Wendy's, "Dia Duit" to the farmer out standing in his field in Western Ireland, "How!"* to the Cherokee Indian working at a fast food joint just outside an Indian reservation...
* - Disclaimer, did not say "How!". Made that up for humor's sake.
Serving Your Wedding Program Needs
I was going thru my old bin of collected quotes last night and came across these gems. In the unlikely event you need a quotation to put at the bottom of your wedding program, I offer these possibilities. Some are a little more romantical than others, see if you can tell the difference:
I was going thru my old bin of collected quotes last night and came across these gems. In the unlikely event you need a quotation to put at the bottom of your wedding program, I offer these possibilities. Some are a little more romantical than others, see if you can tell the difference:
“When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married” – Shakespeare
“…their collected
Hearts wound up with love, like little watch springs.” – Stephen Spender
"I may chance have some odd quirks and remnants of wit broken on me, because I have railed so long against marriage.” – Shakespeare
“Hasty marriage seldom proveth well.” – Shakespeare, apparently favoring long engagements
“Love is not love which alters what alterations finds, or bends with the remover to remove.” – Shakespeare (I'll have to show my wife that one)
“Neither me without you nor you without me.” - anon
“I’m getting married in the morning,
Ding! Dong! The bells are gonna chime.
Pull out the stopper;
Let’s have a whopper;
But get me to the church on time!” - Alan J. Lerner
“May God, the best maker of all marriages, combine our hearts in one” – Shakespeare
July 10, 2003
Knock me over... ...a Ham of Bone Update
I was waiting in line for lunch when an old co-worker by the name of Shelly asked me for a Bone update. I reported that he reads the IT positions in the want ads and tries to keep from vomiting - some of them read as though they should say, "must be willing to bend over"; such is life when employers are in the driver seat. Shelly has an innocence about her, a certain wide-eyedness that suggests gullibility. So when I mentioned that Bone was writing another screenplay her strenuous eye-rolling was amusing.
But just as somebody has to win the lotto somebody's gotta sell a screenplay, else we'd all be reading books instead of going to movies. Bone forwarded me an email today that was shocking - his agent contact, who he'd begged to read his screenplay months ago, suddenly out of the bolt blue sent this:
"Hi -----*,
How is the progress? I have, believe it or not, located a producer that is interested in [the screenplay]! We should talk about it if you're interested.
Peace,
Jack"
Despite (still) having never read Bone's screenplay, Jack wants to sign him up. He said he has only five clients, so Ham would get much of his time. On the phone he sounded like the cat who ate the canary, like he knew something that Ham didn't but wouldn't tell till Bone signed. Jack said, "Less than 1/10th of 1/10th of 1% of all screenwriters are sitting where you are. A head of a studio wants to read your script." Just not Jack apparently.
Bone will retain an entertainment lawyer to look over any deals, but apparently there is no cash up front to Jack (i.e. no Nigerian scammer deal where a mere $5,000 will eventually net Bone a major motion picture deal). Jack is a pure "10%'r" - he receives 10% of whatever Ham does.
The out-of-the-blueness of the offer lends credibility but I'd be curious if anyone has any thoughts on this. Just hit the ol' comment button and follow the destructions. Bone says his second screenplay is much better than his first by the way.
* -- the agent remembered Bone's name, I just removed it for privacy purposes, lest you figure out who it is and break into his house in the middle of the night and steal his screenplays.
I was waiting in line for lunch when an old co-worker by the name of Shelly asked me for a Bone update. I reported that he reads the IT positions in the want ads and tries to keep from vomiting - some of them read as though they should say, "must be willing to bend over"; such is life when employers are in the driver seat. Shelly has an innocence about her, a certain wide-eyedness that suggests gullibility. So when I mentioned that Bone was writing another screenplay her strenuous eye-rolling was amusing.
But just as somebody has to win the lotto somebody's gotta sell a screenplay, else we'd all be reading books instead of going to movies. Bone forwarded me an email today that was shocking - his agent contact, who he'd begged to read his screenplay months ago, suddenly out of the bolt blue sent this:
"Hi -----*,
How is the progress? I have, believe it or not, located a producer that is interested in [the screenplay]! We should talk about it if you're interested.
Peace,
Jack"
Despite (still) having never read Bone's screenplay, Jack wants to sign him up. He said he has only five clients, so Ham would get much of his time. On the phone he sounded like the cat who ate the canary, like he knew something that Ham didn't but wouldn't tell till Bone signed. Jack said, "Less than 1/10th of 1/10th of 1% of all screenwriters are sitting where you are. A head of a studio wants to read your script." Just not Jack apparently.
Bone will retain an entertainment lawyer to look over any deals, but apparently there is no cash up front to Jack (i.e. no Nigerian scammer deal where a mere $5,000 will eventually net Bone a major motion picture deal). Jack is a pure "10%'r" - he receives 10% of whatever Ham does.
The out-of-the-blueness of the offer lends credibility but I'd be curious if anyone has any thoughts on this. Just hit the ol' comment button and follow the destructions. Bone says his second screenplay is much better than his first by the way.
* -- the agent remembered Bone's name, I just removed it for privacy purposes, lest you figure out who it is and break into his house in the middle of the night and steal his screenplays.
(Update: For what it's worth, I updated the last part of this vast post because I thought it was way too vague and didn't reflect what I was trying to say. Believe it or not, that happens in blogging. )
Labels...We've Got Labels...
There is a natural drive toward division, towards distinctiveness. It is painfully exhibited at our "ultra-orthodox" (to use a label) church by women who wear veils in church shunning women who don't.
Protestants are now more likely to think of themselves as Protestant or non-denominational - in the 1950s, if asked their religion, they would say Baptist or Methodist, never Protestant. Is this bonding because the external threat - once perceived as the Methodists or Episcopalians down the road in the '50s - is now the Muslim or atheist in 2003? Or is it because they are apathetic about theology but passionate about politics? Have we "traded down" by getting worked up over politics instead of theology?
There are legit times to stand up and be counted, so it's not as easy as just ascribe everything to this drive towards division. David Mills makes this point in his book, "The Saints' Guide to the Real Jesus", where he discusses and recusses how the early Christian saints were so dogmatic about the words - the creed - and why it was so important to them. Now we're willing to just fudge the differences - we all love Jesus right? The early saints were willing to die for seeming slight theological nuances because they loved Christ so much they wanted an accurate picture of Him passed on. "It is hard for us, trained as we have been to think that every conflict is a fight over power and control, to realize that some men may have fought for truth and love."
Of course, they were saints and we're not and Mills is careful to say we probably shouldn't try this at home. He explains how the early saints were able to be neither cowards nor foolhardy folks taking joy in skewering, something he admits moderns are mostly unable to finesse.
*
the Changes of the '60s
Fr. Jim Tucker writes:
Changes [in the '60s] were swift, radical, sometimes self-contradictory, and often very poorly explained. Good changes came side-by-side with terrible ones...Most of these changes were effected by clergy and religious (who themselves didn't exactly understand what was going on), and the laity seems to have followed along with whatever Father and Sister said. It didn't take too long for people to see how arbitrary much of this was and either to ignore the religious "professionals" altogether or to follow them quite selectively...The fruits of the chaos seem fairly obvious to me: rotten for everyone....
All of these things (and the other arrangments that others come up with) are, I think, sincere attempts to make sense out of the confusion that we've had since the 1960s, even though they're not equally successful in conveying the full meaning of Catholicism.
Truth Uber Alles
If there were good changes in the Church as a result of Vatican II, that suggests that something of the truth was imperfectly understood in order for changes to have been good. Given that we believe the Holy Spirit guided the Church to Vatican 2, there is no reason not to think the changes were good, at least the changes that were specified in the documents and not simply bad interpretations. The fact that some changes were necessary suggests that the order and discipline in the Church in the '50s was acquired partially at the cost of "under-nuanced" truth. An example of less-than-nuanced truth might be the popular interpretation of "no salvation outside the church" meaning literally "no salvation outside the visible church". But that doctrine, taken in the 50s way, could possibly have produced better Catholics given that folks may've felt willing to give more of themselves to a church that was the sole means of salvation. A poor motivation compared to the pure desire of following Christ, but we do live in a fallen world. Similarly, Mormons may produce good fruits in the form of lower divorce and abortion rates even though their doctrine is haywire. But we must seek after the truth because it shall set us free.
Update: Came across this fascinating nugget from Simone Weil via Hernan's Spanish blog that seems appropo:
Dostoyevski professed a blasphemy when he said: "If Christ is not the truth, I prefer to be with Christ far from the truth". Christ said: " I am the truth ". Also he said that it was bread, that was drink; but he said: "I am the true bread, the true drink", that is to say, the bread only of the truth, the drink only of the truth. It is necessary to wish him first like truth, and only next like food.
Labels...We've Got Labels...
There is a natural drive toward division, towards distinctiveness. It is painfully exhibited at our "ultra-orthodox" (to use a label) church by women who wear veils in church shunning women who don't.
Protestants are now more likely to think of themselves as Protestant or non-denominational - in the 1950s, if asked their religion, they would say Baptist or Methodist, never Protestant. Is this bonding because the external threat - once perceived as the Methodists or Episcopalians down the road in the '50s - is now the Muslim or atheist in 2003? Or is it because they are apathetic about theology but passionate about politics? Have we "traded down" by getting worked up over politics instead of theology?
There are legit times to stand up and be counted, so it's not as easy as just ascribe everything to this drive towards division. David Mills makes this point in his book, "The Saints' Guide to the Real Jesus", where he discusses and recusses how the early Christian saints were so dogmatic about the words - the creed - and why it was so important to them. Now we're willing to just fudge the differences - we all love Jesus right? The early saints were willing to die for seeming slight theological nuances because they loved Christ so much they wanted an accurate picture of Him passed on. "It is hard for us, trained as we have been to think that every conflict is a fight over power and control, to realize that some men may have fought for truth and love."
Of course, they were saints and we're not and Mills is careful to say we probably shouldn't try this at home. He explains how the early saints were able to be neither cowards nor foolhardy folks taking joy in skewering, something he admits moderns are mostly unable to finesse.
*
the Changes of the '60s
Fr. Jim Tucker writes:
Changes [in the '60s] were swift, radical, sometimes self-contradictory, and often very poorly explained. Good changes came side-by-side with terrible ones...Most of these changes were effected by clergy and religious (who themselves didn't exactly understand what was going on), and the laity seems to have followed along with whatever Father and Sister said. It didn't take too long for people to see how arbitrary much of this was and either to ignore the religious "professionals" altogether or to follow them quite selectively...The fruits of the chaos seem fairly obvious to me: rotten for everyone....
All of these things (and the other arrangments that others come up with) are, I think, sincere attempts to make sense out of the confusion that we've had since the 1960s, even though they're not equally successful in conveying the full meaning of Catholicism.
Truth Uber Alles
If there were good changes in the Church as a result of Vatican II, that suggests that something of the truth was imperfectly understood in order for changes to have been good. Given that we believe the Holy Spirit guided the Church to Vatican 2, there is no reason not to think the changes were good, at least the changes that were specified in the documents and not simply bad interpretations. The fact that some changes were necessary suggests that the order and discipline in the Church in the '50s was acquired partially at the cost of "under-nuanced" truth. An example of less-than-nuanced truth might be the popular interpretation of "no salvation outside the church" meaning literally "no salvation outside the visible church". But that doctrine, taken in the 50s way, could possibly have produced better Catholics given that folks may've felt willing to give more of themselves to a church that was the sole means of salvation. A poor motivation compared to the pure desire of following Christ, but we do live in a fallen world. Similarly, Mormons may produce good fruits in the form of lower divorce and abortion rates even though their doctrine is haywire. But we must seek after the truth because it shall set us free.
Update: Came across this fascinating nugget from Simone Weil via Hernan's Spanish blog that seems appropo:
Dostoyevski professed a blasphemy when he said: "If Christ is not the truth, I prefer to be with Christ far from the truth". Christ said: " I am the truth ". Also he said that it was bread, that was drink; but he said: "I am the true bread, the true drink", that is to say, the bread only of the truth, the drink only of the truth. It is necessary to wish him first like truth, and only next like food.
Sandra is the Constitution
Bill O'Reilly has often called Hillary Rodham Clinton the most powerful woman in America.
Balderdash!
How can it not be Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, the "swing voter" on the Court? Jonah Goldberg irreverently opines:
As Charles Krauthammer and others have noted, Sandy Baby (as John Riggins once dubbed her) is the Constitution of the United States of America. If she wants the text to mean free speech for everybody, then free speech for everybody it is. If she wants it to mean censorship for everybody, well shut my mouth!
....
And, yes, I'm exaggerating when I say Justice O'Connor can single-handedly (single-mindedly) make the American charter mean whatever she wants, but we really do need something dramatic to signal to the public that the Supreme Court is pretty much making stuff up as it goes.
Bill O'Reilly has often called Hillary Rodham Clinton the most powerful woman in America.
Balderdash!
How can it not be Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, the "swing voter" on the Court? Jonah Goldberg irreverently opines:
As Charles Krauthammer and others have noted, Sandy Baby (as John Riggins once dubbed her) is the Constitution of the United States of America. If she wants the text to mean free speech for everybody, then free speech for everybody it is. If she wants it to mean censorship for everybody, well shut my mouth!
....
And, yes, I'm exaggerating when I say Justice O'Connor can single-handedly (single-mindedly) make the American charter mean whatever she wants, but we really do need something dramatic to signal to the public that the Supreme Court is pretty much making stuff up as it goes.
Received email from a left-of-center acquaintence who said about Lee Greenwood's song, "It's not just that it's sappy cornball patriotism, it's that it's really become the Red-State Anthem, the way "Lift Ev'ry Voice" is the "black national anthem," etc. So it makes people nuts that way."
Understood. But is there a song embraced by the left that recognizes that the freedom and wealth we enjoy is on the backs of those who died, some in questionable wars but some in noble ones? I know many on the left approve of Guthrie's song, "This Land is Your Land" but I don't think that fits the gratitude bill. In fact, the final verse goes: In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple / Near the relief office - I see my people / And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin' /If this land's still made for you and me.
My sense is that many cry hysterically about freedoms not enjoyed while never paying homage to those who helped us get what we got. Gratitude is ever a hothouse flower...I recognize my own great lack in that dep't, so this is ridiculously hypocritical.
Understood. But is there a song embraced by the left that recognizes that the freedom and wealth we enjoy is on the backs of those who died, some in questionable wars but some in noble ones? I know many on the left approve of Guthrie's song, "This Land is Your Land" but I don't think that fits the gratitude bill. In fact, the final verse goes: In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple / Near the relief office - I see my people / And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin' /If this land's still made for you and me.
My sense is that many cry hysterically about freedoms not enjoyed while never paying homage to those who helped us get what we got. Gratitude is ever a hothouse flower...I recognize my own great lack in that dep't, so this is ridiculously hypocritical.
July 09, 2003
From Oprah's Book Club Page on "East of Eden".....
THE NOVEL: Timshel—Man's Ability to Choose Between Good and Evil
The main theme for East of Eden turns on the correct translation of the Hebrew word timshel, translated differently in various versions of the Bible. The word appears in the Cain and Abel story in Genesis, when God discusses sin with Cain.
What is the true meaning of this passage?
(a) God promises Cain that he will conquer sin ("thou shalt rule over him")?
(b) God orders Cain to conquer sin ("Do thou rule over him")?
(c) God blesses Cain with free will, leaving the choice to him ("Thou mayest rule over him")?
By studying the passage in the Bible, Adam Trask's Chinese servant, Lee, helps characters Samuel and Adam understand the intended original meaning in this passage from East of Eden:
"…this was the gold from our mining: 'Thou mayest.' The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin (and you can call sin ignorance). The King James translation makes a promise in 'Thou shalt,' meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word timshel—'Thou mayest'—that gives a choice. For if 'Thou mayest'—it is also true that 'Thou mayest not.' That makes a man great and that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of his brother he has still the great choice. He can choose his course and fight it through and win."
Here is the choice each of the characters in East of Eden face; as does, ultimately, every human being. No matter how deep-rooted the sin, there is always a chance for redemption. In the authoritative Orthodox Jewish translation from The Chumash: The Stone Edition the passage in question reads: "Surely if you improve yourself, you will be forgiven. But if you do not improve yourself, sin rests at the door. Its desire is toward you, yet you can conquer it."
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According to the Bible, Cain was the first murderer in history, committing a sin not only against God but against another human being because he felt unloved. After strife between man and God in Eden, here was strife between man and man; the filial bond is stressed time and again in the sixteen Bible verses, Although the Bible gives no reason* for why God chooses Abel's sacrifice over Cain's, Cain's violence is sparked by anger at the rejection of his gift, and jealousy and resentment toward his brother. As a result, not only does he kill, he lies. As punishment, he is condemned to "till the ground" fruitlessly and to be "a restless wanderer." His mark is not a curse, but a protective sign of God's enduring care. --Oprah Book Club
* -- Aquinas writes that God's love is preferential:
The good that God wills for His creatures, is not the divine essence. Therefore there is no reason why it may not vary in degree.
Everything loves what is like it, as appears from (Ecclus. 13:19): "Every beast loveth its like." Now the better a thing is, the more like is it to God. Therefore the better things are more loved by God.
I answer that, It must needs be, according to what has been said before, that God loves more the better things. For it has been shown (2, 3), that God's loving one thing more than another is nothing else than His willing for that thing a greater good: because God's will is the cause of goodness in things; and the reason why some things are better than others, is that God wills for them a greater good. Hence it follows that He loves more the better things. --St. Thomas Aquinas
Update: Kathy the Carmelite writes, "Actually, God cursed the ground as the result of Adam's sin (Gen. 3:17). Cain should have known better than to have offered God vegetables he grew from the soil!"
THE NOVEL: Timshel—Man's Ability to Choose Between Good and Evil
The main theme for East of Eden turns on the correct translation of the Hebrew word timshel, translated differently in various versions of the Bible. The word appears in the Cain and Abel story in Genesis, when God discusses sin with Cain.
What is the true meaning of this passage?
(a) God promises Cain that he will conquer sin ("thou shalt rule over him")?
(b) God orders Cain to conquer sin ("Do thou rule over him")?
(c) God blesses Cain with free will, leaving the choice to him ("Thou mayest rule over him")?
By studying the passage in the Bible, Adam Trask's Chinese servant, Lee, helps characters Samuel and Adam understand the intended original meaning in this passage from East of Eden:
"…this was the gold from our mining: 'Thou mayest.' The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin (and you can call sin ignorance). The King James translation makes a promise in 'Thou shalt,' meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word timshel—'Thou mayest'—that gives a choice. For if 'Thou mayest'—it is also true that 'Thou mayest not.' That makes a man great and that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of his brother he has still the great choice. He can choose his course and fight it through and win."
Here is the choice each of the characters in East of Eden face; as does, ultimately, every human being. No matter how deep-rooted the sin, there is always a chance for redemption. In the authoritative Orthodox Jewish translation from The Chumash: The Stone Edition the passage in question reads: "Surely if you improve yourself, you will be forgiven. But if you do not improve yourself, sin rests at the door. Its desire is toward you, yet you can conquer it."
****
According to the Bible, Cain was the first murderer in history, committing a sin not only against God but against another human being because he felt unloved. After strife between man and God in Eden, here was strife between man and man; the filial bond is stressed time and again in the sixteen Bible verses, Although the Bible gives no reason* for why God chooses Abel's sacrifice over Cain's, Cain's violence is sparked by anger at the rejection of his gift, and jealousy and resentment toward his brother. As a result, not only does he kill, he lies. As punishment, he is condemned to "till the ground" fruitlessly and to be "a restless wanderer." His mark is not a curse, but a protective sign of God's enduring care. --Oprah Book Club
* -- Aquinas writes that God's love is preferential:
The good that God wills for His creatures, is not the divine essence. Therefore there is no reason why it may not vary in degree.
Everything loves what is like it, as appears from (Ecclus. 13:19): "Every beast loveth its like." Now the better a thing is, the more like is it to God. Therefore the better things are more loved by God.
I answer that, It must needs be, according to what has been said before, that God loves more the better things. For it has been shown (2, 3), that God's loving one thing more than another is nothing else than His willing for that thing a greater good: because God's will is the cause of goodness in things; and the reason why some things are better than others, is that God wills for them a greater good. Hence it follows that He loves more the better things. --St. Thomas Aquinas
Update: Kathy the Carmelite writes, "Actually, God cursed the ground as the result of Adam's sin (Gen. 3:17). Cain should have known better than to have offered God vegetables he grew from the soil!"
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