Who said this, when, where, why, and about whom: (think Moby)
"He is a king over all the children of pride."
Monday, October 31, 2011
Sunday, October 30, 2011
The Secret of the Child; or, if you are one, be one.
This may take a while to unfold as children are like the most convoluted rose or origami figure one can imagine. Keep in mind also that I write pretty much off the cuff; but usuallly about stuff that's been percolating quite a while.
I love to visit The Onion from time to time--amidst all the usual perversities there are some useful ideas and even verities. What struck me most memorably was a skit some time ago in which an Onion reporter purportedly found two of the last living adults in America. I don't recall any of the details; but it suddenly struck me that there are really NO adults living on the planet even now. And no writer who can even define what one might look like.
Personhood, as I said in my previous blog,(bassocontinuo), is a given; it's a gift; a personality is whatever traits inher in a particular individual. Some aspects can be seen right away; like my ornery nature. Others take years to develop--and some aspects we hide so well that no one sees them. Even sometimes ourselves.
Recently I read in Sports Illustrated about Walter Payton and the kind of hell he put his wife through; not as badly as a certain golf personality, but it only takes one to hit it, as they say in baseball. I'd like to believe he accepted the forgiveness that was always there when Mike Singletary visited him in the last month. But I can never assume.
By some odd coincidence (ha!) I also pulled down "Anna Karenina" off the top shelf where it has been lingering or languishing for decades beside "War and Peace". It appears that the theme is exactly the same--a faithful wife used and abused in this case by a "well-liked" hypocrite named Oblonsky.
Does this kind of disloyal, backstabbing, vicious behavior strike anyone as it does me--nauseating.? I'm no longer sure I'll get through this book--for one thing Tolstoy may not have been an adulterer, but like his admirer Ghandi, he treated his wife with less dignity than most dogs receive.
.
What's the point? And how does that relate to children? (As if that were not obvious enough)
It's quite easy to define adultery. Not so with adulthood. Adultery is cruel thoughtless child's play for sexually advanced adolescents, which is far more indulgent than I really mean to be.
A Calvin and Hobbes masterpiece has Calvin reading the movie ads out loud: "Adult situations. What's that supposed to mean?" Hobbes replies, "I suppose it has to do with paying bills, doing laundry, and stuff like that." Calvin: "It's a wonder anybody goes to these!"
My point exactly. No one would go. And that's because there are no adults--it's like "The Lord of the Flies" writ large, complete with the oxymoronic "rescue destroyers".
The Bible purposely and realistically captions all of us as children of one sort or another. At no point that I can recall does Jesus ever say to anyone, as we often do is exasperation, "Oh, grow up!" "And a wise child will say under his breath, "Never!)
To be continued.
I love to visit The Onion from time to time--amidst all the usual perversities there are some useful ideas and even verities. What struck me most memorably was a skit some time ago in which an Onion reporter purportedly found two of the last living adults in America. I don't recall any of the details; but it suddenly struck me that there are really NO adults living on the planet even now. And no writer who can even define what one might look like.
Personhood, as I said in my previous blog,(bassocontinuo), is a given; it's a gift; a personality is whatever traits inher in a particular individual. Some aspects can be seen right away; like my ornery nature. Others take years to develop--and some aspects we hide so well that no one sees them. Even sometimes ourselves.
Recently I read in Sports Illustrated about Walter Payton and the kind of hell he put his wife through; not as badly as a certain golf personality, but it only takes one to hit it, as they say in baseball. I'd like to believe he accepted the forgiveness that was always there when Mike Singletary visited him in the last month. But I can never assume.
By some odd coincidence (ha!) I also pulled down "Anna Karenina" off the top shelf where it has been lingering or languishing for decades beside "War and Peace". It appears that the theme is exactly the same--a faithful wife used and abused in this case by a "well-liked" hypocrite named Oblonsky.
Does this kind of disloyal, backstabbing, vicious behavior strike anyone as it does me--nauseating.? I'm no longer sure I'll get through this book--for one thing Tolstoy may not have been an adulterer, but like his admirer Ghandi, he treated his wife with less dignity than most dogs receive.
.
What's the point? And how does that relate to children? (As if that were not obvious enough)
It's quite easy to define adultery. Not so with adulthood. Adultery is cruel thoughtless child's play for sexually advanced adolescents, which is far more indulgent than I really mean to be.
A Calvin and Hobbes masterpiece has Calvin reading the movie ads out loud: "Adult situations. What's that supposed to mean?" Hobbes replies, "I suppose it has to do with paying bills, doing laundry, and stuff like that." Calvin: "It's a wonder anybody goes to these!"
My point exactly. No one would go. And that's because there are no adults--it's like "The Lord of the Flies" writ large, complete with the oxymoronic "rescue destroyers".
The Bible purposely and realistically captions all of us as children of one sort or another. At no point that I can recall does Jesus ever say to anyone, as we often do is exasperation, "Oh, grow up!" "And a wise child will say under his breath, "Never!)
To be continued.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
FYI
I am sorry - but maybe not real sorry - that I cannot do "comments" because neither of my computers will let me--something about the wrong Google account. I am tempted to get an account with someone else so I can bypass this. Any suggestions? In the meantime any replies with have to be included in my regular "formal" posts.
As to your question, Dennis, I mean the novel and not the play. As Camus would probably have to admit, the play is more of a homage to the very long novel: And the play captures well the attitudes and thoughts of Camus with none of the breadth of Dostoevsky. The incidents of Chapter 7, Part III, are not found in the play nor in any commentaries I have ever read so far. "Impending Doom LTD" is all that most people want from Dostoevsky--the suspense of observing and revelling in a constant parade of evil, with not a thought of what pilgrimages are going on in and around them.
The "Final Wanderings of Stephan Trofimovich" just precedes the conclusion in which Stavrogin ends his pilgrimage as well, in entirely the opposite direction i.e. he hangs himself. It seems improbable in the extreme that the author did not wants us to "compare and constrast" the two--something that all critics I have read simply refuse to do. The reason is both simple and embarrassing and almost openly stated by Dost.--people are either ashamed of Christ--or not.
This would all be literary theory if it didn't hit so close to my home. Perhaps that's why secular critics are so tone-deaf to the Savior and any personal contact with God. (See today's facebook entries) They just don't get it, as they say--except that they in almost total ignorance simply dismiss scathingly any reference to the above concerns--their latest default position (W. Percy et.al.) is: "Moving right along....."
For myself, the difference between this blog and bassocontiuo is that I have realized that life is "moving right along", all right--At the Speed of Light. I have no idea how much time I may have left; but whatever it is, it's a pittance, not even a mite, in comparison to the width and length and height and timelessness of Christ. No time left to be ashamed or reticent or hint around or point to other men: except as "ensamples" of Grace Accepted, Grace Rejected, or most commonly among the living, "Grace-on-hold." See Flannery quote on recent facebook entry.
As to your question, Dennis, I mean the novel and not the play. As Camus would probably have to admit, the play is more of a homage to the very long novel: And the play captures well the attitudes and thoughts of Camus with none of the breadth of Dostoevsky. The incidents of Chapter 7, Part III, are not found in the play nor in any commentaries I have ever read so far. "Impending Doom LTD" is all that most people want from Dostoevsky--the suspense of observing and revelling in a constant parade of evil, with not a thought of what pilgrimages are going on in and around them.
The "Final Wanderings of Stephan Trofimovich" just precedes the conclusion in which Stavrogin ends his pilgrimage as well, in entirely the opposite direction i.e. he hangs himself. It seems improbable in the extreme that the author did not wants us to "compare and constrast" the two--something that all critics I have read simply refuse to do. The reason is both simple and embarrassing and almost openly stated by Dost.--people are either ashamed of Christ--or not.
This would all be literary theory if it didn't hit so close to my home. Perhaps that's why secular critics are so tone-deaf to the Savior and any personal contact with God. (See today's facebook entries) They just don't get it, as they say--except that they in almost total ignorance simply dismiss scathingly any reference to the above concerns--their latest default position (W. Percy et.al.) is: "Moving right along....."
For myself, the difference between this blog and bassocontiuo is that I have realized that life is "moving right along", all right--At the Speed of Light. I have no idea how much time I may have left; but whatever it is, it's a pittance, not even a mite, in comparison to the width and length and height and timelessness of Christ. No time left to be ashamed or reticent or hint around or point to other men: except as "ensamples" of Grace Accepted, Grace Rejected, or most commonly among the living, "Grace-on-hold." See Flannery quote on recent facebook entry.
Thursday, October 27, 2011
"Philosophy is dead." to Mr. Hawking!
Etienne Gilson: "Philosophy always buries its undertakers."
So often men, satisfied and smug within their tight little world of specializations and special friends, call for, or declare, an end to the world outside of their fields.
All truth is inconvenient to someone most of the time; and ready to be sacrificed at any moment. Anymore we use the term only as a political or personal "wedge."
But it doesn't go away at our whims and fashions of culture or our narrow worldviews. We are inherently and biologically blind, of material necessity. Which is why it makes sense to follow the divine mandate of being poor in spirit. I see no other logical possibility; hubris is always unjustifiable--note that it is only mentioned in literature as a pejorative term--but always in reference to someone outside one's self or circle.
I would like to develop this further when I locate my copy of "The Possessed"--to compare the two maiu pilgrimages of the book which I believe Dost. meant to be compared and contrasted in process and in outcome.
Etienne Gilson: "Philosophy always buries its undertakers."
So often men, satisfied and smug within their tight little world of specializations and special friends, call for, or declare, an end to the world outside of their fields.
All truth is inconvenient to someone most of the time; and ready to be sacrificed at any moment. Anymore we use the term only as a political or personal "wedge."
But it doesn't go away at our whims and fashions of culture or our narrow worldviews. We are inherently and biologically blind, of material necessity. Which is why it makes sense to follow the divine mandate of being poor in spirit. I see no other logical possibility; hubris is always unjustifiable--note that it is only mentioned in literature as a pejorative term--but always in reference to someone outside one's self or circle.
I would like to develop this further when I locate my copy of "The Possessed"--to compare the two maiu pilgrimages of the book which I believe Dost. meant to be compared and contrasted in process and in outcome.
Sunday, October 23, 2011
SCIENCE CANNOT PROVIDE AN ULTIMATE EXPLANATION OF ORDER
"As (Stephen) Hawking and Mlodinkow occasionally seem to realize, far from philosophy being dead, having been killed by science, the deepest arguments in this area are not scientific but philosophical. And if the philosophical reasoning runs in the direction I have suggested, it is not only philosophy but also natural theology that is alive and ready to bury its latest would-be undertakers."
--from Philosophy Lives by John Haldane in First Things Jan 2011
This is his concluding summary; to see how he got there, read the entire article.
As a practicing scientist, I get a frequent look in the kitchen and find lots of statistics, speculations, and assumptions that reflect our culture more than anything justifiable in any objective sense. And what we get is not a twice baked potato but one half baked--which is being way too generous. (My Flo used to eat raw potatos when she was little, from her uncle's store on Taylor Street--so it can be done--but it's the difference between hot, cold, and lukewarm--which I have on the very best Author-ity.) (Also think iced coffee, steaming coffee...and coffe at room temperature--that is, one that has adapted to its surroundings; read "culture."
Dennis: do you read First Things? My son Dr. Stephen can't get enough of it and finds it quite useful in his lines of work and thought. I prefer Touchstone because it is more Lewis-like; but both magazines are a meld of Catholic, Evangelical, and even Jewish authors.
--from Philosophy Lives by John Haldane in First Things Jan 2011
This is his concluding summary; to see how he got there, read the entire article.
As a practicing scientist, I get a frequent look in the kitchen and find lots of statistics, speculations, and assumptions that reflect our culture more than anything justifiable in any objective sense. And what we get is not a twice baked potato but one half baked--which is being way too generous. (My Flo used to eat raw potatos when she was little, from her uncle's store on Taylor Street--so it can be done--but it's the difference between hot, cold, and lukewarm--which I have on the very best Author-ity.) (Also think iced coffee, steaming coffee...and coffe at room temperature--that is, one that has adapted to its surroundings; read "culture."
Dennis: do you read First Things? My son Dr. Stephen can't get enough of it and finds it quite useful in his lines of work and thought. I prefer Touchstone because it is more Lewis-like; but both magazines are a meld of Catholic, Evangelical, and even Jewish authors.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
"Doctor Elihu will see you now."
On the followup visit:
"suffer me a little..."
Patient: Haven't I suffered enough, already?
"I have yet to speak on God's behalf..."
pt: So;you admit you were wrong, then? That everything you've said until now was just your opinion?
"I will fetch my knowledge from afar."
pt: What? the UN?
"If they serve Him, they shall spend their days in prosperity and their years in pleasures."
I think I may have heard something of the sort recently.
Here's the prosperity gospel and the Protestant ethic nicely summarized.
"We cannot order our speech by reason of darkness."
God: "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?"
Big Hint: God is never a patient. But for His inexplicable patience I give thanks--but,no, not nearly enough.
"suffer me a little..."
Patient: Haven't I suffered enough, already?
"I have yet to speak on God's behalf..."
pt: So;you admit you were wrong, then? That everything you've said until now was just your opinion?
"I will fetch my knowledge from afar."
pt: What? the UN?
"If they serve Him, they shall spend their days in prosperity and their years in pleasures."
I think I may have heard something of the sort recently.
Here's the prosperity gospel and the Protestant ethic nicely summarized.
"We cannot order our speech by reason of darkness."
God: "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?"
Big Hint: God is never a patient. But for His inexplicable patience I give thanks--but,no, not nearly enough.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Words are a source of misunderstanding--The fox
The book of Job is known for its many windy words and speeches--which are not far removed from the spirit of the "information age"--which is far removed from any semblance of wisdom, as even Oscar Wilde noted long ago.
The problem with words and reasonings is that they lead us down a unique path, every time, of an artificial understanding, usually based on "information" of a very transient nature, deeply salted with the overwhelming desire to seem righteous to ourselves and to as many others as possible.
Science purports to be "objective" but science itself is only an artifice to service our perceived needs for, again, self-legitimization. "We all offend in many ways" by the simple fact that no one can get out of him/her self.
Paul got it right: "Who will deliver me from this body of death?" i.e. our own self seeking which is at the same time ironically self-destructive?
Answer that (and answer Job aright) and you get The Grand Prize!!!
The problem with words and reasonings is that they lead us down a unique path, every time, of an artificial understanding, usually based on "information" of a very transient nature, deeply salted with the overwhelming desire to seem righteous to ourselves and to as many others as possible.
Science purports to be "objective" but science itself is only an artifice to service our perceived needs for, again, self-legitimization. "We all offend in many ways" by the simple fact that no one can get out of him/her self.
Paul got it right: "Who will deliver me from this body of death?" i.e. our own self seeking which is at the same time ironically self-destructive?
Answer that (and answer Job aright) and you get The Grand Prize!!!
Saturday, October 15, 2011
New Hobbit in the 'Hood
This is named after The Habit of Being, a wonderful collection of the letters of Flannery O'Connor, the Southern fiction writer who dealt a great deal in mystery and grace in the grotesque. Tolkein is a different sort of a writer dealing more in epic fantasias. But since these are exciting times to get in the Hobbit Habit--you know, cowls and owls et all--well then..."Hurry up please its time." et set era
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