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There is a school of thought that posits that Adam - of Genesis fame - was not actually the first man, but rather the first prophet in the line of prophets that spawned the Abrahamic faiths. The crux of this is that there was nothing good nor evil prior to the teachings of the creator having reached us - hence like the ravening wolf or the ferocious lion, there was nothing intrinsically wrong in anything we did since it was only natural. Once the concept was introduced that there was a purpose-driven, life-loving God, however, good and evil could be finally identified as those behaviors which departed from that purpose and interfered with that life. Hence the tale of Cain and Abel and most everything else in the Torah.
Now I am not here to argue this idea today. I am more interested in the location. Adam is said to have appeared in the garden of Eden, and of all the locales that have been proposed as the "real" Eden, I have been most convinced by the suggestion of David Rohl that it might have been Tabriz. I think it was the documentary, In Search of Eden - which can be found on You Tube that mostly convinced me. I may well be mistaken, however, so do your own research.
What intrigues me about this location is that some six thousand years later, around 1844, another man appeared in Iran claiming to be next in the Adamic line of prophets. Ignoring every gory detail about this, I will merely note that the Islamic clergy of Iran had this man executed on July 9, 1850 in what was then downtown Tabriz.
In a sense, then, what began with Adam in Eden came full circle and was brought to a close in the same location. Curious.
So, if Iran was in fact the host to the original garden of Eden, then it would follow that some of the oldest cultural elements of civilization may have sprung from that region, and one might expect that some of the most mature concepts regarding life the universe and everything have been and continue to be evolving there.
Sadly, Iran is mostly being demonized these days - not without good reason, mind you - to the citizens of the USA, so it is a knee-jerk reaction of many in the West to eschew everything associated with Iran. In fact, most of the evils that issue out of that country seem to be caused by a minority of fanatics who have a stranglehold on governance and their oppressions are evident and well documented. To some extent, the people of that country are rising up against that oppression, so there may well be an end one day to that circumstance.
All of this is a long way around to recommending that every "educated" American should be familiar with the story of Layla and Majnun - perhaps the original "Romeo and Juliette". It is a tale familiar to most every Iranian, one that inspired Eric Clapton in composing perhaps his most famous tune. Maybe one day, Hollywood will grace us with a worthy film depiction of it.
Likewise, those who would account themselves as culturally informed might wish to peruse some of the poetry of Rumi:
BeyondOut beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field.
I'll meet you there.When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.Ideas,
language,
even the phrase "each other"
doesn't make any sense.
and Hafez:
Will Beat You UpJealousy
And most all of your sufferings
Are from believing
You know better than God.
Of course,
Such a special brand of arrogance as that
Always proves disastrous,
And will rip the seams
In your caravan tent,
Then cordially invite in many species
Of mean biting flies and
Strange thoughts-
That will
Beat you
Up.
So just some ideas on how to fill your new year, or whatever.
Oh yeah, and if any of your neighbors are Iranian refugees, consider going out of your way to talk with them. For the record, I am not Iranian, but one of my neighbors is.
--
"So make the best of the situation before I finally go insane", -Derek and the Dominos, Layla
(Score: 1) by nostyle on Monday February 06, @02:36AM (11 children)
I learned a new word today courtesy of the NYT Crossword (I am religious on Sunday): fantod. I will leave it to the reader to research it further, but you can get through your entire life without knowing it. I have.
So recapping [poorly] the twenty verses in chapter two so far, TLDR:
It is interesting to notice that this seems to be a universal response to any and all guidance, like
So, then, to complete the first tenth of chapter two, here is the next installment, wherein we begin to get an overview of the actual guidance:
Since the ensuing verses [spoiler alert] take up the topic of Adam, my plan is to start a new thread in this journal (about Adam).
--
-Prince and the Revolution, Purple Rain
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 06, @04:00AM (2 children)
> Since the ensuing verses [spoiler alert] take up the topic of Adam, my plan is to start a new thread in this journal (about Adam).
Then I take it all back. Fannoyed.
Drifting is what keeps life... life, it's what keeps the "human" in language. Communication is a free-association art, growing upon previous meals. This is a lunch meeting, right?
Frankly, there is not much to recommend the front page, and you'll slip right off again, with the next wave of frenzies. I keep my notes in one pile. I don't always eat at the same place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 06, @05:14AM (1 child)
You mistake my meaning. I will not start a new journal - merely post a root level comment to this one. This one has legs.
It's like how you go to the party, and nobody there is talking about anything interesting, and none of them are understanding anything you say. So you gravitate to an obscure corner and get comfortable and maybe start singing a little song to yourself to pass the time. Then after a while, if you are lucky, some kindred spirits appear, likewise fleeing the vacuousness of the main room, and maybe you don't see eye to eye, but at least you don't get totally bored. Maybe I simply never learned to drink myself silly.
So this is an abandoned corner, and while here I thought I'd bury some treasure since I am exponentially losing my health and cannot count on finishing my Mona Lisa ever. I only have something less than a quarter of the Book corrected, and it gets more painful to process verses with each passing day. In the end, though, every verse I reflect upon resolves into something I can truly agree with and benefit from, so I bury the text of it here so somebody someday might see how that happens.
I heard somewhere long ago that, back in the days when there were "real" filibusters, long tracts of the Bible got read into the official congressional record. I tickles to imagine I could embed a rendition of the entire Qur'an in the SN database.
Still, moving forward I may need to start a new journal when our comment count here exceeds some reasonable limit. I expect I would toss one on the front page and allow it to slowly roll off after about a month before posting anything that might rile up the natives.
And, of course, if enough non-AC comments were to reach me with the advice that I should STFU and the news that somehow this journal is damaging the site somehow, I could in an instant desist from further mischief here. But then there would be no reason to remain at the party.
--
Now fantod, according to dictionary.com is "a state of extreme nervousness or restlessness". So if you get nervous when you get up to perform on stage, would that be a fantod of the opera?
--
"'Cause I'm already standin' / On the ground /" -Eagles, Peaceful Easy Feeling
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 06, @06:31AM
Didn't look up my variation "Fannoyed," assuming it would be a contraction of fan and annoyed. Well, if you look it up, it seems that some people have way too much time on their hands.
As to your project, am always reminded of these lines:
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And always reminded that Dylan Thomas died at age 39. Please do enjoy these days with someone.
As far as I'm concerned, this is the only thing making this place livable. Almost quoted janrinok in #1289265 [soylentnews.org], but it basically says almost nothing except that they're happy with main topic participation w/o AC ruining/spamming threads, and that same AC mob has gone off to this dark corner, but it somehow doesn't ruin things here. Pat 'em on the head and send 'em to the backwoods where they belong. He hates running off-topic even more than he hates [redacteds], and thinks that metaphor and simile are euphemisms for... well, here's a tag from the bottom the page, earlier today:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 06, @09:38PM (6 children)
Even more Hanoing would be if this split into two pages. Amend an old topic, and the next time you try to find it, it's on the wrong page. Doing The Soylent Shuffle.
Just don't delete this one. What with the world's lowered expectations, this would have a quintillion followers on a real site... and even a few of them wouldn't be bots or chatbots.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 06, @11:33PM (5 children)
Please don't throw me into the prior batch.
[Brando voice says,] "I could have been a
contenderinfluencer!"-nostyle [imagines dancing geek to geek on TikTok]
--
"Well, I coulda' been an actor, but I wound up here" -Don Henley, Dirty Laundry
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @09:27PM (4 children)
> "Well, I coulda' been an actor, but I wound up here"
Amp down.
Amp up: "Money for Nothing" - Dire Straits
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @11:19PM (3 children)
Sure, but it only seems so. It's like the other incorrect assertion "chicks for free". Anyone with any experience will tell you there is always an associated cost and like the third law of motion, everything you own has an equal and opposite ownership over you.
Still, I don't "get" the draw of Addison Rae and the Kardashian/Jenner K-coven, finding them indistinguishable from any other fat girl with a glam team.
I probably shouldn't say all this out loud. I mean God must love a working girl, right?
--
-Eagles, Hotel California
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 09, @11:49PM (2 children)
Since the Panda-Demonic, haven't been out all that much. Of late, seems like a side-effect of all those shots is eyelashes growing like beach-house awnings. Blink, and their eyeglasses flying off. There's an investigation for you!
See, I watch a half-dozen TV shows, and virtually none based in my own stomping ground... especially on account of being stomped out affects one. Then there was this one epic with white sofas and supernatural beings mugging for cameras. They all had bulging... wallets. They all had those awnings... they must be the carriers! It's affecting children, now! Does the FDA or DMV know about this?
Flashed back a generation in that suburb of sin and that guy with the awnings standing and preaching before the fawning acolytes who only pretended to eat their dinner. And I thought... there's something not quite right goin' on. They buy the best, but they don't eat nothin', they do nothin' for nobody, yet their wallets bulge. Maybe it's too many colitas. What else is growing unhinged, fringed from that outbreak?
In retrospect, Canoga Park was like paradise.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 11, @05:05AM
It must be spreading! My nosehair is getting unruly, lately. And it's so hard to comb.
It's not helping my wallet a bit, either.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 13, @12:11AM
"In earthly riches fear is hidden and peril is concealed."
--
"Every girl crazy 'bout a sharp-dressed man" -ZZTop
(Score: 1) by nostyle on Tuesday February 14, @06:20AM
Correction - in case anyone cares. Verse 2:28 should read "and He gave you life":