March 2008 Old Testament – Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon – audio recording
Here’s the audio recording for the Old Testament January call. Listenonline or download the mp3 file and listen to it as a podcast on youripod.
Download Old-Testament-March2008-Ecclesiastes-Song-of-Solomon.mp3
February 2008 Team of Rivals – audio recording
Here’s the audio recording for the Team of Rivals November call. Listen online ordownload the mp3 file and listen to it as a podcast on your ipod.
Two love poems to ponder/enjoy
First poem:
“Astray or captured, all bear witness
to the consummate skill of this lady,
Shrewd at her craft and perfected by heaven.
Her hand has the feel of new-blown lotus,
Her breast the delicate scent of ripe berries
her arms twine like vine stems, and tangle,
And her face is a snare of fine-grained redwood.
And I? who am I in this recital? —
The proverbial goose
(and my love it lures me)
Tricked by her tasty bait
to this trap of my own ingenious imagining.”
Sounds like song of songs, right?
Except it’s not! It’s from Egypt 1,000 years earlier than
Song of Songs writing.
Second poem. A bit more recent love lyric. Not so much related to the Bible but
written by one of my all-time favorites Frank O’Hara. From 1960. Wanted to share it with you all.
Having a Coke With You
is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonne
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your love for yoghurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around the birches
partly because of the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary
it is hard to believe when I’m with you that there can be anything as still
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it
in the warm New York 4 o’clock light we are drifting back and forth
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles
and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them
I look
at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world
except possibly for the Polish Rider occasionally and anyway it’s in the Frick
which thank heavens you haven’t gone to yet so we can go together the first time
and the fact that you move so beautifully more or less takes care of Futurism
just as at home I never think of the Nude Descending a Staircase or
at a rehearsal a single drawing of Leonardo or Michelangelo that used to wow me
and what good does all the research of the Impressionists do them
when they never got the right person to stand near the tree when the sun sank
or for that matter Marino Marini when he didn’t pick the rider
as carefully as the horse
it seems they were all cheated of some marvellous experience
which is not going to go wasted on me which is why I am telling you about it
Song of Songs weekender
Hey guys, Thought you might like some food for thought for weekend reading of song of solomon.
Love. What a great idea! Glad the Bible finally took it up.
The more you love poetry the more you like this book. How does it stand up as a love poem? Is anyone willing to find an ancient or classical love poem that even through translation and transcription exceeds it for rhythm and flow? (I will look for some Islamic ones.)
Some of it reads so personal, yet it’s meant for public consumption. So let’s think about who is loving whom in this book: God and man? Man and Israel? “Man” and “woman”? Solomon and his BBW bride from egypt? If all of the above, why?
What about the structure, nothing like we’ve seen before in the Bible: Non-linear. Episodic. Call and response. Tightly focused, sensory moments and symbology that overlaps like rings. Is this product of several authors or poet’s intention?
Before we get all hot and bothered about the soft-core nature of S of S (“open up to me, my sister, my love”), heed some cooler heads on the subject of what happens when you plunge into sexual or erotic love without having the spiritual component. Digging around on the Web, I noticed that our fellow reading group member Pope Benedict XVI delivered his first encyclical, the Vatican’s first in many years, in Dec 2005 on the subject of love. It was called Deus Caritas Est (God Is Love). In it he draws on lots of sources, including the Song of Songs, to make his point that we all love along a continuum between eros (an ascending, possessive, sensual love) and agape (a descending giving love). But watch out, because eros is “at risk” of being downgraded to mere sex if it doesn’t have that spiritual component. Do you all think the Song of Songs encourages love without a spiritual component? (NB: Besides condemning one-night-stands, Pope Benedict has also come out against “unscrupulous adults who, lying to themselves and to [their children], draw them into the dead-end streets of consumerism.” Take that, Urban Outfitters.)
In chapt 2, why does the poetic address use so many nature references: flowers, birds, fig trees, grapes, foxes, lilies and harts. Intention?
Chap 3: The Lover wanders the streets at night looking for her beloved. Later, men around his bed “all hold swords, being expert in war: every man hath his sword upon his thigh because of fear in the night.” Why the note of dread? Why the war footing?
What’s going on in chapt 5? Why does the assignation fail?
Also, I thought you might love this line from corinthians:
“If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but do not have love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor 13:3).
More to come on second half of SofS over the weekend.
bruce
Bob Stevens (H2008)
Bob Stevens, who lives in NYC, is the founder of Growth Insight, Inc., a management consulting practice. Bob studied economics in Rhode Island and Wisconsin, and business at Columbia. A Buddhist, Bob chairs the
Board of Trustees of the Shambhala Meditation Center of New York.
Seeking Wisdom – February 2008 – audio recording
Here’s the audio recording for the first Seeking Wisdom, February 2008, call. Listen online or download the mp3 file and listen to it as a podcast on your ipod.Download SeekingWisdom-February2008-Call1.mp3
Book 8 Thucydides – audio recording
Here’s the audio recording for the Thucydides February 2008 book 8 call. Listen online or download the mp3 file and listen to it as a podcast on your ipod.Download Thucydides-February2008-Book8.mp3
February 2008 Old Testament – 1/2 of Psalms, Proverbs – audio recording
Here’s the audio recording for the Old Testament February call. Listenonline or download the mp3 file and listen to it as a podcast on youripod.
Proverbs
I hope you are all enjoying the second half of Psalms and the book of Proverbs.
I’m really enjoying Proverbs. Most of the lessons seem as relevant today as they must have been thousands of years ago. I laughed out loud when I read 18.2: “A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing personal opinion.” I was in a business meeting earlier this week that proved the point. I hope you will pick a couple of your favorites to share with the group on Tuesday.
I’m struck by the difference between the teaching of Proverbs and the laws stated in early books in the OT. These lessons and the method of instruction are much more compelling, because they are not simply commandments. Almost all explain the inherent benefit of the desired behavior – linking wise and righteous actions to joy and long life, and foolish and wicked actions to misery and death.
Bruce asked if others felt Provers was used to teach children. I think it is for teens and adults. The difference between the commandments and proverbs reminds me how parenting skills have to evolve as a child grows. I remember the first time I actually said “Because I said so!” to my 2 year old son. It probably wasn’t effective then, but it certainly wouldn’t work now that he’s 19.
I also hope you’ll give some thought to why Wisdom is personified as female. This isn’t unique to the Old Testament, and I find it very interesting indeed.
I’m looking forward to our call on Tuesday!
Kendall
My thoughts on Thucydides Book 8
Dear fellow readers,
As we wrap up our reading and discussion of Thucydides with Book 8, let me encourage you to keep in mind a few things as we conclude:
1. Persia’s role in the war becomes very important in Book 8. Ultimately, it will help determine the outcome of the war.
2. The political changes and challenges to Athenian democracy are very important to an Athenian like Thucydides, who was probably in exile at the moment and wondering if he would ever be able to return to his home. The Spartan influenced oligarchic revolution in Athens at the end of the war (404) would ultimately claim many victims, the most famous of which was Socrates.
3. The military theater of war in Book 8 embraces the shores of the Aegean sea on two continents (Europe and Asia). This geographical focus in Book 8 seems to define the location of conflict for the rest of the war. As Robert Strassler himself points out in his concise but eloquent Epilogue (pp. 549-554), Athens’ power base relies on contact with the colonies in Ionia and the Black Sea through the placeHellespont. Once these important connections are severed, Athens is doomed. Indeed, the major battles left to narrate (Cyzicus in 410, Arginousae in 406, Aegospotami in 405) all take place in the same theater of operations that Book 8 describes. We at least have a taste of what Thucydides was striving to cover before his work went unfinished.
Please join us in our final discussion of Book 8 as we invite Robert Strassler to help us bridge the unfinished portion of Thucydides great work to our own time and explore how history is recorded. Phil and I look forward to conversing with you and fielding your questions next week, Monday February 11 @ 8pm NYC time, call-in number 1-800-615-2900.
06. February 2008 by Arrian
Categories: Commentary, Thucydides | Tags: Commentary, Thucydides | Comments Off on My thoughts on Thucydides Book 8