During the last season of “West Wing,” reporters tried to pin down candidate Arnie Vinnick (Alan Alda) on the subject of his religious beliefs. Vinnick–who wanted to keep the fact that he’d lost faith in God under wraps–stated that his personal views on God were off limits, he’d never discuss them, that they weren’t relevant to the job he was to do as president, and that as far as he was concerned that was the end of it. To all intents and purposes it was. It never came up again in the series.
I commented at the time that in the real world, that would never happen. That such an assertion would only be the beginning of the story, not the end of it.
Now it seems that we’re seeing the scenario played out in real life as Rudy Giuliani asserts that his personal religious beliefs are just that–personal–and should have no bearing on his campaign.
This promptly became front page news on “Newsday” and now we’ll see just how fast the question goes away. I suspect it won’t anytime soon.
The ironic thing is that Giuliani is both right and wrong. The fact is that his personal beliefs *shouldn’t* be a factor. If he doesn’t want to discuss them, he should be entitled to that. The problem becomes that the automatic assumption is that he is either agnostic or atheist, and in a society where the vast majority of people assert a belief in SOME sort of divine spirit, that’s not going to go over very well.
On the other hand it really IS a relevant question because look who we’ve got running the country now: A man who believes that he’s operating at the personal behest of God. Bush doesn’t simply believe in God; he KNOWS there’s a God and that he and God are tight. If a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, too much “knowledge” can be a lethal thing.
If Giuliani is an atheist and doesn’t want to discuss that beause he figures it’s nobody’s business and that it might cost him votes, I can understand both viewpoints. Still, knowing that a candidate will not run this country and world affairs under the belief that he’s taking his marching orders from God might not be such a bad thing.
PAD
• 
Sort of like a mad Mad Lib?
Re: Ten Commandment and biblical text.
For the story of the ten commandments I was looking at my own bible in Hebrew, which is presumably the original un-translated language. But of course, the Hebrew text also has a history of copying and editing.
For the quotes I gave I used biblegateway.com, which has as default the New International Version; except when I directly translated from the Hebrew myself.
I don’t think there is much of a change between the KJB and this English version. And I’m not sure if there is that much of a change in meaning between the original Hebrew and the KJB, although there might be som difference in nuances, such as having ‘words’ instead of ‘things’. I personaly feel that the old English of KJB captures better the archaic feel of the Hebrew top me as a Modern Hebrew speaker, and the beauty of the language which I’ve now come to appreciate more. But this is just style.
As I understand it, the Christian Old Testament is derived from a Greek translation of the Hebrew made by 70 Rabbis before Christianity. I’ve heard that the 70 rabbis made changes in the Greek version, to fit the text to the non-Jewish audience. But I don’t know what were the changes or if it is relevant to this discussion.
“Another point was the one I mentioned. There are… discrepancies… in what’s popularly believed and how things are actually written. Even if you don’t completely agree with the Commandments example, there is still the Magdalene example. If you’re willing to play a little more, I can even throw another one out there.”
Yes, I agree there are discrepancies. It should be noted that texts like that leave a lot of room for interpretation and filling in the blanks. These interpretations end up influencing popular beliefs. This is very true for the Hebrew text, which is very succint and spare.
It should also be noted that the text of the Old Testament and the New Testament are seperate froom each other. The NT was written much later and in Greek.
I own a Hebrew translation of the New Testament distributed by missionaries. They tried to be cute by translating the name ‘Peter’, which in Greek means rock, with an aramaic word for rock.
“I’ve actually read several different theories on the subject. Some hold the belief that the laws given to Moses by God as first listed in the Bible were to be verbal reminders of already established laws. While some prior religious laws don’t quite match the wording for some of those given starting at Exodus 20:1, you can find the ancient laws very close to those. And some of those listed laws are too obviously preexisting laws. Certainly no one is dumb enough to try and claim that the Jews were unaware that lying, theft and murder wrong and/or crimes.”
When we were discussion thou shall not kill I did a little research. Some modern interpreters said that this commandment goes against the laws of Hammurabi by making murder absolutely illegal without differentiating between slaves and free men or allowing paying money to redeem the crime, or punishing relations for the crime of a person.
I think that according to Orthodox Judaism God told Moses all the Verbal Torah which is the basis of Jewish law.
Concerning the Ten Commandments it would seem that, according to the text:
1) God speaks the familiar (ethical) Ten Commandments.
2) God speaks the more detailed judgements.
3) Either the ethical commandments or the commandments and the judgement were inscribed on tablets.
4) When Moses makes the new tablets it is said that he writes the same things as on the original, but there is also a new list of ritual commandments. After that list we hear the first reference to ‘ten’ commandments.
5) The chronolgy in general is a little strange.
6) Whoever wrote Deutoronomy felt it necessary to recite again the ethical commandments.
7) The word ‘dvarim'(things) is used to refer both to the ethical and the ritual commandments.
The question now is how to interpret this. I don’t think it is unreasonable to interpret it as saying that the ethical commandments, i.e. the familiar ones, were inscribed on the tablets in both versions. This seems to have been the belief of Jews from a very early stage.
I agree that Christians and Jews should be more aware of the complexity and ambiguity of the biblical text before they speak of reading it literally or attrubuting objectivity to it.
It is true that mainstream religions today exhibit more tolerance to other religions than in the past, which may be attributed in part to these religions having a little more humility about their faith than in the past. Fundementalists (in all religions) resent this tolerant attitude, and want to go back to the good old intolerant certainty.
“That being the case, can you have a “true” Christian? Is there even such a thing today? And, getting back into the area of PAD’s kickoff to this thread, is it truly relevant what variation of the faith someone believes in if you can in fact say that no modern version of the faith is actually 100% right?”
I would say that he modern individual version of the faith is more relevant than its relation to earlier or ‘original’ versions of the faith, except for Historians.
Re: Onanism.
“Am I the only one who grew up thinking that it was a really bizarre idea that Onan could father Er’s son?”
People should emember that religions were formed by ancient people whose attitudes were much different than our own. Ones that can only be understood in anthropological terms. Here the idea is that by taking his brother’s place Onan takes on himself the continuation of the bloodline to which they both belong. Even today, if I had a brother who died, and hios wife sought to remarry, we would have to go through a ritual in which I release her from the obligation to marry me. It is a very ancient ritual that is described in the book of Ruth. Didn’t Henry VIII marry Catherine of Aragon after his brother died?
As I understand it Judaism forbids the ‘casting of seend without purpose,’ which was Onan’s crime. I don’t know exactly what’s the official stand on the whole issue. I think the focus on the pleasure involved reflects Christian attitudes, but I’m not sure. When I was in highschool we had to read a book (written by a 20th century Jewish novelist) about an 18th centuy Jew who is taken as a slave and has an affair with a non Jewish woman. At a certain point he considers ‘doing what Onan did’ in order to prevent pregnancy. I don’t remember if he considered it a sin as such.
In modern Hebrew the word for mastrubation is ‘onanut’. But this may be a translation of the English term.
“Is it just nit-picking?”
Just nit, I hope.
In any case, you’ve made your point well. As I said above, thetext is too complex, too ancient for anybody to talk about it without at least some humility, none the less impose a certain interpretation of it on others.
“Atheism just lacks anything resisting the resolve to kill. It makes it more likely that a given individual will, in fact, kill. There is never a guarantee because an atheist can choose to do the right thing despite what his or her philosophy logically entails.”
Ooooooookay. What, exactly, would make an atheist more likely to kill, or, make a theist any less likely to make the choice to do the right thing? Basing an arguement only on whether or not someone believes in a god or not will not tell you whether or not they will kill. There are always circumstances behind a killing. If one of the psychos in the world is coming at my family with a weapon of their choosing, I’m pretty sure that I’m going to kill them first. Doesn’t really matter if I’m atheist, theist, or anything in between. Also, I know many extremely morally centered atheists that would not be happy with your line of thought, but, being as centered as they are, most would be willing to let you have your beliefs as they wouldn’t want to impose theirs on you. Might want to take a lesson from that.
Jerry, that’s an interesting question, about being a “true” Christian. What would constitute that title, and by whose interpretation? Do you just go with the accepted Scripture, or do you go with the add-ons that have been thrown into the mix over the last couple thousand years? Suppose that Gospel of Judas is confirmed to be real? What does THAT do? I’m not saying you should have the answers here, just an interesting line of thought.
Well, I’m glad that you two think I got some of my point across well enough to understand it. This is a topic that I usually try to phrase everything very neutrally so that it doesn’t come across as attacking the faith or people’s beliefs and it’s one of the topics that I’m far better at discussing in a live, face to face exchange where you can pick up nuance in voice and build off of each others points in real time. That often makes me a little less good at long form text discussions on the subject.
Micha, you’re right the the variances in modern versions aren’t too extreme, but they do exist on some key points or there wouldn’t be the different factions in Christianity over interpretation and teachings that exist today. There certainly wouldn’t be the almost violent hatred of Catholics by some churches. (And that’s not a misstatement. I can show you entire churches that view the Catholics as the group who destroyed the faith.) There’s also boatloads of historical evidence that there have been numerous errors in the process of translating the Bible over the centuries.
There are issues where words only had a one letter difference that created a completely different meaning (as the words “son” and “sun” show in modern English) and the surprisingly shaky literacy levels of some early scribes caused mistakes. Some areas didn’t even have “professional” scribes to do the work. There’s evidence that entire sections have been added to later texts as multiple older texts are without these newer texts. That’s not always saying that someone took it upon themselves to create new verses. Some religious historians have pointed out where some of the original writers (the people who the passages are credited to) sometimes wrote letters that expanded upon their teachings. Sometimes these letters got collected into the texts be scribes.
I have two translations of the Dead Sea Scrolls that are quite interesting. There are passages that mirror the modern texts, but then you find yourself reading an entirely new passage that adds to the one before it and after it that you knew from before. Then there are the odd bits that seem to have been dropped that add or subtract nothing from what we knew before. It does raise some interesting questions about the editing process that determined what was cannon and what wasn’t.
“Suppose that Gospel of Judas is confirmed to be real? What does THAT do?”
Sean, I’ll throw a different question out. Does it matter? In the grand scheme of Christian belief, does it really change the idea of the death of Jesus and the meaning of that event in Christian belief?
The Judas debate has been going for some time now. Even before this Gospel was unearthed, there have been discussions as to what Judas’s true role in the story was. There have even been religious historians using that story as an example of some of the odd translation ticks in the modern Bible due to some words being translated differently depending on where they were in the story even though the original text used the same word in the same meaning in those places.
There’s something about one of the lines (sorry, but I don’t have it out so I am doing this one from memory) where the word betrayal or betray is used where the older word simply means to hand over or to give over without any relation to the concept of betrayal. It’s pointed out that this word is used in that manner in several other places and translated correctly, just not consistently. That and other things in the story have long ago lead to the question of just what was Judas’s role. Was he a betrayer or was he the good friend who had to do what must have seemed a hard and terrible thing to complete the necessary chain of events to fulfill The Christ’s destiny?
And, again, does that really alter the meaning of Christ’s sacrifice in the hearts of his followers? Does it really change the modern faith all that much? Judas, while kicked in the nads by history, isn’t like the Devil. Changing the role of Judas doesn’t fundamentally change huge sections or meanings of the faith.
But still, it could end up being another example of a long held belief that was held in error.
See, it’s things like this that made me become a non-denominational Christian and to start seeking as much different knowledge and history on the texts as I could. There so much there that really deserves greater inspection. But that, for me, doesn’t weaken faith. For me, it just created an understanding with myself that my faith is exactly that. It’s my faith. If others follow it as well, then that’s fine. If others go a different route, then that’s just as fine. I’ve also learned to lean less on the words and more on the meaning. I think that’s part of the reason I react so poorly to religious bigotry. I think the closer you get to the meaning of faith, the more you recognize its beauty and the more disgusting it then makes it to see someone pervert or abuse it.
Jerry, Sean, PAD had a thread about the Gospel of Judas back in April of 2006. If either of you are interested in checking out what people had to say about it at the time.
Oh, and as folks may or may not have noticed, the caught-in-the-spam-filter post came through, but it was inserted into yesterday’s posts timestamped when I actually wrote it, which means it now appears before the post saying it was caught in the spam filter.
Rick
Jerry, it wouldn’t matter one iota to me. But I’ve run into enough literalists to know that there’s a good chunk of people that it would mean a great deal to. Some people get so focused on a piece of minutiae that everything they believe hangs on it. It’s sort of like speculating about a bride’s underwear. Is it on inside out or rightside in? Some people would look at you rather oddly if you asked that, but there are those that if everything isn’t according to the proper way, everything is ruined. The rest of the ceremony, the rest of the entire day can go perfectly, but if there is that one question–people just can’t sit still with it. Now, granted, depending on the gospel you read, Judas’s actions ain’t exactly wearing his wife’s underwear inside out, I mean, well, you know what I mean. But does that change the Sacrifice? Again, not to ME. Now, I only cited that particular one because it’s the most recent religious thing to get people arguing. There’s always going to be something else. But, speaking of faith, I personally have faith that I’m never going to know EVERYTHING, or even fully understand what I DO know, but I know there’s a higher power over all this physicality. There are some who, either because their own faith is too weak or it’s so overwhelmingly strong, that need to impose their own belief on others. What I, and seemingly a bunch of others around here, feel like is what I believe works for ME. If it doesn’t work for you, believe something different. We can all compare notes, but in the end, we can’t say “THIS IS HOW IT IS, BELIEVE THIS OR BE SMITED UNDER A TON OF MACARONI AND CHEESE!” Part of that whole “love your brother as yourself” thing.
Rick, thanks to you, there is now a tear in the space/time continuum where posts appear in non-sequential time order. The whole thing is now bolluxed up. Which is cool for me, actually, because now I can go back in time to before my son lost his Optimus Prime arm at school and bring it forward, thus creating my own paradox. And then I’m going to meet myself, my wife’ll come home to two of me, and her head will literally explode. And it’s all on you, Rick.
From PAD’s inital post:”and that as far as he was concerned that was the end of it. To all intents and purposes it was. It never came up again in the series.”
This, yet again, proves A. Conan Doyle’s point from “A Case of Identity.” The writer of fiction must proceed in a logical fashion, whereas real life is often quite unbelieveable and even more unfathomable.
“I have two translations of the Dead Sea Scrolls that are quite interesting. There are passages that mirror the modern texts, but then you find yourself reading an entirely new passage that adds to the one before it and after it that you knew from before. Then there are the odd bits that seem to have been dropped that add or subtract nothing from what we knew before. It does raise some interesting questions about the editing process that determined what was cannon and what wasn’t.”
It only shows you that the Hebrew texts have also went through an histrical process and did not simply fall in tact out of the sky. However, I don’t know about the processes involved or the relation between them and the processes the Christian texts went through.
I do no that Christian theologians learned Hebrew or went to talk to Jewish rabbis in order to interpret and translate the texts.
The Dead ea Scrolls were written by a one of the three Jewish schools that existed at that time. After the destruction of the temple only one — the pharasees — survived and ended up shaping the Judaism we have today.
“Micha, you’re right the the variances in modern versions aren’t too extreme, but they do exist on some key points or there wouldn’t be the different factions in Christianity over interpretation and teachings that exist today. There certainly wouldn’t be the almost violent hatred of Catholics by some churches. (And that’s not a misstatement. I can show you entire churches that view the Catholics as the group who destroyed the faith.) There’s also boatloads of historical evidence that there have been numerous errors in the process of translating the Bible over the centuries.”
I am surprised that these reformation animosities still live on. However, I think the cause of the conflicts were more the result of a shift in cultural, political and social attitude, and the changes in the interpretation of the text only reflected that. Protestanism criticizes Catholicism mostly for adding layers upon layers of ritual, legislation and interpretation to the biblical text. Judaism has been similarly criticized. Although part of protestanism was the return, reinterpretation and retranslation of the biblical text.
My own view on religion is this. As a human phenomena I see many positive things in it as well as negative. As for the question of the exstence of god, I consider it an unimportant philosophical difference not worth arguing about. However, when someone suggests that because I don’t believe in god I am either immoral or a moral parasite, I do react.
“Can you provide an answer that does not depend on a strawman or a contradiction?”
Yes, but since I already have I will not do so again.
“Ben: the crusades, the Spanish inquisistion, 300 years of burning accused witches — these are examples of mass killings under the pretense of serving the christian god. How does your criticism of atheism not apply to christianity?”
I would hardly call the Inquisitions mass killings. The death toll of all inquisitions, not just Spanish, is believed to have been 60,000… but over hundreds of years. That is maybe two hundred deaths a year throughout the entirety of Europe, not just one nation.
“Also, I know many extremely morally centered atheists that would not be happy with your line of thought, but, being as centered as they are, most would be willing to let you have your beliefs as they wouldn’t want to impose theirs on you. Might want to take a lesson from that.”
I’d like to know when I have tried to impose anything on anyone.
It’s sort of like speculating about a bride’s underwear.
Wait… You mean she was supposed to be wearing underwear???? Ðámņ, the things you learn…
Heres a bit of the mirror universe version of our debate thanks to Lionel. He’s also the only reason, since getting added to their lineup a few weeks back, that I still keep Air America Radio on my XM playlist.
(The link is text, not audio.)
http://www.airamerica.com/node/4035
If you’ve never heard Lionel before, he’s worth tuning into the net feed for on a slow workday. He’s at his best when he gets fed up with politics and stuff and just decides to talk about whatever mundane thing he feels like talking about.
The single most entertaining talk radio block I’ve ever heard was one time when he got fed up with the day’s talked-to-death events and ended up talking to a trucker for 45 minutes about where to find the best food (best New York style pizza, best cheese-steak, etc.) up and down the East Coast. It’s also a bit odd that AAR picked him up since he doesn’t always play the Left VS Right game.
Hey, Jerry, man, um, I’d make another comment about brides and underwear, but both of our wives know where we keep our weapons and I don’t want any of our kids growing up without a father. My view, tho, if you keep it between us, only necessary if the dress is translucent or made of Saran wrap.
Sean Scullion said, “Rick, thanks to you, there is now a tear in the space/time continuum where posts appear in non-sequential time order. The whole thing is now bolluxed up.”
Actually, the posts appear in the right order. The caught-in-the-spam-filter post was inserted at the point it would have appeared had it gone straight though. It’s just that the follow-up post has become redundant.
But you’re right. The tear in the space-time continuum is all my fault. But not because of anything that happened on this thread. Instead, it happened because I tried to prevent it from happening. After I built my time machine I went back in time to tell myself not to build a time machine because traveling in time might disrupt the space-time continuum.
It’s interesting that you brought up A. Conan Doyle in this thread. Yesterday I returned my attention to the two-volume Annotated Sherlock Holmes (1967) edited by William Baring-Gould, and was reading a chapter (the exact title of which escapes me at the moment) that addresses some discrepancies in the dates that Holmes and Watson worked together.
Now, as you may or may not know, many Holmes fans like to pretend that Holmes and Watson were real people and that Watson collaborated with Conan Doyle in publishing stories based on Holmes’ cases. Several chapters of The Annotated Sherlock Holmes that don’t contain actual Holmes stories are written from that conceit. And I think it must originally have been marketed to existing Holmes fans rather than new readers, as this “Holmes was real” mindset is there from the beginning. If I recall correctly, the editor only addresses the fact that they’re just pretending he’s real after several dozen pages.
Anyway, these Holmes fans like to imagine Holmes was real, and to fit his adventures into a real world context. Which, in and of itself, is mostly harmless fun. However, in that chapter concerning the dates of the partnership, Conan Doyle’s canon is referred to in one passage as “the Sacred Writings.”
WTF?
Sacred Writings (in capital letters)? That’s ridiculous. And the sad thing is, the author of that passage didn’t make this statement with tongue in cheek or any sense of irony. He, and presumably other Holmes fans, consider Conan Doyle’s stories to be “Sacred Writings.”
I’m not offended by that declaration, and don’t consider it sacreligious, but as I said above, I do consider it ridiculous. Something like Dr. King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” or his various speeches; or letters or speeches by Gandhi; or written works by anyone else who has spoken eloquently about the human condition are better candidates for “sacred writings” (either lower-cased or capitalized) than a collection of mystery stories, albeit enjoyable ones. That’s not to say such letters or speeches deserve such a lofty designation, but they’d be more logical candidates than the Conan Doyle canon. After all, the Holmes stories aren’t thinly disguised morality plays or other comments on the human condition. They’re just entertaining stories.
Given that Conan Doyle later tried to distance himself from Holmes by killing him off, he must still be spinning up a storm inside his coffin.
“Sacred Writings”? Sheesh.
Rick
Your refusal to simply reference the answer you claim to have made makes it looks like you are trying to pass a strawman as fact. You insist we take you at your word, but you demonstrate you cannot be taken at it.
Whatever the qualifications for severity those killings meet, they were done under the pretense of serving the christian god. No matter how severe the killings, genocides in atheistic cultures were not done in the service of th void. How is that which is neutral to evil less moral to that which shelters evil?
Rick, I’ve heard that Conan Dyle based the character of Holmes on a doctor he knew in Edinbourgh called Bell, who was capable of a similar kind of deduction as Holmes. I once caught the tale end of a BBC TV show which had this Bell solving crimes with young Conan Doyle as his sidekick.
“Sacred Writings (in capital letters)? That’s ridiculous.”
There is a certain similarity between the attitude of fans toward certain books/T V shows/movies and the attitide toward sacred scripture. This is most apparent when fictional worlds are created, with fans spend time analyzing and expanding on every sentence or reference, as with Star Trek, Tolkein, Star wars, etc. Is theology a kind of fanfiction?
———————–
Jerry, while I was politically active I was often astounded at the narrow mindedness of my friends in the left.
In Israel the religious are most often right wing. But we had formed an alliance with a religious peace group. I always liked them, because they were going against their own upbringing. Part of it involved having one of their Rabbis perform a little end of the Sabbath ceremony on our weekly demonstration. But one of the women in my group couldn’t get out of her anti-religious mindset. For her these people were guilty of the right wing attitudes of the majority of the religious people, and shuld hang their head in shame. It was amazing. Even a certain old communist in our group thought it was extreme, but she could not be reasoned with.
According to Greek mythology: Zeus, a sibling of Zeus, or of the line of Zeus. Prometheus was not.
Actually, Prometheus was a Titan, the son of Iapetus. Iapetus was Cronus’s brother, making Prometheus Zeus’s cousin.
Since the Titans were the
Incidentally, his name means “forethuoght”. According myth, he threw in with Zeus’s Olympians because he foresaw them winning, which is why he was allowed to continue teaching humanity after Zeus and his siblings threw out the Titans. (there’s a bit of contradiction in the some of myths, which describe Cronus and the Titans ruling over a “golden age” of humanity before Zeus was born, but then later showing Zeus
breathing life into the figure of clay made by Prometheus to become the first man).
Though why he didn’t see the thing with the eagle eating his liver every day if he stole fire coming. . .
If I recall correctly, the editor only addresses the fact that they’re just pretending he’s real after several dozen pages.
You recall incorrectly; Doyle’s authorship is addressed directly on page 2.
And the sad thing is, the author of that passage didn’t make this statement with tongue in cheek or any sense of irony. He, and presumably other Holmes fans, consider Conan Doyle’s stories to be “Sacred Writings.”
No, not literally. As Dorothy L. Sayers said (sort of paraphrasing here because I couldn’t find a definitive version of the quote online): “The game must be played with one’s tongue firmly in one’s cheek, but with all the seriousness of a cricket game at Lord’s.” (This is amply demonstrated by the essays written by Rex Stout, which purport to prove that Watson was a woman by finding scenes where he behaves in a stereotypically “feminine” manner; faux-seriousness in this context is entertaining, but burlesque is just embarrassing.)
There’s plenty of irony in The Annotated Sherlock Holmes, and referring to them as “The Sacred Writings” is a prime example; it just doesn’t wave a spotlight on itself and dance up and down shouting, “Hey, this is all a big joke!” The reader is presumed to be smart enough to get it.
“The fact is that his personal beliefs *shouldn’t* be a factor.”
In an ideal world a leader’s personal beliefs should have no real bearing on the desicions he has to make.
In the real world it might have a great deal to do with the man’s desicions as leader.
Reality aside a lot of people will vote based more or less or who they trust, and that trust is established based on what the candidate states he believes.
I must say that I’m quite embarassed to have never seen the Annotated Holmes. Although, recently at a local used bookshop, I DID just pick up a collection of Holmes stories with the original Strand illustrations for three dollars. It has the Adventures, the Memoirs I think, and Valley of Fear and Hound in it. Best of all, it has that old book smell. Also, for any Holmesians out there, I highly recommend The Supreme Adventure of Inspector Lestrade by MJ Trow, where our intrepid Scotland Yarder goes after the Ripper. Apparently, there’s also a few more Lestrade books by Trow, but having not read them, I can only acknowledge their exsistence.
As for the Holmes/Watson relationship, I never thought of it as being akin to male/female, and having read all the stories Doyle wrote, including the ones some people don’t know about in a delightful book I picked up once, The Final Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, which adds fourteen more cases to the sixty generally known. Actually, the closest thing I know of in literature is the Batman/Robin relationship. In the old days, though, it was closer to the way Watson was portrayed in those early films, a bumbling oaf whose only contribution to a case would be stepping in the right bucket or blowing his nose on a clue.
As for people believing Holmes was real, I’ve heard that New Scotland Yard still gets letters asking for Holmes’s help. Apparently, they think not only is he real, but he’s used either Rick’s or my time machine to get out of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
I must say that I’m quite embarassed to have never seen the Annotated Holmes.
There are actually two versions; the Baring-Gould is fairly easy to find used (it was reissued in a single-volume edition as a Waldenbooks exclusive about ten years ago), and there’s also another version by Leslie Klinger that’s still in print. (It’s focused on explaining the details of the stories but without the fictional chronology and continuity, so it’s a better work for the general audience, if a bit drier.)
As for the Holmes/Watson relationship, I never thought of it as being akin to male/female,
Fortunately, I don’t think anyone (including Rex Stout) actually ever believed the “Watson Was a Woman” theory. It’s just an example of someone pursuing the joke of mock-serious Holmesian scholarship while being too obvious about it being a joke; as a result, it kind of falls apart.
(For example, he claims that the “true” order of the stories spells out Watson’s true name, “Irene Watson,” but he produced this “result” by using ridiculous fake numerology to rearrange the stories into the order he wants. As a result, it fails on the level of appearing to be scholarly and rigorous, which is a key element of the joke.)
I found a copy of the piece online (I believe it was actually a presentation at a gathering, not an essay) but since articles with links have been having spam-filter trouble lately, I’ll post it separately. (If it doesn’t come through, Google on stout “watson was a woman” and it’s the first hit.)
Here’s the link:
http://www.nerowolfe.org/htm/stout/Watson_was_a_woman.htm
…aaaaand it’s caught in the spam trap. Anyway, it’s easy to find through Google.
Been off-line for a couple of days (my ISP has been “improving” my service). This thread seems to have taken a rather nasty turn.
I just wanted to thank Mr. Chandler for his fascinating review of the history behind the Ten Commandments. It has been a very long time since I read the Bible in such detail and that aspect had never hit me.
As for Mr. Lesar. I did not accuse you of bigotry. I use the term “pseudo-Christian” to describe those who describe themselves as being Christians but behave in a most unChristian-like manner. Do you really think that what you are presenting in this thread is what Yeshua bar Miriam would expect of you? (Food for thought. No answered needed or desired)
regards, the Rev
Weird, the rest of the sentence seems to have been cut off:
Since the Titans were the gods before the Zeus and the Olympians took over, Prometheus was most definitely a god.
Rick,
Just got back home from work and looked up your “lost post”.
Congrats on the story.
re: Yeshua bar Miriam
just a thought concerning an earlier post by The Rev. Mr. Black. I see no reason why modern American Christians should use the Aramaic or Hebrew form of Jesus’s name. All names have become altered as they were translated from language to language, and most Hebrew/Aramaic names and place names have translated equivalents in Greek (language of the New Testaments) which were than transformed in the Latin and into European languages. None of the biblical characters or places are refered to in in English with the correct pronounciation of their names in Hebrew, so why should Jesus?
Micha. I agree we tend to use modern versions of ancient names. However, my point is that the “christ” part of Jesus’ name is a title not part of his name. Logically then, he should either by Jesus Maryson if we extend the modernisation or Jesus Maryson the Anointed One or something similar. (PS. were it up to me, we’d revert to the original name formats. I think something is lost from the historical context when we homogenize/modernize names.)
(Actually, I think I do this because I love the blank looks on people’s faces when I make one of my semi-obsessive iconoclastic comments. I like people to think about what they believe not merely repeat it by rote.)
regards, the Rev
Doug Atkinson said, “As Dorothy L. Sayers said (sort of paraphrasing here because I couldn’t find a definitive version of the quote online): “The game must be played with one’s tongue firmly in one’s cheek, but with all the seriousness of a cricket game at Lord’s.””
Now that you mention it, I do recall that bit, but I also recall that it seemed to appear well into the introductory chapter(s). Unfortunately, The Annotated Sherlock Holmes lacks an index, so I can’t just jump to the correct page.
I also seem to recall that within the first few pages- and well before the Sayers quote- Conan Doyle and Watson are discussed as if they’re both real people. A conceit that goes on for some time, as I recall, before the editor acknowledges it’s all in fun. Like I said before, the book seems to have been targeted to existing fans of the Holmesverse. A newcomer might have become perplexed, wondering whether these folks really believed Holmes and Watson were real.
And I say this as someone who’d previously read the entire Holmes canon, and was already somewhat familiar with “The Game.”
“There’s plenty of irony in The Annotated Sherlock Holmes, and referring to them as “The Sacred Writings” is a prime example; it just doesn’t wave a spotlight on itself and dance up and down shouting, “Hey, this is all a big joke!” The reader is presumed to be smart enough to get it.”
Well, the irony in the “Sacred Writings” passage slipped past me, but then I haven’t been reading the book straight through. It’s been months since I last picked it up.
Micha said, “There is a certain similarity between the attitude of fans toward certain books/T V shows/movies and the attitide toward sacred scripture. This is most apparent when fictional worlds are created, with fans spend time analyzing and expanding on every sentence or reference, as with Star Trek, Tolkein, Star wars, etc. Is theology a kind of fanfiction?”
I’ll take a pass on that last question for now, but yes, fans of Star Trek, Star Wars, etc. often do a lot of behind the scenes universe building. When I was younger, I enjoyed reading the Best of Trek books, which compiled articles from Trek magazine. One feature I especially enjoyed was “Star Trek Mysteries Solved” By Leslie Thompson. She (and/or readers writing in response to her theories) would come up with interesting and sometimes ingenious expanations for various Trek-related mysteries. At the moment, the only one that comes to mind is the answer to why the turbo lift was always there; no one had to wait (except McCoy in Star Trek II. The answer: As soon as one car left, another would immediately take its place; and in high traffic areas, like the Bridge, several turbo cars would be lined up (or stacked up, as the case may be).
I also enjoyed articles hypothesizing about the chronology of the Star Trek universe (though I was a bit annoyed when recently re-reading one such article about the Mirror Universe. The author, who presumably had watched “Mirror, Mirror”, cast Christopher Pike as one of the emperors (a line that began with Khan), and said he was assassinated by some guy or other, who then became emperor, ignoring the fact that the Mirror-Kirk had killed him); and I did a speech in high school about the show’s cultural significance.
But even at the height of my immersion in all things Star Trek, I never considered anything written by Roddenberry- or anyone else who wrote for the show- to be “Sacred Writings.” In fact, I remember one of the Best of Trek books contained a letter from someone who wondered why, if the Star Trek universe is real, there wasn’t a real Edith Keeler and a real Gary Seven, etc.
Because it isn’t real!. While Star Trek had a lot of positive things to say about humanity’s ability to survive and mature as a species, even if we do so, we aren’t going to encounter Vulcans, Romulans and Klingons in the centuries to come. Maybe we’ll encounter aliens, but they’ll be real aliens, not fictional ones.
Sean Scullion said, “As for people believing Holmes was real, I’ve heard that New Scotland Yard still gets letters asking for Holmes’s help. Apparently, they think not only is he real, but he’s used either Rick’s or my time machine to get out of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.”
Sean,
So they’re the ones who’ve been leaving those cookie crumbs and cigarette butts in my time machine. I’ll get them for that!
And speaking of Sherlock Holmes and time machines, there’s a board game called… wait for it…. Sherlock Holmes and the Time Machine, a mysery game in which Holmes and Watson borrow H.G. Wells’ time machine to solve the great unsolved mysteries of the 20th century. If you’re familiar with the game 221 B Baker Street, in which the players go to various locations around London collecting clues, it’s set up along the same lines.
Anyway, one rather… interesting mystery concerns the solution to the fate of Jimmy Hoffa. SPOILER WARNING for those who might want to play the game some day….
It turns out Hoffa’s still alive. Knowing he was in danger, he killed and is now impersonating actor Robert Blake.
Wow! Talk about a total lack of research. No doubt the people who put the game together thought Robert Blake was a total unknown in 1975, ignoring the fact that not only had he been in the movie In Cold Blood in 1967, but that he’d also been one of Our Gang/The Little Rascals as a child.
I remember wondering when I first played that game perhaps a decade ago what Mr. Blake and his lawyers would have thought about that theory.
And speaking of irony, Blake portrayed Hoffa in a TV movie about Hoffa and Bobby Kennedy back in the 80s.
Micha,
Yes, Doyle based Holmes on Dr. Joseph Bell.
By the way, I’ve been to the real 221 B Baker Street (or the address closest to where it would have been*). It’s a business district, not residential, but there’s a small plaque of Holmes in profile outside one of the buildings (or there was in 1988). On the other hand, at some other location in London (I forget where) there’s a restauraunt called “The Sherlock Holmes” that has a recreation of Holmes’ sitting room on the upper floor.
*A chapter in The Annotated Sherlock Holmes addresses the Baker Street location, and as I recall (again, it’s been months since I read those early chapters) there was some question as to whether some streets may have undergone name changes and/or address changes since the 1880s. In other words, Holmes may have “lived” on a different Baker Street than the one that exists in London today.
Turning to Watson for a moment, like I said, I’d previously read the entire canon, but that was back in 1988, and in earlier years, I’d read various scattered stories. However, I was most familiar with Watson through Nigel Bruce’s portrayal. And while I knew the Watson of the stories was nowhere near as obtuse as Bruce portrayed him, I had assumed that Watson and Bruce were about the same age.
That wasn’t a big deal when watching a World War II era Sherlock Holmes movie that was set in the 1940s. You just go with the idea that Holmes operated in the mid 20th century, rather than the late 19th. No problem. However, the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes radio program with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce threw me for a loop (whatever that means) when Watson and announcer Harry Bartell would talk in the “present day” of the late 1940s about a case that occurred in the 1880s. I kept thinking of Watson as being in late middle age when he and Holmes began their partnership, so how could he be alive in the 1940s. In re-reading the Holmes stories, I was a bit surprised to (re)discover that Watson was quite a bit younger when the partnership began, possibly in his early to mid 20s.
Holmes is younger than often portrayed, too. As I recall, he was a “student” when he and Watson met, though I think he’d have been considered a graduate student rather than an undergrad, which might put him in his mid to late 20s. I’m sure somewhere in the Annotated Sherlock Holmes there’s a chronology of their lives which would give their ages when they met, but I don’t have the books in front of me right now.
At any rate, as I recall most TV and movie versions of the Holmes stories cast Holmes and Watson as being in their 30s or 40s (or older, in Watson’s case)-even if the movie depicts their first meeting. That being the case, I wonder how many “average people” would be surprised not only to find that Watson isn’t completely clueless, but also that he’s much younger than he’s been portrayed on celluloid and over the radio airwaves.
Jerry,
Thanks. Hope you’ll pick up a copy of the audiozine and hear the story.
Rick
P.S. To return to the original topic of this thread, if Holmes were real and alive today, he’d take one look at the various candidates, and say something like, “Senator So-and-So, I perceive that you had a breakfast consisting of French Toast with syrup but no butter, and a large orange juice; that you read Fallen Angel IDW edition issue 1 while being driven here; that you were raised a Presbyterian, but decided to become a Catholic while in college, after getting into a discussion about philosophical and theological matters with a red-haired girl at a candy machine, which, to your dismay was out of Butterfinger bars. So there’s really no need for you to discuss your views on faith. The facts are plain to see for those who know how to observe them.”
Hey, Rick, cigarette butts and cookie crumbs beats the things I’ve been finding in mine. All I can figure is my son from 10 years in the future is bringing dates back to see what a goofball his old man’s always been and how cute he was in kindergarten.
Count me as one who’s going to pick up a copy, too.
Mr. Black, I gotta say I enjoy that look as well. Especially when I tell them how in Ireland my last name would’ve been O’Scolain, for the battle cries my ancestors apparently used. We were apparently kinda scary nasty guys. Eventually, I’m going to get my Gaelic tapes and be able to compliment people(or not…) and they’ll have no clue. Or try explaining to some AOH guys how Saint Patrick was an Italian named Pasquale, that’s equally fun.
Well, the irony in the “Sacred Writings” passage slipped past me, but then I haven’t been reading the book straight through. It’s been months since I last picked it up.
The first time it’s referred to is a line on page 1 to the effect of (I’m at work, so I don’t have my copy with me) “The ‘Sacred Writings,’ or Canon [1]” with note 1 being “Or Conan,” clearly a playful wink at the audience. While it also starts out discussing Watson as the writer of the stories, on page 2 it wraps up by saying, essentially, “Watson wrote them like that because that’s how his creator wrote them,” and then spends a few chapters discussing Doyle and the stories’ publishing history before getting back into the fictional continuity. While I’m not sure it’s the best approach for non-Holmesians (the new version is probably better for people who just want to know what a tantalus is, although any annotation should still discuss issues like how Watson knew who Moriarty was in “The Valley of Fear” but not “The Final Problem”), I didn’t see any cause for worry that Baring-Gould was deluded as to the nature of the joke. (Any more than I think most people who refer to the original Star Wars films as “The Holy Trilogy” mean it seriously.)
Posted by: The Rev. Mr. Black at June 15, 2007 10:23 AM
“I agree we tend to use modern versions of ancient names.”
Actually, Yehoshua is an ancient name, but it is also a modern Israeli name, although a little out of fashion at present.
In my Hebrew translation of the New Testament Jesus appears as Yeshua (slightly different spelling). I don’t know why. Hebrew speakers usually refer to Jesus as Yeshu, and the Hebrew name is Yehoshua. I guess the translators have their reasons.
In any case, as you know, names in Hebrew, Greek and Latin usually have different variations in different European languages. The most familiar is John: in Hebrew Yochanan, in Latin Iohannes, and then onward, John, Jean, Sean(?), Johann, Ivan, Juan, Giovanni etc. I personaly kind of like that. It’s as if each language has it’s own point of view, it’s own take on the same theme.
One Professor I studied with tended to use the German version of the city Munich, instead of the Hebrew version, and I felt he was being a snob. I’ve also argued with my mother (who teaches Islamic History), about writing Arabic names in Hebrew. In this case I felt it should be written in the way that allows us to pronounce it correctly, instead of what might be correct from a linguistic point of view.
“However, my point is that the “christ” part of Jesus’ name is a title not part of his name. Logically then, he should either by Jesus Maryson if we extend the modernisation or Jesus Maryson the Anointed One or something similar.”
Christ literally means annointed, as does the Hebrew word Messiah (if you check in wikipedia you get the character from Buffy). However the meaning of both words (Messiah and Christ, not Buffy) contains much more than that by now. A good comparison would be the word Pope. It comes from Papa = father. However, obviously the title is not father, it has a distinct meaning that can only be described as ‘Pope.’
“were it up to me, we’d revert to the original name formats. I think something is lost from the historical context when we homogenize/modernize names.”
Like I said, I personay feel it is not homogenizing as much as giving it a particular English take. there is something very American/English about John, just as there is something distinctly Spanish about Juan. It is not the same name.
I also think that part of the point of christianity (and I realize it sounds strange coming from an Israeli Jew living in Jerusalem), is to go beyond the particular level of the Jewish nation to an international level.
Furthermore, I realize that part of your motivation is to stump the annoying kind of fundementalist, literal minded Christians. But, in a way, you accept their logic. This goes back to my discussion with Jerry: in a way the present interpretation/translation, and/or interpretations translations in various times, are more authentic than the original text (or in this case the historical context, since the text is Greek — iesos Christós).
By the way, did you know that the fish is a Christian symbol because the Greek word for fish, ‘ichtos’, is an accronym of “Jesus christ the Son of God.”
“(Actually, I think I do this because I love the blank looks on people’s faces when I make one of my semi-obsessive iconoclastic comments. I like people to think about what they believe not merely repeat it by rote.)”
OK. Go ahead. I don’t want to be pedantic (but obviously failing. I am probably channeling the above mentioned professor).
———–
“Mr. Black, I gotta say I enjoy that look as well. Especially when I tell them how in Ireland my last name would’ve been O’Scolain, for the battle cries my ancestors apparently used. We were apparently kinda scary nasty guys. Eventually, I’m going to get my Gaelic tapes and be able to compliment people(or not…) and they’ll have no clue. Or try explaining to some AOH guys how Saint Patrick was an Italian named Pasquale, that’s equally fun.”
Actually, I think he was a Roman Breton named Patricius. Is Pasquale a variation of that name? I’m not sure, me and your son paaed through Ireland in your time machine, but this is only going to happen when I’m older, and my memory is not going to be so good. Other than that, I sympathize with your interest in your Gaelic heritage Sean.
——————
Rick, is was certainly not my intention to suggest that trekkies are out of touch with reality… no, seriously I didn’t. The comparison I was trying to make was that in both cases: holmes and Star Trek, the fictional world has such a strong attraction that it had become almost real to the fans, taking a life of its own.
Micha said, “Rick, is was certainly not my intention to suggest that trekkies are out of touch with reality… no, seriously I didn’t. The comparison I was trying to make was that in both cases: holmes and Star Trek, the fictional world has such a strong attraction that it had become almost real to the fans, taking a life of its own.”
Micha,
I didn’t get that impression from you; nor, for that matter am I suggesting that either Star Trek fans or Holmesians and/or Sherlockians (depending on what term a particular Holmes fan prefers) are out of touch with reality (the one individual I cited wasn’t intended to be a representative of all Star Trek fans. ).
I do, however, agree that these fictional worlds have a strong attraction. I just found the term “The Sacred Writings” to be a bit too over the top. But like I said above, I didn’t catch the irony in that phrase. Maybe we (or at least I) have become so used to reading a harsh edge, even a subtle put-down in such statements, that if such elements aren’t present, the “we’re just having fun with this” element just slides by.
Ironically, Doug Atkinson mentions Star Wars fans and the “Holy Trilogy.” I’ve never encountered that phrase before, but I know it’s not serious. Yet the “Sacred Writings” comment gave me pause. What’s the difference? Maybe it’s because the Holmes fans have been at their “Game” longer.
Or maybe it’s because some of the passages quoted by Baring-Gould in The Annotated Sherlock Holmes seem to have been written by people who jumped into the “game” to such a degree that they apparently forgot it was just pretend. In fact, I don’t think the “Sacred Writings” comment came from Baring-Gould himself (which is why I referred to “the author of that passage” and not Baring-Gould by name), but was part of an extended quotation from someone else. Again, I don’t have the books in front of me right now.
At any rate, perhaps the author of that particular passage came across as having gone overboard, because not every aspect of “the Game” strikes me that way. I mentioned the chapter discussing the “real world” location of the Baker Street rooms. Now granted I read that months ago, and there may be particular passages within that chapter that might give me pause, but the overall impression I retain is “cool.” Like I said, I enjoyed articles in Best of Trek about a Trek related Chronology; or theories as to where Kirk lived, or whatever. They’re fun intellectual puzzles; and I retain a similar impression from the “where was Baker Street?” questions.
Regarding Trekkies, someone suggested (in a volume of Best of Trek if I recall correctly) that we should have three distinct terms:
Trekkies are the fanboy types (in the worst sense of the word).
Trekkers are more serious fans, who can and do have discussions about the text and subtext of an episode; how it speaks to and about the times it was made; the show’s strengths and weaknesses; and things of that nature. And, of course, they still enjoy watching it.
Trekkists are casual fans, who know a few key points about the Star Trek universe, but not detailed minutia. Boone in Lost would fit into this category. In one episode when he’s talking with Locke, he refers to the captain, the doctor and “the guy with the ears”, and knows about red shirts. But he (apparently) doesn’t know the name of the “guy with the ears.”
I’ve always agreed that those distinctions make sense, though I don’t know if the terms “Trekker” and “Trekkist” ever caught on with Star Trek fans. I know they didn’t with the general public. I consider myself a Trekker with regard to the original series and a very casual Trekkist with regard to Enterprise. Of course, I grew up with Star Trek. By comparison I’ve only seen one full season of Enterprise and scattered episodes from the rest of the run; and in many cases, I’ve only seen those episodes once.
Sean,
Those cookie crumbs attract ants. And the cigarette smoke permeates the upholstery. But what really bugs me is how people tend to think my other time machine is available for their use. There seems to be a several different groups, some consisting of just two people, others of a larger compliment who regard my machine- shaped like a big blue box, as their personal property. The apparent leaders of these groups have included an crochety old man, a tall, curly-haired man with a long scarf, another curly-haired man with the most garish coat you could imagine, a man with a close-cropped hair cut and a leather jacket (his was one of the two people teams) and a Scottish man who carried around an umbrella with a handle shaped like a question mark (another two-person teamer).
They don’t bother to ask permission; they just take the thing (though they never travel together for some reason), and to add to my annoyance, none of them have ever bothered to refill the windshield wiper fluid.
Sheesh. Show a little respect for other people’s property, huh.
Rick
Micha–one of the engineers at work is actually named Pasquale, from Italy as far as I know, and everyone except for myself and a Romanian with the odd name of John ever call him anything but Pat. I’m going to have to check with him on Patricius. Coincidentally, my mom’s name was PatriciA. As for the spelling of my name, blame my crazy Celtic ancestors. Don’t forget those Wacky Welsh with Ian, either. I had always heard that the fish was a symbol because of the loaves and fishes bit. Huh. The things you can learn around here.
Rick, I feel your pain. Some goofy old guy and a guitar player keep snagging my time machine out of my driveway just when I want to use it. As for your windsheild fluid, leave a note where the windsheild is and terse instructions to refill it or else.
Micha, at work we have an Italian engineer named Pasquale, although apart from myself and a Romanian engineer with the odd name of John(maybe he’s from Planet 10?) everybody just calls him Pat. I’ll have to check with him on the Patricius thing. Coincidentally, my mom’s name was PatriciA. As for my name’s spelling, blame those Crazy Celts that came before me. Trust me, if one more person calls me “Seen” there will be blood. You could also throw into the mix the Wacky Welsh with “Ian,” which makes me ask, if we’re to have ion propulsion for space probes, will the be Welsh?
Rick, you’re preaching to the choir, here, man. Although, with your other one, maybe the don’t know to replace the washer fluid because they can’t find the windsheild? Although, if the guy with the leather jacket had left the blond in there, don’t know that I woulda minded much. My problem is the goofy big haired guy and the guitar player that keeping taking mine outta the driveway JUST when I want to use it. They have a bad habit of leaving it out of plutonium and on the train tracks. Well, as they say, if you don’t have less on, you have….
Sorry ’bout the duplicate, folks.
“Your refusal to simply reference the answer you claim to have made makes it looks like you are trying to pass a strawman as fact. You insist we take you at your word, but you demonstrate you cannot be taken at it.”
Under nihilism there is no meaning to life nor is there an objective moral code. This is not so under Christianity. Happy?
“Do you really think that what you are presenting in this thread is what Yeshua bar Miriam would expect of you?”
I will answer anyway, because I think this is important. While I do not always act in accordance with God’s will –being a sinful, fallible human—I have in this thread done almost everything I believe God would want me to. Jesus was very harsh in his words, much more so than I have been, and many here would no doubt have called him a bigot. Jesus told us the world would hate us, just as the world hated him first.
“Since the Titans were the gods before the Zeus and the Olympians took over, Prometheus was most definitely a god.”
You could call him that. Greek myth is unclear and inconsistent. He was not, however, an Olympian, but a Titan.
You are using the terms “religion” and “Christianity” interchangeably. This qualifies you as a Christian bigot.
Your reply was appropriate for by question about “any religion” and I withdraw the bigotry accusation. Let me reframe the context of my question:
Again, how in a world where no god leaves evidence of his existence do we have any more purpose or any more access to objective morality than if he didn’t exist?
“I had always heard that the fish was a symbol because of the loaves and fishes bit. Huh. The things you can learn around here.”
I actually learned that during a visit to a Museum in Dublin.
“Trust me, if one more person calls me “Seen” there will be blood.”
I thought Sean is a very common name in the US. I think there even some Israelis who were given that name (American sounding names being popular). I assumed they were imitating you Sean. although they may have been influenced by that bald Scottish actor.
Sean is WAAAAAAAY too common a name. Trouble is, there are three or four different ways to spell it, lucky me, my folks went with the traditional Gaelic. People who’ve never seen it just read it like it’s spelled. Now, I had a psychologist whose brother was named after that bald guy, but, as you very wisely surmised, he was named for me, although he’s forty-some years my senior. It’s those stupid time-machine problems.
Sean,
My wife would like to have some words with you about making fun of both the Welsh and the name “Ian” up there. I believe the words are…
“darky ally”
“2×4”
and
“knee-capping”
I wash my hands of the entire thing.
Great, just what I need. Another Jenn with access to weapons who wants to do terrible nasty things to me. And what is it with wives and 2×4’s? Stacie’s been threating to hit me with one for ten years, now. And I wasn’t making fun, I was just employing some half-clever alliteration, yeah, that’s it, that’s what I was doing. Now, granted, alliteration traditionally is word groups of three or more, but I figured I’d be in enough trouble as it is. And, she should notice, I did the same to my people, with the whole “Crazy Celts” thing up there.
Crap.
I’m not getting out of this one, am I?
Sean,
I do feel your pain about people not pronouncing your name right….but give me a break here. In a society that regularly spelled both my first name (Jennifer) and my maiden name (Morris) wrong, what can you expect? Gennifer, Genifer, Jenifer, Jennier, Morse, Moris, Morrise. Even Jerry can’t see how someone could spell them or pronounce them wrong, but they did. The funny thing is my sister, Alethia (A-lee-thee-a), had her name pronounced and spelled wrong less often than me.
As for Ian…It’s what we’re naming the baby if it’s a boy. If it’s a girl it will be Aeowyn. I love my Welch/Irish/German heritage and the really “fun” names they have.
And yes…I have LOTS of weapons to come after you with…but 2 x 4’s are just convenient, don’t have serial numbers, and the evidence can go up in smoke. However I prefer my grandmother’s rolling pin…it’s a multitasker.
And I ask, what happened to the good old names, like Suri, Shilo and Apple (or avocado)?
It’s funny, but when my sister was pregnant the first time, her husband told her he didn’t want any of those “crazy wierd Welsh or Irish names.” We’re collectively about as Welsh as a Maserati. Irish and Scottish, yeah, but not a drop of Welsh in our blood. We gave serious consderation to Alexander, but then his initials would’ve been nasty, as in our family the son takes the father’s name as a middle name, so that went right out. We figured it’d take some first grader 3.67 seconds to figure that out, so what do we do? We name him Brian, so his initials are BS. We give that until maybe second grade to come out.
Rolling pin….BRRRR…like being attacked by the wife of the Swedish Chef….
“Again, how in a world where no god leaves evidence of his existence do we have any more purpose or any more access to objective morality than if he didn’t exist?”
I wouldn’t stay that God leaves no evidence of his existance. Even if you consider the Bible and archeology confirming events in it (not to mention philosophy supporting his existence) insufficient for belief, that is no reason to claim there is no evidence. Besides the matter of evidence is irrelevant. If God exists that means there can be objective purpose and morals. Not so if he doesn’t. Whether we know of his existence or not this is still the case. Why should our knowledge effect the objective state of the universe? If we didn’t know about physics would gravity not exist?
Saying the bible provides evidence is ridulous. Just because Lord of the Rings had gravity (things fall), and the fact that a sword wound can kill you doesn’t make everything in the book real.
The best way to fool people is to mix a few true things in with the fiction and people will “suspend their disbelief” and buy into the story.
Indeed. Thank you for answering my question, Ben.
Belief in gravity is founded in evidence of gravity, not the other way around. Aristotle, for one, discussed “falling” long before the term “gravity” was coined.
“Even if you consider the Bible and archeology confirming events in it”
The bible is a collection of historical documents. Archeology is the study of artifacts from the past. We can assume that some of the history described in the bible might leave archeological remains, although much of biblical history did not unfortunatly. However the remains found are of historical places, societies, and less oftenly people and events. It is not much relevant to the issue of god and morality. We should also remember that if you go through historical documents or archeological remains looking to confirm preconceived ideas, you are likely to find them — any mouintain in Sinai could be mount Sinai, any burial site the grave of a prophet, any spear, Achilles’s spear, and so forth.
“not to mention philosophy supporting his existence”
Some philosophers have presented philophical arguments why a god or gods — and not always the same god — exists. Others have presented agnostic or atheistic arguments. Philosophy is widefield with many different ideas on many different subjects. In any case, philosophy is not science, only the ideas of different smart people holding differing opinions at different times.
“Besides the matter of evidence is irrelevant. If God exists that means there can be objective purpose and morals.”
Not necessarily. There might be a god who is totally indifferent to purpose and morals. Some philosophers suppose the existence of such a god.
“Not so if he doesn’t.”
Again, not necessarily so. Why couldn’t objetctive morals exist regardless of the question if there is a god? The objective laws of physics (without getting into quantum mechanics) are recognized and studied by scientists independantly of the question of god. Some thinkers tried to base objective morality on the scientific observation of nature, although there are problems with that approach.
“Whether we know of his existence or not this is still the case.”
If we don’t know of god’s existence and/or the existence of objective morals, any ideas we may have about them will be opinions.
“Why should our knowledge effect the objective state of the universe? If we didn’t know about physics would gravity not exist?”
However, this is the difference between morality and physics. Gravity exists always regardless of our knowledge of its working. It is not invented or discovered. It presents itself to us directly as a phenomenon which physics then tries to explain. Not so with morality. Unless you are an anthropologist studying it as a social phenomenon.