finale of sorts

I should have been blogging like mad to make it look like I was...decent at this but life got in the way. I've been working my tail off for the pass two weeks doing the writing, drafting, editing of over 30 pages worth of papers, several presentations, quizzes and so on and my printer seeing this incoming anthology of my scholastic work up and died...yay >.>
It's been a hard year and has really made me wonder if a Literature/philosophy double major is a good plan.
Well I forget this blog often, i just don't think my thoughts are that important and don't really feel they warrant the bandwidth, memory, or anything that make up this post, still I would like to make up for that and tell all my feelings about this course, so sit back and enjoy.

I'll start back to front with today's discussion. A point which stuck out for me was that doubt isn't the opposite of faith, but goes along with it. I haven't hidden my beliefs here so I've found that a bit odd. I know that personally doubt is what caused me to leave the church, and after investigating some other denominations and even religions it didn't falter at all. The thing that sprang to my mind was an odd quote on a t-shirt "Philosophy gives you questions without answers. Religion gives answers without questions" and there are those in class that have admitted asking if the bible is real was just not done. It just doesn't seem to make sense since doubt leads to questioning one's faith.
Then i realized the answer came from the class all along. Mostly in terms of the bible. Jacob in the slave doubted God, and questioned his faith and he came out better for it I believe. I think many of the characters that did question at some point were by far the more faithful or at least the most literary compelling. Job comes to mind, even Jesus was uncertain about the crucifixion for a bit.

It's incredible to have spent so much time in class pushing through hte work and reading in order to come out the other end and...have an answer. Okay maybe not an answer. Dr. Sexson has mentioned how answers aren't great, but at least the knowledge to continue the thought process yourself beyond the question. It's a great feeling.

In terms of the group projects, I'm surprised. surprised in a good way. All the groups did really well and had a new way of looking at things. In terms of my group I'm just amazed at the level of work we did in a short amount of time. Not only that but we fit a huuuuuuge amount of text into a 15 minute presentation.
Some of the interesting parts of samuel, well the transition between judges and Kings for one.
Another interesting part is some of the possible redactionist history. It seems that Saul goes from being fantastic to some loser and it's possible that this was done with anti monoarchism in mind, Saul to be made out later to be less great than he was and Samuel was made out to be better cause he was the real chosen one of God. This may or may not be true, take it with a grain of salt.
I did like being able to spot some redaction activity in my section, particularly the scene part which happened twice.
There's also being able to see some of the works of David, though I must say there was a part where I felt the characterzation of God, or at least how to follow would be disjointed.
Some might think (especially after reading earlier violent parts of the bible) that safely entering the tent of a man that has been out to kill you for no reason would be a sign that God thinks you're cool and you should take advantage of the opportunity. makes sense right, but the literary reason that this is missed by David make sense. BY sparring Saul David shows he is far more devote, a humble man, all around awesome, and is just characterized in a few short passages as all around better than Saul.
I think the best part of our presentation was having B bathing. Sock puppets are dirty >.>;

I think i learned a lot from this course. I learned all about the writers after all, and some hilarious parts of the bible which are fantastic out of context. I am incredibly glad I took this course even if it was intimidating from the beginning. I'm not sure I really have time to go over everything I've learned...So let us assume everything I'm a new person now and that is what I like out of a class. To have my knowledge base built up so much that I am a new person with new insights and thoughts.

Good luck to the rest of you at the final, and after class. Now we can all go home for the holidays and make silly comments about passages in the bible. :P

script

Samuel 18-26 Script

Narrator: David followed Saul’s orders and was successful wherever he was sent. Saul gave david command of the army and David was successful, but problems arose when David returned from killing the philistines.

Generic girls: Saul has killed thousands, and David his ten thousands!

Saul: They ascribe to me thousands and to David ten thousands. What more could he have but the kingdom. I better keep an eye on david.

~The next day~

Saul: Now’s my chance, while David is playing his Lyre I’ll pin him to the wall. *throws spear at david twice, David dodges both times*
He dodged my spears! I’ll just send him out with the army, that will get rid of him!

Narrator: It seems strange in this passage that David would just continue on as normal after Saul has attacked him. This episode is not in the Septuagint and may have been added in anticipation of later events.

~Later~

Saul *Aside* I know how to get rid of david. I’ll have him marry my daughter and in return he’ll fight in the wars. That way the philistine’s can kill him. *to david* David! Have my elder Daughter Merab, in return you can fight the lord’s battles.

David: Oh that’s okay, I’m not important enough to be the son-in-law of the king.

Saul: *Aside* well maybe Michal will tempt him *to servant* Tell david you’re cool, everyone likes you, you should become the king’s son in law. *servant goes to david*

David: I don’t know. It seems like a big deal. I’m just a poor average guy. *servant goes back to Saul*

Saul: Tell him I don’t want any bride price except for 100 foreskins of the philistine’s *servant goes back to David*

David: That’s it? Awesome!

Narrator: So David went out and slayed 100 philistine’s and brought back their foreskins to Saul and married Michal. Saul realized The Lord was with David and became much more afraid. So he told Jonathan of his plans to kill David.
Jonathan: David hasn’t done anything wrong. He’s gone to war for you and done well, you’re just people paranoid.

Saul: oh alright, I won’t kill David.

Narrator: Again David went off to war and was successful and Saul was afraid, So again he waited when David was playing his Lyre and threw a spear at him. The spear missed and David fled.

David: Michal Saul is trying to kill me!

Michal: You go hide. I’ll put the idol in your bed and pretend it’s you

David: *leaves*

Servant: *enters* We’re here for David

Michal: he’s sick

Servant: Well we’ll bring the bed *they take the bed and it’s discovered it’s a fake.*

Saul: This isn’t david, it’s just an idol in his bed. Why have you tricked me?

Michal: David told me “let me go, why should I kill you”

~Later~

David* to jonathan* Why is your dad trying to kill me I haven’t done anything wrong!

Jonathan: No, he tells me everything, why would he hide this from me?

David: I’m serious he has it out for me

Jonathan: Alright I’ll talk to him.

David: There’s the feast tomorrow. I’ll hide here in the fields if he misses me say “David had to go to Bethlehem where there’s a yearly sacrifice for the family” If he says “good” then everything is great, but if he gets mad then he wants to kill me.

Jonathan: I’ll have a servant come into the field with me and I’ll shoot an arrow. If I tell the servant to collect the arrows to the side of you, you’re wanted. If I have the servant search behind you must flee.

~Later at Dinner~
Saul: Where is David, His place is empty

Jonathan: There’s a yearly sacrifice for the family in Bethlehem

Saul: that is not okay!

Narrator: so Jonathan told David what happened and David escaped. David travelled and gained followers through his good actions, in the meantime Saul was searching for David. He’d heard was nearby, and followed with his army, but David came across where Saul was sleeping and snuck in, cutting a piece of his robe.

Generic Male *to David*: Hey, we have him here, we should just kill him. That solves the problem right?

David: No, the Lord does not want me to kill him, it isn’t right to kill my master. *leave tent goes to the edge of camp* Hey Saul!

Saul: *wakes up* huh?

David: Why do you think I’m trying to kill you? Look, I got a piece of your robe, but I didn’t kill you. I didn’t do anything. The Lord will judge us and avenge me, but I won’t hurt you

Saul: Is that you David? You’re a better man than I. You’ve treated me well and I treated you badly. But promise you’re not going to kill me or my descendents.

David: I promise.

~later!

Narrator: Samuel died

Samuel: bleh *falls over*

What have I learned?

Another blog to go over what I've been doing in the radio silence of this blog. The Test went well. I'm glad I passed this time. I spelled their wrong in the essays...rather embarrassing really.

I've decided that the thing I have mostly been learning is that fact that I really ought to take a blog writing course. >.> I still just see them as a little random journal entry. Oh well. it's too late to make a fantastically amazing blog.

In terms of my paper thesis

I would like to write my term paper over the importance of mythology to understanding the bible. As we have all come to learn the bible is not something easily read, and even after reading remembering each rule is a daunting task. Remembering the mythos and stories of the bible help us to remember and understand these rules presented. This is seen prominently in The Slave with Jacob, as he deals with his slavery he recalls stories in association with the rules, particularly when he questions these rules.

The Slave II

More reading of the slave. I seemed to stop at a good place last time, and now I'm taking a break to write this after Jacob has rescued and brought back to his home town.

The story has really reminded me of Joseph so far. Jacob was a good jew just as Joseph was a good son. They were both sold into slavery and made good slaves, despite the fact jacob was a scholar and knew very little of being a cowherd he ended up with some of the best cows in the town and they both are tempted by a mistress. Then it seems to fall through a bit when the ransom is paid.
I didn't like this part as much. I suppose once he gives in to wanda a lot of the conflict is gone. I suppose I should have been worried for his life as well but I'm a bit of a Meta-reader and was well aware there was much more story to be told. So really I hope it does pick up. I just thought the similarity to joseph was very interesting. I've gotten to the part now where he has gotten back to town and his sister tells him of the tortures...I can be one sick puppy myself. I firmly believe that my study in literature has really desensitized me to some of this stuff, but some of those descriptions had me shocked, and I really needed a break before my imaginaton ran away with me. ew...just....ew.
I do find Jacob's questions to be very interesting. They seem to grow deeper and more troubling as the story continues, but maybe that is my meta reading. We're all okay with joseph being a slave, because in the end it has a purpose for a greater good which we can see, just as jacob's suffering may do that, but Job really bothers perople, me in particular, with the seemingly pointless suffering presented, just as the mass murder of the people of josefov is incredibly disturbing and doesn't seem to have much of a point.

I think I must stop now, those images are getting to me. I will note that the names of the girls tortured had me confused for a moment, for a brief moment I thought they were referencing the terrible things that happened to biblical Dinah and such for reference. I'm not sure if that is very important though, or if it's just to point out similar situations and such.

Also for some random filler. Wanda is a german name which means Kindred. And now you have a useless fact of the day

Another mediocre post

I feel the need to write something, it makes me feel better. Right now I think I'm having a mini panic attack, my chest feels tight and everything has gotten a bit surreal...I've written out the due dates for things in November and...I'm honestly scared. I suppose this happens every year, all the classes love to cram everything right before thanksgiving break, and by the time you get a glorious two day break you're worn out. Still the work ahead seems to have almost "biblical" proportions.

The large project looming now is the term paper. So I think I shall just write out my options and thoughts.

First, writing what I have learned. well there's certainly a lot there, I learned about the more metaphorical language the bible is written in. The P, J, E, D, and R writers and other scholastic type things. Honestly however that seems a bit vanilla to me. I'm sure someone else can write a fantastic paper on that, but I personally can't think of a way to write a good paper on it, mostly just tidbits, and if I could do that well this blog would be far more interesting to read.

So in terms of picking my own topic. I would greatly enjoy writing on folktales and mythologies.

One thought I had was comparing the creation stories with other creation stories in mythologies.

I also had the thought of looking at superstitions and seeing what parts of the bible they might have roots in, but the only thing that really comes to mind is the Lilith story, so I suppose that doesn't count.

Revelation is a book in new testament I like. The only one that I've read all the way through and actually tried to study (before this class)
Maybe comparing those visions with some other apocalypse type myths.

Another part I was interested in was the similarities of modern christian thoughts and images and older icons. for instance there is a theory i know of that satan is stylized after Pan in order to discredit Pan and get more people to turn from paganism to christianity. see similarities with Pan and Satan There's also the stuff like easter, halloween, so on...

Anyone else have ideas dealing with folktales or myths?

The Slave

I am so behind in my reading it is sad, but anyway I started reading the slave. It was a breathe of fresh air really. The bible is great and even poetic, plotz has an interesting take on it, and I'm certainly learning a lot from all those readings, but with "The slave" I've really got a story to sink my teeth into. Not a collection of stories but one, with an overall plot and message.
I certainly like the style of the book. I can see why so many people have been commenting on how they couldn't put it down.
The first thing that struck me was the way jacob is described in his enviornment. It reminds me of castaway stories, almost as if he is adrift in this ocean of foriegners. The contrast between his desperate clinging to faith, and their lack of faith is interesting. I say lack of faith because while the peasants of the village are described as christian, it seems only a word. It states how they still act like animalistic pagans, they worship old house gods, and they don't have any rituals that I would associate with the christian religion. Their world is full of faeries and superstition, and the christian term is just a word to add more gods and monsters.
Speaking of monsters, I must admit I love all the old folk lore references, particularly Baba Yaga, one of my favorite old story creatures. http://efimero.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/baba-yaga.jpg She's your standard wood witch type, but she's got a hut with chicken legs :D http://images.elfwood.com/art/r/e/reuben/reubencdodd_baba_yagas_hut.jpg

One line that struck me, on page 37 of my book, as Jacob is trying to resist temptation and at the same time think of a way for it to be okay for him to be with wanda, he thinks this "It was God who spoke in the simpler language while evil overflowed in learned quotations" First of all this threw up a red flag for me in terms of the preist, where he's described as having lost his knowledge except for the ability to speak in large words.

But it also struck me as a sort of lesson from simply taking this class. Just from reading the bible we've all had a moment where we've realized some highly quoted thing is misquoted. I'm sure we've all had a moment where we've seen someone mindlessly quoting the bible to further some sort of point, but without any real knowledge of what that means. Sometimes when I've asked they are unable to put it into summary and use simpler words.
This speaks to me because I personally see it as one of the larger problems with religions. It isn't really the message that's wrong, simply that people will use little quotes and such, without knowing the real meaning of something.

Anyway I shall carry on with my reading. I just needed to write this bit out before I forgot.

Group of Samuel *please read and comment*

Hey guys, could you guys maybe comment here so we can figure out where and when to meet. There's less than a month so just getting together to know each other and figure out stuff would be a good plan I think.

I don't have classes after 1 any day, so afternoon any day of the week is alright for me.

Sussana & Job

Arg there is so much reading in this class T.T

I read susanna, it was shorter than i thought it would be, but a very nice little read. It's certainly different in style from the J and P and so on writers. At least it seemed that way to me.
I liked the story. It seemed to put a lot of emphasis on age however. The evil elders and young susanna and daniel are awesome, and by the by young...yeah, maybe i looked into that too much, I'm not sure.
This little story seemed better in terms of a complete story. The version i read had dialogue, the two elders saying it's dinner, then running into one another, it's almost comical. I can see how this was a story. I'm not entirely sure why Susanna is considered to be so great. She stuck to her morals? okay i must admit that is a very strong characteristic. Still I'm trying to understand what she is meant to represent? When confronted by the men, she decided to not give in even though she knew it would be the death of her or worse. Then at the trial she doesn't really deny it, she just asks god for help.
So Ask god for help? doesn't that go against the, god helps those that help themselves bit?
It did remind me of Narnia though (I am a big dork >.>) in prince caspian Lucy pretty much just waits around until Aslan shows up. Yay faith?

Ah reading Job. I knew this story before, and it has always bothered me, generally the nature of suffering when a deity is involved bothers me. Doestovsky sums up my feelings rather well in his great novel. If there is a God that expects us to accept suffering as a test of faith...I don't want anything to do with it.
There is so much that bothers me in this book. First of all, innocent lives are lost to make a point. His offspring all die...to make him sad. I assume his offspring were mostly innocent. It says Job worked at resolving their sins, and we're not all perfect, that doesn't mean lives ought to be taken just to prove how awesome you are.
Honestly it seems like the Job's trouble starts because God wants to get in a pissing contest. But looking past that, I suppose the core of it makes sense. Faith isn't really faith if it goes untested. Anyone can believe God is awesome if they have a great life.
The reasoning for God's actions at the end bothers me. Claiming that God is never wrong in his decisions (I guess the whole being sorry for the flood thing doesn't mean he was wrong), humans can't fathom everything god can (fair enough) so God is completely free in his actions with his creation, he can do what he wants and we can't question it and should just trust in it. The answer to why there is suffering in the world is "I do what I want, stop asking questions"
I can't stomach it. I try not to be hypercritical of this story, but I just don't understand why this is appealing. Why would you trust in a being that may torture you for unknown reasons,Why would you want that feeling of helplessness.

I've had someone comment to me about this. Asking how I could deal with being Atheist when there's still suffering and you can't do anything about it. Well I see it a bit differently. Shit happens, a simple fact of life, but it's impersonal. There is no one causing me to suffer this way. I am not like a mouse pinned beneathe a cat's paw waiting to see if it will eat me or let me go.

It's just that personal causing or allowing his followers to suffer that bothers me with this God.
Admittedly Jod gets all his stuff back (sort of) and it's better, but I find that to be a very hollow gift for faith. Possesions mean to mask a tear in trust.

Spoiler warning D:

This discussing of suffering and tragedy got my thinking. I've read King Leer, great play. If you haven't read it yet DO IT.
Anyway the Brothers of Dostoevsky. Here is a link. It's a bit long, and Dostoevsky can be a bit...heavy, but it's worth taking time to study, it is referenced...so often.
Here is a link to the online chapter (yay e-text :D)

All this makes me think of a movie. A Dog of Flanders. I saw an animated version, so i couldn't say anything for the live action, but this movie is the most tragic story I have ever read/seen. It's based on a book, so you could probably check that out too.

This is where spoilers begin, if you don't want anything given away don't read further.

In King Leer, he isn't that innocent. It begins with his idiotic idea of love being measurable. So while it is terribly tragic, there is a reason all the trouble began.

In Brothers it is much worse, but with the kid he still did something (throwing the rock like a punk) to start the tragedy going for him. I'm not saying that isn't one of the most terrible things I have ever read, I am simply noting that these tragedies have a start.

In a Dog of Flanders, it doesn't. The Story is about a poor boy, Nello, that lives with his Grandfather and his dog Patrasche. Patrasche was adopted by them after escaping a nasty owner that beat him and such and Nello nursed him back to health. Nello and his grandfather are milk farmers and Nello is a talented artist. Nello is friends with a girl who's father owns the windmill in the village, basically owning the town.
The story starts with Nello wishing to see canvases painted by Rubens that are on display at the church, but there is a fee and he can not afford it. The trouble starts when Patrache's previous owner spots Nello with the dog and goes after them. In order to ensure Patrache stays with the family Nello's Grandfather pays the previous owner his life savings. Later Nello is playing with the windmill owners daughter in secret (her parents don't want her playing with the poor boy) and the windmill catches fire because the overseer forgot to oil the gears. It is blamed on Nello. Now the town won't do business with him and his grandfather, and to top that off his grandfather grows ill and dies. So Nello is alone and broke. He enters an art contest. The winner of the contest would get a full tuition to a prestigious art school. Basically he loses to the rich kids that can afford more supplies. Still alone, still poor, christmas rolls around. it's freezing and his landlord (the mill overseer) kicks him out of the home as he can't afford the rent. So he starts a long walk to the church. On the say he finds a large bag of money. It belongs to the mill owner, his friends father, surprise surprise it's a large chunk of his savings. Nello returns it to the house, leaving patrache there.
The family finds it and discovers he hasn't taken a single coin, despite the fact just one would make his life much better. They see they greatly misjudged the poor kid. Also a man from the art school comes saying he wants to personally fund Nello's education. Fantastic. they go to find him and discover he was kicked out of the house. The finally find him in the church. Nello died of exposure, in front of the Rubens picture...happy because he got to see something everyone else had just taken for granted.
That is a seriously depressing story, and the reason it reminds me of Job. despite all that terrible stuff brought upon him for no apparent reason, the kid doesn't lose his faith in humanity. He's still nice and he actually dies happy.
that story will always have my vote for most tragic >.> Sorry Prof. Sexson

perfect day/ worst day

I suck at blogging. >:{
Anyway i felt I should describe my perfect day and the worst day of my life.

First the perfect one. It started with being able to sleep in. this may not sound amazing, so i should explain. I was stayingg with my family on a break. they have a tendency of going to bed before i do and waking before I do. Whenever i try to sleep in something happens. the dog escapes the yard, someone needs something from the room, they wake me up to ask innane questions, something is always there to wake me, except this time. I woke late and then went to visit my boyfriend where we spent a leisurely day watching firefly, gilmore girls, and other dvds. We made dinner, and just chilled. It is a fantastic feeling to do absolutely nothing after so many classes and so many midterms and papers and such. That night we discovered there was a meteor shower, and on a whim we drove off to pete's hill, hiking the hill in the dark (it was on a whim and we forgot flashlights) and we sat on a fence to watch the stars fall.

Now for my worst day. It started with being woken up early (funny how that happens) in order to start chores, because it was saturday and my mother is a morning person, so when she cleans, we all clean XP. After the chores were done my parents went for a drive. I went to do pressing homework so I could watch the movie we rented for later. I started to get a stomach ache and went to lay down, but it didn't go away. it turned into a burning stabbing pain in my stomach. it only grew worse and I had to go to the emergency room. Stomach pain wasn't particularly high on their list so i waited a few hours. When they finally got to testing i wasn't much happier. I had to move around, and do things, and getting very few answers. to top that off they were testing for appendicitis...if you have ever had a test where they inject dye into your intestines they you will understand when I say this was the most painful experience of my life. If you haven't...take my word for it, it hurts. It hurt enough that the tech felt no reason to sugar coat. He simply told me is was excrutiatingly painful...joy. Well that was done, and they decided I needed emergency surgery. Well now I was hungry, getting surgery the first time ever, in horrible pain, and didn't get to see the movie (weekend rental). Also it was the day before valentine's this is important info for later. I got the surgery, turns out that I was internally bleeding, so I was enemic for a while afterwards, and like i said it was valentines, and i missed school the day a guy that had had a crush on me for a while brought roses. Sigh. I'm glad it's over now...

test fail

I thought I was prepared, I studied through the night, but i couldn't get to sleep until 7. I don't know why, i just couldn't turn my brain off. I woke for the test and, I'm so angry I made so many stupid mistakes. It was far more detail oriented than I thought and well blah. maybe there will be a way i could make it up. hopefully.

Women in the bible

yep it's been a week. I've been busy running around town for meetings and such. So i finally have time to tell my opinions on the guest lecture. I found it to be incredibly interesting. It gave me new insight into the patriarchy. Sure it was very anti woman, but it was also anti anything which wasn't the dominant male. I found it really interesting how women were the representation of isreal being lead astray.

Anyway hopefully this test goes well tomorrow. Now i must return to work :<

Bleh XP

so i was absent tuesday unfortunately. I'm rather sensetive to sudden weather changes so the recent fluctuation had me sick enough that I had to miss class (that and i didn't want to share germs if i had the flu)

So I read some exodus, the king james version with etext. I gotta say, the pharoh is a really dim guy. The way i understood it was he has a group that he's using for hard labor, and wants to kill off all males of the slave group. Honestly I always thought it was the first male born that was killed and after that it was alright. It almost makes sense, it gets numbers down and it's a bit kick for family lines, but no, apparently this was a pharoh with no contingency plan whatsoever. Kill now, find a new work force later.

I want to say he's stupid for needing so many plagues to get the point, but in a way, it's almost like modern thinking. Now adays when we see something miraculous, scientists try to replicate it, and normally they do. So it turns out it isn't mystical, it's science. yay. Well pharoh does the same thing in a way. Moses throws down his staff and the whole snake bit happens, the magicians replicate it. It's not amazing if it happens twice. Granted moses' snake pwned the other snake. I'm sure it's a metaphor for god's power and dominion or something, but still it's nearly like the modern era thinking
I wonder how many believers out there see something interesting as a miracle, when science has repeated and explained it. How many think it's all just a trick.

I had a friend that was joining the mormon church and often attended bible study on a weekly basis. I was curious about it, and like to be informed about religions and so I followed along to observe. There was something that bothered me about it, but for the longest time I couldn't put my finger on it, at least not until someone said what I had been thinking. You, or they really, needed to push aside logic for faith. It's a concept that I personally can't live by, but it's interesting to see it now in terms of the pharoh. Imagine if he just had faith in the power moses had, instead of trying to seek explanation and hardening his heart, he would have been saved a lot of trouble, but the story would have been rather boring.

another thing I noticed in my sickness. The bible is a lot more fun to read when you imagine the pharoh as darth vader >.> stew on that one for a while

Stories and things

So as we established before, I am a big nerd. (glad we are all on the same page there) I have a particular interest in mythology and like to collect stories, like the epic of gilgamesh, and sigurd the valsung (or any story where Odin pops up is worth reading) so on and so forth.
Last class we talked about Lilith, Adam's first wife. As I said I first learned of her through knowing of vampire fanfiction and...such. yeah...well anyway, I noticed we didn't go over what the story was, So here it is. The source on this is supposedly "The alphabet of Ben Sira" (my sources are the internet so take it with a grain of salt) and this is the story as I know it

After God created Adam, who was alone, He said, 'It is not good for man to be alone.' He then created a woman for Adam, from the earth, as He had created Adam himself, and called her Lilith. Adam and Lilith immediately began to fight. She said, 'I will not lie below,' and he said, 'I will not lie beneath you, but only on top. For you are fit only to be in the bottom position, while I am to be the superior one.' Lilith responded, 'We are equal to each other inasmuch as we were both created from the earth.' But they would not listen to one another. When Lilith saw this, she pronounced the Ineffable Name and flew away into the air.Adam stood in prayer before his Creator: 'Sovereign of the universe!' he said, 'the woman you gave me has run away.' At once, the Holy One, blessed be He, sent these three angels Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, to bring her back.Said the Holy One to Adam, 'If she agrees to come back, what is made is good. If not, she must permit one hundred of her children to die every day.' The angels left God and pursued Lilith, whom they overtook in the midst of the sea, in the mighty waters wherein the Egyptians were destined to drown. They told her God's word, but she did not wish to return. The angels said, 'We shall drown you in the sea.’'Leave me!' she said. 'I was created only to cause sickness to infants. If the infant is male, I have dominion over him for eight days after his birth, and if female, for twenty days.’When the angels heard Lilith's words, they insisted she go back. But she swore to them by the name of the living and eternal God: 'Whenever I see you or your names or your forms in an amulet, I will have no power over that infant.' She also agreed to have one hundred of her children die every day. Accordingly, every day one hundred demons perish, and for the same reason, we write the angels' names on the amulets of young children. When Lilith sees their names, she remembers her oath, and the child recovers.

So there you have it then. Lilith was pretty much the opposite of Eve. Aggressive, domineering, stubborn. Though after reading more about Adam, and his lack of spine (particularly the pat where he rats out eve right of the bat) I am surprised he didn't submit.
There's more to Lilith more or less, different stories and attributions. I have seen her called the wife of Asmodeus, the mother of vampires, succubi, or just demons, but the sources on that is even less clear and only worth mentioning so if you ever see such a story you can think back to this and go "oooh yeeeah"
The more you know ------* (you can tell i'm tired)

The other thing I mentioned was the Grigori, also known as The watchers. A group of angels that were meant to watch mankind, but got a little too...personal. They've been attributed with the fathering of the nephilem. Supposedly they pop up in the books of Enoch which i think is part of the apocrypha. My sources again are internet based, so I don't take them with deadly seriousness, but i just wanted to show that this story is another one that exists and is a fairly popular tool in fictional, slightly biblical based story telling. (I'm just glad i'm not crazy)

~Sigh~

I find this to be very...disapointing. I know that i need to do these blog posts twice a week, and yet i still can't get into the habit. It's aggrivating to say the least, knowing that i can do this, and i should do this...frankly i have to do this for a good grade, and yet I can't really remember to keep it up. I haven't really had time to read the bible anyway >.> I mentioned this before but since the beginning of the school year all my time has been wrapped up in work, sleep, and a major project I've been working on for the past month. I suppose I should be entirely forthright in these explanations, you should know Professor sexson why i am doing so abysmally on this blog thing.

Well the project for the past month was to make a full body costume (seen in action above). I started with a box of fur and absolutely no knowledge of sewing besides the skill of threading a needle. Over the past month I have basically designed and hand sewn the costume from stratch in order to make a deadline which came and went this past weekend and I am rather happy with the result.

I suppose i ought to feel guilty, especially considering that if i put as much effort and time into reading the bible as I did this suit, i could probably have been done with it by now. However at the end of the day I did get to run around in a big fox suit, and that is it's own reward really.

It's been hard getting into the bible, Genesis is so...dreary. It's not the foundation for a kind loving religion where you feel wanted and loved. It's quite a few stories of violence, rape, murder, trickery, and some all together evil things. Not really my cup of tea to be honest. Though I must admit Joseph's story was a nice come back. He has character development! He starts as a whiney little taddle tale that's daddy's favorite, and through his many life trials, which he overcomes with human perserverance with the blessing of god (nothing superhuman) and becomes a powerful man that actually does what's right GASP! he forgives his brothers without some sneaky coniving backstabby reason. Sure as david Plotz points out, he makes a terrible dictator, probably ruining it for everyone later on, but at least on the personal level he has a heart...something i'm not sure i could say for the other characters.

That leads to my reason for this blog. While i haven't really had the time to read the bible, i picked up the Good Book on my way back from Seattle this weekend. I finished the summary of genesis. First I would like to comment on how refreshing it is to read. I don't need to set aside hours of alone time in order to read this book and understand it, as i do with the bible. Plotz has a style that almost seems like you're having a conversation. He's just telling you what his experience reading the bible was like as you hang out. My one disagreement is he seems to take things to literaly or i don't know, he seems to be searching for meaning where i have come to the conclusion there is none. For instance in his examination of the story of Noah, he asks why God does such a terrible thing. What has mankind done to deserve genocide. If God wanted to teach us humility and the fact we are dependant on him aren't there better ways? Where's the moral here?
I personally don't think there is one. It's a sort of Urmyth (is that the right word? i'll pretend it is anyway) I think it did actually happen, sort of. Once upon a time there was a big flood. Maybe even a few. It was so devastating that it passed through generations of storytellers until one day, instead of breaking the river banks and flooding the village, killing all the chickens in town, it flooded the world! I mean after allthere's many many many myths about the great flood.
despite that little disagreement I quite like Plotz's style. He tells his opinion on things without making it seem more than opinion, not without citing and quoting the bible anyway. I liked how he came to the conclusion of many writiers are responsible for the bible, or really, many editors. It doesn't really make me feel guilty for not continueing with as much enthusiasm as i should have however. In summary Genesis really is rather...well like i said dreary. It's just such a spectacular hypocracy to the idea of the bible being the ultimate book of goodness and morality. It doesn't help the bible's case to see where Plotz points out every point of what could easily be considered evil.
Well i shall toil away at the bible again at some point, and I shall certainly try to read as much plotz as I can now that I have found myself with freetime again. Pity really. I was getting really good at sewing.

Making...me

So I haven't been entirely faithful with posting here. I mentioned at the beginning that i don't do well posting my thoughts onto the web, i can't get past the thought that I am not that important, and no one should care that much about what i have to say. So when things get a bit tough, I tend to forget to do these sorts of things.
Lately I have been very busy on a big project that has had my full attention for the last 3 weeks. This caused a squeeze when school started, so i had class full time, work full time, and my project to work on, so forgive me professor for being less than mindful of this blogging assignment.
I finally finished Genesis after...well...pushing back sleep a bit and I can't say that i have all that much to add on after reading what everyone else has said. I can just echo the same thoughts. there is a lot in the bible that i did not expect to see. of course jonah was swallowed by a big fish, not a whale..that kind of thing. there is also the things that i knew were there, but still are rather...disturbing to read. Mostly i find it strange how, a religion where marraige and having only one mate is important, has a book where marrying many and using housemaidens and slaves for children is totally cool, but to be fair that's just common patriarchal family lines. doesn't matter who you do it with as long as everyone knows who daddy is. I'll go more in depth on genesis in a later post, probably wensday.
What i wanted to talk about now was...well this project i've been working on. It is a costume, a large full body fox costume, a bit like a mascot. Now it is a daunting task and I had no idea how to even sew before I started, but i took it a peice at a time, just day by day, and after a while it reminded me of the first genesis story. I may as well have been making the world for the difficulty it brought me to learn to hand stitch this entire suit. I began to joke about it with my partner. Well tonight the entire thing has come together and the body has taken form. I find it all to be particularly deep because, funnily enough, one of my final acts was to blow air into the "nose" to clear any loose peices of foam stuck in there.
As i said I am not religious, but it resonated quite well to immitate literature in a way. Plus i got a nice quote out of it :P

Anyway before i go there is one question i had that i wanted to write down. Why has it been so important for the story to restart so many times? Civilization started with Adam and Eve, then Noah, then in a sense Abraham started the nations of those that would be reading the bible and such. it reminds me of other mythologies. the greek/roman ages of gold, silver, and iron...the aztecs worlds that were created then destroyed, the hopi worlds they travelled through. Why is early literature doing this?

the bible...as literature

I've been forcing myself to stop thinking in terms of theology, because frankly it's too easy (and not the point of the class) I'm sure we could all pick holes in the Bible and it's religious message when taken literally, we've all noticed some weird discrepancies by now. So I've been working on looking at the bible and it's role as literature.
Karen's post made me think about it mostly. She asked why circumcision is a requirement, why was it put in the bible? Well it does seem random, but when i thought about it I figured it was there for the same reason a lot of old laws were there, Hygene. Sure now it's all well and good, we bathe regularly, we got cool disinfectant wipes and lysol, and if something does happen, a trip to the doctor will probably fix you right up. Well in ye olden times it wasn't the same. Things were dirty, people didn't bathe much, nasty little germs all around and if you got sick, it could very likely kill you. So there were certain things people noticed would kill them, or make them sick. Pork for instance couldn't be properly prepared at the time, you eat pork, you get sick, why? well we didn't have the technology at the time to trace to cause and effect, nor even the knowledge of nasty little germies, so god did it. He's made at you. same with shellfish. So I may not have the er...expert opinion on the matter of circumcision but, i think it was just a way to make things a bit cleaner and less likely to get all infected and gross XP
Really the bible is like all the good classical literature, it's a collection of the human experience used as a guide. You can break down classics into morals Don't kill your brother and marry his wife, don't have a big stupid blood feud, teenage love angst sucks...okay i might have given a few english professors an anerism summarizing shakespeare so simply, but i think i've proved a point. Frankenstein shows us to not try and surpass the bonds of what is human, the bible tells us love thy neighbor, or don't eat pork, or whatever.
Honestly looking at it as a peice of literature, I can't say it's the best. It doesn't have the kick that more modern literature has, and to be fair the style of prose hadn't had time to develope yet, but it's also missing the spirit that oral tales seem to have. It's certainly no Beowulf. It strikes me as a sort of hybrid, between a how to guide, and chicken soup for the soul. Perhaps it will get better as I go along.

Genesis to 6.8

I always find the beginning of the bible to be particularly interesting. I highly enjoy creation myths and so the likenesses to other creation myths is quite fun. First I suppose I should start with God creating the world in 7 days. The most interesting part to me was the idea that he created a dome to hold the sky seperate from the water, because while this was obviously written a very long time ago, this shows that the writers had the idea that the sky at least was round, and were probably well aware that the earth itself was round as well (but the myth of it being flat perpetrated because sea navigation was not advanced enough for ships to travel far from the coasts without being lost...maybe, i'm no historian)
I think I prefer the first story of the creation. It's interesting to look at it and try to trace early human conciousness of their own surroundings and how they interpretted the earth. the second story, with adam and eve bothers me at certain points when taken literally, but also has interesting points.
First I find it fascinating how many creation myths begin with the idea of human beings being created from the earth be it dust, dirt, or clay. It is like that with the romans, some african mythology, and the dust in particular is an interesting likeness to mesopotamian mythology where men start from dust, and after their death return to dust (this is not a happy endevour, the afterlife is not a very nice place to be in mesopotamia) It's very interesting the likenesses those myths have, and makes me wish i had a chance to just trace oral traditions through history, but alas I am only an undergrad, let's move on to my more sophmoric review of the second story.
The tale of Adam and Eve has always bothered me, and perhaps i am viewing it in a biases way (no, i probably am, but i don't much mind) first, while i don't mind the idea that woman was created from man so much, it's a curious change over from the 7 day story where both were created together. It makes me think that perhaps this story came from a different set of oral traditions as societies began to become patriarchal instead of family groups where the mother and father would rule together. It seems many mythologies have this patriarchal shift, for instance you can see it in the greek creation myth with the fall of the titans. Zeus becomes the patriarchal figure, in control, and civilization starts, but back to the bible (sorry i am so scatterbrained today)
I really hate the apple story. First of all, God hasn't really been said to be all knowing yet, but i assume that he is a very intelligent being, at least smarter than humans, in the way that parents are smarter than their children. He tells the two that they can have anything they want, except this one fruit from this one tree. really? He thought that would work? sure there was the added bonus of, this fruit will kill you, but still, it's like telling a child not to touch the cookies on the table then leaving them on a plate, in the open. That is quite the safeguard >.>. So the snake comes along and tells the little children that no the cookies aren't going to kill them. so obviously they take them. Yep that was a brilliant plan there. So God is walking in the garden, does he have a human form? can adam and eve gaze upon him without being hurt by his presense? is he wearing clothing, since he does know of good and evil and his own nakedness? well he grows angry and the two are kicked out of eden. Still seems to be a bit harsh, but i wonder if it is a point to mark when we as humans no longer hunted and gathered but began to farm for our food. The part that bugs me is the great pains during childbirth, honestly is it a proper punishment to make it so that they'll nearly die? and add on that they won't be able to resist having children and nearly dying? again, a tad harsh.
I wonder though, Does the knowledge of good and evil also equate to the knowledge of right and wrong? good=right, evil=wrong. sure the right thing to do, like helping an old lady across the street is a small bit of good, but it is still good, just as lying is a small bit of evil, but it's still evil. Well the point of my question is this. If they were unaware of good and evil, how could adam and eve be expected to know that disobeying god was bad? They were given free will and a choice to make, but they didn't have the tools to make the right choice. so they were punished for something they couldn't really help, and with the idea of original sin, all the babies ever born will be punished because god asked adam and eve to choose between right and wrong, before they knew what it was.
Next comes Cain and Abel. Obviously the human race is farming at this point. It was around this time that human beings were beginning to stop killing (and sometimes eating) other tribes and start taking slaves. the value of human life became...valueable and I believe this story marks when murder and canabalism became unacceptable to people. Taking it literally again, both Cain and Abel are devote and bring offerings, but Cain's is snubbed for some reason? God couldn't muster up any sort of "good job" for an offering to him? I'd be mad too if i didn't even get a thank you. God's curse is another point the story makes for how human life is valueable and killing is no longer acceptable.
That was mostly the interesting part to Cain. I do wonder where his wife came from, did god try again in Eden and they failed again? Did he just make more people in the world? How is it the terrible Cain became the patron for a ciilization, or a few of them really? It makes me wonder if it was more oral traditions pulled together, then at some point reflavored with name changes so now it's about Cain. The tidbit with his decendant is interesting where the curse is 72 fold for killing him. I wonder what it means. It ended so ubruptly. perhaps the first decendants of gods first children are special, or maybe it's against injuring anyone, or maybe just goes to show people are getting more nasty and violent and the violence begets more violence it only becomes worse.
The decendants of seth is an interesting bit (i know i'm odd for finding it interesting. it's just a long line of fathering really) but it was interesting at two parts. The first was that humans were apparently near divine, they were alive for 900 years and such, but this era had to end and the human being would only manage 120 years. How could our ancestors have come to that number? at the time the life span wasn't anywhere near that! it still hasn't quite managed that now, except a few outliers, but studies in DNA show that after 120 years the structure of our DNA begins to weaken. This is why clones have problems with aging. if you clone yourself after 60 years, the clone has about 60 years left to live. neat isn't it? i always found that little part of the bible to just be...fascinating. Anyway the other interesting part is, it resembles the greek mythology with its ages. the divine humans are much like the men of the golden age. what does that mean? maybe we like to think we were at least once great, maybe we know that once our ancsestors were far more physically superior to ourselves. they were the wolves to our being dogs. or maybe there really was a part of human history where god was with us and we were awesome.
The Nephilim children are like the greek heroes, all touched by the gods in some way, normally through their bloodline. The human idea of superior blood is interesting, and has some creedane. when a family starts with very nice genes, royal families for instance, and continue to have children with people like themselves (normally through imbreeding) they manage to have a very fine family...pole. the problem comes from marrying outside of the family. See imbreeding doesn't create bad genes, it just brings out any bad genes. If you carefully selectfully breed, it's not a problem until new genes are in the mix, then everyone ends up with hemophilia.
Well i shall call it a night on this part. I didn't mean to get so ranty but i do really like to analyze this sort of thing. I'll be better later on, though i'm not sure who will really be reading this anyway? Are we supposed to comment on everyone elses blog?

first day of class

So I must say that I am quite pleased with this first day of class. I was dreading this course to be honest, so much work and such a touchy subject, but after seeing the other people in the course, and listening to Professor Sexson I am happy I signed up.

Now to start with my journey through the bible. Like I said in class I "read" it before, but professor Sexson was right, i didn't strive to fully comprehend everything. The story behind this is fairly simple really. I am an atheist...well I am more of a Daoist, but i don't believe in a deity or that the universe has any interest in me whatsoever, so for simplicity I just say I'm an atheist. Now i understand some people need religion, and if you believe in something and arent hurting anyone, then who am I to say that you're wrong. Well some people don't particularly feel the same way and I was getting quite a bit of flack simple for not believing in what they did. So one day I simply decided to pick up a king james bible and read it cover to cover. It certainly made it easier when people quoted scripture at me to point out counter examples from the same book.
but yes, it will be interesting to see what i get out of it when i'm looking at it in an academic sense.

I wonder...

With only a few more days until class I can't help but wonder what the classes will be like, you can never be sure after all. Perhaps if you have had the professor before you have a good idea of what the policies will be, but that doesn't really tell what the courses will be like. Without knowing the other students one cannot know if it will be a friendly class, happy to give their imput and driving the class discussion and lessons on by themselves, or a silent class ready to curl into themselves at any tough question.
Mostly however I am wondering how this class will deal with the religious aspects of the course. Will it be like my early philosophy courses, where some believers were unable to question their beliefs for a moment and became angry and defensive at the idea of analyzing christianity, or will it be like a later course, where the participants are open to questioning what they believe and offer well formed arguments for their views, creating an interesting discussion or debate.
Maybe I've been in too many philosophy courses, this is a literature class after all, perhaps I will only see analyzing the bible as any other book and seeing it's effect on literature...hopefully. I'm not up for any more fights. That's the problem with courses that touch on religion or other topics. It is extremely interesting as a class, but how each student will be effected is pretty much a gamble.
Hopefully this will be a nice course. I'm looking forward to finally starting soon.

Premiere Entry

This is a blog that I have created for the Biblical Foundations course of Montana State University, Taught by Prof. Sexson.
A little bit about myself. My name is KT (yes that is really how I spell my name, no it doesn't mean anything.) I come from an English family and moved to the states when I was 5. I have read the bible before out of scholastic curiosity, but that was a long time ago so this will be quite the refresher course.
My first impressions on the class, is that I am rather surprised that I was required to start this blog for the course. I suppose it is equivalent to asking the class to keep a journal of their thoughts and ideas as they read, but with internet and computers. I suppose it makes it easier to be certain students are actually writing as they go. I suppose it's for the best; I have spell check at my disposal now as well as the ability to copy and paste links to interesting things i find on the internet. Still it's amazing to see the university system adapt and use technology, particularly in a study like literature...where we are studying rather old technology.
Anyway I'm not sure how well I will be able to keep up this blogging thing. I've never really felt the need to do something like this, i'm not under the illusion that the Internet wishes to know my thoughts, but i hope that I'll be able to keep it up with the incentive that it is for class.