Ruth - a story

All at once - my translation of Ruth without any fuss - it is a story to be told at one sitting. For my reading and grammatical musings on this book, the 38 odd posts are here. I still have not helped you read by punctuating. So pause at every carriage return and stray comma and before every capital letter. Other than that - no grammatical markings, no colour, no structure. Just imagine your voice informing your ear as if you were two people, a story-teller and a listener. May you captivate yourself as Boaz was captivated by Ruth.  

There is a PDF here.

But there was no information

A new blogger has been noted by John Hobbins - Margaret's Musings. She has posed an initial game - to summarize Christianity in one word. A sucker for reductionism, I picked 'information'.

My allusions are first, to the Journey of the Magi by T. S. Eliot

Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

 

Secondly to a definition of God by Stafford Beer - where I do not know, but in the body of his work somewhere - God is a store of negative entropy. I.e. God is information. God also forms me inwardly - so inner formation, secretly wrought,is also in the word.

And finally, in anticipation of the science of gravity that may itself be an aspect of information according to the latest thoughts, all things held together by the word of power that was in the beginning.

My definition is meant to be inclusive. I asked a real question today in a place I don't usually frequent. I seriously doubt that there will be an answer that is, I might say, satisfactory. (I am right so far - but perhaps they are too busy as Elijah once quipped. I wonder how long I will put up with a blog that takes such history for granted.)

Happy 42nd anniversary Bob and Di

Well - we did it - we made it to the answer to life the universe and everything 6 x 7 = 42 years. We had a fine wine Chateau la Gorce 2003 Medoc with beef tenderloin - cooked by yours truly on our own Bar-b-que with mushrooms, onions, and garlic - the vegetarians will not be pleased. Salad too - and fresh chocolate sauce with ice cream for dessert. A quiet ceremony.

The unknowable conclusion

This morning I woke up with the most obvious conclusion in my head. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. Many conclusions can be reached, but this is the foundation. All other conclusions - perhaps better called consequential policy, are contingent. Even morality is contingent on faith, as Paul writes - whatsoever is not of faith is sin.

This does not imply that God will not show mercy to those whom we consider not to have faith. That double negative should be so obvious. Why is it that our minds slip into conclusions without evidence and without logic? It is clear, however, that God is in a merciful covenant with all who have believed. Even the last and the middle verses of Lamentations confirm this.  "Unless you have utterly rejected us."  It is not hard to hear the faith in this sentence.

Such faith is not without cost, as the Song puts it, it is the cost of 'coming up from the desert'. And as Lamentations teaches, it is the faith that continues even in the exile. Such faith is as stubborn as the spirit exhibited by atheist and agnostic in what might appear to be furious attacks on their perception of the false conclusions of those who to them seem to have faith without any foundation except their own self-deception or wishful thinking.

Why attack your own perceptions of others' faith? (The stimulus for my irenic response is here.)

Lamentations 5

Translating without the constraint of the acrostic. This is a very sad prayer. I have almost nothing to say.

Verse	Hebrew text	A translation	What shall we say?
1	זְכֹר יְהוָה מֶה הָיָה לָנוּ הַבִּיטָה וּרְאֵה אֶת חֶרְפָּתֵנוּ	Remember יְהוָה how it is with us look and see our reproach	Lam 1:11 'see and look'
2	נַחֲלָתֵנוּ נֶהֶפְכָה לְזָרִים בָּתֵּינוּ לְנָכְרִים	Our inheritance is turned over to strangers our houses to foreigners	10 verses of first person plural
3	יְתוֹמִים הָיִינוּ וְאֵין אָב אִמֹּתֵינוּ כְּאַלְמָנוֹת	orphans and without a father our mothers as widows
4	מֵימֵינוּ בְּכֶסֶף שָׁתִינוּ עֵצֵינוּ בִּמְחִיר יָבֹאוּ	our water for money we drink and our wood comes at a price
5	עַל צַוָּארֵנוּ נִרְדָּפְנוּ יָגַעְנוּ וְלֹא הוּנַח לָנוּ	on our necks persecution we labour and there is no rest for us
6	מִצְרַיִם נָתַנּוּ יָד אַשּׁוּר לִשְׂבֹּעַ לָחֶם	Egypt - we give a hand Assyria - to be satisfied with bread
7	אֲבֹתֵינוּ חָטְאוּ וְאֵינָם וַאֲנַחְנוּ עֲו‍ֹנֹתֵיהֶם סָבָלְנוּ	Our fathers sinned and there is no them and we ourselves their iniquities bear
8	עֲבָדִים מָשְׁלוּ בָנוּ פֹּרֵק אֵין מִיָּדָם	Servants rule over us there is no one to break from their hand
9	בְּנַפְשֵׁנוּ נָבִיא לַחְמֵנוּ מִפְּנֵי חֶרֶב הַמִּדְבָּר	with our lives we are come to our bread from the edge of the sword in the desert
10	עוֹרֵנוּ כְּתַנּוּר נִכְמָרוּ מִפְּנֵי זַלְעֲפוֹת רָעָב	our skin is hot as an oven in the face of the ferocities of famine
11	נָשִׁים בְּצִיּוֹן עִנּוּ בְּתֻלֹת בְּעָרֵי יְהוּדָה	they humiliated the women in Zion the virgins of the cities of Judah	now a switch to third person plural
12	שָׂרִים בְּיָדָם נִתְלוּ פְּנֵי זְקֵנִים לֹא נֶהְדָּרוּ	Princes by their hand are hanged the faces of the elders they do not honour
13	בַּחוּרִים טְחוֹן נָשָׂאוּ וּנְעָרִים בָּעֵץ כָּשָׁלוּ	they bear youth to grind and the lads fail under the wood	elders, youth, and virgins (and fail where fall might be better) all hearken back to chapter 1 - though the links between 1 and 5 seem not as plentiful as those between 2 and 4. No diagrams to prove it yet though.
14	זְקֵנִים מִשַּׁעַר שָׁבָתוּ בַּחוּרִים מִנְּגִינָתָם	The elders from the gate have ceased the youth from their strings
15	שָׁבַת מְשׂוֹשׂ לִבֵּנוּ נֶהְפַּךְ לְאֵבֶל מְחֹלֵנוּ	Ceased is the joy of our hearts turned to lament is our dance	Now back to first person plural without ceasing
16	נָפְלָה עֲטֶרֶת רֹאשֵׁנוּ אוֹי נָא לָנוּ כִּי חָטָאנוּ	fallen the crown of our head alas now for us for we have sinned
17	עַל זֶה הָיָה דָוֶה לִבֵּנוּ עַל אֵלֶּה חָשְׁכוּ עֵינֵינוּ	because of this our heart has become faint because of  these black are our eyes	faint Lam 1:13 black Lam 4:8 - not in a framing position so perhaps a different gloss is called for
18	עַל הַר צִיּוֹן שֶׁשָּׁמֵם שׁוּעָלִים הִלְּכוּ-בוֹ פ	because the hill of Zion is desolate foxes go about on it	an interpretation of the foxes of Song 2:15?
19	אַתָּה יְהוָה לְעוֹלָם תֵּשֵׁב כִּסְאֲךָ לְדוֹר וָדוֹר	You יְהוָה remain for ever your throne from age to age
20	לָמָּה לָנֶצַח תִּשְׁכָּחֵנוּ תַּעַזְבֵנוּ לְאֹרֶךְ יָמִים	Why in perpetuity do you forget us and forsake us for such a length of days
21	הֲשִׁיבֵנוּ יְהוָה אֵלֶיךָ  וְנָשׁוּבָה חַדֵּשׁ יָמֵינוּ כְּקֶדֶם	Turn us יְהוָה to you and we will be turned refresh our days as of old	Psalm 90 - a poem on turning, and Psalm 80:3-4
22	כִּי אִם-מָאֹס מְאַסְתָּנוּ קָצַפְתָּ עָלֵינוּ עַד-מְאֹד ש	For if to reject you reject us you are displeased with us very severely

A study of interjections

I have felt some unwillingness, most noble and devout lady, to expound these four stanzas which you have requested me to explain ... (the first few words of the prologue to Living Flame of Love by St John of the Cross.)

I thought I might write about the 'Ah' and the 'O' of the beloved as noted in Carl's post on the Song. Or even include the opening demonstrative of the Lamentations chapters 1, 2, and 4 to which 'how' I prepended an 'Ah' for the acrostic. All this in order to relate the intensity of these particles to the 'Oh' of the Living Flame of Love - as the expositor does in the first few pages. I cannot do more than point out that these are the interjections of love.

Each word of the exposition is so well placed, I find it impossible to reduce it. Further in the introduction the writer invokes the promises of the farewell discourse - (John 14:23). In the exposition of stanza 1, the writer also invokes John 7:38. All these allusions are true in themselves and true in the context - but there is an area of the exposition which my own knowledge would not necessarily agree with. The expositor claims that the breaking of the web in the first stanza is a desire to pass into eternal life. I don't think so. The poet is already in eternal life and is still in the land of the living and is able to write. So nihil obstat or not, there is more to say.

And that says to me that perhaps I am not yet ready to read this. Or is it that I must find a different language from that which has received a nihil obstat in order that I might express this joy. I am to find words - but my exposition might not be without obstacle. Or has the expositor implicitly pushed the exposition to say what is acceptable to others even if it misses the mark. Perhaps these writings cannot then be trusted having been tamed by a hidden conformity.

I have often found this - and I wonder if I am simply wrong and alone. Where does this leave me? Am I such a maverick? If I felt that, I would be saying that God is fickle - and this I know is false. Psalm 27 expresses the enigma already

...what if I had not believed I would see the goodness of יְהוָה
in the land of the living?

For a month or so I have been looking forward to what April Deconnick may say on John and the history of the Church - I wonder if it will be pointing in this direction. This may relate also to the heart strangely warmed of Wesley which Ken Schenck pointed out this morning.  In the meanwhile - tonight, our Bible study will begin to read the five scrolls - starting with the Song.

Living Flame of Love

This fourth poem of St John of the Cross I came across this morning. The book has a somewhat dank smell of basement living. It cost $1.50 some time ago - at least 35 years ago.

It is 271 pages on 4 short stanzas. A cursory read of the first few pages reveals a knowledge such as I have not seen in most blogging on the Bible.

The book is translated edited and with an introduction by E. Allison Peers from the critical edition of P. Silverio de Santa Teresa C.D. Probably it is online somewhere. I found it. (Or something close to it.) To think I could get $4.00 for this used copy - hah!

Here's the poem. But the exposition is astonishing. Perhaps I shall find a way to cite a bit here and there... Is it easier to understand than the Jabberwocky? There are people who have said to me that my sentences are grammatical but they can't understand them. (It would be fun to create some grammatical Hebrew to this effect - at least we know which letters form the grammar ...- maybe some day.)

Oh, living flame of love

That tenderly woundest my soul in its deepest centre,

Since thou are no longer oppressive, perfect me now if it be thy will,

Break the web of this sweet encounter.

Oh, sweet burn! Oh, delectable wound! 

Oh, soft hand! Oh, delicate touch

That savours of eternal life and pays every debt!

In slaying, thou has changed death into life.

Oh, lamps of fire, In whose splendours 

The deep caverns of sense which were dark and blind

With strange brightness

Give heat and light together to their Beloved!

How gently and lovingly thou awakenest in my bosom,

Where thou dwellest secretly and alone!

And in thy sweet breathing, full of blessing and glory,

How delicately thou inspirest my love!

Beloved, be still, and do not answer. But in this taste of eternal life, glory in the Spirit which from the Son, and in the Son, glories, God in God on your behalf, in this fragile earthen skin-bottle. Be still, Beloved.