"The number of people identifying as transgender has risen sharply over the past several years, especially among young girls. This rise has caught the attention of journalists, scientists, and the medical community, many of whom have come to conclude that something is very wrong. Are gender and sex actually linked? What about those that “detransition?” And what about the fact that culture seems to be shifting its view of transgenderism? In this talk, we will look at some of the data that is coming out from various cultural sources as well challenge Christians to think about how we can be Christ to a hurting people."
by Alycia Woods
Showing posts with label God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label God. Show all posts
Sunday, September 29, 2024
Sunday, September 15, 2024
Saturday, May 4, 2024
Review of a controversial Melville biography alleging a married woman was the cause of Melville's writing Moby Dick
MELVILLE in LOVE by Michael Shelton
Shelton in the past was nominated for a Pulitzer for one of his previous biographies. So I thought this was going to be a powerful biography.
But in this recently released biography, Shelton alleges, despite very little factual evidence, that Melville had a many-year'd fervent adulterous relationship with Sarah Morewood. The latter was a flirtatious, lively secular married woman living in the Berkshires where Melville had moved with his wife of 3 years and their 1st child.
Though Melville in Love is listed as biography not fiction, Shelton speculatively guesses as to what exactly Melville and other characters are thinking and intending. Such guesses would seem to make this fiction, not factual biography.
Then Shelton glorifies Melville's alleged affair, as if such an immoral and unjust action were one of the great romantic loves of history and literature.
And Shelton does this, too, by mischaracterizing Melville’s faithful, conscientious wife Lizzie, accusing her of being priggish, shallow, puritanical, etc.
But Melville had only married 3 years to Lizzie before his alleged affair began. Some literary commentators wonder why Melville married such a nonliterary, conservative wife and guess it must have been for her money because her dad was a well-known judge with lots of money, which he showered on his daughter and son-in-law for years. The father often helped Melville get out of debt when his books, beginning with Moby Dick, failed to sell.
However, Melville's, alleged, odd choice, not that different from other famous writers who lived off of their wife’s money so they could write full-time and who picked wives who were conservative, non-literary, etc. Just to start the list--especially true of Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Bob Dylan, etc.
The old cliché, of opposites attract does seem to be true of Melville (and some other famous writers), though it is tragic, that after the wedding, Opposites often do ATTACK.” :-(
Allegedly, the only possible time that Melville and could have slept together in the small village without townspeople and family knowing was on a small gathering of young adults who hiked up Mt. Greylock one day and stayed there all night. It’s Shelton’s contention that somehow they managed to slip away in a couple of hours midnight hours, while others slept, to “sleep.”
Shelton fails to acknowledge that while it is true Sarah was very flirtatious in her letters to Melville and with him in person (until she died at the early age of 40!), she often was that way to other married men, too, including Oliver Windel Holmes, etc.
During a few of her young adult years, Sarah was living alone in the Berkshires, while her absent distant, business-focused husband lived and worked in New York City. Their relationship seems odd, though he did care for her in his own way, even had a piano shipped out to her at their estate in Pittsfield, etc.
I thought maybe I was being too critical of Shelton’s very doubtful biographical claim, but then I read a few literary reviews on Melville in Love. They were even harsher than my conclusions—skewering the biography and its thesis as almost ridiculous.
Especially, Shelton’s claim that Moby Dick was written because of Sarah’s ‘freeing’ intimate influence so contrary to the alleged very puritanical, restrictive views of Lizzie.
Besides, Moby Dick is extremely male-centered narrative, with hardly any women even mentioned! Some critics have even labeled it homoerotic, for such parts of the story as Ismael and Queequeg’s relationship, including hugging in bed. The long very odd novel shows no trace of any illicit romantic love affair.
From Wikipedia:
“Lizzie described their marriage as "very unexpected, and scarcely thought of until about two months before it actually took place".[83] She wanted to be married in church, but they had a private wedding ceremony at home to avoid possible crowds hoping to see the celebrity.[84] The couple honeymooned in the then-British Province of Canada, and traveled to Montreal. They settled in a house on Fourth Avenue in New York City (now called Park Avenue).
“According to scholars Joyce Deveau Kennedy and Frederick James Kennedy, Lizzie brought to their marriage a sense of religious obligation, an intent to make a home with Melville regardless of place, a willingness to please her husband by performing such "tasks of drudgery" as mending stockings, an ability to hide her agitation, and a desire "to shield Melville from unpleasantness".[85] The Kennedys conclude their assessment with:
“If the ensuing years did bring regrets to Melville's life, it is impossible to believe he would have regretted marrying Elizabeth. In fact, he must have realized that he could not have borne the weight of those years unaided—that without her loyalty, intelligence, and affection, his own wild imagination would have had no "port or haven".
“Biographer Robertson-Lorant cites "Lizzie's adventurous spirit and abundant energy," and she suggests that "her pluck and good humor might have been what attracted Melville to her, and vice versa".
“An example of such good humor appears in a letter about her not yet used to being married: "It seems sometimes exactly as if I were here for a visit. The illusion is quite dispelled however when Herman stalks into my room without even the ceremony of knocking, bringing me perhaps a button to sew on, or some equally romantic occupation".[87] On February 16, 1849, the Melvilles' first child, Malcolm, was born.”
--
Despite my negative review of this shallow Procrustean effort and Shelton claiming that Moby Dick is the result of his affair with Sarah, I did find it worth reading because of a few intriguing facts about Melville, and I was opened to the possibilities of speculative ideas that no other biographer has ever raised!
But Herman Melville lived such a tragic-misguided life; even worse, he treated his wife horribly often drunk in his 50's. Then his life winded down to a tragic end. Also, one wonders why his 3 main books are so very pessimistic, almost nihilistic in tone and detail with their main characters ending tragically.
Lastly, like often in American literature, AUGUSTINIAN-CALVINISM RAISES ITS SATANIC HEAD. It turns out that the central horror of Melville’s family background was the fatalism of Augustinian-Calvinism that he sought to escape from:_("
Notice Ishmael's statement in the 1st couple of pages: "Call me, Ishmael. Though I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the Fates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when others were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short and easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in farces--though I cannot tell why this was exactly;
yet, now that I recall all the circumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment."
A biography one can learn from, but not really a winner.
In the LIGHT of the GOOD, the TRUE, the JUST, the CARING...
Daniel Wilcox
Shelton in the past was nominated for a Pulitzer for one of his previous biographies. So I thought this was going to be a powerful biography.
But in this recently released biography, Shelton alleges, despite very little factual evidence, that Melville had a many-year'd fervent adulterous relationship with Sarah Morewood. The latter was a flirtatious, lively secular married woman living in the Berkshires where Melville had moved with his wife of 3 years and their 1st child.
Though Melville in Love is listed as biography not fiction, Shelton speculatively guesses as to what exactly Melville and other characters are thinking and intending. Such guesses would seem to make this fiction, not factual biography.
Then Shelton glorifies Melville's alleged affair, as if such an immoral and unjust action were one of the great romantic loves of history and literature.
And Shelton does this, too, by mischaracterizing Melville’s faithful, conscientious wife Lizzie, accusing her of being priggish, shallow, puritanical, etc.
But Melville had only married 3 years to Lizzie before his alleged affair began. Some literary commentators wonder why Melville married such a nonliterary, conservative wife and guess it must have been for her money because her dad was a well-known judge with lots of money, which he showered on his daughter and son-in-law for years. The father often helped Melville get out of debt when his books, beginning with Moby Dick, failed to sell.
However, Melville's, alleged, odd choice, not that different from other famous writers who lived off of their wife’s money so they could write full-time and who picked wives who were conservative, non-literary, etc. Just to start the list--especially true of Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Bob Dylan, etc.
The old cliché, of opposites attract does seem to be true of Melville (and some other famous writers), though it is tragic, that after the wedding, Opposites often do ATTACK.” :-(
Allegedly, the only possible time that Melville and could have slept together in the small village without townspeople and family knowing was on a small gathering of young adults who hiked up Mt. Greylock one day and stayed there all night. It’s Shelton’s contention that somehow they managed to slip away in a couple of hours midnight hours, while others slept, to “sleep.”
Shelton fails to acknowledge that while it is true Sarah was very flirtatious in her letters to Melville and with him in person (until she died at the early age of 40!), she often was that way to other married men, too, including Oliver Windel Holmes, etc.
During a few of her young adult years, Sarah was living alone in the Berkshires, while her absent distant, business-focused husband lived and worked in New York City. Their relationship seems odd, though he did care for her in his own way, even had a piano shipped out to her at their estate in Pittsfield, etc.
I thought maybe I was being too critical of Shelton’s very doubtful biographical claim, but then I read a few literary reviews on Melville in Love. They were even harsher than my conclusions—skewering the biography and its thesis as almost ridiculous.
Especially, Shelton’s claim that Moby Dick was written because of Sarah’s ‘freeing’ intimate influence so contrary to the alleged very puritanical, restrictive views of Lizzie.
Besides, Moby Dick is extremely male-centered narrative, with hardly any women even mentioned! Some critics have even labeled it homoerotic, for such parts of the story as Ismael and Queequeg’s relationship, including hugging in bed. The long very odd novel shows no trace of any illicit romantic love affair.
From Wikipedia:
“Lizzie described their marriage as "very unexpected, and scarcely thought of until about two months before it actually took place".[83] She wanted to be married in church, but they had a private wedding ceremony at home to avoid possible crowds hoping to see the celebrity.[84] The couple honeymooned in the then-British Province of Canada, and traveled to Montreal. They settled in a house on Fourth Avenue in New York City (now called Park Avenue).
“According to scholars Joyce Deveau Kennedy and Frederick James Kennedy, Lizzie brought to their marriage a sense of religious obligation, an intent to make a home with Melville regardless of place, a willingness to please her husband by performing such "tasks of drudgery" as mending stockings, an ability to hide her agitation, and a desire "to shield Melville from unpleasantness".[85] The Kennedys conclude their assessment with:
“If the ensuing years did bring regrets to Melville's life, it is impossible to believe he would have regretted marrying Elizabeth. In fact, he must have realized that he could not have borne the weight of those years unaided—that without her loyalty, intelligence, and affection, his own wild imagination would have had no "port or haven".
“Biographer Robertson-Lorant cites "Lizzie's adventurous spirit and abundant energy," and she suggests that "her pluck and good humor might have been what attracted Melville to her, and vice versa".
“An example of such good humor appears in a letter about her not yet used to being married: "It seems sometimes exactly as if I were here for a visit. The illusion is quite dispelled however when Herman stalks into my room without even the ceremony of knocking, bringing me perhaps a button to sew on, or some equally romantic occupation".[87] On February 16, 1849, the Melvilles' first child, Malcolm, was born.”
--
Despite my negative review of this shallow Procrustean effort and Shelton claiming that Moby Dick is the result of his affair with Sarah, I did find it worth reading because of a few intriguing facts about Melville, and I was opened to the possibilities of speculative ideas that no other biographer has ever raised!
But Herman Melville lived such a tragic-misguided life; even worse, he treated his wife horribly often drunk in his 50's. Then his life winded down to a tragic end. Also, one wonders why his 3 main books are so very pessimistic, almost nihilistic in tone and detail with their main characters ending tragically.
Lastly, like often in American literature, AUGUSTINIAN-CALVINISM RAISES ITS SATANIC HEAD. It turns out that the central horror of Melville’s family background was the fatalism of Augustinian-Calvinism that he sought to escape from:_("
Notice Ishmael's statement in the 1st couple of pages: "Call me, Ishmael. Though I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the Fates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when others were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short and easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in farces--though I cannot tell why this was exactly;
yet, now that I recall all the circumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment."
A biography one can learn from, but not really a winner.
In the LIGHT of the GOOD, the TRUE, the JUST, the CARING...
Daniel Wilcox
Thursday, April 18, 2024
The Question of Non-Theism
In some of his many books, John Shelby Spong, the Bishop of Newark, New Jersey for 21 years, succinctly and lucidly describes key concepts of the New Testament and Christianity and explains keen insights.
A creative theologian at times, he has made startling statements including that “God is not a noun” but “a verb that invites us to live, to love and to be”!
(Probably, in that phrase, he is alluding to Process Theology which speculates that God is process, not substance). According to Process thinkers, God is very real, but God isn't a substance like most Creedal theologians believe.
However in the latter part of his leadership, Spong started denying many of the key doctrines of orthodox Christianity.
And most shocking--indeed, incomprehensible and incongruous--Spong promulgated in a few of his later books that there is No God! That Nontheism is the Truth!
Non-theism didn’t start with him, but is central to one branch of modern liberal religion, including one branch of Quakers in Britain and America. This is very strange since the Society of Friends is centered on God, has been for 380 years!
From Wikipedia:
“Non-theism among Quakers probably dates to the 1930s, when some Quakers in California branched off to form the Humanist Society of Friends (today part of the American Humanist Association), and when Henry Cadbury professed agnosticism in a 1936 lecture to Harvard Divinity School students.
The term "non-theistic" first appeared in a Quaker publication in 1952...In 1976, a Friends General Conference Gathering hosted a Workshop for Nontheistic Friends (Quakers).”
And in 2024 at Haverford College, June 30 through July 6, 2024, FGC is hosting an atheist leader, Tom Kunesh.
"His website on ‘atheisms‘ has an interesting typology of atheism (and agnosticism) and is well worth exploring..."
"Of particular interest is the page on ‘religious atheisms‘ which includes a short, very recently updated, biography of tom..." "Tom writes:
"What is a god? A god is an idealized human being, human characteristic or human creation to which is attributed with super-human powers of giving meaning to human existence. Examples of gods are Jesus...but no atheist, shaman or otherwise, knows a real god.
Knowing all the gods, the atheist must take care not to fall into the worship of any god."
"The following link takes you to a book by Kunesh, available there as an easy to navigate html file: http://atheisms.info/shaman/
How can this religious atheism be central for spiritual seekers? Especially for Quakers since their central focus is on gathering for “Worship” every 7th day?
One well-known Quaker in the U.S. stated that he doesn’t worship at Worship but, instead, pays close attention to the moment. Another, claimed that he agrees with the hard materialism of famous new atheists.
Of course, there has been a major fracturing of Quakerism in the 20th century, into many different, even contrary meetings, manily as a counter moivement against the quietist, often stringent, Quakerism of the 19th century where Quakers were removed from Yearly Meetings for many reasons including marrying a non-Quaker, being an abolitionist and part of the “Underground Railroad,” for deviation from required clothing styles, etc.
However, it is one thing to strongly oppose rigid, narrow, demanding Quakerism (even early Quakers often disagreed about major points), but it's entirely different to centrally identify with Non-Theism, to deny that the Light is real.
Such modern non-theist Friends appear to strongly agree with Spong’s Non-theism, not only that many of the doctrines of Christianity aren’t true, but that there is no God. They appear to be promoting religious atheism.
How can Spong or Henry Cadbury, an agnostic, be so knowledgeable and inspirational, yet think the Light doesn’t exist, that no transcendent Creator is real?
Such claiming is contrary to the inspirational witness of George Fox, Margaret Fell, other early Friends, and many visionaries all the way back to Jesus?
It is possible that some Quaker Non-theists aren’t denying the True God, but only denying the concept of God in Creedal Christianity. A number of them had very severe experiences in creedal denominations, and so want nothing to do with the Creeds and other doctrines.
If that is so, then they aren’t really Non-theists but deniers of the creedal God.
If that is the case, then such a Friend is completely in line with George Fox who found no succor or belief in the religious denominations of Christianity in Britain.
And I agree with such unbelievers. As a devout theist of a Friendly sort, I’ve never believed in the Creeds of orthodox Christianity and Evangelical Christianity.
As I reflect about this odd, tragic development in modern, fragmented, Quakerism, and think about my previous article on the tendency of modern Friends to lean to rightwing or leftwing ideologies, I admit I feel discouraged. But then I remember, the present isn't that different from how Britain was in the 1640's--rife with all sorts of contrary movements, beliefs, etc.
More later
In the LIGHT of the Good, the True, the Just, the Caring,
Daniel Wilcox
A creative theologian at times, he has made startling statements including that “God is not a noun” but “a verb that invites us to live, to love and to be”!
(Probably, in that phrase, he is alluding to Process Theology which speculates that God is process, not substance). According to Process thinkers, God is very real, but God isn't a substance like most Creedal theologians believe.
However in the latter part of his leadership, Spong started denying many of the key doctrines of orthodox Christianity.
And most shocking--indeed, incomprehensible and incongruous--Spong promulgated in a few of his later books that there is No God! That Nontheism is the Truth!
Non-theism didn’t start with him, but is central to one branch of modern liberal religion, including one branch of Quakers in Britain and America. This is very strange since the Society of Friends is centered on God, has been for 380 years!
From Wikipedia:
“Non-theism among Quakers probably dates to the 1930s, when some Quakers in California branched off to form the Humanist Society of Friends (today part of the American Humanist Association), and when Henry Cadbury professed agnosticism in a 1936 lecture to Harvard Divinity School students.
The term "non-theistic" first appeared in a Quaker publication in 1952...In 1976, a Friends General Conference Gathering hosted a Workshop for Nontheistic Friends (Quakers).”
And in 2024 at Haverford College, June 30 through July 6, 2024, FGC is hosting an atheist leader, Tom Kunesh.
"His website on ‘atheisms‘ has an interesting typology of atheism (and agnosticism) and is well worth exploring..."
"Of particular interest is the page on ‘religious atheisms‘ which includes a short, very recently updated, biography of tom..." "Tom writes:
"What is a god? A god is an idealized human being, human characteristic or human creation to which is attributed with super-human powers of giving meaning to human existence. Examples of gods are Jesus...but no atheist, shaman or otherwise, knows a real god.
Knowing all the gods, the atheist must take care not to fall into the worship of any god."
"The following link takes you to a book by Kunesh, available there as an easy to navigate html file: http://atheisms.info/shaman/
How can this religious atheism be central for spiritual seekers? Especially for Quakers since their central focus is on gathering for “Worship” every 7th day?
One well-known Quaker in the U.S. stated that he doesn’t worship at Worship but, instead, pays close attention to the moment. Another, claimed that he agrees with the hard materialism of famous new atheists.
Of course, there has been a major fracturing of Quakerism in the 20th century, into many different, even contrary meetings, manily as a counter moivement against the quietist, often stringent, Quakerism of the 19th century where Quakers were removed from Yearly Meetings for many reasons including marrying a non-Quaker, being an abolitionist and part of the “Underground Railroad,” for deviation from required clothing styles, etc.
However, it is one thing to strongly oppose rigid, narrow, demanding Quakerism (even early Quakers often disagreed about major points), but it's entirely different to centrally identify with Non-Theism, to deny that the Light is real.
Such modern non-theist Friends appear to strongly agree with Spong’s Non-theism, not only that many of the doctrines of Christianity aren’t true, but that there is no God. They appear to be promoting religious atheism.
How can Spong or Henry Cadbury, an agnostic, be so knowledgeable and inspirational, yet think the Light doesn’t exist, that no transcendent Creator is real?
Such claiming is contrary to the inspirational witness of George Fox, Margaret Fell, other early Friends, and many visionaries all the way back to Jesus?
It is possible that some Quaker Non-theists aren’t denying the True God, but only denying the concept of God in Creedal Christianity. A number of them had very severe experiences in creedal denominations, and so want nothing to do with the Creeds and other doctrines.
If that is so, then they aren’t really Non-theists but deniers of the creedal God.
If that is the case, then such a Friend is completely in line with George Fox who found no succor or belief in the religious denominations of Christianity in Britain.
And I agree with such unbelievers. As a devout theist of a Friendly sort, I’ve never believed in the Creeds of orthodox Christianity and Evangelical Christianity.
As I reflect about this odd, tragic development in modern, fragmented, Quakerism, and think about my previous article on the tendency of modern Friends to lean to rightwing or leftwing ideologies, I admit I feel discouraged. But then I remember, the present isn't that different from how Britain was in the 1640's--rife with all sorts of contrary movements, beliefs, etc.
More later
In the LIGHT of the Good, the True, the Just, the Caring,
Daniel Wilcox
Tuesday, April 2, 2024
Musings on Great Songs —and on early Quakers’ Rejection of Music-Art
Musings, while spending hours in the new year listening to music,
(instead of focusing only on opposing-lamenting current immoral, false political-social claims and actions).
1 What is the difference between spiritual songs versus ones that harm and even are destructive?
2 Songs that are sung by empty rote versus songs that fill us with Light?
3 How do we tell the difference?
4 What are some of the best songs of the last 60 years?
In no particular order:
Sounds of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel
“Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence
In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dared
Disturb the sound of silence…”
The first time I heard this powerful reflection on the superficial nature of most human speaking--the woeful lack of deep communication-communion among us, I was driving through the night in a white wonder of a snowstorm down Van Dorn Avenue in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1966. Huge flakes of snow were silently hitting the wind shield, and Simon was talking to the darkness...
‘And the sign said, "The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sounds of silence"
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Paul Simon
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group
This verse is almost bizarre! Because, usually, written words in subways, etc. are obscene, superficial, or shallow false slogans...
How is this graffiti at at all prophetic compared to the superficial miscomunication of humans?
"Sounds" has amazing powerful poetry with an expert rhyme scheme (because it isn’t sing-songy nor does it draw attention to itself like most such couplet rhyming does). --
Colored People by DC Talk
...
“Pardon me, your epidermis is showing, sir
I couldn't help but note your shade of melanin (shade of melanin)
I tip my hat to the colorful arrangement
'Cause I see the beauty in the tones of our skin
We've gotta come together (come together)
And thank the Maker of us all
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
One, one, one, one
Two, two, two, two...
A piece of canvas is only the beginning for
It takes on character with every loving stroke
This thing of beauty is the passion of an artist's heart
By God's design, we are a skin kaleidoscope
We've gotta come together (come together)
Aren't we all human after all?
We're colored people and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
Ignorance has wronged some races
And vengeance is the Lord's
If we aspire to share this space
Repentance is the cure, oh yeah
Well, just a day in the shoes of a colorblind man
Should make it easy for you to see
That these diverse tones do more than cover our bones
As a part of our anatomy
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
(Oh, colored people)
We're colored people and we all gotta share this space
(Yeah, we've got to come together somehow)
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted world
(Red and yellow, black and white)
We're colored people, every man, woman, boy, and girl
(Colored people, colored people, colored people, colored people, yeah)
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Toby Mckeehan / George C. Cocchini
Colored People lyrics © Achtober Songs
A transcendent morally real wonder of truth. Opposed to white supremacy and to BLMer WOKE-false narrative against all whites, the nuclear family, and police. INSTEAD of white "colored' racism or Black-victimhood, celebrate the wonder of the HUMAN RACE--in all its variations--so COLORFUL! --
A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall by Bob Dylan
Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
And where have you been, my darling young one?
I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I've walked and I crawled on six crooked highways
I've stepped in the middle of seven sad forests
I've been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I've been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard
And it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard
It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall
Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?
And what did you see, my darling young one?
I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it
I saw a black branch with blood that kept dripping
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleeding
I saw a white ladder all covered with water
I saw ten-thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken
I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children..."
Copyright © 1963 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music
That startling lament against nuclear weapons and other forms of mass slaughter by Dylan is fairly easy to understand despite some of the very strange images. However, many of the best modern song lyrics are far more difficult to ascertain as to what their central meaning is.
While I like to write complex, imaged esoteric lyrics and listen to those difficult sorts of lyrics, many ambiguous literary lyrics often open up many possible contradictory meanings, even though they draw one deep into the lyrics’ allusions, archetypes and symbols.
Too many listeners will end up with wrong meanings--often immoral and destructive ones.
Consider the very famous rock song "(Don't Fear) the Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult:
All our times have come
Here but now they're gone
Seasons don't fear the reaper
Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain
We can be like they are
Come on, baby (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, take my hand (don't fear the reaper)
We'll be able to fly (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, I'm your man
La, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la
Valentine is done
Here but now they're gone
Romeo and Juliet
Are together in eternity (Romeo and Juliet)
40, 000 men and women everyday (like Romeo and Juliet)
40, 000 men and women everyday (redefine happiness)
Another 40, 000 coming everyday (we can be like they are)
Come on, baby (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, take my hand (don't fear the reaper)
We'll be able to fly (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, I'm your man...
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Donald Roeser
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
When I first studied the lyrics, “Don’t Fear…” appeared to be a pro-suicide rock lament. But some commentators have stated, they don’t think that is true.
While the song is a lament it is affirming that life should be accepted, not fearing everyone’s eventual deaths.
Even the author of the lyrics, Buck Dharma, stated,
"I felt that I had just achieved some kind of resonance with the psychology of people when I came up with that, I was actually kind of appalled when I first realized that some people were seeing it as an advertisement for suicide or something that was not my intention at all. It is, like, not to be afraid of [death] (as opposed to actively bring it about). It's basically a love song where the love transcends the actual physical existence of the partners."
— Buck Dharma, lead singer
Lien, James (November 6, 1995). "Buck Dharma interview". College Music Journal. New York City: CMJ. And on Wikipedia.
And there is the infamous rock ballad by the heavy metal band Led Zeppelin:
Stairway to Heaven
There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to Heaven
When she gets there she knows, if the stores are all closed
With a word she can get what she came for
Ooh, ooh, and she's buying a stairway to Heaven
There's a sign on the wall, but she wants to be sure
'Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings
In a tree by the brook, there's a songbird who sings
Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiven
Ooh, it makes me wonder
Ooh, makes me wonder
There's a feeling I get when I look to the West
And my spirit is crying for leaving
In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke through the trees
And the voices of those who stand looking
Ooh, it makes me wonder
Ooh, really makes me wonder
And it's whispered that soon if we all call the tune
Then the piper will lead us to reason
And a new day will dawn for those who stand long
And the forests will echo with laughter
Oh-oh-oh-oh-whoa
If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now
It's just a spring clean for the May queen
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on...
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Jimmy Page / Robert Anthony Plant
© Succubus Music Ltd., Sons Of Einion Publishing, Flames Of Albion Music, Inc.
This very unusual rock song with many religious symbols and images including biblical ones. It is unique and amazing, unlike any other music in the last 60 years..
But there have been contradictory commentaries written about the lyrics, some saying it is an anti-spiritual song, others disagreeing.
What do you think?
3. For What It’s Worth by Buffalo Springfield
There's something happening here
But what it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware
I think it's time we stop
Children, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?
There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
It's time we stop
Hey, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?
What a field day for the heat (Ooh ooh ooh)
A thousand people in the street (Ooh ooh ooh)
Singing songs and they carrying signs (Ooh ooh ooh)
Mostly say, "Hooray for our side" (Ooh ooh ooh)
It's time we stop
Hey, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?...
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Stephen Stills
© Cotillion Music Inc., Springalo Toones, Ten East Music, Richie Furay Music
What a distinctive seminal creative song! One's like "For What..." come once or twice in a generation. Its haunting lyrics somehow defined the protest movement.
In the fall of 1966, we used to go down to Hollywood’s Sunset Strip. As college students, we didn’t have money for concerts, but we hung out at coffee shops and philosophized and chatted, spoke against the Vietnam War and for civil rights and of our favorite music groups.
The song appeared shortly after the Sunset Curfew Riot, which we somehow missed. Maybe we Long Beach State students no longer hitchhiked or drove down to Hollywood because of the new 10 PM curfew.
How ironic--but very 60's contradictory--that allegedly nonviolent=promoting teens would riot!
Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning) by Alan Jackson
One of the very best poetic laments against war ever written.
Chimes of Freedom (Dylan) by The Byrds
It’s a lyric extoling human rights, justice, kindness, but the tragedy of how often goodness and the truth lose out to intolerance and persecution.
Monday Morning Church (Brent Baxter and Erin Enderlin) by Alan Jackson
Deeply sorrowful dirge with an incredible chorused metaphor. Sung by one of my favorite country ballad singers.
What If I Stumble by DC Talk
Very spiritual song of conscience and care; deeply spiritual, moral, and emotional-- without being formally religious
Desperado by the Eagles
Another example of lucid ballad poetry set to music; in this case the brief story of a Wild West gunman who is being
counseled by the singer through playing card imagery that love is the best choice, not killing and money.
The Gates of Eden by Bob Dylan
60’s folk song filled with surrealistic images and metaphors of protest.
Woodstock (Join Mitchell) by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young
Paean to the most famous rock concert of all time.
Though the famous event led to countless immoral, unjust, and destructive future actions. How tragic for a concert whose music was fabulous, creative, often morally positive.
Gods of Men by Randy Stonehill
Spiritual satire against the finite idols that too many of us humans ‘worship’ instead of the Good, the True, the Just.
The Universal Soldier (Buffy St. Marie) by Donovan
An anti-war song that covers human history. While not excusing militarist leaders, the lyrics instead focus on how each of us as individual humans are responsible for war.
8 Miles High by The Byrds
The instrumentation in this rocker is amazing, though, correctly or not, many have claimed it is about drugs.
See My Life by Seals and Croft
Philosophical, reflective early song from these two Bahai's.
Somebody Must Be Praying for Me (Frank Vinci, Bob Mould, Kris Bergsnes) by Tim McGraw
A very meaningful spiritual song of how sometimes problems and loss of dreams if considered from a spiritual point can open up other possibilities including love.
Cats in the Cradle by Sandy Gaston and Harry Chapin
Poem and song filled with allusions and metaphoric images which warns the severe and tragic consequences of a father who is too busy succeeding in his career for his family.
Old Man's Rubble (Brown Bannister) by Amy Grant
Probably the best ever song of the danger of living contrary to what one sincerely believes.
Celebrate this Heartbeat by Randy Stonehill
Everything I Own by Bread
Written and sung for his father who died tragically young.
--
Since I am a poet/wannbe-songwriter, artist, and lover of music, (of all kinds except rap and opera), it was difficult (and still is) for me to understand the thinking of early Quakers.
And here's a quote
from one early Friend, an outstanding musician before abandoning his career in music to become a Quaker:
Early Friend Solomon Eccles:
From A Musick Lector
"a QUAKER (so called) being formerly of that Art, doth give his Judgment and Sentence against it; but yet approves of the Musick that pleaseth God."
Written by SOLOMON ECCLES, 1667
"So I see, that Musick pleases well that which is for destruction, and grieves that which God doth highly esteem and honour; Isa. 42.21.
--
Modern Friend Jon Watts:
“Solomon Eccles rejected his upper-class, baroque music profession, and took all of his instruments and manuscripts and burned them in a public demonstration of leveling. The early Friends were rejecting the social class system, which they deemed unjust and ungodly. How could I possibly hear about that and not write a song about it?"
Friends threw out anything that was formulaic. The idea was experiential—to have your own experience of the Spirit, to have the Living Spirit speak through you. If you’re going to be baptized, let the Spirit baptize you. If you’re going to take communion, take it because the Spirit is leading you to, not because it’s just a thing you do every Sunday.
If you’re going to sing, don’t let someone else write it for you. Sing it! So Quakers were the first jazz musicians, always improvising. The Spirit was their muse.
So when I’m playing a song I try to listen to the Spirit the same way one does in a meeting for worship when preparing to give vocal ministry. I wait until I’m quaking to write a song down. I wait until a song is streaming out of me, until it’s not me anymore. It’s as if I’m watching the song get written.”
Jon Watts, Quaker Musician, songwriter, and movement leader
from an interview in the Friends Journal, May, 2013
http://www.friendsjournal.org/bum-rush-the-internet/
And from A Musick Lector by Solomon Eccles:
"To obey the Lord, is better than to give all my goods to the poor, and my body to be burned; yet to let thee know the Truth of this thing; when I came to be convinced of this everlasting truth, I saw my Calling would not stand before it; I went, but not in the Counsel of the Lord, and sold most of my instruments;
"howbeit that would not cover me, for the Lord met with me; and as I was learning to sew, for I had formerly some insight of a Tailors Trade, but I was too high to bow to it, till the Truth came, and that is of power to make the strong man bow, and I sitting alone, with my mind turned in, the Voice of the Lord said, Go thy way, and buy those Instruments again thou lately soldest, and carry them and the rest thou hast in thy house to Tower Hill, and burn them there, as a Testimony against that Calling."
"So I obeyed the Lord, and bought them again, and carried them, and all I had in my house, to Tower Hill, and burnt them there, according to the uprightness of my heart before the Lord; which Books and Instruments did amount to more than four and twenty pound; and I had great peace. Glory be to God for ever. Amen."
"That Heaven will be shaken, and thy Song will be turned into howling; for such Musick and Singing was never set up of God, but of men; and it takes with that part in man that serves not God aright, but is for wrath and judgement, Heb. 12.26. 1 Cor. 2.24."
"But what effects hath Musick brought forth, that men so highly esteem it? What fruit did Nebuchadnezzars Musick bring forth in his day, was it not to murder? But the three servants of the Lord would not bow to his Image at the sound of his Pipes and his Fiddles, though others did.
"And how did Musick and Dancing take the heart of the foolish King Herod, by means whereof he committed murder, and caused John Baptists's Head to be cut off, who was a blessed man, approved of God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, and was greater than the prophets; and because he reproved him for having his Brothers Wife, rankor lay in the heart of the Damsels Mother, and when the Fidlers did strike up, and the Wench began to dance, his affectionate love began to be enflamed to the Girle, that he killed the Lords servant in coole blood. O ye Fidlers and Dancing- Masters, let this President break you off from your filthy practice;"
"Why do you dance without the Ark? Where is your Ark? What President have you in Scripture for your Dancing? You set up the Devils Kingdom by your proud Calling: You set their Bodies in postures to enflame and take with the lustful Nature in men, and with proud Apparrel, and Spots on their Faces. Woe to the Crown of Pride."
"What account will ye give to the Lord, ye Dancing- masters, from whence came ye, where is your Ark? David danced before the Ark. O repent ye shameless men, will you not blush at your doings? If my Calling was unlawful, much more is yours; O do not provoke the Lord any more; haste, haste, and leave off your practice before it leave you, for what thank will it be to you then, when you shall break off sinning because you can sin no more?"
--Quaker Heritage Press
http://www.qhpress.org/index.html
BUT, why can't good music be creatively planned?
Why must songs always be only, allegedly, spontaneous from the Divine?
Surely, the Light has also given humans the amazing ability to think rationally, morally, mathematically, scientifically...
To create not only via inspiration but through carefully engaged creativity.
This negation of the arts, especially music shows how lopsided the early Friends were when trying to get rid of hypocrisy, formalism without reality, and destructive
influences.
But early Quakers didn’t get rid of business, medicine, science, new technology,
No, on the contrary, Quakers excelled in the sciences and in business, neither any more holy or spiritual than music or any other art.
In fact, business probably is far more an occasion to err, even to destroy than music ever has been.
Do you have a suggestion of a song to add to Great Music?
Quaker rock to rock;-).
In Light,
Daniel Wilcox
1 What is the difference between spiritual songs versus ones that harm and even are destructive?
2 Songs that are sung by empty rote versus songs that fill us with Light?
3 How do we tell the difference?
4 What are some of the best songs of the last 60 years?
In no particular order:
“Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence
In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dared
Disturb the sound of silence…”
The first time I heard this powerful reflection on the superficial nature of most human speaking--the woeful lack of deep communication-communion among us, I was driving through the night in a white wonder of a snowstorm down Van Dorn Avenue in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1966. Huge flakes of snow were silently hitting the wind shield, and Simon was talking to the darkness...
‘And the sign said, "The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sounds of silence"
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Paul Simon
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group
This verse is almost bizarre! Because, usually, written words in subways, etc. are obscene, superficial, or shallow false slogans...
How is this graffiti at at all prophetic compared to the superficial miscomunication of humans?
"Sounds" has amazing powerful poetry with an expert rhyme scheme (because it isn’t sing-songy nor does it draw attention to itself like most such couplet rhyming does). --
...
“Pardon me, your epidermis is showing, sir
I couldn't help but note your shade of melanin (shade of melanin)
I tip my hat to the colorful arrangement
'Cause I see the beauty in the tones of our skin
We've gotta come together (come together)
And thank the Maker of us all
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
One, one, one, one
Two, two, two, two...
A piece of canvas is only the beginning for
It takes on character with every loving stroke
This thing of beauty is the passion of an artist's heart
By God's design, we are a skin kaleidoscope
We've gotta come together (come together)
Aren't we all human after all?
We're colored people and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
Ignorance has wronged some races
And vengeance is the Lord's
If we aspire to share this space
Repentance is the cure, oh yeah
Well, just a day in the shoes of a colorblind man
Should make it easy for you to see
That these diverse tones do more than cover our bones
As a part of our anatomy
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted place
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
We've got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a Holy Grace
We're colored people, and they call us the human race
(Oh, colored people)
We're colored people and we all gotta share this space
(Yeah, we've got to come together somehow)
We're colored people, and we live in a tainted world
(Red and yellow, black and white)
We're colored people, every man, woman, boy, and girl
(Colored people, colored people, colored people, colored people, yeah)
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Toby Mckeehan / George C. Cocchini
Colored People lyrics © Achtober Songs
A transcendent morally real wonder of truth. Opposed to white supremacy and to BLMer WOKE-false narrative against all whites, the nuclear family, and police. INSTEAD of white "colored' racism or Black-victimhood, celebrate the wonder of the HUMAN RACE--in all its variations--so COLORFUL! --
A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall by Bob Dylan
Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
And where have you been, my darling young one?
I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I've walked and I crawled on six crooked highways
I've stepped in the middle of seven sad forests
I've been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I've been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard
And it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard
It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall
Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?
And what did you see, my darling young one?
I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it
I saw a black branch with blood that kept dripping
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleeding
I saw a white ladder all covered with water
I saw ten-thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken
I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children..."
Copyright © 1963 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music
That startling lament against nuclear weapons and other forms of mass slaughter by Dylan is fairly easy to understand despite some of the very strange images. However, many of the best modern song lyrics are far more difficult to ascertain as to what their central meaning is.
While I like to write complex, imaged esoteric lyrics and listen to those difficult sorts of lyrics, many ambiguous literary lyrics often open up many possible contradictory meanings, even though they draw one deep into the lyrics’ allusions, archetypes and symbols.
Too many listeners will end up with wrong meanings--often immoral and destructive ones.
Consider the very famous rock song "(Don't Fear) the Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult:
All our times have come
Here but now they're gone
Seasons don't fear the reaper
Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain
We can be like they are
Come on, baby (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, take my hand (don't fear the reaper)
We'll be able to fly (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, I'm your man
La, la, la, la, la
La, la, la, la, la
Valentine is done
Here but now they're gone
Romeo and Juliet
Are together in eternity (Romeo and Juliet)
40, 000 men and women everyday (like Romeo and Juliet)
40, 000 men and women everyday (redefine happiness)
Another 40, 000 coming everyday (we can be like they are)
Come on, baby (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, take my hand (don't fear the reaper)
We'll be able to fly (don't fear the reaper)
Baby, I'm your man...
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Donald Roeser
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
When I first studied the lyrics, “Don’t Fear…” appeared to be a pro-suicide rock lament. But some commentators have stated, they don’t think that is true.
While the song is a lament it is affirming that life should be accepted, not fearing everyone’s eventual deaths.
Even the author of the lyrics, Buck Dharma, stated,
"I felt that I had just achieved some kind of resonance with the psychology of people when I came up with that, I was actually kind of appalled when I first realized that some people were seeing it as an advertisement for suicide or something that was not my intention at all. It is, like, not to be afraid of [death] (as opposed to actively bring it about). It's basically a love song where the love transcends the actual physical existence of the partners."
— Buck Dharma, lead singer
Lien, James (November 6, 1995). "Buck Dharma interview". College Music Journal. New York City: CMJ. And on Wikipedia.
And there is the infamous rock ballad by the heavy metal band Led Zeppelin:
Stairway to Heaven
There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to Heaven
When she gets there she knows, if the stores are all closed
With a word she can get what she came for
Ooh, ooh, and she's buying a stairway to Heaven
There's a sign on the wall, but she wants to be sure
'Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings
In a tree by the brook, there's a songbird who sings
Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiven
Ooh, it makes me wonder
Ooh, makes me wonder
There's a feeling I get when I look to the West
And my spirit is crying for leaving
In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke through the trees
And the voices of those who stand looking
Ooh, it makes me wonder
Ooh, really makes me wonder
And it's whispered that soon if we all call the tune
Then the piper will lead us to reason
And a new day will dawn for those who stand long
And the forests will echo with laughter
Oh-oh-oh-oh-whoa
If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now
It's just a spring clean for the May queen
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on...
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Jimmy Page / Robert Anthony Plant
© Succubus Music Ltd., Sons Of Einion Publishing, Flames Of Albion Music, Inc.
This very unusual rock song with many religious symbols and images including biblical ones. It is unique and amazing, unlike any other music in the last 60 years..
But there have been contradictory commentaries written about the lyrics, some saying it is an anti-spiritual song, others disagreeing.
What do you think?
3. For What It’s Worth by Buffalo Springfield
There's something happening here
But what it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware
I think it's time we stop
Children, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?
There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
It's time we stop
Hey, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?
What a field day for the heat (Ooh ooh ooh)
A thousand people in the street (Ooh ooh ooh)
Singing songs and they carrying signs (Ooh ooh ooh)
Mostly say, "Hooray for our side" (Ooh ooh ooh)
It's time we stop
Hey, what's that sound?
Everybody look, what's going down?...
Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Stephen Stills
© Cotillion Music Inc., Springalo Toones, Ten East Music, Richie Furay Music
What a distinctive seminal creative song! One's like "For What..." come once or twice in a generation. Its haunting lyrics somehow defined the protest movement.
In the fall of 1966, we used to go down to Hollywood’s Sunset Strip. As college students, we didn’t have money for concerts, but we hung out at coffee shops and philosophized and chatted, spoke against the Vietnam War and for civil rights and of our favorite music groups.
The song appeared shortly after the Sunset Curfew Riot, which we somehow missed. Maybe we Long Beach State students no longer hitchhiked or drove down to Hollywood because of the new 10 PM curfew.
How ironic--but very 60's contradictory--that allegedly nonviolent=promoting teens would riot!
Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning) by Alan Jackson
One of the very best poetic laments against war ever written.
Chimes of Freedom (Dylan) by The Byrds
It’s a lyric extoling human rights, justice, kindness, but the tragedy of how often goodness and the truth lose out to intolerance and persecution.
Monday Morning Church (Brent Baxter and Erin Enderlin) by Alan Jackson
Deeply sorrowful dirge with an incredible chorused metaphor. Sung by one of my favorite country ballad singers.
What If I Stumble by DC Talk
Very spiritual song of conscience and care; deeply spiritual, moral, and emotional-- without being formally religious
Desperado by the Eagles
Another example of lucid ballad poetry set to music; in this case the brief story of a Wild West gunman who is being
counseled by the singer through playing card imagery that love is the best choice, not killing and money.
The Gates of Eden by Bob Dylan
60’s folk song filled with surrealistic images and metaphors of protest.
Woodstock (Join Mitchell) by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young
Paean to the most famous rock concert of all time.
Though the famous event led to countless immoral, unjust, and destructive future actions. How tragic for a concert whose music was fabulous, creative, often morally positive.
Gods of Men by Randy Stonehill
Spiritual satire against the finite idols that too many of us humans ‘worship’ instead of the Good, the True, the Just.
The Universal Soldier (Buffy St. Marie) by Donovan
An anti-war song that covers human history. While not excusing militarist leaders, the lyrics instead focus on how each of us as individual humans are responsible for war.
8 Miles High by The Byrds
The instrumentation in this rocker is amazing, though, correctly or not, many have claimed it is about drugs.
See My Life by Seals and Croft
Philosophical, reflective early song from these two Bahai's.
Somebody Must Be Praying for Me (Frank Vinci, Bob Mould, Kris Bergsnes) by Tim McGraw
A very meaningful spiritual song of how sometimes problems and loss of dreams if considered from a spiritual point can open up other possibilities including love.
Cats in the Cradle by Sandy Gaston and Harry Chapin
Poem and song filled with allusions and metaphoric images which warns the severe and tragic consequences of a father who is too busy succeeding in his career for his family.
Old Man's Rubble (Brown Bannister) by Amy Grant
Probably the best ever song of the danger of living contrary to what one sincerely believes.
Celebrate this Heartbeat by Randy Stonehill
Everything I Own by Bread
Written and sung for his father who died tragically young.
--
Since I am a poet/wannbe-songwriter, artist, and lover of music, (of all kinds except rap and opera), it was difficult (and still is) for me to understand the thinking of early Quakers.
And here's a quote
from one early Friend, an outstanding musician before abandoning his career in music to become a Quaker:
Early Friend Solomon Eccles:
From A Musick Lector
"a QUAKER (so called) being formerly of that Art, doth give his Judgment and Sentence against it; but yet approves of the Musick that pleaseth God."
Written by SOLOMON ECCLES, 1667
"So I see, that Musick pleases well that which is for destruction, and grieves that which God doth highly esteem and honour; Isa. 42.21.
--
Modern Friend Jon Watts:
“Solomon Eccles rejected his upper-class, baroque music profession, and took all of his instruments and manuscripts and burned them in a public demonstration of leveling. The early Friends were rejecting the social class system, which they deemed unjust and ungodly. How could I possibly hear about that and not write a song about it?"
Friends threw out anything that was formulaic. The idea was experiential—to have your own experience of the Spirit, to have the Living Spirit speak through you. If you’re going to be baptized, let the Spirit baptize you. If you’re going to take communion, take it because the Spirit is leading you to, not because it’s just a thing you do every Sunday.
If you’re going to sing, don’t let someone else write it for you. Sing it! So Quakers were the first jazz musicians, always improvising. The Spirit was their muse.
So when I’m playing a song I try to listen to the Spirit the same way one does in a meeting for worship when preparing to give vocal ministry. I wait until I’m quaking to write a song down. I wait until a song is streaming out of me, until it’s not me anymore. It’s as if I’m watching the song get written.”
Jon Watts, Quaker Musician, songwriter, and movement leader
from an interview in the Friends Journal, May, 2013
http://www.friendsjournal.org/bum-rush-the-internet/
And from A Musick Lector by Solomon Eccles:
"To obey the Lord, is better than to give all my goods to the poor, and my body to be burned; yet to let thee know the Truth of this thing; when I came to be convinced of this everlasting truth, I saw my Calling would not stand before it; I went, but not in the Counsel of the Lord, and sold most of my instruments;
"howbeit that would not cover me, for the Lord met with me; and as I was learning to sew, for I had formerly some insight of a Tailors Trade, but I was too high to bow to it, till the Truth came, and that is of power to make the strong man bow, and I sitting alone, with my mind turned in, the Voice of the Lord said, Go thy way, and buy those Instruments again thou lately soldest, and carry them and the rest thou hast in thy house to Tower Hill, and burn them there, as a Testimony against that Calling."
"So I obeyed the Lord, and bought them again, and carried them, and all I had in my house, to Tower Hill, and burnt them there, according to the uprightness of my heart before the Lord; which Books and Instruments did amount to more than four and twenty pound; and I had great peace. Glory be to God for ever. Amen."
"That Heaven will be shaken, and thy Song will be turned into howling; for such Musick and Singing was never set up of God, but of men; and it takes with that part in man that serves not God aright, but is for wrath and judgement, Heb. 12.26. 1 Cor. 2.24."
"But what effects hath Musick brought forth, that men so highly esteem it? What fruit did Nebuchadnezzars Musick bring forth in his day, was it not to murder? But the three servants of the Lord would not bow to his Image at the sound of his Pipes and his Fiddles, though others did.
"And how did Musick and Dancing take the heart of the foolish King Herod, by means whereof he committed murder, and caused John Baptists's Head to be cut off, who was a blessed man, approved of God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, and was greater than the prophets; and because he reproved him for having his Brothers Wife, rankor lay in the heart of the Damsels Mother, and when the Fidlers did strike up, and the Wench began to dance, his affectionate love began to be enflamed to the Girle, that he killed the Lords servant in coole blood. O ye Fidlers and Dancing- Masters, let this President break you off from your filthy practice;"
"Why do you dance without the Ark? Where is your Ark? What President have you in Scripture for your Dancing? You set up the Devils Kingdom by your proud Calling: You set their Bodies in postures to enflame and take with the lustful Nature in men, and with proud Apparrel, and Spots on their Faces. Woe to the Crown of Pride."
"What account will ye give to the Lord, ye Dancing- masters, from whence came ye, where is your Ark? David danced before the Ark. O repent ye shameless men, will you not blush at your doings? If my Calling was unlawful, much more is yours; O do not provoke the Lord any more; haste, haste, and leave off your practice before it leave you, for what thank will it be to you then, when you shall break off sinning because you can sin no more?"
--Quaker Heritage Press
http://www.qhpress.org/index.html
BUT, why can't good music be creatively planned?
Why must songs always be only, allegedly, spontaneous from the Divine?
Surely, the Light has also given humans the amazing ability to think rationally, morally, mathematically, scientifically...
To create not only via inspiration but through carefully engaged creativity.
This negation of the arts, especially music shows how lopsided the early Friends were when trying to get rid of hypocrisy, formalism without reality, and destructive
influences.
But early Quakers didn’t get rid of business, medicine, science, new technology,
No, on the contrary, Quakers excelled in the sciences and in business, neither any more holy or spiritual than music or any other art.
In fact, business probably is far more an occasion to err, even to destroy than music ever has been.
Do you have a suggestion of a song to add to Great Music?
Quaker rock to rock;-).
In Light,
Daniel Wilcox
Sunday, March 3, 2024
To us an Infant is GIFTED--No to "abortion on demand"
What is a baby?
Don't ask many modern thinkers. According to them there are "abortion rights"! And the new human life in its mother's womb is a "parasite" only unwanted "tissue"!
Nothing could be further from the moral truth.
That doesn't mean that state governments or the federal government should make intolerant, oppressive rules like some rightwing politicians have been doing lately, ones that require a woman or girl who has been raped or molested to bring the rapist's infant to birth, etc.
There are also tragic biological accidents where preborn infants in the womb are missing their brain or so severely malformed that they will die shortly after birth or never be able to function.
I'm not speaking to any of those severe pregnancy tragedies.
And, in all cases of pregnancy, the mother (in consultation with her husband and doctor) IS the ONLY one who decides!
NOT strangers or the government.
The key point of this article is that generally conception, growth in the mother's womb, and birth are the wondrous creation of new human life!
Also, don't ask theologians or become entangled in illusions and delusions, long-winded metaphysical splits/spit;-) of religious thinking.
What if we didn't focus on abstract philosophical doctrine, but viewed each baby as a true gift.
Instead, most traditional churches claim the doctrine of Original Sin-- that all babies are born inherently guilty sinners. In contrast, New Thought religion declares all babies are born divine. What a philosophical split!
What does either doctrinal extreme have to do with the real living being who is birthed from her mother?
the creation of her and her husband's love-making?
Human beings at birth are neither divine nor depraved. A baby is a natural offspring of a primate species. But uniquely (probably unlike any other species of life, even dolphins and chimps) a human being has the potential to grow spiritually--to relate to her Creator, and to create, bring newness and improvements into existence since she has been created in the image of God.
What a wonder a baby is! I recently held my first grandchild. Experientially, the moment was blessed. How perfect her tiny living body. What a true gift from the Divine.
But a little later, when she got hungry, wow, what lungs and what a puckered face she suddenly developed!
I must admit, I don't think something called a "soul" enters a baby at conception, or for that matter anytime later.
At conception a new life begins with amazing characteristics from the genes of her/his ancestors. At conception, the life appears to have no awareness. But brain wave activity begins early in the womb.
Even after birth, however, a baby is sort of an eating and pooping blob;-) She has awareness, but probably not much except she wants to be fed, and fed now!
Then gradually her awareness grows month after month. Finally she becomes self-conscious. Then later her sense of conscience develops--what is morally good, true, and just.
Finally, an awareness of her finiteness and the mystery of existence comes into her consciousness.
No, a baby doesn’t come into the world a walking, talking, mentally active philosopher/theologian/moralist/saint.
On the contrary she is a living breathing consciousness at the most simple level.
As she grows in the next 6 to 7 years in her consciousness, self-awareness, and her moral conscience develops with a sense of ought, then she will become a moral and spiritual individual who acts. Sometimes she will fail, sometimes "miss the mark."
But even then she is still an innocent child struggling to function and to understand and to fulfill needs and desires and hopes, and the demands of the big people in her life.
Is not this the stage that Jesus referred to when he said those who enter the Kingdom of God must do so as a little child? And where he said to people to let little children come to him for of such is the Kingdom?
And this was my own personal experience—when so young. I don’t remember being a sinful-driven child that fundamentalist Christians claim all babies and small children are.
Instead, as far back as I can remember, I had very deep desires to do good, to be good, to know God and to love the Light. And I had a lot of childlike wonder questions about God, life, other...always asking why about everything:-)
Of course the slither of wrong thought, wrong action, wrong living does come to us all, but not at conception or birth!
A child's awareness will grow if she is introduced to God and is shown her responsibility to share, to think of others and their needs, even though she still doesn’t voluntarily give outwardly if it is to her own privation.
Finally, the her moral consciousness kicks in mid-childhood. At each given moment, there will be a tussle between her babyhood past (all spontaneous need and desire) and her adulthood future (potentially all share, give, and bliss).
At that moment by moment juncture—that possibility moment--she must make continual moral, spiritual decisions. She is finite and so will make mistakes and fail. She is learning in her emotions, her mind, her conscience, and her body as she moves through time. Her choices are a much more complicated version of the way she learned to walk and to talk three years earlier--by trial and error.
But now a new possibility rears its ugly or saintly head. If she doesn’t continue to develop holistically, widening outwardly her care, her helpfulness, her compassion, then she slows, stalls, or even regresses backward to a total need/want level.
However, since she isn’t an infant but has the outer body and will and growing mental ability of a 6 or 7 year old, her regression hurts herself and other persons.
To try and fulfill life as a growing child, by returning to the barely conscious self-focused life of an infant actually distorts life and will bring harm to others to varying degrees.
Continued growing, in contrast, takes her through new stages of human development and new challenges. Each developmental advance brings new ethical and spiritual choices—either good or bad, advancing or regressing or a combination of both.
As anyone knows, when climbing a mountain, the higher one goes the more dangerous the climb becomes—not because the action of climbing mountains is evil, or because individuals who climb mountains are depraved sinful beings, but because the very nature of going "higher" also offers more options of choosing. Some of the ways are wrong, even could cause one to plummet to the bottom. Some of the ways are right, and lead toward the peak.
If a baby cries when she hungry that doesn’t show she is sinning.
On the contrary that is how an infant acts to get the attention she needs to survive. If a 4-year-old child throws a tantrum and takes her little brother’s bottle because she thinks she isn’t getting enough attention from her parents, while her action is wrong and needs to be corrected, she shouldn't be told she is a sinner. She hasn’t developed enough in her conscious awareness and ethical conscience to make altruistic decisions.
However, if at 8, she hides her little brother’s medicine, because she wants all the attention instead, this is morally wrong because by then her mental, moral conscience has developed enough to know that her action isn't the right way to get attention. And, besides, by this point she should be widening her compassion and care for others out beyond her own needs and desires.
If at 18, she steals her younger sister’s boyfriend to build up her own ego, deep wrong has occurred. By 22 if she joins with many of her countrymen and demonizes others and distant people in another country and lies, steals, and joins in the slaughter of those enemies, we do have actions of evil,
just as if in contrast,
she joins an outreach organization such as Habitat for Humanity or World Vision and sacrifices her time, talent, and money and inspires her younger sister to do so as well, we have actions of goodness.
Then the two sisters think of a way to get other people in their neighborhood, school, and city to get involved. One such inspired girl, about 13 years of age, raised thousands of dollars for starving, hurting people in a far off country.
See how the moral growth of human beings happens. A human being is in process from simple surviving to becoming the acting being of moral truth.
Reminds me of several of Jesus’ moral parables...
Go and do thou likewise...please stop talking about babies being unwanted "parasites" or "depraved sinners..."
“Holy infant so tender and mild*,” except when she cries at 3 a.m. and the parents haven’t slept through the night for weeks;-)
In the LIGHT,
Dan Wilcox
Don't ask many modern thinkers. According to them there are "abortion rights"! And the new human life in its mother's womb is a "parasite" only unwanted "tissue"!
Nothing could be further from the moral truth.
That doesn't mean that state governments or the federal government should make intolerant, oppressive rules like some rightwing politicians have been doing lately, ones that require a woman or girl who has been raped or molested to bring the rapist's infant to birth, etc.
There are also tragic biological accidents where preborn infants in the womb are missing their brain or so severely malformed that they will die shortly after birth or never be able to function.
I'm not speaking to any of those severe pregnancy tragedies.
And, in all cases of pregnancy, the mother (in consultation with her husband and doctor) IS the ONLY one who decides!
NOT strangers or the government.
The key point of this article is that generally conception, growth in the mother's womb, and birth are the wondrous creation of new human life!
Also, don't ask theologians or become entangled in illusions and delusions, long-winded metaphysical splits/spit;-) of religious thinking.
What if we didn't focus on abstract philosophical doctrine, but viewed each baby as a true gift.
Instead, most traditional churches claim the doctrine of Original Sin-- that all babies are born inherently guilty sinners. In contrast, New Thought religion declares all babies are born divine. What a philosophical split!
the creation of her and her husband's love-making?
Human beings at birth are neither divine nor depraved. A baby is a natural offspring of a primate species. But uniquely (probably unlike any other species of life, even dolphins and chimps) a human being has the potential to grow spiritually--to relate to her Creator, and to create, bring newness and improvements into existence since she has been created in the image of God.
What a wonder a baby is! I recently held my first grandchild. Experientially, the moment was blessed. How perfect her tiny living body. What a true gift from the Divine.
But a little later, when she got hungry, wow, what lungs and what a puckered face she suddenly developed!
I must admit, I don't think something called a "soul" enters a baby at conception, or for that matter anytime later.
At conception a new life begins with amazing characteristics from the genes of her/his ancestors. At conception, the life appears to have no awareness. But brain wave activity begins early in the womb.
Even after birth, however, a baby is sort of an eating and pooping blob;-) She has awareness, but probably not much except she wants to be fed, and fed now!
Then gradually her awareness grows month after month. Finally she becomes self-conscious. Then later her sense of conscience develops--what is morally good, true, and just.
Finally, an awareness of her finiteness and the mystery of existence comes into her consciousness.
No, a baby doesn’t come into the world a walking, talking, mentally active philosopher/theologian/moralist/saint.
On the contrary she is a living breathing consciousness at the most simple level.
As she grows in the next 6 to 7 years in her consciousness, self-awareness, and her moral conscience develops with a sense of ought, then she will become a moral and spiritual individual who acts. Sometimes she will fail, sometimes "miss the mark."
But even then she is still an innocent child struggling to function and to understand and to fulfill needs and desires and hopes, and the demands of the big people in her life.
Is not this the stage that Jesus referred to when he said those who enter the Kingdom of God must do so as a little child? And where he said to people to let little children come to him for of such is the Kingdom?
And this was my own personal experience—when so young. I don’t remember being a sinful-driven child that fundamentalist Christians claim all babies and small children are.
Instead, as far back as I can remember, I had very deep desires to do good, to be good, to know God and to love the Light. And I had a lot of childlike wonder questions about God, life, other...always asking why about everything:-)
Of course the slither of wrong thought, wrong action, wrong living does come to us all, but not at conception or birth!
A child's awareness will grow if she is introduced to God and is shown her responsibility to share, to think of others and their needs, even though she still doesn’t voluntarily give outwardly if it is to her own privation.
Finally, the her moral consciousness kicks in mid-childhood. At each given moment, there will be a tussle between her babyhood past (all spontaneous need and desire) and her adulthood future (potentially all share, give, and bliss).
At that moment by moment juncture—that possibility moment--she must make continual moral, spiritual decisions. She is finite and so will make mistakes and fail. She is learning in her emotions, her mind, her conscience, and her body as she moves through time. Her choices are a much more complicated version of the way she learned to walk and to talk three years earlier--by trial and error.
But now a new possibility rears its ugly or saintly head. If she doesn’t continue to develop holistically, widening outwardly her care, her helpfulness, her compassion, then she slows, stalls, or even regresses backward to a total need/want level.
However, since she isn’t an infant but has the outer body and will and growing mental ability of a 6 or 7 year old, her regression hurts herself and other persons.
To try and fulfill life as a growing child, by returning to the barely conscious self-focused life of an infant actually distorts life and will bring harm to others to varying degrees.
Continued growing, in contrast, takes her through new stages of human development and new challenges. Each developmental advance brings new ethical and spiritual choices—either good or bad, advancing or regressing or a combination of both.
As anyone knows, when climbing a mountain, the higher one goes the more dangerous the climb becomes—not because the action of climbing mountains is evil, or because individuals who climb mountains are depraved sinful beings, but because the very nature of going "higher" also offers more options of choosing. Some of the ways are wrong, even could cause one to plummet to the bottom. Some of the ways are right, and lead toward the peak.
If a baby cries when she hungry that doesn’t show she is sinning.
On the contrary that is how an infant acts to get the attention she needs to survive. If a 4-year-old child throws a tantrum and takes her little brother’s bottle because she thinks she isn’t getting enough attention from her parents, while her action is wrong and needs to be corrected, she shouldn't be told she is a sinner. She hasn’t developed enough in her conscious awareness and ethical conscience to make altruistic decisions.
However, if at 8, she hides her little brother’s medicine, because she wants all the attention instead, this is morally wrong because by then her mental, moral conscience has developed enough to know that her action isn't the right way to get attention. And, besides, by this point she should be widening her compassion and care for others out beyond her own needs and desires.
If at 18, she steals her younger sister’s boyfriend to build up her own ego, deep wrong has occurred. By 22 if she joins with many of her countrymen and demonizes others and distant people in another country and lies, steals, and joins in the slaughter of those enemies, we do have actions of evil,
just as if in contrast,
she joins an outreach organization such as Habitat for Humanity or World Vision and sacrifices her time, talent, and money and inspires her younger sister to do so as well, we have actions of goodness.
Then the two sisters think of a way to get other people in their neighborhood, school, and city to get involved. One such inspired girl, about 13 years of age, raised thousands of dollars for starving, hurting people in a far off country.
See how the moral growth of human beings happens. A human being is in process from simple surviving to becoming the acting being of moral truth.
Reminds me of several of Jesus’ moral parables...
Go and do thou likewise...please stop talking about babies being unwanted "parasites" or "depraved sinners..."
“Holy infant so tender and mild*,” except when she cries at 3 a.m. and the parents haven’t slept through the night for weeks;-)
In the LIGHT,
Dan Wilcox
Saturday, July 29, 2023
Why Be a Quaker? Transcendent open worship--a powerful example from Pacific Yearly Meeting
Our worldwide Society of Friends has seriously splintered in the last 150 years into very different camps, most of whom have very little in common with the early founders of the spiritual movement. Quite a few of us have often pondered over this severe quandary.* Many books and conferences over the years have struggled...
Instead of dwelling in that past, let us be Present now. Here is an actual Transcendent experience of the Light at a Pacific Yearly Meeting for worship in California.
OPEN WORSHIP TRANSCENDS
Drowned in family tragedy, despairing, distraught--
that morning earlier;
thus, down encumbered,
he came to worship meeting, but not speaking
of his family’s severe circumstance, kept hidden;
But in the midst
of open expectant communion, Transcendent Light
shown forth in a stranger’s sudden
a cappella spiritual chorus--
a deep songing deepening within;
intense meaning lifted us gathered in communion--
vivid encouraging Hope;
That sacred chorus didn’t take away our shattered glass
lives, nor end many distraught
circumstances and tragedies--
but
Oh, what Hope fulled within.
In the LIGHT,
Dan Wilcox
In a later article, I could give my own understanding
of some of the complex series of tragic evidences of how it came that the Society kept breaking into contrary groups...
or of the equally troubling 'quietistic' era before that when there were many rigid religious restrictions on Quakers, including that no Quaker could marry a non-Quaker and remain in good standing.
We are in this sometimes disagreeable patchwork/collage called Friends, Quakerism, and
on why to continue to move toward the Light within this small 380-year-old movement.
1. For me personally, I visited a Friends meeting one Sunday and was drawn to its less-ritual, more open experiential worship.
Side Note: Besides the experiential factor that I came to Quakerism because I was a conscientious objector to the VietNam War serving my drafted time working in a mental hospital.
This was with other pacfists in the Fall of 1967 near Philadelphia, PA. I was helping pay the rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Trevose, PA. 3 Mennonite/Brethren C.O.'s slept in the bedroom on cots, me on a mat behind the couch in the living room:-).
I greatly valued creativity, openness, experiential spirituality, so one can see why the Society of Friends meeting was a wonderful new experience.
Before being drafted, I had been a Creative Writing major at Long Beach State in California. Now in September 1967, I was newly arrived in Pennsylvania near Washington's Crossing, and wanted to find a new church.
I had admired the Quakers in the news 6 years before back in 1961 for protesting against nuclear weapons, so I decided to give their meeting a visit.
After one Sunday going to a nearly empty meeting for worship near Newtown in September, I eventually began regularly attending worship in downtown Philly at Backbench Young Adult Friends gathering. Though as a mental health worker, I worked 10 days on, 4 days off so could only take the L-Train into downtown Philly 2 times a month.
How powerful those times of OPEN WORSHIP were!
I’m not into forms, not sharply, rigidly, traditionally, ritually-structured forms. As all artists and writers know, “form and freedom” are 2 contrary characteristics of any creative endeavor.
One needs both freedom and form. Not either or. Too much freedom, chaos and havoc and destruction rule, too much form, slavery and rigidity and still-death reign.
Quaker meeting for worship seemed the perfect combination of freedom and form!
2. While actual spiritual experiences--vivid stories that happen to us humans don't prove our views are correct, there is GREAT inherent worth in such transcendent experiences,
as shown with the poetic sharing of the Light-filled worship one First Day at Pacific Yearly Meeting in California.
Instead of dwelling in that past, let us be Present now. Here is an actual Transcendent experience of the Light at a Pacific Yearly Meeting for worship in California.
OPEN WORSHIP TRANSCENDS
Drowned in family tragedy, despairing, distraught--
that morning earlier;
thus, down encumbered,
he came to worship meeting, but not speaking
of his family’s severe circumstance, kept hidden;
But in the midst
of open expectant communion, Transcendent Light
shown forth in a stranger’s sudden
a cappella spiritual chorus--
a deep songing deepening within;
intense meaning lifted us gathered in communion--
vivid encouraging Hope;
That sacred chorus didn’t take away our shattered glass
lives, nor end many distraught
circumstances and tragedies--
but
Oh, what Hope fulled within.
In the LIGHT,
Dan Wilcox
In a later article, I could give my own understanding
of some of the complex series of tragic evidences of how it came that the Society kept breaking into contrary groups...
or of the equally troubling 'quietistic' era before that when there were many rigid religious restrictions on Quakers, including that no Quaker could marry a non-Quaker and remain in good standing.
We are in this sometimes disagreeable patchwork/collage called Friends, Quakerism, and
on why to continue to move toward the Light within this small 380-year-old movement.
1. For me personally, I visited a Friends meeting one Sunday and was drawn to its less-ritual, more open experiential worship.
Side Note: Besides the experiential factor that I came to Quakerism because I was a conscientious objector to the VietNam War serving my drafted time working in a mental hospital.
This was with other pacfists in the Fall of 1967 near Philadelphia, PA. I was helping pay the rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Trevose, PA. 3 Mennonite/Brethren C.O.'s slept in the bedroom on cots, me on a mat behind the couch in the living room:-).
I greatly valued creativity, openness, experiential spirituality, so one can see why the Society of Friends meeting was a wonderful new experience.
Before being drafted, I had been a Creative Writing major at Long Beach State in California. Now in September 1967, I was newly arrived in Pennsylvania near Washington's Crossing, and wanted to find a new church.
I had admired the Quakers in the news 6 years before back in 1961 for protesting against nuclear weapons, so I decided to give their meeting a visit.
After one Sunday going to a nearly empty meeting for worship near Newtown in September, I eventually began regularly attending worship in downtown Philly at Backbench Young Adult Friends gathering. Though as a mental health worker, I worked 10 days on, 4 days off so could only take the L-Train into downtown Philly 2 times a month.
How powerful those times of OPEN WORSHIP were!
I’m not into forms, not sharply, rigidly, traditionally, ritually-structured forms. As all artists and writers know, “form and freedom” are 2 contrary characteristics of any creative endeavor.
One needs both freedom and form. Not either or. Too much freedom, chaos and havoc and destruction rule, too much form, slavery and rigidity and still-death reign.
Quaker meeting for worship seemed the perfect combination of freedom and form!
2. While actual spiritual experiences--vivid stories that happen to us humans don't prove our views are correct, there is GREAT inherent worth in such transcendent experiences,
as shown with the poetic sharing of the Light-filled worship one First Day at Pacific Yearly Meeting in California.
Tuesday, May 23, 2023
Tightrope Wonder, Discarding, After Backpacking
Tightrope Wonder
Precarious life,
To be present here
In this moment
Between birth and death;
Not unknown skyrocketing futures
Or dead-bogged pasts;
More difficult than the highest trapeze
Artist—our brief human
Awareness,
The poised tightrope balance
Of this present
Moment
--
Discarding
On the way to the town dump
Our junk in the back jostles in the turn.
Dark blue clouds curtain rain down.
I pull onto the miry dirt road
Past tall leaning one-story screens
Where many dark birds and wrens perch
But launch to flight as I pass and reverse.
Backing up my loaded van to trash heaps,
I get out and step through thick hogged mud,
Throw out our old broken stand and chairs,
A rusted bike, worn shirts and old ‘genes,’
Failed hopes and my grouchy frustration;
Yes, and my bulging head off-tilted
With church dogma, loads of heavy tenet,
And too many years of clouded regret.
Driving home—so empty and satisfied.
--
After backpacking
Yosemite
Half Dome
Granite monolith eoned in time
Glaciated but not destroyed
Majestic time lord
But unaware of anything--
Ever mattered
daniel
half done
fragile being decaded in years
ruined and soon inert
temporary time slave
but conscious of the Ultimate--
soon matterless
why?
--
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
1st published in Tipton Poetry Journal
and the poetry book, Dark Energy
Sunday, February 12, 2023
Finding the CENTER
Finding the CENTER
"Strained by the mad pace of our daily outer burdens, we are further strained by an inward uneasiness, because we have hints that there is a way of life vastly richer and deeper than all this hurried existence..."
"Within, is the beginning of true life."
"...a dynamic center, a creative life...a Light Within which illumines the face of God and casts new shadows and new glories upon the face of humans."
"Life is meant to be lived from a Center, a divine Center."
"From this holy Center we love our neighbors as ourselves and are stirred to be the means of their awakening..."
--Wise words from Quaker Thomas Kelly,
A Testament of Devotion and The Eternal Promise
The central difficulty though in finding this CENTER
and
living in the CENTER and becoming more and more who we truly can and ought to become
is
that many humans, including some Quakers, state that NO Center exists.
In so many ways, finding and CENTERING is like the story the Jewish prophet told about a seeker of fine pearls who found a wondrous pearl. One first needs to seek!
Then one needs to use her/his reasoning ability to identify and discard fake pearls and fraudulent ones that at first looked genuine.
Then one needs to compare average pearls to fine pearls--average facts to transcendent oughts and great truths.
And then comes the most difficult of all--when finding the ONE pearl of perfection,
we humans need to focus on that central wonder.
Each of us needs to give all in order to acquire the perfect gem.
Let us, in this dark present time of horrific suffering and confusion and delusion--
Seek that CENTER--seek what is true,
what is reasonable,
what is wise,
what is good,
what is just,
what is beautiful,
what is kind...
Live in the Reason which spangled the universe into becoming.
In the Light, in the Center,
--Daniel Wilcox Posted by Daniel Wilcox at 9:11 AM No comments: Links to this post Labels: A Testament of Devotion, burdens, Center, creative, destruction, Friends, God, hatred, Light, Quakerism, religious persecution, The Eternal Promise, Thomas Kelly, trials, troubles, war
"Strained by the mad pace of our daily outer burdens, we are further strained by an inward uneasiness, because we have hints that there is a way of life vastly richer and deeper than all this hurried existence..."
"Within, is the beginning of true life."
"...a dynamic center, a creative life...a Light Within which illumines the face of God and casts new shadows and new glories upon the face of humans."
"Life is meant to be lived from a Center, a divine Center."
"From this holy Center we love our neighbors as ourselves and are stirred to be the means of their awakening..."
--Wise words from Quaker Thomas Kelly,
A Testament of Devotion and The Eternal Promise
The central difficulty though in finding this CENTER
and
living in the CENTER and becoming more and more who we truly can and ought to become
is
that many humans, including some Quakers, state that NO Center exists.
In so many ways, finding and CENTERING is like the story the Jewish prophet told about a seeker of fine pearls who found a wondrous pearl. One first needs to seek!
Then one needs to use her/his reasoning ability to identify and discard fake pearls and fraudulent ones that at first looked genuine.
Then one needs to compare average pearls to fine pearls--average facts to transcendent oughts and great truths.
And then comes the most difficult of all--when finding the ONE pearl of perfection,
we humans need to focus on that central wonder.
Each of us needs to give all in order to acquire the perfect gem.
Let us, in this dark present time of horrific suffering and confusion and delusion--
Seek that CENTER--seek what is true,
what is reasonable,
what is wise,
what is good,
what is just,
what is beautiful,
what is kind...
Live in the Reason which spangled the universe into becoming.
In the Light, in the Center,
--Daniel Wilcox Posted by Daniel Wilcox at 9:11 AM No comments: Links to this post Labels: A Testament of Devotion, burdens, Center, creative, destruction, Friends, God, hatred, Light, Quakerism, religious persecution, The Eternal Promise, Thomas Kelly, trials, troubles, war
Wednesday, August 24, 2022
Review of The ROAD BACK by Erich Maria Remarque
This incredible starkly vivid realistic novel of the return home of defeated German soldiers at the end of the Great War is the most powerful anti-war novel I’ve ever read. Centrally this is so because seldom does Remarque get on his author’s soap box and preach or lecture and definitely doesn’t harangue (like some anti-war books do).
Add to that Remarque’s realistic sharp poetic prose and many short vignettes about individual soldiers’ horrific experiences, sharp daggers into readers’ emotions.
Often, I felt I was there—the descriptions of the landscape, nature, comrades—in that terrible time. What is so strange is that those German soldiers’ experiences (who supposedly were the bad Huns according to American interpretation such as Billy Sunday’s) are almost exactly like many Americans’ war experiences.
That is a central theme in The Road Back that war itself, and the pro-war lies and propaganda is the evil, not individual soldiers on any side! The latter go off to war convinced they are on the Right side, and that they are doing their patriotic duty, are honorable, and just.
However, after being in the war all of those false claims and promises and hopes are shell-holed obscenities. What is real are the tragic, needless, excruciating deaths of their comrades, and that they ruthlessly shot, bayoneted, hand-grenaded strangers, like unto themselves, who had done nothing against them but just happened to be born in a different nation.
It is qualities such as those for why I give Road Back a 9/A. Then why the 2nd grade, an 8/B? Because for one, there really is no plot, no narrative, no beginning to end story in this famous novel published in 1930.
Rather, as mentioned already, its key feature are vivid real vignettes (most likely that happened to actual individuals that Remarque fictionalized).
These many vignettes describe many different situations, results, activities, etc. of soldiers in the Great War and their alienations when they return at the end. Many of them are exactly the same ones that occur in all wars—loss of loved comrades,
bogus government propaganda (“For the Fatherland”),
the objectification of women, brothels (I was shocked that the German government provided such evils), V.D.,
the brutalization of idealistic naïve young men,
their descent into regularly violating all of the 10 Commandments, especially killing with gusto and stealing constantly,
the lack of food and equipment, the government failing to provide what is necessary,
the blithe ignorance and delusion of civilians back home about what is really like,
cynicism and loss of hope, direction, and purpose for many soldiers, etc.
But where is there a plot and story? Not there.
Repeatedly, while listening to the great audio interpretation by Graham Halstead, I found myself restless to get to the end of the book.
And since Germany for hundreds of years had been very religious, the center of Christianty, theological study, etc., it is vey weird that Remarque never mentions God, Jesus, going to the Lutheran, Reformed, or Roman Catholic services--none at all except to identify a cathedral in a description or to mention he taught his elementary students their catechism!
The novel is entirely secular in theme. The only focus of the characters are on the most superficial of things in life. Constantly women, marriage, values are ignored, mistreated, or objectified!
Lastly, the weakest part of the novel is its poor conclusion (in the last 75 pages or so). Suddenly Remarque leaves off his hundreds of pages of stark, vivid prose of dark realism and tries to pass off a weak romanticism/nature mysticism as a positive answer for the main character and the others as to how they can find direction again. For that reason, the last evaluation is a 2.5/D.
What the book has done for me is to give me a deep philosophical and political desire to understand on a personal level (not the famous leaders’ historical tomes) why and how the brilliant, highly educated Germans came to such horrible, tragic ends in the 20th century.
Of course, one central factor is that after the war, when there was so much suffering, resentment, hatred, brutalization, loss of moral values, etc., many didn’t choose the ways of Ernst and his comrades, but in that empty/noting chaos, they opted for false utopian visions—many to the Bolsheviks, and many to the National Socialists.
What’s scary is that in many ways—though of course to a far lesser extent—I see the same things occurring in the U.S. now—cultism, propaganda of right and left-wing extremism, injustice, massive lying, superficial media values, the loss of moral vision and civil behavior, etc.
Evaluation: A/B/D
8/24/2022
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
Often, I felt I was there—the descriptions of the landscape, nature, comrades—in that terrible time. What is so strange is that those German soldiers’ experiences (who supposedly were the bad Huns according to American interpretation such as Billy Sunday’s) are almost exactly like many Americans’ war experiences.
That is a central theme in The Road Back that war itself, and the pro-war lies and propaganda is the evil, not individual soldiers on any side! The latter go off to war convinced they are on the Right side, and that they are doing their patriotic duty, are honorable, and just.
However, after being in the war all of those false claims and promises and hopes are shell-holed obscenities. What is real are the tragic, needless, excruciating deaths of their comrades, and that they ruthlessly shot, bayoneted, hand-grenaded strangers, like unto themselves, who had done nothing against them but just happened to be born in a different nation.
It is qualities such as those for why I give Road Back a 9/A. Then why the 2nd grade, an 8/B? Because for one, there really is no plot, no narrative, no beginning to end story in this famous novel published in 1930.
Rather, as mentioned already, its key feature are vivid real vignettes (most likely that happened to actual individuals that Remarque fictionalized).
These many vignettes describe many different situations, results, activities, etc. of soldiers in the Great War and their alienations when they return at the end. Many of them are exactly the same ones that occur in all wars—loss of loved comrades,
bogus government propaganda (“For the Fatherland”),
the objectification of women, brothels (I was shocked that the German government provided such evils), V.D.,
the brutalization of idealistic naïve young men,
their descent into regularly violating all of the 10 Commandments, especially killing with gusto and stealing constantly,
the lack of food and equipment, the government failing to provide what is necessary,
the blithe ignorance and delusion of civilians back home about what is really like,
cynicism and loss of hope, direction, and purpose for many soldiers, etc.
But where is there a plot and story? Not there.
Repeatedly, while listening to the great audio interpretation by Graham Halstead, I found myself restless to get to the end of the book.
And since Germany for hundreds of years had been very religious, the center of Christianty, theological study, etc., it is vey weird that Remarque never mentions God, Jesus, going to the Lutheran, Reformed, or Roman Catholic services--none at all except to identify a cathedral in a description or to mention he taught his elementary students their catechism!
The novel is entirely secular in theme. The only focus of the characters are on the most superficial of things in life. Constantly women, marriage, values are ignored, mistreated, or objectified!
Lastly, the weakest part of the novel is its poor conclusion (in the last 75 pages or so). Suddenly Remarque leaves off his hundreds of pages of stark, vivid prose of dark realism and tries to pass off a weak romanticism/nature mysticism as a positive answer for the main character and the others as to how they can find direction again. For that reason, the last evaluation is a 2.5/D.
What the book has done for me is to give me a deep philosophical and political desire to understand on a personal level (not the famous leaders’ historical tomes) why and how the brilliant, highly educated Germans came to such horrible, tragic ends in the 20th century.
Of course, one central factor is that after the war, when there was so much suffering, resentment, hatred, brutalization, loss of moral values, etc., many didn’t choose the ways of Ernst and his comrades, but in that empty/noting chaos, they opted for false utopian visions—many to the Bolsheviks, and many to the National Socialists.
What’s scary is that in many ways—though of course to a far lesser extent—I see the same things occurring in the U.S. now—cultism, propaganda of right and left-wing extremism, injustice, massive lying, superficial media values, the loss of moral vision and civil behavior, etc.
Evaluation: A/B/D
8/24/2022
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
Tuesday, February 9, 2021
Part #2: Prayer and Fishhooks
Prayer and Fishhooks*
Our third daughter, Hope, learned-disabled early, Struggling with the squiggles and numeric symbols
Of unseen realities, of knowing, that set the stars In motion and our human minds in transition.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Her childish zest died while, as her father and provider, I practiced disabling late, raised to belief's unreason
In the rigid way of Huck's Miss Watson, so stubborn
In righteous doctrine, ignoring our doctor's suggestion,
Not giving Hope medication, but certain in literal petition.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
So I prayed time-round-the-three for our daughter's minded healing, But just like gullible Finn and his never-gotten fishhooks,
Hope got none, and I— doubt, ill-gotten mishap, and bilge, Eventually lessening into cynicism, the wounded death Of an ash-filled, but empty-petitioning/requesting mouth.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Yet unlike Huck, to this day I keep reeling out petitions, Focusing like the Widow (Huck's other guardian),
On heartened prayer, the learning of spiritual gifts; But not even the gentle fish lures of patience
And boundless joy ever ripple my faithless way; I, too, become the lost orphan in the dying of trust.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
No longer a fisher of miracles in the doubtful churning, Of the endless surging views of oceans seven
The world round, I struggle between trust And reason, earnest but lost in cruel confusion
Fearing those extremes — nihilistic negation And fishy delusion — doubting all to a hellish end.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Still rises the good news of caring medicine: Briefly free of false hooks, we gave our dear Hope,
So dead to minded school, the late prescription And she was upward raised, yes, recovering soon A zest for learning — early for her, way late for me –
How wondrous thoughtful reason-decided invocations
Except to say the real hook of it all is that True knowing is not gulping barbs of pious deceit,
Nor being gilled or gulled into the dying of truth, But yearning and learning — like Descartes and Kant
Of old — finding in humble, reasoned trust The poetry and prose of spiritual growth, A Godly way of reasoned becoming,
How wondrous thoughtful reason-based deliberations
--Dan Wilcox
First published in The Centrifugal Eye then in the published poetry collection, Psalms, Yawps, and Howls
-- *From Huck Finn: “Well I got a good going-over in the morning from old Miss Watson on account of my clothes; but the widow she didn't scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay, and looked so sorry that I thought I would behave awhile if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it."
"She told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn't so I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn't any good to me without hooks."
"I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn't make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why, and I couldn't make it out no way."
"I set down one time back in the woods, and had a long think about it. I says to myself, if a body can get anything they pray for...why can't the widow get back her silver snuffbox that was stole? Why can't Miss Watson fat up?"
"No, says I to myself, there ain't nothing in it. I went and told the widow about it, and she said the thing a body could get by praying for it was "spiritual gifts." This was too many for me, but she told me what she meant -- I must help other people, and do everything I could for other people, and look out for them all the time, and never think about myself."
"This was including Miss Watson, as I took it. I went out in the woods and turned it over in my mind a long time, but I couldn't see no advantage about it -- except for the other people; so at last I reckoned I wouldn't worry about it any more, but just let it go."
"Sometimes the widow would take me one side and talk about Providence in a way to make a body's mouth water; but maybe next day Miss Watson would take hold and knock it all down again."
"I judged I could see that there was two Providences, and a poor chap would stand considerable show with the widow's Providence, but if Miss Watson's got him there warn't no help for him any more."
"I thought it all out, and reckoned I would belong to the widow's if he wanted me, though I couldn't make out how he was a-going to be any better off then than what he was before, seeing I was so ignorant, and so kind of low-down and ornery.”
Wise words of yearning and learning from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Samuel L. Clemens
-- In the Light of Hope and Reason,
Yearning and Learning, Trust and Skepticism,
Ideals and Science, Imagination and Fact...
Dan Wilcox
Our third daughter, Hope, learned-disabled early, Struggling with the squiggles and numeric symbols
Of unseen realities, of knowing, that set the stars In motion and our human minds in transition.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Her childish zest died while, as her father and provider, I practiced disabling late, raised to belief's unreason
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
So I prayed time-round-the-three for our daughter's minded healing, But just like gullible Finn and his never-gotten fishhooks,
Hope got none, and I— doubt, ill-gotten mishap, and bilge, Eventually lessening into cynicism, the wounded death Of an ash-filled, but empty-petitioning/requesting mouth.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Yet unlike Huck, to this day I keep reeling out petitions, Focusing like the Widow (Huck's other guardian),
On heartened prayer, the learning of spiritual gifts; But not even the gentle fish lures of patience
And boundless joy ever ripple my faithless way; I, too, become the lost orphan in the dying of trust.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
No longer a fisher of miracles in the doubtful churning, Of the endless surging views of oceans seven
The world round, I struggle between trust And reason, earnest but lost in cruel confusion
Fearing those extremes — nihilistic negation And fishy delusion — doubting all to a hellish end.
How dangerous those fish-hooked praying supplications
Still rises the good news of caring medicine: Briefly free of false hooks, we gave our dear Hope,
So dead to minded school, the late prescription And she was upward raised, yes, recovering soon A zest for learning — early for her, way late for me –
How wondrous thoughtful reason-decided invocations
Except to say the real hook of it all is that True knowing is not gulping barbs of pious deceit,
Nor being gilled or gulled into the dying of truth, But yearning and learning — like Descartes and Kant
Of old — finding in humble, reasoned trust The poetry and prose of spiritual growth, A Godly way of reasoned becoming,
How wondrous thoughtful reason-based deliberations
--Dan Wilcox
First published in The Centrifugal Eye then in the published poetry collection, Psalms, Yawps, and Howls
-- *From Huck Finn: “Well I got a good going-over in the morning from old Miss Watson on account of my clothes; but the widow she didn't scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay, and looked so sorry that I thought I would behave awhile if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it."
"She told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn't so I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn't any good to me without hooks."
"I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn't make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why, and I couldn't make it out no way."
"I set down one time back in the woods, and had a long think about it. I says to myself, if a body can get anything they pray for...why can't the widow get back her silver snuffbox that was stole? Why can't Miss Watson fat up?"
"No, says I to myself, there ain't nothing in it. I went and told the widow about it, and she said the thing a body could get by praying for it was "spiritual gifts." This was too many for me, but she told me what she meant -- I must help other people, and do everything I could for other people, and look out for them all the time, and never think about myself."
"This was including Miss Watson, as I took it. I went out in the woods and turned it over in my mind a long time, but I couldn't see no advantage about it -- except for the other people; so at last I reckoned I wouldn't worry about it any more, but just let it go."
"Sometimes the widow would take me one side and talk about Providence in a way to make a body's mouth water; but maybe next day Miss Watson would take hold and knock it all down again."
"I judged I could see that there was two Providences, and a poor chap would stand considerable show with the widow's Providence, but if Miss Watson's got him there warn't no help for him any more."
"I thought it all out, and reckoned I would belong to the widow's if he wanted me, though I couldn't make out how he was a-going to be any better off then than what he was before, seeing I was so ignorant, and so kind of low-down and ornery.”
Wise words of yearning and learning from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Samuel L. Clemens
-- In the Light of Hope and Reason,
Yearning and Learning, Trust and Skepticism,
Ideals and Science, Imagination and Fact...
Dan Wilcox
Friday, October 30, 2020
The Significance of the Human Species from an Enlightenment Perspective
Why do quite a few modern thinkers (from Stephen Jay Gould to Yual Noah Harari to Sam Harris) emphasize minimizing, negating, discounting, dehumanizing, etc.—and that all humans lack inherent worth?
These naysayers deny so many essential characteristics that define what a human is—the reality of human conscious awareness, moral realism, the ability to reason, to think so we can transcend our limited space in time and place, our ability to choose among alternative actions, our moral responsibility, our creativity, hope for an open future, the amazing structure of our brain and body, our DNA, artistic creations, sense of wonder and awe, and so forth.
But enough of the negative. What I wish to write about is the significance of the Enlightenment Story of humans.
This story rejects superstition, tradition, intolerance, injustice, inequality, oppression, dogmatic pride, and instead emphasizes reason, the scientific method, openness, justice, equality, caring and compassion and cognizant humility toward the wonder and mystery of reality, the cosmos, the nature of sentient life, the human species, and human reflecting and seeking.
The story goes like this. Ultimate Reality brought into being and becoming the cosmos (this universe, or the multiverse if indeed there is more than one cosmos) about 13.8 billion years ago.
For transcendent reasons unknown to our limited human minds, over that vast period of time in an expanse beyond most people’s fathoming, U.R., popularly called “God,” brought about a complex movement of the physical which developed into galaxies, solar systems, and planets, etc. about 9 billion years ago.
Our Milky Way galaxy alone has over 100 billion stars, and there are over a trillion other galaxies in the observable universe!
Then, approximately, at least 3.5. billion years ago, 1 billion years after its coming into becoming, basic life first appeared. Life followed evolutionary paths which branched out in many directions until at some point sentient life, and then intelligent life (able to use reason and to reflect and to transcend) came to be and to become.
One form of this intelligent life appeared in a minor solar system on the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy, which is called by us, the human species.
For hundreds of thousands of years, we as a species remained primarily at an instinctive level just surviving in at times hostile environments, but yet sensing a transcendence in our short life that came out as basic reverence and awe at existence and life.
Gradually, humans kept seeking, discovering, and reflecting on reality, especially in the last 10 thousand years. Of course, humans often erred into superstition and delusion when trying to ascertain the meaning of it all. Learning isn't quick nor is it easy.
At present, multi-millions of humans still tend to swing off center to 2 extremes—1. that of an egocentric organized religious view where the human species, despite its brief tiny presence in a vast universe, is the very center of creation
OR
2. the other already mentioned, a secular negating view where the human species is considered, inconsequential, a minor “bush” in the evolutionary jungle of life.
The Enlightenment view seeks a more balanced view, one that recognizes our species’ tiny presence and its very limited understanding of the in depth aspects of reality, let alone to know extensively why or even how it all came about,
YET
which is amazed in wonder and awe that in our brief consciousness, awareness, reflection, reason, and transcendence we get to participate in this incredible adventure of reality.
We get to seek, to study, to test, to question, to grow however slowly toward greater and greater knowledge of this vast existence. And that, my friend, (to quote an old Quaker) is the joy and wonder of our living, and becoming aware.
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
These naysayers deny so many essential characteristics that define what a human is—the reality of human conscious awareness, moral realism, the ability to reason, to think so we can transcend our limited space in time and place, our ability to choose among alternative actions, our moral responsibility, our creativity, hope for an open future, the amazing structure of our brain and body, our DNA, artistic creations, sense of wonder and awe, and so forth.
But enough of the negative. What I wish to write about is the significance of the Enlightenment Story of humans.
The story goes like this. Ultimate Reality brought into being and becoming the cosmos (this universe, or the multiverse if indeed there is more than one cosmos) about 13.8 billion years ago.
For transcendent reasons unknown to our limited human minds, over that vast period of time in an expanse beyond most people’s fathoming, U.R., popularly called “God,” brought about a complex movement of the physical which developed into galaxies, solar systems, and planets, etc. about 9 billion years ago.
Our Milky Way galaxy alone has over 100 billion stars, and there are over a trillion other galaxies in the observable universe!
Then, approximately, at least 3.5. billion years ago, 1 billion years after its coming into becoming, basic life first appeared. Life followed evolutionary paths which branched out in many directions until at some point sentient life, and then intelligent life (able to use reason and to reflect and to transcend) came to be and to become.
One form of this intelligent life appeared in a minor solar system on the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy, which is called by us, the human species.
For hundreds of thousands of years, we as a species remained primarily at an instinctive level just surviving in at times hostile environments, but yet sensing a transcendence in our short life that came out as basic reverence and awe at existence and life.
Gradually, humans kept seeking, discovering, and reflecting on reality, especially in the last 10 thousand years. Of course, humans often erred into superstition and delusion when trying to ascertain the meaning of it all. Learning isn't quick nor is it easy.
At present, multi-millions of humans still tend to swing off center to 2 extremes—1. that of an egocentric organized religious view where the human species, despite its brief tiny presence in a vast universe, is the very center of creation
OR
2. the other already mentioned, a secular negating view where the human species is considered, inconsequential, a minor “bush” in the evolutionary jungle of life.
The Enlightenment view seeks a more balanced view, one that recognizes our species’ tiny presence and its very limited understanding of the in depth aspects of reality, let alone to know extensively why or even how it all came about,
YET
which is amazed in wonder and awe that in our brief consciousness, awareness, reflection, reason, and transcendence we get to participate in this incredible adventure of reality.
We get to seek, to study, to test, to question, to grow however slowly toward greater and greater knowledge of this vast existence. And that, my friend, (to quote an old Quaker) is the joy and wonder of our living, and becoming aware.
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
Saturday, August 1, 2020
Wednesday, June 10, 2020
Stand up to Protect Little Girls in Egypt and other Nations from Fathers Who Mutilate
From BBC World News:
"The UN estimates that 200 million women and girls alive today have undergone some form of genital mutilation.
As much as 87% of Egyptian women and girls aged 15-49 have undergone FGM, according to a 2016 survey by the UN Children's Fund."
"It can cause lasting physical and mental trauma, including chronic infections, menstrual problems, infertility, pregnancy and childbirth complications."
This year,
"a man in Egypt who allegedly had female genital mutilation (FGM) carried out on his three daughters after tricking them, has been charged along with the doctor who performed the procedure.
The girls, aged under 18, were drugged and the doctor cut their genitals.
FGM was made illegal in 2008 in Egypt but remains prevalent."
Read the rest of tragic story at BBC World News.
Photo from CNN
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Part 2: Living the Questions: Meta-Stories about Reality
Living the questions, without definitive answers--somewhat lost, unlike most humans who seem so sure they know what it's all about.
I’m lost...not lost in the sense of the religious pietistic term, not un-rescued in the moral sense...not blind to ethical and transcendent truths...not existentially estranged in the sense of not having hope in the future, not lost when it comes to moral realism.
No, I’m not lost in those common meanings—nor am I caught in destructive habits or delusions or nontheistic confusions.
Though I often find I don't live as good as I know I ought to do,
I do seek to do what is right. And I do often experience the Light,
have a sense of the Good, the True, and the Just.
In all of those, I am found.
Thankfully.
No, how I am lost is
that I no longer have a vivid meta-story to identify with, a cosmic narrative.
I no longer have a sense why natural evils occur, such as Covid-19, cancer, etc.
About 10-15 years ago, I finally lost all hope in the Christian meta-story.
It turned out to be even at its best, an illusion. So I lost the philosophical
and theological understandings of my Christian worldview that I had thought
was a fairly stable foundation, despite my questions.
But the Christian meta-story turned out to be only many mirages, swirling sand that blew into a shifting Sahara of fading dunes. Besides, there were so many contradictory versions of what other humans claimed Christianity was!
Heck, most Christians claimed that Christians such as myself, who was one for 55 years, actually never were real Christians.
Furthermore, even all of those years as a Christian I never believed in their Creeds or their horrific concept of God.
But, finally, I realized, deeply, that I was trying to live a “true Scotsman” version of Christianity, one completely contrary to what most Christians claim. I realized down to the marrow of my bones that not even the Anabaptist/Quaker version of the Good News can be true.
I’m lost in that sense--from an intellectual standpoint. When in reflection, I step outside of my own personal commitment and try to see Life impartially and accurately, I have to admit that I don’t know the ultimate nature of Reality.
Unlike all of those who support various contrary versions of Christianity, those who claim they know that the meaning of existence is Islam, and those who claim to know that there is no god, etc., I am uncertain; indeed, never was “certain,” but now am very aware how little I know.
This is not the first time, I suddenly woke up lost--doubting my thinking and my perceiving, not knowing as much as I thought I knew when I was young.
Not long ago, about 10 years ago, I was sharing my spiritual struggles, a crisis I was in,
and one of my family joked “Oh Dan’s whole life has been one long spiritual crisis.”
And, in a sense, I suppose that is true as far as it goes:
from my earliest remembrances, I have—more than many—been the living human primate of “questions” far more than “answers.”
in process
Friday, May 15, 2020
"All things sick...evil great and small...foul": Covid-19 Virus and God
Jeremiah 14:11--16 "The YHWH said to me: “Do not pray for the welfare of this people.
Though they fast, I will not hear their cry,
and though they offer burnt offering
and grain offering, I will not accept them.
But I will consume them by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence.”
Many, many verses from the Christian Old Testament deeply stress and trouble humans. In the numerous readings through the entire of Bible, studying its various books in depth, listening to many sermons, and reading plenty of scholarly books, the great evil of such passages grows like a cancer within our moral selves.
Where in these vindictive, slaughtering, hate-filled parts of the Bible--that claim all natural evil and human evil are brought into being by God--is there the God of infinite love of the Good News, the God who never gives up on any human, the God who is the Good, the True, the Just, the Loving?
Then besides this textural hell, more and more Christian leaders--millions of them--emphasize these passages as central to Christinaity! They base their views in part by the study and promotion of Romans 9, the chapter which claims that God hates some humans, predestined billions of us to destruction and hell.
One famous Christian leader claims that God makes some humans "toilets" "spittoons."
Most state that all humans are "worthless," and "in essence, evil."
And so on...
Romans 9:
"11 though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls— 12 she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.
19 You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” 20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 Has the potter no right over the clay..."
Then there is the whole Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin.
Covid-19, the Black Plague, the Spanish flu, the Indian Ocean tsunami that slaughtered about 170,000, etc. all occurred because Adam and Eve disobeyed God. And God had foreordained their disobedience and punishment and that it would be inherited by all of the billions of infants conceived and born after them, over many thousands of years.
Even many Orthodox Jewish think that G-d created evil!
They quote Isaiah 45:7 "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the YHWH do all these things."
And it gets worse....
--
Now many current Christian leaders are applying these doctrinal beliefs to the current pandemic, that Covid-19 has been sent by God to punish America, the world.
According to the latest poll, 2/3rds of religious people (American Christians, Jews, and Muslims) think God sent Covid-19 as a message to all humans. So even though hundreds of thousands of innocent people are suffering and dying, this pandemic is God's way of warning us.
--the poll is from the University of Chicago and NORC Center for Public Affairs, May 2020
DOES THIS SOUND LIKE GOOD NEWS?
Here's a parody/satire of Christian beliefS.
from Monty Python Contractual Obligations Album:
All things dull and ugly
All creatures short and squat
All things rude and nasty
The lord god made the lot
Each little snake that poisons
Each little wasp that stings
He made their brutish venom,
He made their horrid wings
All things sick and cancerous
All evil great and small
All things foul and dangerous
The lord god made them all
--
"Black Death, a mid-fourteenth century plague, killed 30 to 50 per cent of the European population in just five years. The pandemic was caused by the Yersinia pestis bacteria with millions dying from the disease in two major outbreaks. This image is of a plague pit in Marseille, France"
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3412769/Black-Death-lurking-centuries-DNA-plague-victims-France-backs-theory-bacteria-lay-dormant.html
Each nasty little hornet
Each beastly little squid
Who made the spiky urchin
Who made the shocks... he did
All things scabbed and ulcerous
All pox both great and small
Putrid, foul and gangrenous
The lord god made them all
Amen
--Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: John Du Prez / Eric Idle / Trad
All Things Dull and Ugly lyrics
© Python Monty Pictures Ltd.,
Emi Virgin Songs Inc
--
So in Summation what are the “Books” of Nature and the “Books” Library of the Bible Teaching Us Humans?
#1 At one extreme are the Augustinian-creedal Christians, Orthodox Muslims and Orthodox Jews most of whom claim that both sets of books accurately describe the will of the nature of Ultimate Reality—that God causes whatever happens to humans.
Their views is already briefly described in the first part of this reflection.
HOW DO WE KNOW IF AN EVENT IS FROM GOD?
If it happens in nature or human history, then it is “God’s will.”
So, it is God’s will that Covid-19 happen.
Why?
To give God “glory,” “good pleasure,” to punish humans for failing to worship God.
#2 At the other extreme are the Naturalists, Materialists, and Atheists most of whom claim that there is no ultimate reality—that “God” or the “gods” are delusions of the human brain.
They state that there really is no good or bad, but only subjective morality, mere preferences, and that our preferences aren't really ours. We have them because it was determined by nature, the Laws of Physics, etc.
All of what appears to be horrific disasters, diseases, plagues, etc. including somewhat minor ones as Covid-19 aren’t even really "bad."
That judgment is only our subjective preference because we humans have a survival instinct instilled into us by natural selection. Besides, it was determined that that would happen because there is no free will and no moral responsibility.
"Free will" and "moral responsibility," according these thinkers, are delusions of the human brain that were determined to occur for who knows why. We humans don't choose our views or our actions.
We are "puppets" of nature.
Of course, why this happens, they state is for no reason.
So take your pick--God determined Covid-19 or the Laws of Nature/Big Bang determined it would happen.
#3
TO BE CONTINUED--
*The Triumph of Death by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1562)
*
Saturday, April 18, 2020
Is There Meaning in Reality?
RESPONDING TO NONTHEISTS' CLAIMS THAT HUMAN “MEANING” CAN EXIST IN MEANINGLESS REALITY
This time around, it isn’t famous atheists such as Jerry Coyne or Sam Harris or Lawrence M. Krauss denying humankind’s belief in cosmic meaning but Michael Shermer.* This is a bit unusual because sometimes in the past, Shermer has, while supporting a mild atheism, has also tried to argue for the transcendent in reality in several of his books.
And, of course, countering this non-theist view of reality are other thinkers such as Carl Jung who wrote, “The decisive question for man is: Is he related to something infinite or not?"
"That is the telling question of his life. Only if we know that the thing which truly matters is the infinite can we avoid fixing our interests upon futilities, and upon all kinds of goals which are not of real importance....The more a man lays stress on false possessions, and the less sensitivity he has for what is essential, the less satisfying is his life. He feels limited because he has limited aims, and the result is envy and jealousy. If we understand and feel that here in this life we already have a link with the infinite, desires and attitudes change.”
“Our Actions Don’t Matter in a Cosmic Sense—but That Doesn’t Mean They Don’t Matter” "Alvy's Error and the Meaning of Life" in Scientific American 318, 2, 67 (February 2018)
By Michael Shermer on February 1, 2018
“In a flashback scene in the 1977 film Annie Hall, Woody Allen's character Alvy Singer is a depressed young boy who won't do his homework because, as he explains to his doctor: “The universe is expanding.... Well, the universe is everything, and if it's expanding, someday it will break apart, and that will be the end of everything.” His exasperated mother upbraids the youth: “What has the universe got to do with it?! You're here in Brooklyn. Brooklyn is not expanding!”
Shermer continues, “Whether you behave like a Soviet dictator who murdered tens of millions of people or a Roman Catholic missionary who tended to the poor matters very much to the victims of totalitarianism and poverty. Why does it matter?
“Because we are sentient beings designed by evolution to survive and flourish in the teeth of entropy and death.”
Laughing out loud! Here is another philosophical naturalist speaking of undirected, unpurposeful evolution as “designing” !
I am amazed at how many non-religious thinkers who in their own writing speak of evolution as if it was a purposeful agent.
Probably, Shermer doesn’t believe this but is only showing how difficult it is for humans to speak about reality without “meaning” and “purpose.” He would probably say he was using “designed by evolution” metaphorically.
However, many “religious” thinkers would also state that their theistic statements are “metaphoric” not literal in a dirt and rock sense.
Then he writes “…expending energy to survive and flourish. Being kind and helping others has been one successful strategy, and punishing Paleolithic Stalins was another, and from these actions, we evolved morality.”
Huh? Does that mean if doing immoral and unjust acts would increase our “survival” then they would become the new morality. Sounds like Nietzsche, the reversal of values.
Human survival isn’t the true basis of meaning or morality. On the contrary, often true meaning and morality is contrary to human survival!
Then Shermer states, “In this sense, evolution bestowed on us a moral and purpose-driven life by dint of the laws of nature.”
There it is, again, giving agency to a natural process which, allegedly, has none—“bestowed.”
Also, how can “a moral and purpose-driven life come from the laws of nature” if cosmic reality is without any of that?
If all f reality is meaningless and purposeless, then any claim by humans that their actions and views have meaning is a delusion.
And Shermer ends with, “In the long run, entropy will spell the end of everything in the universe and the universe itself, but we don't live in the long run. We live now. We live in Brooklyn, so doing our homework matters. And so, too, does doing our duty to ourselves, our loved ones, our community, our species and our planet.”
Not if we, our places, our actions are PART of the “long run.” Then ourselves, our acts, or beliefs all don’t matter either because they are included in the whole.
I think it makes far more sense to go with those scientists who do think that all of reality--including humans--has meaning.
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
*Michael Shermer is publisher of Skeptic magazine (www.skeptic.com) and a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University. His new book is Heavens on Earth: The Scientific Search for the Afterlife, Immortality, and Utopia (Henry Holt, 2018).
Saturday, November 23, 2019
Part 2: Realistic Hope--Reason, Humble Searching, Moral Realism
Part 2: REALISTIC HOPE
1. Begin with Reason
2. Humbly Search to Discover
3. When seeking what is true, don’t start with the most speculative, but with the here and now, daily life of human choice and creativity.
HOW DIFFERENT AMERICAN POLITICIANS, both REPUBLICANS and DEMOCRATS and THEIR CONSTITUENTS WOULD ACT if they first started with COURTESY,
NOT with their own in-group, political party, etc.
NOT their own particular worldview,
NOT their own philosophical beliefs about reality.
Think about daily details right in front of you, decisions you need to make today, how ought you to treat others, what you should do, and what you shouldn't, what is wrong for everyone to do.
When we have discovered how to live morally at this brief moment in this time and this place,
THEN
from that foundation, we can hypothesize, even guess, what may or may not be true about Ultimate Reality.
Notice in current events, and throughout history, most humans have instead chosen a life-stance/worldview concerning all of reality,
and then, based upon that speculative stance
have made their daily decisions. They’ve made ethical decisions based upon speculative beliefs.
Under that tragic system, humans hold that the end justifies means—so we show bias, will lie, steal, deceive, be cruel, will abuse, oppress, slaughter, even many thousands of civilians because God or the Absolute or Dialectical Materialism or the Historical Process or the Romantic-Nationalist Ideal wills the means to achieve the just end.
To be continued--
In the Light,
Dan Wilcox
Friday, November 22, 2019
REALISTIC HOPE
REALISTIC HOPE
Once one has discovered the fallacious nature of organized religion, its superstitions, denials of verified scientific study, and illusions, where does one turn for new hope?
Definitely not to the nihilism and illusions of many non-religous humans who claim that moral realism is false, that the good, the true, the just, human rights, equality, meticulous honesty, inherent worth, meaning, and purpose are all “myths."
They claim all those values are delusions, not true, and that all humans are incapable of moral choice, are only “biochemical puppets,” and morality is subjective, a mere preference of a human or a society.
INSTEAD, we humans ought to start searching for what is true, good, and just. Study the thinking of the Enlightenment
(though obviously not the darkness of the French Reign of Terror or the hypocrisy of leaders such as Thomas Jefferson).
1. Reason is central to start one’s trek up toward that impossibly difficult climb toward God, Ultimate Reality (using Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary first definition of “God”).
A beginning caution, however, is immediately in order because all of us humans have a way of rationalizing/misguiding our reasoning. Or we start with fallacious presuppositions and thus our brilliantly reasoned conclusions are based upon a foundation of quicksand.
One example of how this happens is Benjamin Franklin’s famous example from his autobiography of how he managed to reason himself into anything that he already wanted to do;-)*
2. A realistic humility is very important through out one’s life. The older I get, the more I realize how little I (and all humans) ‘know’. We live, experience, think, test, hypothesize, revise, repeat… NO ONE KNOWS in the sense of certainty. How could a finite human primate, a brief blip /conscious spark in a cosmos of billions of galaxies, possibly KNOW?
I still am baffled and shocked how many creedal Christians, Muslims, orthodox Jews, and Atheists, etc. are sure--certain--that they ‘KNOW’ the ultimate nature of reality.
Famous scientists including Einstein strongly emphasize humility is the beginning of real learning and wisdom.
For, instance, Einstein wrote, “I am not an atheist...The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different languages.
“The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God.
“We see a universe marvelously arranged, obeying certain laws, but we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that sways the constellations.”
Albert Einstein
--
BUT billions of humans in the past and the present claim to be certain. Not, that such a certainty wasn’t an essential part of my own childhood faith in non-creedal Baptist religion. We were constantly told and preached at, that everyone can KNOW.
However, I never had such assurance. Though I sought that "assurance, "to KNOW," instead, I always had questions, doubts, could step outside of my genuine hope, and observe Existence and the Cosmos from other contrary worldviews and life-stances.
As I used to joke, I was born with a “why” in my throat, instead of the infamous spoon.
To be continued--
In the Light of the Good, the True, and the Just,
Dan Wilcox
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