{"id":667,"date":"2005-01-01T20:10:41","date_gmt":"2005-01-02T00:10:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/2005\/01\/01\/short-takes-not-just-any-old-biker-qu"},"modified":"2005-01-01T20:10:41","modified_gmt":"2005-01-02T00:10:41","slug":"short-takes-not-just-any-old-biker-queen-tossing-magic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/2005\/01\/01\/short-takes-not-just-any-old-biker-queen-tossing-magic\/","title":{"rendered":"Short takes: Not just any old biker queen tossing magic"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

Happy New Year, dear reader.<\/p>\n

Here’s a quote I came across the other day:<\/p>\n

One thing is sure. The earth is now more cultivated and developed than ever before. There is more farming with pure force, swamps are drying up, and cities are springing up on unprecedented scale. We’ve become a burden to our planet. Resources are becoming scarce, and soon nature will no longer be able to satisfy our needs.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to p.45 of Massive Change<\/a> (the book), the sentiments expressed above are attributed to Quintus Septimus Florens Tertullianus<\/a> (incorrectly identified as a Roman theologian from 200 BC<\/b> — not bloody likely if he’s talking about Christ, too: bad copy-editing can really ruin an “aha”….). But still, it’s an eye-opener to read an old ancient pessimistic sour-puss grumpy-face anti-intellectual<\/a> like Tertullian make such a huge blooper, isn’t it? If the human race is dying and killing the planet while it’s at it, we’re sure taking a long long time to die. <\/p>\n

Since the editors of Massive Change<\/a> made such an egregious error in dating Tertullian’s quote, one wonders how they did with the Latin translation. “Planet”? What do you think? Did he say “planet”? Does it matter, though, if the gist is the same? <\/p>\n

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\nI read somewhere that preachers and imams in Indonesia are telling the faithful that the tsunamis were a sign of God’s displeasure with humans for having strayed too far from “His” path. They must be channelling Tertullian. I have no charitable feelings toward anyone who calls on God’s pleasure or displeasure to “explain” nature, or politics. On a related note, ages ago my son (who’s a history buff) told me about Prince Vladimir of Kiev<\/a> (10th century), who figures mightily in the founding of Russia. He wasn’t born into any of the major religions, so he sent his envoys about to inform him about what was available, and to learn what would serve his fledgling empire. In the end, he chose Greek Orthodox Christianity, no doubt because of political considerations, but here’s what my son told me about his other options: He rejected Islam because it wouldn’t allow him to drink alcohol; he thought Catholic ceremonies were ugly; and to the Jews he said something to the effect of, “If your god had loved you, he wouldn’t spread you around like this.” <\/p>\n

In the United States, George Bush and his Christian fundamentalist followers think that the end of the world is ok, because they’ll get “raptured,” while the rest of us (including Yours Truly, darlings) will go to hell …or someplace at the mall. This makes the poor preachers in tsunami-stricken communities rimming the Indian Ocean seem like beacons of Enlightenment. At least they are saying, “look, let’s behave and be more moral, and maybe the end of the world won’t hit us …again.” Bush & Co. think the End of The World [copyright!] is peachy-keen. He and his ilk are at least as bad if not worse than the most primitive despots the rest of the world has to offer. The preachers and their flocks, who want to behave, can perhaps be “reached” via education and aid. Bush and friends are beyond the pale.
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\nBefore me I have two books. In one of them, Breaking Ground<\/a>, Daniel<\/a> Libeskind<\/a> writes, <\/p>\n

Think of it: When we consider history, what we see before us are the buildings. Ask us about the French Revolution, and we don’t visualize Danton, we conjure the image of Versailles. If we drift back to Rome, what we see first are the Colosseum and the Forum. Standing beside the temples of Greece or near the circle at Stonehenge, we feel the presence of the people who created them; their spirits speak to us across the divide of history. (pp.3-4)<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In the other book, War<\/a>, by Gwynne Dyer (although I’m referring to the excellent New Edition, 2004, which should be available beyond Canada soon: you must<\/i> read<\/b> it<\/i>), Dyer calls (among other things) on military history as the backbone of our story-telling traditions:<\/p>\n

The soldier was one of the first inventions of civilization, and he has changed remarkably little over the five thousand years or so that real armies have existed. The teenage Iranian volunteers stumbling across minefields east of Basra in 1984 or the doomed British battalions going over the top in the July Drive on the Somme in 1916 were taking part in the same act of sacrifice and slaughter that destroyed the young men of Rome at Cannae in 216 BC. The emotions, the odds, and the outcome were fundamentally the same. Battle, the central act of civilized warfare, is a unique event in which ordinary men willingly kill and die as though those extraordinary actions were normal and acceptable. Changes in weapons and tactics have not altered those essential elements of its character.<\/i> [p.6, from War; The New Edition (2004)<\/a>] <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A bit further on, Dyer<\/a> adds, “War is a huge, multi-faceted, ancient human institution that is deeply entrenched in our societies, our history, and our psyches. No matter which angle we approach it from, we will initially be in the position of one of the blind men trying to describe the elephant.” (p.11)<\/p>\n

On the one hand, we have the architect’s (and art historian’s) view of history as the story of its artefacts, and on the other we have the military historian who tells history as a series of battles. I think it’s important to keep both perspectives in mind, to hold them in dialectical relation to one another, to regard them as bits of the whole, and to consider, whenever possible, all the other bits we might be inclined to leave out when constructing a story. We should be moving toward a sort of distributed grid of stories, where we no longer need to hold firm to one central cause, metaphor, or agency. God did not make the tsunamis happen. The earth is not on its last legs.<\/p>\n

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\nThe other day I looked up the name of a guy I used to fool with lightly 3 decades ago, here in Victoria. His name is Mark, but I heard that he now calls himself by the name of two animals and one galactic object. One animal is a mammal and has a mane, the other is a snake and has knowledge, and the galactic object is “male,” our star, the Sun. Yes, Mark was always very intense<\/i>, very very very. There isn’t much on the web, but I came across an interview with a Seattle witch who mentions Mark in passing. The Seattle witch has some interesting things to say, along with quite a few things I don’t really relate to at all. For example, re. the former category, he says: “… each person has to come to spiritual truth on their own. You’re not going to significantly change; you never really listen to anyone. Perhaps you should, but you don’t. The most intelligent thing you’ll ever say to your teacher is, ‘Shut up, I’m interpreting.'” Further down, he adds:<\/p>\n

The way I look at it, if all magic practitioners in the universe quit doing their work, the sun wouldn’t come up, the seasons wouldn’t come at the right times. The elementals would be totally out of control, and it would be uninhabitable, this place. That doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be life here, but humans wouldn’t have a place in it.<\/p>\n

A lot of what we’re doing to disrupt the environment is a magic we’re doing [ — ] a black magic spell we’re thoroughly involved with. I got a postcard at Momo from this person, and they were saying that Hecate was trying to destroy the planet, and I think it’s just the other way around. From my point of view, it’s the Christian fundamentalists, or the No fundamentalists is more like it, that are out there trying to destroy the planet and wreck the government and social services. They’re doing this because it really doesn’t matter, because it’s all going to be Armageddon soon, in their minds. So there’s nothing to save the universe for.<\/p>\n

It isn’t Hecate. She’s the goddess that maintains the universe. She doesn’t want to destroy it. If she did, she’d just quit. <\/i> [More…<\/a>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Excuse me if I say that makes a lot of sense, and I’ll any day<\/i> take someone like that over a “leader” who tells us that we better straighten out because God doesn’t like us anymore, or that Armageddon and Rapture are ok, or that there’s this really new cool “magical” product down at the local mall that will change my life if I buy it<\/i> (re: “New Age”). <\/p>\n

But that’s just me and my crazy take on this New Year’s Day…
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\nSee? It’s a rainbow, and it really takes all kinds. What you put in your parking meter — watch it. And don’t follow leaders. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Happy New Year, dear reader. Here’s a quote I came across the other day: One thing is sure. The earth is now more cultivated and developed than ever before. There is more farming with pure force, swamps are drying up, and cities are springing up on unprecedented scale. We’ve become a burden to our planet. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":311,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[600],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-yulelogstories"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/311"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/yulelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}