Notes From Oct 14th

Mirror of identiy (The Bible)
  engage somebody in the Bible and Blog about it (Aka argue)
How has the Bible influence literature? Blog about it
Talmud-authorized body of commentary on the Bible

Alegra's misererre-based on psalms 51
  "all the arts aspire to the condition of music"

Notes From Oct 12th

Read Suzanna and Peter Quince at the Clavier by Wallace Stevens. Blog about it.
Parataxis-literary form placing thigs side by side rather than subordinating elements

An argument About the Bible

One of my friends agreed to be my opponent in an argument of the Bible. This argument, which was based on the reliability of  the authority of the Old Testament in its influence on Christianity was similar in many respects to many other arguments I've had with people on the subject of the Bible. The most interesting and volatile arguments always seem to come up between my mother and I, and she is extremely well educated in the Bible, oftentimes pointing out obscure passages and interpreting them in ways I've never considered before. My argument with my friend was not as extensive but it was interesting in the fact that she offered the same bottom line as anybody else I've ever argued with. Faith. No matter how many mass slaughters, intertextual inconsistencies and improbable coincidences of similarities between the Bible and other great religious works, she remained unshaken in her answer. Faith answers everything. How can you argue with that? 

Susanna and Peter Quince

Clavier-depending on the language any sort of keyboard instrument or a specific keyboard instrument.

Just as my fingers on these keys
Make music, so the self-same sounds 
On my spirit make a music, too. 
Music is feeling, then, not sound; 
And thus it is that what I feel, The relationship between the music and the writing and their connection to emotions is interesting. Is he expressing his emotion in his music or creating emotion by playing music?
Here in this room, desiring you, Desiring who?

Thinking of your blue-shadowed silk, 
Is music. It is like the strain 
Waked in the elders by Susanna;

Of a green evening, clear and warm, 
She bathed in her still garden, while 
The red-eyed elders, watching, feltWhy are they red-eyed?

The basses of their beings throb 
In witching chords, and their thin blood 
Pulse pizzicati (Light plucking sound) of Hosanna (Which as I understand to be a cry for help in the archaic sense and a shout of praise in more recent usage, such as in hymns).

II

In the green water, clear and warm, 
Susanna lay. 
She searched 
The touch of springs, 
And found 
Concealed imaginings. 
She sighed, 
For so much melody.

Upon the bank, she stood 
In the cool 
Of spent emotions. 
She felt, among the leaves, 
The dew 
Of old devotions.

She walked upon the grass, 
Still quavering. 
The winds were like her maids, 
On timid feet, 
Fetching her woven scarves, 
Yet wavering.

A breath upon her hand 
Muted the night. 
She turned -- 
A cymbal crashed, 
Amid roaring horns. The music becoming abruptly harsh

III

Soon, with a noise like tambourines, 
Came her attendant Byzantines.

Against the elders by her side;

And as they whispered, the refrain 

Was like a willow swept by rain. Beautiful imagery, but it confuses me
Anon, their lamps' uplifted flame 
Revealed Susanna and her shame. Indication that something did indeed happen, rather than Susanna remaining resistant as in the Biblical story

And then, the simpering Byzantines 
Fled, with a noise like tambourines.

IV

Beauty is momentary in the mind -- 
The fitful tracing of a portal; 
But in the flesh it is immortal. Beauty momentary in the mind, eternal in the body-this is opposite what is expected

The body dies; the body's beauty lives. 
So evenings die, in their green going, 
A wave, interminably flowing. Wave of time
So gardens die, their meek breath scenting 
The cowl of winter, done repenting. 
So maidens die, to the auroral 
Celebration of a maiden's choral.

Susanna's music touched the bawdy strings 
Of those white elders; but, escaping, 
Left only Death's ironic scraping. 
Now, in its immortality, it plays 
On the clear viol of her memory, 
And makes a constant sacrament of praise.

  This poem appears to be about beauty, and specifically about the beauty and immortality of art, such as poetry, music or the literature of the Bible. The narrator of the poem seems to make a certain point of separating the passion he feels for his type of beauty and the lust of the Elders for Susanna's beauty. The Elder's  lust, aroused by "Susanna's music" , the beauty of her body, is on an instinctive level ,and is fleeting and doomed to nothing, while Peter Quince's idea of true beauty is to create something from his feelings that will last in "in its immortality" a "constant sacrament of Praise".  A reader of this poem and the Bible can make an instant connection with the beauty and immortality, spoken of, and the great piece of art that the poet drew his inspiration from.

Important!

Women in the Bible-Guest speaker (Linda Sexson) Attendence required

Women In the Bible-Guest Speaker Linda Sexson

1. Women-historical Figures or Socially Designation (Social Construction)
2.Female-Biological Category
3. Feminine-Symbol or Metaphor
1 and 3 are easily confused

monotheism   One God absorbs attributes of all E.G. Creation=Fertility a feminine trait

Eve is 1 [mother of all]
  Taking the rib from Adam to create Eve-separating male and female
      Rib-Te in some languages (Tiamat, Tiat Goddessses)
Anat-warrior Goddess

Repetitive Parallelism

Linda's law # 45-All Gods are metaphors

Zipporah-3
In Patriarchal societies phallic images ALWAYS take precedence over feminine (A women who hits a guy in the balls to save her husband must have her hand chopped off Deut.)

Lot and his Daughters-Moabites and Amenites, like Bastards Or SOB (Ancient insult)

Judges 19-The Levite and his Concubine/Wife
  Rules of hospitality are sacred

"Place your hand on my thigh" Testes are vows
     Foot may be a euphemism in bible

Amos-Hosea \
721-fall of Norther Kingdom--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Fall of Southern Kingdom
                                           Prophets appear to explain Israel's suffering
                                                 -Israel's fault for not worshipping correctly and not treating each other right
                                                       First consideration given to Social Justice
                                                        Cultic Purities

Hosea's Whore of a Wife=Israel

Jeremiah (And his Loincloth)

Teraphim-Household Gods
  Rachel's blood

1)Deborah
            2)Jael
                   3)Mother of Sisera
    The Decline
        !)Strong women who entered battle, even to the point of affirming masculinity [general who wouldn't go to battle without her] 2)Having to use trickery and deceit to establish power [killing enemy general with tent peg (Which head?)] 3)Women were spoils of war

  This lecture was especially interesting to me. I've noticed that sexist teachers of the Bible always used these women as justification for male dominated societies, while PC teachers always completely avoid mentioning them. I also noticed several correlations between Linda Sexson's literary perspective of Women and the Bible and ideas discussed in a Sociology of Gender class I took last year, especially the repression of women being a Social Construction and appearing in customary traditions (like the isolation of a woman while she is having her period).

Notes from September 28th

The Scattering
Portable religion---[God in a box] becomes integral to displaced Jews
Zionism-return to homeland
Christians-Jesus was Messiah Jews-Messiah hasn't come yet Islam-?

Notes from September 21st

Polysemous-many meanings
"All literature is displaced myth" N. Frye
"According to J, the moral of the story IS the story" P. Sexson
Lilith
Etiology-study of causation
Axis Mundi

Different Levels of Reading Literature
1. Descriptive
2. Poetic
3. Metaphor