Blogging the bible How Psalms Is Like Casablanca The most famous poem ever written. By David Plotz Wednesday, February 28, 2007, at 5:48 PM ET.By Kandy Griffin MRG President. Morgellons is not a disease. It is a process. It is a form of forced/directed evolution of the human genome. It is the fetal stage of. Search settings; Web History : Advanced search Language tools. Slateblogging the bible. How Psalms Is Like Casablanca. The most famous poem ever written. By David Plotz. Wednesday, February 2. ![]()
PM ET. From: David Plotz. Subject: The Most Famous Poem Ever Written. Posted Wednesday, February 2. PM ET. The Book of Psalms presents two daunting challenges to the Bible blog. First, because it's just a series of poems, in no particular order, there is no compelling reason to start at Psalm 1 and read on to Psalm 1. You might as well start at Psalm 4. But since the aim of the blog is to read straight throughthe Bible, I will dutifully begin with Psalm 1 and trudge forward. Second, because there is no story, it's a very demanding read. As I quickly learned when I began my Psalmistry last night, reading one psalm is a joy, reading two is a pleasure, reading three is a chore, and reading a dozen or more is like sitting next to a desperate Amway salesman on a trans- Atlantic flight. Psalm 1. A righteous man studies the Lord's teaching ! All crossword clues in our system starting with the letter E. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has been threatening to pass a law to effectively end the use of secure encryption in Australia for a while now. Psalm 2. One of several psalms addressed to kings and princes, all of which strike a similar theme. Don't plot against God or try to supplant Him. Remember, you serve at His pleasure, and if you get too big for your britches, you will regret it. Since David is the Bible's most fascinating character, I'm looking forward to reading these. Given David's not- inconsiderable ego, it's hardly surprising that the main theme of David's psalms is: Poor me, I have so many enemies, even though I'm such a righteous man. Thanks for killing all my enemies, God! I love this wonderfully modern line at the end of Psalm 3, where he praises the Lord: . Have mercy on me, O Lord. God often reacts too quickly in the Bible, immediately flying into a rage at human sin and frailty. What's so appealing about this verse is that David is not denying his wrongdoing—he knows he's a sinner—but he wants God to count to 1. He's asking God to grant him a few moments so that he can plead for forgiveness and prove his faith, hoping that the Lord's fury will subside. As always, David is a superb psychologist, daring to understand, and manipulate, the Lord. Also, a literary point: Note that the first line—. Many are those who attack me. It is salted with so many famous phrases that it sometimes sounds trite. In this psalm, for example, appears the question: . In any case, the psalm thanks God for bothering to pay attention to us. It's a winning poem because it's humble without being self- loathing. It also occurs to me that I like it because it reflects my own gratitude about being alive: Isn't it nice, that of all the gin joints, on all the planets, in all the galaxies in the universe, I walked into this one! Why am I so lucky to be born on Earth, and a human being too? If that's not a reason to thank God, I don't know what is. Psalm 1. 0At the beginning of the psalm, the poet, like Habakkuk, asks God why He . But by the middle of the poem, the author recognizes that God is paying attention to all this evil and keeping score: ! You take note of mischief and vexation! The entire cycle of belief, from doubt, to revelation, to vindication, in just 1. Psalm 1. 1God will rain down . Question: Why is sulfur a frequent Bible punishment? It's God's favorite chemical weapon, the mustard gas of the ancient Near East. Was sulfur in fact an Israelite weapon? Or, even if it was not a weapon, was it a common natural threat? Was there a Judean volcano or hot spring that spewed dangerous sulfur? I've been to Israel a few times and never seen (or smelled) any sulfur. But I can't imagine the Bible's authors would have written about sulfur with such alarm unless they had reason to fear it. Psalm 1. 3This psalm displays David at his most Davidian. We hear his incredible whininess: ? Listen to this fabulous line, exactly the approach to God you'd expect from a pickup artist as skilled as David: ? What mortal dares to command God, ? Only His most beloved king, David. Psalm 1. 6Among many other nice metaphors about the Lord, David says, ? Psalm 1. 8The longest and most spectacular psalm yet, it's actually an almost word- for- word copy of 2 Samuel, Chapter 2. It opens with David rattling off an amazing series of nouns to praise God: . Egomaniac David, naturally, thinks he deserves nothing less because he is a . Usually his psalms are all about, well, David—how great he is, how the Lord had better stop ignoring him, how his enemies will suffer, etc. In this poem, David finally spares a thought for everyone else: . Psalm 2. 2This psalm surely has special meaning for Christians. David, complaining again, opens the psalm by crying: . It is not the only line in this psalm that relates to the death of Jesus. David imagines his killers . David bargains with God, promising to proclaim His glory—as long as God saves him from death. This is characteristic of David. His love of God is conditional—dependent on God doing good for him (making him king, saving his life, etc.). Yet the overriding message of the Bible is always that our love for God mustn't be conditional. When your faith is conditional, it's self- interested and utilitarian. Love for God must be absolute. But David is always the Bible exception. Because he is God's favorite, he can get away with gamesmanship that the rest of us don't dare try. Psalm 2. 3Probably the most famous poem ever written: . I have only two small points to make about it. First, the King James version famously and majestically refers to ? One reason must be that Psalm 2. One of the revelations I've had reading the Bible is that its most famous passages are almost always its gentlest and most loving parts. While there are certainly famous Bible stories that are disturbing—Noah, Ten Plagues, etc.—the celebrated bits are far milder than the book as a whole. Psalm 2. 3 is a perfect example of this whitewashing, presenting a God who is loving, mild, forgiving, openhearted—even though the God of the psalms, and of the Hebrew Bible generally, is usually quick to anger, furious, and unforgiving. The Psalm 2. 3 God is certainly better for marketing. Psalm 2. 4I pause here only for family reasons. This psalm begins, . Thoughts on Blogging the Bible? Please e- mail David Plotz at plotzd@slate. Everyone—and I mean everyone—loves that story. Let me touch briefly on the question that interested you (and me) most: How could Jonah have survived three days inside a whale/fish? Nonbelievers answered: He couldn't, and of course it never happened. Some believers said: It didn't happen, but it's still a wonderful allegory. Those who said it did happen made one of these three points: 1) Maybe, just maybe, he could have survived in a sperm whale or whale shark; or. It's a miracle. If God wanted to do it, He could do it. Heck, he could have made a big fish just for the occasion and made it vanish as soon as Jonah was spewed on the beach. He could do anything, because He's God. For a fascinating version of the miracle position, listen to William Jennings Bryan squaring off with Clarence Darrow during the 1. Scopes trial; or. Jonah didn't survive his fishy journey. He died, spent three days in the darkness, and then was resurrected—like a certain other holy man popular with Christians. Several Baptist readers told me that they were taught very explicitly that Jonah was a precursor to Christ. On to the last five of the minor prophets. I'm going to race through them because, well, they're not very interesting. The Book of Habakkuk. Chapter 1 and Chapter 2. A bit of a whiner, Habby keeps wondering how long he will have to cry to the Lord for relief. Eventually, he decides to stand in a watchtower until God answers his complaint. This gloomy fellow is evidently not the inspiration for the Coca- Cola slogan, . If I am understanding the Lord—the language is a little muddy—He answers by saying that the wicked will eventually be punished and the righteous rewarded. God checks off a list of malfeasants—. I find God's response a little unsatisfying, though I don't know what else He could say. As far as I can tell, the only way, theologically, to justify evil's success today is the promise of a next world where the wicked will suffer and the good will be rewarded. If there is no future redemption or punishment, then God would be a sadist, allowing the good to suffer with no hope. I mention it only to note two eye- catching phrases. The prophet describes the Lord . And when God arrives to judge and redeem, Habakkuk is so nervous that his . He's not minor league, he's rookie league. His three, mercifully short, chapters are third- rate Isaiah, a completely familiar prophetic poem: God's going to destroy mankind to punish Baal worshippers. He will trash the Israelites, the Moabites, the Ninevites, etc. Then He'll redeem Zion. Nothing you haven't heard 4. In Zephaniah, as in so many other books, the Lord describes razing a city—often Jerusalem, but Nineveh in this case—and leaving it such a wasteland that everyone who passes by . Why would people hiss at a devastated city? What kind of hand gesture would they make? Are hissing and gesturing customs that persist in the Middle East? The Book of Haggai. Chapter 1 and Chapter 2. A confusing but lively story. After the Persians reconquer Israel from the Babylonians and allow the Jews to return, the Temple remains in ruins. The Jews say, . Haggai, channeling God, rebukes them for their lack of faith. Why are their crops failing? Why do they never have enough warm clothes? Because they're not serving God, that's why! God instructs them to rebuild the Temple and promises glory and prosperity if they do. But the book ends ambiguously, with the Temple still in ruins. The Book of Zechariah. This is the longest book in the minor prophets, and while it's not a thrill ride, it's weird and psychedelic. Chapter 1 through Chapter 3. Chapter 3 brings a landmark moment: the debut of Satan! In a dream, Zechariah sees the high priest of Israel facing off against . It's clear that this is no horn- bedecked, pitchfork- wielding, perfumed- with- brimstone, red- satin devil. Prime Minister Says the Laws of Australia Can Beat the Laws of Math. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has been threatening to pass a law to effectively end the use of secure encryption in Australia for a while now. On Friday, he made his intentions more concrete and said that legislation mandating a government back door of some type will be introduced before the end of the year. This is bad for everyone. After the horrifying terror attack in London last week, the familiar debate over government access. A wider audience than ever before received an education in the fundamental principles of encryption and the fact that it loses its security value if anyone has a key to decrypt the files. It appears that Prime Minister Turnbull does not understand this principle. On Friday, the Australian government revealed details about its plans the require tech companies to offer access to encrypted files. Turnbull’s comments about the law betray his willful ignorance on the issue.“The laws of Australia prevail in Australia, I can assure you of that,” Turnbull said. The laws of math are “commendable.” Turnbull is very bluntly saying that Australia simply won’t have end- to- end encryption. The laws of math don’t change just because Australia wants them to.“A back door is typically a flaw in a software program that perhaps the — you know, the developer of the software program is not aware of and that somebody who knows about it can exploit,” Turnbull said, before he demonstrated that those are just words in his head of which he has no understanding. While that legislation has its own issues, it only requires communications service providers that are based in the UK to have an ability to access encrypted files at the government’s request. It exempts foreign companies from the rule. Brandis told ABC, “Last Wednesday I met with the chief cryptographer at GCHQ, the Government Communication Headquarters in the United Kingdom. And he assured me that this was feasible.” As Tech. Dirt points out, Brandis is likely confused about the conversation he had. On July 1. 0th, the former head of GHCQ, Robert Hannigan said that back doors shouldn’t be implemented and intelligence agencies should focus on attacking the end points of encryption, a practice that has been used for some time. It seems that Brandis probably heard that it was feasible to attack end points without disrupting the security of end- to- end encryption. Anthony Albanese, leader of the opposition to Turnbull’s government made no promises about how the legislation would be received, saying that lawmakers would take “a common sense approach that we must keep Australians safe.” Weakening encryption for global tech companies would make everyone, not just Australians, less safe. As Elaine Pearson, Australia director at Human Rights Watch, put it in a statement: The government needs to accept that it won’t know what everybody is doing all of the time. We don’t outlaw whispering or drawing the blinds for privacy. In the same way, we should accept encryption is the only way to safeguard our communications in an era of cybercrime and unauthorised surveillance.
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