Quoth Stephen Booth

"It's not saying anything interesting; poems rarely do." – Professor Stephen Booth

“Alliterating all around” by Sam Urfer

Saints and soothsayers have this in common,

Crass crowds crucify them for their message.

Many a martyr has been made this way,

Withholding no wisdom or wit to live

Longer, lest they be found liars in death.

Do not doubt that destiny has a time

To test any temperament, a season

To search out souls and see what lies beneath.

Be bold, then, and believe, for the prophets

Provide perfectly pleasant company.

"An Emo Confession of Faith"

Fear consumes me, doubt plagues my every step;

By this sign, I know that I am alive.

I don’t know what I want to be when I

Grow up; the right path to take eludes me.

I don’t know what the future holds for me,

And the darkness of the future scares me.

All I can do is trust in providence.

I have a hope that I hold in my heart,

A faith that drives me forever forward,

A love that lasts through all of life’s sorrows.

I do not understand the universe

Or what my place in the grand scheme of things

Will be, but I know that there is a plan.

Now we see as in a mirror, darkly,

But in the end, we will see, face to face,

And the Truth shall set us free from ourselves.

So, I took this test at beliefnet about how my beliefs match up with various religions. Interesting results, I recommend checking it out.

1.	Orthodox Quaker (100%)
2.	Eastern Orthodox (94%)
3.	Roman Catholic (94%)
4.	Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (90%)
5.	Seventh Day Adventist (85%)
6.	Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (71%)
7.	Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (65%)
8.	Orthodox Judaism (65%)
9.	Islam (57%)
10.	Liberal Quakers (55%)
11.	Jehovah's Witness (54%)
12.	Hinduism (53%)
13.	Bahá'í Faith (52%)
14.	Sikhism (51%)
15.	Unitarian Universalism (43%)
16.	Reform Judaism (41%)
17.	Jainism (33%)
18.	Neo-Pagan (30%)
19.	Mahayana Buddhism (26%)
20.	New Age (24%)
21.	Theravada Buddhism (24%)
22.	Secular Humanism (22%)
23.	Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (19%)
24.	Nontheist (17%)
25.	Taoism (17%)
26.	Scientology (16%)
27.	New Thought (15%)

“And Lucifer Fell" - a Poetic response to "A Canticle for Leibowitz"

It came to pass in those days, as it did

In the days of Jonah, Prophet of old,

That the nations of the Earth grew wicked.

Minimizing pain and maximizing

Safety became the sole obsessions

Of the princes and magistrates of Earth.

In seeking their security, they found

Only conflict, and in seeking to end

Suffering, they piled new woes on the world.

They strutted like peacocks, trying to hide

Their fears, using brave faces for shelter,

For they said in their hearts, “There is no God.”

Therefore, God left them to their own devices,

After they scoffed at his Saints and Prophets.

This time no Jonah arose, no savior

To prevent proud fools from pushing buttons.

And so we lost our green garden again,

As the mushroom clouds rose, and Lucifer fell.

Vulgar, yet true....

I Got What America Needs Right Here

Life bleeds over into poetry...

"Prayer for Guidance" by Sam Urfer

Set the truth in my heart, that I may find

My way to the Promised Land at long last.

My soul is stuck in the wastes of Sinai,

My faith urges me to an unexpected

Destination, my compass is retuned.

Long have I been wandering these trails,

With no end in sight. Now I hear the call,

What choice do I have but to follow it?

Behind me, all the history of the Saints

Before me, the glory of Your name.

I have tasted Your blood, eaten Your flesh,

Now I shall love You and honor your name.

Implicit faith and cold reason clouded

My view of Your vast Mysteries till now.

The flaw of Ephesus, the sin of Milton,

And all its ways, I reject utterly.

Show me the truth, wherever it may lead.

Amen

Chaos and Order in W. B. Yeats’ “The Second Coming”

William Butler Yeats poem “The Second Coming” is an emotional diatribe on the chaotic state of the world as he saw it, as part of a dystrophic whole threatening to consume civilization wholesale. This weighty subject matter is conveyed through the way he uses seemingly confused language to paint a picture of despair in the face of the modern worlds increasing propensity for self-destruction and malevolence. Every word he uses is chosen specifically to invoke this feeling of palpable desolation that the poet sees engulfing the world around him, suggesting throughout that in all likelihood things will get worse before they get better. It seems at first that there is no discernable pattern to the way the lines are formed in the poem, and the language looks disordered, but the poem is carefully constructed so as to appear without order. The lines go back and forth in length, like a roller coaster of syntax, and a close analysis reveals a startlingly regular metrical pattern that is by no means apparent at first glance. Through, his choice of words and syntax, Yeats succeeds in setting up a frantic atmosphere of anxiety and even horror in the poem using an orderly system to set up a seemingly chaotic poem.

In terms of vocabulary, every word in this poem is specifically chosen to elicit the feeling of eminent doom and gloom in the reader. Negative words are featured prominently from the beginning, when “The falcon cannot hear the falconer” (line 2) and “the centre cannot hold” (3), setting up the highly pessimistic tone of the whole poem through negation. He uses words such as ‘lack’ and ‘worst’ to set put the reader in a negative frame of mind so as to see that there is in fact little hope in the current age of the world. Yeats is able to convey his feeling thatthe present order is doomed to fail because it’s run out of steam and “lacks all conviction” (7).

When he speaks of the chaos, he calls it “mere anarchy” (4). This choice to say ‘mere’ is interesting, as the poem is generally playing up the chaos Yeats sees around him, but this one line he undermines this purpose by suggesting that anarchy is in fact not so dangerous or bad, but more a petty nuisance. Or perhaps the way he means the word is to suggest that the anarchy entering the world is pure, unadorned by any superfluous pretext of order. The fact that ‘mere’ has this double meaning adds to the complexity of this line and the whole poem, throwing the meaning of the poem subtly into question.

Yeats chooses to repeat the word ‘loosed’ in line 5, putting special emphasis on it’s meaning. This word suggests a sort of letting go, of traditional moral behavior and order, as well as the idea of an outside force worming it’s way into society to destroy it. It sets up the enemy as being simultaneously part of and not part of the world as he sees it, something that is set on from outside, but that achieves it’s victories due to the loosening of standards in the world at large.

The last line of the first stanza rings true, more than ever in light of the later events of the twentieth century, such as the rise of Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Mao, and other genocidal maniacs:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Yeats had seen the beginning of this trend in 1919 when he wrote this poem, with radicals committing acts of terrorism in Ireland to get it’s independence, as well as the horrors that permeated the recently ended Great War. The method that Britain and France were later to use to initially “combat” Hitler through appeasement, designed to keep the German dictator happy by giving into his demands. This falls neatly into the theme of Yeats poem here, as they lacked all conviction, and few human being in all history have been more full of raw passion than Hitler, and perhaps no person could be described as being worse than him. In these two lines, the poem assumes an almost prophetic nature by setting up one of the central themes of the entire twentieth century.

The second stanza begins with the beginning of the hopeful beseeching of ‘Surely’. From here on out, the poem starts to take up an apocalyptic religious symbolism, such as when he uses the Biblical word ‘surely’ followed by the even more loaded ‘revelation’, which is the common English name of the Apocalypse of St. John of Patmos, the final book in the Christian Bible which describes the end of the world with cryptic symbolism. He follows this with a reference to the Second Coming, the point where Christ returns to the world to judge the living and the dead, twice in a row. The word choice throughout is reminiscent of the bible: ‘is at hand’ (11), the use of desert imagery, “A shape with lion body and the head of a man A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun” (14) which is evocative of the biblical book of and Ezekiel, a prophetic book of the end times filled with strange chimerical creatures of supernatural origin. Yeats speaks of the Christian Era this way:

but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle

This seemed to be at first reading to be a reference to the desert beast he sees, but on further reflection, this is referring to all 2000 years of preceding history, which was defined by life and death of a Palestinian carpenter, and his use of ‘vexed to nightmare’ is a reference to many things, from the Dark Ages, to the Crusades, to the Inquisition, all in a short few lines. The birth and like of one individual in a humble manger had ramifications that affect Yeats and the whole world in the 20^th century, two millennia later, and not always in ways pleasing to Yeats.

It is then that he ends the poem on a strange note, “what rough beast, its hour come round at last,/ Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?” (21-22). This seems to be Yeats imagining of the dawn of a new, post-Christian Era, one that is in some indescribable way the horrifying repercussion of all past history, possibly even the end of all things. The phrasing is morbid, as he describes the movement towards this new birth as being ‘slouching,’ which is a sinister word, associated usually not with movement but with laziness, decay, and sitting. How can anything slouch its way anywhere, if slouch means to slump down? The visual image, of a knuckle-dragging ape shuffling towards birth, is not an encouraging view of the future.

The syntactical structure of the poem is indeed complex from beginning to end. While visually the lines appear to be of many various lengths, counting the syllables in each line reveals that most of them are ten syllables long, with a few exceptions being eleven or twelve. The first stanza in fact consists entirely of ten syllable lines, while the longer exceptions don’t occur until the middle of the second stanza when Yeats begins to speak of the strange beast he imagines slowly waking from an ancient slumber to herald a new age. It is then that he goes over his apparent line length standards in order to describe this leonine being, and then he promptly returns to his previous pattern to finish the poem.

He uses enjambment for dramatic effect, for example in lines 5-6, when he ends with “and everywhere” before proceeding on to “The ceremony of innocence is drowned,” leaving the reader to wonder what is going on everywhere until one reaches the next line. This creates engagement for the reader, as one wishes to find out what happens on the next line. This technique is as old as written poetry itself, but Yeats proves himself a master of it here.

The syntax and vocabulary of the poem were chosen carefully by Yeats to convey a particular emotional state of anguish he found himself in at the time as he surveyed the ‘Spritus Mundi’ that was just beginning to take hold. The poem seems to be a chaotic rant on first read, but in truth it is a methodical piece of work set up so as to appear to not have a pattern. The syntax is strictly kept throughout, with only a couple exceptions for emphasis in the middle. The word choice is erudite and deliberate, leading to a pleasing sounding poem, and one with various and complex meanings to be found by repeated readings and contemplation.

Andreas Capellanus and St. Paul: A Comparison of Views on Love

The Art of Courtly Love by Andreas Capellanus is a testament to his aristocratic ideals of love, which he advocates through a set of “rules” for young men to follow on a path to success. Capellanus’ views contrast sharply with the teachings of St. Paul the Apostle, as espoused most completely in his first Epistle to the Corinthians. While Capellanus sees love as a pastime to occupy the mind with longing and elaborate rhetorical flirting games, Paul describes a strong emotional connection that transcends such trivialities to encompass the totality of the union that a true bond of love creates. Admittedly, they are discussing two very different ideas, Capellanus thinking of eros, the Greek concept of sexually charged relationships; whereas Paul speaks of agape, the Greek concept of unconditional compassion that can exist between any and all beings. In the classical languages, these two concepts are divided for the purpose of not confusing shallow and complex relationships with each other, as is established by the King James Version translation of agape as “charity,” rather than love like in more modern translations. While these are different concepts, they are related, and the distinction does not even exist in the English language.

St. Paul also puts down the idea of erotic love in I Corinthians in favor of agape-based marriages built around mutuality and the controlling of sexual urges. Capellanus’ love as a diversion outside of marriage has no place within the system of morality Paul sets out in I Corinthians 7. For example the advice to simply rape peasant woman is not particularly inspired by any sort of Biblical sentiment, as expressed by either Paul or Jesus Christ himself. Ultimately, Capellanus paints a picture of a bleak and lifeless love, versus the vibrant and kind love extolled by St. Paul.

“Love is a certain inborn suffering derived from the sight of and excessive meditation upon the beauty of the opposite sex” (Andreas Capellanus, The Art of Courtly Love, p. 28). Thus Capellanus begins his treatise on the nature of love, with a definition of his subject matter. Love, in his view, is a painful set of emotions that occur when two people are physically attracted to each other. This seems to be a negative view of an entire set of human emotional experience, casting love as a kind of undesirable madness that people put themselves through purely because their bodies tell them to go forth and multiply. Everything noble that people do is a calculated gambit to make one look better for potential mates.

While Paul does say that love “suffereth long” (I Cor. 13:4), he refers to patience inspired by the emotion rather than the actual substance of what love in fact is. Paul’s conception of love is one of infinite good will, where the individual chooses to show love to others, no matter what they receive in return. Paul’s love is not limited to sexual relations, or even to one-on-one friendships, but extends to all people in all circumstances. While this love is willing to suffer through whatever the object will do, it is not the suffering that forms the substance of the love itself, but the willingness to face the suffering for the sake of the beloved. Not a selfish love, but a selfless love that seeks the good of others.

“II. He who is not jealous cannot love…XX. A man in love is always apprehensive…XXI. Real jealousy always increases the feeling of love…XXII. Jealousy, and therefore love, are increased when one suspects his beloved…XXVII. A slight presumption causes a lover to suspect his beloved” (Capellanus, p. 184). This series of “rules” make a particularly telling point in Capellanus’ opinion of the nature of love as a concept. Jealousy and suspicion is necessary to his conception of love, as the need to possess the other is that which creates the feeling he terms love. A man in love, according to Capellanus, must always be in suspicion of his beloved, and be thinking of his own position in her esteem constantly.

This differs markedly from St. Paul, who says “Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil” (I Cor. 13:4-5). These views are mutually exclusive, with Paul saying that love never makes one think ill of another, and is totally unconcerned with position in the eyes of the other. This unconditional nature of Paul’s love sets it apart from Capellanus’ mechanical and vain peacock-like system. In a Capellanus style relationship, it is a constant struggle for dominance and attention, a Darwinian free-for-all of emotions. Paul’s love does not care what the other person thinks, whether any feelings are even returned at all. It is a matter of pure caring for the other, regardless of reciprocal emotions, and is not even limited by being a romantic love. Paul’s love can be extended to all people, all things, though it clearly seems his ideals for marriage, including the “marriage debt”, are based in a similar sort of agape way of thinking.

The inclusiveness of Paul’s doctrine makes it far more useful as a philosophical goal than Capellanus’ eros, which consists almost entirely of how to obtain sexual favors. Everything Capellanus writes is obsessed with how to get someone to agree to sex, with every noble action being a mere gambit to impress the beloved. In Paul, it works the exact opposite way, going from a general will to do good to all, down to the specific love for an individual that creates the mutual bond of marriage. Two more different views on the subject cannot be imagined.

“IV. It is well known that love is always increasing or decreasing…XIII. When made public love rarely endures…XIX. If love diminishes, it quickly fails and rarely revives” (Capellanus, p. 185). Capellanus views love as a transient state that is changeable and mortal in nature. One can fall out of love as easily as falling in love, in such a system. Paul, on the other hand, says “Charity never faileth: But whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away” (I Cor 13:8). Paul’s agape love is unchangeable, immortal, and unconditional. No matter what happens around it, Paul’s style of love will fight through to survive. It is tenacious and energetic, not a limp sort of longing as extolled by Capellanus. Capellanus’ love is obsessed with position, and can easily be distracted by the next best thing over and above what had previously been the object of desire.

Capellanus even has rules stating how one should end an affair, or how long to wait between affairs, and so on and so forth. Paul’s love needs no such rules, because the nature of his love is infinite. There is no way to measure how much love there is in Paul’s system, as it neither waxes or wanes. It is a constant, something that lives on even if the object is dead. But, it is also flexible enough to embrace all things, so it is possible to love everybody, each in their unique way. Capellanus love is limited to obsession with, at most, a few individuals at a time.

Champions of fundamentally different ideas of love in the form of agape and eros, St. Paul and Capellanus are on opposite ends of the spectrum. Capellanus was a cleric, and hence technically a disciple of Paul, showing the 12^th century Frenchman to be a hypocrite ultimately. He is supposed to be following the teachings of Paul and Christ by denying himself worldly pleasures, thinking of things higher and nobler than physical reality. Instead, he decides to write a self-help book about how to get laid. Even if the book is an elaborate joke, as is quite possible given the cultural context it was composed in, the fact that he is thinking about the topic seems to be out of place with the stated philosophy of his chosen path of life. The sort of love he advocates is vain and empty, being nothing more than adolescent trysts sought out by bored aristocrats. The love Paul backs is more universal in nature, and provides a better way to live.

Odin and Loki: A Comparison of Two Tricksters

The American Heritage Dictionary defines a psychopath as “A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse.” Clearly, this is an apt description of almost every activity that the Norse god Loki participates in, always the consummate trickster figure. Odin, father of the Aesir gods and their self-proclaimed king, displays a remarkably similar pattern of behavior throughout the corpus of Norse mythology, being an equally fickle and untrustworthy being. Loki is consistently depicted in a negative light as a chaotic enemy of civilization, whereas Odin is king of the Aesir, and therefore the ruler of the natural order. While Snorri Sturluson and some of the other Christian redactors are advancing a post-pagan agenda throughout the extant corpus, the Aesir are generally depicted as the “Good Guys”, the noble warrior-sages wearing white hats and fighting the dark forces of the giants. While Odin is their leader and chief wise man, he is often as chaotic and perverted as Loki in his actions, choosing first one side in a conflict, then giving the secrets of war to their enemies solely to gain more recruits for his massive army of the dead. He hides his name, changes his shape, is constantly drunk, and in general creates a mess of things rather frequently. Loki is introduced by Snorri (p. 26, Edda) with a litany of how infamously evil he is, accusations most of which can be said to apply equally to Odin, although the redactors usually praise the exact same traits in Odin. Snorri accuses Loki of being erratic in his behavior, a trait that Odin takes equal part in. Loki causes numerous problems for the gods, but he almost always comes up with the solution himself, while Odin needs his son Thor to clean up his messes with his straightforward approach to problems. Loki and Odin, while ostensibly diametric opposites, are in fact practically the same as beings of elemental chaos with little to no concern for anyone except for their close kin.

In “Gylfaginning”, Snorri sets the lens through which both Odin and Loki are to be viewed throughout the rest of the mythology. Odin is presented to Gylfi as an omnipotent force to be worshipped above all others, while Loki is shown as a chaotic and evil being contrary to all life. This can be viewed with a little skepticism as Gylfi is getting this story from Odin in three of his guises, leading to a slight bias towards the Aesir. Snorri is trying to demonstrate the falsity of the old pagan religion, but it is also possible that he is subtly drawing parallels between the king of the Aesir and the most vile of demonic Giants, to further re-enforce the superiority of his own Catholic religion. Every charge that he lays at Loki’s feet is in some way applicable to Odin. Even the spawning of weird monsters on a Giantess is not thoroughly un-Odinic in nature. Odin spawns both Vidar and Vali solely for vengeance, a monstrous activity if there ever was one. Thor’s mother is also possibly a Giantess, and from a Giantish perspective, nothing could be more monstrous than the murderous thunderer himself. As for the other charges, namely being capricious and cunning troublemaker, these traits are manifestly part of Odin’s personality as well. Loki is shown to be a resourceful problem solver, rescuing Idunn from Thiassi, procuring many useful artifacts from the dwarfs in recompense for his pranks, and aiding Thor on several of his journeys. In fact, the only bit of mischief that Loki doesn’t help to amend is that of Baldur’s death, which the text credits him with making final beyond all repairs. Odin, on the other hand, often creates problems that need an outside force, namely his son Thor, to come in and fix due to his daring exploits in the quest to obtain all knowledge. Odin is credited with the creation of the cosmos through the murder of his maternal grandfather, Ymir. But again, Snorri is telling us this isn’t really so and that this revelation to Gylfi all a trick being pulled on the gullible Swede, which puts Odin even lower than Loki in a moral context as Loki never claims powers of Cosmogenesis. Without the moral superiority of being the creative force of the universe, which Snorri undermines every chance he gets, Loki is no worse than Odin, who is recast as simply a tribal chieftain possessed of especial aggression and violence against his neighbors.

The ever-fickle Odin is accused by Loki of giving what he “shouldn’t have given, victory, to the faint-hearted” (Poetic Edda, p. 88). Odin doesn’t even bother responding with a defense of his choices in favor, but counters by recalling Loki’s act of ‘ergi’. This is a broad range of interlinked negative concepts in Norse culture, constituting deceitfulness, treachery, witchcraft, and worst of all the ultimate humiliation within medieval Icelandic society, being the passive partner in a homosexual act. Odin’s lack of effective counter-argument suggests that Loki is in fact right, and Odin gives victory to those who don’t deserve it because it suits some other ends of his, generally the procuring of the best of warriors for his einherjar army in preparation for Ragnarok, as shown in Eiriksmal in dialogue between Odin and Sigmund over why he robbed Eirik Blood-Axe of victory despite his worth in battle. The story of the Langobards, although not technically part of the Scandinavian corpus, points to an inconstant and changeable nature for Odin, as he is arbitrarily convinced of the worthiness of the Langobards to win because their women show up with their hair in front of their faces. There’s not exactly a strong case against Loki’s accusations of underhanded dealings with his followers.

Being a pervert, in the Icelandic concept of ‘ergi’, is a crime that Loki is most definitely guilty of, having given birth to Sleipner after having changed shape into a mare and engaging in intercourse with the stallion Svadilfari (Edda, p. 36-36). This is the ultimate act of ergi, but Odin is guilty of ergi on numerous occasions himself. He constantly lies about his true identity, a sneaky and cowardly thing to do by Norse moral standards, and part of the broader implications of ergi. His complete mastery of the magical arts of seidr manifest a deep and constant state of ergi, a charge which Loki makes directly to Odin in “Loki’s Quarrel” after Odin accuses him of another gender-bending childbearing experience on top of that of Sleipner:

‘But you once practiced seid on Samesey,

and you beat on the drum as witches do,

in the likeness of a wizard you journeyed among mankind

and that I thought the hallmark of a pervert.

This leaves Odin speechless, and he lets off to let the other Aesir have their turn arguing with Loki. Thus Loki beats Odin in a contest of words, the domain over which Odin had obtained mastery, the only such case I can find in the texts. Odin can’t honestly say that Loki is wrong in his accusations, and he also can’t defend his actions as being anything other than they are, blatant acts of ergi. Both Loki and Odin are depicted as perverted practitioners of unnatural magic. Since they are both blatantly guilty, the question of why Odin let Loki win the exchange arises. Since they are both guilty of ergi, why is it that Loki is allowed to keep on going, while Odin sits down with his tail between his legs? The answer is that what Odin did was even worse than Loki. Loki gave birth to Sleipner, and apparently three other children never named, which seems to be as bad as it gets. But Loki’s accusations are worse in that he can’t narrow it down to one or even two examples. The actions of ergi he accuses Odin of actually are consistent behavioral patterns that Odin never wavers from. He is always practicing seidr, like witches do, and he is always wandering among mankind in disguise as a wizardly figure. Brave and virtuous warriors fall in battle all the time due to Odin’s treacherous nature. He is just as guilty of being a beguiling Trickster as is his archenemy Loki, if not far more guilty.

Though they are set up as polar opposites on the moral plane of Nordic myth, Loki and Odin are essentially equivalent in terms of their deeds as agents in the world. Both are users of perverted magic, which requires them to take on female roles contrary to the masculine ethos of Norse society. Both play tricks on people of the very cruelest kinds imaginable, leading to the death of many, and in Odin’s case to the creation of a vast army of the dead. The image in the Edda of Loki and Odin staring each other down from their high halls after the murder of Baldur does not depict two diametrically opposed figures representing good and evil, or order and chaos. They both are looking into a mirror, showing that they are both essentially the same, power-hungry and chaotic beings out to get the best possible advantage from every situation without regard for others, the dictionary definition of psychopaths.

David and Saul, the Anointed of God

Both Saul and David faced a serious problem in consolidating their power over the disparate tribes of Israel. At first, not all the people were willing to accept Saul’s leadership just because Samuel anointed him. David, however, faced the problem of not being the legitimate heir to the dynasty, being an ambitious war hero not related to the previous king except through a childless marriage. It took time and effort to establish their hegemony over the disparate tribes of Israel. The passages found in I Samuel 11 and II Samuel 2 show the first acts of both men as kings, though in David’s case over Judah specifically rather than the whole tribal confederation. The problems they face in their early years of kingship are on one level the same: Saul faces a series of existential threats to the people of Israel, in the form of Ammonites, Philistines, and other ornery neighbors he has to fight off. David has to fight the same enemies, but he defeats them once and for all. On top of the external threat, David had to establish his rule over Israel itself through a protracted civil war, making his rise to power bumpier than Saul, who had no competition for the newly established throne. David’s greatness lies in his ability to manipulate the public, as seen in II Samuel 2 by his high praise for Jabesh-gilead’s heroic kindness in saving Saul’s body from the stakes the Philistines had stuck it on. He gives all the appearance, sincere or not, of grieving for the death of his predecessor, which he does whenever possible. Saul, on the other hand, is not so great in public, and given to bouts of paranoia. His only real advantage is being really tall compared to the average man. These chapters demonstrate the character of these two different men, through their actions and the reaction of Israel.

At the time of the Ammonite threat to the city of Jabesh-gilead, Saul does not wield true monarchial power as seen in 1 Samuel 10:27a, where “some worthless fellows” refuse to accept him as king. When he gathers the armies of Israel to fight Nahash, he does so in the same way a Judge from earlier times would, through the explicit threat of death to those who dare to break the treaty of tribal confederation. Indeed, his actions in cutting up the yoke of oxen are reminiscent of the Levite chopping up his concubine and calling for the destruction of the Benjaminite town of Gibeah, Saul’s own hometown interestingly enough, for its crimes in Judges 19. Saul at this moment isn’t leader because of Samuel anointing him in the name of the Lord, but because he is the man willing to call on the house of Israel to fight against an offense to tribal honor. He is a traditional warlord, rather than a divinely appointed king. Only after his spectacular victory over the Ammonites do the people say to him, “Who is it that said, ‘Shall Saul reign over us?’ Give them to us so that we may put them to death” (1 Samuel 11.12). Saul magnanimously overrides this death sentence, but the point is that now he has the authority to say who lives or dies. Only after demonstrating his worth to the people is he really the king of Israel. The ‘renewal’ of the kingship at Gilgal is not really a re-pledging of allegiance to Saul, but the first moment in which he is actually made king. Now, instead of tribal confederacy, it is the power of monarchy that protects Israel from threats external and internal. From this point forward, whenever the enemies of Israel come together, it is Saul or his successors who lead the army into battle.

When David first assumes power, he does so only after having consulted the Lord as to whether it’s the right course of action, as is right in the eyes of the Deuteronomist. His actual assumption of power, however, amounts to essentially an opportunistic military power-grab backed up by his extended kin group. Of the whole nation of Israel, only David’s own tribe supports his bid for the throne. The sons of Zeruiah, David’s sister, are instrumental in fighting the war against Saul’s house, and his power is initially based in the significantly large army he had gathered in his exile as a mercenary warlord. David also has a serious case of Thomas Becket Syndrome, especially with his nephew Joab. People who get in David’s way die, and then he gets very upset and punishes whoever did the killing, except for Joab, who gets away with it all the time. This chapter in particular shows Joab in his role of violent aggression, pursuing and fighting Abner from Gibeon to Ammah. It is significant that David does not take part in this battle himself. His nephew prosecutes the really messy civil war, while David stays out of the picture. David is the great warrior and general, yet he isn’t leading his men at the decisive crisis. David can’t lead his army in civil war in the Deuteronomist’s worldview, because that would look like the perfect servant of God fighting against Israel, the chosen people of God. Surely David would never do such a thing! Though instances of David doing wrong make it into the text, such as Bathsheba, David never fights against Israel, despite being a mercenary in the hire of the Philistine lords and being the center of two major civil wars over the course of his reign. David gets all the credit for victory over the Philistines, or over Ammon, but when a civil war breaks out, suddenly Joab is the one responsible for all the violence and murder. He is responsible for the convenient death of a huge number of David’s political and personal enemies, from Abner to Uriah. Abner himself is a kinsman of Saul, further highlighting the tribal nature of the conflict. The twelve youths at the pool of Gibeon represent Judah and Benjamin, not Judah and Israel. This is painted not as a lone tribe against all of Israel, but as two tribes fighting for the respect of the rest.

Strangely, his first action as king over Judah is to commend the city of Jabesh-gilead, far to the north, out of his realm of his influence in Judah, for their kindness to in burying Saul and Jonathan. This links the rise of David directly with the rise of Saul, and demonstrates the ways in which the Deuteronomistic History keeps track of places and events, weaving together different strands to create a whole. Jabesh-gilead is only mentioned in three episodes: as the town that sent no soldiers to fight the Benjaminites at Gibeah in Judges, as the town that Saul saves, and as the town that heroically saves Saul’s body under cover of darkness. These three episodes are importantly linked, as Gibeah is also the hometown of Saul, and the other episodes directly involve Saul. Saul’s kingship rested firmly on his actions in saving Jabesh-gilead from the Ammonites, and David begins his kingship by showering the same city with honor for their actions in saving Saul’s remains. This public relations move is so typical of David, always the consummate politician. Jabesh-gilead, as the notes to the text say, is one of Saul’s primary enclaves of support, due to his pivotal role in saving them from the Ammonites. His ultimate goal is to be king over all of Israel, so he needs to make those who loved Saul love him as well. He promises the loyal followers of Saul reward for their loyalty to their king, even as he tries to overthrow the legitimate son of Saul. This double-speak is the modus operandi of David throughout his reign, speaking sorrow and sympathy for his enemies who have an unfortunate habit of dying.

The link between Jabesh-gilead and Saul is also reflected in the Judges passage, which some scholars think was a propagandistic addition to denigrate Saul and his dynasty. The important role Jabesh-gilead plays in the episode, as the one town that doesn’t send men to fight against the tribe of Benjamin, is probably an integral component of the message the author of that tale was trying to get across to his ancient Israelite audience. One possibility is that is a cautionary tale told to Saul loyalists, demonstrating the fate of those who defy the will of the Lord. Not accepting David as king due to Saul’s serious blunders is as bad as not purging gang rapists from the house of Israel.

What do these two passages tell us about the Deuteronomistic History as a whole? Even though many sources, often contradictory, were used, the redactors managed to construct a complex, interweaved narrative that carries characters, events, places, and themes throughout. We learn that Saul and David are very different sorts of men, yet face the same essential problems in trying to rule a chaotic, disobedient people like the Israelites. Tribal concerns can be more important than taking the long view, such as the loyalty the tribes of Judah and Benjamin show to their respective sides during the civil war between David and Ishbaal. These chapters also encapsulate the cyclical nature of the Deuteronomistic History, as the problems of unity and leadership David and Saul face are the same ones faced by the Judges and kings throughout the pre-exilic history of Israel.

"On the New Year: Or, The Earth Abides Forever"

Another year rolls down the calender
The world marches to the same old drumbeat
I found out this week that my cousins kid is
Monomaniacal about Bionicles
Which is fun to say, but I don't grok it
Just as when my cousin did not believe
Children my age watched a TV show called
"Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"
One generation follows another
Babel isolating by division
When the boy comes of age, and my children
Play their innocent games, explaining how
Heroes defeat villains, good trumps evil,
And everyone sits down to drink some tea
in Valhalla after a hard days fight
He shall look on, bemused, not "getting it"
Just as now my brows furrow when he
Talks about robot champions of his youth

The Destrucive Locomotive, part I

“Sestina dé Slacker” by Sam Urfer

I

I think I’ll talk about boredom
While I sit here in my privacy
Leaning back as I move my pen
Over the plain notebook paper
Seeking to attain a sense of ease
As I ponder what to write

II

It is no small matter to write
It does not always come with ease
Sometimes I just sit there and look at the paper
Hesitating to lift my pen
Afraid to put an end to my boredom
And break my wall of privacy

III

All I have is my privacy
Where I can be myself at ease
Alone with my blank white paper
Trying to fill it with my pen
Seeking inspiration to write
Through my great Muse, Lady Boredom

IV

What can I say about Boredom?
Without her prompt, why ever write?
She stirs in my heart's privacy
When she speaks, she makes a prison of ease.
So I get up and take my pen
Seeking release in this paper

V

It taunts me, this piece of paper
As I sit here and try to write
Distracted in my idle ease
Seeking relief for my boredom
In my foolish, accursed privacy!
Be Thou my Salvation, O Pen!

VI

This sly traitor, my false friend “Pen”
Leads me to this attempt to write
Despair grips me in my boredom
Steals from me any sense of ease
Oh, how I hate my privacy
My only companion this dead paper!

VII

Still, here I put pen to paper,
Out of boredom set out to write,
Seeking ease in my privacy.