Tag: Israel

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A Pete Morton song for our times: Two Brothers

Pete Morton is absolutely one of my favorite folk singers of all time.  While I love his voice and his simple guitar playing, the real beauty of his music is in his message and the way he crafts the words and images.

He is English, lives in London, and performs mostly in England, Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany.  Occasionally, he will drift over to the States and play at The Focal Point here is St. Louis. If there were any sanity in the music business he would be better known that he is. Of course, folk music is a style that drifts in and out of popularity… but not with me.

Given that the situation in this world and this country seems to be degenerating more and more quickly,  I think what the world needs is Pete’s message in his song, Two Brothers, to be taken to heart.

Sometimes the greed, the lust for power, the lust for money, the absolute self-centeredness of so many folks, the need to impose your beliefs, your religion, your values on others, even against their will, just overwhelms me.  It is more than I can bear at times, and there really is no place to run. There is no alien inter-galactic ark coming to carry us safely to the proverbial mountain top.

Below is Pete Morton’s song Two Brothers. Enjoy, maybe even meditate on the message.

And so I wish it would go.

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Bill Maher On Current Middle East Crisis

I used to be a bit of a Bill Maher fan, but not so for the last several years.  I now find him to be a self-righteous pendejo, and thus hard to watch.  However, the video below was embedded in an article  that appeared in the online version of the St. Louis Jewish Light: ‘Where do you think Israel is going?’ Bill Maher quips in viral eight-minute clip.

Maher makes a lot a sense to me in his segment.  At some point you just have to move on.  Of course, it took me a few years to stop lamenting about some of the fallout from my divorce, but you just do it. Sometimes you just need to let go.

Given that this is Bill Maher, the language is reasonably clean.

If you want a good quick review of the current history of Israel and The Occupied Territories, I discussed a recently published book by Daniel Skotach at this link: Can We Talk About Israel?

And is almost always the case, there are two sides to the story, if not more.  I discussed a 2005 Arabic language movie about the recruitment of two young West Bankers to be suicide bombers here: Paradise Now | Revisited

While not Jewish myself, my wife is, so much of this strikes close to home. Especially so as our October trip to Israel – a lifetime dream of my spouse – was cancelled abruptly.

And so it goes in this absurdity we call life.

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Can We Talk About Israel? by Daniel Sokatch

Why I Read This Book

This book, Can We Talk About Israel?, is subtitled, A Guide for the Curious, Confused and Conflicted, which is a good summary of most folks position and feelings about Israel.  We received two copies of this book as part of the pre-tour preparation of our now cancelled two week visit to Israel with side trips to Jordan and Egypt. What is it they say?  Timing is everything.  Also as part of that preparation Señora and I watched two Wondrium courses that I can whole-heartedly recommend:

    • The World of Biblical Israel taught by a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, Cynthia R. Chapman, Th.D. Using the Bible as a framework Chapman ties in historical and archeological records to support its narrative.  She also points out when they do not support the Biblical story.  She also ties together the varied religious influences, including non-Abrahamic religions, that influenced those who wrote the Bible. I learned a great deal about the Babylonian exile of the Jews, a subject of which I had only sketchy knowledge.
    • The Holy Land Revealed taught by Jodi Magness, Ph.D. Using mainly the Bible and the works of the Roman historian Josephus as source materials,  Magness explores various archeological sites around the Holy Land and their significance to the Biblical narrative.

Not a Book Review

This is not so much a review of this recently published book, but more of a recommendation of something to read if you are indeed curious, confused or conflicted about Israel. Sokatch has a very accessible Continue reading “Can We Talk About Israel? by Daniel Sokatch”

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And Another Thing I Do Not Understand

And another thing I do not understand is this.  Why do Evangelicals always quote scripture to you like that is the final authority on everything?  Obviously, if you are a non-believer, that is a logical argument of the dog chasing his own tail variety.

This branch of religion (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) has it roots in nomads who could not figure out for 40 years how to cross the Sinai Desert to get from Egypt to Israel.  The distance is less than 500 kilometers.  The piece de resistance is that while they wandered for 40 years in this barren place, food rained down from the heavens upon them.  I can think of many places today that this would be a blessing indeed.  I’ve yet to see it though.

Once they finally figured where  the heck Israel was, they went on a genocidal tear to take the land from the inhabitants that were already there.

Then we get into Jesus, a religious figure with no historical record.  It just seems improbably to me that a personage of this import would not put at least a minor verifiable page into history.   All we really have is mythology.  This puts him in the same company as Zeus, Thor, and Shiva.

Put that hound on a trail that I can see, feel, smell or otherwise sense, then get back to me.

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