The Song Of Songs

***FLIPPANCY WARNING - DON'T READ THIS UNLESS YOU ALREADY KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT.***

I’m at a complete loss about this one.

Some say it’s meant as an allegorical picture of God’s relationship with Israel, however since it doesn’t claim this about itself, that seems to require rather a lot of work on the part of the reader.

Others say that it’s an allegorical picture of the relationship between Christ and the individual believer, but again, IMHO someone trying to write about that just would never have come out with this. Like my misgivings about the first chapter of Genesis being an allegory, if that had really been the case, then surely the author would have said so.

And then there’s the theory that it’s just a literal poem about love between a man and a woman, or maybe how love between a man and a woman is meant to be. But again this doesn’t work for me. These two only seem to see each other’s physical characteristics, and not look at each other’s heart much. Even the narrative makes little sense, with the fourth song seeing the man knocking at the woman’s door and then apparently losing interest and just leaving. The woman then goes searching for him, even though she says she knows where he is.

I’m sorry, I don’t wish to offend anyone, but this is like reading Hollywood. The story makes little sense, the “love” is skin-deep and this is exactly the sort of relationship that everyone, including the church, tells me doesn’t really exist, and rarely lasts.

Surely that can’t be the love that God has for anyone.

Old buddy Nigel, beginning his graduation speech at the Catholic Discipleship College in Takapuna today, after a 9-month course in Sacred Studies.

The PERFECT HAMBURGER by Alexander McCall Smith

This is one of those joyous books that I never want to grow out of.

The simple pleasure of reading about a young boy’s friendship with an old man who no-one wants to see any more.

Mr Borthwick’s hamburger shop is going out of business, thanks to a smart new Krustyburger, sorry, Hamburger House chain that’s opened up in town. Against impossible odds, Joe and Mr Borthwick must somehow turn public opinion around and make their ancient old-fashioned burgers popular again.

Along the way they meet a whole chain of people who each help in their own little way, including a chef called the Great Casarolli.

I could go on, but if that hasn’t piqued your interest, then it's probably not your sort of book.

The Perfect Hamburger delivers exactly what it promises.

Ecclesiastes

I guess we all know a moaner.

One of those people who has an infallibly negative outlook on everything, and is forever thinking the future through to disastrously doom-laden certainties.

Heck, some of us even write Doctor Who reviews.

Ecclesiastes has been baffling Bible-readers for millennia. “Why the heck was this included?” Oh, we can positively think around it and come up with a few reasons though. Like:

1. To prove that God understands our deep yearning to understand him.

2. To show that that way lies madness.

3. No, maybe we were right before.

If twelve chapters of one man’s depression about the futility of life is supposed to teach me something, it does rather propose the question of how much of it is to be taken as literal teaching.

A young man who is poor and wise is better off than an old, foolish king who won’t take advice any longer. - Ecclesiastes 4:13 GW

Yeah, yeah that sounds like teaching.

Don’t be too virtuous, and don’t be too wise. Why make yourself miserable? - Ecclesiastes 7:16

Erm…

Well, it’s all in context, isn’t it? This is the account of one man’s journey trying to make sense out of everything. You can’t just read it and blindly take it as teaching from God. It’s all within the author's quote-marks.

But then, the epistles are all within their authors' quote-marks too. They’re simply true accounts of what those writers happened to believe about God. Calling it “God’s word” is a bit of an exaggeration. If not that, then certainly an assumption of the writers’ intent.

And the gospels, they’re just honest accounts of what four people genuinely said had happened. Heck, and whenever a crowd of people speak in the Bible, they hardly all chanted those words together in unison, panto-style. Those words are just a representation of the general things they were saying, surely. The crowds must have been paraphrased.

Even Jesus speaks in different styles, using different words, depending upon who is recalling the occasion. Those are therefore surely not the actual words he used. (brilliant sermons though – so short.)

Ultimately, I have to wonder if one day, in Heaven, quoting the Bible to God would really be a wise thing. I can easily see him cutting me off with “Hey - I didn’t write that, you people did.” He might even call the original human author as a witness to this. Paul might stand there and howl “I never ever intended my letters to be published out of context and misused like that. What would you say if, after your death, I went around claiming your blog was the holy unchanging infallible word of God? That’s not what you intended either.”

I guess what I’m saying is that I’ve always known that I have no good reason for believing the Bible. My one and only reason is because everyone else says so, which is an utterly rubbish reason. Surely we believe it to be God’s word because, hungry for any words at all from him, we clutch onto manuscripts that have lasted through the ages enough to have taken on a mysteriousness, that they would never have had on day one.

Don’t get me wrong – I still believe the Bible and base my whole life on it, for better or for worse. If I were wrong, and only 90% of it were right, that would still be a good average to have died following though. All I can do is accept that I don’t understand, seek truth, and live my life as best I can following God, and trust that it will all be okay when I do die.

So there you go – in this post I’ve honestly voiced something about my faith that I can’t make sense of, and concluded that I should just get my head down, do my best and trust God.

I think that’s what the author of Ecclesiastes was saying to do...

Me And My Shadow

Ho-ho, the shadow knows...

The Book Of Ruth, chapters 3 and 4

Thanks as always to Melissa, Dave and Melwyn, but particularly Brett for the loan of his sandal!

Click here for Ruth chapter 1.
Click here for Ruth chapter 2.

The Bruce Murray Singers present “Listen to the Music”

I have to admit that when I first read this musical performance's tag-line “The best from the swinging 60’s to the legendary 90’s”, I had to wonder just what music there had been in the 90’s that had been legendary. I need not have worried however – numbers like Colours Of The Wind and Phantom Of The Opera easily proved me wrong.

Heck, tonight put me in such a good mood that I’m even willing to count the ’91 remix of Bohemian Rhapsody. And these guys’n’gals knew exactly how to treat such a modern-day classic – dead straight.

This joyous evening absolutely flew by, covering as it did a colossal range in barely two short hours. Pop, opera, gospel, even parody was covered as we got to hear one of the fab four crooning away at the end of his career…


Finishing up with an ABBA medley proved beyond any doubt that 35 years of putting these things on had honed a real understanding of how to do it well.

I’d recommend The Bruce Murray Singers – and The Eno Sisters – to anyone.


Link: www.brucemurraysingers.org.nz

Long In The Tooth

In March 2004, I bought a tube of toothpaste.

Today I bought another one, at reduction.

In nearly four years, these have been the only two tubes of toothpaste that I have actually had to pay for in New Zealand.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – Radio Series

What happens when one of your favourite books, by one of your favourite authors, gets adapted for radio by one of your favourite producers?

Something very special – you go in with high hopes, that actually get met.

Producer Dirk Maggs has certainly taken a few liberties with the original novel of Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency… but then he’s entitled to. In fact, I rather hoped that the man who adapted the last three Hitchhiker novels so lovingly, by changing so little and magnifying so much, would give us quite a lot of new Dirk Gently material, and I wasn’t disappointed.

Despite its mixed-up chronology, Maggs’ script comes out much clearer than the original book, although he does sometimes imply things so briefly that it’s easy to miss them. The final episode wraps everything up so casually that it rather robs the moment of feeling like a proper accomplishment. It also didn’t quite make sense to me – being one of those annoying time-paradoxes – but the accomplishments elsewhere were such that I didn’t mind.

Harry Enfield plays the title character rather pleasantly. In the books, Gently always came across to me as quite a clever man but with an apathetically bleak life. Enfield keeps the cleverness, but also gives him quite a cheery outlook, making him someone you’d almost aspire to.

The change I did have a problem with though was relating the actions of Gordon Wey’s ghost by giving Gently a definite psychic ability. In the book, as I recall, this was only hinted at, and it’s a shame that here he didn’t use that great intellect of his to work out what Gordon was saying, in much the same way that Gently’s secretary did. After all, Gently’s great appeal is surely that he has no super-powers at all, enabling any one of us to achieve the impossible things that he does.

Great stuff. More please.


Review of second series here.

The Book Of Ruth, chapter 2 of 4

Thanks to Melwyn, Brett, Melissa and Dave.

Click here for Ruth chapter 1.
Click here for Ruth chapter 2.
Click here for Ruth chapters 3 and 4.

Ooh.

Last Saturday night I went outdoors to go to the laundry-room, and in the pitch-darkness I managed to smash my shin right into our new neighbour’s wooden bench. I do this very rarely – I swore.

The following day I sat down in flatmate Dave’s new rocking-chair, leant back and it went right over, tipping me out onto my head.

Later that evening, after doing some filming with flatmate Cathy, I accidentally knocked the rocking-chair into Dave’s halogen light on the coffee-table, smashing the lamp to smithereens.

The next day, outside Westfield shopping centre in Manukau, I was walking along when I actually managed to smack my forehead into a low-hanging tree-branch.

Late the following night, at the end of the latest Cession / Creative meeting, just as I was about to quietly tip-toe out into the night, I picked up the large wooden board that I’d been sitting with my back against, and managed to drop it straight onto the bare wooden floor, in such a way that it deafeningly bounced several times across the room, and brought their concerned bleary-eyed flatmate out from his bedroom.

This morning I got into work and was completely unable to turn the key in the lock. I turned and turned so hard that I wound up physically twisting it. After my boss had later arrived, he tried putting my key in and it opened first time.

As Moby would say, I’m rubbish.

I'm No John Dorian Either

Last night I dreamt that I was friends with Zack Braff's identical twin brother.

The Book Of Proverbs

One of my favourite Bible books as a kid was Proverbs.

It’s not hard to figure out why. Most of it appears fairly up-front and easy to ‘get.’

Reading it over the past month, I found that I had to take it all in a completely different way to the rest of the Bible. With this one I found that I was reading each verse separately, and pausing afterwards to let it sink in. Not a conscious decision, just the result of encountering so many apparently unconnected ideas one after the other like that.

Most of the time I read my Good News Bible, mainly because it’s small and easy to carry about with me, but occasionally, when I have the chance, I dip into any other translation that’s easily to hand, and often it’s like reading a completely different book.

Proverbs 10:10:

(GOOD NEWS TRANSLATION)
Someone who holds back the truth causes trouble, but one who openly criticizes works for peace.

(NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION)
He who winks maliciously causes grief, and a chattering fool comes to ruin.

Often some sort of parallel meaning can be found however, but it’s always fun to suddenly dive into the modern Message version…

Proverbs 25:16:

(NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE)
Have you found honey? Eat only what you need,
That you not have it in excess and vomit it.

(THE MESSAGE)
When you're given a box of candy, don't gulp it all down;
eat too much chocolate and you'll make yourself sick;

Top marks though, whatever the translation, have to go to the whole of chapter 30. The reason I’ve been reading this book is because there’s tons of the Bible that I’ve never touched, so I’m currently working my way through reading all the books that I know I’ve never read completely. When I got to it, Proverbs chapter 30 was completely new to me and, I have to say, utterly fascinating…

(NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION)
15 "The leech has two daughters.
'Give! Give!' they cry.
"There are three things that are never satisfied,
four that never say, 'Enough!':

16 the grave, the barren womb,
land, which is never satisfied with water,
and fire, which never says, 'Enough!'

17 "The eye that mocks a father,
that scorns obedience to a mother,
will be pecked out by the ravens of the valley,
will be eaten by the vultures.

18 "There are three things that are too amazing for me,
four that I do not understand:

19 the way of an eagle in the sky,
the way of a snake on a rock,
the way of a ship on the high seas,
and the way of a man with a maiden.

20 "This is the way of an adulteress:
She eats and wipes her mouth
and says, 'I've done nothing wrong.'

Or as The Message version puts it:

15-16 A leech has twin daughters
named "Gimme" and "Gimme more."

Three things are never satisfied,
no, there are four that never say, "That's enough, thank you!"—
hell,
a barren womb,
a parched land,
a forest fire.

17 An eye that disdains a father
and despises a mother— that eye will be plucked out by wild vultures
and consumed by young eagles.

18-19 Three things amaze me,
no, four things I'll never understand—
how an eagle flies so high in the sky,
how a snake glides over a rock,
how a ship navigates the ocean,
why adolescents act the way they do.

20 Here's how a prostitute operates:
she has sex with her client, Takes a bath,
then asks, "Who's next?"

Manukau… What’s It Called? Manukau… Once Again! Manukau!!!

Have you ever walked into a room in slow-motion?

Y’know – like in movies? When the lead character is overcome with realization, or revisits a place of deep emotional significance many years after the event? The thing is that everyone else around them moves in slow-motion too, so you know that it’s just a cinematic thing – the character wasn’t actually walking very slowly into a room full of people, everything just seemed that way to him. Well, this afternoon I did exactly that.

I went to Manukau intending to get my hair cut. (a goal I didn't achieve) I got off the bus (where, last April, I’d met Nigel on our trip down to Palmy), walked into the shopping centre, and… looked around me, and… just… slooooowwweedd - ddoowwwnnnn…

I had been here once before. Nearly four years ago. After a coffee-shop, this was the very first place I had come to when I first arrived in New Zealand on the morning of February 28th 2004.

Back then, to me, this had just been any old generic shopping-centre, and words like “Westfield” had meant nothing to me, so I hadn’t remembered them.

There had been other culture-shocks that day too. I don’t think I’ll ever forget approaching one of the fast food stands there, asking for a glass of milk, and having to tackle the sales assistant’s disturbing question “Blue or green?”

I’m pretty sure I'd answered “Well, blue. That doesn’t sound as bad as green.”

Today I had no idea which of these stands that had been, but I did clearly remember the mall’s basic layout, enough to locate where I’d likely changed money, ironically had my hair cut, and spent 20 minutes in the toilet with a sudden nosebleed. (brought on by the flight, I guess) And the supermarket where I’d then bought tissues, remembered my budgie Ford, and failed to find sunscreen for our two cats. Today I ascertained that it had been called “Food Town.”

I’d been very tired that first morning – I’d only had maybe four hours of proper sleep, and that had been before the exhausting 24-hour flight that I was still on my own auto-pilot from.

That cup of coffee took a long time to sink in though - nearly four years, and only today was this place finally seeming to slow-down for me...

:)

The Book Of Ruth, chapter 1 of 4

Bible reading we did at Cession tonight. Though the voice is mine, I think the slides were masterminded by Brett, Melissa, Dave and Reuben. If this list is wrong, please tell me and I'll be pleased to amend it! :)

Click here for Ruth chapter 1.
Click here for Ruth chapter 2.
Click here for Ruth chapters 3 and 4.