Friday 10 February 2023

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"If we demand perfection or nothing, we will have nothing." — Francis Schaeffer

Friday 18 November 2022

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"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly." — #FranzKafka

Sunday 1 May 2022

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"Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at something that doesn't really matter." — D. L. Moody

Friday 28 January 2022

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"History shows that when religion and politics get in bed together, violence is their love child." — Bruxy Cavey, The End of Religion: Encountering the Subversive Spirituality of Jesus. 

Friday 26 March 2021

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 "[A] man's reach should exceed his grasp, [o]r what's a heaven for?" — Robert Browning 

Tuesday 12 January 2021

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"That is what life is: a chain reaction of individuals colliding with others and influencing their lives without realizing it. A decision that seems minuscule to you, may be monumental to the fate of the world." -- J. D. Stroube

Saturday 8 August 2020

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"Live by the harmless untruths that make you brave and kind and healthy and happy." — Kurt Vonnegut 

Friday 27 March 2020

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"We human beings are vulnerable to many kinds of affliction and most of us are at some time afflicted by serious ills. How we cope is only in small part up to us. It is most often to others that we owe our survival, let alone our flourishing, as we encounter bodily illness and injury, inadequate nutrition, mental defect and disturbance, and human aggression and neglect. This dependence on particular others for protection and sustenance is most obvious in early childhood and in old age. But between these first and last stages our lives are characteristically marked by longer or shorter periods of injury, illness or other disablement, and some among us are disabled for their entire lives." -- Alasdair MacIntyre

Monday 23 March 2020

Spesieïsme

Ek het sopas 'n erg ontstelde video gekyk van die Wuhan-vleismark waar party reken die oorsprong van die huidige Korona-virus is. Die video wys allerhande diere, van katte en honde tot slange, rotte en vlermuise, asook die bekende "kos" soos varke, in hokke of opgekap op slagtersblokke.

Terwyl 'n mens die makabere beelde aanskou is daar 'n groot versoeking om te dink ons is minder barbaars as dié Sjinese wat honde en rotte eet. Omdat dié "kosse" só volksvreemd is maak dit ons blind vir ons eie barbaarse slagting van bekende "kosse", die miljarde hoenders en beeste, die kalwers en lammers watse braaivleisgeure ons monde laat water. Nee, net omdat jy nie hond eet nie, maak dit jou nie 'n beter mens nie.

Jy eet steeds die vlees van 'n ander lewende wese, en jou verlustiging aan daardie hoenderboudjie of skaap tjoppie, varkribbetjie of T-bone steak is eties dieselfde as dié van 'n kat- en honde-eter. 'n Vark ervaar dieselfde vrees en pyn in die slagpale as wat jou skoothondjie sou ervaar. Laat ons nie diere-rassiste wees en maak of die lewe van een tipe dier meer waarde het as dié van 'n ander tipe dier nie; dat 'n hoender "behoort" geëet te word, maar 'n olifant te edel is, dat 'n skaap is kos, maar 'n hond is familie.

Konfronteer jouself met die waarheid van jou medepligtigheid aan die lyding en moord van lewende wesens. Ons moorddade het te verwyderd geraak, ver weg agter die hoë mure van die slagpale, en mooi verpak agter die blink vensters van slaghuis en supermark. Dit is omdat die bloed van ons prooi nie meer aan ons eie hande sit nie, dat ons vergeet het hoe aandadig ons is, en hoe die skarlaken van alle onskuldige diere aan ons vingers en monde kleef.

Thursday 5 March 2020

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"Spirit animates matter; matter expresses spirit. This synergy is the soul." 

Tuesday 23 July 2019

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“To make injustice the only measure of our attention is to praise the devil.” – Jack Gilbert

Thursday 6 June 2019

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If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?

The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956 (1973) by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is

'n Waardeuring van "Christ in the House of His Parents"

Onlangs het ek 'n arikel gelees oor rooikoppe in kuns. In die artikel word verskeie skilderye gewys met rooikoppe -- een daarvan is hierdie sklidery deur John Everett Millais, getiteld "Christ in the House of His Parents" (circa 1850). Met nadere kyk kon ek nie help om daardeur beindruk te wees nie. Die simboliek en intertekstuele verwysings is besonders en die tegniese vaardigheid van die werk is eenvoudig lieflik.

John Everett Millais' "Christ in the House of His Parents"
Die skildery wys 'n jong Jesus in sy pa Josef se houtwerk-werkswinkel. Hy het klaarblyklik sy palm aan 'n spyker gesny en die bloed drup op sy voet. Die bloed aan die palm en voet is duidelik 'n vooruitwysing na sy kruisiging. Sy moeder Maria kom om hom te troos, maar uit die gesigsuitdrukkings is dit eerder Jesus wat haar troos. Let op die besorgde frons van die moeder en die vreedsame uitdrukking van die kind. Jesus is ter verwagte die enigste van die figure wat heeltemal in wit geklee is, wat verwys na sy Kleed van Geregtigheid. Sy handgebaar (duim-teen-wysvinger) is 'n simbool uit Grieks-Romynse retoriek wat "perfek" of "uitmuntend" beteken, en toon natuurlik op Jesus as die Perfekte Mens.

Regs is Jesus se "nefie" Johannes die Doper wat 'n bakwater bring om die wond te was, 'n vooruitwysing op Jesus se doop. Buiten vir die bak water kan ons herken dat dit Johannes is weens die kameelvel rompie wat hy aan het -- 'n bekende simbool in klassieke kuns vir Johannes die Doper. Al is die seuntjie Johannes ouer as Jesus, is sy postuur effens vooroor in eerbied en nederigheid vir sy jonger "nefie".

Agter teen die muur is die houtwerkdriehoek, 'n simbool vir die Drie-eenheid en ook teen die muur is 'n leer. Die leer is 'n dubbele verwysing: eerstens na Jakob se leer in die Ou Testament, en twedens na die vele skildery wat Jesus toon wanneer hy van die kruis afgehaal word. Op die leer rus 'n duif, 'n simbool vir die Heilige Gees.

Links buite sien ons 'n pastorale toneel -- skape was 'n gewilde beeld in Jesus se gelykenisse. Die skape kyk in na die toneel van Jesus. Hulle hunker na Hom as die Herder. Aan die regterkant is 'n lampie in die venster. Die lamp (en lig) is 'n ander belangrike simbool in Jesus se spreuke.

Die houttafel verteenwoordig die offertafel (tabernakel / altaar). Aan die linkerkant staan 'n jong man met 'n veelkleurige kleed om sy heupe, waarskynlik 'n verwysing na Josef uit die Ou Testament. Dus is daar twee Josefs in die komposisie om die Ou Testament aan die een kant en die Nuwe Testament aan die anderkant van die "Offer" te verteenwoordig. Jesus is die tabernakel, die altaar wat deur spykers gewond word.

Die vrou-figuur agter is dalk Maria se moeder wat volgens oorlewering Anna is, maar ek verkies om te dink dit is eerder Elizabet, die moeder van Johannes die Doper. Nes Maria het sy ook 'n wit kopdoek aan om haar begunstiging voor God te toon. (Elizabet was kindloos tot op 'n bejaarde ouderdom totdat die Engel Gabriel aan haar man Zacharia verskyn het om aan te kondig dat Elizabet swanger gaan word. Dit was ook Gabriel wat aan Maria verskyn het om haar swangerskap aan te kondig.)

Hoe langer ek na die skildery kyk, hoe dieper en mooier raak dit vir my. Ek is steeds nuuskierig oor moontlike ander simboliek, byvoorbeeld die rooi turksevy blom, die rietmandjie voor-links (dalk 'n verwysing na Moses), en die houtskaafsels op die grond.

Daar is min kontemporere skilderkuns van so veelvlakkige diepte en betekenis het. Dit is jammer.

Die bekyk en besin oor hierdie skildery het my maak terug verlang na die tyd toe ek nog Kunsgeskiedenis gestudeer het. Ek het oorweeg om my meestersgraad in Kunsgeskiedenis te doen, maar ek kon dit nie bekostig nie en daar was nie 'n beurs vir Kunsgeskiedenis nie; daar was wel 'n beurs in die Skool vir Tale en gevolglik het ek my meestersgraad in Skryfkuns gedoen. Ek is nie spyt nie omdat dit vir my ook ander deure oopgemaak het, insluitende my huide pos as letterkunde dosent hier in Korea, maar my liefde vir die visuele kunste het nooit verminder nie.

Sunday 28 April 2019

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"The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either -- but right through every human heart -- and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained." -- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Gulag Archipelagox

Thursday 20 September 2018

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Three thought-provoking quotes from Jeff McMahan's article Innocence, Self-Defense and Killing in War:

Three thought-provoking quotes from Jeff McMahan's article Innocence, Self-Defense and Killing in War:

...it is not obvious why a political leader who orders troops into battle is engaged in causing harm while voters in a democracy who demand that the leader should do so are not; or why drivers who transport arms to the troops count as combatants while the taxpayers who provide the arms by paying for them do not; or why a soldier who is asleep or sitting at a desk well behind the lines can be regarded as threatening or causing harm when a civilian editorialist who stirs support for the war is not...

*

Persons who join the military are typically aware that this abdication of moral autonomy is a condition of military life; indeed, some join the military in part in order to enjoy the freedom from responsibility. They know, in short, that they are allowing themselves to become instruments of the wills of others. There is, moreover, something else they could know with a little reflection, which is that most wars in which people fight are unjust. This follows from the assumption that a war can be just on at most one side, though it can be unjust on both.

Even if this formal assumption is unwarranted, it does seem true as a contingent fact that very few wars, if any, have been just on both sides, while, as Anscombe puts it, “human pride, malice and cruelty are so usual that. . . wars have mostly been mere wickedness on both sides.” Putting these two points together, we arrive at the conclusion that, in joining the military, one allows oneself to become an instrument for the violent pursuit of purposes that are more than likely to be unjust. How can this possibly be a morally acceptable thing to do? Of course, in many cases, the pressure to join the military may be nearly as strong as the pressure, once one is in the military, to surrender the prerogative of determining for oneself whether or not the war in which one is asked to fight is just. It is only when this is true that there can be a convincing case for regarding an Unjust Combatant as morally innocent. For, otherwise, following one’s superiors into an unjust war is roughly analogous to committing a crime while drunk: one may not be responsible for one’s action given one’s condition at the time, but one’s conduct nevertheless remains culpable because of one’s responsibility for getting oneself into a condition of diminished responsibility.


*

First, the morality of war, and not the rules of war, is what should govern the conscience of the individual soldier. In particular, if the individual soldier has reason to believe or suspect that his country’s war is unjust, this is equivalent to believing or suspecting that his action as a belligerent in this war is or would be murderous. If he is convinced that the war is unjust, then he must not participate.