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Would I destroy everything religious? I might, if I was the dictator of the world. I may try to find a more practical use as well. Just because I'm against the gideon in your hotel room doesn't mean I'm the monster you seem to be trying to make me out as.

I am not trying to make you out as a monster. Where on earth did you get that impression?

I simply asked you if you would get rid of everything "religious" in your perfect world. You stated that as an atheist, you preferred "not to have anything religious in your vicinity."

No Bach at all. No Handel's "Messiah." No Mozart's "Requiem." No MIchelangelo's "David" or "Pieta." No Sistine Chapel. No Bernstein's "Chichester Psalms." No...well, no lots of things.

What I asked you is if you really thought your life would be better without any of these things...if the world would be better without them. It's an honest question.

Is "David" religious? I thought it was just this nude guy called David.

MariaHobbit wrote:

Is "David" religious? I thought it was just this nude guy called David.

You're kidding, right? David, the guy who killed Goliath? The one who played his harp for Saul? The King? The guy who wrote most of the Psalms? The House of David? Forefather of Jesus?

One of the major players in the Old Testament.

I always thought it was the Biblical King David. But let me look it up.

ETA: Yep, that one. From David and Goliath.


Jewel, some people just aren't familiar with Christian traditions or with art based on Christianity. It's nothing to ridicule.

jewelsong wrote:

You're kidding, right? David, the guy who killed Goliath? The one who played his harp for Saul? The King? The guy who wrote most of the Psalms? The House of David? Forefather of Jesus?

Don't forget: mass-murderer

elfshadow wrote:

Jewel, some people just aren't familiar with Christian traditions or with art based on Christianity. It's nothing to ridicule.

I apologize if I came across as ridiculing. It's just such a famous statue with so much history behind it...it took me aback that someone wouldn't realize that it was a representation of the Biblical David.

I never knew that either. I think it was only in the last few years that folks pieced together who Mona Lisa was, right? I just thought David was of some hot young thing Michaelangelo took a liking to.




*E*

*E* wrote:

I just thought David was of some hot young thing Michaelangelo took a liking to.

Me, too, actually!

I'm not a Christian because I lost faith and left the church, Jewelsong, I'm one of those people who was raised completely without religion. Never went to Sunday School. Have only attended church services for weddings and funerals. Most of what I know about Christianity was picked up accidentally, from context in cultural references.

I read one of the (what do you call them?) "books"? in the skeptic's annotated Bible a few years ago, but lost interest in reading the rest. There was nothing in that section I read (Matthew) that said anything about a David, I think. Or if it did, I didn't connect it with the famous statue. Why would they portray a religious reference as a nude?

I never felt the need to read the Old Testament. From what I've heard, it's pretty brutal.


edit: There's something grammatically wrong with my "I'm not a Christian" sentance, but I really can't figure out what it is! I'm going home. See you all later.

Did you mean to say "I'm not NOT a Christian"?




*E*

Nude statues are an artistic convention.

There are a few other things about "David" that I could say but I shall refrain. However, remember that in creating David, Michelangelo maintained the convention of ancient Greek statuary.

jewelsong wrote:

elfshadow wrote:

Jewel, some people just aren't familiar with Christian traditions or with art based on Christianity. It's nothing to ridicule.

I apologize if I came across as ridiculing. It's just such a famous statue with so much history behind it...it took me aback that someone wouldn't realize that it was a representation of the Biblical David.

I didn't know that either. I had no clue that that sculpture meant to represent the David from David and Goliath. I never looked into the history of that sculpture, but just knew of it and who made it. Like *E*, I just thought David was supposed to be some epitome of a handsome man back then.

edit: Not to mention I have no knowledge of David's story in the Bible. Really, I know jack crap about the Bible (I think I went to church for a year or two and that was before I turned 6) and have no want to change that. I'm like Maria and have only picked up bits from cultural references.

Yeah, we have a little cartoon version of David and Goliath because the former is voiced by Robby Benson ("Beast" from Disney's Beauty and the Beast). I was a film geek before I hit double digits, apparently.




*E*

jewelsong wrote:

Quote:

Would I destroy everything religious? I might, if I was the dictator of the world. I may try to find a more practical use as well. Just because I'm against the gideon in your hotel room doesn't mean I'm the monster you seem to be trying to make me out as.

I am not trying to make you out as a monster. Where on earth did you get that impression?

I simply asked you if you would get rid of everything "religious" in your perfect world. You stated that as an atheist, you preferred "not to have anything religious in your vicinity."

No Bach at all. No Handel's "Messiah." No Mozart's "Requiem." No MIchelangelo's "David" or "Pieta." No Sistine Chapel. No Bernstein's "Chichester Psalms." No...well, no lots of things.

What I asked you is if you really thought your life would be better without any of these things...if the world would be better without them. It's an honest question.

Would my life be better? Can't answer that questions considering how much influence those religious icons have had on the development of culture in the western world. I would have to re-invent the entirety of western history. It becomes an exercise in futility. Take the baroque composers for example: I won't pretend to know anything of what influenced them, but I'm sure it was something religious, and their influence in music can be felt all the way to the simplicity of four chord punk songs (see Pachobel's Canon in D minor). So, maybe without religion we would never have had punk music, but then who is to say that punk music wouldn't have come about in some other way. It turns into a thought experiment similar to writing the Silmarillion (a history book from a world that doesn't exist except in the mind, and on those pages). As to those particular items: I don't listen to Handel, Mozart, or Bach; I have never seen the David, or the Sistine Chapel.

I'm going to over-simplify. Bear with me. The artists of the Middle Ages and Renaissance and Reformation made beautiful art to glorify God. The artists of Ancient Greece and Rome made beautiful art to glorify Man. Even their gods glorified Man. Artists since the Enlightenment have done both. If organized religion had never happened, we would have found another reason to create beauty. Making music, painting, sculpting, writing/telling stories are just things humans do. We have this drive to create that we paste excuses on after the fact because we don't understand where the need comes from. It's just there. That said, the art created in the name of religion is spectacular. But the great artists drew material from more than Christianity and the results are still around to be seen and heard and enjoyed (none of the music at my wedding was religious, for all it was beautiful).

That said, like jewelsong, I take some comfort in finding a Gideon's Bible in my hotel room. I look for it deliberately, as a holdover from a silly ritual my sister and I invented on family road trips. TV? Check. Phone? Check? Bible? Check. Phone books? Check. Pen? Check. Pad of paper? Check. Okay, it's safe to sleep here. I'm not calling this a rational thought process, but getting flaming pissed about finding a Gideon's Bible isn't rational either. If my sister and I found just a New Testament, we'd make certain judgements about the quality of the establishment (Not even a full Bible! How cheap and lame! What else are they half-assing us on?), and if we found something in addition to a Bible we'd get excited about the "exotic" types that came through. Usually, the addition was a Book of Mormon, but when I went to Hawaii while I was in HS, the place I was staying at had a Bible AND a collection of Bhuddist teachings in the drawers. Oddly enough, the places I've stayed that have half-assed Bibles are pretty half-assed all around, unless the half-assed Bible is accompanied by, say, the Book of Mormon. Places that do that are cutting corners but only in ways you'll notice if you're looking. I wonder if the Gideons are trying to say something when they do that.

ETA: I know the story of David and Goliath. However, for some odd reason, I've never really made the connection between the story and the statue. Probably because, in the kiddie books at Sunday School, David was always portrayed as a skinny, pre-pubescent boy in a knee-length tunic and all the adults around him were wearing baggy robes that hit the floor. So my mental image of David of Old Testament fame had ever been one of a skinny, pre-pubescent boy in a knee-length tunic. And sandals.

I knew the David statue was King David (well, actually David before he became king), but I never quite knew why he was nude. I assume it was due to the revival of classical art in the Renaissance age, but I'm no art historian.

To add to River's first paragraph about art and its relationship to god. Paintings from the middle ages generally had people looking up because life sucked so much that the best hope was for heaven, and when the renaissance rolled around, paintings had people looking down, or level more because life got better, so everyone wasn't so eager to get to heaven. The middle age paintings used a lot of gold backgrounds, while the renaissance paintings focused more on Earth, so there were landscapes. My art educated gf informed me of all of this.

Quote:

but getting flaming pissed about finding a Gideon's Bible isn't rational either.

I would never condone torching a hotel because of a bible. Now if the t.v. remote didn't work? Light that place up!

Erunáme wrote:

jewelsong wrote:

elfshadow wrote:

Jewel, some people just aren't familiar with Christian traditions or with art based on Christianity. It's nothing to ridicule.

I apologize if I came across as ridiculing. It's just such a famous statue with so much history behind it...it took me aback that someone wouldn't realize that it was a representation of the Biblical David.

I didn't know that either. I had no clue that that sculpture meant to represent the David from David and Goliath. I never looked into the history of that sculpture, but just knew of it and who made it. Like *E*, I just thought David was supposed to be some epitome of a handsome man back then.

edit: Not to mention I have no knowledge of David's story in the Bible. Really, I know jack crap about the Bible (I think I went to church for a year or two and that was before I turned 6) and have no want to change that. I'm like Maria and have only picked up bits from cultural references.

This sounds like an argument for having "The Bible as Literature" taught in all the schools.

Interesting discussion about David and knowledge of the Bible, I think.

David is the only man in the Bible who is actually physically described as being good-looking - beautiful, in fact. He was quite a pivotal figure in both the history and events of the Old Testament and the ancestor of the people in the New Testament. He was very human and very flawed and did things both brave and cowardly. He was a hero in many ways but he could also be petty and small-minded.

He is also an interesting character because his story in the Bible is chronicled from the time he was a very young boy until he was quite an old man - until his death, in fact....not just in little pieces and bits, but more or less in a cohesive format. If the Old Testament has a main character, it's him.

(Maria, the Old Testament is pretty brutal in places, but it's also where all the good stories are.... )

vison once stated that the Bible was the most influential book in the Western world (I can't find the post, but I think it was a conversation with her grandson!) and I think she is right. If you know next to nothing about the Bible, you are at a disadvantage in the study of art, music, literature and history. You won't "get" many references and subtleties - and this includes modern literature and the arts as well. It will prevent you from fully enjoying or fully understanding much of what you read, hear or see. This is one of the reasons I think a class in the Bible as literature is a great benefit to students.

(And even if you think you've "never" listen to Bach or Handel or Mozart...you'd be surprised at how much of their music has crept into everything we listen to today. Classical music is the foundation of most of western music. Also, pictures of the David statue and the Sistine chapel are part of the zeitgeist ...you've seen pictures even if you've not seen the real thing.)

vison's right about the Bible. The political power of the modern evangelicals is only the surface. You know that phrase "the writing's on the wall"? I looked up the origin of that one day. It's from the Book of Daniel. I remember learning about the lion's den in Sunday School (another evocative image and story). I don't remember the story about the wall, but maybe they decided it was a bit strong for kids or something. "For every thing there is a season" isn't just The Byrds; it's from Ecclesiastes. And so on. We take it for granted, which just underscores how profoundly this book affected our culture.

I was thinking about this on my way to work this morning. Just off the top of my head, here are some of the common cultural references and stories that have their roots in the Bible.

Adam and Eve and the apple
Snake in the grass
Cain and Abel and "Am I my brother's keeper?"
Noah's ark
Sodom and Gomorrah (yes, the word "sodomy" comes from this story.)
Daniel in the lion's den
Joseph and his coat of many colors
Tower of Babel
Ezekiel and the wheel in the air
Ark of the Covenant
David and Goliath
David and his harp
Joshua and the battle of Jericho
Moses and the burning bush
Aaron and the golden calf (the idol)
Manna from heaven
Parting of the Red Sea
Holy Grail
Good Samaritan
Loaves and fishes
"Fishers of men" (The fish was an early symbol of Christianity)
Betrayal with a kiss
Having a "cross to bear."
Lord of the Dance (David danced before the Ark of the covenant as it was paraded through the streets, much to the chagrin of his rather prudish wife Michal. He not only danced, he danced naked.)


And many, many more! These is just what I can think of right now.

River, the story of the "writing on the wall" is from Daniel 5 and the feast of King Belshazzar. It's a GREAT story...Belshazzar was a huge party boy and completely decadent. He scandalized the name and memory of his father, King Nebuchadnezzar and refused to honor God or any of His commandments. One night, at a huge feast with naked dancers and slave boys and caviar and lots of wine and sex and so on, a hand appeared out of nowhere and wrote on the wall. No one could understand the writing and the King was greatly afraid. Finally someone brought Daniel around to translate the writing. And what it said, basically, was "The party is OVER." Belshazzar was murdered that night.

Here's the whole story... (New Living Translation)

Daniel 5

The Writing on the Wall

1 Many years later King Belshazzar gave a great feast for 1,000 of his nobles, and he drank wine with them. 2 While Belshazzar was drinking the wine, he gave orders to bring in the gold and silver cups that his predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar, had taken from the Temple in Jerusalem. He wanted to drink from them with his nobles, his wives, and his concubines. 3 So they brought these gold cups taken from the Temple, the house of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles, his wives, and his concubines drank from them. 4 While they drank from them they praised their idols made of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.

5 Suddenly, they saw the fingers of a human hand writing on the plaster wall of the king’s palace, near the lampstand. The king himself saw the hand as it wrote, 6 and his face turned pale with fright. His knees knocked together in fear and his legs gave way beneath him.

7 The king shouted for the enchanters, astrologers, and fortune-tellers to be brought before him. He said to these wise men of Babylon, “Whoever can read this writing and tell me what it means will be dressed in purple robes of royal honor and will have a gold chain placed around his neck. He will become the third highest ruler in the kingdom!”

8 But when all the king’s wise men had come in, none of them could read the writing or tell him what it meant. 9 So the king grew even more alarmed, and his face turned pale. His nobles, too, were shaken.

10 But when the queen mother heard what was happening, she hurried to the banquet hall. She said to Belshazzar, “Long live the king! Don’t be so pale and frightened. 11 There is a man in your kingdom who has within him the spirit of the holy gods. During Nebuchadnezzar’s reign, this man was found to have insight, understanding, and wisdom like that of the gods. Your predecessor, the king—your predecessor King Nebuchadnezzar—made him chief over all the magicians, enchanters, astrologers, and fortune-tellers of Babylon. 12 This man Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar, has exceptional ability and is filled with divine knowledge and understanding. He can interpret dreams, explain riddles, and solve difficult problems. Call for Daniel, and he will tell you what the writing means.”

Daniel Explains the Writing

13 So Daniel was brought in before the king. The king asked him, “Are you Daniel, one of the exiles brought from Judah by my predecessor, King Nebuchadnezzar? 14 I have heard that you have the spirit of the gods within you and that you are filled with insight, understanding, and wisdom. 15 My wise men and enchanters have tried to read the words on the wall and tell me their meaning, but they cannot do it. 16 I am told that you can give interpretations and solve difficult problems. If you can read these words and tell me their meaning, you will be clothed in purple robes of royal honor, and you will have a gold chain placed around your neck. You will become the third highest ruler in the kingdom.”

17 Daniel answered the king, “Keep your gifts or give them to someone else, but I will tell you what the writing means. 18 Your Majesty, the Most High God gave sovereignty, majesty, glory, and honor to your predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar. 19 He made him so great that people of all races and nations and languages trembled before him in fear. He killed those he wanted to kill and spared those he wanted to spare. He honored those he wanted to honor and disgraced those he wanted to disgrace. 20 But when his heart and mind were puffed up with arrogance, he was brought down from his royal throne and stripped of his glory. 21 He was driven from human society. He was given the mind of a wild animal, and he lived among the wild donkeys. He ate grass like a cow, and he was drenched with the dew of heaven, until he learned that the Most High God rules over the kingdoms of the world and appoints anyone he desires to rule over them.

22 “You are his successor, O Belshazzar, and you knew all this, yet you have not humbled yourself. 23 For you have proudly defied the Lord of heaven and have had these cups from his Temple brought before you. You and your nobles and your wives and concubines have been drinking wine from them while praising gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone—gods that neither see nor hear nor know anything at all. But you have not honored the God who gives you the breath of life and controls your destiny! 24 So God has sent this hand to write this message.

25 “This is the message that was written: Mene, Mene, Tekel, and Parsin. 26 This is what these words mean:
Mene means ‘numbered’—God has numbered the days of your reign and has brought it to an end.
27 Tekel means ‘weighed’—you have been weighed on the balances and have not measured up.
28 Parsin means ‘divided’—your kingdom has been divided and given to the Medes and Persians.”

29 Then at Belshazzar’s command, Daniel was dressed in purple robes, a gold chain was hung around his neck, and he was proclaimed the third highest ruler in the kingdom.

30 That very night Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, was killed.

31 And Darius the Mede took over the kingdom at the age of sixty-two.