Grief

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  From these two confessions should be distinguished the Anglican Church, which the continental historians from defective information usually count with the Reformed Church, but which stands midway between evangelical Protestantism and Roman Catholicism, and may therefore be called Anglo-Catholic. She is indeed moderately Reformed in her doctrinal articles,39 but in polity and ritual she is much more conservative than the Calvinistic and even the Lutheran confession, pays greater deference to the testimony of the ancient fathers, and lays stress upon her unbroken episcopal succession. The confessional division in the Protestant camp arose very early. It was at first confined to a difference of opinion on the eucharistic presence, which the Marburg Conference of 1529 could not remove, although Luther and Zwingli agreed in fourteen and a half out of fifteen articles of faith. Luther refused any compromise. Other differences gradually developed themselves, on the ubiquity of Christ’s body, predestination, and baptismal regeneration, which tended to widen and perpetuate the split. The union of the two Confessions in Prussia and other German states, since 1817, has not really healed it, but added a third Church, the United Evangelical, to the two older Confessions which, still continue separate in other countries. The controversies among the Protestants in the sixteenth century roused all the religious and political passions and cast a gloom over the bright picture of the Reformation. Melanchthon declared that with tears as abundant as the waters of the river Elbe he could not express his grief over the distractions of Christendom and the "fury of theologians." Calvin also, when invited, with Melanchthon, Bullinger and Buzer, in 1552, by Archbishop Cranmer to Lambeth Palace for the purpose of framing a concensus-creed of the Reformed churches, was willing to cross ten seas for the cause of Christian union.40 But the noble scheme was frustrated by the stormy times, and still remains a pium desiderium. Much as we must deplore and condemn sectarian strife and bitterness, it would be as unjust to charge them on Protestantism, as to charge upon Catholicism the violent passions of the trinitarian, christological and other controversies of the Nicene age, or the fierce animosity between the Greek and Latin Churches, or the envy and jealousy of the monastic orders of the Middle Ages, or the unholy rivalries between Jansenists and Jesuits, Gallicans and Ultramontanists in modern Romanism. The religious passions grow out of the selfishness of depraved human nature in spite of Christianity, whether Greek, Roman, or Protestant., and may arise in any denomination or in any congregation. Paul had to rebuke the party spirit in the church at Corinth. The rancor of theological schools and parties under one and the same government is as great and often greater than among separate rival denominations. Providence overrules these human weaknesses for the clearer development of doctrine and discipline, and thus brings good out of evil.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  As we have almost grown tired of repeating, the woman had the body of an angel and a temperament to match, and the two young masters of the vessel fell so violently in love with her that they could concentrate on nothing else except how best they might make themselves useful and agreeable to her, at the same time taking care not to let Marato see what they were up to. On discovering that they were both in love with the same woman, they talked the matter over in secret and agreed to make the lady’s conquest a mutual affair, as though love were capable of being shared out like merchandise or profits. For some time their plans were thwarted because they found that Marato kept a close watch on her. But one day, when the ship was sailing along like the wind and Marato was standing on the stern facing seaward without the least suspicion of their intentions, they both crept up on him, seized him quickly from behind, and hurled him into the sea. By the time anybody so much as noticed that Marato had fallen overboard, they had already sailed on for over a mile, and the lady, hearing what had happened and seeing no way of going to his rescue, began to fill the whole ship with the sounds of her latest affliction. The two gallants immediately rushed to her assistance, and with the aid of honeyed words and extravagant promises, few of which she understood, they attempted to pacify her. What she was bemoaning was not so much the loss of Marato as her own sorry plight, and so after she had listened to a stream of fine talk, repeated twice over, she seemed considerably less distraught. The two brothers then got down to a private discussion to decide which of them was to take her off to bed. Each man claimed priority over the other, and having failed to reach any agreement on the matter they began to argue fiercely between themselves. Nor did their quarrel stop with the exchange of verbal abuse. Losing their tempers, they reached for their knives and hurled themselves furiously upon one another, and before the ship’s crew could separate the pair, they had both inflicted a number of stab-wounds, from which one man died instantly whilst the other emerged with serious injuries to various parts of his body. The lady was sorely distressed by all this, for she could see that she was now alone on the ship with nobody to turn to for help or advice, and she was greatly afraid lest the relatives and companions of the two men should vent their rage upon her. However, partly because of the injured man’s pleas on her behalf, partly because they soon arrived at Corinth, the danger to her person was short-lived.

• From Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997)

  At the police station, the officer who looked up the man’s record discovered that he had committed six other so-called “armed robberies” over the past fifteen year s, all of them at 6:30 in the morning on July 5! Upon learning that the man was a Vietnam veteran, the police surmised that this event was more than mere coincidence. They took him to a nearby VA hospital, where Dr. Van der Kolk had the opportunity to speak with him. Van der Kolk asked the man directly: “What happened to you on July 5th at 6:30 in the morning?” He responded directly. While he was in Vietnam, the man’s platoon had been ambushed by the Viet Cong. Everyone had been killed except for himself and his friend, Jim. The date was July fourth. Darkness fell and the helicopters were unable to evacuate them. They spent a terrifying night together huddled in a rice paddy surrounded by the Viet Cong. At about 3:30 in the morning, Jim was hit in the chest by a Viet Cong bullet; he died in his friend’s arms at 6:30 on the morning of July 5. After returning to the States, every July 5 (that he did not spend in jail), the man had re-enacted the anniversary of his friend’s death. In the therapy session with Van der Kolk, the vet experienced grief over the loss of his friend. He then made the connection between Jim’s death and the compulsion he felt to commit the robberies. Once he became aware of his feelings and the role the original event had played in driving his compulsion, the man was able to stop re-enacting this tragic incident. What was the connection between the robberies and the Vietnam experience? By staging the “robberies,” the man was recreating the firefight that had resulted in the death of his friend (as well as the rest of his platoon). By provoking the police to join in the re-enactment, the vet had orchestrated the cast of characters needed to play the role of the Viet Cong. He did not want to hurt anyone, so he used his fingers instead of a gun. He then brought the situation to a climax and was able to elicit the help he needed to heal his psychic wounds. He was then able to resolve his anguish, grief, and guilt about his buddy’s violent death and the horrors of war. If we look at this man’s behaviors without knowing anything about his past, we might think he was mad. However, with a little history, we can see that his actions were a brilliant attempt to resolve a deep emotional scar. His re-enactment took him to the very edge, again and again, until he was finally able to free himself from the overwhelming nightmare of war.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  An Exposition of Psalm XLIV1359 It was written for the nuns of Soissons, to whom he owed his life, and the dedication to them is an integral part of the first of its four books. It is allegorical and very diffuse, but edifying. 3. An Exposition of the Lamentations of Jeremiah.1360 This was the fruit of his old age, and once more, as in his early manhood, he deplored the vices, both lay and clerical, which disgraced his times. His allusion to the Norman incursions in the neighborhood of Paris,1361 which took place in 857, proves that he must have written the work after that date. In his prologue, Radbertus states that he had never read a commentary on Lamentations written by a Latin author. Hence his information must have been derived from Greek sources, and he was unacquainted with the similar work by Rabanus Maurus. He distinguished a triple sense, a literal, spiritual, and a moral, and paid especial regard to types and prophecies, as he considered that there were prophecies in Lamentations which referred to his own day. 4. Faith, Hope and Love.1362 This work is preceded by an acrostic poem, the first letters of each line forming the name "Radbertus Levita." Each of the three books is devoted to one of the Christian virtues. Radbertus wrote the treatise at the request of abbot Wala, for the instruction of the younger monks. The book on faith is remarkable for its statement that faith precedes knowledge, thus antedating the scholastics in their assertion, which is most pregnantly put in the famous expression of Anselm, Credo ut intelligam.1363 The third book, On Love, is much later than the others on account of the author’s distractions. 5. Life of Adalhard,1364 the first abbot of New Corbie. It is a panegyric rather than a strict biography, but contains much interesting and valuable information respecting the abbot and the founding of the German monastery of Corbie. The model for the work is the funeral oration of Ambrose upon Valentinian II. Its date is 826, the year of Adalhard’s death. It contains much edifying matter. 6. Life of Wala,1365 the brother of Adalhard at Old Corbie, and his successor. It is in the peculiar form of conversations. In the first book the interlocutors are Paschasius, as he calls himself, and four fellow Corbie monks—Adeodatus, Severus, Chremes, Allabicus; and in the second, Paschasius, Adeotatus and Theophrastus. These names are, like Asenius, as he calls Wala, manifestly pseudonyms. He borrowed the idea of such a dialogue from Sulpicius Severus, who used it in his life of St. Martin of Tours. The date of the book is 836, the year of Wala’s death. 7. The Passion of Rufinus and Valerius,1366 who were martyrs to the Christian faith, at or near Soissons, in the year 287. In this work he uses old materials, but weakens the interest of his subject by his frequent digressions and long paraphrases. § 174. Patramnus. I.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  And whilst he occasionally saw his mother, who was in attendance on Currado’s lady, he never recognized her, nor she him, for they had both changed a great deal in the period that had elapsed since they had last seen one another. Now, whilst Giannotto was in Currado’s service, it happened that a daughter of Currado’s, whose name was Spina, was left a widow by a certain Niccolò da Grignano, and returned to her father’s house. Being a beautiful and very graceful girl of little more than sixteen, she began to take an interest in Giannotto, and he in her, with the result that they fell madly in love with one another. Their love was soon consummated, and since it continued for several months undetected, they became excessively confident and were less cautious than they should have been. And one day, while out walking in a fine, thickly wooded forest, Giannotto and the girl, forging on ahead of their companions, came to a delectable spot all covered with grass and flowers and surrounded by trees, and, thinking they had left the others far behind, they began to make love. So great was their enjoyment that they lost all track of time, and they had been together for ages when the girl’s mother arrived on the scene, to be followed a moment later by Currado. Dismayed beyond measure by what he saw, 7 he ordered three of his servants, without giving any reasons, to seize the pair of them, bind them, and march them off to one of his castles. Then he stalked away, seething with distress and anger, and intent on having them ignominiously put to death. The girl’s mother was extremely upset, and regarded no punishment as too severe for her daughter’s lapse. But she could not stand passively aside and allow them to suffer the kind of fate which, on piecing together certain of Currado’s remarks, she realized he was intending to inflict on the culprits. So she hurried to catch up with her irate husband, and began pleading with him not to ruin his old age by killing his own daughter in a sudden fit of frenzy and soiling his hands with the blood of one of his servants. He could, she insisted, find some other way of placating his anger, such as having them incarcerated, so that, as they languished in prison, they would have a chance of repenting in full for their sinful behaviour. The saintly woman pressed these views and many others upon him with so much urgency, that she dissuaded him from killing them. And he ordered each of them to be imprisoned in different places, where they were to be closely guarded, receive a minimum of food, and suffer the maximum of discomfort, until such time as he decided otherwise. These instructions were promptly carried out, and I leave you to imagine the sort of life they led in their captivity, weeping incessantly and almost starving to death.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  In Bologna, then, that illustrious city in the Lombard plain, there once lived a gentleman called Messer Gentile de’ Carisendi,1 distinguished for his valour and noble blood, who whilst still in his youth became enamoured of a gentlewoman, Madonna Catalina by name, who was the wife of a certain Niccoluccio Caccianimico. But because his love for the lady was ill-requited he almost despaired of it and went away to Modena, where he had been appointed to the office of podestà. At the time of which we are speaking, Niccoluccio was absent from Bologna, and his wife, being pregnant, was staying at an estate of his, some three miles distant from the city, where she had the misfortune to contract a sudden and cruel malady, whose effects were so powerful and serious that all sign of life in her was extinguished, and consequently she was adjudged, even by her physicians, to be dead. Since her closest women relatives claimed to have heard from her own lips that she had not been pregnant sufficiently long for the unborn creature to be perfectly formed, they troubled themselves no further on that score, and after shedding many tears, they buried her, just as she was, in a tomb in the local church. The news of the lady’s demise was immediately reported to Messer Gentile by one of his friends, and despite the fact that she had never exactly smothered him with her favours, he was quite overcome with sorrow. But at length he said to himself: ‘So, Madonna Catalina, you are dead! You never accorded me so much as a single glance when you were alive; but now that you are dead, and cannot reject my love, I am determined to steal a kiss or two from you.’ Night had already fallen, and having made arrangements to depart in secret, he took horse with one of his servants, riding without pause2 till he came to the place where the lady was buried. Having opened up the tomb, he made his way cautiously inside, and lying down beside her, he drew his face to hers and kissed her again and again, shedding tears profusely as he did so. But as every woman knows, no sooner does a man obtain one thing, especially if he happens to be in love, than he wants something else; and just as Messer Gentile had made up his mind to tarry there no longer, he said to himself: ‘Ah! why should I not place my hand gently on her breast, now that I am here? I have never touched her before, and I shall never have another opportunity.’

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  But who was it who brushed that silence aside? Not Stephen Gordon . . . oh, no, surely not . . . Stephen Gordon was dead; she had died last night: ‘A l’heure de notre mort . . .’ Many people had spoken those prophetic words quite a short time ago—perhaps they had been thinking of Stephen Gordon. Yet now some one was slowly climbing the stairs, then pausing upon the landing to listen, then opening the door of Mary’s bedroom, then standing quite still and staring at Mary. It was some one whom David knew and loved well; he sprang forward with a sharp little bark of welcome. But Mary shrank back as though she had been struck—Mary pale and red-eyed from sleeplessness—or was it because of excessive weeping? When she spoke her voice sounded unfamiliar: ‘Where were you last night?’ ‘With Valérie Seymour. I thought you’d know somehow . . . It’s better to be frank . . . we both hate lies . . .’ Came that queer voice again: ‘Good God—and I’ve tried so hard not to believe it! Tell me you’re lying to me now; say it, Stephen!’ Stephen—then she wasn’t dead after all; or was she? But now Mary was clinging—clinging. ‘Stephen, I can’t believe this thing—Valérie! Is that why you always repulse me . . . why you never want to come near me these days? Stephen, answer me; are you her lover? Say something, for Christ’s sake! Don’t stand there dumb . . .’ A mist closing down, a thick black mist. Some one pushing the girl away, without speaking. Mary’s queer voice coming out of the gloom, muffled by the folds of that thick black mist, only a word here and there getting through: ‘All my life I’ve given . . . you’ve killed . . . I loved you . . . Cruel, oh, cruel! You’re unspeakably cruel . . .’ Then the sound of rough and pitiful sobbing. No, assuredly this was not Stephen Gordon who stood there unmoved by such pitiful sobbing. But what was the figure doing in the mist? It was moving about, distractedly, wildly. All the while it sobbed it was moving about: ‘I’m going . . .’ Going? But where could it go? Somewhere out of the mist, somewhere into the light? Who was it that had said . . . wait, what were the words? ‘To give light to them that sit in darkness . . .’

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  He shaded his face with his long, thin hand, so that she could not see his expression, yet it seemed to her that he knew quite well why she had come to him in that study. Then she told him about Martin, told him all that had happened, omitting no detail, sparing him nothing. She openly mourned the friend who had failed her, and herself she mourned for failing the lover—and Sir Philip listened in absolute silence. After she had spoken for quite a long time, she at length found the courage to ask her question: ‘Is there anything strange about me, Father, that I should have felt as I did about Martin?’ It had come. It fell on his heart like a blow. The hand that was shading his pale face trembled, for he felt a great trembling take hold of his spirit. His spirit shrank back and cowered in his body, so that it dared not look out on Stephen. She was waiting, and now she was asking again: ‘Father, is there anything strange about me? I remember when I was a little child—I was never quite like all the other children—’ Her voice sounded apologetic, uncertain, and he knew that the tears were not far from her eyes, knew that if he looked now he would see her lips shaking, and the tears making ugly red stains on her eyelids. His loins ached with pity for this fruit of his loins—an insufferable aching, an intolerable pity. He was frightened, a coward because of his pity, as he had been once long ago with her mother. Merciful God! How could a man answer? What could he say, and that man a father? He sat there inwardly grovelling before her: ‘Oh, Stephen, my child, my little, little Stephen.’ For now in his pity she seemed to him little, little and utterly helpless again—he remembered her hands as the hands of a baby, very small, very pink, with minute perfect nails—he had played with her hands, exclaiming about them, astonished because of their neat perfection: ‘Oh, Stephen, my little, little Stephen.’ He wanted to cry out against God for this thing; he wanted to cry out: ‘You have maimed my Stephen! What had I done or my father before me, or my father’s father, or his father’s father? Unto the third and fourth generations. . . .’ And Stephen was waiting for his answer. Then Sir Philip set the lips of his spirit to the cup, and his spirit must drink the gall of deception: ‘I will not tell her, You cannot ask it—there are some things that even God should not ask.’

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  Mary said: ‘This means . . .’ but she stopped abruptly. Bless said: ‘Got a match, anyone? Oh thanks!’ And she groped for her white metal cigarette case. Howard said: ‘Well, the first thing I’m going to do is to get my hair properly shampooed in Paris.’ Thurloe laughed shrilly, then she started to whistle, kicking the recalcitrant fire as she did so. But funny, old, monosyllabic Blakeney with her curly white hair cropped as close as an Uhlan’s—Blakeney who had long ago done with emotions—quite suddenly laid her arms on the table and her head on her arms, and she wept, and she wept. 2Stephen stayed with the Unit right up to the eve of its departure for Germany, then she left it, taking Mary Llewellyn with her. Their work was over; remained only the honour of joining the army’s triumphal progress, but Mary Llewellyn was completely worn out, and Stephen had no thought except for Mary. They said farewell to Mrs. Claude Breakspeare, to Howard and Blakeney and the rest of their comrades. And Stephen knew, as indeed did they also, that a mighty event had slipped into the past, had gone from them into the realms of history—something terrible yet splendid, a oneness with life in its titanic struggle against death. Not a woman of them all but felt vaguely regretful in spite of the infinite blessing of peace, for none could know what the future might hold of trivial days filled with trivial actions. Great wars will be followed by great discontents—the pruning knife has been laid to the tree, and the urge to grow throbs through its mutilated branches. 3The house in the Rue Jacob was en fête in honour of Stephen’s arrival. Pierre had rigged up an imposing flagstaff, from which waved a brand new tricolour commandeered by Pauline from the neighbouring baker; flowers had been placed in the study vases, while Adèle had contrived to produce the word ‘welcome’ in immortelles, as the pièce de resistance, and had hung it above the doorway. Stephen shook hands with them all in turn, and she introduced Mary, who also shook hands. Then Adèle must start to gabble about Jean, who was quite safe although not a captain; and Pauline must interrupt her to tell of the neighbouring baker who had lost his four sons, and of one of her brothers who had lost his right leg—her face very dour and her voice very cheerful, as was always the way when she told of misfortunes. And presently she must also deplore the long straight scar upon Stephen’s cheek: ‘Oh, la pauvre! Pour une dame c’est un vrai désastre!’ But Pierre must point to the green and red ribbon in Stephen’s lapel: ‘C’est la Croix de Guerre!’ so that in the end they all gathered round to admire that half-inch of honour and glory.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  And so Jamie who dared not go home to Beedles for fear of shaming the woman she loved, Jamie who dared not openly mourn lest Barbara’s name be defiled through her mourning, Jamie had dared to go home to God—to trust herself to His more perfect mercy, even as Barbara had gone home before her. CHAPTER 511T he tragic deaths of Barbara and Jamie cast a gloom over every one who had known them, but especially over Mary and Stephen. Again and again Stephen blamed herself for having left Jamie on that fatal evening; if she had only insisted upon staying, the tragedy might never have happened, she might somehow have been able to impart to the girl the courage and strength to go on living. But great as the shock undoubtedly was to Stephen, to Mary it was even greater, for together with her very natural grief, was a new and quite unexpected emotion, the emotion of fear. She was suddenly afraid, and now this fear looked out of her eyes and crept into her voice when she spoke of Jamie. ‘To end in that way, to have killed herself; Stephen, it’s so awful that such things can happen—they were like you and me.’ And then she would go over every sorrowful detail of Barbara’s last illness, every detail of their finding of Jamie’s body. ‘Did it hurt, do you think, when she shot herself? When you shot that wounded horse at the front, he twitched such a lot, I shall never forget it—and Jamie was all alone that night, there was no one there to help in her pain. It’s all so ghastly; supposing it hurt her!’ Useless for Stephen to quote the doctor who had said that death had been instantaneous; Mary was obsessed by the horror of the thing, and not only its physical horror either, but by the mental and spiritual suffering that must have strengthened the will to destruction. ‘Such despair,’ she would say, ‘such utter despair . . . and that was the end of all their loving. I can’t bear it!’ And then she would hide her face against Stephen’s strong and protective shoulder. Oh, yes, there was now little room for doubt, the whole business was preying badly on Mary. Sometimes strange, amorous moods would seize her, in which she must kiss Stephen rather wildly: ‘Don’t let go of me, darling—never let go. I’m afraid; I think it’s because of what’s happened.’ Her kisses would awaken a swift response, and so in these days that were shadowed by death, they clung very desperately to life with the passion they had felt when first they were lovers, as though only by constantly feeding that flame could they hope to ward off some unseen disaster.

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  13 o Why did a military defeat and a national displacement serve as a catalyst for the collection and editing of a nation’s history? Periods of national crisis are often followed by a reshaping of a nation’s story, as we see in our own history with such events as the Vietnam War or 9/11. • Although the Bible does not give us a great deal of detail concerning the individual experiences of deported Judeans, we can make some generalizations based on what we know to be the military practices of Babylonia in this period. Judeans at all levels of society may well have been forced to watch as their family members were killed, as was the case with King Zedekiah. They would have seen their homes burned and their sacred sites looted. • Tens of thousands of Judeans were probably taken into exile. They would have traveled from Jerusalem north into Syria, east across southern Turkey, and finally, south along the Euphrates River into what was then Babylonia (modern Iraq), a distance of 800 to 900 miles. Because the group included women, children, and the elderly, the journey would have been long and slow, and it’s likely that many people died along the way. • Once the Judean exiles arrived in Babylonia, a new stage of transition would begin. They would find themselves in a land very different from their own, surrounded by a people who spoke a foreign language and worshipped foreign gods. • Much of what was ultimately preserved in the Bible speaks in some way to the horrific loss and displacement the Judeans experienced during the period of exile. Psalm 137 • Psalm 137 was probably written during the Babylonian Exile and offers one of the few descriptions we have of exilic life. • In the psalm, the captives ask, “How can we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?” They have a sense that singing praises to their

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Boccaccio’s handling of the improbable tale of Lisabetta da Messina (IV, 5) is no less secure, and the tragic fate of the heroine is if anything even more compelling. The story is familiar to English readers from Keats’s romanticization of its details in a famous poem.27 Boccaccio’s version is altogether more sinewy and straightforward, and the motives of the various characters are more clearly defined. Lisabetta, the unmarried sister of three young and wealthy merchants, falls in love with the handsome young manager of their commercial enterprises, Lorenzo, who, after his amorous liaison with the girl has been discovered, is lured into the countryside by her three brothers and murdered in cold blood, his body being interred in a shallow grave. He appears to her in a dream, tells her how he was murdered, and describes the place where her brothers have buried his body. She goes to the spot with a maidservant, uncovers the young man’s body, and, ‘seeing that it was impossible for her to take away the whole body (as she would dearly have wished), she laid it to rest in a more appropriate spot, then severed the head from the shoulders as best she could and wrapped it in a towel.’ Like Ghismonda, she drenches her gruesome treasure with copious tears, then she buries it in a pot, ‘in which she planted several sprigs of the finest Salerno basil, and never watered them except with the essence of roses or orange-blossom, or with her own teardrops’. Once again, therefore, the macabre element of the narrative assumes strong ritualistic overtones which lend it an aura of high seriousness, and the tale proceeds ineluctably to its tragic albeit grotesque conclusion when, deprived by her brothers of her pot of basil, Lisabetta ultimately cries herself to death. In the third tale (IV, 9) of this ‘trilogy of horror’, a Provençal knight, Guillaume de Roussillon, murders his best friend, Guillaume de Cabestanh, after his discovery of his wife’s adulterous liaison with the latter. Having torn the heart from Cabestanh’s breast, he hands it over to his cook, telling him it is the heart of a wild boar, and ordering him to use it in preparing the finest and most succulent dish he can devise. Boccaccio’s subsequent description of the cook’s labours comes perilously close to being interpreted as black humour: The cook took away the heart, minced it and added a goodly quantity of fine spices, employing all his skill and loving care to turn it into a dish that was too exquisite for words.28

• From Crazy Brave (2012)

  Yet her father was of the Wind clan. At four years old, when your parents are gone, they are gone forever. I mourned. I did not speak to the staff who came to check my vital signs or change me. My parents arrived the next morning to take me home. The test results were negative. I did not have polio. [image "6706.jpg" file=Image00008.jpg] [image "6709.jpg" file=Image00009.jpg] [image "6711.jpg" file=Image00010.jpg] It was shortly after the polio scare that I began to dream the alligator dream. I am a young girl, between four and five years old. It’s early in the morning. I delight in my feet touching the ground and in the plant beings who line the trail to the river. I breathe in playful energy from small, familiar winds as I walk to get water for the family. The winds appear to part the tall reeds through which I walk with my water jar. An alligator whips me suddenly to the water and pulls me under. I struggle, and then I am gone. My passing from earth is a quick choke. To my mourning family, my life has been tragically ended. They did not see that I entered an underwater story to live with the alligators and become one of them. I had that dream many times throughout my childhood. (My parents gave me a little brown dog, and I named him Alligator. He lived for the thrill of chasing cars. No matter where or how we penned him, when he heard a car, he was gone. One day he finally caught a car and that was the end of him.) I believe now that I had the beginnings of polio. The alligators took it away. It is possible. This world is mysterious. [image "6706.jpg" file=Image00008.jpg] [image "6709.jpg" file=Image00009.jpg] [image "6711.jpg" file=Image00010.jpg] In those early years I lived in a world of animal powers. Most children do. In those years we are still close to the door of knowing. I got to know the trees, plants, and creatures around our little white house with red trim built in the postwar boom. Our house was one of many houses on the block. Each centered on a square of lawn, each with a gas meter perched near the street, in the place of a house altar. I played with garter snakes, horned toads, frogs, June bugs, and other creatures. Some of my favorite playmates were roly-poly bugs. They busied about with several legs and didn’t trip themselves up. They protected themselves when threatened by curling into a ball. As we played, I could see the light shining around their little armored bodies. I enjoyed lightning bugs, what others call fireflies, on long summer nights. I saw them as tiny stars lighting up the intimate, close skies of childhood. One morning I went with my mother across the street to visit her friend, another Cherokee woman.

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  116 Lecture 16: Ezekiel—Exilic Informant o Ezekiel’s selective muteness lasts for about seven years, until he receives word that Jerusalem has fallen. o Although Ezekiel’s muteness serves a clear theological purpose in the book, it also likely describes the experiences of trauma that many of the exiles had when they lost loved ones in the battle with Babylonia and were forcibly led from their homes to a foreign land. • Ezekiel also loses his wife while in exile and is told by God that he may not observe the customary mourning rites for her (Ezek. 24:16–17). o Again, Ezekiel’s personal experience of the loss of his wife becomes a symbol for the entire nation’s loss of many loved ones. o When Ezekiel explains to the exiles why he is not observing the mourning rites for his wife, he tells them that God is preparing to destroy his sanctuary, and in that destruction, the exiles’ sons and daughters—those they were forced to leave behind—will fall by the sword. Those who are already in exile, when they hear the news of the deaths of their children, will not be allowed to mourn for them. • Ezekiel also engages in a series of sign acts, what we might call today performance art. He physically enacts what siege, conquest, and deportation will mean for his people. o Every action of Ezekiel’s life becomes a sign for the people of the devastation that will come to Jerusalem when it finally falls to Babylonia. o Ezekiel knows the trauma of physical dislocation and loss of loved ones, the fear and deprivation that come with military siege, and the scenes of horror viewed by survivors as they are led out of a conquered city and into an unknown land.

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  118 Lecture 16: Ezekiel—Exilic Informant laid out on a bench in the family tomb, where it was left to decompose. Later, family members would return, gather the bones, and place them in a pit or repository in the floor of the cave, where they would rest with the bones of earlier ancestors. o Artifacts found within these burial caves, including animal bones, serving vessels, tools, weapons, and jewelry, suggest some concept of an afterlife. • Ezekiel’s many visions of death and destruction clearly spoke to a central concern of the exiles: What had happened to the love ones left unburied in Judah? To answer this question, we turn to another section of the book of Ezekiel, the section focused on restoration. Here, we find the famous vision of the valley of dry bones. o In chapter 37, the Israelite god drops Ezekiel into a valley filled with dry bones. On one level, these exposed bones are precisely the image that has haunted the exiles as they think of those in Judah whom they had to leave unburied. On another level, however, the bones are a metaphor for the exiles themselves, who have lost hope of ever returning to their homeland. o In the vision, God asks Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?” Ezekiel answers, “Only you know.” The bones are then brought to life (Ezek. 37:10). o This living, breathing host is meant to give Ezekiel prophesies to the dry bones, which then come together to form skeletons; flesh and sinews grow over the bones, and finally, God commands the wind to breathe into them. © Dr Jorgen/Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  On hearing this question, the lady fetched a deep sigh and was greatly amazed, for she was under the impression that nobody had ever discovered her secret, albeit there had been a certain amount of gossip since the murder of the man who had been buried for Tedaldo, because of certain things which had been said, rather unwisely, by the friend in whom Tedaldo had confided. ‘It is obvious,’ she replied, ‘that God reveals all of men’s secrets to you, and I therefore see no reason for attempting to conceal my own. In my younger days, I was indeed deeply in love with the unfortunate young man whose death has been imputed to my husband. I was enormously grieved to hear that he was dead, and I have wept countless tears over him, for although I assumed an air of haughty indifference towards him before he went away, neither his departure nor his long absence nor even his unfortunate death has been able to dislodge him from my heart.’ ‘You were never in love with this hapless youth who has died,’ said the pilgrim, ‘but with Tedaldo Elisei. However, tell me: what reason did you have for snubbing him? Did he ever offend you?’ ‘Oh, no!’ replied the lady. ‘He certainly never offended me. My aloofness was prompted by the words of an accursed friar, to whom I once went for confession. When I told him how much I loved this man and described the intimacy of our relationship, he gave me such a severe scolding that I have never recovered from the shock to this day, for he told me that unless I mended my ways I would be consigned to the devil’s mouth at the bottom of the abyss2 and exposed to the torments of hellfire. I was so frightened by all this that I firmly made up my mind never to have anything more to do with him. So as to remove all temptation, I refused from then on to accept any of his letters or messages. I suppose he eventually gave up and went away in despair. But if he had persevered a little longer, I am sure I would have relented, for I could see that he was wasting away like snow in the rays of the sun, and I was longing to break my resolve.’

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  ‘Sir Philip—oh, Gawd, it’s over ’is chest! It’s crushed in ’is chest—it’s the big branch wot’s given! Some one go for the doctor—go quick for Doctor Evans. Oh, Gawd, ’is mouth’s bleedin’—it’s crushed in ’is chest—Won’t nobody go for the doctor?’ The grave, rather pompous voice of Mr. Hopkins: ‘Steady, Thomas, it’s no good losin’ your head. Robert, you’d best slip over to the stables and tell Burton to go in the car for the doctor. You, Thomas, give me a hand with this bough—steady on—ease it off a bit to the right, now lift! Steady on, keep more to the right—now then, gently, gently, man—lift!’ Sir Philip lay very still on the snow, and the blood oozed slowly from between his lips. He looked monstrously tall as he lay on that whiteness, very straight, with his long legs stretched out to their fullest, so that Thomas said foolishly: ‘Don’t ’e be big—I don’t know as I ever noticed before—’ And now some one came scuttling over the snow, panting, stumbling, hopping grotesquely—old Williams, hatless and in his shirt sleeves—and as he came on he kept calling out something: ‘Master, oh, Master!’ And he hopped grotesquely as he came on over the slippery snow. ‘Master, Master—oh, Master!’ They found a hurdle, and with dreadful care they placed the master of Morton upon it, and with dreadful slowness they carried the hurdle over the lawn, and in through the door that Sir Philip himself had left standing ajar. Slowly they carried him into the hall, and even more slowly his tired eyes opened, and he whispered: ‘Where’s Stephen? I want—the child.’ And old Williams muttered thickly: ‘She’s comin’, Master—she be comin’ down the stairs; she’s here, Sir Philip.’ Then Sir Philip tried to move, and he spoke quite loudly: ‘Stephen! Where are you? I want you, child—’ She went to him, saying never a word, but she thought: ‘He’s dying—my Father.’ And she took his large hand in hers and stroked it, but still without speaking, because when one loves there is nothing left in the world to say, when the best belovèd lies dying. He looked at her with the pleading eyes of a dog who is dumb, but who yet asks forgiveness. And she knew that his eyes were asking forgiveness for something beyond her poor comprehension; so she nodded, and just went on stroking his hand. Mr. Hopkins asked quietly: ‘Where shall we take him?’ And as quietly Stephen answered: ‘To the study.’

• From The Decameron (1353)

  No man was ever more sorely distressed by the loss of the thing he loved than Filippo by the death of his wife. On finding himself bereft of the companion he adored, he firmly resolved to withdraw from the world and devote his life to the service of God, taking his little son with him. He therefore gave all he possessed to charity, and made his way forthwith to the slopes of Mount Asinaio,7 where he installed himself in a tiny little cave with his son, fasting and praying and living on alms. At all times, he took very great care not to let him see any worldly things, or even to mention their existence, lest they should distract him from his devotions. On the contrary, he was forever telling him about the glory of the life eternal, of God, and of the Saints, and all he taught him was to pray devoutly. He kept this up for a number of years, never permitting the boy to leave the cave or to see any living thing except for his father. Every so often, the good man came to Florence, where various kindly people supplied him with things he needed, and then he returned to his cave. But one day, his son, who by this time was eighteen years old, happened to ask Filippo, who had reached a ripe old age, where he was going. Filippo told him that he was going to Florence, whereupon the youth said: ‘Father, you are an old man now, and not as strong as you used to be. Why not take me with you on one of your excursions to Florence, introduce me to those charitable and devout people, and let me meet your friends? I am young, and stronger than you are, and if you do as I suggest, in future you’ll be able to send me to Florence whenever we need anything, and you can stay here.’ On reflecting that this son of his was now grown up and no longer likely to be attracted to worldly things because he was so inured to the service of God, the worthy man said to himself: ‘The fellow’s talking sense.’ And since he had to go to Florence anyway, he took him with him. When the young man saw the palaces, the houses, the churches and all the other things that meet the eye in such profusion throughout the city, he could not recall ever having seen such objects before and was filled with amazement. He questioned his father about many of them and asked him what they were called.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  He died, July 29, 1099, a fortnight after the capture of Jerusalem (July 15) by the Crusaders. § 20. Pascal II. and Henry V. 1099–1118. The letters of Paschalis II. in Migne, 163.—W. Schum: Die Politik Papst Paschalis II. gegen Kaiser Heinrich V. Erfurt, 1877. —- G. Peiser: Der deutsche Investiturstreit unter Heinrich V. bis 1111. Berlin, 1883.—Gregorovius Iv., Hauck Iii., Pflugk-Harttung: Die Bullen der Päpste. Gotha, 1901, pp. 234–263. —Mirbt, art. Paschalis II in Herzog, XIV. 717–725, and the literature there given. Pascal II., a monk of Cluny and disciple of Hildebrand, but less firm and consistent, was elected in July, 1099, and reigned till 1118. Clement III., the anti- pope, died in September, 1100, weary of the world, and left a reputation of integrity, gentleness, and dignity. The imperialist clergy of Rome elected another anti-pope, Sylvester IV., who soon disappeared noiselessly from the stage. Pascal gained a complete victory over Henry IV. by supporting the wicked rebellion of his second son, Henry V., the last of the Salic or Franconian line of emperors, 1104–1126. The unfortunate father died under the anathema in misery at Liège (Lüttich), Aug. 7, 1106. The people of the city which had remained faithful to him, lamented his death; but the papal agents commanded the bishop of Liège to remove his body from consecrated ground to an island in the Maas. Henry V. had not lost all feeling for his father, and complied with his dying request for burial in the imperial sepulchre at Spires. The clergy and the citizens accompanied the funeral procession to the cathedral of St. Mary, which the departed sovereign had himself built and richly endowed. He was buried with all honors. But when Bishop Gebhard, one of his fiercest persecutors, who was absent at the time, heard of it, he caused the body to be forthwith exhumed and removed, and interdicted all services in the church till it should be purified of all pollution. The people, however, could not be deterred from frequent visits to the unconsecrated chapel where the dishonored remains of their monarch and patron were deposited. At last the pope dissolved the ban, on the assurance of Henry V. that his father had professed sincere repentance, and his body was again deposited in the cathedral, Aug. 7, 1111. By his moral

• From The World of Biblical Israel (2013)

  171 Loss and Restoration—Two Biblical Stories Lecture 24 A s we have learned, the Bible was compiled and preserved by a remnant of Judeans who saw themselves as the memory holders for “all Israel.” On the one hand, it is a book written by and for a literate elite—the “winners” of this history. On the other hand, it is also a story of national loss—of land, family, sacred sites, and political and economic stability. It is the story of a displaced people who never fully regained a sense of home. Thus, in this closing lecture, we will look at two famous biblical stories of loss and recovery: Abraham’s near sacrifice of his son Isaac and Job’s loss of his children, his wealth, and his health. The Binding of Isaac • One of the first things that we learn about the patriarch Abraham is that his wife, Sarah, is barren. In the ancient world, children were considered a blessing from God, but they were also needed to assist in farming and household tasks and to care for their parents in old age. • For these reasons, the miraculous birth of Isaac to an aging Sarah and Abraham was greeted with incredulity and joy. But in the story known as the Binding of Isaac (Gen. 22), God directs Abraham to take his son to the mountains and sacrifice him as a burnt offering. Only the intervention of an angel at the last moment causes Abraham to stop the sacrifice. • This story evades a simple explanation or theological interpretation. In its ancient setting, it may echo known practices of child sacrifice, or it may teach the lesson of total obedience to one’s god. If, however, we read this story from the perspective of the community that ultimately preserved it—those who had experienced conquest and exile—it takes on added levels of meaning.