Humiliation

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 Macho Sluts (1988)

  Kay’s right hand found her urethra. She altered the angle of her left hand so that it was pressing up and began to fuck her in earnest. Roxanne had a very well-defined, large piss hole, and Kay titillated it with her index finger until the reclining, swaying girl felt a tiny spurt of urine escape from her bladder. “It’ll feel so good,” EZ promised her. “Can’t you feel it now, gushing out, running down your legs, the relief, how hot it will feel?” A fiery pain shot through Roxanne’s belly as she clamped down on the rising flood. “Don’t fight it,” EZ advised her. The gloved hand came down on her face, offering the bullet again. “Take a nice big hit and piss yourself.” Kay continued to probe her urethra, and her efforts were intensified by the amyl. “Help her out,” EZ said. “Fuck the piss out of her, Kay.” Roxanne felt another tiny spurt. She jumped and cried out, scalded. EZ slapped her face, and she pissed like a horse before the feel of the leather had faded from her cheek. As her bladder shrank, her ass expanded. Kay pushed her cupped hand in as far as it would go, until Roxanne’s bowel rebelled. It spasmed, trying to expel the hand that tormented it. “Go ahead,” Kay said. Her voice jolted Roxanne. She had somehow forgotten that it was Kay who was working in and out of her ass. EZ’s face had been with her so constantly that she had somehow come to believe that EZ was fucking her. “This part we do without the poppers, baby. Just you and me.” The discomfort was building, rising in a wave from high up in her colon. “Shit it out,” Kay said. “Come on, fucker, if you really don’t want it, hate it, can’t take it, don’t piss and moan at me, shit it out . Bet that hungry butt just chews up my hand. You’re gonna climb down on me if you do what I say, push me out .” She pushed. A ripple descended from behind her breast bone, amplified, became a wave of desperate hard contractions. Kay had a grim, fixed smile on her face. She hung on to Roxanne’s thigh with one hand and kept the other one wedged firmly in her asshole. Her rectum opened, closed, opened wider, and Kay slid in. Her querulous asshole flattened out and disappeared. It felt as if her body had swallowed the advancing hand, sucked it in instead of struggling to repel it. Now it was folded up neatly inside her, a miracle, no pain at all, just the gift, the blessing of someone entering and pleasuring this forbidden part of her body. Kay had made this new channel, made it part of her just by touching it. Her lungs hurt. Had she been shouting? They rested, Kay almost leaning on her. Roxanne shifted her position slightly to ease a cramp that was threatening to develop in her calf.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Alex went to is head and used padlocks to fasten her manacles to the chains that supported the sling. She threw EZ her keys, and EZ took off Roxanne’s ankle restraints. Kay cupped her left foot, pointed her toe and slipped it through the stirrup. Joy had done the same thing to her right foot as soon as EZ took the fetter off that ankle. EZ got up in Roxanne’s face, under Alex’s nose. “On your back and spread your legs,” she sneered. “That’s the seven words you like to hear the most, right? Gets you drippin’ in nothing flat. Well, it better. Only it’s your asshole that better start juicin’ up now, girlchild, gonna show you a new way to be a pussy. We want your ass, bitch, and we’re gonna come and get it with both hands. You can either get some sugar or get hurt. If I was you I’d rather be sweet. Understand? Understand!” Kay was pulling off each of her rings and stashing them in the pockets of her jacket. “EZ, hang this up someplace,” she said, shrugging out of it. The arms that emerged from the leather sleeves had rounded biceps and long, bulging forearms. “Takes more than fucking to put on muscle like this,” she laughed to Tyre, “but a lot of fucking don’t hurt.” She hauled on the chained-up, giant can of Crisco and plunged one hand into it, then started greasing up her left hand. Her face went expressionless. “She looks like some kind of goddess,” Chris breathed in Tyre’s ear. “A goddess of gates and furrows and wounds and the yoni, plowing and sowing, fucking and fertility, everything human but more than human.” Tyre wasn’t sure how long she could listen to this stuff about doorways and seeds and double-headed axes, and she was infinitely relieved when Michael sleazed over, squeezing her dick, and began to lick Chris’s tattoos and grope her crotch. Kay stuck a finger up Roxanne’s ass and probed. “Clean to here,” she pronounced. “Anne-Marie, you must have had her blowing her guts out.” Anne-Marie chuckled. “No, but a lot of other extraneous matter came out.” EZ had Roxanne’s face between her hands and was spitting invectives at her, alternating between threats and flattery. Roxanne was fascinated by her scowling face. It looked like a choirboy on speed, and sounded as if her mind was as spiky and messed-up as her hair. “Wiggle your ass down here,” Kay growled. Roxanne slid toward her.

• From The Story of My Experiments with Truth (An Autobiography) (1927)

  from different parts of the province, who went to Natal on indenture, came to know of this case through their indentured brethren. There was nothing extraordinary in the case itself, but the fact that there was someone in Natal to espouse their cause and publicly work for them gave the indentured labourers a joyful surprise and inspired them with hope. I have said that Balasundaram entered my office, head- gear in hand. There was a peculiar pathos about the circumstance which also showed our humiliation. I have already narrated the incident when I was asked to take off my turban. A practice had been forced upon every indentured labourer and every Indian stranger to take off his head- gear when visiting a European, whether the head- gear were a cap, a turban or a scarf wrapped round the head. A salute even with both hands was not sufficient. Balasundaram thought that he should follow the practice even with me. This was the first case in my experience. I felt humiliated and asked him to tie up his scarf. He did so, not without a certain hesitation, but I could perceive the pleasure on his face. It has always been a mystery to me how men can feel themselves honoured by the humiliation of their fellow beings. 48. THE £ 3 TAX Balasundaram’s case brought me into touch with the indentured Indians. What impelled me, however, to make a deep study of their condition was the campaign for bringing them under special heavy taxation. In the same year, 1894, the Natal Government sought to impose an annual tax of £ 25 on the indentured Indians. The proposal astonished me. I put the matter before the Congress for discussion, and it was immediately resolved to organize the necessary opposition. At the outset I must explain briefly the genesis of the tax. About the year 1860 the Europeans in Natal, finding that there was considerable scope for sugarcane cultivation, felt themselves in need of labour. Without outside labour the cultivation of cane and the manufacture of sugar were impossible, as the Natal Zulus were not suited to this form of work. The Natal Government therefore corresponded with the Indian Government, and secured their permission to recruit Indian labour. These recruits were to sign an indenture to work in Natal for five years, and at the end of the term they were to be at liberty to settle there and to have full rights of ownership of land. Those were the inducements held out to them, for the whites then had looked forward to improving their agriculture by the industry of the Indian labourers after the term of their indentures had expired. But the Indians gave more than had been expected of them. They grew large quantities of vegetables. They introduced a number of Indian varieties and made it possible to grow the local varieties cheaper. They also introduced the mango. Nor did their enterprise stop at agriculture. They entered trade. They purchased

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  “We went to dinner with Mamma and a railroad magnate who was trying to get her to star in a light musical comedy written by his oldest son. That very evening, Berenice tied me to our bed and spanked me with her own hand, on my bare bottom! I was terribly humiliated. I had never been tied up before, and certainly never been struck on my naked flesh. After she untied me, she insisted on being thanked and ordered me to kiss her all over. Instead of refusing or performing a perfunctory job, I found myself crying out passionately, fondling myself while I knelt and suckled, pleading with her to possess me completely. ‘That is just what I intend to do,’ she told me. ‘I don’t know exactly how yet, but I will learn. I will learn from you how to keep you under my dominance and make you love me, and we will never be parted, dear sister. You will always belong to me.’” Elise stopped to pour another waffle for Clarissa and refill their mugs with hot coffee. Clarissa jiggled impatiently in her chair until Elise was settled once more at the table and ready to resume her tale. “Hurry,” she urged. “I don’t want Aunt Jennifer to come and spoil the story.” Elise smiled. “I’ll try to finish. But I told you it was long. Let me see. Where was I? Oh, yes. Well, in the days that followed, I tried to please her in the smallest thing. But when the mood was on her to see me cry out and struggle, she could always detect some fault that required correction. Gradually, we began to play the game of discipline for its own sake. I fell more and more in love with Berenice, and would endure the most ingenious and barbaric tortures for the sake of her kiss and smile. Mamma was very pleased with the change in us. We no longer bothered her with our petty quarrels, and everyone could tell how fond we were of each other. “The idyll continued until I was eighteen. Mamma came home early from the theater one evening and caught Berenice in the act of whipping me with a handful of long-stemmed roses. This could have been passed off as bizarre but well-intentioned corporal punishment, and Berenice would have received no more than a scolding for being too severe. But she had stuffed a peeled persimmon up me before beginning the flagellation, and I was so frightened when I saw Mamma that it tumbled out, rolled across the floor, and came to rest at her feet.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Hard as it seemed to Fra Alberto to go on such wise, nevertheless, of the fear he had of the lady's kinsmen, he resigned himself thereto and told his host whither he would be carried, leaving the manner to him. Accordingly, the other, having smeared him all over with honey and covered him with down, clapped a chain about his neck and a mask on his face; then giving him a great staff in on hand and in the other two great dogs which he had fetched from the shambles he despatched one to the Rialto to make public proclamation that whoso would see the angel Gabriel should repair to St. Mark's Place; and this was Venetian loyalty! This done, after a while, he brought him forth and setting him before himself, went holding him by the chain behind, to the no small clamour of the folk, who said all, 'What be this? What be this?'[230] till he came to the place, where, what with those who had followed after them and those who, hearing the proclamation, were come thither from the Rialto, were folk without end. There he tied his wild man to a column in a raised and high place, making a show of awaiting the hunt, whilst the flies and gads gave the monk exceeding annoy, for that he was besmeared with honey. But, when he saw the place well filled, making as he would unchain his wild man, he pulled off Fra Alberto's mask and said, 'Gentlemen, since the bear cometh not and there is no hunt toward, I purpose, so you may not be come in vain, that you shall see the angel Gabriel, who cometh down from heaven to earth anights, to comfort the Venetian ladies.' [Footnote 230: _Che xe quel?_ Venetian for _che c'e quella cosa_, What is this thing?] No sooner was the mask off than Fra Alberto was incontinent recognized of all, who raised a general outcry against him, giving him the scurviest words and the soundest rating was ever given a canting knave; moreover, they cast in his face, one this kind of filth and another that, and so they baited him a great while, till the news came by chance to his brethren, whereupon half a dozen of them sallied forth and coming thither, unchained him and threw a gown over him; then, with a general hue and cry behind them, they carried him off to the convent, where it is believed he died in prison, after a wretched life. Thus then did this fellow, held good and doing ill, without it being believed, dare to feign himself the angel Gabriel, and after being turned into a wild man of the woods and put to shame, as he deserved, bewailed, when too late, the sins he had committed. God grant it happen thus to all other knaves of his fashion!" THE THIRD STORY [Day the Fourth]

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  You ain’t entitled to wear leather in front of this crew.” The insult made the cords on EZ’s neck stand out, but she let the jacket slide to the floor. “Chaps too, bigmouth, dumbshit, troublemakin’, good-for-nothin’. What’s the matter? Can’t bend over? Well, figure it out, ’cause nobody’s gonna help you now.” Somehow, EZ got her chaps unsnapped and the zippers undone. They joined the jacket in a pile on the floor. “Wanna save that for a rummage sale, Tyre?” Kay said. “I’d consider it a pleasure to make the first donation. Start a home for wayward girls. I know one that’s about to be homeless.” Before EZ could protest the loss of her precious leather, Kay punched a hole in her T-shirt and cut it up the front and down. She put the knife in her teeth, whirled EZ around, pulled the T-shirt slightly off her shoulders, and yanked the cords together in a neat square knot. EZ’s elbows nearly touched. Tyre had quietly folded and piled the discarded leathers on one of the bar stools. She came over now, taking her handcuffs off her belt, and handed them to Kay, who snapped them onto EZ’s wrists. “Shall I leave these on?” Kay wondered, unbuttoning the waistband of EZ’s 501s. “Kay, please—” “Shut up, I’m just talkin’ out loud to hear myself think. Yeah, I think I better leave them on. After all, you always do. I sometimes wonder if you shower with your pants on, EZ. You got something in here you don’t want me to see?” She shoved her hand down the front of the faded jeans and rummaged around. EZ bent double, trying to stop her, and Kay removed her hand and kneed her in the crotch. “No, there’s nothing there, just pussy,” she said, her voice made harsh with old grief. “That’s why you look at Michael as if looks could kill, ’cause she went out and bought herself a dick?” She smacked EZ between the legs, and let her go to her knees from the pain. “Michael, come here. Let’s get a good look at that joint of yours.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Joe was an earthy little bull who could probably fuck anything that walked, but this southern redneck was in her only because Don told him to do it, and he was determined to make her pay for the humiliation Don had inflicted upon him in front of her. Nevertheless, when he reached underneath her and began to fondle her clitoris while his penis moved in and out of her hole, she almost started to spasm. Her sexual flesh was so congested that what happened to it mattered a great deal more than what went on in her head. Don, that bastard, noticed, and moved in closer to watch. “You almost got her,” he said. “Honey, wouldn’t it be humiliating if we got you to like dick so much you just couldn’t do without it? Just imagine, hunting for it in dark bars and dirty alleys, looking for a joystick to sit on, looking for some man with a big, hard dick to hold your legs apart and sink it in, being obsessed with cock, needing it and hating it at the same time. Coming around it. Being addicted to it. Needing it there to come around. Like you need it now, to come around, to fuck you and grind you down and make you holler and groan.” He put one foot up on the bed, then gradually insinuated the toe of his boot between her legs, nudging Mike’s fingers aside. At the feel of that smooth boot leather against her clit, she couldn’t hold back any more. She mashed her pussy down onto it, cried to be fucked, and came each time Mike’s long cock slammed past her cervix. ‘At least,’ she thought, ‘I didn’t come for this fucker behind me, I came because Don’s boot was pressing against me.’ It was small consolation. The humiliation lingered, and it lit a fire that made her orgasm dwindle into irritation. She wanted more. Joe came back with a paper cup of water and held it for her to drink while Mike turned her loose. When he went to remove the nipple clamps, Don said, “Don’t. Leave them on. You, cunt. Go squat and piss.” She trotted into the bathroom and left the door open without being told. It was hard to get it started, with her insides rearranged and all of them staring at her. Finally, a hot stream spurted out. Before she got a chance to wipe herself, Don had her in handcuffs and headed toward the cage. He was impatient to get going. That meant he was planning to have a lot of fun. Shit. “You two climb into bed and amuse yourselves,” he called over his shoulder. He opened the cage door and thrust her inside, locked it, then reached through the bars for her tits.

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  I misheard him, I thought. But there was no mistaking his satisfied face, the gin-wetted lips widening with a grin. I’ll find someone else, I said. I turned away, but not before he muttered to his wife. She chortled. It was the first time she’d emitted a sound. I found Isabel, one of the other waiters, frothing hot milk into a tin. I asked if she could take the table. I’m falling behind, I explained. She looked up from the machine, surprised. I have a full section, too, she said. Please, Isabel, I said. She’d trained me during my first week here, and still passed along helpful hints. Push the branzino. That three-top tips badly. Watch out for Paul tonight. I tried to keep a light tone, but I hoped she knew I wouldn’t have asked if it weren’t urgent. I took the foamed milk; I poured it into the waiting cups. I’ll owe you, I said. She shook her head. Earrings swiveled, thin feathers. Sure, all right, she said. I returned to the other tables, but what had been an even, yielding night lost its swing and give. I fell behind. I dropped wine-bloodied napkins. Though I listed specials or balanced plates, I kept hearing the wife’s laugh. Then, standing up, a man pushed back into my shins. Careful, he said, as if I’d shoved into him. I apologized. I went to the bathroom, leaned on the sink. The basin burned white in the glass. No loss occurs in isolation, and a side profit of the faith that I missed at times like this was how easily, while Christ shone in each face, I loved. If hatred cuts both ways, to forgive can be a balm, and I often missed, as I would a friend, the more tranquil person I now had no reason to be. I opened the spigot. I washed my hands, then face; eyes closed, I saw my mother wringing out long, baptized hair, twisting it into a rope. Released, the strands flew loose, flicking wet silt. She picked me up, my legs swinging. I thought I felt His elation in her hold, glimpsed it in the silt-sparked light. I used to love imagining His hand upon me, its heft and size: I’d known His impress in the laddering of my ribs, His fingerprint in the whorl crowning my head. The God I followed had been as real to me as a living person—more real, since I’d put so much into inventing Him.

• From Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

  And he soon became rather superb, somewhat lordly with the nurse. She had rather expected it, and he played up without knowing. So susceptible we are to what is expected of us! The colliers had been so like children, talking to her, and telling her what hurt them, while she bandaged them, or nursed them. They had always made her feel so grand, almost super-human in her administrations. Now Clifford made her feel small, and like a servant, and she accepted it without a word, adjusting herself to the upper classes. She came very mute, with her long, handsome face, and downcast eyes, to administer to him. And she said very humbly: "Shall I do this now, Sir Clifford? Shall I do that?" "No, leave it for a time, I'll have it done later." "Very well, Sir Clifford." "Come in again in half an hour." "Very well, Sir Clifford." "And just take those old papers out, will you?" "Very well, Sir Clifford." She went softly, and in half an hour she came softly again. She was bullied, but she didn't mind. She was experiencing the upper classes. She neither resented nor disliked Clifford; he was just part of a phenomenon, the phenomenon of the high-class folks, so far unknown to her, but now to be known. She felt more at home with Lady Chatterley, and after all it's the mistress of the house matters most. Mrs. Bolton helped Clifford to bed at night, and slept across the passage from his room, and came if he rang for her in the night. She also helped him in the morning, and soon valeted him completely, even shaving him, in her soft, tentative woman's way. She was very good and competent, and she soon knew how to have him in her power. He wasn't so very different from the colliers after all, when you lathered his chin, and softly rubbed the bristles. The stand-offishness and the lack of frankness didn't bother her, she was having a new experience. Clifford, however, inside himself, never quite forgave Connie for giving up her personal care of him to a strange hired woman. It killed, he said to himself, the real flower of the intimacy between him and her. But Connie didn't mind that. The fine flower of their intimacy was to her rather like an orchid, a bulb stuck parasitic on her tree of life, and producing, to her eyes, a rather shabby flower.

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  I misheard him, I thought. But there was no mistaking his satisfied face, the gin-wetted lips widening with a grin. I’ll find someone else, I said. I turned away, but not before he muttered to his wife. She chortled. It was the first time she’d emitted a sound. I found Isabel, one of the other waiters, frothing hot milk into a tin. I asked if she could take the table. I’m falling behind, I explained. She looked up from the machine, surprised. I have a full section, too, she said. Please, Isabel, I said. She’d trained me during my first week here, and still passed along helpful hints. Push the branzino. That three-top tips badly. Watch out for Paul tonight. I tried to keep a light tone, but I hoped she knew I wouldn’t have asked if it weren’t urgent. I took the foamed milk; I poured it into the waiting cups. I’ll owe you, I said. She shook her head. Earrings swiveled, thin feathers. Sure, all right, she said. I returned to the other tables, but what had been an even, yielding night lost its swing and give. I fell behind. I dropped wine-bloodied napkins. Though I listed specials or balanced plates, I kept hearing the wife’s laugh. Then, standing up, a man pushed back into my shins. Careful, he said, as if I’d shoved into him. I apologized. I went to the bathroom, leaned on the sink. The basin burned white in the glass. No loss occurs in isolation, and a side profit of the faith that I missed at times like this was how easily, while Christ shone in each face, I loved. If hatred cuts both ways, to forgive can be a balm, and I often missed, as I would a friend, the more tranquil person I now had no reason to be. I opened the spigot. I washed my hands, then face; eyes closed, I saw my mother wringing out long, baptized hair, twisting it into a rope. Released, the strands flew loose, flicking wet silt. She picked me up, my legs swinging. I thought I felt His elation in her hold, glimpsed it in the silt-sparked light. I used to love imagining His hand upon me, its heft and size: I’d known His impress in the laddering of my ribs, His fingerprint in the whorl crowning my head. The God I followed had been as real to me as a living person—more real, since I’d put so much into inventing Him.

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  I took down his orders, but once I made a trip to the kitchen, I had to return to apologize. Someone else had claimed the last available chop. Is that right? he said. Extending a lightly muscled arm across the table, in a gesture more languid than alarmed, his wife moved a painted fingertip along the top of his hand, from the wrist to his third knuckle joint. He inhaled. I want to talk to Paul, he said, lowering his voice. He’s a friend of mine. Go tell Paul that Miles Harris says hello. He’ll recognize the name. I’m sorry, sir, but Mr. Conti isn’t here. I thought I saw him. Is he gone for the night? You should tell him that putting an item on his menu, then not having it—it’s false advertising, which isn’t legal. I nodded. I let him talk. Paul was downstairs, in his office. If this man had been his friend, I’d have known it by now. When I could, I apologized again. I offered cocktails, gratis; I mentioned the suckling-pig ravioli, the Michelin critic who’d extolled Michelangelo’s poached quail. I convinced him to substitute the quail for veal, but when I brought him the martinis he sent them back. I fetched a second round; he told me to wait. His round lips parted for the rill of clear liquid. He took more sips. The drink’s fine, he said, but I’ll switch waiters. I misheard him, I thought. But there was no mistaking his satisfied face, the gin-wetted lips widening with a grin. I’ll find someone else, I said. I turned away, but not before he muttered to his wife. She chortled. It was the first time she’d emitted a sound. I found Isabel, one of the other waiters, frothing hot milk into a tin. I asked if she could take the table. I’m falling behind, I explained. She looked up from the machine, surprised. I have a full section, too, she said. Please, Isabel, I said. She’d trained me during my first week here, and still passed along helpful hints. Push the branzino. That three-top tips badly. Watch out for Paul tonight. I tried to keep a light tone, but I hoped she knew I wouldn’t have asked if it weren’t urgent. I took the foamed milk; I poured it into the waiting cups. I’ll owe you, I said. She shook her head. Earrings swiveled, thin feathers. Sure, all right, she said. I returned to the other tables, but what had been an even, yielding night lost its swing and give. I fell behind. I dropped wine-bloodied napkins. Though I listed specials or balanced plates, I kept hearing the wife’s laugh. Then, standing up, a man pushed back into my shins. Careful, he said, as if I’d shoved into him. I apologized. I went to the bathroom, leaned on the sink. The basin burned white in the glass.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  13 God said to Abram, “Know for sure that your descendants will be strangers [living temporarily] in a land (Egypt) that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years. [Ex 12:40 ] 14 “But on that nation whom your descendants will serve I will bring judgment, and afterward they will come out [of that land] with great possessions. [Ex 12:35 , 36 ; Acts 7:6 , 7 ] 15 “As for you, you shall [die and] go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age. 16 “Then in the e fourth generation your descendants shall return here [to Canaan, the land of promise], for the wickedness and guilt of the f Amorites is not yet complete (finished).” [Josh 24:15 ] 17 When the sun had gone down and a [deep] darkness had come, there appeared a smoking g brazier and a flaming torch which passed between the [divided] pieces [of the animals]. [Jer 34:18 , 19 ] 18 On the same day the LORD made a covenant (promise, pledge) with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I have given this land, From the river of Egypt to the great river Euphrates— 19 [the land of] the Kenites and the Kenizzites and the Kadmonites 20 and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Rephaim, 21 the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Girgashites and the Jebusites.” Genesis 16 Sarai and Hagar 1 N ow Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not borne him any children, and she had an Egyptian maid whose name was Hagar. 2 So Sarai said to Abram, “See here, the LORD has prevented me from bearing children . I am asking you to go in to [the bed of] my maid [so that she may bear you a child]; perhaps I will a obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to Sarai and did as she said. 3 After Abram had lived in the land of Canaan ten years, Abram’s wife Sarai took Hagar the Egyptian [maid], and gave her to her husband Abram to be his [secondary] wife. 4 He went in to [the bed of] Hagar, and she conceived; and when she realized that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress [regarding Sarai as insignificant because of her infertility]. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “May [the responsibility for] the wrong done to me [by the arrogant behavior of Hagar] be upon you. I gave my maid into your arms, and when she realized that she had conceived, I was despised and looked on with disrespect. May the LORD judge [who has done right] between you and me.” 6 But Abram said to Sarai, “Look, your maid is entirely in your hands and subject to your authority; do as you please with her.” So Sarai treated her harshly and humiliated her, and Hagar fled from her.

• From The Ice Storm (1994)

  The sinister combs, of all shapes and stripes, plastic and onyx, contemporary and antique, the combs that decorated Dot’s half-bath, pressed in against him. He guzzled water from the spigot, his lips curled unsanitarily around it. He was unshaven. His ascot had disappeared somewhere. He wondered if his overcoat was still in the guest room by the front door, and if his wallet was in it. The modern domestic tale always features the ordeal and dismemberment of a father. This was the dim certainty to which Hood awoke. His consciousness had closed down, had narrowed down to a dot, like the old monochrome television sets when you shut them off. Sometime in the midst of the party his consciousness had closed down. He wasn’t sure how he had arrived in the bathroom, how he had spilled these flecks of upchuck on himself. Gray, isolated moments of conversation returned. He had a vivid recollection of being inches from his wife’s face and, in the midst of some debate, losing control of his own saliva, so that a tusk of the stuff protruded from his cavernous and angry mouth. Later, he remembered trying to speak to Rob Halford, trying to apologize for something and finding himself suddenly, inappropriately alone. Halford had just walked out of the conversation, had simply walked away without excuse or apology. Hood had been in the middle of a sentence, in the middle of a heartfelt confession, and Rob had simply given up on him. Benjamin was treated with contempt at these parties, it became obvious to him now. He was treated like a common bum. And like a bum he remembered finishing his conversation out loud, to himself. In isolation. Alone. Now he wandered the spotless first floor of the Halfords’ house as though its emptiness was his responsibility. None of the lights worked. The clocks were stopped. Hood’s coat remained on the bed in the guest room where he had left it. It was like a disconsolate body spread there. In the front hall, his keys lay in the salad bowl, unchosen from the night before. So Benjamin Hood left the way he had come, trying to undo what faulty recollections he had of the evening’s mindless pleasures. He’d felt worse, but not that he could remember. Outdoors he came face-to-face with the crippling elements. The ice was like some polystyrene coating that separated him from the world, some wax curtain that pronounced his guilt—guilty of drunkenness, of boorishness, of adultery, of forging a bad relationship with chance. Guilty of presuming upon chance. Guilty of weakening and diluting what bonds of family remained in his family. Guilty of following bad impulses to their bad conclusions. He was quarantined and he deserved it. At least the Firebird remained in the driveway. But the driver’s-side lock was frozen. This was just the next embarrassment. He didn’t even curse. He undertook that procedure well known in more northerly climates. It was time- consuming but he had time.

• From Understanding the Old Testament (2019)

  155 BiBliogra Phy Levenson, Jon D. “The Exodus and Biblical Theology.” Biblical Theology Bulletin 26 (1996): 4-10. Points out that God does not deliver Israel in Exodus because he regularly sets captive people free but because of his covenant with Israel, suggesting liberation theology could be cultural appropriation. Lohfink, Norbert. Qoheleth: A Continental Commentary . Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003. Excellent commentary on Qohelet that highlights the joy promoted in the book. Longman, Tremper. The Book of Ecclesiastes . Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007. Another great commentary on Qohelet that emphasizes the joy promoted in the book. Meyers, Carol Discovering Eve: Ancient Israelite Women in Context . New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. Discusses the advent of patriarchy in the words of God to the woman at the end of Genesis 3. Meynet, Roland. “Two Decalogues, Law of Freedom.” Studia Rhetorica 16 (2004): 1–35. Explains the use of “serve” in the Ten Commandments and how the commandments guarantee freedom, not slavery. ———. Called to Freedom . Miami, Florida: Convivium, 2009. Expansion of the author’s 2004 article on the Ten Commandments as a guarantee of freedom. Middleton, J. Richard. The Liberating Image: The Imago Dei in Genesis 1. Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2005. Best analysis of what “made in the image and likeness of God” has meant to interpreters and actually means in the text. Miller, Robert D., II. Chieftains of the Highland Clans: A Social History of Israel in the 12th and 11th Centuries BC. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005. Repr. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2012. Your lecturer explains how to tell Israelites from Canaanites and the relationship of archaeology of the Early Iron Age to the Book of Judges.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  1 Chronicles 19 David’s Messengers Abused 1 N OW IT came about after this, that Nahash king of the Ammonites died, and his son became king in his place. 2 David said, “I will be kind (gracious) to Hanun son of Nahash, because his father was kind to me.” So David sent messengers to comfort him concerning [the death of] his father. And the servants of David came to the land of the Ammonites to comfort Hanun. 3 But the leaders of the Ammonites said to Hanun, “a Do you think that David has sent people to console and comfort you because he honors your father? Have his servants not come to you to search and to overthrow and to spy out the land?” 4 Therefore Hanun took David’s servants, shaved them [cutting off half their beards], and cut off their garments in the middle as far as their buttocks, and sent them away [in humiliation]. 5 When David was told how the men were treated, he sent messengers to meet them, for they were very humiliated and ashamed [to return]. So the king said, “Stay in Jericho until your beards grow [back], and then return.” 6 When the Ammonites saw that they had made themselves hateful to David, Hanun and his people sent 1,000 talents of silver to hire for themselves chariots and horsemen from Mesopotamia, Aram-maacah, and Zobah. 7 So they hired for themselves 32,000 chariots and the king of Maacah and his troops, who came and camped before Medeba. And the Ammonites gathered together from their cities and came to battle. 8 When David heard about it , he sent Joab and all the army of courageous men. 9 The Ammonites came out and lined up in battle formation at the entrance of the city [Medeba], while the kings who had come were by themselves in the open country. Ammon and Aram Defeated 10 Now when Joab saw that the battle was set against him in the front and in the rear, he chose warriors from all the choice men of Israel and put them in formation against the Arameans (Syrians). 11 The rest of the soldiers he placed in the hand of Abishai his brother, and they lined up against the Ammonites. 12 He said, “If the Arameans are too strong for me, then you shall help me; but if the Ammonites are too strong for you, I will help you. 13 “Be strong and let us show ourselves courageous for the sake of our people and for the cities of our God; and may the LORD do what is good in His sight.” 14 So Joab and the people who were with him approached the Arameans for battle, and they fled before him. 15 When the Ammonites saw that the Arameans fled, they also fled before Abishai, Joab’s brother, and entered the city [Medeba]. Then Joab came to Jerusalem.

• From Unbought and Unbossed: Transgressive Black Women, Sexuality, and Representation (2014)

  It is precisely this notion with which the reverend must contend; for, upon his realization that Etta is no more intent than he on future encounters and as relieved as himself to part, he attempts to assuage his fractured male ego by characterizing Etta as a "worldly" woman-one outside convention and, even more precisely, the church. The paradox, however, is that his conduct as a preacher is far less conventional than Etta's since he violated the rules of the religious practice he chose and in which he was ordained. The reverend judges his own behavior gently as "temporary weakness of the flesh," displacing his own sexual indiscretion onto Etta, who "got out of the car unassisted and didn't bother to turn and watch the taillights as it pulled off down the deserted avenue adjacent to Brewster Place" (72). "Black male sexuality differs from female sexuality because black men have," as Cornel West posits, "different self-images and strategies of acquiring power in the patriarchal structures of white America and black communities."12 Whereas Reverend Moreland anticipated governing the terms of their next encounter and having control over whether or not it ever occurs, Etta, in a move that exposes her own sexual autonomy, transgressive behavior, and empowerment, expects nothing more in a mutual discontinuation of sexual engagements. She walks away, disregarding the reverend, just as he ostensibly would have done. And so, even if Etta did not necessarily beat him at his own "game," she did alter the rules of engagement, renegotiating, as she always does, the fundamental right of the game to exist. This scene and Etta's cumulative experiences with the reverend offer another critique of religion that parallels the problematic dynamics it presents in Mattie's situation regarding sex as unorthodox. Yet, instead of a castigation of religion for a repressiveness that leads to experimentation and negative consequences (pregnancy, in Mattie's scenario), the critique here is of the inhibitions in the preacher, who, despite his religious position, operates off of lust and a masculinist hegemony regarding Etta. He attempts to attain sexual gratification through an objectification and reduction of her to a sexual being-or, in his words, a "worldly" woman. In this regard, he commits "fornication" in the Greek and loaded sense of the word in that he engages in "the objectification of another human being for the purposes of self-gratification."13

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  37 “Thus you will [reverently] say to the prophet, ‘What has the LORD answered you?’ and, ‘What has the LORD spoken?’ 38 “For if you say, ‘The oracle of the LORD !’ surely thus says the LORD , ‘Because you said this word, “The oracle of the LORD !” when I have also sent to you, saying, “You shall not say, ‘The oracle of the LORD !’ ” ’ 39 “Therefore behold, I, even I, will assuredly forget you and send you away from My presence, you and the city (Jerusalem) which I gave to you and to your fathers. 40 “And I will bring an everlasting disgrace on you and a perpetual humiliation (shame) which will not be forgotten.” Jeremiah 24 Baskets of Figs and the Returnees 1 A fter Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had taken Jeconiah [who was also called Coniah and Jehoiachin] the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and the princes of Judah [along] with the craftsmen and smiths into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, the LORD showed me [in a vision] two baskets of figs set before the temple of the LORD . 2 One basket had very good figs, like the figs that are the first to ripen; but the other basket had very bad figs, so rotten that they could not be eaten. 3 Then the LORD said to me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” And I said, “Figs, the good figs, very good; and the bad figs, very bad, so rotten that they cannot be eaten.” 4 Again the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 5 “Thus says the LORD , the God of Israel, ‘Like these good figs, so I will regard as good the captives of Judah, whom I have sent from this place into the land of the Chaldeans. 6 ‘For I will set My eyes on them for good, and I will bring them again to this land; and I will build them up and not overwhelm them, and I will plant them and not uproot them. 7 ‘I will give them a heart to know Me, [understanding fully] that I am the LORD ; and they will be My people, and I will be their God, for they will return to Me with their whole heart. 8 ‘And as for the bad figs, which are so rotten that they cannot be eaten,’ surely thus says the LORD , ‘so I will abandon Zedekiah king of Judah and his princes, and the remnant of Jerusalem who remain in this land and those who live in the land of Egypt. 9 ‘I will make them a focus of ridicule and disappointment [tossed back and forth] among all the kingdoms of the earth, a [notorious] disgrace, a byword, a taunt and a curse in all places where I will scatter them.

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

  But, by the intrigues of the Monophysite empress, his successor, Pope Silverius (a son of Hormisdas, 536–538), was deposed on the charge of treasonable correspondence with the Goths, and banished to the island of Pandataria, whither the worst heathen emperors used to send the victims of their tyranny, and where in 540 he died—whether a natural or a violent death, we do not know. Vigilius, a pliant creature of Theodora, ascended the papal chair under the military protection of Belisarius (538–554). The empress had promised him this office and a sum of money, on condition that he nullify the decrees of the council of Chalcedon, and pronounce Anthimus and his friends orthodox. The ambitious and doubled-tongued prelate accepted the condition, and accomplished the deposition, and perhaps the death, of Silverius. In his pontificate occurred the violent controversy of the three chapters and the second general council of Constantinople (553). His administration was an unprincipled vacillation between the dignity and duties of his office and subservience to an alien theological and political influence; between repeated condemnation of the three chapters in behalf of a Eutychianizing spirit, and repeated retraction of that condemnation. In Constantinople, where he resided several years at the instance of the emperor, he suffered much personal persecution, but without the spirit of martyrdom, and without its glory. For example, at least according to Western accounts, he was violently torn from the altar, upon which he was holding with both hands so firmly that the posts of the canopy fell in above him; he was dragged through the streets with a rope around his neck, and cast into a common prison; because he would not submit to the will of Justinian and his council. Yet he yielded at last, through fear of deposition. He obtained permission to return to Rome, but died in Sicily, of the stone, on his way thither (554). Pelagius I. (554–560), by order of Justinian, whose favor he had previously gained as papal legate at Constantinople, was made successor of Vigilius, but found only two bishops ready to consecrate him. His close connection with the East, and his approval of the fifth ecumenical council, which was regarded as a partial concession to the Eutychian Christology, and, so far, an impeachment of the authority of the council of Chalcedon, alienated many Western bishops, even in Italy, and induced a temporary suspension of their connection with Rome. He issued a letter to the whole Christian world, in which he declared his entire agreement with the first four general councils, and then vindicated the fifth as in no way departing from the Chalcedonian dogma. But only by the military aid of Narses could he secure subjection; and the most refractory bishops, those of Aquileia and Milan, he sent as prisoners to Constantinople. In these two Justinian-made popes we see how much the power of the Roman hierarchy was indebted to its remoteness from the Byzantine despotism, and how much it was injured by contact with it.

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  21 “And I will clothe him with your tunic [of distinction] And tie your sash securely around him. I will entrust him with your authority; He will become a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. 22 “Then I will set on his shoulder the key of the house of David; When he opens no one will shut, When he shuts no one will open. 23 “I will drive him like a peg in a firm place, And he will become a throne of honor and glory to his father’s house. 24 “So they will hang on him all the honor and glory [the complete responsibility] of his father’s house, offspring and issue [of the family, high and low], all the least of the articles, from the bowls to all the jars. 25 “In that day,” declares the LORD of hosts, “the peg (Eliakim) that was driven into the firm place will give way; it will even break off and fall, and the burden hanging on it will be cut off, for the LORD has spoken.” Isaiah 23 The Fall of Tyre 1 T HE [MOURNFUL, inspired] oracle (a a burden to be carried) concerning b Tyre: Wail, O ships of Tarshish, For Tyre is destroyed, without house, without harbor; It is reported to them from the land of Cyprus (Kittim). 2 Be silent, you inhabitants of the coastland, You c merchants of Sidon; d Your messengers crossed the sea 3 And they were on great waters. The grain of the e Shihor, the harvest of the Nile River, was Tyre’s revenue; And she was the market of nations. 4 Be ashamed, O Sidon [mother-city of Tyre, now like a widow bereaved of her children]; For the sea speaks, the stronghold of the sea, saying, “I have neither labored nor given birth [to children]; I have neither brought up young men nor reared virgins.” 5 When the report reaches Egypt, They will be in agony at the report about Tyre. 6 Cross over to Tarshish [to seek safety as exiles]; Wail, O inhabitants of the coastland [of Tyre]. 7 Is this your jubilant city, Whose origin dates back to antiquity, Whose feet used to carry her [far away] to colonize distant places? 8 Who has planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, Whose merchants were princes, whose traders were the honored of the earth? 9 The LORD of hosts has planned it, to defile the pride of all beauty, To bring into contempt and humiliation all the honored of the earth. 10 Overflow your land like [the overflow of] the Nile, O Daughter of Tarshish; There is no more restraint [on you to make you pay tribute to Tyre]. 11 He has stretched out His hand over the sea, He has shaken the kingdoms; The LORD has given a command concerning Canaan to destroy her strongholds and her fortresses [like Tyre and Sidon].

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  As the youngest and quietest, I was pushed to the aisle, just beside the next table of straights, two couples on dates, slumming, I guess. I prayed for the guys in my group to calm down. But the presence of hostile, if mesmerized, heterosexual spectators made them hysterical. Morris leaned across the table and asked a “sister” huskily, “Like my lashes? Ronnie dyed them, said it’d give me definition.” “Honey, the only definition that fits you starts with Q and rhymes with—waitress, beer, please,” he shouted at an old tattooed man in white shirt-sleeves who worked the lobster shift. He looked at the waiter more closely. “Oh, you’re a waiter, not a waitress. Sorry, Dearie, I thought you were a Fish for a moment, there’s such a strong smell of Fish in here tonight, wouldn’t you say?” He was staring aggressively at the two girls beside me. “Can’t bear Fish or Fisheaters, smell like cans of old tuna.” The girls had stopped chewing their gum and were noisily sucking the ice melt in their Coke glasses. I smiled conspiratorially at them, as if to say, Aren’t these guys weird, but I noticed that they were looking back at me with open disgust. One of their dates said, “Some people are sick, real sick,” which touched off a volley of birdcalls at our table (“Are you sick? Who’s sick? You don’t look sick”) and a whole dumbshow of fever tests (palm on forehead) and tongue checks (“Say ah”). For the first time I’d crossed the line. I was no longer a visitor to the zoo, but one of the animals. My mother had just moved to downtown Chicago, to a brand-new high-rise along Lake Michigan, a place where the floors were raw concrete and had to be covered by wall-to-wall carpeting. Hers was gold, as were the sheer curtains woven with metallic thread, and the upholstered armchairs and sectional sofa. The windows were sealed shut; cooled or warmed air seeped in through vents. From the twenty-fourth floor I looked down on the older buildings and across to the newer ones. Their windows reflected the light or sank into shadow or glowed from within as the heavens turned, as a construction crane turned atop a rising tower or stood, dozing, inert against the night sky. Twenty-four stories below, over and over again a traffic signal gave its crude demonstration of spectrum analysis: red, yellow, green, and back again, a primary lesson sometimes imparted to the glossy hood of a car, sometimes wasted on the rain-slick pavement. Out of another window the winter lake at night, unheard behind glass, flickered with foam like the black-and-white television I kept on, sound off, for the wan company it provided, Sid Caesar doing a pratfall, Imogene Coca mugging. When my mother was out for the evening I’d take off my clothes and dance naked, barefoot, through the dim apartment on the shaggy carpets. The glittering spires outside surrounded me like astounded adults.