The City of Ladies, Christine de Pizan, a review

The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I am going to give this book four stars, for the following reasons:

It took a lot of guts to write it.

It was ground-breaking.

It serves a huge need, that of empowering and validating women.

I withhold the fifth star reluctantly but I must. The first section of the book is incredible -- personal, powerful, excellent, as Christine first agonizes over the slights and slurs and oppression that women suffer, and lays out her plan to attack it, and goes busily to work.

But then she fills a lot of space in the second section merely quoting other writers, especially Boccaccio -- rehashing some of his most dreadful tales. What woman could possibly feel inspired by the story of a wife who is lauded as a great spouse, because she allowed her husband to have their two children killed simply because he wanted it so -- saying nothing, doing nothing?

Part three is a very medieval litany of martyred saints, laid out in gruesome detail, one after another, paired with bizzare miracles, such as severed heads bleeding milk -- Mel Gibson would be proud.

I salute Christine for the importance of her work and for the beauty of her personal expressions shining through, where they do shine through. I could have done without the rest of the book.



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A new look at the Book of Abraham, and questions of faith

As a Latter-day Saint, do not buy into the insistence of some who are opposed to your faith, that the Book of Abraham is a goose which has been thoroughly cooked, a fraud to which only the ignorant still cling.

Most recently, note the work of Kerry M. Muhlestein, BYU ancient scripture professor and vice president of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities. Per BYU Magazine, Fall 2016, Muhlestein examines details of the Book of Abraham as a contributor to Laura Hales' book, "A Reason for Faith: Navigating LDS Doctrine & Church History."

He of course builds on the pioneering work of the late Hugh Nibley, which I still recommend.

Resolved:

To update this blog much more than I have in the past.

To make it a learning tool that I can share with the world.

To bring more attention to it, so that we can discuss life together.

With love,
Cliff

A good cause

There are so many ways that good people in the world are working to make it a better place. I am going to start posting links to such people when I find them. Today's choice: Join My Village, a joint project with General Mills and CARE to provide financial opportunities for entrepreneurially minded women of Malawi, Africa.

See the link at right.

The Pseudepigraphical Greek Apocalypse of Ezra

I have returned to my re-reading of a series of ancient documents associated with Jews or Christians of long ago. To what purpose? To learn more about the roots of my Judeo-Christian faith; but also to remind myself that men and women of every age have asked the same human questions: What of suffering? Does God judge justly? Why are we even here?

Tonight's reading was short and in essence, is the story of a man who got no answer to his burning question. But it also acquainted me with its first modern translator, the esteemed Constantin von Tischendorf, who traveled far and wide and labored diligently to prove to the world that the Bible had been faithfully transmitted over the centuries; as well as the recent translator of the work, Michael E. Stone, another great scholar,

Greek Apocalypse of Ezra

Once again, we have a strange little writing of unknown provenance, and a composition date that ranges from 150 to 850 A.D. We have no knowledge of whether it was ever accepted as a sacred writing, who wrote it or why, other than he was a Greek-speaking Christian and probably sought to build on existing Ezraic tradition, esp. 4th Ezra.

Though a 15th century Greek manuscript of the text was known to scholars, it fell to the great scholar Constantin von Tischendorf to publish the first edition for the modern age. (In Latin?) This was the same man who discovered the earliest extant version of the Bible, Codex Sinaiticus, in St. Catherine’s Monastery at Sinai; and who also published, in 1847, an account of his journeys, “Travels in the East.”

This edition is the work of Michael E. Stone, emeritus professor of Armenian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Another interesting scholar and a poet as well.

The writer’s God is one who can be approached, even argued with. And this Ezra does.
It begins with his request to be glorified that he may see God’s mysteries, and find an answer to his gloomy question: isn’t it better that mankind was never born?

God and Ezra both acknowledge that His judgment is just but Ezra, as noted above, wonders why sinful man was created. He gets no real response but seeks to see hell itself. The various torments bring forth his question, again, and still no answer.

Ultimately, God takes his soul to glory and the questions are never answered.