Reggae Psalmist

As we looked at Psalm 137 in class, I recalled that Matisyahu had written a song based on it. Alter tells us that "This psalm was almost certainly composed shortly after the deportation of the Judeans by the Babylonians in 586 BCE - the experience of exile is fresh and acutely painful." (Alter, p. 473).

 

Here are the lyrics, with verses from Psalm 137 and some comments:

 

[Chorus]: Jerusalem, if I forget you, fire not gonna come from me tongue. Jerusalem, if I forget you, let my right hand forget what it's supposed to do. In the ancient days, we will return with no delay Picking up the bounty and the spoils on our way We've been traveling from state to state And them don't understand what they say 3,000 years with no place to be And they want me to give up my milk and honey Don't you see, it's not about the land or the sea Not the country but the dwelling of his majesty [chorus] Rebuild the temple and the crown of glory Years gone by, about sixty Burn in the oven in this century And the gas tried to choke, but it couldn't choke me I will not lie down, I will not fall asleep They come overseas, yes they're trying to be free Erase the demons out of our memory Change your name and your identity Afraid of the truth and our dark history Why is everybody always chasing we Cut off the roots of your family tree Don't you know that's not the way to be [chorus] Caught up in these ways, and the worlds gone craze Don't you know it's just a phase Case of the Simon says If I forget the truth then my words won't penetrate Babylon burning in the place, can't see through the haze Chop down all of them dirty ways, That's the price that you pay for selling lies to the youth No way, not ok, oh no way, not ok, hey Aint no one gonna break my stride Aint no one gonna hold me down Oh no, I got to keep on moving Stay alive [chorus]

v. 5,6: Should I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand wither. May my tongue cleave to my palate if I do not recall you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my chief joy. The chorus is almost identical to these verses; clearly they were the inspiration. v.4: How can we sing a song of the Lord on foreign soil? The roughly 3000 years since the Babylonian captivity show that Matisyahu understands the historical context of the Psalm. We see here references to the rebuilding of the temple, an important promise the Jewish people are waiting for. The oven and gas are specific references to the Holocaust, which are then expanded into a general statement about antisemitism, "our dark history". v. 8: Daughter of Babylon the despoiler, happy who pays you back in kind, for what you did to us.

Obviously, not all the verses line up perfectly, and there is a lot added in Matisyahu's song that is nowhere to be found in the Psalm. He is taking the central elements of the Psalm and putting them in a framework that shows their relevance today, just like many translations (such as the Bay Psalm book) strive to do: The Captivity is expanded to today in some senses, particularly in respect to antisemitism; the longing for Jerusalem goes beyond a geographical or political intent, it is a desire for unity, for God's presence, and for the rebuilding of the temple.

Thus, we can see how even without Christianity, just within Judaism, the Psalms can be understood in a larger context and applied to modern situations. The original authors never could have foreseen these expansion of the meaning, though they probably anticipated reuse of their words in some form.

Psalms - The difficulty of Poetry

It seems to me that the underlying difficulty in studying the Psalms is that they are, primarily, poetry. And poetry, more than more concrete literary forms, is highly dependent on the culture and context it is written in. Translators of the Psalms are met with the difficulty of taking on the viewpoint of the Hebrew people of that time (so as to understand the Psalms correctly), and then, in translating, to give us the same poetic effect. In some cases, I would go so far as to say that a technically correct translation and a translation that conveys the same poetic or emotional content might be mutually exclusive. This can be remedied by educating the reader (as through footnotes), to assist him in understanding those aspects of the text that could not be translated well.
On that basis, I think one must proceed cautiously when comparing translations of the Psalms. We must ask who, when, why, and with what intent about the translators as much as we do about the original authors.
Robert Alter's translation is mainly concerned with literal, historical accuracy, and secondly attempt to maintain a poetic sense (the success of the latter is debatable). The Bay Psalm Book, to which I will be comparing it, was the first book printed (and written) in British America. It was translated by a group of Puritan ministers. While it is in parts remarkably accurate considering the circumstances under which it was written, it was written in meter, thus possibly damaging the accuracy.

In Psalm 2 we see two significant variances.

The first lies in the word which Alter (and most common translations) translate as "nations", in the context of the statement: "Why are the nations aroused, and the people murmur vain things?" Psalm 2:1.
The Bay Psalm Book translates as follows: . The choice of the word heathen is curious - it seems to bear little relation to "nations". We might write it off as an intentional reinterpretation by the Puritans. No doubt it was, but it may not be so far from the original meaning as we would assume. The Hebrew people were simultaneously a religious, a cultural, and a political entity, and attacking one aspect of this was an attack on the other parts. Even in Alter's translation, though this first verse might be understood politically, the second states that worldly rulers conspire "against the Lord." Since the Puritans were reading the Psalms from a Christian context, an attack against Israel would make little sense, but an attack against Christianity or against their God would - thus, translating "nations" as "heathen" simply refers to enemies of their God. It is technically inaccurate, though for the people at the time, it may have provided them with the most understandable paraphrase.

The second difference is at the end of the Psalm. What Alter translates as "With purity be armed", the Bay Psalm Book writes as"Kiss yee the Sonne".
This is a significant difference. In Alter's footnotes, he mentions that the verb for "be armed" could also mean "kiss", and that the phrase makes little sense. He also explains that he has "revocaliz[ed] bar (son? wheat?) as bor, purity." (Alter, p.7) Thus, it seems that the Bay Psalm book is completely justifiable based on the original text. It surprises me that Alter did not indicate the possibility of this translation, and causes me to wonder about his translating practice. He explains in the introduction that he has tried to remove Christian imagery from the Psalms. Perhaps he has been over-enthusiastic in this respect - for the translation from the Bay Psalm book makes perfect sense in the context of the Psalm. Alter translated verse 6 and 7 in a way that makes clear that (in whatever sense), the King is referred to as God's Son. In his footnotes, he clarifies that this is not to be understood in a Christological sense. I understand that, but it makes it even more confusing that he avoided the translation of "Kiss the Son".

At random, I read another Psalm (Psalm 4), in both translations, and found them remarkably similar. Most differences in the Bay Psalm Book could be accounted for by the need to remain in meter. Two things I will point out: First, what Alter translates (presumably more correctly) as "vain things", the Bay Psalm book writes as "vanity", a rather significant change in tone, that I think we could ascribe to a Puritan interpretation. On the other hand, there was no attempt made to hide the following passage which speaks of gladness coming from corn and new wine. This casual treatment of drinking seems to indicate - in contrast to the choice of the word "vanity" - that the translators were committed to an accurate translation, even when it differed from how they generally understood things.


Comparing these two translations has been inconclusive, thus far. While the Bay Psalm Book is known not to be perfectly accurate, I am surprised to find that in the place that it differed most significantly from Alter's translation, it was in fact more accurate - it seems that the surrounding culture influenced both the Puritans and Alter. In a broader perspective, I found that the translations remain remarkably similar.

#4 - Symbolic piles of dirt?

For your next blog post read chapters 3-5 of Indian Mounds of Wisconsin. Locate as well on the Web an image of effigy mounds (one or more) in Wisconsin. For the image you may want to look at the website for Effigy Mounds National Monument, the Wisconsin Historical Society, or even do a Google image search. Just make sure you find an effigy mound. Find an image and include it at the head of your blog post. Then explain how these mounds reflect the "system of symbols" in Geertz's definition of religion. Another way to think about this would be to ask how effigy mounds "formulate conceptions of a general order of existence."

I do not mean to be condescending by calling Effigy Mounds piles of dirt - I merely wish to point out how trivial or common they are, in that sense. It is only through their symbolism that they gain such historical, social, archeological, and (to Native Americans) spiritual importance.

 

These mounds developed out of the older tradition of burial mounds, which were of spiritual significance to the Indians. As we know from pottery and modern Native American knowledge and folklore, their traditional belief systems were structured by the duality of overworld and underworld  - the underworld being seperated into water and land. The creatures represented by effigy mounds clearly represent the beings from these different spiritual realms. Not only are they similar to the images found on pottery, their geographical distribution corresponds to features of the landscape (more water-creature mounds are found in areas abundant with lakes and rivers).

I find it most curious how in this case, the symbols are much easier to identify than the beliefs that accompanied them. That is not always the case, as we discussed when looking for symbols in Scientology. Current study on Effigy Mounds suspects that the mounds were places for social gatherings and rituals, and were created to create harmony in the world. I would love to know how Indians thought they created harmony. Did the spirits see the mounds and understand them as a call for action? Did the mounds actually create spirits or turn into spirits? Were they only a reminder for the Natives, with the actual effects being brought about by the accompanying rituals? These types of questions are probably the most difficult to answer archeologically, but some beliefs of this sort very likely existed.

My cousin's comment on the long 3rd entry

I apologize for the length of blog #3, it was an important point to me and I got carried away.

Anyway, here is one thing my cousin said about it, which helps explain it:

As usual, there's the problem of definitions. You can get very confused by using the same words as other people but meaning something else. I think everybody is religious if you mean they have faith in something that they can't prove, or if you mean that they make rules for themselves to follow in all of life that they think aren't just things they made up (re - ligare -- to bind again, if that's even the right etymology), or that people have developed entire systems of thought that function as systems and which affect everything they do (I think this is maybe what Abraham Kuyper meant?) But then there's the Henry James definition, something like "related to experiences that are transcendental" (what you mean by "spiritual"?) and then "thinks there's a supernatural world". "Science" could just be any body of knowledge, or it could be induction + falsification, which both apply to religion somewhat, or it could be induction + falsification according to a particular social program (induction + falsification about things that everybody can access publicly, ideally repeatable) which gives rise to the "science" in "science class", which is really just information about the natural world. It seems the big division is between public experience and private experience, as to the popular distinctions between "science" and "religion". - James Banks

#3 - The Materialist Religion

Today, we discussed the Indian mounds in Wisconsin, and how the new European settlers explained them through their Religion - more broadly, we studied how people groups will incorporate new discoveries into their Religions to make them explainable.

Central to my point is the following quote from my professor: "The purpose of this class is to bring religion into the realm of argument, leaving to the side the argument of what's true and what's not true."

Ok, what? We're discussing Religions from a scientific point of view, but not whether they are true or not. And yet, we are discussing truth? Here's another quote:

"...Scientology can be critiqued from the point of science." - Woah, so we could critique them scientifically. I guess that means we are just assuming them to be scientifically false, correct?

"You get something strange on the landscape that you can't explain; the Natives don't seem capable to do it, so you kind of explain it through your religion." So we're saying that religion is the way we explain those things that we can't explain.... that we can't explain rationally, is the implication.

However, we did recognize in class that on the basis of these false, unscientific assumptions, Religions are built quite rationally. When I suggested that a Religion could be scientific, however, I was abruptly confronted on the matter: "I wouldn't use the word Science. Science is based on testing and being willing to overturn your theories."

Ok, so I see that two important aspects of Science are (1)peer review and the (2)willingness to change theories based on new evidence.

Well, (1) peer review implies that a scientist cannot simply state a fact, it must be agreed upon or recognized by the scientific community. Religions have this too. Our studies have frequently affirmed that Religions are always group phenomena, and that their sense of truth relies heavily on being confirmed by others.

I don't even have to argue (2) the willingness to change theories, because my teacher did so for me: "At some point, things don't make sense [according to older beliefs] and people come up with a different story."

I am sure you have a few points heavily burning in your mind right now. You are thinking (a) religious group follow whatever their leaders invent, and don't think themselves, (b) science proves things, whereas religious explanations just coincidentally are true for the most part, and so the hypotheses are accepted as fact over time, (c) Religions will force what they see into their Theistic worldview, whether it supports that or not, and (d) Religions are influenced by their need to create (comfortable) explanations for things we don't understand.

I think those are enough to drive my point.

(a) Religious groups do follow their leaders to various degrees, on the assumption that these leaders are more knowledgeable and better at perceiving truths. This is not at all different from scientific experts, whom those who know less about a field will trust based on their studies and reputation for integrity.

(b) Religions simply incorporate hypotheses over time to become fact. Science has been known for ages to do this; the idea that the world is flat influenced a lot of astronomical and geographical studies, which, based on this assumption, are in fact very logical and rational. We commonly accept gravity as an everyday fact - but it is a name, a symbol, for a phenomenon which science to this day has difficulty explaining (You don't think so? Yes, we can calculate it and describe it, but why it happens is not known - we think it relates to the theory of relativity. Which is a theory.)

(c) Religions will force what they see into their Theistic worldview. Yes, indeed. And here they differ, for popular materialistic science openly admits that it will force discoveries into a non-Theistic worldview. As Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin said: “It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation* of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.” (quoted from Phillip E. Johnson’s book “Defeating Darwinism”). On a side note, a student in class said about Religions that there is "a balance of mystical things and things that are actually true." I would suggest that Religions have the right to say the same of Science (where for instance the paradox of light being both wave and particle, which are mutually exclusive, is widely accepted).

And the last one: (d) Religions are influenced by their need to create (comfortable) explanations for things we don't understand. Oh, this is a fun one. I put the word "comfortable" in because that is a basic assumption people often carry toward religious people. However, most Religions include some type of Hell, Judgement, Punishment - they include moral and ethical codes to follow, angry gods to appease, rituals to perform. So we can dismiss of the word "comfortable": Religions are influenced by a need to create explanations for things we don't understand. As our instructor said, people "make meaning actively out of their world - and that's kind of this religious framework through which they see things." Woah! We make meaning, and see things through these explanations. That is exactly how science works. We explain phenomena we see, we verify (when possible), and if others agree, than we base our future thoughts and investigations on this new knowledge.


One more point:

First, we might point out the Spiritual element of religions. The odd thing is, there are many atheists who consider themselves spiritual. I am Christian, and yet I very rarely feel spiritual at all. But assuming that one does base knowledge on spiritual perceptions - who ever declared that our physical senses are less biased than our spiritual ones? Do we assume there is no spiritual world, and therefore spiritual perceptions are illegitimate? That same approach could destroy the validity our material perceptions. And as stated earlier, all of these things are group phenomena: Many scientists identify the same effects in their experiments or observations of the world, people in Religions agree that they have similar spiritual experiences, sometimes distanced by time or space. A person might very well spiritually become convinced that there is no God, or, on the other hand, materially become convinced that there is a God.

Let's not put to the side the argument of what's true and what's not true. Only someone who fears that they are wrong would do so. I agree with convinced atheists on this point: That it is a weak excuse to insist that things are 'your truth, my truth'. We have the capability to compare and discuss, and if two disagree, then at least one is wrong. It could be me. Or perhaps not.


*PS: See where I underlined and put that star? He is openly stating that science does not go against a belief in God. BKMW

#2 - It's hard to be an animal

Last class period, we watched some excerpts from a documentary of Timothy Treadwell called "Grizzly Man".

 

Mr. Treadwell spent 13 Summers with the bears, protecting them and spending the rest of the year trying to convince people to support them. And then a bear ate him.

My point is not to be cynical about his death - it is difficult to write him off as crazy when he did survive for so many years. Rather, I find it an intriguing situation to see how we are like animals, and how we are not. Not least, religion plays into this, both as a motivation to try to live with animals, and as something that distinguishes us from them.

It is difficult to imagine someone closer to animals than Mr. Treadwell. He lived, often with no human companions, with the bears, for months at a time. He was willing to die for them (and he did), he talked to them. And yet, the gaps he breaches between humans and animals are much fewer than those that remain. He films the bears, he considers himself their protector, he studies them - all of these things set him apart from them in significant ways.

Evolution says that we are animals, and yet our entire nature denies it. Even when we live in the midst of them, our psychological make up denies that we are the same - whether we truly are different or not, I will not discuss here.

It seems impossible to really think of oneself as an animal. Even the awareness of being an animal, or the attempt to be one, are something that would never occur to an animal. No other living being discusses whether or not it should be considered the same category as other beings, so the discussion of the matter alone is enough to separate us. I suppose there may be people who really are like animals - but if they are, they would neither be aware of that fact, nor care to defend it, so it's unlikely we'll ever hear from them.

At the center of the question of our difference from other animals (our "dignity", perhaps) is the desire to know our purpose, who we are, why we exist. This is also a central motivation behind religion (and Religions), and one of the main questions they seek to answer. While Hinduism in a sense puts us on a similar plane as animals, most Religions give humans a special role - as something specially placed by God, or as those whom He has given the rest of nature to as a gift and a responsibility.

And really, if it were relatively normal for a human to consider themselves on the same level as animals, people like the Grizzly Man probably wouldn't attract this much attention.

I guess it's just really hard to be an animal.

Moo. (Or as a human, do I consider speaking my mooing?)

#1 - Should we ditch religion?

Assignment: For your inaugural blog read the article "Why We Believe" on Moodle and then watch the short video clip by Sam Harris on ditching religion. Write your own reflection on whether or not religion is something that should be ditched by people. Does the article "Why We Believe" contradict the notion of ditching religion? Is there an alternative way of thinking about how we should respond to religion?

Please distinguish in my posts between religion and Religion - by the first, I mean beliefs that are explicitly and by nature not rationally based - the latter, capitalized one will refer to actual Religions: Judaism, Buddhism, etc.
 
Should religion be ditched? That's a difficult question to answer in a couple hundred words :). I think my answer, in short, is no. A religion, as it is defined by Geertz in my first blog, is a set of symbols (in the broad sense - words, images, maybe even ideologies). These symbols create a worldview and cultural structure without a rational basis.

Of course, we see this in Religions: Christianity has the Cross, the Fish, the Chi Rho (all symbols of Christ, actually); Judaism has the Star of David and the Menorah... and Religions have less obvious ideas that function symbolically: blood (in many ways and many Religions), greetings, Heaven and Hell (or other ideas of life after death).

I find Geertz's definition rather appealing as a way to describe aspects of our culture we commonly don't see as religious: The way football fans wear their team's logo and colours. The dedication people feel to their favourite TV shows.

I've even seen quite a bit of Lawrencianism in my first week at this university: Inexplicable oddities are responded to with the phrase: "It's the Lawrence difference." For instance, yesterday at the Jazz night, there was an incredible number of percussionists wanting to jam. This statement rang out. Or, in a more serious setting, the Welcome Week Choir learned their first song in fifteen minutes. The director said: "See, that's the difference at Lawrence. Where else could a group of new students get together and learn a piece of music this fast?" I've been at one other college, a tiny community college in the middle of Nowhere in Illinois - and our choir learned the same piece, just as fast.

There is a strong religion of numbers in our scientifically oriented culture. Statistics are accepted as facts without consideration of fallacies that may be present in the methods of research used or the manner in which the results are presented. Numbers are (quite literally) symbols, and certainly serve to create an "aura of factuality". In fact, I read a book last summer that tossed around some disturbing insights into the way we religiously perceive numbers (Seife, Charles: Proofiness: the Dark Arts of mathematical deception).

The reason I still think religion should not be ditched is that it is in itself not harmful, as long as we are aware of what simply has an "aura of factuality" and what is based on solid thinking. Let me put it this way: I do not believe in Jesus because of the symbol of the cross or the fish - I appreciate the symbols as elegant ways to refer to the most defining aspects of His life and character, which I discern from what is written about Him, and what He communicates with the Church or me personally (the latter, I understand, is often personal, spiritual, and not generally applicable - I also prefer not to argue by my personal experiences).
I do think there is value in careful analysis of what we observe, and numbers and statistics can be a good way of representing that, but I do not find the presence of numbers and percentages in an essay very compelling evidence of the truthfulness of the statements.


---- Okay. 550 words. I have other work to do, so I will stop here, although I am not without answer both to the reading and the video (much of my thoughts can probably be guessed based on what I already have written). If anyone has specific questions, feel free to post them. If I have the time, I will gladly answer. And if I don't have an answer, I'll look for one.

See you all soon,

Benny

What's this?

Hello, mysterious and possibly non-existent crowd of readers!

Please distinguish in my posts between religion and Religion - by the first, I mean beliefs that are explicitly and by nature not rationally based - the latter, capitalized one will refer to actual Religions: Judaism, Buddhism, etc.

A large portion of my "Intro to religious Studies" course is maintaining an online blog, so you can expect about twenty posts over the next ten weeks.

The class focuses not so much on the claims that various religions make, but on the nature of religion itself - looking at it as a social phenomenon, as an evolutionary adaption or side-effect, and as something that is perhaps separate from what we commonly conceive as "religions":

In our first class, Mr. Smith gave a definition of religion by Clifford Geertz. According to Geertz, religion is "a system of symbols which acts to establish powerful, pervasive and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic."

I have a mixed impression of this definition - on the one hand, I understand this view of religion, and it is precisely why I am wary of applying the term "religious" to myself. However, I dislike his choice of words. It is rather negative, seemingly based on the assumption that religion and true fact are mutually exclusive - or that Religions consist only of this type of religious belief.

As a Christian convinced by experience and logic (and I wouldn't exclude the possibility of Divine guidance) of the factual truth of the Bible - historically, scientifically, philosophically, etc. - I will take this class as an opportunity to reexamine the foundations of my beliefs, to defend these against challenges by my instructor or my classmates, and also to find if there are facets of my views that are weakly founded or contradictory (That is, in addition to gaining a better understanding of how "religiousness" functions and affects people).

Without further ado, I present to you my blog: Truth and Belief - What is religion.

Cheers!

Benny W.