The Ant and the Grasshopper -another version

A man enjoying the sun while lolling on a lawn found ants making a beeline from B to B and it stung him. Next instant he shot up with a howl that would have made a banshee nod in approval.

Is it watusi?” a grasshopper asked the ant nearest to him.

“No what you see is neither here nor there but it is his move.”

The grasshopper said, “By Jiminey! he cant do as we do naturally Can he?”

“We can cut a caper without batting an eyelid…”

“Batman!” called out another, “here comes death from the skies, a robin.”

The grasshopper continued after the threat was gone, “Whatever it is the man is all hands.”

The ant replied,”You shall not be so critical if you had ants in pants as he does.”

benny

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On Understanding the Word: an essay

Words are bricks to construct a sentence and yet passages giving shape to ideas are built upon treacherous foundations. Some of the words are likely to go out of fashion and change their cultural significance; some are thought in a particular language but has no equivalent word in another. How one thinks in the east can easily be misunderstood by one in the west. Take a word like Wabi-sabi is a Japanese term that describes our appreciation of transient and imperfect beauty – such as the fleeting splendour of cherry blossom. What a millennial in Bronx would make of it unless given a thorough grounding in the mystery of language? In whichever language the mystery remains as in a Gothic tale the building reeks of doom and foreboding. Words erect sometimes barriers for great many to breach unless they are tuned to their nuances in any language.

When we read a novel we are not reading words for themselves but in context of other words. We create literary spaces. From great writers for example Balzac the words are so laid out the decrepit Boarding house has a literal space: so pervasively decay fills it. When we see Père Goriot through the medium of descriptive passages you can be sure it is merely a subjective feeling and fools you to think in a manner than the character really is. So literally taking the manner a sentence is constructed to be true is error. It is compounded by cultural sensitivity of the reader who is primed to take it in a certain manner.

We see the egregious folly of some theologians impose strictures how to interpret the prophet. What are their credentials? What makes them think they can speak for the prophet since he is not there to defend himself? Literal interpretation is a veritable minefield.  When laymen are ready to raise battle cry over a word or idea it is a give away of mischief. When mother feeds a child with milk it is solely knowing there is no allergic reaction to it. The bottom line of Peace is peace and not  imposing it by force. Look at Islam as some have interpreted it to mean imposing religion at the point of sword. Given so many centuries what do we see? Peace or conflict? When a religion which is of peace and tolerance by any reading, becomes synonymous with religion of hate we need ask who is the villain?

benny

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Intuition: a quote

“How can one be unhappy unless had a vague idea what happiness is? How can conscience prick unless one had some notion what Perfect is? Intuition is sum total of what an individual is capable of taking cues from consciousness on any given moment,pared to its *least reducible limit. Flight or fight is one aspect of it; so is knowledge of the Most High

*In its least reducible limit what impinges from without and what responds from within are one”.

benny

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