Script (2nd Samuel Ch. 14-24)

2^nd Samuel Ch. 14-24

On the streets of Jerusalem:

Derek(narrator): Wanting to reunite father and son, Joab hatches a plan. He has a widow go and trick David into feeling guilty for ex-communicating Absalom. David falls for his plan and tells him that Absalom can come back to Jerusalem.

Joab: The King said that you can come back to Jerusalem.

Absalom: Don’t I get to see him?

Joab: He’s still pretty mad. Don’t push your luck.

Absalom: (grumbles angrily)

Random women: O my god! It’s Absalom! (swoon)

Absalom: (flips hair)

Random women: (swoon)

In a field

Narrator: David refuses to see Absalom for two long years. Drastic measures must be taken.

Absalom: (has a torch and is lighting stuff on fire) Ha ha ha!

Joab: What…what is this?

Absalom: You told me I could see my father, so I came all the way back to Jerusalem! Now random women stalk me wherever I go! I should have stayed in Geshur!

In the palace

Joab: King, can you please see Absalom? The kid’s a nutcase; he’s going around Jerusalem and setting things on fire!

David: (sighs) Fine, fine…bring him in.

-Enter Absalom-

Absalom: (bows)

David: I guess you’re still my son, and I forgive you for killing your brother.

Absalom: (to the side) Hehehe…now I can hatch my evil plan…

Joab/David: What was that?

Absalom: Nothing.

On the streets of Jerusalem

Absalom: Your King is a sham! My brother raped my sister, for God’s sake! And he did nothing!

Citizens: (whispering)

Absalom: I’m the rightful king! And I’m much better looking (flips hair, women swoon)!

Citizens: Ok.

In the Palace:

Narrator: Here, the Bible says that forty years passed, but this is actually thought to be a misinterpretation. Scholars believe that it was actually only four years later. Absalom decides to plant his friends around Jerusalem to say “All Hail Absalom when a trumpet sounds. His little prank goes better than expected. It turns out that the people of Jerusalem agreed with Absalom. A messenger was sent to tell David to watch out, because the people liked Absalom better. David gave up and went into the wilderness. Absalom decided to get a bunch of men together and go after David, but not after some “extracurricular” activities…

Absalom (chasing concubines around): Being King is great! I should have done this years ago!

Concubines: (giggle and run around)

Soldier: Sir! We must proceed to battle!

Absalom: Dang it! All right…

Narrator: A great battle took place, and 20,000 people died. Some men who were with Joab killed Absalom, and his short reign was over. David returned to Israel to become King again. The King was sad that Absalom was dead, even though he seemed to want him dead this whole time…The people of Judah remained loyal to the King, but some of the other Israelites left and supported Sheba. But David had more important things to attend to.

In the palace

David (to the concubines): Into the basement with you!

Concubines: What did we do?

David: You slept with my son!

Concubines: But he was the king…and we’re concubines! That’s our job!

David: You’re only supposed to sleep with the true king!

Concubines: How are we supposed to know who the King is? You left and Absalom was the king…

David: Enough! You have to live in the basement now!

Concubines: Awww…

Narrator: The King and Joab went out against Sheba, and his head got cut off. After that, there was a terrible famine. David asked God why he was punishing the Israelites, and God said it was because of all the bad things Saul did, including killing some Gibeonites. So David apologized to the Gibeonites and gave him all Saul’s children (except Jonathan, of course…) and they hanged them. The famine ended, but the Philistines declared war on the Israelites. Again. But they defeated them. Again. So David wrote some Psalms and all was well.

In the palace:

God: I’m angry with you David. You’ve done some mean things in your lifetime.

David: I’m sorry…

God: That’s not good enough. You have to choose a punishment: Behind door number one we have seven years of famine. Behind door number two lies three months of getting chased by your enemies And door number three holds three days of plague.

David: Well…I guess…

Servants: Pick door number 1/2/3!

David: Number 3!

Narrator: David chose the three days of plague, and 70,000 Israelites died.

David: Oops…

Narrator: But after David offered some sacrifices, the plague was lifted. Israel would live to see another day!

The End.

Ezekiel

The first thing I thought while starting to read Ezekiel: "Yes! More strange Biblical creatures!" The first is a creature with four faces: lion, ox, eagle, and man. Each one had four wings, and they had cows feet and hands. No science fiction writer can do it better than this.

God makes Ezekiel shave off his beard and hair too. Plotz is right: God does love bald men. Only Ezekiel has to scatter it around.

Unlike the "small voice" Elijah heard, God talked to Ezekiel in a "loud voice."

Another thing with four faces: face 1=cherub, face 2=man, face 3=lion, and face 4=eagle.

"Thus saith the Lord God; Woe to the women that sew pillows to all armholes, and make kerchiefs upon the head of every stature to hunt souls!" What?

Ezekiel seems to think that Noah, Daniel, and Job were the three most righteous men. Interesting, considering most other sources point to Abraham, Jacob, and Moses.

Chapter 23 says the word "whoredom" roughly ten times.

The coolest part of Ezekiel, by far, was the part with the valley of bones. I'm pretty sure this is the first "horror movie." About zombies. It was really cool.

Lamentations

The second verse of Lamentations ("among all her lovers, she hath none to comfort her") reminded me of an episode of Sex and the City (my mom and I watched the whole series...don't ask), where Samantha comes down with the flu and she finds out that, out of all the "friends with benefits" she has, she doesn't have anyone to take care of her. Even though she was a "free, independent" woman, she sacrificed having a connection with anyone because she slept with everyone. I guess the author here is saying the same thing about Israel: they've "been with" so many gods, but none of them will come to help her when she needs it.

The rest of Lamentations is pretty much just what the name implies, with a plea to God tacked onto the end.

Jeremiah

I liked the verses in Chapter 1 where God says "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee." It reminded my of how my mother would always tell me, "God knew you before you were even born." It was always reassuring to me.

Jeremiah has a lot of interesting quotes that, translated, don't make much sense. Example: "Return ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backsliding." This verse conjures images of kids sliding down snowy hills on their backs...

There's a lot of horse imagery in the Bible. I found it somewhat strange that God would pick a horse to represent anger and vengeance. He says they will "devour the land and [...] all those that dwell within." I never really thought of horses as particularly ferocious.

Jeremiah 16: The most angry chapter in the Bible.

Another example of mis-translation: "One basket had very good figs, even like the figs that are first ripe and the other basket had very naughty figs." Naughty figs? I remember those really old commercials for california raisins where the raisins were in a rock band. I guess their groupies could be naughty figs...

Later, God alludes to "evil figs" to describe the people of Israel.

Jeremiah 41 really points out how different the ancient Hebrews were than other civilizations at the time. It says that the Israelites considered "treasure" to be "wheat, barley, oil and honey." No gold, silver, or jewels.

More prophet-feeling-like-a-woman-in-labor stuff. Pretty prominent theme in the prophecy books.

The Slave

I have to say, The Slave was the only book I read this semester that wasn't a textbook or the Bible, so I enjoyed it. Singer is a fabulous writer for creating a story during which you can feel both sorrow and joy.

The most interesting theme I found in the story is impossible love. It might not be a theme that's easily noticed, but I found it to be particularly touching because I think it's something a lot of people have experienced. Jacob falls in love with Wanda in the beginning, but he is taken away from her. When he gets her back, she passes away. It's a classic Romeo/Juliet story, only instead of the roadblocks being political or because of the person's family, they are Cosmic. It doesn't come right out and say it, but I saw a definite correlation between God and the Prophets, such as Ezra and Neamiah, preaching about intermarrying and the forbidden marriage of Jacob and Wanda. I think everyone's had an experience with someone who they really care about but, due to certain circumstances, can't be with.

So that's my little spiel about The Slave, which made me not really laugh but definitely cry. It wasn't the best book I've ever read and I don't know how particularly inspiring or memorable it was, but it was definitely an enjoyable read and it was nice to have a good book to go to after reading Stats and Psychological Theory...

Term Paper

My idea for my term paper is to write about Esther, because, as you all probably know by now, it's my favorite book of the Bible. I'm going to compare Esther to some other literary characters. I'm not sure which literary characters yet, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to use The Slave and at least two other novels.

Isaiah: one of my favorites so far

So we move into one of the most pointless books of the Bible to one of the most important. Isaiah, as evidenced by my poem, is (along with Esther) one of my favorite books of the Bible so far, just because I think the prophecy books are really cool.

"the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a tinkling with their feet." Great imagery here. I can just see self-important women strutting around. Not much has changed since B.C. Israel...

The part about the seraphim is the coolest thing I've read so far.

"And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots." Jesus! Yay!

This verse kind of hit home. For all the pro-choicers who say there is nothing in the Bible about abortion; I present this: "they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare children."

One interesting facet I found in Isaiah (and later, in Jeremiah) are men saying that, during their "visions" or whatever you want to call them, they feel the pains of childbirth. Kind of interesting.

"And in that day shall the deaf hear the words of the book, and the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity, and out of the darkness." This is where the lyrics to one of my favorite Christmas songs came from "Mary, Did You Know."

The next verse says "the meek also shall increase their joy in the Lord." Jesus re-iterates this in Matthew, in his Sermon on the Mount.

I like when Isaiah yells at the Israelites for their transgressions. He seems like the guy who would say all the things everyone was thinking but too afraid to say. He says, "Have ye not known? Have ye not heard? Hath it not been told you from the beginning?"

But then God reassures them and says, "When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them." God is kind of like an overprotective parent. He definitely punishes the Israelites when they do something wrong, yet he's still there for them when they really need him.

"their molten images are wind and confusion." I just really liked that verse.

God says, again, that he will take care of the Israelites: "Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?"

God explains why good people die: "and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come." I never thought of it that way.

"And the Gentiles shall come to thy light" More prophesizing about Jesus.

Solomon: The Hef of the Bible

A lot of preachers I've heard over the years have tried to justify Song of Solomon as "the way Christ is supposed to feel about his Church." No. It's about sex.

While most of the book seems like the lame guy at the bar trying to pick up girls by reciting poetry, there are some romantic bits. For example, the woman says that her "soul" loves the man, and I thought that sounded nice.

One weird part is how they keep saying that each other's teeth are "like a flock of sheep." I don't really understand how teeth look anything like sheep...

He keeps calling her "my sister." Maybe just a weird translation.

Also, I didn't get how her breasts looked like deer.

"I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house, who would instruct me." On what? Seems like kind of a strange thing for a mother to teach her daughter.

"I would cause thee to drink of the spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate." Her pomegranate? Is she talking about what I think she's talking about? Kinky...

Ecclesiastes

Who the heck translated this verse: "I made me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards"?

"For in the multitude of dreams and many words there are also divers vanities, but fear thou God." This verse reminded me of the conversations we had in class about how logos meant word, and how words were seen as powerful.

"Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour." I was excited to read this verse, because my high school orchestra director always used to warn us about not being "a fly in the ointment," and I never knew what it meant until I read it in context.

The verse Dr. Sexson wouldn't want us to see: "of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh."

That's all I've got for Ecclesiastes. It's a short book about how good God is.

Isaiah 6:2

Isaiah 6:2 is the coolest verse of the Bible I've read so far. It is the part when Isaiah sees the angels, only they didn't look like our traditional interpretation of angels:

"Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly."

The imagery here was so incredible to me, that it inspired a short poem. Keep in mind, this is a very rough draft, so I can't be certain yet whether it's great literary art or a random smattering of brain-vomit. But I suppose you can judge for yourself.

Isaiah 6:2

I walked along black pavement
under the stars;
there is no moon.
Oh...you're back so soon?
From your mission to Mars
your proud achievement.

You approach me,
Hands covering your face,
shoes covering your feet
waiting, waiting ever to meet
the terms of your love's disgrace
pledging your protection eternally.

You told me once it was a fact
you would always sit behind my shoulder
but sometimes I look and I can't find you.
And when I turn back around I see the proof.
You wipe a tear from my cheek, your hands so much colder
than the cashmere fog settling onto your back.

And you fly away to space
but you're still standing at my side.

Peace is in your face,
but war in your eyes.

And light in your wings.

So, it needs a little bit of work, but it's a start. Hope you liked it. I'll leave you with a few artist's interpretations of Isaiah 6:2:

I couldn't find the name of the artist who did the first painting. The second one is by Viktor Vasnetsov. The third one came from Godwin's Cabalistic Encyclopedia, circa 13th century.