Maggie's Farm

From Dr. Bob:

Deep within each of us dwells a bottomless abyss, into which we pour an endless train of insufficient and destructive detritus. We seek to fill the abyss with material goods; with drugs, or alcohol, or food, or sex; we seek relationships, hoping through them to fill that void — then destroy those relationships when they fail to accomplish what they are utterly incapable of fulfilling. Neither power, nor money, nor eminence, nor the esteem of others will suffice. Only to be chosen by God; to be accepted, fully, unconditionally, eternally by Him: this alone fills the despondent destitution within — for that emptiness was made to be filled with naught but God Himself.

I understand what Dr. Bob is saying in his post, but surely not all foolish desires are displaced and misplaced yearnings for God...or are they?

h/t, Washington Reb

An email with pics from our friend and occasional guest-poster Nathan, who is living in Jerusalem:

After watching Verdi's Nabuco performed at night at the foot of Matzada, I planned my ascent on Saturday.

Up at 415 a.m. and cabbed to Matzada from Ein Gedi Kibbutz facing the Dead Sea, two kilometers below sea level. Hiked up the 350 Meters during sunrise. First one up. Took the "snake path" on the east face of the mountain fortress built about thirty years before Christ by Herod, the son of Edomite Converts to Judaism, who was King under the Romans and fairly much despised by the Jews, even as he prevailed over some thirty years of stunnning prosperity and --- trained as an engineer/architect -- proliferative building including the entire port of Cesaria (named after Cesar), which included a hippodrome and perhaps more importantly a major port for the Romans.

The snake path

The history here is ironic and as twisty as the Snake Path, which was built by Herod so that supplies, including water from Ein Gedi oasis about 17 km north, could be brought up by donkeys. There is a western ramp built by Jewish slaves under the Romans to defeat the Jewish Sicari in 73 AD, but that in a moment.

The remarkable stillness (beyond quiet) on the 45 minute hike up gives time for reflection and occassional glances to sight the hints of sun's birth over the Dead Sea, even as the crescent moon and a star-like planet linger in the South East.

Sunrise over the Dead Sea

Herod built this fortress, designed by himself after his architects and engineers said that it could not be done. Built it to protect himself with the sheers on all sides. Protect himself from his Jews. Having been driven once from Jerusalem by angry Jews (a tough crowd to rule over, it seems), he decided he needed a few refuges to which to escape in the future. Built Herodian just south of Jerusalem, but Matzada was his star. Quarried in place, he imported the two-piece capitals for the columns. The quarries apparently became used for water storage. But, Josephus (the Jewish general turncoat who became a chronicler for the Romans) describes massive storehouses filled with wine amphoras (Greek for any container that can be lift from either side) for wine and olive oil, and supplies of corn, dates, pulse and other preserved foodstuffs, which Josephus said could supply the garrison for years.  There are remaining frescos (apparently the artisans were familiar with Vitruvius multi-volume work on architecture) and elegant mosaic floors in place. The castle was built on three levels at the northern tip of the plateau, on three natural ledges.  The castle faces towards the oasis of Ein Gedi, where David once took refuge from King Saul, who was jealous of DAvid's achievements. But that is another tale.

Below as one reaches the top, the Dead Sea has a heaviness to it, as if made of  molten lead.  Light appears before the Sun, which arises with its shifting colors until it attains that blinding glare of the Desert.

After Herod's death, the Jewish rebellion began against Rome: the Jews even minted their own shekels, labeling them for each year of the rebellion: one can eye these up to the fifth year in the new Museum at the end of the visit.

Jerusalem fell. (The Romans complained that there was so much blood from slaughtering Jews in the Old City that Roman horses had to wade through lakes of blood to their bellies.)  A group of some seventy Sicari Jews (very fierce and named for the Sicar, double-edged curved knives) retreated to Matzada, which became the last refuge and last place defeated by the Romans. Coming out here, at the edge of a dead lake of salt, two kilometers below the world of sea level, surrounded by pastel-hued mountains which themselves once were ocean bottom, on the edge of the Syrian-African rift, one is impressed, amazed at the extent to which the Romans went to defeat this last 70-citizen outpost of the Jews.

They set a siege that lasted several years, the Romans building some eight permanent camps, the largest of which had a Cardo, the central commercial street of every major Roman town.  The Sicari settled into the opulent palace and buildings of Herod, leaving evidence of their pottery, which measure poorly when compared to the simple, but elegant Edom-tinted, reddish pottery made for Herod (and each labelled by its artisan).  The Jews wrote notes on pottery shards to use for dealing out each families portioin and so on.

Surrounding landscape

The Romans, as I said, used Jewish slaves to build the assault ramp. At first the Romans built, but the Sicari would dump scalding oil on the Roman laborers, so Jewish slaves were enlisted to solve that problem. To taunt and demoralize the Roman soldiers, whose water was carefully met out, the Jewish women would hang out their clothes to dry, as if to show that they had plenty of water in the underground cisterns (which are massive as one walks into them.)

The end of this story came quickly when it came. The Romans, upon completing the ramp, pushed a ram to the top to batter the wall. The Jews tried to reinforce with stone and dirt. I believe that at this point the Jewish set the ram afire, but winds blew this towards the wall and burned through what was not made of stone. 

The rest we know from Josephus, a very literate turncoat, who in turn learned of the last moments of the Sicari from two surviving mothers and their five children who had hidden within the double-walled storage area so as not to be "suicided" by the Sicari.  Ben ari, the leader of the Sicari Jews gave a speech, stating that their women would not be violated by Romans, nor their children ever taste slavery. They set all the stores afire to defeat the Romans in death. After the ten men killed the others, they had lots with their names written upon them. The leader cut the throats of the remaining nine, then his own.   These lots -- with the names legible -- were found by Yigal Yadin in the 1960's excavation.

Ruins of Herod's castle

Matzada was mostly forgotten. Briefly used by some monks, then forgotten again. In the late 50's a Jewish archeologist, Shmarayu Guttman suggested excavation. but, not until 1963 did former General Yigal Yadin do the excavations as a Professor at the Hebrew U. Just a brief tale from Yadin. By reading Josephus (you know the reversible-coat part here already), Yadin was determined to find the castle on the northern lip. But, from above, it looked like nothing was there and colleagues doubted that anything could have been built on such a sheer, surfaced with shards and rubble.  But Yadin tied a rope to a rock at the top, rappeled down with a brush and hand tool, and discovered the castle. When they got to the lowest level, the third terrace, they found the skeleton of a Roman soldier -- armor intact -- lying near a woman's skeleton, her hair braids intact.

That's the news from Matzada.

Psalm 30

30:1 I will extol you, O LORD, for you have drawn me up, and did not let my foes rejoice over me.

30:2 O LORD my God, I cried to you for help, and you have healed me.

30:3 O LORD, you brought up my soul from Sheol, restored me to life from among those gone down to the Pit.

30:4 Sing praises to the LORD, O you his faithful ones, and give thanks to his holy name.

30:5 For his anger is but for a moment; his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.

30:6 As for me, I said in my prosperity, "I shall never be moved."

30:7 By your favor, O LORD, you had established me as a strong mountain; you hid your face; I was dismayed.

30:8 To you, O LORD, I cried, and to the LORD I made supplication:

30:9 "What profit is there in my death, if I go down to the Pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness?

30:10 Hear, O LORD, and be gracious to me! O LORD, be my helper!"

30:11 You have turned my mourning into dancing; you have taken off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,

30:12 so that my soul may praise you and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks to you forever.

 It's wedding anniversary season:

More on Palin and Feminism

The Spirit Of Walter Duranty

The truth about those atolls

Progressive Bloggers Are Money-Grubbing Corporatists

UVA’s Defense of Michael Mann: Back Off, He’s a Scientist! Like a priest or something?

Helen Thomas: The Jews should go back home

Taking a look at border security - video

Michelle: The long, hot Summer of Corruption

Time to change birth citizenship?

The Fastest Growing Class of U.S. Millionaires: Government Workers Making 2X Private Workers

Worse than a Depression

Krauthammer: Those troublesome Jews

Freshman orientation at Wesleyan. Sounds like re-orientation.

Will states come begging for a trillion? It's like Euroland.

Employers have gone on strike:

Imagine if Ms. Romer had instead promised in 2009 that Congress could spend nearly $1 trillion, and 16 months later the unemployment rate would be nearly 10% and that more than 2.5 million additional Americans would be without jobs. Would Congress have still spent the cash? Well, sure, Congress will always spend what it can get away with, but the American public would have turned against the stimulus even faster than it has.

Is the Turkish Military a Bulwark against Islamism?

Also,

Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said all deals with Israel are being evaluated.

"We are serious on this issue. New cooperation will not start and relations with Israel will be reduced," he said.

Energy Minister Taner Yildiz has said discussions about extending a Russian natural gas pipeline to Israel and providing fresh drinking water to Israel from the Manavgat river were being shelved.

The pro-Palestinian activists' deaths on the aid ship increased tensions in the Mideast, especially with Turkey, an important ally of Israel. On Thursday, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called Israel's actions "a historic mistake."

 More sad stuff about Turkey, at Shrinkwrapped, who is interested in Islamic use of language. - especially hyperbole.

Also related, from Mead: Terrible Twins: Turkey, Brazil and the Future of American Foreign Policy

To His Coy Mistress

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.

        But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.

        Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

This is from yesterday, and has been widely linked:

Hereabouts, it's time to yank out the Spring pansies. Many people have the nurseries fill their planters right about now, but people like Mrs. BD like to do them herself.

She says all you need to know is that a planter needs one thriller, a few spillers, and filler - with interesting foliage contrast and compatible color. It's a form of flower arranging. In a couple of weeks, these pots will be looking good:

One Too Many Mornings, with Johnny Cash (1969)

Jeff Jarvis in the NYPost: How not to save news - Bad government ideas for journalism. He begins:

The Federal Trade Commission says it wants to save journalism. I'm not sure who asked it to.

So far, 54 theaters around the country have signed up to show "The Lottery", and more are signing up daily. Take a moment to see if "The Lottery" is playing in a theater near you and buy tickets by clicking http://www.screenvision.com/s/showing/TheLottery/.

The Lottery" will be playing for some single showings and week-long runs: In New York for one night, June 3, a free showing at the Apollo Theater followed by a reception, 253 W 125th St., in New York from June 11-18 at the Big Theater, 239 East 59th Street (near 2nd Avenue). In Los Angeles from June 18-25 at Laemmle's Music Hall 3, 9036 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills. Additional runs in Denver and other cities are being planned.

Recent reviews:

An already heated national debate over charter schools gets a few degrees hotter tonight with the premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival of "The Lottery," a powerful documentary about the Harlem Success Academy charters launched by former City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz. The film is designed to knock ambivalent people off the fence when it comes to the benefits of charter schools, and it does. In the same way that "An Inconvenient Truth" mobilized a vast constituency to take action on climate change, "The Lottery" will create and energize charter supporters by the thousands.
-   New York Daily News


For this lottery, the stakes couldn't be higher. The nerve-racking bid by parents to land their 5-year-old kid a coveted seat in a high-performing Harlem charter school is detailed in a documentary set to screen tomorrow at the Tribeca Film Festival.
-   New York Post

Here's our request to our regular and/or irregular readers:

As summer begins in the northern hemisphere, people tend to find better things to do than to read websites. That is good. However, here at Maggie's the steadily-growing readership is our only compensation for our (enjoyable and self-educating and sometimes simply therapeutic) effort and time.

We know we are not to everyone's taste, but there are tons of folks out there who might enjoy our eclectic site if they knew we existed. If you have not done so already, do us a favor and introduce us to your friends, neighbors, relatives, colleagues, enemies, etc. (It used to be called "viral marketing," but before that it was called "word of mouth.")

Thanks, from the Maggie's Team.

PS: Dr. Merc reminds me to remind you to not be shy, and send us comments when you have them.

How do Americans spend their leisure time? Paul Bloom begins:

The answer might surprise you. The most common voluntary activity is not eating, drinking alcohol, or taking drugs. It is not socializing with friends, participating in sports, or relaxing with the family. While people sometimes describe sex as their most pleasurable act, time-management studies find that the average American adult devotes just four minutes per day to sex.

Our main leisure activity is, by a long shot, participating in experiences that we know are not real.

Fascinating article. However, that 4 mins per day seems dubious on many counts.

Warbler migration season has reached its end, but our readers need a tougher challenge. Here 'tis. It is cheating to go to the link (I'll thank him with a link for the photo later today).

Hint: It's a female. Another wonderfully charming female below the fold, mostly safe for work -

Five or six more months until duck season. A friend sent me these photos of a splendid, if surrealistically overblown, duck blind. It has to be in Arkansas.

Janet Greene, 1966 (h/t Tim Blair). As Sipp occasionally reminds us, da youts should not believe all they hear about the 60s.

Also known as Catmint (it is related to Catnip). It's a long-blooming front-of-the-border plant, and will re-bloom later if the exhausted blooms are cut off. It comes in a few cultivars of varying heights.

This was yesterday. Note the happy Digitalis on the left. Little Lamb's Ear Hydrangea in front.

Photo from Anchoress' God is not sophisticated enough

Shut up and dance: Margot Fonteyn’s merry dance through the farce of a failed coup d’état

Read this: FTC proposes federalizing newspapers, killing blogs 

Watts: About those melting ice sheets

Hennessey: Why do so many Americans pay no income tax?

The EU: Blame the Jews

Stem cells instead of implants? Sign me up

Hewitt: The collapsing Obama Presidency

Teachers Need A Teachable Moment About Their Unions

Sea mammals as guards. Cool. h/t, Linkiest

Thompson's idea of hell

Maher: Obama Not Acting Like A "Real Black" President

The elections:

It used to be said — the president before an election had to go to Ireland, Israel and Italy. Well, now it’s Jews, Hispanics, and gays if you are going into a midterm election...

The death of Democratic Socialism: Am Thinker

Refugees From Communism React With Horror to Moonbats

Pethokoukis: 5 reasons why “Son of Stimulus” is a bad seed

Am Thinker: Are Climate Alarmists losing the Mainstream Media?

Top counterterror guy just doesn't get it:

It should be further noted that this tendency to project one’s own cultural norms of right and wrong onto others is the height of arrogance and ethnocentrism — precisely what liberals always warn against. Yet the irony is that “open-minded” proponents of cultural relativism and respect for “the other” are also the ones most prone to westernizing Islam. When Brennan insists that jihadists are really not motivated by religion but rather are products of “political, economic and social forces,” is his position — that jihadists are just like us, they just don’t know it yet — not the height of cultural arrogance?

David Brooks wrote a much-linked piece on the two enlightenments last week. Far better and more amusing is this ripping apart of Brooks' essay. It's tough to get away with BS in the internet era.

That is quite correct that there was no "British Enlightenment." Here's our post, with a good link, on the Scottish Enlightenment.

And another good one: How The Scots Invented The Modern World

h/t, Sipp: