My paper on The Slave

The Slave by Isaac Singer depicts a heroic tale of a man named Jacob and his outstanding tribulations to overcome suffering, slavery, and his audacious efforts to seek answers within his own religion of Judaism. He encounters many demons, not in a physical sense, but rather a metaphysical sense by suffering through the agonizing accounts of unjust living and punishment for actions out of his control. Jacob has lost his wife and children, but has found a new true love named Wanda. The couple fights through a world of suffering to exist together in a world that is against their forbidden love, and they battle through a whirlwind of odds that are against them.

Isaac Singer makes his story apparent to the fact that Jacob lives a life of suffering, but he neglects to paint the picture in the reader’s mind of how Jacob’s actions have lead to the suffering and emotional enslavement of others. In this sense, I have chosen to take a more immersed approach to my paper for the unnoticed sufferer in this novel. I am very fascinated by the character of Wanda, and am rather absorbed in trying to unravel the suffering that she has endured due to living side by side with Jacob. She has not lost a family due to murders from the Cossacks, and she was not enslaved by a stranger to live a life unfamiliar to her, and she was not forced to lose her religion based on all these regards. But in a sense, she has lost herself completely for her love of Jacob.

Wanda has lost her identity by having to conceal who she is as a person, in order to live with Jacob and to be his lover. She was forced to act as a deaf mute to camouflage her religion, and more so, because she was not Jewish when Jacob returned to his homeland of Josefov along with her. She changed her identity to take on the nature of another woman, named Sarah. She had to change who she was, by not being able to speak, defend, and justify her voice as a woman. For Jacob had fallen in love with the woman he knew as Wanda, a woman who was able to voice herself, and she now had to live as Sarah, someone different than the woman that her companion had fallen in love with, and that must have been a painful truth for her to swallow to be alongside him. Jacob had known that she was in fact Wanda, and not Sarah, but she had to act as someone different, and live in the relationship with Jacob as a partner, dealing with the fact that she was pretending to be a different woman who he had not in fact fallen in love with. Sarah is a different person all together, as her preceding life living as Wanda.

Wanda was made paralyzed enough from losing her voice as a woman to not even be able to let out a painful wail from enduring childbirth, and she was greatly surrounded in suffering when she had to face consequences when she finally let out her voice as she gave birth to her son Benjamin. She had to suffer the claims made upon her by the residents of Josefov of having a demon inside of her because she finally let out her voice that was hidden inside of her. She made public her true identity of being Wanda, and not Sarah which eventually led further enslavement from Jacob, intentional or not, as she was trying to disguise herself for the sake of being with him. She did this to make him and herself happy. The truth of who she really is as Jacob’s lover would end her suffering. But she was never able to speak the truth.

After her childbirth, Wanda died. She had to suffer through the abandonment of her motherhood for her son Benajmin that she had created with her true love, Jacob. Isaac Singer does not go into great detail to describe the bond that she had created with Benjamin while she carried him in her womb. And also the deeper relationship that she has grown with Jacob, as they fight through their emotional struggles, and embellish the beauty of preparing for parenthood together. But she no longer has a chance to enjoy the one glimpse of hope for happiness in her life by experiencing motherhood. It is all ripped away from her when she passes on. She again suffers by not having a chance to even live the life she has always wanted.
Benjamin and Jacob both suffer from her death. Their suffering leads to further suffering for Wanda because she in return has to live an eternity knowing that they have suffered. I have come to this conclusion because Isaac Singer elucidates her character as originally being a Christian. She believes in going to heaven to look after the lives of Benjamin and Jacob, and gains an understanding of the pain they both had went through without her in their lives. Wanda suffers in death as she looks on to watch her son become a professor, but not being able to physically be there with him through his accomplishments. Again, she misses out on the life she has always wanted.


Another point that was never touched on was Wanda not being able to see her father, Jan Bzik, again once she had fled to the Jewish town of Josekov with Jacob. She knew that Jacob was a slave to her father, but he had to have suffered through the pains of the absence of him not being in her new life. Wanda also had to see Jacob question his faith and life due to the enslavement from her own father.
I understand it was the choice of Wanda to follow Jacob when he came for her, and to transform herself into another woman named Sarah, but the power of love gave her no other choices, and that was ultimately her suffering. It may have not been the true intention of Jacob to make Wanda his slave under the suffering of love, but the novel, The Slave, illustrates many realities of this being so. However, Wanda’s suffering seems justified when Jacob passes away and she is finally laid to rest with her true love as his bones are buried along hers. For this image makes it seem that Wanda is no longer a slave to the circumstances of Jacob by having to adapt to any and all conditions to be with her true love. After his death, not only was Jacob released of all suffering, but so was Wanda as she was buried along the side of her love, able to be with him forever, and finally fulfilling her true motives after having endured so much suffering in order to get there.


Wanda’s greatest suffering profoundly involves Jacob and not in an enslavement type of suffering from him. The couple had fought so long to take the steps towards ultimate freedom and escape the burden of being forbidden lovers, and to finally live their lives the way they wanted. Their freedom is only ever found in death, buried beneath the earth of a cemetery. Wanda was lost and forgotten in this burial place, but the same burial place where Jacob has found her once again.

An Epiphany in the midst of Suffering

I have had a somewhat painful epiphany, but when digging myself deep into the thoughts of suffering in a Biblical sense, I have found that my occurrences have led me to believe I had a moment of deeper understanding. I had the combination of having a bad day, and a day that held an epiphany. A moment of rarity, rather, but that is the best kind.

My Uncle passed away on November 27th of this year after a long battle of liver cancer. He suffered through years of fear, physical anguish, and hopelessness due to the devastation of his disease. I was lucky enough to be home the night that he passed. My family and I stood around him as tears flooded down our faces, and we watched him take his final breaths. I had seen him suffer more than anyone in the events leading up to his death. He had laid in that hospice bed not being able to fully live, or fully die, but just lay there in agony as his world moved on without his control. I knew he was hiding his pain, but it was made evident with every grievous breath of air that he took, as his body housed this murderous cancer. He was innocent, and he suffered.

And then he went. The expressions on his face beneath his wrinkled skin that had once been filled with strain and torment, had somewhat released expressions that had turned to relief and comfort in the moments after he had passed. It was as if his suffering was erased. I was too upset to juggle any other thoughts, but as my mind had eventually calmed, I had noticed that I had an epiphany. Death ended his suffering. My Uncle had "accepted God's invitation", and released his suffering from his cancer, and it was all made evident to me as I witnessed the change of expressions upon his face.

From this experience, I have come to my own understanding of why God allows the suffering of innocents. I think that for he knows one day these innocent people who suffer, will one day be delivered to ultimate solitude, and freed of all devastation. For while we are on earth, we live fully and that will entail coming upon suffering, but that is the beauty of life, and overcoming the triumphs that will be in our way. And I think that even though this may require suffering, God wants humans, his children, to find out who we really are individually, and take notice of how strong we can be to move past suffering into a world of complete sanctuary, which will we be welcomed into once we succumb death ,and rest in ultimate peace.

Thank you Uncle Tommy for teaching me strength through your suffering.

Response to Debbie's Blog

Debbie blogged a very hilarious experience that she had while discussing the Book of Ruth with her mother. And it made me realize the absolute treasure that the Bible becomes in the world of storytelling. Her mom was reading The Book of Ruth, as described by Plotz, and her mother says, "So, Boaz didn't want to get into Ruth's pants?" After I laughed until my sides ached, I began to realize how different interpretations of the Bible lead to different endings in each of the stories. And that is part of the beauty of it all because it leads to many understandings and messages hidden beneath the trialing language of the Bible. Debbie showed this well in her blog by demonstrating the different comprehensions of the Book of Ruth between her mother and David Plotz. We translate these stories into our own understandings, and the tale of storytelling continues on with how the work is learned and taken in. This may lead to misinterprtations, or just another way of telling the story different than others have. For that is the importance for being a reader of the Bible, and for the room that is given to learn and appreciate the meaning of the Books, which leads to a fuller understanding of the Bible as a whole.

Link to Debbie's Blog---->http://bible240.blogspot.com/

Why must we suffer?

The question I often ponder is, does God himself suffer along with innocents beneath him?
Must he suffer in order to seek compassion for those on Earth who have suffered as well?
How do we know? How do we not? The Bible does not clearly demonstrate any accounts of justification for innocent suffering, but the message may be hidden beneath the verses.

We question why innocent children die and why the Holocaust occured, and if God was a God of compassion, how can he allow suffering among his people? But we come to these understandings without fully embelleshing ourselves in the Books of the New Testament, and diving in deep to the questions that may be answered under the compelling literature.




I came across an interesting passage as I was reading Revelations.

"And I heard a great voice out of Heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."


I really enjoyed reading this because it places God on both a physical and emotional level with man rather than him being above these emotions that we fill ourselves with. He may often have the same emotions that we uphold, and take in the pain of suffering.

Another question I often ponder is what if one persons' suffering is another persons' refuge? How do we define the true and ultimate term of suffering? When is it suffering and when is it not? For example, the death penalty is what made me wonder of this. The person being put to death is obviously suffering from feelings of terror and shame, but on the other end the suffering becomes less daunting as the family of an innocent victim sees the guilty person put to death, and justice becomes the result of the suffering.

In a way, my thoughts coincide with the Book of Job. Job says that he has not sinned, and so his suffering is unjustified. But the case of the death penalty, in some contexts, has an opposite approach. The person who is suffering from being put to death is convicted as gulity, and the family members of the victim have an ease of suffering.

If I take a historical look at suffering and the death penalty, the women that were convicted of being witches and sentenced to death in the Salem Witch Trials, were in fact innocent. But they suffered along with guilty upon false accusations. If I begin to wonder how often this may occur within death penalty cases, it makes me think that suffering will never be justified, and there will always be unjust suffering. But then again, this may be more of a political view for me to have, rather than a biblical view. :)

Jesus is Everywhere!

The following are pictures of the face of Jesus in bizarre places. He is with us everywhere, I suppose.

• 

A picture was captured of Jesus in the clouds.

• 

On the left someone popped their toast out of the toaster, and Jesus' face appeared!
And on the right the face of the Virgin Mary appeared on a grilled cheese after it was taken off the frying pan. Talk about breakin' the bread!







A person took a bite into a Kit Kat bar and claims to have looked down and have seen the face of Jesus... sort of. Break me off a peice of that... Jesus!







A family breakfast turned religious when a mother opened a jar of Marmite to put on her son's toast, and WHAM... Jesus face.






Here, Jesus was found after someone had fried some pot stickers! Nice choice Jesus. Those are delicious.






Before someone could get to soaking their pots and pans, this face of Jesus appeared on the bottom of the grease.






Have you ever gotten ready to peel back a banana and seen the face of Jesus in the bruised fruit? Neither did this lady until she pulled it from her fruit bowl! Another form of Jesus in fruit, he appears in this orange soon enough to been seen before someone sliced it further.





Someone searched on Google Earth a farm in Hungary and were
astonished when the face of Jesus appeared on their map.
Holy Cow!

Why haven't I finished the Bible?

I haven't finished the Bible yet for several reasons.

1... well, I may be a slow reader, and the Bible is more complex and full of meaning than any literature I have yet to encounter.

2... I read a Book of the Bible and gain my own understanding of the story. And then I read Plotz

to compare how accurate my understanding is as compared to his. So, this takes some time.

3... To read the Bible to it's entirety takes more time than I am able to put forth in a given semester along with all my other readings.

After reading the above accusations as to why I haven't finished, do not let me fool you into thinking I won't finish! Because I will. I want to be able to not only proudly say that I have finished the Bible, but hold a valid argument and to articulate my thoughts about the Books in the Bible with any Bible thumper out there. I'll show them what it really takes to thump it after having read it from cover to cover! :) ... And I also want to finish it for myself. I, so far, have been introduced to some of the most wonderful stories I have yet to encounter and have negated all mundane views of the Bible I have once had. I want to continue to dive in head first, with no armor, but prepared to take on the headstrong battle of interpreting it for myself.

Biblical Brawl

I had a conversation about the Bible with a Jehovah's Witness. He is a man that lives in my neighborhood, and I am a friend of his daughthers who are not Jehovah's Witnesses, something he is not happy with. So, as we started the conversation, he wasn't happy with me from the beginning, as one could imagine since he is very passionate for his religion, and thinks that everyone else should be as well. And I wasn't there to talk about his religion. I was there to discuss, the Bible. And I told him that. So, our conversation continues on vigorously. He told me that the Jehovah's Witness version of the Bible was the most accurate version of the Bible. I didn't laugh, or sneer, or even scoff at him. I simply asked him who wrote it? He could only reply that 100% of the Bible is inspired by God. By that being his only reply, it was obvious he had not read the Bible, even the Jehovah's Witness Bible, and I having read at least through Psalms, wanted to ask a few more questions.
"Are you familiar with the first book of the Bible about creation?", I proceed to ask him.
"Well, every Bible is a little different", he quickly shoots back. I am not looking to get in an argument at this point, I just want to see if he's read any Bible, or just the type, as we say in class, that claims to read the Bible, but never does.
So, I calmly ask, "Oh you know the story of Adam and Eve, and when God creates the Earth, what's the name of that Book in the Bible?"
I'm obviously playing dumb to make him more comfortable to answer, a bit satan like of me don't you think? :)
He just looks at me strange and replies, "We talked about that story all the time at my old Kingdom Hall I used to go to in Chicago." (Kingdom Hall is the Jehovah's Witness Church. I wasn't aware of this either.)
"It's called the Book of Genesis in the Bible" I inform to him.
He mocks me and says, "Well, The New World Translation of the Bible may be different and is more accurate."
I ask to see his Bible. He shows me it and I turn to the first Book. The Book of Genesis appears before me, and throughout the Book the scriptures are a little different a re-worded but nonetheless, the meaning is there. I show him his Bible, and I show him mine. I think he is a little astonished at this point.
"They're both here, pretty cool huh?" I tell him.

I think I learned from my discussion with him that he may have learned a lot about his religion by going to his Church and listening, but he never got the full meaning of the Bible by reading it for himself. He didn't even know the name of the first Book, or even that the story of Genesis was he opening to the Bible, even the opening to his Bible. It makes me want to finish the Bible even that much more so I can take into the account the meaning of the Books of the Bible for myself, instead of leaving it up to someone else to interpret them for me.

Oh, Susanna!

I often find myself more engaged in the literature of the Bible when I hear Dr. Sexson read to us passages in class. I enjoyed being submerged in the text of the Story of Susanna in the Book of Daniel, and quite enjoyed reading and understanding it. However, the poem of Peter Quince at the Clavier by Wallace Stevens was a bit more challenging to unravel a meaning to compare. So, what do I do? I YouTube it. And I find a man reciting it, much like Dr. Sexson recites Bible passages in class.



As I read the story of Susanna, I understood that she was the victim of the elders lies. I looked at her as a character who was cheated out of a chance to speak her side of the story. But I never thought of her physical appearance. The Peter Quince poem by Wallace Stevens put the Story of Susanna into a new perspective for me. I looked at why Susanna was the victim. Why did the elders choose to threaten her unless she had sex with them? Why did she have have the integrity as a women to say no? She knew truth would prevail. Wallace Stevens description of her physical appearance describes her as more than the victim. But a woman of strength, rather. She did not give in to the threats of the elders for committing adultery. Much like Joseph did not give in to Potiphar's wife's threats when he refused her in the Book of Genesis. It was important to Susanna, like Joseph, to preserve their innocence.





Also, Wallace Stevens uses the description of music to set the tone for his poem from the beginning. It doesn't have to be the sound of music technically, but rather the feeling that is sprung when music is heard.

"Music is feeling, then, not sound;

And thus it is that what I feel,

Here in this room, desiring you,



Thinking of your blue- shadowed silk,

Is music. It is like the strain

Waked in the elders by Susanna:"





The description of music to set the tone of the poem is used throughout the verses of the whole poem.

"Susanna's music touched the bawdy strings

Of those white elders; but, escaping,

Left only Death's ironic scrapings."

In this verse, Stevens uses Susanna's "music" to represent her devotion to sticking to the truth, and in the end, her truth kept her alive, and sent the elders to death instead of her, for their lies.





"Soon, with a noise like tambourines,

Came her attendant Byzantines."



"And then, the simpering Byzantines

Fled, with a noise like tambourines."

These passages show significant success at describing music or sound, to set the tone. The first verse describes the chaos of Susanna's attendant coming and seeing her with the Elders, and the noise like tambourines is used to show this.

And the next passage uses the same noise of tambourines to describe when the loud mouthed attendant runs off to tell on Susanna and all hell will break loose.



-------->The YouTube Video of Peter Quince at the Clavier that I viewed

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVSXt4GHMPc

Exodus

I really enjoyed battling through the Book of Exodus. I only wish God would give me a rod that would turn into a snake when I threw it down too, to help me chow through all this painful, but compelling literature. It's no wonder Dr. Sexson ranked Exodus as an 8 that day in class. I mean, the Ten Commandments are listed, the Israelites are led out of Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea is described, Mount Sinai is here and is important in relation to Words with Power, and of course... we meet Moses. However, what I like best about Exodus is the reader gets to actually know more about God. It may not be what I thought, it may be that he is easily angered and snaps on the Israelites for every human mistake that is made, for example, when he wanted to kill them all for worshipping that calf made by Aaron, but we still see God a lot more in this Book as compared to Genesis.

I enjoyed reading the transformation of Moses from somewhat of a weak man into a courageous man. At the beginning of Exodus, he wouldn't comply with God's request to talk with Pharaoh in Egypt and does nothing but complain about this mission given to him. Because why? He is afraid of speaking and doesn't do so well with communication. Kind of a wimpy excuse for the prophet chosen by God to fulfill such an important task of leading the Israelites out of Egypt. So, we have Joseph the Dreamer, Jacob the trickster, and Isaac the Blind of Genesis, and Moses the Complainer of Exodus. But towards the end of Exodus we see Moses flourish into a savior, or other words someone actually deemed worthy to be chosen by God for such a mighty undertaking. He actually saves the Israelites from God. And he does this by speaking to God, and speaking was such a timid matter for him before.


David Plotz brings up an interesting argument about Exodus concerning monotheism and polytheism in the Ten Commandments, that I have yet to think about. The first two of the Ten Commandments states, " You shall have no other Gods besides Me" and "You shall not bow down to them or serve them", now, that leaves room for a lot of interpretation, especially for an individual who is not highly religious, such as myself. David Plotz desribes the Israelites being polytheists, and then discovering that God was the top dog, coming to this realization of monotheism. But it still leaves grounds for further interpretation for me. If God was the only God why would he even have to make a rule of not having other Gods? Is there proof in the Ten Commandments that there is multiple gods? Wow, perplexing argument David Plotz. I need to study/theorize more on this. Did anyone else find this as thought provoking as I did?

WOmen in the Bible

...Or do they? Sure, they may be hidden under the blustering tales of the men. But they're present among the minds who look closely.
It's a little, but grand word called manipulation. And us women know how to work it. :)


Ok, let's be honest. Women in the Bible are material objects. They're made into prostitutes by their fathers, sold off basically for marriages and don't even get to choose their own spouses, they're seen as repulsive for having a menstrual cycle, and above it all they are not recognized for how big of a part they play in recreation. Ok, Adam we know you gave life from your rib. Thanks be to God.


But now let me dig into my reminiscent mind, and fish out the times that women have made fools of men, and risen above their dominating ways, by the power of manipulation. And maybe just being smarter all together.

Examples:


-When women can trick their own father into having sex with them, that is manipulation. (Lot's daughters in Genesis)


- Rebekah (or the original Lady Macbeth as David Plotz calls her, hehe) manipulates her son Jacob to trick Isaac into blessing the wrong son. And if you remember, Jacob is hesitant at first because he is afraid of getting cursed. But all Rebekah has to say is "Just do as I say", and the scam unfolds.

- Sarah, Abraham's wife, fools Pharaoh into thinking that she is Abraham's sister. Abraham couldn't have done that good of acting.

-Who sends Joseph to jail because he won't "lie" with her? A woman. Ok, so Potiphar's wife being a sex crazed maniac may not be the best example, but it still shows women in power due to manipulation.


A person who is fond of detracting would say I am dead wrong. But we must not forget terms such as Couvade, when men envy childbirth in the Bible shown when Adam gives "birth" to Eve via his rib, and as we discussed in class, in a patriarchy, even men are women. Women are visibly seen as less important in the Bible, but still hold much significance.

As discussed in Linda Sexson's visit to our classroom, women in the Bible are present in 3 categories. And these categories are: feminine: symbolic and metaphorical , women: social persons who are designated by culture, and female: biological

I think I will find it helpful while continuing to read the Bible, and as I reach and interpret the stories of women, to keep in mind these 3 categories. These help determine the role they play.

The Wrath of God-eek!

I've always been afraid to view God in any light rather than a positive one. I use the word afraid because of my religious upbringing. Yes, afraid. Take it as you like. I didn't want to think negatively towards God, because who knows, he could strike me down at any time. He's God right? He can do those things.

But as I've been reading David Plotz and comprehending his constant pessimistic accounts of God in the Bible, it's refreshing in a way. Not because he has the guts to explain how God is really acting through Genesis in the Bible, (I'm on Chap 28 of Genesis in the "Good Book") but because he talks about God as if he's just a normal human being, rather than an "almighty power". Up to this point in the Bible David Plotz acknowledges when God judges and is being unfair and I've never seen anyone do this before. I don't know if it's because people are afraid of doing this or what, but I know I grew up to be. Why is this? Can't we still believe in God and talk "crap" ? haha. Or be honest with ourselves about the Bible at least? Which is essentially all David Plotz is doing. Because every comment he makes in the "Good Book" goes right along with the occurrences in Genesis thus far.

Favorite quote of David Plotz so far... he really is a character right?

"I love the way God just drops in, like a nosy neighbor in a sitcom." --referring to when God stops by Abraham's tent unexpectedly, to let him know he's going to destroy Sodom and Gomorroah. pg 14 in the "Good Book"

The Book of Genesis

I went to Catechism classes when I was younger, where I read parts of the Bible but nowhere near all of it. I am sure those classes would have came in handy now when having to face our task of tackling the whole Bible. However, I have now read Genesis. And it is sad how much I did not know. Maybe, I am oblivious? or maybe life gets too busy to care if I have memorized what happens in every book of the Bible? Who knows. But now that I am taking a class, that I have to know the books of the Bible, it will be nice to actually HAVE to know them. Because all in all, I want to.
So, surprises from Genesis?
Please do not think less of me from my responses. Just remember that I do not have my Bible reading experiences ok? haha.
I knew about the creation of earth.
I knew Adam and Eve
And then the book of Genesis says... Adam and Eve had a son named...Cain! Ok ok ok, Not surprising to most of you. I knew of the brothers Cain and Abel, but I have no idea why I did not know that they were the sons of Adam and Eve.
Alright, I need to keep reading. I have to reach each page twice, and we have Bible class today, so I need to keep reading.

Until next time fellow Bible readers.