I can call the creation story/ies of Genesis a myth because…

“The concept ‘myth’ … suggests a central place and value of such stories in the collective memory and consciousness of a group, and/or a direct link with ritual, in other words, a kind of sacred text.” (Niek Veldhuis, Religion, Literature and Scholarship: The Sumerian Composition Nanshe and the Birds, p. 67)

Of course, this would apply equally to the story of the Last Supper, which I’ve never found myself wanting to designate as “myth.”

Things I fantasize about researching in-depth if I weren’t a full-time grad student in a non-funky field:

- The Dance of Death (Todtentanz, danse macabre)

- Carnival

- Thomas Cranmer and how he wrote the Book of Common Prayer, and how the same man who wrote the BCP could be Henry VIII’s yes-man

- the relationship between the origins of Presbyterianism, the Westminster Confession, and Oliver Cromwell, and whether the Westminster divines condoned regicide

- Puritan witch trials – WTF!?

- witch trials in general

- how Christian attitudes toward the supernatural (demons, the devil, witches, miracles, prophecy etc) have changed over the centuries – e.g. Martin Luther thought the Devil hung out in his study

- attitudes toward violence in Islam: in the Quran and other canonical sources; different ways these have been interpreted in different times and by different sects

- just when and how the Judeo-Christian tradition came to regard sex between a married man and an unmarried woman as adultery: you sure don’t see that in the Old Testament, and I’m not sure about the New

Carnival and the Dance of Death

I found this fascinating paragraph in the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the “dance of death.” (I really am not obsessed with death, it’s just one of many Christian themes that I find worth thinking about, in conjunction with Resurrection and New Life of course, but once I decided to name my blog after Bach’s cantata “I stand with one foot in the grave,” the death theme took on a life of its own.)

“In Florence (1559) the “triumph of death” formed a part of the carnival celebration. We may describe it as follows: After dark a huge wagon, draped in black and drawn by oxen, drove through the streets of the city. At the end of the shaft was seen the Angel of Death blowing the trumpet. On the top of the wagon stood a great figure of Death carrying a scythe and surrounded by coffins. Around the wagons were covered graves which opened whenever the procession halted. Men dressed in black garments on which were painted skulls and bones came forth and, seated on the edge of the graves, sang dirges on the shortness of human life. Before and behind the wagon appeared men in black and white bearing torches and death masks, followed by banners displaying skulls and bones and skeletons riding on scrawny nags. While they marched the entire company sang the Miserere with trembling voices.”

- Written by Charles G. Herbermann & George Charles Williamson. Transcribed by Rick McCarty. The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IV. Published 1908. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Nihil Obstat. Remy Lafort, Censor. Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York

Movies: The Valet and Snow Cake

This weekend I watched two movies that I can unabashedly recommend: The Valet (a French farce starring Daniel Auteuil, one of the funniest and most satisfying movies I’ve seen in a long time) and Snow Cake, an independent movie set in Canada with Alan Rickman and a great soundtrack.

I had never been much of an Alan Rickman fan, despite my Anglophilia, because I thought he was pretty much the poster child for over-acting (his Colonel Brandon always brought on gestures of pretend vomit). Also, as far as I can tell he plays the same character over and over again, or at least talks and emotes the same in every movie I’ve ever seen him in, whether he’s Snape in Harry Potter, the aforementioned Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility, the cuckolded husband in Close Your Eyes (a very guilty pleasure) or the one who’s thinking about having an affair Love Actually… But I loved him in Snow Cake. He’s still Alan Rickman, but toned down a bit, and that unsmiling, deadpan, perfectly elocuted delivery and tragic gravitas are hilarious counterpoints to an autistic Sigourney Weaver (especially during their Scrabble game) and the ridiculous situations he finds himself in. I think the straightman is even funnnier when he’s the only Brit in the room. Not that the movie is primarily a comedy, it has a lot of sadness, and he’s good there too, but I liked it mainly for its humor.