Jamie123

"Big Brother" (ugh!) "America's (Britain's, Outer Mongolia's...) Next Top Model" "The Great British Bake Off" (Who cares who can and can't bake a cake?) "Say Yes to the Dress" (Why does everyone apart from me think that batty brides-to-be and their equally batty mothers crooning over wedding dresses, while effeminate salesmen mince around them is the greatest thing since the Incarnation?) "Strictly Come Dancing on Ice with the Stars" (all those shows merge into one blur of mysery for me - I can't even distinguish between them). I can't imagine it would ever come down to "Big Brother" or nothing. Surely there are books and music you could take with you into space for entertainment.

This went through my head too when I first read Maureen's post; it's not my (or Maureen's) business to tell the Church how (for example) endowments should be performed, or whether celestial rooms should be equipped with juke boxes. But since this relates to the crossover between the Mormon and non-Mormon worlds, perhaps it is some of her beeswax. (I speak as someone who spends a lot of time worrying about things that don't pertain to him.)

I wish we knew a bit more about Jonah. Outside the Book of Jonah itself, all we know about him is he prophesied that God would "...restore...the border of Israel from the entrance of Hamath unto the sea of the Arabah" (2 Kings 14). Jesus mentions him of course, but only to use the "whale" episode as an analogy for what was about to happen to himself. The question people always ask about the Book of Jonah is: "Is it real history or a parable/allegory?" I'm inclined to think that: Jonah probably was a real man (otherwise why would he be mentioned in 2 Kings?) However, the story of the Book of Jonah is probably fiction. In case this offends anyone let me explain: Jonah has always been described as "one of the minor prophets". The Jews also classify it as such. All the other "minor prophet" books contain actual prophesy. If Jonah is "real history" then it sticks out like a sore thumb. If the story is fictional then it can be read as prophesy couched in the form of allegory. As such it fits in far better with the other books in the "minor prophets" category. The "real" Jonah probably had a reputation for xenophobia making him the last person anyone would expect God to preach to Assyrians. Getting straight on a ship to Tarshish (which is modern day Spain - totally the opposite direction from Nineveh) is exactly what he would have been tempted to do. The original readers of the book would have seen the humour in this. The true "prophesy" of the book relates not to Jonah's immediate message to Nineveh, but to the more extension of God's grace beyond the Israelite community, which would come to full fruition after the coming of Christ. It's a premature "breaking out" of the New Testament era to come into a world which was still primarily "Old Testament". Also the "whale" part of the story was a prefiguring of what would happen to Jesus - who himself identifies this as the "Sign of Jonah".

I am working through "The Pocket Bible in One Year" which has the entire Bible divided into daily readings. Today was the last day of 2 Kings (which I've been ranting about in another thread) but reading ahead the next book we get to is Jonah. Yes, yes I know Jonah doesn't come next in the regular Bible, but it does in this one. I've always been fascinated by Jonah. He had a whale of a time. It seems ironic that a story of deep repentance not leading to deliverance we should come to one of God sparing the Assyrians because they (however temporarily) listened to Jonah. I suppose God holds his own people to a higher standard than outsiders. You've gotta like the way Jonah reacts though - throwing a sulk (or a "mard" as we used to call it) because God didn't do what he wanted him to - and because he was nice to someone other than the Israelites. Then throwing an even bigger tantrum because God took away his shade. It makes me wonder that if God could choose someone as ornery as Jonah, perhaps there's at least some hope for the rest of us!

Gandalf. Castle Gandolfo is where the pope used to live. Another instance of resurrection is with the Elves, who though they were immortal could be killed. Tolkien tinkered with the exact details, but it seems that for Elves death was a kind of short-cut for their souls to reach the West (where most of them were headed anyway), where they would be given new physical bodies and could in theory at least return to Middle-earth. I'm not sure if Tolkien ever stated this explicitly but it's often claimed that the Glorfindel who died in the fall of Gondolin (in The Silmarillion) was the same Glorfindel who helped Frodo escape from the Black Riders (in Peter Jackson's version he was replaced with Arwen, and in Ralph Bakshi's with Legolas). The souls of mortal Men (and presumably Hobbits) also traveled to the West, but unlike the Elves they traveled on and left Arda altogether, to be with Iluvatar (God).

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the female pronoun here. I know one person (a woman in fact) who gets so angry at the thought that God might be feminine. I never dared suggest to her she read "The Shack" by William Young. (I can only talk about the book - I've not yet seen the movie.)

I'll try: maybe Neco and the Assyrian king had no interest at that time in fighting Judah and the arrival of Josiah's army was an unwanted distraction. Maybe "Your God told me to do this" was an argument he thought might appeal to Josiah, to make him go away.

Very interesting. An alternative telling often helps. It sounds like Josiah may have had a "stupid death". One thought springs to mind though: why would a pagan Egyptian Pharaoh claim to be doing what God told him to do? (Though I believe the Egyptians did have at least one period of monotheism.)

Tell her I'm practicing the ukulele. I can play "O Suzanna" quite well (if you don't mind 10 minute intervals during chord changes).

Very likely, but didn't God rather hasten that moment by having Josiah get himself killed by Neco? If so it sounds like God punished the people by having their good king die so a bad one could take over, so he could then get on with the business of punishing them some more. Also verse 26 suggests that God was not angry with the people in general but with Manasseh (who was by that time dead anyway). There's no denying that God is complicated. But maybe that's what we ought to expect, God being God and all that. The "unreliable narrator" - there's an interesting thought!

Please give my regards to his daughter Georgina and tell her I hope her bagpipes lessons are going well.

This would be Benjamin Franklin of Franklins Dry Cleaners and Spectacle Makers, Bedford Ave, Brooklyn, NY 1211?

Word to the wise, eh? The trouble is I'm stupid!

Interesting... I find it hard to square this with "The vilest offender who truly believes, That moment from Jesus a pardon receives." Still - hymn writers don't always get their theology right.

But remember the "Utmost West" was where the Valar (or Gods) were based. (Not at the beginning I grant you, but since Melkor had destroyed their original home of Almaren before the Elves even awoke). And the Elves had been heading west even during their ascendancy, since the Valar summoned them from Cuivienen. (Yes I know - I'm a sad Tolkien geek.)

Does it not worry you that after all the things Josiah did put things right (with the temple etc.), God was still angry because of the bad stuff Manasseh had done? It makes you wonder if perhaps repentance isn't all its cracked up to be.

In the same vein: A man goes into a shop and asks for a comb. The shopkeeper asks "Do you want a steel one?" "No," replies the customer. "I don't mind paying."

A Politically Incorrect Joke A Chinaman telephones the dentists to make an appointment. "Two thirty?" asks the receptionist? "Ah yes," says the Chinaman. "Tooth hurty very very much!"

We have chocolate biscuits afterwards.

As a kid, I found the best plan was to give them your report card and - before they've had time to read it - leave the house on some urgent pretext. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT return for at least two hours. By that time they have (hopefully) calmed down somewhat.

And E is death of YOU?

What does he do when they get an A? Buy them a Cray supercomputer?

I agree Americans are as entitled to have view on brexit as we are to moan about Trump. I am just a little surprised someone in Florida would care much one way or the other whether one small island thousand of miles away stays politically united with the European mainland or not.

That's Lord Bucket-Head in the middle! He'd have got my vote