decalogue

The always inspired and insightful This American Life reprises acts from earlier episodes to reflect on the Ten Commandments just after Pesach and Easter and the way those fundamental rules bind and perpetuate social order and how transgressions are addressed.
All of the stories are interesting but it was especially the first vignette, a memory by Shalom Auslander, in which a pupil at Chabad (Jewish Religious School) is informed that he bears one of the seven-two names of God and as the third Commandment directs, “shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” Peace was not the most common epithet for the divine but a strict interpretation of the law and customs (chumra) dictate that not only must special care be taken to avoid blasphemy and not to invoke God’s name to do harm, writing it down created something holy out of the profane and had to be handled in a fitting fashion. Ephemera and papers bearing the name of God were to be collected in a shaimos (name) box and once full, buried respectably in a storage structure (genizah) at a synagogue or cemetery according to tradition. School assignments and paper lunch bags from Auslander were permanently archived along with retired torah and prayers.

throwing down the gauntlet

We’ve yet to see the concluding chapters of the Avengers’ franchise and only know of Death-Dealing Thanos (no spoilers, please) but have been exposed enough to the references and artefacts to appreciate the resemblance that the super villain’s glove has to this reliquary which holds the uncorrupted hand of Teresa of Ávila (*1515 – †1582).
A noble woman whose Jewish ancestors were coerced to convert during the Spanish Inquisition, this Doctor of the Church was called to the monastic and contemplative life and after canonisation was a candidate for the patron saint of Spain—just edged out by James (Santiago de Zebedeo) and Catherine of Siena (whose Feast Day is coincidentally today). The well-travelled reformer succumbed to illness on the way to Alba de Tormes, just as most of Europe was switching from the Julian to Gregorian calendar so there’s some debate as to the time of her death and when to observe her Saint’s Day—15 October according to liturgical calendars, and her exumed body was dismembered and spread as relics to holy sites and the convents that she founded, her left eye and right hand going to Ronda in Andalusia, the later pictured next to the cinematic prop being kept by Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, sort of like the Lance of Longinus, until his death when the treasure was restored to the nunnery.

a foul-weather commander and fair-weather friends

The population of Pitcairn and Norfolk islands being descendants of the mutineers and their Tahitian consorts, master’s mate Fletcher Christian seized control from Lieutenant William Bligh on this day in 1789 and expelled him from the HMS Bounty whilst on a mission to transport breadfruit to the West Indies.
Christian and his conspirators had grown weary of Bligh’s rather harsh regimen and became rather enamoured with the Polynesian way of life and the women that they had encountered. Attempts to permanently settle in Toubouai were rebuffed by natives and in January of 1790, and they landed—divided and with a significant amount of infighting and violence, on the unpopulated, remote Pitcairn group.  The British Admiralty dispatched ships to bring these fugitives to justice but were only able to retrieve a few survivors of the original crew, stranding their children and mothers on the deserted island, the Bounty having been cannibalised and set ablaze shortly after arrival.  

hall of fame

Graciously, the Gentle Author of Spitalfields Life invites us to seek refuge from the hustle of the High Street and hide a bit in an old haunt—The Champion located in the West End, just off the retail monotony of Oxford Street—and soak up the atmosphere.
Though the pub has been there on the corner of Wells and Eastcastle since the mid-nineteenth century, a contemporary of the Victorian explorers and sports pioneers depicted in stained glass, these were much later additions, commissions from the accomplished artist Ann Southeran installed in 1989 to give the place some added character, and include the subject Captain Matthew Webb (*1848 - †1883) who was the first recorded individual to cross the English Channel under his own power. In 1875, Webb swam from Dover to Calais in just under twenty-two hours, fighting the powerful rip-tide and painful jellyfish stings. Sadly, Webb’s later stunt of crossing the Whirlpool Rapids below Niagara Falls proved to be too treacherous and Webb died during his swim. Webb’s life and legacy are remembered in the poem “A Shropshire Lad” by Poet Laureate John Betjeman and the caricature of him that appeared on a brand of weatherproof matches is said to have been the model for Peter Sellers’ Inspector Clouseau. Much more to explore at the link above plus a detailed gallery of the Champions at the link above.

xристос воскрес! воістину воскрес!

page not found

Referred by the always remarkable Miss Cellania, we find the HTTP 404 (see also here, here and here) response code pages for the United States 2020 presidential candidates’ campaign websites’ up for inspection and ranked.
A lot of them are pretty funny and self-aware, and while we find a strong sense of revulsion leading with anything that narcissistic nihilist and cult leader, the Trump-Pence redirect error page—coming in twenty-third and indeed on the bottom of the heap—does illustrate the textbook definition of a sore-winner (so much winning) and the fact that he’s been unable to move beyond 2016.