lindsays blog

The Last Breath

This semester has been hard. Classes have been difficult to keep up with, extracurricular stuff even more difficult to keep up with, and the combination of everything on a daily basis has been overwhelming. Reading Frye, Bloom, and the Bible has been a welcome break from my other classes/readings, and a learning process that has changed and enhanced my views on spirituality, religion, and belief in general.

I wish the class was a year long. I would like to continue learning and progressing.

lindsays blog

Presentations November 30, 2006

First off, nice work on Rosa's part, perfect message-relaying... And everyone else for that matter. I thought they went well, nice and short, put-together, and interesting. much better than the 10-20 minute spiel we have to sit through.

As for the final, Im planning on printing off some blogs with feasible study info. I hope it'spossible to combine everything and not overwhelm myself with fact.

I hope what I summed up in a few jumbled phrases today, made some amount of sense, because I really wanted to get across what I wrote about. I wanted to outline the pain and misery both Jacob and the Hallelujah lyrics exemplify. I wanted to tell everyone about the heartache and the trials filtering through the lives of Jacob and Jeff (I used Jeff Buckley's version of 'Hallelujah' because Im a little bit in love with him....especially when he sings that song) and the LOVE embodying both good and evil by free will, with faith hovering above. God shines through both men's lives as they either sing/mourn or travel along a rough road in the name of love for, well, a woman.

Anyway, I posted my paper, and hopefully it makes sense.

lindsays blog

-This is my term paper everyone. I have no idea what other way to paste this......Yes, I am retarded and know nothing about computers, NOR do I wish to know more. I will live in the woods forever, there is no need.

Enjoy,
Lindsay









December, 2006
English 211



















Love:
The Word of God












Lindsay M. Duckworth
“I heard there was a secret chord, 1
that David played and it pleased the Lord,
but you don't really care for music, do you?
Well it goes like this the fourth, the fifth,
the minor fall and the major lift,
the baffled king composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah...

Well your faith was strong, but you needed proof,
you saw her bathing on the roof,
her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you.
She tied you to her kitchen chair,
she broke your throne and she cut your hair,
and from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah...

Baby I've been here before,
I’ve seen this room and I've walked this floor,
I used to live alone before I knew you.
I’ve seen your flag on the marble arch,
but love is not a victory march,
it's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah...

Well there was a time when you let me know
what's really going on below,
but now you never show that to me do you?
But remember when i moved in you,
and the holy dove was moving too,
and every breath we drew was Hallelujah

Well maybe there's a god above,
but all I've ever learned from love,
was how to shoot somebody who outdrew you.
And it's not a cry that you hear at night,
it's not somebody who's seen the light
it's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah...
Jeff Buckley, “Hallelujah”
2 As Jeff Buckley moans passionately over the love that so hauntingly pains him in “Hallelujah,” sorrow blankets the mood. Love becomes tangled with misery in the bittersweet lyrics, and a yearning for faith cries out behind the powerful harmonies. The love for a woman against the love available to and from a god, flows through the words just as The Slave’s Jacob longs for Wanda while maintaining a trust and love for God. Jacob and Jeff Buckley both find themselves burdened with a lust and love so so forceful that their faith is tested, tried, and beat-down until love seems something destructive and dangerous.
The risk Jacob takes in regards to his love for Wanda, is above and beyond a small feat, but rather a quest beginning with sinful lust, fueled by religion, and ending in eternal love. But the lust Jacob experiences upon first laying eyes on Wanda, leaves him guilt-ridden and burdened by his sinful nature of falling into temptation. Lust, love, and the precarious position one takes in fulfilling the satisfaction temptations offer, often lead to a face-off with God, and Jacob ‘s humanism fully exudes such an instance. “Every night he dropped onto his bed like a log. Thank God there was something stronger than his lust.” (The Slave, 62) The love and peace Jacob receives from God, is a gift he did not want to destroy, and a privilege he felt necessary to fully appreciate and serve. In the midst of his strict commitment to God, Jacob strays from the rigid Scripture and begins to feel a passion for Wanda, a Gentile Christian, forbidden for him to be with as a Jewish man. But Jacob’s lust overtakes his once narrow path along God’s word, and he falls for Wanda, allows her to come to him, and gives in to the temptation lust created. “If the desires of the flesh came from Satan, then he was in the Devil’s net.” (The Slave, 62) Jacob’s
3
turn from God soon engulfed him in a sea of guilt from the sin he so willingly commit under the watchful eye of his Creator. The love Jacob and Wanda experience for one another, both crushes and enlightens them, yet also enslaves them beneath a heavy blanket of guilt surrounding their sin’s on a quest of love.

The struggle for love that encompasses both Wanda and Jacob, mirror what the Bible advises against taking part in. Ecclesiastics 6.7 says that, “All human toil is for the mouth, yet the appetite is not satisfied.” A few lines later, in 6. 9; “Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of desire; this also is vanity and a chasing after wind.” Now, had Jacob not seen Wanda and felt lust and desire, love would not have been possible to reach between the man and woman. Ecclesiastics simply reinstates that all humans are, in fact, sinful by nature, and by following the eyes, only sin can reside. But what about love between man and woman? Love begins with initial attraction, desire, and/or longing, all actions saturated in sin, yet love is viewed as the greatest gift from God. This is where lust and love clash, both terms coming together as a unit and defining what God graced both Wanda and Jacob with in order for them to show their love to Him. To become more like Him through their love for one another .
The numerous conflicts that arise as Jacob and Wanda grow in their love, together and under God, place both characters on a rough journey within the community and their faith, but the undying strength of their love override the disgust society directs toward their relationship. Although Jacob and Wanda fight religiously to be together, they are consistently punished
4
throughout their lives, existing in a constant cage of post-sin guilt, held hostage by their choice to love one another against the community’s violent opposition of their relationship. “Jacob’s longing for Wanda made him willing to take any risk. Even though the journey must result in sin, he sang Psalms and begged God to keep him safe.” (The Slave, 133) Jacob chooses his love for Wanda over the outrage stimulated by people in disagreement of such a sin against God, but Jacob and Wanda continue to believe and depend on God’s grace to guide them together.
As love paves a bumpy road for Jacob, Wanda, Jeff Buckley, and the many incidences in the Bible between men and women, the term/emotion/feeling begins to evolve and shatter at once. Love becomes the slavery Wanda and Jacob battle to be freed from and plead to be a part of, the
complexity of the matter progressing with every turn they take, but through the undying faith and belief in God, they are bound together eternally. “How could he have known that such passion and love as Wanda’s existed?” (The Slave, 70) Powered by the strength his love for Wanda provided, Jacob displays an act of free will, a God-given token for man to live by choice. Jacob’s freedom to choose the forbidden peasant woman, is a risk he knows dangerous, and although his ever-present guilt rides the current through a large portion of their relationship, Jacob remains faithful to God. “What was the purpose of Creation? Free will! Man must choose for himself between good and evil. This was the reason God had sent for the man’s soul from the throne of Glory. He blessed us with His mercy, and if now and again He let us slip and fall, it was to accustom us to walking alone.” (The Slave, 82) The choice Jacob makes to love Wanda while remaining faithful in his belief and servitude of God, is a muddled picture of lust, love, and
5
the sinful nature of man, a process undeniably tumultuous in emotion yet thriving to believe.
The love between Wanda and Jacob is unique in the hardships it endures, the growth it experiences, and the ridicule it faces throughout their lives. Jacob relies on God to carry this forbidden love through the obstacles and barriers their lives present at every corner, allowing pain and suffering to filter into their journey, only to be conquered by the undying love both man and woman have for one another. The Slave is more than a love story. It is a glimpse into the realities of a relationship viewed as ‘wrong,’ but strong enough to move beyond society and the rigid expectations continuously weighing them down, and only through Jacob’s belief in God and His words, are they able to live and die together in love.
So, as Jeff Buckley pierces through the silence with a knife-edged longing, love bleeds from the pages of The Slave. Jacob and Wanda’s lives are closed and exist only in the story their love could tell. Hallelujah...

lindsays blog

Term Paper Stuff....CONTINUED

Lust, sin, and guilt in relation to The Slave and the manner in which Jacob approaches temptation but is then enslaved in his own sin committed with Wanda, and the guilt that follows sin. What does the Bible say about this? Lust, both in the mind and acted upon, is a selfish desire to some extent, but is there more than that? Is lust all humanity is capable to experiencing that is somewhat related to Love? Does Love exist between two people? Or is Love unique only to God?

"the human ideal is a paradoxical mixture of a belonging and an escape." Frye

This passage, from Frye, embodies what I would like to analyze...Belonging being the social aspect of humanity and the individual craving /desiring acceptance, 'love', connection with another person. The escape could represent the mental 'world' an individual creates for him/herself that does not involve interacting with another person in the physical sense. My question is: How can this human ideal work through serving God? Is God the only 'escape' that should be allowed on that one side of the paradox? And as one side of the mind veers from the reality of the physical world, how do they ultimately align to create a 'godly' life?

Jacob is a perfect example of this paradox. He reads the Scripture and devotes his life to God, promises to serve Him with all of his entirety and honesty, avoiding temptation and sin. But Jacob's 'escape' leads him to think sexual thoughts of Wanda. His 'animalistic' desires spoil the promise to God. So, if we as humans, are made in God's image, why do we read a book like The Slave, and allow him to get away with such a sin? He PROMISED, he gave his life to God, but went away from Him by sleeping with Wanda while unmarried....But it was all in the name of Love. Can man and woman ever truly be in love. Is God the only Love that exists. He forgives us for our inherantly sinful nature. He Loves us no matter what we do, and He gave His life for us to live. So, where did this term 'Love' become so significant OUTSIDE of God? We do not know love. Jacob was not in love. The only time a human can actually experience Love, is through God. Everything else that may seem like love, feel like love, LOOK like love, is merely lust, hormones (physical/genetic makeup), and selfish desire. We, like Jacob, and I will only use Jacob as my subject of victimization (somethign like that), are slaves to God. Jacob committs his life to God, fails to do so, and is punished. Slavery begins at birth, BEFORE birth even, and in Jacob's case, exemplifies the process in which he experiences various forms of slavery. The promise, temptation, choice, SIN, guilt, punishment, and the repenting throughout that highlights the entrapment and slavery Jacob experiences under God and His Love.

Ok, my 'topic' does not really exist now. I just went on and on about things that dont really come together. There has to be a way to align what I want to know with what I have already learned and experienced. A case study?

Well I looked my demons in the eyes,
laid bare my chest, said do my best,
destroy me
see I been to hell and back so many times,
I must admit,
you kind of bore me.

Shall we call this a lesson learned?

lindsays blog

Term Paper Stuff....CONTINUED

Lust, sin, and guilt in relation to The Slave and the manner in which Jacob approaches temptation but is then enslaved in his own sin committed with Wanda, and the guilt that follows sin. What does the Bible say about this? Lust, both in the mind and acted upon, is a selfish desire to some extent, but is there more than that? Is lust all humanity is capable to experiencing that is somewhat related to Love? Does Love exist between two people? Or is Love unique only to God?

"the human ideal is a paradoxical mixture of a belonging and an escape." Frye

This passage, from Frye, embodies what I would like to analyze...Belonging being the social aspect of humanity and the individual craving /desiring acceptance, 'love', connection with another person. The escape could represent the mental 'world' an individual creates for him/herself that does not involve interacting with another person in the physical sense. My question is: How can this human ideal work through serving God? Is God the only 'escape' that should be allowed on that one side of the paradox? And as one side of the mind veers from the reality of the physical world, how do they ultimately align to create a 'godly' life?

Jacob is a perfect example of this paradox. He reads the Scripture and devotes his life to God, promises to serve Him with all of his entirety and honesty, avoiding temptation and sin. But Jacob's 'escape' leads him to think sexual thoughts of Wanda. His 'animalistic' desires spoil the promise to God. So, if we as humans, are made in God's image, why do we read a book like The Slave, and allow him to get away with such a sin? He PROMISED, he gave his life to God, but went away from Him by sleeping with Wanda while unmarried....But it was all in the name of Love. Can man and woman ever truly be in love. Is God the only Love that exists. He forgives us for our inherantly sinful nature. He Loves us no matter what we do, and He gave His life for us to live. So, where did this term 'Love' become so significant OUTSIDE of God? We do not know love. Jacob was not in love. The only time a human can actually experience Love, is through God. Everything else that may seem like love, feel like love, LOOK like love, is merely lust, hormones (physical/genetic makeup), and selfish desire. We, like Jacob, and I will only use Jacob as my subject of victimization (somethign like that), are slaves to God. Jacob committs his life to God, fails to do so, and is punished. Slavery begins at birth, BEFORE birth even, and in Jacob's case, exemplifies the process in which he experiences various forms of slavery. The promise, temptation, choice, SIN, guilt, punishment, and the repenting throughout that highlights the entrapment and slavery Jacob experiences under God and His Love.

Ok, my 'topic' does not really exist now. I just went on and on about things that dont really come together. There has to be a way to align what I want to know with what I have already learned and experienced. A case study?

Well I looked my demons in the eyes,
laid bare my chest, said do my best,
destroy me
see I been to hell and back so many times,
I must admit,
you kind of bore me.

Shall we call this a lesson learned?

lindsays blog

Lust, Guilt, and Biblical Passages

"There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it lies heavy upon men:"
Ecclesiastes

"There are those who are pure in their own eyes, but are not cleansed of their filth."
Proverbs

"There are six things which the Lord hate, seven which are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innovent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and a man who sows discord among brothers." Proverbs

"With much seductive speech she persuades him. All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its entrails; as a bird rushes into a snare; he does no know that it will cost him his life." Proverbs

"And so it is, just like you said it would be. Life goes easy on me, most of the time. And so it is, The shorter story, No love no glory, no hero in her skies. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes.... And so it is, just like you said it should be. We'll both forget the breeze most of the time. And so it is...The colder water, the blowers daughter, the pupil in denial. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes off of you. I can't take my eyes..."
Damien Rice



I can't stop thinking about the guilt married to sin. The shame that comes along with desire and lust, and the disgusting perversions alongside uncontrollable passion. After listening to a local Pastor preach on the sinful results of lust surrounding human flesh, physical desire, and perverse obsession, someone approached me and confessed his own difficulty in dealing with the consumption of lust/desire. I immediately lost respect for him and became both disgusted and disappointed, bordering on ill. I asked him how he felt and how he was trying to deal with these feelings of lust and physical desire for sex, but I couldn't let myself listen. I didn't want to hear it. I wanted him gone and I wanted to never speak with him again. I still wonder whether or not Im willing to listen and try to understand the sinfulness and guilt he is experiencing. I can't help but wish for his punishment because of the pettiness and selfishness this 'problem' strikes me as. But then I remember to love your neighbor more than yourself, though that says nothing about respect. I listened, felt a bit nauseous, but listened to him confess and beg forgiveness, and I suddenly felt the weakness of man. Not male man, but humankind. The need we have for a fix surrounding some inherant desire, and the pain and process following committing a sin that results in such a heavy guilt that you feel like there is no point in going on. He felt similar to this. Broken, weak, sickened by his own perverse thoughts, disloyal to God and his friends. So, I read more and more of the Bible. (Im almost all the way through) But there are so many verses dealing with the struggle surrounding lust/desire/physical obsession, and there has been no better time than now to recognize and acknowledge the significant and repetition of those verses. Look at the society we are living in. There are sexy images, sex on every tv station, magazine covers advertising something dealing with sex, and an undeniably large proportion of the population obsessed with their physical performance and appeal. That's the majority of what I think about. I think about losing weight, how much weight I might have gained and whether or not it shows. I see beautiful people and wish I could look like that. I obsess and lust after an image, images, and drain myself with unrealistic and selfish goals. And then I return to the Bible and read the many passages begging and pleading for us to set those obsessions and lustful desires aside as selfish sins. I see him struggling with his own self-control and feel nothing but pity and sadness instead of anger and jealousy. THis does not mean to say that we should let ourselves go and be unhealthy and not care. But lust, image, desire, is nothing but another addiction to distract us from the truth and happiness. My group has been analyzing and reading Samuel for the past few weeks, and with my part being Amnon and the rape of his sister, this topic of lust and desire couldn't have been more fitting. And the pastor's speaking on Sunday really pushed me into writing and finding out more about the Biblical history of lust and desire. Amnon thinks he is in love with Tamar, but actually he just thinks she is beautiful, probably likes that she is a virgin, and forces her to sleep with him....well, he rapes her. Suddenly, his 'love' is gone, and he is 'cured' from his own lust from her. Is that why so many guys, and girls, but fewer, just sleep with girls then move on? Does "Love" really exist? I am weary of 'love', and although I would like to say that I believe Love is something that can exist between a man and a woman, both intimately and spiritually, I don't really think I can. I doubt man and woman can ever really Love one another, and though I have said that I have loved someone, I honestly believe it had more to do with wanting and needing the comfort and company of someone who thinks that I am some sort of desireable. But what do I know? I am basing this on experience and observation, and I have yet to see Love as something honest and real. Maybe that's pessimism at its finest, but Im ok with it. So, if anything, Im going to listen to my friend and try to help him, because it might be all I, as a friend, can do in this time of physical obsession in our society that weighs so heavily on us. As for myself, Love is not something I am interested in anymore as a future experience, because really, isn't lust the same thing nowadays? Maybe I will just read and listen to those who wonder and struggle with what I choose not to become a part of.'

lindsays blog

Here is Amnon's/My story

This story involves me, Amnon, son of King David and stepbrother of Tamar, my brother Absalom's sister. Tamar and I have different mothers but the same father. I love Tamar. She is the most beautiful woman on earth, and I am deeply in love with her. My days and nights are consumed with thoughts of her and I had to find a way to be with her. I had to find a way to lie with her. I pretended to be ill one night, and cried out for Tamar to bring me food so that I could eat from her lovely hand. When she came, I could not control my urge and lust for her. I asked her to lie with me and she did not comply. I begged her to come to me so I could love her and be with her, but still she refused. I am much bigger and stronger than Tamar so I forced her to come to me. I took her virginity and her innocence. That was all I needed to ride myself of the lust and consumption she held over me. I no longer felt any love for Tamar, only hatred and contempt. I made her leave and told her never to come to me again. I got what I wanted and I make no apology for what has happened. She owed me my self-control and now it is over. I raped my sister but she will never tell because no one saw this. I loved her and that is not a sin. I slept with her for love, but now it is gone and we will go one living separate lives. I have no regrets.

lindsays blogI

I want to brainstorm about term paper topics...Im struggling with the narrowness of finding a key idea that would allow for me to combine two pieces of something significant within our readings...I guess that would probably something from the Bible and The Slave, because The Slave really did make me think differently about A LOT of things, plus I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it. Primarily, I want to further my knowledge on the idea of the title, The Slave, and compare and discuss the book in relation to the Book of Job. I feel like they are so similar in language, emotion, and value. I think I 'blogged' about this earlier in the semester. Anyway, deepening my understanding of that undeniable faith and loyalty both Job and Jacob have toward God and the written word, yet turning away from what each knows is the 'right' path, is something I find very interesting in the way humans approach faith/belief/religion. I just need to narrow this idea into some feasible thesis and/or thematic phrase.help.

In other areas of class 'stuff', I can't help but take extreme amounts of pity on myself for doing poorly on a test I was certain I would ace. nope. wrong again. Aside from that, reading the Bible, The Slave, Book of J, and Frye, has both changed and enhanced the way in which I view and comprehend Christianity and religion. The writing is not only beautiful and passionate, but it contains such an astounding level of value and confidence surrounding each 'author's' faith. I find myself constantly referring back to some Scriptural passage to compare thoughts and ideas, in both my personal life and my academic life....Two very OPPOSITE sides of the spectrum. So, what have I learned? What have I gained knowledge on that I lacked in prior to English 211? I have accumulated heaps of questions, stacks of pseudo-theories, and a shadow of doubt surrounding both of the above. I loved reading the Bible, lost myself in Singer's story-telling, and let myself write and speak freely about the many occurances reflecting the literature I had been reading. I am developing an identity I always knew existed but I set aside from the Catholicism my family insisted was the route in which I was to choose. I am able to believe in trying to believe and humble myself to everything I don't know while still thriving to learn more. I am becoming the person I've wanted to be for a long time but have been too damn sad and angry to allow vulnerability into my life. I feel a little less scared of being so scared, a little less mad about the hatred built up inside me, and a lot less down about the future I tend to dread on a daily basis.
Maybe what Im saying is really quite unrelated to what Im supposed to present after participating in an academic study of biblical literature, but I really don't care right now. This is how I have changed, and this class had a tremendous effect on that outcome and the process I have spoken about.

lindsays blog

Water, Revelation, and Sunday's waste


"And the third angel sounded, and there fell from heaven a great star, burning as a torch, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of the waters;"

I HAD planned on going to Church on Sunday (today), if only to bring some channels together in my head to form a substantial body of water...hahahaha. But I ate all day, took a nap, then retired to the couch for over 5 hours of Greys Anatomy. oops. humanity at its finest. Anyway, I would have liked to attend the service and learn more of what I still struggle to tie together. That is, water and religion. Now, I've seen A River Runs Through It, pined over Brad Pitt's character until I fell in love with a Montana boy with a hat and a fly rod wonderfully similar to Paul McLeans. And then I left for school in Boston, watched the movie over and over, read the book (well, I don't like the book, so I would read and re-read the last page....In my mind, the only section of writing with both humilty and brilliance), and pined some more. The guy is gone, I fish because my family only comes together if the event revolves around fishing, and I still don't have an answer as to why John McLean felt the passionate need to combine flyfishing and religion together to.....do something. Ever since I remember, water has been my core, my foundation, and the place I go to feel something beyond stressed out, tired, and distracted by everyday nonsense. Water means more to me than anything physical in the world. I dreamt of being a fish when I was younger, and now spend my excess hours floating, swimming, and enjoying what covers the majority of OUR earthly habitacion.

After reading Revelation, re-reading A River Runs Through It (only the last page of course), and remembering John ( My real-life Paul McLean), I had a minor revelation of my own. Because water is a relative mystery to humans, due to our inability to liive IN it, or beneath it rather, yet depend on it so 'reliigiously', it holds a deeper meaning in an opposite sense of what science deems it necessary to do. Water allows for things to grow, blossom, BECOME, and live. Water can create, destroy, and bring together life, but we, as humans, seem to be slighltly ignorant of its' importance, both as a Biblical metaphor for 'life' and 'growth', AND as a physical element taking up 3/4 of the earth we are quickly covering, nearly falling off the edges into the ocean with our massive population. Water, like Revelation, or the Apocalypse, COULD be the end of the world for humans. Or water could save us. Maybe, like Jesus, we will soon walk on the surface, then become inhabitants of the underworld. Water is the spring of life, the reason for the growing of 'things', the substance embracing the womb of a creation, and a significance Revelation highlights, if only to remind us of the beauty and danger water embodies.

lindsays blog

Since I've previously 'blogged' about reading The Slave, Im going to keep THAT part of my comparison semi-compact. I would like to refer to Ecclesiastes, Book of Job, and The Slave in order to form some connections between the texts. Beginning with Jacob in The Slave, and Job, the similarities of character and mentality are uncanny. Jacob, perpetually enslaved in his love, his sin, his regret, his LIFE, and finally, in his acceptance of being human, is so similar to the way in which Job approaches God. I really liked Jacob at the beginning of The Slave, and admired him for his steadfast ability to live by his beliefs and faith without compromise. But Jacob fails to maintain the loyalty toward Judaism that he fought so hard to hold, and gives in to the temptation of Wanda, a Christian and a gentile. Now, I AM thrilled that he and Wanda had such a great, albeit tumultuous, love, and I WOULD whine if he HAD, in fact, refused her, BUT I also hold a grudge against Jacob. I disrespect him in a way that I didn't see coming. Jacob spent so much time reciting the Torah, enscribing the words into the wood in order to remind himself of God's importance, but he also spends so much energy complaining about his slavery under this and that. He is a slave to Wanda, to love, to God, to his religion, his people, and his decisions, yet he does very little to THANK God for what he has been given...ie: Love, Life, LIBERTY, and seemingly, a bit of brilliance and scholarly power. So, Jacob in my mind, lacks what Job lacks toward the middle of his battle with God. They cast aside free will as something nonexistent and immediately blame God or SOMETHING for their misery, when in fact, each man CHOSE to curse God, chose to chose a woman, AND chose to walk the path that would indeed be a bit more rough than the one without heart. So, just as Job begins by stating his loyalty to God and his uncompromising resistence to turn away from the Lord, Jacob begins by stating HIS loyalty to the Torah and HIS uncompromising resistance to choose something/one OTHER than God. But both men turn. Each man places something or someone before his religion/beliefs, and suffers the consequences..Now, I believe Jacob did this in a more 'godly' manner, because HE chose to love in the name of God, and accept a woman who WASN'T of his background, yet he knew, she was sent to him by God, therefore, must be loved by him. But Job, he stood proud before God and said "Give it to me...Anything,and I WON'T turn away from You." God gave him misery, struggle, and extreme suffering, and sooner than later, Job turned away and cursed God. He complained and complained but finally asked foregiveness and was saved by God. Job, in my mind, relates to the morality of Ecclesiastes, in that his vanity is what ultimately destroys him, although he does come to his senses and repent toward the end. But Job does NOT fulfill what he said he could.

This sums up what both Jacob and Job should probably have memorized BEFORE making vows.

"When you make a vow to God, do not delay fulfilling it; for he has no pleasure in fools. Fulfill what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not fulfill it." (Ecclesiastes 5:4)