Queen Elizabeth's platinum jubilee is an incredible, once-in-a-millennium occasion. It's an incredible achievement to do anything for 70 years, let alone serve as head of state for a major world power. I wanted to travel to the UK to be part of the celebrations, actually, but my schedule would not permit it.
Elizabeth has reigned at an odd time. She inherited an empire in decline, and some of the most memorable moments of her early years on the throne had to do with her reckoning with the newly-independent post-colonial world. She famously danced with Ghanaian leader Kwame Nkrumah -- unusual for a monarch, and unusually avant-garde for the racial politics of the time.
She has also ruled as Britain became a welfare state at home, and where the royal family was often regarded by critics as an expensive burden on the public. Her family life has often been difficult, marked by tragic death and scandal.
And yet she has maintained a wondrous sense of dignity throughout. The rabbis of the Pale of Settlement in the early 19th century were said to have preferred the Czar to Napoleon, because while Napoleon offered freedom, the monarchy was a manifestation of God's reign on earth, and pointed to the messianic age.
Queen Elizabeth has embodied some of that divinity in an age of disbelief and discord. She has united pop culture and politics: who else could be the chosen symbol of one of the greatest rock bands in history, while also leading the state church? Long may Her Majesty continue to reign, if I do say so from here.
The story of Noah is familiar; the details, less so.
Noah is often seen as an ambivalent figure. He was righteous -- but only for his generation. What was his deficiency?
One answer suggests itself: knowing that the world was about to be flooded, he built an Ark for the animals and for his own family -- but did not try to save anyone else or to convince them to repent and change their ways (the prophet Jonah, later, would share that reluctance).
Abraham, later, would set himself apart by arguing with God -- with the Lord Himself! -- against the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, saying that they should be saved if there were enough righteous people to be found (there were not).
Still, Noah was good enough -- and sometimes, that really is sufficient to save the world. We don't need heroes every time -- just ordinary decency.
Hi all -- as I noted last month, I'm going to be closing down my Locals page, at least for tips and subscriptions -- I may keep the page up and the posts as well, but I'm no longer going to be accepting any kind of payment.
Look for cancelation in the very near future. Thank you for your support!
An interesting weekend -- one of the last of Daylight Savings Time -- in which there is much to celebrate, much to contemplate, and a bit to worry about.
The Gaza peace deal is shaky, but holding, after the living hostages returned; the shutdown is still going on, with no end in sight; the China trade war is heating up; and the confrontation with Venezuela continues to escalate.
The "No Kings" protest was a dud, despite the media's attempt to inflate it. What I find fascinating is that the Democrats have basically stolen the rhetoric and the imagery of the Tea Party protests, circa 2009. They claim they are defending the Constitution -- just like the Tea Party did.
On the one hand, this is good. How wonderful to have a political system in which both sides, bitterly opposed though they are, articulate differences through the Constitution -- and not, as in so many other countries, outside it.
On the other, this is sheer hypocrisy for the Democrats. Not only did they malign the Tea Party as ...
