Ralphies 2024

 I observe that "Ralph" began 20 years ago, in November 2004.  At the time, it seemed like a cutting-edge thing to do.  Then Twitter with its hot takes came along, and Reddit with its memes, and Donald Trump to corrupt everything, and Elon Musk to corrupt what Trump overlooked.  Now social media is a vast wasteland. Blogging seems like a quaint holdover from a simpler era.  I'm OK with that, because I get to do ...

Ralphies! Here we go ..

Movies: It's getting harder to distinguish movies from TV these days; it's all streaming content, and I don't go to theaters anymore.  Not against it or anything, but, hey, everything winds up on Netflix or whatever eventually.  I don't think I saw anything that came out this year, but I did catch up by watching Oppenheimer from 2023-pretty good, I guess? But the one that wowed me the most was 1917 (2019), innovative filmmaking and an exciting, moving story. It gets the Ralphie.

TV: Again, what is TV? Something you watch on a TV network? Or something called TV on a streaming service? I'll opt for the latter, since actual TV we use only for news, weather, and sports.  I enjoyed the series Dark Winds, although Zahn McClarnon is not at all my idea of Joe Leaphorn (probably not Tony Hillerman's, either). But the Ralphie goes to Arcane for the action and highly imaginative graphics and world-building, although it has more characters than War and Peace. 

Music: This, too, is affected by the streaming trend.  People used to get albums; now it's replaying your favorite track on a streaming service (take your pick).  But there were some good songs this year.  I got into listening to acoustic versions of rock hits; among them I give high marks to "1979" by Freedom Fry (Smashing Pumpkins cover) and "Wonderwall" by Ryan Adams (Oasis cover). But there was plenty of good new music too: "People Watching" by Sam Fender, "SPEYSIDE" by Bon Iver, "Josh Tillman and the Accidental Dose" by Father John Misty; "kisses" by Slowdive; but the Ralphie goes to "Candy" by Mk.gee, because I'm a sucker for melodic guitar playing.

Books: This one is always tricky, because I read a lot, both for business and pleasure.  For fiction, I'm going to give the Ralphie to Mythago Wood by Robert Holdstock, and for non-fiction to All of the Marvels: A Journey to the Ends of the Biggest Story Ever Told by Douglas Wolk.  I'm sure I'm forgetting some, so I might revisit this later.

As far as current events go, I can't think of a more distressing and worrisome year, and 2025 doesn't look like it's going to improve things.  So I guess the only answer is to keep calm and keep blogging. See your around, true believer. Nuff said. 

Hell and Donald Trump

 Donald Trump, with his usual delicacy, seems to have spent most of Christmas telling various parties to "go to hell." or, more picturesquely, "rot in hell." No, I'm not going to link to any of his posts. 

Perhaps Donald Trump has never pondered the possibility that he himself could one day find himself in hell.  If you flinch at the notion that anyone should go to hell, then ponder these prophetic words of C. S. Lewis:

Picture to yourself a man who has risen to wealth or power by a continued course of treachery and cruelty, by exploiting for purely selfish ends the noble motions of his victims, laughing the while at their simplicity; who, having thus attained success, uses it for the gratification of lust and hatred and finally parts with the last rag of honour among thieves by betraying his own accomplices and jeering at their last moments of bewildered disillusionment. Suppose, further, that he does all this, not (as we like to imagine) tormented by remorse or even misgiving, but eating like a schoolboy and sleeping like a healthy infant—a jolly, ruddy-cheeked man, without a care in the world, unshakably confident to the very end that he alone has found the answer to the riddle of life, that God and man are fools whom he has got the better of,that his way of life is utterly successful, satisfactory, unassailable. ...

    Supposing he will not be converted, what destiny in the eternal world can you regard as proper for him? Can you really desire that such a man, remaining what he is (and he must be able to do that if he has free will) should be confirmed forever in his present happiness—should continue, for all eternity, to be perfectly convinced that the laugh is on his side?

This imaginary person in The Problem of Pain reminds me of Donald Trump. Such a man, argues Lewis, challenges the assumption that no person should go to hell; challenges it by recruiting our sense of justice to argue with our (possibly over-developed?) sense of mercy. 

Well, it challenges me.  Trump, and to a lesser extent, his minions (like Elon Musk) challenge daily my sense of mercy.  What a disheartening time we live in.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: The quotation is from The Problem of Pain (New York, 1947), pp. 108-109. 

A Previously Unnoticed Alternative Targum to Psalms 38:4

 

    In preparing a reader's edition of the Targum to Psalms, I came across an alternative targum (marked תרגום אחר) in the margin of Codex Solger (the Nuremberg codex) to Psalm 38:4 (38:3 in English versions).  The RSV translation of the Hebrew reads "There is no soundness in my flesh because of thy indignation; there is no health in my bones because of my sin." 

    The main targum text of Codex Solger reads (in translation): "There is no healing in my body because of your anger, no health in my limbs because of my sin." Not a great departure from the Hebrew. But the marginal alternative targum reads as follows: 

 לית אסותא לבישרי מן קדם תקוף רוגזך על דלא קיימית פיקודך ולית שלם לאיתתי

דאיתקרית עצם כדכ<תיב> עצם מעצמי מן קדם חובי ארי אלהא מסער חובי גבר על

איתתיה כדכתיב למה יקח משכבך תחתיך

Translation: "There is no health to my flesh because of the strength of your anger, because I did not observe your commandments and there is no peace to my wife (who is called Bone as it is written, bone of my bones [Genesis 2:23]) because of my sin, for God visits the sins of a man on his wife, as it is written, lest he take your bed under you [Prov 22:27]." 

    As noted, I haven't seen a reference to this text, and David Stec makes no mention of it in his translation (The Targum of Psalms [Aramaic Bible 16], 2004).  Since Codex Solger was a principal source of the Rabbinic Bibles of 1517 and 1525, one might expect to find it there, there's no trace of it.  I also haven't seen this particular midrash anywhere (but there's a lot to search, so); it's not in Midrash Tehillim to the verse. None of the other alternative renderings in this Targum quote other Scripture, either, so this one is unique in that respect. (I also don't quite get the application of Prov. 22:27, which, by the way is slightly misquoted, the Masoretic text having מתחתיך not תחתיך). 

    Anyone out there have any comments? Anyone seen a similar take on the verse elsewhere?