Tag Archives: Jews and Greeks

The Titus Tease

The wokeness is so deep: they’re sleeping.
Clueless legions are on the march . . .
Ignorance has Wisdom weeping;
The wokeness is so deep they’re sleeping
Through the harvest, and the reaping.
Behold the view from Titus’s arch:
The wokeness is so deep they’re sleeping—
Clueless legions are on the march.

After these things Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth;
And found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, lately come from Italy, with his wife Priscilla;
(because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome:) and came unto them.
Acts 18:1,2

Sworn to kill the Church (or at least forestall),
Reviling Jesus, Christians, and Saint Paul,
The Pharisees finally blow their cover.
Things in Rome are starting to boil over;
Vesuvian rumblings portend Pompeii . . .
Judah await their Messianic day—
       But Claudius plans to expel all Jews . . .

Hateful superstitions cloud their views:
Torah with Talmud their rabbis confuse.
Not-so-Abrahamic agitation
Fails again to unify the nation;
Waiting for Moses/Elijah/David
Some expectations are waxing fervid
       And Claudius moves to disperse the Jews.

Zionist riots make the nightly news
Every Roman synagogue now must choose:
Goyim government tells them to desist—
Caesar demands incense—and some resist.
For subversion (or just causing trouble)
Imperial power rewards them double.
       Meanwhile, Claudius expels the Jews.

Failing empire demands what saints refuse;
They wait for Babylon to pay her dues . . .
Forced to pack up and leave, all Israel flees.
No plagues, no Passover, no exit fees.
Like Lot, they had to leave in a hurry;
Enriched by God in interest, gold and worry.
       Now why would Claudius banish all the Jews?

Stand historically in Josephus’ shoes.
Rabbi’s babble on while Rome’s legions lose . . .
Empires die. It’s agonizingly slow.
You think it happened suddenly—but no.
In retrospect, not different from today.
And History will have the final say:
       Why then did Claudius expel the Jews?

 

 

Nicean Barks

 
 

Such transports as true poetry provides

In raptures of the soul, and lyric rides,

May carry one beyond the lofty heights

In chariots of sun on drunken nights.

Whether true odyssey or shorter trip,

Homeric craft or humbler sort of ship,

The poet’s chosen stowaway rides free;

The ticket paid for literarily.

And afterward, the traveler comes home

Enriched by distant sights and worlds unknown.


PROMPT #2: write a poem about a specific place . . .

Wisdom: Palm Sunday 2013

picture-of-judean-desert

For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness;
but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

Where is the wise? where is the scribe?
where is the disputer of this world?
hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God,
it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.

For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom:

But we preach Christ crucified,
unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;

But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks,
Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.

I Corinthians 1:18-24 [KJV]

Judean Palms

Photo: toulogoilogou.blogspot.com/