Derrida: Leviticus 10:10

Poking around in leftover thoughts scavaged on by the vultures of my intellect, I came upon this doctoral thesis by Adrian Platts:

Jacques Derrida, the Sacred Other and Seventh-day Adventism: Stumbling on the Creative Play of Différance in Genesis.

This seems to be the only text on the internet (as of first Google search) that uses Leviticus 10:10 and Derrida together:

What Derrida means when he uses the word "sacred" is not immediately evident nor is it necessarily consistent. The French - sacré - clearly sharing a common root with the English, provides no obvious additional insight. In a biblical context, one stumbles on the word "holy" - the Hebrew root being transliterated qdsh. Whether in the verbal form (qadash) or as a noun (qodesh), the idea of holiness or the sacred is denoted - including the idea of being separated or set apart. Hence, the sacred stands in direct contrast to that which is "common or profane" as in Leviticus 10:10: "You must distinguish between the holy and the common, between the clean and the unclean" (NIV). Here "qodesh occurs as the antithesis of hol ('profane,' 'common')." (p. 36, ft. 144) (Platts adds another antithesis: blessing, curse. p. 36) 

See 144 Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, ed. R. Laird Harris, Gleason L. Archer, Jr. and Bruce K. Waltke (Chicago: Moody Press, 1980), s.v. "1990.

The author of this doctoral thesis is Adrian Platts, and he wrote it in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Cape Town, in November 2012.

Platts himself speaks correctly in noting that the basic meaning of "holiness" is that of being "set apart" or "separated," but I hesitate to give "blessing, curse" the same status. Not having read all of Platts's thesis, I don't know what he does concerning Derrida's inconsistency, but Leviticus 10:10 might offer some insight, given the verse's use of both parallelism and chiasm. 

Maybe . . .

Make a distinction . . .

Derrida speaks of difference, of distinction between this and that, and somewhere that the sacred and the profane are distinguished as of between clean and unclean, which reminds us of the original act of separation between light and darkness, but why meaningless separations such as those demanded in Leviticus?

Or has Derrida said nothing of the sort?

Wittgenstein said that in the presence of that before which we cannot speak, we usst remmust werg emsinrem . . .

A wordy world? A worldly word?

Yeah, it's . . .

Language Games

I. Pour Derrida:

This word is strictly about

whatever this word keeps out.

II. Für Wittgenstein:

This world is solely within

whatever this world keeps in.

Another reworking?

Derrida asks: "What's the difference?"

"It's all the same," Wittgenstein replies.

Is this Game Serious?

Here is the most current version of whatever it is that I'm doing these days:

Language Games

I. Pour Derrida:

This word is strictly about

whatever the word it leaves out.

II. Für Wittgenstein:

This world is solely within

whatever the world it leaves in.

According to Pynchon, if the world is just all that the case is, that's a pretty discouraging basis upon which to place any kind of romance.

Worldly Word

I first worked on this short, two-point poetic work many years ago, during my early times in Germany. This current version is rather different from the one back then and also from the one posted a couple of blog entries ago. Here is the current version:

Hermeneutics of Suspicion

I. Pour Derrida:

This poem is strictly about

whatever in word it leaves out . . .

II. Für Wittgenstein:

The world is solely about

whatever in case it leaves out . . .

Chronology apart, are the two parts coherent? Note also the apparent etymological connection between "pour" and "für." Are they linked? In a post like this one, you can bet on a good deal of trickery.

Expletive Undeleted?

Perhaps that limerick I finished would work better without the profanity and a few other words I used. You judge:

Krypticket

Heading home through a thick, thickety thicket

got me a dadgummed low-speed, speeding ticket

for driving too slow,

so I floored it to go,

and flew faster than lickety split it!

You can see the original profane word a couple of blog entries back, one of those "expletive-undeleted" cases in which the speaker regrets having spoken what was spoken by the speaker. Kind of like in the sentence preceding this sentence that I am right 'now' writing . . .

Word and World

Deconstructive Hermeneutics

I. Pour Derrida:

This poem is strictly about

whatever

in word it leaves

out . . .

II. Für Wittgenstein:

The world is solely about

whatever

in case it leaves

out . . .

Happy New Year, 2022

Perhaps the limerick that I've been laboring on would work better with a few small changes:

Krypticket

Heading home through the thick, thickety thicket

got me a goddamn low-speed, speeding ticket

for driving too slow,

so I floored it to go,

and flew faster than lickety split it!

And here we are, on January 1, 2022, housebound in Seoul due to a ten-day quarantine placed upon travelers to South Korea arriving from the United States. Happy New Year.

Lickety Split

This poem probably works as a limerick now:

Krypticket

Heading home through the thickety thicket,

got a goddamned low-speed, speeding ticket

for driving too slow,

so I floored it to go,

and flew faster than to lickety split it!

December 29th, 2021 has arrived, so we will soon be in Memphis, then again in Seoul (as we now are, on January 1, 2022).

Good Cheer For All

I've finally gotten somewhere with my paean to alcohol:

Drunk Gratitude

I've had but little alcohol at all,

such awesome stuff as Skunk Butt's Hind-end Ale,

and nothing drives truth home like alcohol,

for standing vigil in this dreary vale.

Thanks then to liquor's years of keeping me

from making awful messes of myself,

kept firm in its strong grip with dignity,

a jug placed safe upon the sundries shelf.

I think that's got it, despite its being quite different than initially envisioned.

Goody-Goody Great Cheer

This poem probably still needs more (un)working, even as a limerick:

Cryptic Ticket

Heading home through the thickety thicket,

got a goddamned low-speed, speeding ticket

for driving too slow,

so I floored to go,

and flew faster than lickety split it!

Still awaiting Christmas, we (my family and I) will hang on till December 29th, 2021 in Salem, Arkansas, my Ozark boyhood home.

Vitasta's India

I contacted Vitasta to learn more about her poem:

I've been re-reading your poem and comprehending it better, but I want to be sure before I post any more blog entries. You start with Coleridge, a silly poet who identifies himself and Britain with the Mughal Empire, the Mongols who converted to Islam and conquered Hindustan, destroying its learning, its schools, its culture, and its architecture. The ancient trade routes were all but obliterated. And Kashmir, your Fatherland, underwent artillery siege. Something like that? (By the way, I liked the sudden shift from plain to rhymed couplets. Or near rhymes.)

She agreed, more or less, with my reading:

I suppose so, it's a bit of fantasy as well. The first wave of refugees from Kashmir during the Mongol Era settled in Varanasi. But yes it's largely the current state of the homeland with the violence.

That current violence is between Muslims and Hindus. (Mostly.) Knowing the details above enables us better to understand the poem. (Obviously.)

Cryptic Still

Still before Christmas . . . the poem still needs more (un)working, perhaps as a limerick:

Cryptic Ticket

Heading home back through Thickety Thicket,

I got a damned low-speed, speeding ticket

for driving too slow,

so I floored to go,

and flew faster than let on in cricket!

Still unworking, my family and I spend our December 2021 in my boyhood home of Salem in the Arkansas Ozarks . . .

Tales from the Cryptic

Still before Christmas . . . the poem needs more (un)working, perhaps as a limerick:

Cryptic Ticket

Heading home back through Thickety Thicket,

I got a damned low-speed speeding ticket

for driving way too slow,

so I floored the board at go,

and went so fast its speed simply wasn't cricket!

Still unworking as my family and I spend our December 2021 in my boyhood home of Salem in the Arkansas Ozarks . . .

In Title Meant

Before Christmas . . . the poem needs more (un)working.

Cryptic Poetic

On the way home through Thicket,

I got a low-speed ticket

for driving way long too slow;

so, I floored the board at go,

went gone so fast at length last

through light-speeds beyond space passed.

Still unworking as my family and I spend our December 2021 in my boyhood home of Salem in the Arkansas Ozarks . . .

No Time to Work

A Little Trial . . .

Cryptic Poetic

On the way home through Thicket,

I got a low-speed ticket

for driving way long too slow;

so, the board I floored at go,

went gone so fast at length last

through light-speeds beyond space past.

Still a lot of work to do. Or unwork.

Warp-Speed Ticketing of the Future

Another Attempt at Authorship . . .

Cryptic Poetic

On the way home through Thicket,

I got a low-speed ticket

for driving way long too slow;

So floored I the board at go,

went gone so fast at length last

through light-speeds beyond space past.

It's sounding more like a poem every day. I'll have to do something or other about that . . .

Trying Again

Another Attempt at Authorship . . .

Cryptic Poetic

On the way home through Thicket,

I got a speeding ticket

for driving way long too slow,

so I floored the board at go,

went gone so fast at length last

through light-speeds beyond space past.

I'm getting there, I think. I think I'm getting there. But where is the there I'm coming from?

Thicketed?

Verb used as adjective? Looks like an adverb.

Where once had lain open field now surged upward and at length and great breadth a thicketed realm.

Getting There

Cryptic Poetic

On my way home through thicket,

I was given a ticket

for driving way much too slow,

so I floored to the board go

went gone too fast at long last

at light-speeds beyond pace past.

Getting There? There's a Chance you'll make it if we tend to our garden . . .

Practice is Imperfect

Cryptic  Poetic

On my way through a thicket,

I was given a ticket

for driving way much too slow,

so I floored to the board go,

went gone my reward, for fast

was light-speed beyond pace past.

This 'poem' still needs a lot of work just to achieve mediocrity.

Now Better Behaved

No longer oddly,

the blog now acts godly.

BBB

BBB > BOTTOM LESS BOTTLE  OF BEER 

bbb > Bottomless Bottle of Beer > 666

The above was an allusion to the sign of the beast by way of the uncapitalized letters bbb, which look somewhat like the numbers 666. This was an allusion I made to connect the special beer with the devilish intentions of one of the characters in my novella.

Blog Acting Oddly

 If my blog seems to be acting oddly, that's probably because it's acting oddly. Lately.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

My Bestiary

I have an imaginary bestiary called Hodges’ Bestiary. Or maybe Hodges’s Bestiary? I’m never sure of the rule concerning that crux of the biscuit. Anyway, the bestiary contains 50 beasts, thus 50 poems. Here is the first:

Glowworms, Glowworms

We called them “lightning bugs,” special creatures.

“Fireflies,” said the outsiders instead.

“Glowworms,” said some mad kids, as if features

 like “glow” were hiding deepest secrets in each head.

And they’ve yet to solve the problem of just how

such worms take leave of earth and take to air.

Let’s leave them with that mystery, for now,

as though there were no emptiness still there.

I’m never sure of the rule concerning apostrophes, as I said, but I’ll get a lot of practice on it since I intend to turn my bestiary into a book of poems. My poems are currently in Carter Kaplan's Emanations (ninth edition, pp. 205-221).

Some Poetry from the Mind of Vitasta Raina

I've just read a three-part poem by Vitasta (or is it Raina?), and I feel I've been back to the onset of civilization, thousands of years ago and yet only yesterday, with place names identifying who has been dispossessed over those years, especially, perhaps, over the more recent ones, but I know too little of that history, whether ancient or just yesterday, to understand the references and know what is meant.

But I do have a question to ask about something in these lines, namely, is the word "And" correct:

I met a palmist once, in Varanasi, saffron and divine,

And individual in an individuated street,

A hand without a wrist, a soul without reflection.

Or is this "An" correct:

I met a palmist once, in Varanasi, saffron and divine,

An individual in an individuated street,

A hand without a wrist, a soul without reflection.

Which is correct? I think the latter is correct, the former being a typo, but I could be wrong.

The entire poem - which is excellent, by the way - can be found on pages 284-288 in Carter Kaplan's Emanations: When a Planet was a Planet.

Undefeated Streak?

In the November 18th edition of The Korea JoongAng Daily, the expression "undefeated streak" was used to describe the fact that Korea has gone undefeated (with one tie) in the five games since (and including) Turkmenistan in June, when Korea won 5-0.

My Query: Does the above count as an "undefeated streak"?

A Gay Kim Jong-un?

According to reporter Michael Lee, contributing an article and its headline for Wednesday's Korea JoongAng Daily (November 17, 2021), "Kim Jong-un (is) reported out and about for first time in a month" (emphasis mine).

Breaking News!

Johnson@Johnson is breaking up to form two companies.

Johnson@Johnson will now be known as Johnson and Johnson.

I get these videos titled: "Can you know God?" (And confusion ensues.)

Nobody: "No."

Video: "No! Yes!"

Nobody: "No? Yes?"

Video: "No no! Yes yes!"

Nobody: "No no!? Yes yes what?"

Video: "No to no know. Yes to yes know."

Nobody: "I just say no to know to know."

And so wider . . .

Some Types of Money

So, I'm learning something about money. Here are a few types of money:

1. Fiat Money. Examples: Banknotes (paper money) and coins.

2. Commodity Money. Examples: Precious metals (e.g., gold), salt, beads, alcohol.

3. Representative Money. Examples: Certificates, paper money, token coins.

4. Fiduciary Money. Examples: Checks, bank drafts.

There are others out there, too. I'm merely familiarizing myself with these terms.