ATTN G. Stewart: I was there.

[Kai]

I saw the dead sea scrolls, GS. They were on display at the Royal Ontario Museum when I was in Toronto and took a special trip to see them. The whole experience was very well done from the perspective of the entire exibit, with artifacts and 600 years of history of the Levant displayed with care and excellence, starting with Sepphoris in the 3rd century BCE, through Jerusalem in the Hasonean and Herodean dynasties, and to the 2nd century CE and the possible reasons behind the scrolls. The artifacts built nicely too, with the nearness to the scrolls themselves increasing on to the end of the exhibit. And there in the darkened room at kiosks behind panes of glass were fragments of hand written documents nearly two thousand years old. But by that point, I wasn't totally there.

Well, I was there, physically. My body was there. But as I moved through the exhibit something incredible was happening. I was loosing touch with all the yammering humans all around me, and reaching a place of quiet, and it was just me, and the artifacts. As I increased in this cathexis (I know now thats what this emotional connection is called, such a useful term) I wasn't really all there inside. I was torn across time and space, I was the one wearing the sandals or weaving the cord, or filling the amphora. I became those people, saw through their eyes and here I was thrust back and forth, in both places at once. My body was there but the cathexis had cause my mind to conjure up these visions.

By the time I reached the scrolls I was shuddering, and upon seeing them I was crying. There I was standing before the fragments, yet at the same time I was at the community on the Dead Sea, seated on plaster and writing HVHY in Hebrew. These things, the objects of those who had lived so long ago, were so powerful an experience that I sat in the hall of the Buddhas for twenty minutes trying to catch my breath.

Do you know what I mean, GS? Do you, in the process of a dig, pick up a flint shard or a bone, and are suddenly transported across time and space in your mind to where you are the one using or making or being that object your are holding? Are you overwhelmed by this feeling of connection to our holy and wretched species, and does it make you pause and reflect on how we could be both so wholly beautiful and wholly ugly at the same time?

I'm writing this letter to you because I thought you maybe would understand this more than anyone I know, because you work with these remains, these objects every day, and it must have SOME pull for you. Something. Some connection to a greater humanity that is awesome and terrifying and exists beyond the mundane stupidity of what passes for a persons existence in this country and day. Something beyond a view of humanity covered in McDonald's logos, not romanticized, but not vilified either, just real.

And I felt it there, and just like staring at the stars it was both empowering and draining at the same time, but more importantly it made me feel HUGE, and gave me some perspective. Those sandals...mine too.

[0]

Absolutely Kai.

You've captured the greatest aspect and sole reason to do any form of archaeology. To be absorbed, even for an instant, in the material culture. To transcend the object and understand what the people attached did and how they lived.

That is how i feel every day in this business. The adventure is still there.

George Lucas was right, it's still alive even after all these years.

The object does not belong in a museum, but rather the idea behind it, knowing WHAT it was and HOW and WHY it was used.

What were the people like behind this? They were food for the worms before your or I could ever reckon.

Good job,

You get it.

[Kai]

Absolutely Kai.

You've captured the greatest aspect and sole reason to do any form of archaeology. To be absorbed, even for an instant, in the material culture. To transcend the object and understand what the people attached did and how they lived.

That is how i feel every day in this business. The adventure is still there.

George Lucas was right, it's still alive even after all these years.

The object does not belong in a museum, but rather the idea behind it, knowing WHAT it was and HOW and WHY it was used.

What were the people like behind this? They were food for the worms before your or I could ever reckon.

Good job,

You get it.

Yes.

It's more than that, too, more than just the idea behind it. Even in the sterilized condition of a museum with people milling around, material culture has POWER. It's the physical presence of the objects when they come under the light of understanding of their context. Even WITHOUT complete understanding as I had it, they still draw people. The more understanding and the closer to the context, the more power the object will have. And I don't mean power in a metaphysical sense, but in a emotional sense, in a cathexis sense.

I talked with a friend about my experience afterwards. They said they've had the same, standing in Greece with their hands on the stone of the Parthenon. Even with the milling people, they closed their eyes and that all dissapeared, and they were transported much the same way I was.

There's something about objects crafted by human hands, or both, that all by themselves bring out a deep sense of connection coming from this basic part of me that is human. We recognize what is of our own, and by our hands or of our brothers or our ancestors. And, regardless of reductivist understanding of the universe we will never get away from the "superstitions" of power that objects hold. I say that with quotes, because they do hold power, because we give them power, because the act of creation is an act of will and therefore powerful. Raw emotional, second circuit power, part of being human, yet something other as well. We are our own gods, or our ancestors were, or our children will be.

[Suu]

I once told Herbert that the day we traveled to Egypt I would probably fall down in front of the Pyramids and burst into tears. He didn't get it. At least I know that GS would probably start crying with me....Or run inside of one way ahead of me, hit a booby trap, and then John Williams would appear with an orchestra. Something like that. Right?

[Kai]

I once told Herbert that the day we traveled to Egypt I would probably fall down in front of the Pyramids and burst into tears. He didn't get it. At least I know that GS would probably start crying with me....Or run inside of one way ahead of me, hit a booby trap, and then John Williams would appear with an orchestra. Something like that. Right?

That's what really boggles me Suu. While I can walk through these, well.../events/ or whatever they are, without paying any attention to the people walking around, I don't understand how they can just walk blindly through that same place at the same time and not GET IT. It's like the majority of people lack some sort of fundamental awareness of connections, and maybe that's the case.  I can ignore them, but I don't understand how they can ignore it! This is just another part of the whole beauty and ugliness of humanity all mixed together into one package of real. I struggled to explain in words to my friend, and they waived their hands when I growled in frustration, and smiled and put their hands forward opened up and nodded, and I did the same and nodded in return, because we both understood and there weren't the right words to explain it out loud but we somehow connected anyway.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

It occurs to me that the Dead Sea Scrolls are ~ 2000 years old, and all of our writings will vanish forever the moment the power finally runs out.

ho ho ho

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I once told Herbert that the day we traveled to Egypt I would probably fall down in front of the Pyramids and burst into tears. He didn't get it. At least I know that GS would probably start crying with me....Or run inside of one way ahead of me, hit a booby trap, and then John Williams would appear with an orchestra. Something like that. Right?

I saw the pyramids in 1990.  They're pretty awe-inspiring.

[Kai]

It occurs to me that the Dead Sea Scrolls are ~ 2000 years old, and all of our writings will vanish forever the moment the power finally runs out.

ho ho ho

You're going to publish MSY right? And we've got intermittens and some people have printed out the BIP and whatnot.

I agree though, there needs to be more writing down/publishing. I've been keeping a journal offline...and the writings there are what usually lead to posts on here about various topics. Two thousand years from now after several collapses of civilization I'd like that a stack of Discordian literature was discovered in a ruined tower, a sign of the resistance against the kleptocracy in the darkest of the second middle ages.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

It occurs to me that the Dead Sea Scrolls are ~ 2000 years old, and all of our writings will vanish forever the moment the power finally runs out.

ho ho ho

You're going to publish MSY right? And we've got intermittens and some people have printed out the BIP and whatnot.

I agree though, there needs to be more writing down/publishing. I've been keeping a journal offline...and the writings there are what usually lead to posts on here about various topics. Two thousand years from now after several collapses of civilization I'd like that a stack of Discordian literature was discovered in a ruined tower, a sign of the resistance against the kleptocracy in the darkest of the second middle ages.

I just want people to create a world-wide repressive religion out of it, with an inquisition and everything.  With any luck at all, people will invoke my name while they beat the demons out of epileptics. 

Hey, everyone has to have a dream.

[Kai]

 

[0]

It occurs to me that the Dead Sea Scrolls are ~ 2000 years old, and all of our writings will vanish forever the moment the power finally runs out.

ho ho ho

You're going to publish MSY right? And we've got intermittens and some people have printed out the BIP and whatnot.

I agree though, there needs to be more writing down/publishing. I've been keeping a journal offline...and the writings there are what usually lead to posts on here about various topics. Two thousand years from now after several collapses of civilization I'd like that a stack of Discordian literature was discovered in a ruined tower, a sign of the resistance against the kleptocracy in the darkest of the second middle ages.

I just want people to create a world-wide repressive religion out of it, with an inquisition and everything.  With any luck at all, people will invoke my name while they beat the demons out of epileptics. 

Hey, everyone has to have a dream.

I don't need a religion to beat up epileptics, I do that anyway. STOP SAPPING MY TAXES AND DIE ALREADY YOU FUCKING HARD-ONS!

[The Good Reverend Roger]

It occurs to me that the Dead Sea Scrolls are ~ 2000 years old, and all of our writings will vanish forever the moment the power finally runs out.

ho ho ho

You're going to publish MSY right? And we've got intermittens and some people have printed out the BIP and whatnot.

I agree though, there needs to be more writing down/publishing. I've been keeping a journal offline...and the writings there are what usually lead to posts on here about various topics. Two thousand years from now after several collapses of civilization I'd like that a stack of Discordian literature was discovered in a ruined tower, a sign of the resistance against the kleptocracy in the darkest of the second middle ages.

I just want people to create a world-wide repressive religion out of it, with an inquisition and everything.  With any luck at all, people will invoke my name while they beat the demons out of epileptics. 

Hey, everyone has to have a dream.

I don't need a religion to beat up epileptics, I do that anyway. STOP SAPPING MY TAXES AND DIE ALREADY YOU FUCKING HARD-ONS!

Calm yourself, you savage bonobo of the interspooge.  I have not taken a dime of your tax money (We just had them add more zeros).

[0]

NOT YOU, YOU SCHMEGMA-CONSUMING POT-LICKER!

the god damned epileptics!

if only they'd fall down in traffic and reduce the surplus populations!

HUMBUG!