Sorry my Grünewald pic isn't a better reproduction. I ran across it today by accident while researching something quite different. But, I thought as a piece of stupendous religious art it wasn't necessarily unconnected to mentions of Nightlion, who I know appreciates such things. The Isenheim Altarpiece is an amazing work: a multi-paneled work that folds three ways to display various views of the life of Christ and portraits of St. Sebastian and St. Anthony.
From the Ernest L. Wilkinson Diaries: "ELW dreams he's spattered w/ grease. Hundreds steal his greasy pants."
The War Hound and the World's Pain is a 1981 fantasy novel by Michael Moorcock, the first of the "von Bek" series of novels.
The book is set in Europe ravaged by the Thirty Years' War. Its hero Ulrich von Bek is a mercenary and freethinker, who finds himself a damned soul in a castle owned by Lucifer. Much to his surprise, von Bek is charged by Lucifer with doing God's work, by finding the Holy Grail, the "cure for the world's pain," that will also cure Lucifer's pain by reconciling him with God. Only through doing this can von Bek save his soul.
After many adventures, von Bek eventually finds the Holy Grail, and discovers that it will set mankind on the path to self-redemption through rationality, without the help of God or the hindrance of Lucifer.
- Whenever a poet or preacher, chief or wizard spouts gibberish, the human race spends centuries deciphering the message. - Umberto Eco - To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim that Jesus was not born of a virgin. - Cardinal Bellarmine at the trial of Galilei
moksha wrote:If you have two unseen hands, why assume they are arm wrestling? One could be making shadow puppets while the other is giving us the bird.
I am rooting for the Holy Spirit.
Which of these two spirits do you, Moksha, consider to be holy? Which do you think could be flipping us the bird?
