Just Listen!
A co-worker a while back introduced me to lectures-on-tape, in the general spirit of informal continuing ed and possibly even self-improvement. Having tasted the nectar now, I'd add to the list of benefits a nurturing of the spirit of curiosity. I routinely find that I end up researching other words, concepts, books, etc., as a result of these experiences. My normal day involves an hour or so of pedestrian time when I commonly am receptive/available to some form of audio entertainment, and I was open to lecture/speaking as an option to music. Modernism in Literature and Science Fiction were pretty intriguing. My personal music-listening is suffering, but, suddenly savvy, I'm now plumbing the library.
The lecture genre seems to be rare at the library; my choices have tended towards standard non-fiction books. One recent listen was "Islam - a Short History," by Karen Armstrong. I struggled a bit in dealing with Islam-specific jargon and terminology, not least through the difficulty of not always being able to tease out just what the possible spelling of these unfamiliar-sounding words might be. But having finished the listen, it is a terrific book, and I have few actual criticisms - I think it was a good decision by author to challenge the listener (reader) to deal with the subject on its' own terms and with the appropriate vocabulary. Some of it I got, some I did not. I have a good list of terms to explore via Wikipedia and Google and such, and it is certainly an inspiration for continuing self-ed. Always a Good Thing, eh? Or are you of the incurious tribe? (If so it must be discouraging to find your clan numbers plummeting - down in the low 30's even prior to that pathetic SOTU from what I hear.)
It goes well beyond vocabulary. How was I supposed to know that Mohammed's transcribing of the Koran occurred back in the seventh century (I think that is right!)? Who knew that these teachings involved a full recognition of a series of six or so major prophets including Abraham, Solomon, Jesus, and Mohammed, and seemingly no heirarchy between them? Maybe I had the mumps the week this stuff was taught.
How about the idea that the resulting religion was wonderfully egalitarian, tolerant of Jews and Christians, both prevalent in the area at the time, and any other spiritual creed. All for example living in semi-harmony in today's Saudi Arabia. Mainstream Islam may well deserve credit for a less combative history overall than Christianity. Islam proved through many centuries, per Armstrong, to be amazingly resilient, dealing with being beleaguered and conquered by such as the Mongols and then the Christian Crusaders, among others, yet finding a way to update and maintain their spiritual underpinnnings while submitting to temporary subjection.
The book goes on to address the difficulty the Islamic world has experienced in handling the modern secularism that has been the norm for us in the "west." Armstrong emphasizes that the modern republican state model so familiar to us (albeit increasingly threatened by tyranny in the Bush era), with church-state separation, citizen control of government, etc., evolved somewhat organically in the West over the course of several centuries. Not surprisingly, it has not proven easy to simply adopt such a system on the fly in a much older civilization with an entirely different zeitgeist. The book touches on the numerous stumbles and struggles that have occurred in attempts to meld Islam and modernity.
I find it hard to believe that any of the upper echelon of the Bush administration has properly read and taken the information in this book to heart. Maybe it is only my rustic naivete and innocence, but I want to believe we'd be talking a whole different ball game if they had. Okay, yes, that theoretical education would have to be coupled with enough spiritual evolution to be interested in among other things the progress of humanity as a whole, i.e., a foresaking of capitalism as the ultimate goal and also the nationalism/militarism that has so eroded the basic principles of our former enlightened state. And there's that heart. Case closed?
Recommended.
The lecture genre seems to be rare at the library; my choices have tended towards standard non-fiction books. One recent listen was "Islam - a Short History," by Karen Armstrong. I struggled a bit in dealing with Islam-specific jargon and terminology, not least through the difficulty of not always being able to tease out just what the possible spelling of these unfamiliar-sounding words might be. But having finished the listen, it is a terrific book, and I have few actual criticisms - I think it was a good decision by author to challenge the listener (reader) to deal with the subject on its' own terms and with the appropriate vocabulary. Some of it I got, some I did not. I have a good list of terms to explore via Wikipedia and Google and such, and it is certainly an inspiration for continuing self-ed. Always a Good Thing, eh? Or are you of the incurious tribe? (If so it must be discouraging to find your clan numbers plummeting - down in the low 30's even prior to that pathetic SOTU from what I hear.)
It goes well beyond vocabulary. How was I supposed to know that Mohammed's transcribing of the Koran occurred back in the seventh century (I think that is right!)? Who knew that these teachings involved a full recognition of a series of six or so major prophets including Abraham, Solomon, Jesus, and Mohammed, and seemingly no heirarchy between them? Maybe I had the mumps the week this stuff was taught.
How about the idea that the resulting religion was wonderfully egalitarian, tolerant of Jews and Christians, both prevalent in the area at the time, and any other spiritual creed. All for example living in semi-harmony in today's Saudi Arabia. Mainstream Islam may well deserve credit for a less combative history overall than Christianity. Islam proved through many centuries, per Armstrong, to be amazingly resilient, dealing with being beleaguered and conquered by such as the Mongols and then the Christian Crusaders, among others, yet finding a way to update and maintain their spiritual underpinnnings while submitting to temporary subjection.
The book goes on to address the difficulty the Islamic world has experienced in handling the modern secularism that has been the norm for us in the "west." Armstrong emphasizes that the modern republican state model so familiar to us (albeit increasingly threatened by tyranny in the Bush era), with church-state separation, citizen control of government, etc., evolved somewhat organically in the West over the course of several centuries. Not surprisingly, it has not proven easy to simply adopt such a system on the fly in a much older civilization with an entirely different zeitgeist. The book touches on the numerous stumbles and struggles that have occurred in attempts to meld Islam and modernity.
I find it hard to believe that any of the upper echelon of the Bush administration has properly read and taken the information in this book to heart. Maybe it is only my rustic naivete and innocence, but I want to believe we'd be talking a whole different ball game if they had. Okay, yes, that theoretical education would have to be coupled with enough spiritual evolution to be interested in among other things the progress of humanity as a whole, i.e., a foresaking of capitalism as the ultimate goal and also the nationalism/militarism that has so eroded the basic principles of our former enlightened state. And there's that heart. Case closed?
Recommended.
posted by Sir Gumbo at 10:08 PM
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