Lk:2: 1 ¶ And it came to pass that in those days there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled. 2 This enrolling was first made by Cyrinus, the governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be enrolled, every one into his own city. 4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem: because he was of the house and family of David. 5 To be enrolled with Mary his espoused wife, who was with child. 6 And it came to pass that when they were there, her days were accomplished that she should be delivered. 7 And she brought forth her first born son and wrapped him up in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger: because there was no room for them in the inn. 8 ¶ And there were in the same country shepherds watching and keeping the night watches over their flock. 9 And behold an angel of the Lord stood by them and the brightness of God shone round about them: and they feared with a great fear. 10 And the angel said to them: Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy that shall be to all the people: 11 For, this day is born to you a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David. 12 And this shall be a sign unto you. You shall find the infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God and saying: 14 Glory to God in the highest: and on earth peace to men of good will. 15 And it came to pass, after the angels departed from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another: Let us go over to Bethlehem and let us see this word that is come to pass, which the Lord hath shewed to us. 16 And they came with haste: and they found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. 17 And seeing, they understood of the word that had been spoken to them concerning this child. 18 And all that heard wondered: and at those things that were told them by the shepherds. 19 But Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart. 20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them. 21 ¶ And after eight days were accomplished, that the child should be circumcised, his name was called JESUS, which was called by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. 22 And after the days of her purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they carried him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord: 23 As it is written in the law of the Lord: Every male opening the womb shall be called holy to the Lord: 24 And to offer a sacrifice, according as it is written in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons: 25 ¶ And behold there was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon: and this man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel. And the Holy Ghost was in him. 26 And he had received an answer from the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. 27 And he came by the Spirit into the temple. And when his parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the law, 28 He also took him into his arms and blessed God and said 29 Now thou dost dismiss thy servant, O Lord, according to thy word in peace: 30 Because my eyes have seen thy salvation, 31 Which thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples: 32 A light to the revelation of the Gentiles and the glory of thy people Israel. 33 And his father and mother were wondering at those things which were spoken concerning him. 34 And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother: Behold this child is set for the fall and for the resurrection of many in Israel and for a sign which shall be contradicted. 35 And thy own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts thoughts may be revealed. 36 And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser. She was far advanced in years and had lived with her husband seven years from her virginity. 37 And she was a widow until fourscore and four years: who departed not from the temple, by fastings and prayers serving night and day. 38 Now she, at the same hour, coming in, confessed to the Lord: and spoke of him to all that looked for the redemption of Israel. 39 And after they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their city Nazareth. 40 And the child grew and waxed strong, full of wisdom: and the grace of God was in him. 41 ¶ And his parents went every year to Jerusalem, at the solemn day of the pasch. 42 And when he was twelve years old, they going up into Jerusalem, according to the custom of the feast, 43 And having fulfilled the days, when they returned, the child Jesus remained in Jerusalem. And his parents knew it not. 44 And thinking that he was in the company, they came a day's journey and sought him among their kinsfolks and acquaintance. 45 And not finding him, they returned into Jerusalem, seeking him. 46 And it came to pass, that, after three days, they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them and asking them questions. 47 And all that heard him were astonished at his wisdom and his answers. 48 And seeing him, they wondered. And his mother said to him: Son, why hast thou done so to us? Behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing. 49 And he said to them: How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be about my father's business? 50 And they understood not the word that he spoke unto them. 51 And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject to them. And his mother kept all these words in her heart. 52 And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and grace with God and men. (DRV)
From beginning of Japanese history, art or pictures is very important. This book is example from Japanese Museums to show history of Japan in art.
Much is based upon the scenes one sees outside. Very much like Chinese art. There is a deep connection between Japanese and Chinese culture.
More formal picture.
There is tradition of culture for women. Very noble. Hair is like the Chinese make up hair. This is Nara era, a long time ago.
Wood block print of beautiful cultured lady.
Makeup for face very important.
Geisha are ideal of lady in Japan from long history. They train for many years. When entertaining at Tea Houses and parties Geisha are always most refined and reserved. Geisha are very polite and do many things to show artistic talents. They are highly respected and have a place in Japanese society that honors them. They have respect to have private life not interrupted in any way by those they serve. Geisha wear Kimono. They play Shamisen and also do dance, tea ceremony, conversation, poetry, story telling, singing and calligraphy. Geisha are very charming.
By RONALD BLUM, Associated Press Writer Thursday, November 27, 2008 (11-27) 21:01 PST New York (AP) --
For Daniel Barenboim, music and politics meld together.
Set to make his long-awaited Metropolitan Opera debut Friday night in Richard Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde," the 66-year-old Jewish former wunderkind is known as much for his championing of Palestinian rights as he is for his work as a conductor and pianist.
So when he appeared at the Met for a round-table discussion on Nov. 18, talk quickly turned to Barack Obama's election as president and Barenboim's predictions of events in the Middle East.
"I think the Palestinian-Israeli conflict can be solved only by the Israelis and the Palestinians, but it has to have the backing of the rest of the world. It cannot be an initiative from the outside," he said.
Born in Argentina, Barenboim grew up in Israel, became a famous child pianist and made his Carnegie Hall debut at 14. His conducting debut wasn't until 1967, but he became so noted for his work on the podium that he was hired as music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra from 1991-2006 and music director of Berlin's Staatsoper Unter den Linden in 1992, a position he still holds. He also is principal guest conductor of Milan's Teatro alla Scala.
Yet, for many, his most noted actions came in 2001, when he conducted "Tristan" excerpts in Israel, breaking an unofficial ban on Wagner, whose music and anti-Semitic writings influenced Adolf Hitler; and last January, when he accepted honorary Palestinian citizenship.
So, given his ties with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, he tries not to expect Obama to come up with immediate solutions.
"I'm thrilled and delighted that he has been elected, but I think it's unrealistic to hope that he will achieve a solution to all these problems," Barenboim said.
Part of his reaction to Obama's election stems from his own experiences in the United States.
"I read with my own eyes at the entrance of a golf club in Miami in 1958 ... a sign that said: "No Jews, no blacks and no dogs allowed." So there is quite a development in all that," he said.
He views politics and finance similarly to music, citing the need for leaders in all three fields to recognize "everything is interdependent." As a metaphor, he cites that one cannot be only a rhythmical, melodic or harmonic musician.
He said the world wouldn't have seen the current economic crisis if financial leaders realized "that everything is connected."
He mentions his work with the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, which he founded with the late Palestinian scholar Edward Said in 1999. It includes Israeli and Arab musicians along with many from other countries.
Barenboim recounted a story from the first night the orchestra members met.
"The Syrians sat at one table, the Israelis sat at a separate table and the Egyptians. There was no contact among the different Arabs, either," he said. "And the poor Palestinians, this was actually very typical, didn't know which table to go to. ... 'I think in the end they went and ate in the kitchen. I'm not joking."
Near the end, talk finally turned to "Tristan." Barenboim will become the first conductor other than music director James Levine to lead the opera at the Met since Erich Leinsdorf in 1974.
"Life is not the same after 'Tristan.' Musical life, musical works, everything, after 'Tristan' has to be seen through 'Tristan's eyes. And even the music before 'Tristan' is looked at differently. It is one of those pivotal works, like the 'Well-Tempered Clavier' has been of Bach," he said. "The harmonic language is stretched to the maximum, like an elastic, and there was no beyond that, and therefore new had to come."
He does not, however, view it as a love story.
"Tristan is an opera about death. And it is that death, the fear of death and the looking for death as the only possible way to solve the entanglement in which they find, this is, if you want, the locomotive, the motor of the opera," he said. "There is nothing more democratic in the world than death. In the end, it comes to everyone, rich and poor, good and bad, and is one of the things that we all have to deal with. ... He who spends his life without thinking about death misses out on one of the most forceful dimensions of human existence."
After death comes the judgment. Those who persecuted Christ and his mother and the Palestinians have NO hope, who enter in at the gate to hell.
"And the poor Palestinians, this was actually very typical, didn't know which table to go to. ... 'I think in the end they went and ate in the kitchen. I'm not joking."
What Jesus says about this.
Lk:16: 19 ¶ There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and feasted sumptuously every day. 20 And there was a certain beggar, named Lazarus, who lay at his gate, full of sores, 21 Desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table. And no one did give him: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 And it came to pass that the beggar died and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom. And the rich man also died: and he was buried in hell. 23 And lifting up his eyes when he was in torments, he saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom: 24 And he cried and said: Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water to cool my tongue: for I am tormented in this flame. 25 And Abraham said to him: Son, remember that thou didst receive good things in thy lifetime, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted and thou art tormented. 26 And besides all this, between us and you, there is fixed a great chaos: so that they who would pass from hence to you cannot, nor from thence come hither.
Please read this first and understand what Beladi is and then see real Beladi. Thank you. Safiya
"Belly Dancing" and Childbirth published first in 1964 in "Sexology" & numerous other magazines & papers over the years
Danse du ventre, or belly dancing, is not at all what Western society thinks it to be, i.e. a dance of sex and seduction. This is an erroneous and ignorant belief, reinforced and perpetrated by stage and movie writers too lazy to do research. Neither is it a 'belly' dance, since much more is involved than just the stomach muscles.
Oriental dancing, as the Arabs themselves call it, is one of the oldest forms of dance, originating with pre-Biblical religious rites worshiping motherhood and having as its practical side the preparation of females for the stresses of childbirth. Thus it is the oldest form of natural childbirth instruction.
According to Farab Firdoz, a dancer from Bahrein, Saudi Arabia, the dance was still performed in the less Westernized parts of her country in the '50s, around the bedside of a woman in childbirth, by a circle of her fellow tribeswomen. In this ritualistic form men are not allowed to watch it. The purpose here is to hypnotize the woman in labor into an imitation of the movements with her own body. This greatly facilitates the birth and reduces pain from womb contractions. It helps the mother to move with instead of against the contractions.
Unfortunately, Western civilization brought a sick eroticism to the Middle East along with its technical advances. In The Dancer of Shamahka, Armen Ohanian says: "Thus in Cairo one evening I saw, with sick incredulous eyes, one of our most sacred dances degraded into a bestiality horrible and revolting. It is our poem of the mystery and pain of motherhood, which all true Asiatic men watch with reverence and humility, in the faraway corners of Asia, where the destructive breath of the Occident has not yet penetrated. In this olden Asia, which has kept the dance in its primitive purity, it represents maternity, the mysterious conception of life, the suffering and the joy with which a new soul is brought into the world.
"Could any man born of woman contemplate this most holy subject, expressed in an art so pure and so ritualistic as our Eastern dance with less than profound reverence? Such is our Asiatic veneration of motherhood, that there are countries and tribes whose most binding oath is sworn upon the stomach, because it is from this sacred cup that humanity has issued.
"But the spirit of the Occident had touched this holy dance and it became the horrible danse du ventre, the ‘hoochie-koochie’. To me, a nauseating revelation of unsuspected depths of human bestiality, to others it was -- amusing. I heard the lean Europeans chuckling. I saw lascivious smiles upon even the lips of Asiatics, and I fled."
Generations of Bedouin and Berber mothers may have to bear their young not only without benefit of hospitals and modern antiseptic methods, but also without the comfort and muscular aid of what is definitely an ancient folk ritual. This is because even some Arabic people are now beginning to see sex in what is simply a gymnastic exercise for a natural function. As a result, the ritual is slowly dying out.
Other peoples, among them the Hawaiians and Maoris of New Zealand, have had their own chidlbirth preparation dances involving pelvic and abdominal muscles. The Hawaiians used to have a hula called "Ohelo", that was done in a reclining position, by both sexes, every morning. As late as 1936, the Maoris still practiced their form if this exercise.
A small subsect of the Allaoui Moslems believe that the Messiah will be born to a man, since woman is unworthy of such a high honor. Under this supposition, the men in that sect practice Oriental dancing in preparation for the honor to be awarded them someday, that of giving birth to their Deliverer.
The idea that children must be brought forth in pain is a religious one, based on the Christian concept of original sin and the penance to be exacted for it. The Bible states, "In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children". Nothing is said about undue or excruciating pain, and yet the thought of agonizing birth pangs is pounded into our heads from the earliest age of understanding. Thus, childbirth is approached with bodies & muscles tensed in fear and anticipation. Instead of relaxing and helping nature along, we put stumbling blocks in her way.
The newest idea in obstetrics today is to prepare pregnant women for the coming ordeal either through hypnotism or special training classes. They can now be ultra-modern and still give birth the "natural childbirth" way. Doctors have recently found that babies born in this manner come into the world more alert and without the common anaesthesia-induced torpor.
What hypnotism accomplishes, although temporarily, is the gradual removal through post-hypnotic suggestion of the whole mental concept of painful childbirth. The relaxed woman can now concentrate only on helping nature by moving with the contractions of labor.
This self-same thing is accomplished by the circle of dancing Arab tribes women who hypnotize the woman in labor into imitating their rolling pelvic motions. Their task is far easier though, since there is no unfounded and exaggerated fear of childirth’s pains in primitive societies. Who would think of sending a man who has a sedentary job to run in Olympic races? Why then does Western society expect a woman, who has never used her pelvic muscles for more than just holding up her garter belt, to give birth easily, a feat more taxing for the muscles than any athletic competition?
Childbirth must be prepared for. Dormant muscles must be built up little by little, step by step. All it takes is a little work, which certainly would never harm the mother or the unborn child. Strengthening the muscles also helps in carrying the child through pregnancy and greatly reduces stretch marks on the abdomen.
Training classes, such as Education for Childbirth courses given at one of the major hospitals in New York City, try to accomplish in a few short months or weeks what should have been started in childhood: namely the shaping-up of pelvic muscles used in pregnancy and childbirth and to regain shape and muscle tone after birth.
The first lesson in the Exercise Review Sheet of that hospital says: "Concentration Exercises -- Object: to learn muscular control of muscle groups. Particular attention is paid to strong contraction and absolute relaxation of the rest of the body."
The technique of Oriental dancing is one of contractions and releases while all other muscles not involved in the movemen are relaxed.
Class 2 goes on: "Stand with knees easy, feet parallel and with the weight of the body well over the arches of your feet. Rock your pelvis upward, Tighten slowly your buttocks and lower abdominal muscles. . . Lying on your back, with legs bent, press back firmly on floor, contracting abdominal muscles at the same time -- release."
This is a position assumed in almost every Oriental dance at one point or another, where the head reaches the floor from a backbend and the body relaxes untill the spine rests on the floor. The knees are sharply bent and the feet outside of and close to the thighs. Slow rhythmic breathing is followed by fast shallow breathing, acceleration of which increases with contractions, producing a variety of abdominal movements.
One of the women, who attended classes of this sort, was the wife of a prominent lawyer of Turkish background and mother of twins. She told me that one of the movements her obstetrician stressed was a rippling movement of the abdomen, the old Arabic "belly roll" - what we now refer to as the "camel".
It was explained that the upper part of the wave, as her doctor termed the movement, was to be done between the contractions of the womb, and the lower part of the wave, or bearing down, was to be done as the womb contracted. This would aid the mother considerably in expelling the baby with minimal wear and tear on all the internal organs and muscles involved. Fighting the contractions through fear and preoccupation with the thought of pain would only tense the muscles and tear them rather than allow them to stretch gently during the uterine contractions and relaxations.
The rolling movement itself is no child’s play to learn, for when done wrong it only serves to stetch the stomach muscles. The lower spine, pelvis, diaphragm and abdomen are involved. This is extremely difficult to describe in writing & must be demonstrated, explained step by step, felt gradually muscle by muscle.
Each little muscle must be found and developed in turn, before the whole can be manipulated to the extent that each split second can be perfectly controlled. Rather than sharpness and angularity, there must be a smooth, circular, undulating motion.
Fortunately, the Turkish backround of the woman I mentioned gave her more than just a laywoman's knowledge of Oriental dancing and therefore a greater knowledge of and control over her pelvic muscles. Subsequently, she learned all the exercises with greater speed and facility than the average female produced by a society that is just discovering its hips via some of the newer social and Latin dances.
These are muscles that have been used by almost every Arabic and Turkish - speaker (and many others) from childhood on up, in the execution of some of their indigenous folk dances: vulgarly and wrongly referred to in Western society as the danse du ventre or, worse yet, belly dance.
Wouldn't you know it. Wouldn't you just know it!
See Michael's comment below. Thank you Michael and for the picture. I am updating the post with the picture of "Little Egypt", the first "Belly Dancer" put together by Sol Bloom, a Jew.
