WHY HAVE TRUTHFUL INTEGRITY?

If teaching the truth will get you fired, boycotted, censored, disbarred, shot and killed, lynched, vilified, victimized! Why do people do it? Why not just lie? Why have integrity? Why be forthright? Why not simply be silent? It is because of feelings and forces. Inner feelings and forces innately couple with those on the outside to erupt into activity.

FEELING FEELINGS

Feeling feelings The ability to feel, to feel even pain, is more blessed than the inability to feel at all, be it pain, pleasure, joy! Feeling informs our inner and outer selves. Feeling formulates and fashions. Feeling, an innate form of knowledge, is akin to teleology. That is to say, feeling perceives, projects its own ends, its ulterior designs, interpreted by its feelings. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/teleology Lacking of feeling handicaps. Its lack even heightens vulnerability to, susceptibility for, disease, injury, death. Here, I speak of spiritual, physical, emotional, personal, social feelings and any tributaries.

INQUIRING ABOUT SIN

INQUIRING ABOUT SIN Inquiring in sin: When a tide rises has it sinned? When a tide ebbs, has it triumphed? When the wind blows is that triumph ? When the wind does not blow, is that sin ? When a lion eats its meat, is that sin? When a lamb eats grass is that sin?! What about when man eats meat? Is that sin? What about when the sun and moon set and rise diurnally is that sin? Is there, then, no sin in anything besides religions? If there is no sin in nature , how is there sin in men? Otherwise stated, is not mankind bound by, subservient to, amenable with, the same divine laws of nature binding all else on earth, at least, if not also in the infinite heavens, being that mankind was created by that same God which created all that is, was, or can be? Or is mankind THE EXCEPTION ? Just asking....

African philosophy, obenga

"Black Africans, from ancient Egypt to all the latter forms of African society, come from a different perspective. African traditions have taken pains to express, instead, the radical oneness of humanity and all that exists, 'from the tiniest clod to the entire universe.' "A human-centered vision of the world necessarily develops an anthropological ontology, a philosophy of wholeness . Granted, Epictetus , the first century Stoic philosopher, wrote that each man contains god within himself: 'you are a fragment of god; you have a piece of divinity in you.' In ancient Egypt, however, the human being was precisely, god: human-god, a seamless whole, in effect. That a philosophy of wholeness should take form in the pharaonic 'polis' was altogether natural. For pharaonic society was a grand, organized, universal ensemble embracing the elements (sky, sun, moon, stars, fire, water, earth, vegetation); beings (gods, goddesses, spirits, kings and Queens, viziers, the royal family); administrators of various central, provincial and local government departments (treasury, justice, army, temples); scribes and sundry craftspersons (carpenters, engravers, smelters, cobblers); together with peasants and herders--and the ensemble held for nearly twenty-five centuries of national history. In this system, nothing was completely independent, isolated from the overall pharaonic domain. The sacred and the profane were merely two aspects of a single socio-political reality incorporated by the pharaoh, the god-king. One Egyptologist has summed up this reality concisely: 'Egyptian society embraces the entire universe: all elements and beings are registered participants, like a single whole, collaborators in a single enterprise.' P.124-125, AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY: THE PHARAONIC PERIOD 2780-330 B.C. by Theophile Obenga (2004)

THE TALK

"THE TALK" When I was about 12 years old, I found an empty prophylactic (rubbers) wrapper in our bathroom at home. When I asked Daddy what it was, He responded "Don't worry about what no G--D propolaxis," as he snatched it away from me and walked away. Such went "The Talk" for me. In truth, some boys of my age in our St. Louis locality, had already begun to carry prophylactics in their wallets, as had I, just in case! But, as Richard Pryor or Redd Foxx, or some black comedian had once famously stated: "Back in those days, very few sisters were giving it up. In fact, young brothers like me were 'seeing no parts of pussy.'" Indeed, I carried mine in my billfold for so long, that a circular imprint was visible on the wallet's exterior!

NO SOONER!

NO SOONER! We flighty humans arrogate unto ourselves the option of discretion, as though we were "free" to chose between good and evil; indeed, between life and death. With all due respect, I would humbly suggest that these normal human suppositions rank up there with the earth being flat, or the earth being the center of not just the solar system, but of the universe as well. When it is satisfactorily proven that we chose to be born in this space and time; and thereby, that we are somehow seminally different from the quadrillions of stars In the heavens, untold reservoirs of water in the oceans, or the infinitum of blades of grass upon the ground; or even dirt, itself, our very earth itself, none of which produced themselves by choice, then our vaunted notions of "discretion" of "choice" or "free will," may have attained legitimacy , but no sooner! Stated directly, from my rather intense study and observation it seems ever so obvious to me, that our very human sensory, cognitive, even conceptional, apparatuses, and their capabilities, are divine concessions from Almighty God, as it is with our Reason is as well!

IF NOT LINEAR, THEN WHAT?

IF NOT "LINEAR," THEN WHAT? It must be ever recalled that not all movements are unidirectional, or, one-way. They zig-zag, reverse, go sideways, backwards, stall, speed up, stop, or do some of all above! Humans move . Therefore human society engages in all of the above. I make these basic observations merely to embroider the edges of, not to be critical of, the most sapid sentiments expressed by Mahmoud Mohamed Taha, the late, martyred sage of Sudan, which nevertheless had struck me as linear. He wrote: "Man is manipulated from distance into closeness , from ignorance into knowledge, from plurality into unity, from evil to good, from the limited to infinity (itlaq), and from bondage to freedom." P.105, "Determinism is Absolute Good," THE SECOND MESSAGE OF ISLAM (1987) This less-to-greater, "progressive" view of humanity strikes me as being somewhat linear, in its thrust. That is to say that it is essentially "Western" in its basic orientation. Juxtaposed against linear, I posit "quadralinear" or "omnilnear," as oppositional to one-way motion. As natural examples , I would point to the poles of the earth trading places, periodically, or births being produced asexually, at times, in certain species of plants and animals. One might also point to the Great Pyramids or megalithic structures of ancient Africa as examples, since later men have failed to attain such perfection in construction or conception. Or, one might point to the resurrection to life from death as evidenced by Jesus Christ or those others, who rose, cited in Mathew 27:52-53. Thus, linear is not exclusive, and progress is not necessarily linear. But , if not linear, then what is it?

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

I am not at all certain that even yet, nearly 50 years following his death in 1968, we wholly appreciate the lucid genius of the intellectual side of Rev. Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr. This thought again assailed me, as I read in WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE: CHAOS OR COMMUNITY (1967), his final book, as he quotes, dialectically analyzes, synthesizes, distinguishes, and finally disposes, of many seemingly, reasonable assertions of another preeminent intellectual of our people, the great World War II novelist, John O. Killens, author of AND THEN WE HEARD THE THUNDER (1964). Dr. King wrote: "My friend John Killens recently wrote in the 'Negro Digest ': 'Integration comes after liberation. A slave cannot integrate with his master. In the whole history of revolts and revolutions , integration has never been the main slogan of the revolution. The oppressed fights to free himself from his oppressor, not to integrate with him. Integration is the step after freedom when the freedman makes up his mind as to whether he wishes to integrate with his former master.' "At first glance this sounds very good . But after reflection one has to face some inescapable facts about the Negro and American life. This is a multiracial nation where all groups are dependent on each other, whether they want to recognize it or not. In this vast interdependent nation no racial group can retreat to an island entire of itself. The phenomenon of integration and liberation cannot be as neatly divided as Killens would have it. "There is no theoretical or sociological divorce between liberation and integration. In our kind of society liberation cannot come without integration and integration cannot come without liberation. I speak here of integration in both the ethical and the political senses. On the one hand, integration is true intergroup, interpersonal living. On the other hand, it is the mutual sharing of power. I cannot see how the Negro will be totally liberated from the crushing weight of poor education, squalid housing and economic strangulation until he is integrated, with power, into every level of American life. "Mr. Killens ' assertion might have some validity in a struggle for independence against a foreign invader. But the Negro's struggle is quite different from and more difficult than the struggle for independence. The American Negro will be living tomorrow with the very people against whom he is struggling today. The American Negro is not in a Congo where the Belgians will go back to Belgium after the battle is over , or in an India where the British will go back to England after Independence is won. In the struggle for national independence one can talk about liberation now and integration later, but in the struggle for racial justice in a multiracial society where the oppressor and the oppressed are both 'at home,' liberation must come through integration. "Are we seeking power for power 's sake? Or are we seeking to make the world and our nation better places to live. If we seek the latter, violence can never provide the answer. The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy . Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it . Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you cannot murder hate. In fact, violence increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiples violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars . Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. "The beauty of nonviolence is that in its own way and in its own time it seeks to break the chain reaction of evil . With a majestic spiritual power, it seeks to elevate truth, beauty and goodness to the throne. Therefore I will continue to follow this method because I think it is the most practically sound and morally excellent way for the Negro to achieve freedom." P. 70-73, "Black Power"

CYCLES OF EARTHLY RENEWAL

CYCLES OF EARTHLY RENEWAL Nothing on earth is wasted . Each one feeds the next in the cycles of renewal. Heresy feeds orthodoxy. Invertebrate feeds vertebrate. Prior stuff feeds present. One earth, one subsidence, one species. One God.

HARLEM HELL-FIGHTERS AND MARCHING BAND

I encourage all to read about the amazing, colored 369th Infantry in World War I, which fought under French command, due to American racism and segregation. At one time they were under fire for nearly a whole year, the longest in military history. I read a book called THE HARLEM HELLFIGHTERS and was extremely impressed by their mojo, moxie , esprit de corps, though having lived through hell, on every front! But, they had each other and were able to create jazz and spread jazz all over Europe, breaking down the rigid segregation the white Americans had sought to erect, in the process with Jim Europe, Noble Sissel, Bill "Bojangles " Robinson performing!

DIVIDE AND COMBINE, THE ENNEADS....

We customarily divide in science, gravitating down, down, down. It may be as well for science also to combine. That is, to do both operations: dividing and combining , "until it has reached perfect Intellection." This state is known as "Dialectic" by Plotinus in his powerful chapter of that name, in his book, THE ENNEADS (1991). "Is Dialectic, then, the same as Philosophy? "It is the most precious part of Philosophy. We must not think of it as the mere tool of the metaphysician : Dialectic does not consist of bare theories and rules: it deals with verities; Existences are, as it were, Matter to it, or at least it proceeds methodically towards Existences, and possesses itself, at the one step, of the notions and of the realities. "Untruth and sophism it knows, not directly, not of its own nature, but merely as something produced outside itself, something it recognizes to be foreign to the verities laid up in itself; in the falsity presented to it, it perceives a clash with its own canon of truth. Dialectic, that is to say, has no knowledge of propositions--collections of words--but it knows the truth and, in that knowledge, knows what the schools call their propositions: it knows, above all, the operation of the Soul, and, by virtue of this knowing, it knows, too, what is affirmed and what is denied, whether the denial is of what was asserted or something else, and whether propositions agree or differ; all that is submitted to it, it attacks with the directness of sense-perception and it leaves petty precisions of process to what other science may care for such exercises." P.27-28 

DIVINITY AND MANKIND

DIVINITY AND MANKIND  What if mankind really is divine? By "divine," I mean having the innate capacity to do whatever mankind wants to do, and to live, though not forever, at least for those hundreds of years, as did the old patriarchs in Bible mythology. The Bible speaks of Methuselah living to be 969 years old, outliving Adam, the "first man," by 39 years. Seth attained 912. Noah lived 950 years and Shem, 600 years, it says. Still, hundreds of years of life is not eternal. When mankind was jointly building the Tower of Babel, their tongues were confused by God, it says in Genesis 11:6-7, lest they be able to do anything they plan. This fear that God had of mankind is stated directly in Genesis 3:22-23, when Adam is cast out of the Garden of Eden: "God said, the man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand also and take from the tree of life and eat, and live forever. So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken." Many people take the Bible literally. What people believe is no concern of mine. I have my own beliefs. But, this piece is a supposition, not a belief, not my own proposition for anyone to do anything but to think. This piece was prompted by an accumulation of things over the years from space exploration to climate change to fracking to racism to medical breakthroughs to food production, to a very broad panoply of many everyday things, including this hand-held mobile device, on which I am now writing! If mankind were divine, would that new conception of itself alter life on earth for the good of our species? That is the question. Since it is true that religious conceptions all carry with them moral strictures and structures that were designed by their priesthoods and wise to keep mankind from savagery, from wild animal-like behavior in theory. With wars raging all around us and within us, without ceasing, one may well wonder to what extent these noble religious sages succeeded? One may well wonder whether a new or another--whether "new" or not--conception of mankind might be preferable to what now exists, using the "life on earth" quality standard to measure; using mankind's relationship to itself and to its planet, Earth as the gauge? Or, whether it might be best to rest and to realize that life is struggle, whatever one's religion or beliefs, as nature itself so ably attests daily.

FEELING "ON FIRST PRINCIPLES" BY ORIGEN

Faith and contemplation are both rooted in human feelings. I say this despite having read and, indeed, because I have read, third century theologian, Origen 's, disclaimer in ON FIRST PRINCIPLES (2003): "Now that these points have been discussed, it is time to resume our inquiry into the incarnation of our Lord and Savior, how he became a man and dwelt among men. We have considered to the best of our small ability, the divine nature, from a contemplation of his own works rather than from our feelings, and while beholding his visible creatures, we have also by faith contemplated those which are invisible . For human frailty can neither see everything with the eyes nor comprehend everything by reason, since we men are beings weaker and frailer than all other rational creatures, those that dwell in heaven or above the heavens surpassing us in excellence." P. 135, "The Incarnation of Christ " Not that I would quarrel nor quibble with the African theologian, Origen, whose works, influence, and legacy have lasted 2,000 years, shaping, filling, our present Christian Faith, I would join, here, with Apostle Paul: "That I may apprehend that for which I am already apprehended by Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:12. http://biblehub.com/philippians/3-12.htm "Apprehension" being 'feelings' by any means, meter, or metric, I rest.

RACISM POLLUTES EVERYONE

Racism has not only oppressed and repressed the "blacks." Worse. Racism has also suppressed and repressed the "whites." A lie's lethality is as colorblind as any poison's viral potency. Reading Thomas Paine, William Shakespeare, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Constantine Volney or Plato, one readily perceives that truth finds its votaries among all people of the earth and that pollution to one is pollution to all people as well.

PRESS: HONESTY PLUS FREEDOM, PAINE

"The honesty of the press is as great an object to society as the freedom of it ." --Thomas Paine, "The Forester's Letter I," PAINE: COLLECTED WRITINGS (1955, 1984), p.63

A DEFINITION OF WILL

A DEFINITION OF WILL Will is active. Will is alive. Will is animated by wisdom and/or knowledge. It is motivated by pain and/or desire. Will is focused spiritual energy that is spent toward the execution of an end. A concomitant of life is will. ALTERNATIVELY:  Will is our human conceptional view of divine order preset before time, matter or energy existed by God.

GONE LAY DOWN

GONE LAY DOWN A client with some municipal warrants came to my law office a few years ago. He said he should "gone lay down," meaning go to jail, to clean up his petty "criminal" record. After I told him that municipal violations were not then "crimes" under Missouri law, he perked up. His "gone lay down" metaphor morphed into a "let's beat this stuff" resolution that contrasted sharply with his earlier despondency. We did beat all that stuff, by making a deal, and his record was cleared. Just goes to show that a little exact knowledge at the right time can energize, even the catatonic who would ordinarily "gone lay down."

"EUCLID" RECLAIMED FOR AFRICA

EUCLID: A RECLAIMED ‘AFRICAN’ GEOMETER By Rev. Dr. Larry Delano Coleman Saturday, October 04, 2014 Edited: Tuesday, August 23, 2016 Mathematics is one of mankind’s oldest disciplines. It began where mankind began, and reached maturity where mankind reached maturity. That place was in ‘Africa.’ The Lebombo Bone dates back 44,000 years, having been subjected to rigorous radiocarbon dating after it was found in the Lebombo Mountains, which border Mozambique, Swaziland, an South Africa. It is in “Euclid’s Elements,” however, that a series of irrefutable geometric examples, definitions, with complete proofs, were written in thirteen books. These conflate with divine cosmology. This epic, is an essentially spiritually, esoteric compilation, closer in time to us, 300 B.C., purportedly. Yet, it is regularly hailed as the basis of all mathematics. It was hailed by Leonardo Pisano in 1202 in his “Liber Abaci.” It was hailed as such by Isaac Newton in “Mathematica Principia” between the 17-18th centuries. Albert Einstein in “Ideas and Opinions,” and “Relativity,” did the same. However, very little is known of Euclid . Some say he was instructed by pupils of Plato in mathematics. Yet images of Plato exist, but none of Euclid exists. Plato himself ascribes and imputes mathematics to the Egyptians dating back 10,000 years before his own time in THE LAWS. Similarly in his “Timaeus” and “Critias” he does the same. It is certain that the principles of Euclid’s geometry were rigorously applied in Kemet (Egypt) and Ta-Seti (Ethiopia) in megalithic structures like Temples and Pyramids, thousands of years before Greece, Plato, Euclid, existed. So, what gives with Euclid? Why the mysterious misattribution to Greece of Euclid’s practical but divine mathematics-- which geometry plainly is—instead of to black “Africa:” Kemet, Ethiopia or to Libya, as it was also then known to Greeks? Why were there no contemporaneous, graphic images of Euclid, only fragments of his works, the oldest papyrus copy of which was retrieved from a garbage heap in Oxyrhnycus, 150 miles, southwest of Cairo. While at Elephantine, in far southern Egypt, on its border with Ethiopia, now Aswan, site of the dam, “ostraka” –inscribed pottery fragments-- were found detailing an icosahedron, of solid geometry, from Book 13 of Euclid’s Elements. Not found in Greece, nor elsewhere, was this sacred geometry; neither in ancient Miletus, home of Thales, in present day Turkey; nor in Samos, home of Pythagoras, the island home of the first Greek mathematician, who studied in Africa for 22 years under Egyptian priests. Why is this so secret? White supremacists’ scholarship, long after the extinction of ancient Greeks and Romans, whom they have also anomalously claim, despite being “barbarians” to them, could not then, neither can many of them, now, wrap their heads around the blatant fact of the black African origin of mathematics, geometry, civilization, language, indeed mankind, itself; or philosophy, despite the evidence right in their disbelieving faces! http://www.ams.org/samplings/feature-column/fc-2011-11 “Although many of the results in Elements originated with earlier mathematicians, one of Euclid's accomplishments was to present them in a single, logically coherent framework, making it easy to use and easy to reference, including a system of rigorous mathematical proofs that remains the basis of mathematics 23 centuries later.” This excerpt from Wkipedia makes plain his impact. In truth, however, “Euclid” may well be a pseudonym for a very ancient, priestly, mathematical guild, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclid In addition to the important “ostraka” –illustrated broken pottery--finds at Elephantine in far southern Egypt, there were papyri, at a site about 150 miles southwest of Cairo, known as “Oxyrhynchus,” as its Wkipedia abstract attests: “Also found were the oldest and most complete diagrams from Euclid's Elements.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxyrhynchus #30

APPREHENSIONS

APPREHENSIONS OF THANGS Women commonly like to say that what all men do is to "think" about the same thing, same thang. That is not necessarily true, however. While men often do apprehend the presence of that same thing, that same thang. That is not thought. Rather, that is a male, hormonal, autonomic, apprehension, so often misapprehended as "thought" by all females who may be present . http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/apprehend

"INSIDE-OUT" REVOLUTIONARIES

"INSIDE-OUT" REVOLUTIONARIES From the inside out, rather than from the outside in, our American freedom is to be won, finally, based upon our laden souls' innate civilizing effects upon Western society, by using its creeds, books, heritage , history. "Inside out" means individually and collectively for all, not just a few! The "souls of black folks" enabled these disparate folks to withstand brutal oppression in a distant land, to which they were shipped over the seas, without family, language, history, customs, food, faith, love, opportunities, and to still survive . That same spirit must be called upon to invest us and to magnetize those about us with the redeeming spirit of love, wisdom, knowledge, fun, laughter, rhythm, robustness that brought us through this hell .

MY NEGUS

For reasons that were not always clear, then or since, in the summer of 1969, a group of close friends, formerly involved in the Students for Black Awareness and Action, (SBAA) would communally gather together around a burning candle, discussing, "fellowshipping" frolicking, after work, into the night. Nothing discernible ever came of our weekly, Wednesday night, assemblies, as it was more like a "washing of spears" type-ritual of spiritual release and rejuvenation, rather than anything else, since we were all about to abandon home for college, leaving our friendly circle. Today, our post-Webster Groves, Missouri, High School, long-ago gatherings were called again to mind, as I read REMINISCENCES OF LEVI COFFIN, as abridged and edited by Ben Richmond, (1991, 2006), where I saw the following : "The core of Quakerism is its insistence that Christ is a living presence, able to teach and empower those who are willing to attend to him. Jesus said: "'If you love me, you will keep my commandments . And I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, to be with you forever , even the Spirit of Truth...; you know him for he dwells in you, and will be in you. (John 14:15-17, RSV).' "Friends gather for worship in the expectation that the Counselor will be present, as promised. In traditional Quaker worship, perhaps one or two Friends will rise out of silent worship to pray or to preach as he or she feels the inward guidance of the Spirit. This is no ordinary preaching , but is understood to be the immediate word of God addressed to the gathered community. Whether or not a word was spoken audibly, it is an experience of gathering together for spiritual communion with God." P. xviii-xix, "Foreword"

BEING COMMITTED IN CHRIST

BEING COMMITTED IN CHRIST "Commit your ways unto the Lord, and He will direct your paths." http://biblehub.com/parallel/proverbs/16-3.htm http://biblehub.com/psalms/37-5.htm "I am tangled up. Tied up, tethered up in the Jesus" the old school preachers would say, often closing a roll: "wrapped up & sacked up!" "It is finished" being committed is! Being committed crushes quarrels, all debates as well. One executes. One does. Deeds determine it all. There is nothing left to reason out. "Be not dismayed, whatever betide, God will take care of you." Being committed is ripe fruit at the end of the branch produced by God, after many years of adversity, perversity, struggling torment, toil. Ripe fruit knows & boasts, that "all things come of thee oh Lord and of thine own, have we given to thee." Ripe fruit is spirit and truth, rather than letter and doctrine. It is good. Thus, ripe fruit being of spirit and truth produced the opening verse written above which is neither from Proverbs 16:3 nor Psalm 37:5. It is my blend of both in spirit and truth. Being committed to each in Jesus name: "Commit your ways unto the Lord and He will direct your paths." "Being committed" means being a conduit for Christ, not the source . It recognizes and worships the flow from God which they are blessed to receive and to pass along as grace! Do what you do in Jesus' name and be done, obeying flow, spirit, truth! Amen !

FORTY YEARS FOR A DEGREE

FORTY YEARS FOR A DEGREE Forty years of intensive study were required to in order to become a scribe in ancient Kemet (Egypt). I can well understand that length of time, given the breadth and depth of their amazing corpus, ranging from geometry to medicine, from poetry to astronomy, from music to hieroglyphics and all in between . It is well enough just for us to deem our selves to be educated after a 4 year college degree or 3 or 4 more for a professional or Ph. D. Degree.

AUTUMN GRASS

Just when you thought that you had figured it all out; just when you thought you had it all going on; just when all seemed to be bright, just then: UP JUMPED THE DEVIL! Just to remind you that whatever it is, or may one day be, it too shall pass like autumn grass.

MEDITATIONS ON APOSTLE PAUL

Meditations on Apostle Paul He was mistaken for an Egyptian like Moses had been. He was murdered by the Romans as Jesus Christ had been. He preached an itinerant brand of a gospel of redemption in many lands. He was blinded by light on the road to Damascus while pursuing to persecute the followers of "the way," whose leader he later became, after his sight was restored in Antioch. He was educated. He was trained by the chief doctor of law, Gamaliel. He was a Pharisee and the son of a Pharisee. He was present at the stoning of Stephen, even watching over their clothes, when he was named Saul, like the first king of his Jewish people. But, he later changed that name to Paul, as Jacob who had changed his to Israel. He had no wife like John the Baptist and nor heirs, except, over eons, billions of readers, who have gratefully read his many powerful New Testament teachings, letters and epistles to diverse places and people of old, without ever bothering to inquire, who was "Paul?" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/vaticancityandholysee/5675461/Oldest-image-of-St-Paul-discovered.html

USCT ENDED THE SLAVE TRADE

USCT ENDED THE SLAVE TRADE As I read THE SUPPRESSION OF THE AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE (1896) by W. E. B. DuBois, I have already learned that the only thing that suppressed that infernal trade was the Civil War. Neither law, nor public sentiment, nor threat of prosecution nor ostracism stopped it. Nothing but a victory by the North over the South suppressed it, finally, completely, irrevocably. Since it was the 200,000 black troops and sailors who won their "Freedom War" in the end, after the 1863 executive order enabling their enlistment , provisioning, training, organization, equal pay (finally in 1864), was signed by President Abraham Lincoln , it would be fair, reasonable and true to say that it was, in fact, United States Colored Troops (USCT) who suppressed the African slave trade with their blood, bullets, bayonets, bombs, bravery!

"POLICY"--FAILED PROMISE AND PERIL

"POLICY"--FAILED PROMISE & PERIL It is cruel and unusual to bar groups of descendants of former American slaves' least attempts to get ahead economically, financially, corporately, outside of church. Yet it happens. One may recount one failed attempt by reflection. There was "policy." By it, common black folks in Harlem, Detroit , St. Louis, elsewhere, could play a penny and make $6.00 if their 3-digit number "hit." This remarkably simple lottery system was devised, was invented in the 1920's by Caspar Holstein, a black elevator operator from the Danish West Indies, while he was working in New York, reading the newspapers' stock reports each day. "Policy" created hundreds of jobs internally for its runners , bankers, collectors, distributors, and others. "Policy" created capital for loans, mortgages and businesses. Policy created opportunity and hope in the midst of "Jim Crow" segregation in the North and South for colored folks. Unfortunately, financial security among black folks made politicians uneasy and made the mafia greedy. So, the criminals moved in with their "black hand," murdering, bombing, setting fires, and of course getting away, while politicians passed laws and prosecutors prosecuted. In this two-fold attack the bloom of policy that was a boon to so many in the black community was destroyed. "When Harlem Was in Bloom," with money, it became, predictably, a vast, dangerous desert of dry bones with no money, as their money went away! Meanwhile, "policy" was taken over by the state governments' as another form of regulated, indirect taxation , called the "lottery," helping individual persons discretely, but never whole communities as formerly in "policy."

geometry and society

GEOMETRY AND SOCIETY As equal angles stand on equal circumferences, unequal angles stand on unequal circumferences. So, what is true in geometry may also seem to be true in American society, where angles are people and where circumferences are opportunities . Source: EUCLID'S ELEMENTS Book 4, Proposition 15, citing in reliance: Book 3, Proposition 26. http://aleph0.clarku.edu/~djoyce/elements/bookIV/propIV15.html

JEFFERSON, VOLNEY, BANNEKER, PAINE

JEFFERSON, VOLNEY, BANNEKER, PAINE Purity resides in poetry. Not in reality. Gold has impurities . As does water. Learning that Thomas Jefferson had translated Count Constantin Volney's book, THE RUINS OF EMPIRES, into English had a profound affect on me. Why? Because Volney's work was one of the earliest in the modern era to state directly that the Egyptians were black people. Why? Because Jefferson's "Query XIV," in his 1785 classic NOTES ON THE STATE OF VIRGINIA discounts the capacity of black people to do science, mathematics, philosophy, which the ancient Egyptians' African forebears invented, and bequeathed to earth. Why? Because then-Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson, in his reply to famed black astronomer/surveyor/ naturalist/ farmer, Benjamin Banneker 's acerbic 1791 letter, which decried Jefferson's caustic calumniation of Africans' mental capacity, Jefferson was not only gracious, he proved to be salutary. Jefferson sent Banneker's carefully prepared "ephemeris" --lunar and solar calculations affecting earth's tides, seasons, rains, eclipses--to Jefferson 's learned French colleague for an assessment of its astronomical calculations . His favorable comments on Banneker's work culminated in its publication. Previously, Banneker's publication attempts, for what would later be a 6 years' cycle, known as "Almanac and Ephemeris for Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, and Pennsylvania," had been refused. Thus, Benjamin Banneker's epistolary initiative had not only borne good fruit. But it had, just as importantly, demonstrably refuted Jefferson's unbecoming and wholly racist "Query XIV" in his person. But, back to "purity." Mr. Jefferson was anything but the pure racist. This may be inferred just by reference to his translation of Count Volney's work on black ancient Egypt's enduring legacies,; by his reply to Mr. Banneker missive and by his sedulous send-off of Banneker's ephemeris to France, which enabled its publication. That said, when I read "Query XIV," I definitely got a palpable sense that Jefferson was writing this against his own will, as though he was beholden to a secret, cabalist bond of some kind, which pained him even as he wrote. I sensed desuetude, morbidity. However, I did not annotate as I read , so I was later unable to find, much less to finger, the exact tell-tale passages imparting this. Jefferson was not pure to be sure. No one is. Or ever was. "No, not one." But, the alloy of man, any man, black or white, has much within itself to redeem, even a seeming, tormented soul of our third U. S. President Jefferson from Monticello , Virginia, to the world. One other thing about Jefferson. It is often asserted, and widely assumed, that he wrote the original Declaration of Independence. However, based on my readings of Thomas Paine's COMMON SENSE pamphlet of January 1776, I must join with those who aver that Paine was its author, and editor, not Jefferson ! Jefferson was responsible for Paine coming to America with his rhetoric, however . Owing to limited familiarity with the life and works of Count Volney, or his interaction with Thomas Jefferson, I have attached a link to him here.

MUTUAL MISTAKE OF MASKS

MUTUAL MISTAKE OF MASKS Why must evil mask itself as good? Is there no pride to be had in being evil? Is not malevolence a physical kindred to, a counterbalance of benevolence? Meanwhile, in real-life in day-to-day, culture, whether legal, government, economic, religious, scholarly, even, educational, the true "good guys" rarely win, being seldom successful ! Only in the realm of fantasy, fable, and entertainment do the good guys win, routinely. Others wear the mask! When Paul Laurence Dunbar wrote his famous poem, "WE WEAR THE MASK," he was speaking of his black brothers and sisters, who wore their masks to assimilate more easily, into a racist, white-dominated society. Meanwhile, the very white dominant society was as busily masking itself as all-powerful, as supreme over all! What we are dealing with here is analogous to, is akin to the "mutual mistake of fact" conundrum that voids contracts at the common law. Instead of fact, we substitute masks! Turns out that the mighty Wizard of Oz is just an old man pulling levers. It also turns out that "Uncle Tom" was in fact a liberator, not a servile slave! Turns out that one Jesus of Nazareth, also known as the "Christ," was not God on the Cross, but man in a mask! Well, how do you do, "masketeers!"

is once "saved" always saved?

IS ONCE "SAVED" ALWAYS SAVED? Back in the 1990s, various preachers from diverse denominations, while eating sumptuous breakfasts, at the old Niecie's Restaurant on Prospect Avenue in Kanas City, Missouri, used to debate dogmatically the question : "Whether once one was "saved," meant that one was always saved?" No one that I now recall ever actually defined what he meant by "saved." It was rather assumed to do with one's own life on earth and one's afterlife . This question crossed my mind again today, as I read the following : "The Scypion sisters' maternal grandmother, a woman named Mariette, was a member of the Natchez tribe. The significant 'legal' moment that determines their fates occurred well before Marie Scypion was born. In 1769, when the Spanish controlled the region, a colonial governor issued a decree that banned Indian slavery. And long afterward, by the received Anglo-American tradition, once slaves became free, they were forever free, as were their descendants." P.41, "The Three Daughters of Marie Scypion ," REDEMPTION SONGS SUING FOR FREEDOM BEFORE DRED SCOTT (2014) by Lea Vandervelde . Now, by this logic, a person who once was "saved"--as defined by sect--would always be saved, just like a freed Indian descendant, after 1769, was always "free," under Spanish law. But that would take all the fun out of the argument if either was so certain, wouldn't it?--Salvation or Freedom! So, predictably the Scypion sisters had to sue to gain their freedom, law notwithstanding, when latecomers saw fit to reclaim them as slaves! The sisters sued and they won! Victory was based upon the old law, the "received Anglo-American tradition" that was ignored! A similar "received Anglo-American tradition" that has been as conspicuously ignored as Spanish law is the King James Bible. Returning to the question, salvation seekers must be just as dynamic, just as elastic, just as forthright , as were these Scypion sisters, in order to be "saved" always, since man has been known to trespass into God's lane! The freedom above is physical, while salvation above is spiritual . "Where the spirit of the Lord is, is freedom." https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/… Be not swayed, neither dismayed by man's mundane meanings or letters. The letter kills, but the spirit enlivens. Instead, look to the spirit; be guided by the spirit; be moved by its love, & power in your daily words and deeds. What follows this life is unknowable on this plane, but is exclusive to God.

MY OWN REPARATIONS SOLUTION

MY OWN REPARATIONS SOLUTION The ability to pay is not the same as the willingness to pay, not even close. Take reparations for example. The country has long had the ability to pay the massive sums due to the descendants of African slaves, who have given all, and received so little. Its refusal to pay is not predicated upon its ability. It has long had the means to pay a commensurate sum. It has lacked the political will to pay, which political will is a byproduct of centuries of denial, sophistry, racism. The current rifts in the Donald Trump campaign , following the failures of John McCain and Mitt Romney to beat Barack Obama in 2008 & 2012, reflect a dissolution of the delusion of white hegemony and supremacy over America's most loyal constituency: we often betrayed and long-suffering black Americans, citizens by default ! My solution to reparations is this: Pay me the same sum, tax-free, as I now receive in Social Security, monthly, with the same protections into the same account. I am easy. Of course , cost of living adjustments would also accrue to make it true! I cannot speak for others. But, that sum would surely work well for me!

SLAVERY'S INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION

SLAVERY PRODUCED CAPITALISM AND THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION If the "malignancy" of slavery and of the slave trade, itself, were truly as malignant as they are now regularly claimed to have been; then, how did such presumed "malignancy" bring about such enormous prosperity until 1860, for: the tracker, the trader, the shipper, factor, planter, outfitter, banker, insurer, and their commercial and political cronies, when the legal importation of slaves was outlawed in the U.S. Constitution in 1808? Profits must not be malignant, regardless of their subject matter under capitalism. Indeed so great were the profits that African slavery arguably produced capitalism, itself! The symbolic, now iconic, industrial revolution's looms of Liverpool were all diurnally spinning , weaving, cutting, imported cotton from the Americas. Along with "King Cotton," rice, sugar, tobacco, indigo, hemp, gold, silver, and many other slavery-made products, or kindred commodities displaced mercantilism with capitalism; displaced the royal monopoly with private corporations. This makes one wonder, given the two economic revolutions flowing from it, just how "malignant" slavery could have been to these well-sated European and American profiteers?

WHITHER A JAZZ INTERLOCUTOR?

WHITHER A JAZZ INTERLOCUTOR ? Poets translate natural beauty into verse . Spirituals decode the searing soul. Blues uplifts the downtrodden spirit. Rhythm & blues harmonize human hormones. Is there no one to transliterate Jazz into sensations, information, news ? To translate jazz's enigmatic musical riffs , rhythms, melodies into words? Or must we await our own sensory evolution unto its arcane meanings and into its diverse assemblage? "Don't mean a thing, if it ain't got that swing? Do wop ! Do wop!" Really? Awaiting still the interlocutor of jazz.

SLOW DANCING IN THE 60S

Slow dancing in the '60s was sweet. The music was exquisitely lovely. As were the sisters too. They had us brothers grinning, yet wondering what to do. Though we were cool on the outside, clean as we could be; Inwardly we were trembling amid such beautiful majesty. The musical prelude would activate the enzymes of primal man, Which found him embracing a woman, soon as the lyrics began. It might be Curtis' Impressions, Smokey's Miracles or the Tempts. But, by the time 3 minutes were over, The men were weak as wimps!

WE ARE MAGICAL BEINGS

WE ARE MAGICAL BEINGS A value of some magic is its ability to confound . The danger of magic is its ability to confound . Confoundment is cognitive befuddlement; is akin to the confusing of tongues at the Tower of Babel; is a scrambling of conceptions by deception of sensory perceptions. That is one kind of magic. There are more. You and I are magical beings. Nothing else like us is existing under the sun. Nothing like any form of life on earth is existing anywhere else in space. Difficult to conceive given the vastness of infinity and eternity, it is, surely, but that reinforces our magic.

AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY 2780-330 B.C., EXCERPT....

"Before the Bible, before the Koran, long before the Greek philosophers, ancient Egypt had conceived a lucid doctrine of the agency of the Word, 'Logos,' in the establishment of the real. 'In ancient Egypt, the demiurge created the world by pronouncing the names of beings and things. Sovereign speech is enough for the establishment of any reality simply through the pronunciation of its name.' "Hieroglyphics too, comprised a set of special ontological signs. Physical containers of meaning, they marked a level of substantial discourse where words engaged with nature as vehicles of human value in the larger flux of existence. In their translucence, Egyptian hieroglyphics constituted, for eyes trained to see, a complete vision of reality. They were representations, after all, of living beings, essential forms flowing through all things , the better to make their presence palpable. "Plotinus, who was born in Egypt, and lived around 203-270 B.C., was right to consider hieroglyphic writing 'a science, a body of wisdom,' an essential way of being: 'Hieroglyphics, as understood by Plotinus, actually expresses the reality of complete organic ensembles.' The implication is that in doing so , quite without straining , they bring humanity to the edge of perfection ." P.88-89, "The Birth of the World According to the Philosophical Tradition of Memphis ( The Inscription of Shabaka)," AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY : THE PHARAONIC PERIOD, 2780-330 BC (2004) by Dr. Theophile Obenga

faith, will, and work's reward

FAITH, WILL & WORK'S REWARD When rains portend, those faithful farmers, who, having taken due notice, rejoice. These are they who have earlier made ready their fields by work to receive its wet bounty into their expectant furrows. These will have already sown their seed in fallow soil in anticipation of this blessing. This divine blessing affirms the link with, between, God and man. This liquid blessing is the quintessential pairing that confirms the connubial bond between heaven and earth; which is irrefragably present in patterns over the earth: faith, will and work. Rain and work will reward the faithful. And have and do in season.

GLOSSES ON "GODS"

GLOSSES ON "GODS" Imagining what now is not, as though it were so, is, into and of itself, a foretaste of glory, of majesty, divine. Creating, realizing, synthesizing that which an imagination has envisioned, exalts that seer from the realm of the fantasizer into the elect clan of gods. Gods first conceive within their souls, within their hearts and minds. Then they create that good thing that they have conceived, in accordance with a divine algorithm that created them. Their loss of understanding, their lack of knowledge, culminates in some of the gods' acquiescence in suffering , subjection to wickedness; and worse actual participation in oppression of the widow, the fatherless, the poor. Whence the verse,"Ye are gods, and all are children of the Most High God;" Ps. 82:6. "But, ye shall fall like princes and die like men, but ye are gods, and I have come to judge among the gods. Arise oh gods, judge the earth! You shall inherit all nations " Psalm 82. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+82

ARE REPARATIONS FOR BLACKS "IMPOSSIBLE?"

I find it to be improbable that so many of my most CHRISTIAN friends would use the word "never" in discussing reparations, when the scriptures say that "nothing is impossible with God"! Makes me wonder if there is a balm in Gilead?

NATURAL LAW IS DETERMINATIVE

NATURAL LAW IS DETERMINATIVE Doing something determines something. Doing nothing does too. Something is definitely going to happen, no matter what you do. Such determinism is built into life. You are alive. So life's determinism operates in, upon, around, & by you. This is natural law. Determining natural law is impossible. It preexisted "existence." Not just our existence, but all of existence itself! Yet, we may, we have, we often do: imagine, dream, propose, pray, wish, hypothecate, even venture upon that activity, which we may deem to be, fallaciously if innocently, somehow "determinative" in nature, of nature. This too is natural law. Happily our opinions, our imagination, our dreams, our propositions, also preexisted before existence, before its being, like all else that we do or do not do.

TYPES OF TYPES

TYPES OF TYPES Have we kept pace with our prototype? "our pattern or plan" Our prototype is "E PLUIBUS UNUM." i.e., "One from many." Have we been faithful to our phenotype? i.e., "our make-up." Our phenotype is "You are gods." Psalms 82: 6 Or, have we succumbed to their stereotypes? i.e. "caricatures" Our numerous negative depictions . We African American humans are empowered to become the architects of our own spiritual archetypes, if we ever: 1) reject the negative stereotypes; 2) follow the holy phenotypes; and 3) work to comply with the prototypes! To quote 3rd Century African theologian, Origen: "7. We have outlined, then, to the best of our knowledge, these three opinions. Each of our readers must judge for himself, with all care and diligence, whether one of them may be approved and adopted." P.114, "Book II, Chapter III," ON FIRST PRINCIPLES (2013) by Origen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_file_formats

HE AND SHE MORE OR LESS

More or less -- He is positive. She is negative. He is active. She is passive. He generalizes. She particularizes. He is abstract . She is material. He is philosophical. She is practical. He seeks. She is sought. He engenders. She delivers . He conceives. She congeals. He is verisimilitude . She is pulchritude . He is day. She is night. He is left. She is right. He is acrimony. She is parsimony. More or less They are us; We are them More or less .