2025-01-28 A Meditation on the Scholar of Life

“10 And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. 11 And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, 12 so that “ ‘they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven.’ ”” (Mark 4:10-12 ESV)

In a world gone mad with the iterations of science and technology, with those of people groups and movements, with man fighting man, the scholar does well to go boldly into the night, alongside Christ. Major family changes are underway. Entire revisions are in effect. The bleary-eyed squint sees all the unmentionables now front and center, hearts aflutter because of a companionship, souls alive because of a compact, a promise, a Conclusive Iteration.

The iterations of Man, these beckon us after all to discuss the Pain, the Frustration, the gotcha factor. And when a love letter to life is not in order, then in situ, caged fighters now released into the wild, personally praying up to a litmus and a height of Soldiering: we need nothing from you! Nothing from any of these! We are accustomed to the slog, accustomed to the cynical “it’s all a jest”, accustomed to the bizarre “legal” maneuvers and the horror of Apple-Like questions: existentially I query, answer me I insist! Existentially curious, why do people fall in love; existentially curious, “Bah, humbug” if you think anything less than utmost Manliness, Feminine Grace, upbuilt by a mutual friend… if you think anything less than this is acceptable. Then I have news for you, we shan’t see eye-to-eye. Two combatants, never mind the hearts aflutter, two combatants deuce the institutions of Man, deuce the Commonly-Accepted order of things, deuce the Sensitive, Trusting, Mysterion, of affection, of mutual desire, of each one’s variant on the theme of “take it slow”.

The soldier dabbles in the mysterious, in that affection between lifelong friends, in the slight pain: a little more affection, please! Yet, to be able to joke, to be able to be silly, is a sign of one of a myriad number of friendship categories: each one greater than the last. That is, we fight because we already knew Tomorrow Grace, the field cultivated by the owner and bride, and groom, the end of nightmares of contention, the beginning of life for life’s sake.