Man : Woman
A friend sent me a reference today.
An excerpt from the book of Proverbs.
"There are three things that are too wonderful for me, four that I do not understand:
the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship in the sea, and the way of a man with a woman."
When I read this passage I want to search for what binds these four concepts together. What is the underlying nature of the wonder that the sage feels?
So I rewrote the statement without any language around it, using only the primary words.
eagle:sky
snake:rock
ship:sea
man:woman
When I write it in this manner I am immediately think of SAT or ACT test questions, and my mind attempts to ask "what common thread rules these four?"
eagle : sky
The Eagle soars in the sky. It is master of the ground beneath it and all the air. Yet without the empty atmosphere the eagle would be purposeless. A third wheel. A useless creature without any method of movement.
snake : rock
A snake moves across a rock. The rock supports the weight of the snake and captures the heat of the sun, returning it and giving the snake life. Without the rock, the snake will not survive, for it cannot gather the energy it needs to hunt.
ship : sea
A ship carves through the sea. Without the water the ship would sink, run aground on savage rocks. The sea has the power to destroy but it also justifies the ship's existence. No man would build a ship if there were no water upon which to sail. It allows the ship its freedom and gives it purpose and reason.
man : woman.
Man and Woman in modern times have become viewed as more and more seperate entities. The arrival of women's liberation, the "working mom" and "stay at home dad" archetypes, and even the homosexual community's growing political influence have all served to isolate the 'man' and 'woman' concepts. We begin to think of them as equal parts, exactly equivalent in all things.
Instead of imagining a man as a pillar and a woman as a cornerstone, for example, we imagine the genders as two pillars. Instead of thinking of ying and yang we think of 1=1. we create equality and do not celebrate the hybrid creature that a marriage creates, a symbiotic relationship where each depends on the other and the support is as great and important a task as the movement.
man : woman.
An excerpt from the book of Proverbs.
"There are three things that are too wonderful for me, four that I do not understand:
the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship in the sea, and the way of a man with a woman."
When I read this passage I want to search for what binds these four concepts together. What is the underlying nature of the wonder that the sage feels?
So I rewrote the statement without any language around it, using only the primary words.
eagle:sky
snake:rock
ship:sea
man:woman
When I write it in this manner I am immediately think of SAT or ACT test questions, and my mind attempts to ask "what common thread rules these four?"
eagle : sky
The Eagle soars in the sky. It is master of the ground beneath it and all the air. Yet without the empty atmosphere the eagle would be purposeless. A third wheel. A useless creature without any method of movement.
snake : rock
A snake moves across a rock. The rock supports the weight of the snake and captures the heat of the sun, returning it and giving the snake life. Without the rock, the snake will not survive, for it cannot gather the energy it needs to hunt.
ship : sea
A ship carves through the sea. Without the water the ship would sink, run aground on savage rocks. The sea has the power to destroy but it also justifies the ship's existence. No man would build a ship if there were no water upon which to sail. It allows the ship its freedom and gives it purpose and reason.
man : woman.
Man and Woman in modern times have become viewed as more and more seperate entities. The arrival of women's liberation, the "working mom" and "stay at home dad" archetypes, and even the homosexual community's growing political influence have all served to isolate the 'man' and 'woman' concepts. We begin to think of them as equal parts, exactly equivalent in all things.
Instead of imagining a man as a pillar and a woman as a cornerstone, for example, we imagine the genders as two pillars. Instead of thinking of ying and yang we think of 1=1. we create equality and do not celebrate the hybrid creature that a marriage creates, a symbiotic relationship where each depends on the other and the support is as great and important a task as the movement.
man : woman.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
posted at 4:30 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home