One of the sad parts of living in a culture that both represses and glorifies sexuality is that you lose very good words like ‘intimacy’ down the drain of wasted, euphemistic meaninglessness. I frequently have need of the word ‘intimacy,’ but always pass it up in favor of something less descriptive, simply to avoid any awkward connotations.
But I’m not feeling so cowardly today.
One of the best e-mails I received every week comes from Israel. It’s sent from Daniel Rona, an Israeli LDS tour guide in the Holy Land. He always gives interesting insights into the Hebrew language and how it supports the restored gospel.
I admit I’ve never really even been aware of any category of humor that could be called “Mormon Jokes.” To my surprise, I discovered this thread at Times and Seasons, recently re-linked by Adam on this discussion.
Much has been written on chiasmus and other teaching structures in the scriptures. John Welch, Richard Shipp and Charles Kroupa have written a great deal about it, as have others. Meridian magazine has a very good article by D. Lynn Johnson discussing these patterns. Every time I read these articles I discover new meanings behind the scritpures.
Clark’s recent post on Death and the Atonement got me thinking about the fascinating preface to Lewis Carroll’s book Sylvie and Bruno. Clark’s subsequent post to his own blog related marginaly to Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 and how the characters in the book memorized whole books to preserve them from destruction reminded me of a different part of Carroll’s preface.