A newly-discovered figurine from Hohle Fels cave, south-west Germany, puts the earliest date of European female fertility carvings back to at least 35 000 BP, although calibration of the measured radiocarbon date suggests that it may date to as early as 40 000 BP (Conard, 2009). It is made from mammoth ivory, a hard material that would have been difficult to carve with Aurignacian tools. The breasts and vulva are greatly exaggerated but there is no suggestion of a current pregnancy, rather, with its enlarged vulva and raised, taut breasts, not to mention the abdominal striations, it resembles a female body that has recently given birth. Although the legs are incomplete stumps, they do not seem to have been designed for holding in the hand; the head is represented only by a loop that has been smoothed by use, suggesting that the figurine has been suspended on a string. Unlike the later examples described above, it lacks any pretence to beauty but it would be no exaggeration to describe its sexual symbolism as blatant. The context of this find is important; the Swabian Jura of south-west Germany was a key area of cultural innovation in the early Aurignacian. Excavations from this region have revealed many early examples of figurative art (including the Vogelherd horses), personal ornaments (beads and pendants), new forms of tools made from bone, ivory and stone, and the earliest known musical instruments (bone flutes) (Conard & Bolus, 2003; Conard et al. 2009), indicating a well-established and sophisticated culture.
Nothings Carved In Stone Parallel Lives 2009
Shocked as I was, I just realized more than ever that we are in the last days. I am a member of this church, and he is the LAST person I would have thought this would happen to. But he is HUMAN, as we all are - and he is subject to human errors of judgement and immoral acts, as we all are. Let him that is without sin, cast the first stone. My prayers are for his ability restore his spiritual walk with God, as he is gifted of God. But his actions were wrong. And moreso, my prayers are for his wife and children - who are in need of our constant prayers. My mother once said, "Nothing happens all of a sudden." No doubt this has been an issue (in some capacity) for some time - and we sometimes fail in how we RESPOND to the issues in our lives. Of course, we hold the Man of God to a much higher standard, as he preaches and teaches us. But what we must do is PRAY for him, that he is able to walk blameless before God and man - as he, and his family, are often under great attack because of the Kingdom building work that they do. To the mistress, and there was one, I'm praying for you. While Pastor Paul may have engaged, this was unfair to his wife and children. We can't allow our selfishness, to overshadow the common courtesies in life. You have helped to bring down a man, a ministry and shatter a family. I just hope that everyone involved can be restored spritually. I still love Pastor Paul and his personal ministry. In the end, I guess I would have had more respect for him - if he's stood up amongst the 6000 members he preached to weekly and told us. Instead of having a letter read to the church by an Assoc. Pastor. But I understand that he must be ashamed, as would I be. And we all deal with things differently. He and his family are in my prayers. I hope they all heal from this soon with God's divine help!
I am from the Philadelphia area. Paul Shepherd's radio ministry has touched me, taught me, and strengthened me in the years since I started to listen to him regularly. Through his ministry of God's word, I have grown and members of my family have been blessed as well. Although I am saddened by what has happened, I know that nothing can take away what Pastor Paul Shepherd has poured into myself and his other listeners.As a student of God's word, I realise that there are consequences for sin. But I also know that in the end, we still win. "There is therefore, now, no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." Nothing can separate us from His love.I pray that that God will give Paul and Meredith Shepherd the courage to go through this valley, the confident hope that God will never leave you nor forsake you, and the wisdom of our mothers and fathers who understand that trouble don't last always.You are still His beloved son in whom He is well pleased. He has carved you in the palms of His hands and loved you with an everlasting love. His blood still has miraculaous power. We poor miserable wretched creatures are still more than conquerors through Jesus Christ who loves us.My friends and I are praying that God will surround you with loving friends and family who will support you and comfort you as you grieve your loss and rebuild your lives.May God continue to bless you and keep you and to make His face to shine upon you and give you peace.
Another preacher who has fallen from grace. Do I sense a pattern? That's the way this world works. You better be very careful to put yourself up in a high position. The higher you go, the further you fall. For his sake, I hope he is truly repenting and turning from this sin. Surely no one knows more than him what is at stake when we don't turn from sin. Now it is time for us all to take a good long look in the mirror at ourselves. What are we hiding? What have we not confessed? What sins do we still have in our lives that we just don't want to let go of? Anyone who answers that question with "nothing" is just as much of a hypocrite. We all have our private sins we think we can hide. You may fool the world, but you will never fool the only one who counts. God. So instead of pointing the finger away from us, we need to turn it around and point it right back at us. Take care of your own business before you go into the business of casting stones.
GB I just think he would have thought me rather self-indulgent. With regard to lettering Gill seemed to want to align himself with the artisan rather than the artist, and this idea is perpetuated today by many letter-carvers who, like me, have inherited his 'holy tradition', and see a natural virtue in working entirely to commission with dictated exigencies. I was once accused of not choosing words 'appropriate' to being carved in stone, as if the occupation of letter-carver was a divine responsibility endowed upon me by some rune-master. Letter-carving art is still dominated by this rather worthy spirituality, and of course the inscription carries an inherent gravitas which cannot be ignored, but I think that Gill's life was, to some extent, responsible for attracting disciples and inspiring this approach in them.
He was born in 1674 at Stratford in the county of Warwick, and and died in 1616. He created English theater with a genius full of nature, strength, and fecundity, without any knowledge of the rules. One finds in this great genius the inexhaustible reserve of a touching and sublime imagination, fantastic and picturesque, somber and gay, a prodigious variety of characters, all well-contrasted, who do not hold a single discourse that does not lead to another; talents particular to Shakespeare, and in which he surpasses all the poets in the world. There are such beautiful scenes, such great and terrible moments spread throughout his tragic works, monstrous besides, that they were always performed with the greatest success. He was so well born with all the fertility of poetry that one might compare him to the stone set in the ring of Pyrrhus, which, so Pliny tells us, represented the figure of Apollo with the nine muses which nature herself had carved without any aid from art.
We pulled up before an antique and solid inn, built of Caen stone, in a fashion richer and more florid than was ever usual in such houses, and which indicated that it was originally designed for the private mansion of some person of wealth, and probably, as the wall bore many carved shields and supporters, of distinction also. A kind of porch, less ancient than the rest, projected hospitably with a wide and florid arch, over which, cut in high relief in stone, and painted and gilded, was the sign of the inn. This was the Flying Dragon, with wings of brilliant red and gold, expanded, and its tail, pale green and gold, twisted and knotted into ever so many rings, and ending in a burnished point barbed like the dart of death.
My host conducted me to my apartment. It was a large room, a little sombre, panelled with dark wainscoting, and furnished in a stately and sombre style, long out of date. There was a wide hearth, and a heavy mantelpiece, carved with shields, in which I might, had I been curious enough, have discovered a correspondence with the heraldry on the outer walls. There was something interesting, melancholy, and even depressing in all this. I went to the stone-shafted window, and looked out upon a small park, with a thick wood, forming the background of a château, which presented a cluster of such conical-topped turrets as I have just now mentioned. 2ff7e9595c
Comments