WEEK 15 西概筆記(Western Literature)

1. About Christmas

a. A Christmas carol

A Christmas Carol in Prose, Being a Ghost-Story of Christmas, commonly known as A Christmas Carol, is a novella by Charles Dickens, first published in London by Chapman & Hall on 19 December 1843. The novella met with instant success and critical acclaim. A Christmas Carol tells the story of a bitter old miser named Ebenezer Scrooge and his transformation into a gentler, kindlier man after visitations by the ghost of his former business partner Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come.

b. Meet me in St. Louise

Meet Me in St. Louis is a 1944 musical film from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer which tells the story of an American family living in St. Louis at the time of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition World's Fair in 1904.
Garland debuted the standards "The Trolley Song", "The Boy Next Door", and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas", all of which became hits after the film was released. 


c. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Part of the lyrics :

Have yourself a merry little Christmas,

Let your heart be light

From now on,

our troubles will be out of sight

Have yourself a merry little Christmas,

Make the Yule-tide gay,

                                                                             (extremely happy)

From now on, 

our troubles will be miles away.

2. Stories

a. Pentecost

Pentecost, the fiftieth day, is the Greek name for Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks, a prominent feast in the calendar of ancient Israel celebrating the giving of the Law to Moses at Sinai. In Christianity, Pentecost is celebrated fifty days after Easter Sunday, inclusively (i.e., 49 days with the first day counted, seven weeks), hence its name. In Judaism, Shavuot is on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan (late May or early June). Pentecost falls on the tenth day after Ascension Thursday (40 days after Easter). 

b. Gold, frankincense and myrrh

Since the early days of Christianity, Biblical scholars and theologians have offered varying interpretations of the meaning and significance of the gold, frankincense and myrrh that the magi presented to Jesus, according to the Gospel of Matthew (2:11). These valuable items were standard gifts to honor a king or deity in the ancient world: gold as a precious metal, frankincense as perfume or incense, and myrrh as anointing oil.

c. Original sin

Original sin, also called ancestral sin, is the Christian doctrine of humanity's state of sin resulting from the fall of man, namely the sin of consuming from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, stemming from Adam's rebellion in Eden. This condition has been characterized in many ways, ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without collective guilt, referred to as a "sin nature", to something as drastic as total depravity or automatic guilt of all humans through collective guilt.

d. Three is a perfect number in Bible. 

For example, the Holy trinity : Holy son, Holy father, Holy spirit.

e. Saint Peter

Jesus promised to Saint Peter, empowering him to take binding actions. In the Gospel of Matthew 16:19, Jesus says to Peter, "I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." 

f. creation → light
Let there be light, the phrase comes from the third verse of the Book of Genesis. In the King James Bible, it reads, in context:

1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.    And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4. And God saw the light, and it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.

g. Abraham sacrificed Isaac

According to the Hebrew Bible, God commands Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice. After Isaac is bound to an altar, the angel of God stops Abraham at the last minute, saying "now I know you fear God." At this point, Abraham sees a ram caught in some nearby bushes and sacrifices the ram instead of Isaac.
It can reflect to Agamemnon sacrificed Iphigenia.

h. God is a male?

Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. 
上帝依自己的形象創造了亞當→ God is male.






i. rib → woman
Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man.

3. Other stories

a. No strings attached

“Sometimes I have the strangest feeling about you. Especially when you are near me as you are now. It feels as though I had a string tied here under my left rib where my heart is, tightly knotted to you in a similar fashion. And when you go to Ireland, with all that distance between us, I am afraid that this cord will be snapped, and I shall bleed inwardly.”