Earnest Hemingway – Nazi Hunter

Anne Hydrous (she of the driest of wit) sat with her older sister, Moly Bdenum, under the canopy of a breezy outdoor café in Rio de Janeiro. The city in 1938 was noisy and noisome, but the women found it endearing, charming even.

“So unlike New York,” said Anne.

“Quite unlike Chicago,” replied Moly. “What, with the Nazi occupation and all… Brown shirts and storm troopers on every corner. Nazi flags flying from all the buildings. I never did trust those Dulles brothers.” 

Anne nodded her agreement.

Moly continued, “I just knew they were collaborators, that they were in business with the Nazis.”

The women sipped their coffees and watched a ragged band of bedraggled children chasing a brilliantly plumaged chicken. They were waiting at that particular café on that specific day, at that precise moment, under the shadow of Sugarloaf Mountain, to meet with the world renowned author and secret Nazi hunter, Earnest Hemingway.

Hemmingway was late.

Anne sipped at her coffee and said, “Not that I distrust the man, but…”

“Yes?” prompted her sister.

“Well, how do we know he’s actually him? The author? Hemingway.  How do we know?”

“Moly Bdenum sighed. “First thing: he was wearing an eyepatch, right?”

“Yes, he assuredly is,” said Anne. “But I’m not certain that the author of The Sun Also Rises is known for wearing an eyepatch.”

“Moly sighed again. “And he has that six-toed cat.”

“Yes,” agreed Anne. “That does go a long way to confirm his identity, but…”

“In any case, he told us that he’s him. When we met him, he said, ‘ladies, I’m Earnest Hemingway.’ Just like that.”

“Yes…”

“And he told us all about the time he snuck into the Nazi Zeppelin base in Montego Bay, Jamaica, and how he blew it up.”

“Yes, but…”

“But nothing. The man’s a legend, fighting bulls in Spain and blowing up Nazi airships in the Caribbean.  He’s a legend. A hero. Not at all like that weasel Alan Dulles.”

By this time their coffee had grown cold and the children had caught their bird. This sisters could hear its caterwaul echoing down the stone lined streets. Hemmngway never showed up. Eye patch or no, the famous author and covert Nazi killer had missed his appointment with the curious sisters. They put down their cups and picked up their handbags. They strolled along the boulevard towards their hotel.

“Maybe we could do something to impress him, attract his attention,” suggested Anne.

“How’s that? He’s blown up Nazi dirigibles. How are two old biddies like us going to impress him?”

“We kidnap the Lindbergh baby,” said Anne.

“What?” Moly was aghast.

“The Lindbergh baby.  He’s a Nazi collaborator after all…”

“The baby?”

“No. Charles Lindbergh. If we kidnap the Lindbergh baby, maybe Hemingway would meet with us.”

“Well,” said Moly with great sensitivity. “Dear-heart, it’s already been done.  And I think you’re mistaken. Lindbergh is pro-German and something of an anti-Semite, but he’s not a Nazi sympathizer. I think you mean the war profiteer, Henry Ford.”

“Right. Henry Ford.  And the Dulles brothers. They’re all in cahoots.”

The sisters had arrived at their hotel. “Forget about Hemingway,” said. Anne. “I don’t think that was him.”

How Blessed, How Fortunate, How Happy…(Psalm 1)

There is a story told of the Reformer, Martin Luther – that when asked what he would do if he knew the world would end tomorrow, he responded that he would plant a tree. The story is apocryphal, a liturgical legend – and doesn’t go back any further than the middle of the 20^th century. But still, there is something interesting in that story. Faced with the prospect of calamity and destruction, with ruin and despair, Martin Luther (or at least, this pious story version of Martin Luther) chose to plant a tree. That is, he took the long view, even when the future might seem bleak; he planned and planted something enduring, something that would grow.

A few years ago a friend of mine living in Michigan called me one afternoon with bad news. His life, his career, his hope, all of it was collapsing. His wife was leaving him. He was soon to lose his job. And there was little that he could do about it. And there was even less that I could do about it for him. I had no influence over anything. I couldn’t fix the broken things. I couldn’t restore the dying things. And he lived too far away for me to hop in the car and go over for a visit – and even if I had made the drive across the country to see him, the best that I could have done would have been to sit in stupid silence with and for him.

My schedule for that dark day included helping another friend of mine, one who lived here in town. He needed help transplanting a small magnolia tree. The tree was going to be cut down by developers who were clearing a lot in order to put up a new building, and my friend wanted to try to save the tree. I changed out of my Salvation Army uniform, and drove over to his place to meet him. Together we dug up the tree with its roots, loaded the tree, along with our shovels and gallons and gallons of water into the back of the pickup truck, and moved the tree to its new spot, right near his garden.

We dug a new hole for it, put it in place, poured water over the roots, replaced the dirt, poured more water into the soil around the tree, tamped down the dirt, and poured more water over it all. At the time we weren’t sure if the tree would survive. Neither of us had any experience in digging up and transplanting trees. But, we reasoned, if it didn’t survive, well at least we tried. And if it did survive, then we’d have done something good. Faced with destruction and ruination, despair and helplessness, I planted a tree.

That was a few years ago – and the magnolia tree has survived. I went to check on it yesterday, and it has been growing; it’s taller now than it was. It was in bloom yesterday, with purple, pink blossoms reaching up towards the falling rain. And my friend from Michigan has survived too, though like the tree, he has been transplanted to a new home; he now lives in another state and has a new job. His marriage did fall apart, and his wife did leave taking their children with her. My friend misses his boys tremendously, but he has survived, and grown. Bloomed even.

Is he happy? Blessed, Fortunate? I don't know. These are difficult words to pin down, especially when the world around us is cluttered with chaos, when our lives are bombarded from without and inflamed from within by stress and anxiety and agitation. How can we be (even if we don’t feel) blessed, fortunate, and happy?

So this week we turn to the Psalmist for a bit of an Old Testament Beatitude for a little about what it might mean to be blessed, or fortunate, or lucky, or even happy.

How Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers (Psalm 1:1 NIV)

How blessed – that is, fortunate, lucky, happy – How blessed, how happy is the one who does not walk with the wicked, or stood in the assembly of sinners, or sat down in the session of scoffers.

There is an interesting bit of entropy in this verse, a steady decline in power and vigor. The psalmist's negative example decelerates from walking to standing and then from standing to sitting. Little by little he loses energy and vitality, he loses his strength. She associates with those who bring her down.

But blessed is the one who keeps moving. Blessed is the one who keeps on keeping on. Blessed is he or she who makes some progress every day, even just a little. Even just one step. Blessed, Fortunate, Happy is the one who never lets the counsel of the wicked slow them down. If we allow the world to encourage us to be angry, to hate our enemies, to turn our passion into resentment, to turn our fear into loathing, our energies will be sapped. We will lose our power, our motion. We will get bogged down by the ensnaring concerns, drained by fear and anger and we will give up. We will sit down with the scoffers, slowly dying.  

But blessed, fortunate, happy is the one who keeps moving. Blessed is the one who is not paralyzed by fear and doubt, or immobilized by resentment. Instead, the law of the LORD is her delight. The teaching and instruction of the LORD is his delight. And they meditate on it day and night. They recite it. They ponder it.

Now we should note that the Hebrew word translated “law” here is the word torah which is something more than a legal list of rules and obligations. The psalmist’s beatitude is not saying that happiness can be reduced to a mechanical process of following a set of rules and regulations. Instead it is a dynamic process that requires a constant meditation on the instruction of God in order to determine the will of God in every situation.  (McCann) It is the continual transformation and renewal of our minds so that we can discern what is the will of God, what is good, and acceptable, and perfect (Romans 12:2 NRSV).

Such a one is like a tree planted near streams;
it bears fruit in season
and its leaves never wither,
and every project succeeds. (Psalm 1:2 – New Jerusalem Bible)

Actually the verb here is more than “planted.” More accurately it would be “transplanted” (Dahood, 3). They have been dug up from the soil, pulled up from the roots and moved to a new location, put into new soil, near streams of water where they can grow anew – like my friend’s magnolia tree transplanted, but still blooming, and like my friend whose world came to an end but he kept on going. They bear fruit in season. Maybe not right away. Maybe not a lot at first. But they bear fruit. How blessed, how fortunate, how happy.

There’s also an interesting temporal dimension to these verses that’s not always picked up by the various translations of the bible. In Mitchel Dahood’s translation we read:

How blest is the man who has not entered
                the council of the wicked
nor in the assembly of sinners stood,
                nor in the session of scoffers sat.
But from the Law of Yahweh is his delight,
                and from his law he recites day and night.
So shall he be like a tree
                transplanted near streams of water;
which yields its fruit in its season,
                and whose leaves never wither.
Whatever it produces is good.

We in these verses we have the past (blessed is the one who has not entered, stood, sat…), we have the present (the law of the LORD is his delight, he recites day and night), and we have the future (so shall he be like a tree).  (Dahood, 3)

Yes, the past may have been difficult; we may have found ourselves surrounded by hostile forces, lured by temptations, excited by passions. We may have been tempted to give in, and give up. But we keep the law of the Lord in our minds, and on our tongues, reciting it day and night, constantly refreshing ourselves with it and renewing our minds by it, and we will be like a blossoming tree, bearing the fruit of success.  How blessed, how fortunate, how happy.

And now our psalmist changes tack: Not so, he says, the wicked. How different are the wicked, how very different. They are like chaff blown around by the wind” (Psalm 1: 4 New Jerusalem Bible). They are impermanent, ephemeral, without roots, useless, drifting, always changing their story, telling new lies. They are blown by the inconstant winds here and there, never amounting to anything. They are all desperation and no dreams. All vanity and vainglory. All dust in the wind.

The path of the wicked is doomed; it is a dead end. It is death and nothing more. The wicked are dust and detritus caught in a current of wind. They cannot stand in the face of judgment. They have no root, no depth. They will not endure. They will not prevail.

But the blessed one, the fortunate and happy one, is intimately known by God, is looked over and protected by God. The assembly of the just is kept safe by the LORD. Our lives, cluttered as they are with chaos, bombarded from without and inflamed within by anxiety and fear are known by God, and are protected. We are fortunate, and blessed, even happy. Thanks be to God.

Dahood, Mitchell, Psalms 1 – 50: Introduction, Translation, and Notes. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc. 1966. Text.

McCann, J. Clinton. Commentary on Psalm 1. https://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=2452

Leviticus 19: 9 – 10 for the Libertarian Crowd

When you reap the harvest of your land, be sure to reap all the way to the edges of your fields – gather all your harvest. And the same with your vineyards; gather up even the fallen fruit. Leave nothing for the poor, or the immigrant. I am the LORD your God, and I say gleaning is theft.

Leviticus 19: 9 – 10 RMV (Radically Misunderstood Version)

What Did I Do Yesterday – A List

- Gave blood to benevolent vampires who will tell me something of my future.

- Ate strawberries and Vienna crème with a beauty queen.

- Hunted and gathered like my prehistoric ancestors, only in air-conditioning and accompanied by music.

- Gave the Earth a haircut and scalp massage.

-Chased and was chased by mankind’s ancient friend.

- Solved the problems of the world – or the country – or the state of Iowa, anyway, with a professor of history and ancient languages.

 - Laughed at Picasso, Einstein, and Elvis.

- Observed the birth of bees.

- Read and drank Dandelion Wine under the late afternoon sun, while envying Bradbury’s hyperbolic, but perfectly real childhood in Waukegan that was Greenville that was Byzantium.

- Shared a glass of cold water with a friend who shared knowledge and experience.

- Startled at the ferocious wheezing and sneezing of the creature next door.

- Made a list.

-Swapped memories for anecdotes.

- Watched a stalking lion on the Serengeti stare down an encroaching black panther, then stroked and nuzzled the lion when he came back to the patio.

- Pruned a bleeding heart.

- Put hard calloused feet to cool soft grass.

- Thanked the setting sun and blessed the rising moon.   

Defigured Disformed

Am I sitting in the waiting room of the health clinic or waiting in the sitting room? Either way, I suppose, it make no significant difference. I’m sitting / waiting patiently (to be a patient) as a toxin, injected yesterday into my arm, is tracing its way up my veins, like an inflamed red highway line on the roadmap of my skin.

Skin covered in dirt and steel dust. Skin scaly and scarred. I am not a man, but a creature. A beast. Defigured. Disformed. Tramping through the room on heavy clod hooves instead of feet.

Check the lights and cables. Count the lugs and ladders. I am misassembled.

The multiples will cross eventually - intersect, meet, collide – but, for now, I am out of tape. I am waiting / sitting for the unfamiliar doctor.

150 years ago I would have died. 50 years ago I might have died. But not today. Tap. Click Huzzah. We are nonchalant.