leonardcohenforum.com

thank you, lisa. i too am in a good mood today, and so let us not fight. am soon off to the kulturhuset to see a concert.
meanwhile, here is a page from a book of poems written by a young lady who died far too early - of cancer.
stay well. you are precious https://youtu.be/UfQ91vCMjNA?si=4WoObq1C0LEgVIJd

i wonder if the beauty parlour is filled with sailors shouldering your loneliness, like a gun that you will not learn to aim
you stumble into this movie house, then you climb - you climb into the frame

it's coming from the feel that this ain't exactly real, or it's real but it ain't exactly there Ordained as a Buddhist monk in 1996, Leonard Cohen
was given the Dharma name of 'Jikan' ('Silent One')

https://youtu.be/ATZpJlGYowQ?si=NjlYsUTycVLIL0oL

video fragment dropped into my box today. picture in the background looks familiar
https://youtube.com/shorts/1VveUEy4Hhw?

video fragment dropped into my box today. picture in the background looks familiar
https://youtube.com/shorts/1VveUEy4Hhw?

bob dylan wrote:
"i try my best to be just like i am, but everybody wants you to be just like them" sketch at juanita's home yesterday; signature illegible

Geoffrey wrote: ↑Fri May 03, 2024 9:56 pm ...sketch at juanita's home yesterday...

How quaint. Did you sketch the Sistine Chapel on her ceiling, too? (That is not a euphemism.)

LisaLCFan asked:
>Did you sketch the Sistine Chapel on her ceiling, too?

no, i did not, lisa. unlike da vinci or michelangelo, i have no enchanting story to tell. juanita's ceilings are already adorned with decorative cornices, friezes and centerpieces that they are probably best left alone. she just liked this version of 'the last supper' and took it home. visitors tend to do that, and my interest is in creating, not collecting.

thank you for writing. best wishes, stay well
-g

Geoffrey wrote: ↑Sat May 04, 2024 3:15 am LisaLCFan asked:
>Did you sketch the Sistine Chapel on her ceiling, too?

no, i did not, lisa. unlike da vinci or michelangelo, i have no enchanting story to tell. juanita's ceilings are already adorned with decorative cornices, friezes and centerpieces that they are probably best left alone. she just liked this version of 'the last supper' and took it home. visitors tend to do that, and my interest is in creating, not collecting.

thank you for writing. best wishes, stay well
-g

Since your friend obviously likes famous religious-themed paintings (otherwise, why would she hang that particular sketch on her wall), I simply thought that it would be funny (as in, humourous) to ask if you also did a sketch of the Sistine Chapel on her ceiling. It was a totally tongue-in-cheek question, for I didn't really think that you would have done such a huge sketch on her ceiling (or any sketch on her ceiling, for that matter)! But, thank you, Geoffrey, nonetheless, for the very detailed and seemingly serious response, despite it being completely tangential to the jocular spirit of my query!

Best wishes to you, too!

LisaLCFan wrote:
>Since your friend obviously likes famous religious-themed paintings (otherwise, why would she hang that particular sketch on her wall), I simply thought that it would be funny (as in, humourous) to ask if you also did a sketch of the Sistine Chapel on her ceiling. It was a totally tongue-in-cheek question, for I didn't really think that you would have done such a huge sketch on her ceiling (or any sketch on her ceiling, for that matter)! But, thank you, Geoffrey, nonetheless, for the very detailed and seemingly serious response, despite it being completely tangential to the jocular spirit of my query!

hello lisa. i wondered if you were teasing, but didn't like to assume - and therefore chose to play it safe with a serious response. yes, my friend is religious. as for myself, i prefer to keep my freedom. i think it was groucho marx who said he wouldn't join any club that would have him as a member.
-----------------------------------------------------
"christians told me how jesus was pinned like a lovely butterfly against the wood - and i wept beside paintings of calvary" -cohen

I lack the historical knowledge to speculate, but I wonder whose visage might have been on the last Jikan that bloomed before the one Geoffrey drew.

4

its4inthemorning wrote: ↑Mon May 06, 2024 3:05 pm I lack the historical knowledge to speculate, but I wonder whose visage might have been on the last Jikan that bloomed before the one Geoffrey drew.

just come home. thank you for writing!

people who lack sufficient knowledge to speculate are probably those who give the world the most original thoughts. if a person has nothing upon which to build an opinion, their thoughts and ideas can be like sunken galleons hiding treasure. you pose an interesting question with your wondering, one that i had not considered, and one that is hard to answer. i don't think one should allow a lack of historical knowledge to suffocate speculation. instead perhaps it should be embraced, for who knows what might then transpire? something certainly can come from nothing, for otherwise we would not exist.

for the record, there is often very little thought put into these sketches. the modus operandi is to make a picture as quickly as possible with noisy energetic songs filling the room. this makes it difficult to focus upon anything but the music, and thus prevents a picture from becoming too perfect - definitely something to avoid!

-g

Geoffrey wrote: ↑Mon May 06, 2024 2:38 pm ...yes, my friend is religious. as for myself, i prefer to keep my freedom...

The devoutly religious have always baffled me, but I probably baffle them, too! Is religious belief a choice, I wonder, or is each person predisposed either to hold or to reject religious beliefs? I am inclined to think that the latter plays a role, simply from my own personal experiences. I have also read some studies that corroborate my suspicions, and which claim that there is a genetic predisposition for religiosity, and as with all genetic predispositions, the trait will be stronger in some and weaker (or perhaps even non-existent) in others. That would help to explain why some people believe unquestionably in religious stuff, whereas other people can barely comprehend why or how they could do so (and, of course, there are many people in between those extremes).

Of course, no genetic trait exists in a vacuum, and each person will have many other predispositions that may have an impact on what they are likely to believe (or disbelieve), and environmental and social factors (upbringing, education, personal experiences, etc.), also undoubtedly play a role. Thus, how much of an impact each of these things has on any given person will vary, since some people are more inclined to flow with their internal predispositions, while others are more inclined to be influenced by external factors, and anything and everything in between, and the composition of those internal and external factors will be different for each person. And, of course, beliefs -- including religious beliefs -- can and do change, for any number of reasons, presumably when various factors come together to overwhelm a previously held belief. As with everything else, some people are likely more inclined to change their beliefs over time, whereas others seem to remain stagnant in their beliefs for their entire lives, and everything in between!

Therefore, I think that it is impossible to say precisely why any given person (including oneself) believes or disbelieves something, due to the number and complexity of processes involved that eventually result in any given belief at any given moment! One can, of course, point to what seems to be an obvious reason for a belief (or lack thereof) -- for instance, you suggest that keeping your freedom is why you are not devout, but that seems overly simplistic, focussing on one thing that you value, and while undoubtedly that is part of it, I suspect that there are more factors at play, of which you may or may not, at present, be conscious.

That's my thought for the day! Have a good one, everyone!

thank you, lisa. a huge subject, so i will be brief.

in my opinion you appear to have arrived at a healthy and balanced view of religion. you have examined the various reasons for having (or disregarding) faith, without condemning a person's conclusion. a simple sentence you once wrote has always stuck in my mind: "people believe what they want to believe," - the most concise and simplistic truism if ever there was one.

>you suggest that keeping your freedom is why you are not devout, but that seems overly simplistic, focussing on one thing that you value, and while undoubtedly that is part of it, I suspect that there are more factors at play, of which you may or may not, at present, be conscious.

concerning "more factors at play", my intellect rebels against being a follower of any particular individual, although people such as stephen fry, richard dawkins, christopher hitchens, etc. seem to have a good grip on common sense. add to that the experience of standing at a grave holding the ashes of one's daughter or spouse, and the idea of a merciful god, or any god at all, falls into the category of nonsense.

the bible, and other 'holy' works, make a fascinating read. pure literature. it is not necessary to believe anything in those holy scriptures, any more than one would believe in a harry potter or spiderman story. the library is choc-a-block with such books.

to close, here is a scan from a small pamphlet recently picked up at a religious meeting. it is called 'ultimate questions' written by fear mongerer john blanchard. it's intention is to recruit, but is instead a frightening example of how to bully impressionable sheeple into swallowing church dogma.