A legacy endeavour is no small task. A legacy didn’t mean ‘a memory’, it meant a legation, a gang of emissaries: “Emissaries: those on a mission sent.”
The emissaries may not be human beings. They might be notions, they might be prayers or frets, or a bit of one’s life’s work.
With this much weight borne, we do want to get things right.
Here’s what’s next:
The spring Boreal Sessions will be deferred until August.
Soon we’ll be announcing details of our Scriptorium membership and goals of our funding campaign which include:
- providing funding for the creation of The Scriptorium
- fostering the scribes participating in The Boreal Sessions
- granting someone the opportunity to participate in a class who otherwise would not be able to
- nurturing the ongoing administrivia
We, the Scriptorium Ensemble, are being upheld by words of kindness as we build this Scriptorium.
“I so appreciate these sharings, the honesty and openness is a real balm for these days” A.M.
“For being consistent with your soul and encouraging that we consider and respect our own life’s work.” S.T
“You made your spirit large so it can reach far and be where it’s needed in most miraculous ways” U.K
The Scriptorium: Echos of an Orphan Wisdom
And we want to share a bit of the transcription that is underway.
Regarding Wedding Vows – or When Your Turn to Die Comes On
“Let’s get rid of ‘obey’, and then we should be okay.
Did anybody do the etymology on ‘obey’? Oh, ‘slavish’, uh, ‘submission’, usually by ‘you know who’ to ‘you know who’.
Really? You gotta look it up, man. That’s not what it means. ‘Obey’ means something very … it’s a sense. It’s one of the five senses, inflected in a certain direction. Obedience is the inclination of the ear. That’s all it means. You could say, in a way, it means ‘to attend to’, in this fashion. <he makes a kind of bow>
Does that look slavish to you? I mean, if you ask me something, do I not attend to it? Why do I? Because I’m your slave? No. Because I’m showing you proper regard, by obeying your willingness to speak. That’s exactly what it is, and nothing more than that.
So, how did it become so darkened and slandered, this ‘obedience’ thing? I believe it’s a direct consequence of the enshrining, the deification of the sanctity of the individual.
… I believe you can trace a line a mile wide that binds the madness of refusing obedience to the idea that you should stay just as you are, for as long as you want. In fact … obedience is a gift you have to render in the name of the love you claim to have for someone.
To eschew it completely as something that demeans you, that is connected irrevocably to the idea that you should be able to wed someone or shack up with someone with no particular adjustment or consequence for this unique and holy little you that you are clinging to.
Does that hang together, what I’m saying to you?”
– Stephen Jenkinson
At the Foot of the World Tree Withered: Bali, 2017
