Good Friday
A Cinquain171 total reviews
Comment from gordonmrln
You have lost me yet again in the authors notes.But I understand the spiritual feel of this poem.Although I'm not a follower of faith my self.This does not stop me admiring the views and beliefs of others.Well done thank you again.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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You have lost me yet again in the authors notes.But I understand the spiritual feel of this poem.Although I'm not a follower of faith my self.This does not stop me admiring the views and beliefs of others.Well done thank you again.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Gordon, thank you so much for your gracious review :-) Brooke
Comment from bard owl
One death resulting in eternal life - "for God so loved His world that He gave His only begotten Son". What supreme sacrifice that entails. Life-death-life. Your timely cinquain represents so very much. Wishing you a blessed Easter, Brooke. Linda
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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One death resulting in eternal life - "for God so loved His world that He gave His only begotten Son". What supreme sacrifice that entails. Life-death-life. Your timely cinquain represents so very much. Wishing you a blessed Easter, Brooke. Linda
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Linda, thank you so much for your thoughtful response to this cinquain :-) Happy Easter to you, too, my friend :-) Brooke
Comment from mermaids
Hope revived by new breath is an excellent line. I love the flow of words and the sense of newness. The next two lines show how death brings new life. Excellent poem for Good Friday.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Hope revived by new breath is an excellent line. I love the flow of words and the sense of newness. The next two lines show how death brings new life. Excellent poem for Good Friday.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Elaine, thanks so much for your gracious response to this poem :-) Brooke
Comment from Axiom Gray
This poem is deeper than it first appears. I like the message of the poem that Easter always gets the most praise and attention. It is a great celebration of the resurrection, but sometimes Christians forget that there was a sacrifice as well. In some ways, Good Friday is more important than Easter. I wonder what the middle day is called? The second day between the resurrection and the crucifixion is a time when God was dead. It must have been the darkest day of the world.
This rating does not count towards story rating or author rank.
The highest and the lowest rating are not included in calculations.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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This poem is deeper than it first appears. I like the message of the poem that Easter always gets the most praise and attention. It is a great celebration of the resurrection, but sometimes Christians forget that there was a sacrifice as well. In some ways, Good Friday is more important than Easter. I wonder what the middle day is called? The second day between the resurrection and the crucifixion is a time when God was dead. It must have been the darkest day of the world.
This rating does not count towards story rating or author rank.
The highest and the lowest rating are not included in calculations.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Axiom,thank you for your insightful reading of this Cinquain's message. Could I please ask for a clarification of the 4 rating? Where does this poem fall short for you and require improvement? Brooke
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I think that you should have capitalized "hope" since it is being personified in this poem. You're saying that Hope has been revived with the sacrifice of Christ.
I don't think the second hyphen is necessary. A simple comma will do. It distracts from your big finish. With poetry, everything has a purpose. The shorter the poem, the more important the elements within it. When you use something like a hyphen over and over again with such a short poem like this, some readers will start thinking there's some deep purpose for you doing it. While they're on their wild goose chase of literary analysis, your last line; the big finish, will be lost on them. Your final line carries such a powerful message. You want that to be heard.
These are just my opinions, though.
Comment from elgone
The poem expresses precisely the message of the day and the time of the season. Because we o not know the year or the event, we don't know precise day of the crucifixion and resurrection as it is tied to the Jewish calendar and their rites. Neither do we truly know the exact date of Christ's birth. Some suggest that Christmas may actually be closer to September. In either case it does not matter as much when it happened or when to honor the event as much as honoring the remembrance.
E
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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The poem expresses precisely the message of the day and the time of the season. Because we o not know the year or the event, we don't know precise day of the crucifixion and resurrection as it is tied to the Jewish calendar and their rites. Neither do we truly know the exact date of Christ's birth. Some suggest that Christmas may actually be closer to September. In either case it does not matter as much when it happened or when to honor the event as much as honoring the remembrance.
E
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Elgone, thank you so very much for your thoughtful review. I was unaware I had done anything to imply time of year/season. Brooke
Comment from Writer 4 U
This stated the amazing events of christian faith and it flowed with the words all like the sea and I seemed like I was somewhere else while I was reading it.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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This stated the amazing events of christian faith and it flowed with the words all like the sea and I seemed like I was somewhere else while I was reading it.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Writer 4 U, thank you so much for your gracious review :-) Brooke
Comment from Chrisfiore
Hello again, I enjoy the footnotes you added to this piece. You do study your form and apply it with expertise. Always a pleasure to read your poetry. ;) Chrisfiore
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Hello again, I enjoy the footnotes you added to this piece. You do study your form and apply it with expertise. Always a pleasure to read your poetry. ;) Chrisfiore
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Chrisfiore, thank you so very much for your thoughtful review :-) Brooke
Comment from Janie King
Very profound and well-done...oh the truth...the reality of what Jesus did for us that day..I pray to never be forgotten for there is no other way to Heaven but through the blood of Jesus. God bless.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Very profound and well-done...oh the truth...the reality of what Jesus did for us that day..I pray to never be forgotten for there is no other way to Heaven but through the blood of Jesus. God bless.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Janie, thank you so very much for your thoughtful review :-) Brooke
Comment from Amicus
Rhythmic and rhymed with a timely message...a good cinquain for Holy Week. I enjoyed the r's and b's especially.
Hope your holiday is joyful.
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Rhythmic and rhymed with a timely message...a good cinquain for Holy Week. I enjoyed the r's and b's especially.
Hope your holiday is joyful.
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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Thank you, Amicus, for your gracious response to this Cinquain :-) Brooke
Comment from TKField
So, He died and then came back to life, huh? Interestingly, that's an attribute He shares with Vampires, Zombies and Frankenstein's monster. I don't know about you, but encountering the undead (who by all accounts should not be up and about), would be a deeply unsettling experience and terrifying on multiple levels, regardless of who's being re-animated.
This makes JC a bit of a mythical creature who resides in the part of the brain where our darkest fears and wildest wishful thinking are born. This fable is a meditation on death. His and ours. It seems to have a happy ending, with Jesus atoning for the sins of man in perpetuity, or until the second-coming rapture/apocalypse. Whichever comes first.
According to the story, Jesus died a bloody (albeit common for the day), death. His body was then allowed to be spirited away to a remote location, where it was interred intact (did you ever stop to think what would have been the possibility of a physical resurrection if the Romans had cremated Jesus body and scattered the ashes to the winds?). After three days, not only has rigor-mortis not set in, He's brought back to life (you can't keep a good man down!).
At this point you might expect (and really be pulling for) a triumphant re-entry into Jerusalem, where Jesus would appear to the populace, confirm His"Son-of-God" status, and rub in Pilate's and everyone's collective faces that he was, like, back baby! In the flesh, to set things to right for all time, using His divinely sourced super-powers to bend reality to His will, and usher in an era of peace, prosperity and cooperation on earth among all people.
Does He do that? Of course not! Instead, He deigns to appear to only a handful of people before splitting for the nether reaches once again, faster than you can say, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, thus leaving wide open from that point forward, speculation as to the veracity of this frankly, unbelievable story.
It's true that without the resurrection (and the miracles), Christianity probably would have never gotten off the ground. The people with a vested interest in this new religion, based, not so much on what Jesus taught (find the kingdom of Heaven within), but on a personality cult centered on the man himself and the gory details of his death, had a huge motivation to turn Him into a God, and spread the myth of His physical resurrection.
Naturally, this new faith required an organized church with an elite priesthood to intervene with God on our behalf. The inventors of Christianity accomplished this slight of hand with wholesale religious propaganda (The New Testament).
So what did humanity get out of all this unnecessarily complicated metaphysical rigmarole? For the true believers, a forgiveness of sins, so as to be rewarded with continued existence in an idealized, post-mortem paradise, where they will do, God knows what, for eternity. (I'll finally have time to read, "Moby-Dick"!).
For the unbelievers; never-ending torture in God's private dungeon (sure, Satan is the manager, but You-Know-Who is the landlord). Oh well, they'll have no one but themselves to blame for not blindly and unquestionably swallowing whole, the literal truth of an entirely implausible and completely impossible, body of fantastic claims as to the nature of all reality.
Mankind also gets saddled with the comforting message that pain and suffering are transcendent and empowering in some perverse way, and pleasure, for it's own sake, is somehow sinful and evil.
The biggest upshot of the entire resurrection myth is the notion that we (mortals) can only expect true happiness and fulfillment in the next world, not this one, because humans are born with something wrong with them (original sin). This life is not only inferior and ultimately pointless, it's downright hopeless, and only redeemable after death.
Yes, the faithful go to Christian Heaven, but they have to submit to irrational dogma, and then die to get there. Of course, no one but crazed Muslim suicide-bombers (who believe in an even more absurd, cartoon afterlife) are in any hurry to relocate to Valhalla. The true believers put it off as long as possible and hang on to even the most miserable existence to the bitter end.
In my opinion, the human race will be a sight better off when we consign this story to the slag-heap of wacky ideas that came out of the Bronze-Age. It need no longer enslave us in its morbid world of death, guilt and blood atonement.
Maybe then we can start worrying about how we can improve this world, and the existence we are currently experiencing, instead of obsessively indulging in resurrection fantasies and worrying about whether or not our egos will be preserved forever under optimum conditions.
That's all for now, Brooke. Your poem is competent and technically efficient as usual, but in my opinion, the cockamamy tall-tale it's based on, is a pernicious bit of religious flummery that's done a lot of damage for a long,long time.
Happy Easter....TKF
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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So, He died and then came back to life, huh? Interestingly, that's an attribute He shares with Vampires, Zombies and Frankenstein's monster. I don't know about you, but encountering the undead (who by all accounts should not be up and about), would be a deeply unsettling experience and terrifying on multiple levels, regardless of who's being re-animated.
This makes JC a bit of a mythical creature who resides in the part of the brain where our darkest fears and wildest wishful thinking are born. This fable is a meditation on death. His and ours. It seems to have a happy ending, with Jesus atoning for the sins of man in perpetuity, or until the second-coming rapture/apocalypse. Whichever comes first.
According to the story, Jesus died a bloody (albeit common for the day), death. His body was then allowed to be spirited away to a remote location, where it was interred intact (did you ever stop to think what would have been the possibility of a physical resurrection if the Romans had cremated Jesus body and scattered the ashes to the winds?). After three days, not only has rigor-mortis not set in, He's brought back to life (you can't keep a good man down!).
At this point you might expect (and really be pulling for) a triumphant re-entry into Jerusalem, where Jesus would appear to the populace, confirm His"Son-of-God" status, and rub in Pilate's and everyone's collective faces that he was, like, back baby! In the flesh, to set things to right for all time, using His divinely sourced super-powers to bend reality to His will, and usher in an era of peace, prosperity and cooperation on earth among all people.
Does He do that? Of course not! Instead, He deigns to appear to only a handful of people before splitting for the nether reaches once again, faster than you can say, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, thus leaving wide open from that point forward, speculation as to the veracity of this frankly, unbelievable story.
It's true that without the resurrection (and the miracles), Christianity probably would have never gotten off the ground. The people with a vested interest in this new religion, based, not so much on what Jesus taught (find the kingdom of Heaven within), but on a personality cult centered on the man himself and the gory details of his death, had a huge motivation to turn Him into a God, and spread the myth of His physical resurrection.
Naturally, this new faith required an organized church with an elite priesthood to intervene with God on our behalf. The inventors of Christianity accomplished this slight of hand with wholesale religious propaganda (The New Testament).
So what did humanity get out of all this unnecessarily complicated metaphysical rigmarole? For the true believers, a forgiveness of sins, so as to be rewarded with continued existence in an idealized, post-mortem paradise, where they will do, God knows what, for eternity. (I'll finally have time to read, "Moby-Dick"!).
For the unbelievers; never-ending torture in God's private dungeon (sure, Satan is the manager, but You-Know-Who is the landlord). Oh well, they'll have no one but themselves to blame for not blindly and unquestionably swallowing whole, the literal truth of an entirely implausible and completely impossible, body of fantastic claims as to the nature of all reality.
Mankind also gets saddled with the comforting message that pain and suffering are transcendent and empowering in some perverse way, and pleasure, for it's own sake, is somehow sinful and evil.
The biggest upshot of the entire resurrection myth is the notion that we (mortals) can only expect true happiness and fulfillment in the next world, not this one, because humans are born with something wrong with them (original sin). This life is not only inferior and ultimately pointless, it's downright hopeless, and only redeemable after death.
Yes, the faithful go to Christian Heaven, but they have to submit to irrational dogma, and then die to get there. Of course, no one but crazed Muslim suicide-bombers (who believe in an even more absurd, cartoon afterlife) are in any hurry to relocate to Valhalla. The true believers put it off as long as possible and hang on to even the most miserable existence to the bitter end.
In my opinion, the human race will be a sight better off when we consign this story to the slag-heap of wacky ideas that came out of the Bronze-Age. It need no longer enslave us in its morbid world of death, guilt and blood atonement.
Maybe then we can start worrying about how we can improve this world, and the existence we are currently experiencing, instead of obsessively indulging in resurrection fantasies and worrying about whether or not our egos will be preserved forever under optimum conditions.
That's all for now, Brooke. Your poem is competent and technically efficient as usual, but in my opinion, the cockamamy tall-tale it's based on, is a pernicious bit of religious flummery that's done a lot of damage for a long,long time.
Happy Easter....TKF
Comment Written 07-Apr-2012
reply by the author on 07-Apr-2012
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It is always so grand to hear from you, TK ;-) Thanks for dropping by, and a damned fine Easter to you, too! Brooke
