Facts, Feelings, Thoughts, Opinions

While visiting Joe Huffman's blog, I lifted this excerpt because I felt it deserved more comment.

"While I think there is a fair amount of lying going on they don’t think of it as lying. They just don’t understand facts are independent of their feelings. If they feel something then, in their view of reality, it is true. I’ve had people flat out tell me this. I would point out that what someone was saying was in direct contradiction to verifiable facts. And I would get a response of something to the effect, “Well, it’s true to them and that is what matters.” -- Joe Huffman
There is also a very telling anecdote about liberal “research” in this same article:

In 2006 I was at a cocktail party in Arlington, VA, talking to a liberal journalist about his soon-to-be-released book on Iraq when John Lott joined us. John listened for a moment and then said to the author, 

“I’m curious. You say you just finished a book on the Iraq war. I always find it so hard to finish a book. I get so deep into the research I have a hard time stopping to write. I’m guessing you had a hard time leaving Iraq. There is so much to investigate and understand.”  

The author said, “I didn’t go to Iraq.”  

John paused with this quizzical look on his face before asking, “Oh, how did you do your research?”  

The author said, “I didn’t have to do much. I mean, I already know what I think.”

Feelings versus facts. It’s a type of mental disorder.—Joe]

The article quoted above can be found at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2014/09/25/how-bloombergs-million-dollar-desire-for-gun-control-is-backfiring/

What is so revealing in that last statement by the unnamed liberal author is how he thinks about research.  To him, research isn't about gathering facts and using logic to come to a realistic and logical conclusion on a matter.  To him, research is only necessary to confirm what he already thinks, or more specifically, his opinion.  And because he feels he is a member of the anointed visionary class, he owes it to the unwashed masses (which really means anyone who doesn't already think the way he does), to share his enlightened opinion.

Too much about living in 21st century America allows for this kind of lack of rational thought.  Many decades ago when there were no "social safety nets," failure to think logically and act accordingly could get you killed or end up suffering very bad consequences.

Now the modern world is populated by too many people  (dare I say about half of the population) who have raised the right to an opinion to some kind of sacrosanct status.

Oh, but wait!  That's not entirely true when I really think about it.  On closer examination, only opinions that are politically fashionable to the left that are respected, or damn near worshipped.  I use the phrase politically fashionable because there isn't a damn thing correct about "political correctness."  Political Correctness, in all it's verbal forms, is Orwellian newspeak for the highly intolerant soft tyranny of the statists.

Very soon, the unsustainable economic situation in this country is going to collapse, and when it does, modern liberal thinkers will be forced, dragged kicking and screaming, to the reality that all of their wishful but totally incorrect feelings, thoughts, and opinions on how to create a utopian society is all just crap.

That degree in political science, women's studies, international relations, art history, public administration, urban and regional planning, environmental studies or applied sociology, is going to be about as useful to you as a degree in typewriter repair.  It is not going to help you know how to grow or preserve food, to hunt and field dress an animal, take care of domestic animals, make fire without a lighter or matches, find or purify water, or build a shelter.

The last thing to note about the liberal author's final statement above is the subtle arrogance. An arrogance that even he doesn't seem to recognize.  "I mean, I already know what I think,” pretty much tells you that he doesn't think that any more thought needs to be given to the subject.  For a leftist who has made up his mind, facts are inconvenient and sometimes downright confusing.  I guess you could also attribute his statement to over-confidence.

 

 

The low-or-no-information voter never wants to be bothered with questions of epistemology.  The next time a leftist is defending a socialist idea or attacking a tried-and-true conservative one, just ask the question: "What if you're totally wrong?"

 

Remember the pseudo-genius evil character from Princess Bride?  You'll probably hear the answer: "Inconceivable!"



Eggseptional Size

We have a new winner.

I really wish I had been there to see which hen is responsible for this egg.

You would almost think a large duck had snuck into the ark and laid this egg.  As you can see it is just slightly over three inches long and slightly over two inches wide.  The egg at the top is the previous record holder at the Ben-David farm. The egg on the right is one of our average eggs which would correspond to a store-bought extra large or jumbo.

About a two months ago, we had this egg that you see in the second picture.  We only get such eggs once in a blue moon.  I take it as a sign of calcium or mineral deficiency and add more oyster shell or ground up egg shells to their diet.

This was the softest "shell" that I've held to date.  It was as soft and pliable as a rubber balloon, and you can see the obvious transparency.  I was amazed that the end closed off and the thing got laid without breaking.

Just had to share this before I get back to work on gardening and then my next post on why the Harold Camping Doomsday prediction was so wrong.

Shalom Y'all.

Long Live, O' Live, Olive

Our new olive tree

The nicest birthday gift I received this year came from my lovely wife, Twyla. I consider it ours, and not mine. Every time I walk past it, it makes me smile.  I think of how much joy it will bring me to care for it and shape it as it grows.  Olive trees are one of the ideal trees for pruning and shaping.  Olive trees, the fruit, and the oil, all have special meaning. Now, I've got this cute little Manzanilla olive tree in the back yard, in a pot.  We won't put it in the ground, unfortunately, but you'll understand why.  The olive tree is known to botanists as Olea europaea, with six basic subspecies and over twenty well known cultivars, each having unique qualities and flavors.

Olive trees may seem like a paradox.  They are extremely tough compared to most plants in the entire plant kingdom, yet severe enough cold can kill them.  In fact, they are more likely to be killed by too much water or too much cold and yet they are known to survive severe drought and even fire. A mature and healthy olive tree can be chopped down to the ground and its root system will put up new shoots and likely survive and thrive.  Same thing can happen if you burn one of these trees to the ground.  Olive trees don't like a fully tropical environment.  They prefer a moderately cold period in order to flower and set fruit well.  Apparently it needs to get below 45° F for some time.  Perhaps someone could adapt one of the many olive species to an always warm climate, but why bother?

Olive wood vase

Once olive trees become well established in the right environment they can grow very old.  In several places around the Mediterranean Sea, there are olive trees that are over 2,000 years old.  It is undeniable that some of the trees on the Mount of Olives outside the old city walls of Jerusalem are at least two millennia old. Olive wood from the Holy Land and wherever it grows is used to make all kinds of things. From furniture to eating utensils and even small communion or kiddush cups.  We happen to have a couple such kiddush cups from Israel. Most people probably agree that it would be a sin to use any kind of stain on the wood before sealing it. The wood is just too beautiful with all the variances of grain color and naturally occurring patterns.  Of course, there is no reason to seal any wood that is used for food or beverage consumption.  Some may think that it's just a coincidence that wood still makes the best cutting surface for food.  Not just because wood won't dull a knife edge quickly the way other materials might, but because there are natural substances in wood that are powerfully anti-microbial.  This is true even with very old cutting boards.

A Torah Scroll

Very fine olive wood is often selected to be used for the spindles upon which a Kosher Torah scroll is wound.

Every part of the olive tree is used.  The wood, the leaves, and the fruit which is classified as a drupe.  The simple way to think of a drupe is "stone fruit," meaning it has a hard pit in the middle of a fleshy, edible fruit that contains the actual seed inside of that inner hard shell.  Peaches and cherries are examples of drupes. The various cultivars of olives can be described as having flavors and aromas anywhere from fragrant and fruity to buttery and meat-like.  How's that for a range of tastes?

The olive tree is nothing like a conifer or a holly, but it too, is an evergreen.  This is a big benefit if you live where the temperatures make it necessary to move a potted specimen indoors to protect from hard freezing. Unless you allow the tree to get stressed very much, it's leaves don't turn brown and drop off.  Olive trees don't mind frost.  Damage does not occur to the tender parts of the tree, such as new branch and twig growth, unless the temperature gets below 22° F and it takes several hours below 15° to do serious damage to the thicker parts of the tree.  This is why it's a good idea to keep an olive tree in a nice pot and be prepared to move it inside if you live where it gets consistently colder than those temperatures, as we do here.  An olive tree can produce a fairly decent amount of fruit in a five to eight gallon sized pot.  Fruit production will depend on the species and cultivar, weather conditions and the level of care given the tree.

Olive trees hate to have their "feet wet."  Not only do olive trees produce better and tastier olives in drier conditions, they are very susceptible to fungal disease if they are planted in very rich soil that stays moist all the time.  The conditions that are great for most vegetables and other plants are totally wrong for olives.  They prefer rocky, sandy, almost consistently dry earth to grow well in and produce the richest tasting olives.  When the trees are just getting started they need some care and better conditions, but the older they get, and the more trials they endure,  the tougher they get.  Is there a lesson here, or what?


The olive leaves are now harvested because it has been discovered that they have anti-aging, immune system stimulating, and anti-biotic effects.  Of course, it has been known since the Garden of Eden that olive oil is an anti-biotic and has many healing qualities. But actual clinical research has shown that  olive leaf extracts are proven to reduce blood pressure, fight fungi infections, and reduce inflammation.  A fresh extract of the leaves was recently shown to have more than double the antioxidant qualities than that of green tea extract.  On top of that, it had 400% of the vitamin C content.

Among natural medicine practioners, olive leaf is used to fight all kinds of viral infections, including colds and flu, yeast infections, and ailments such as Epstein-Barr, shingles, and herpes.  Consumption of both the oil and the leaf extract reduce blood levels of low density lipoproteins or LDL cholesterol.

Ancient olive press

Olives are one of the few fruits that are good to eat whether picked green or fully ripe.  They can be preserved in pickling brine or in their own oil.  The process of extracting the oil  would take an entire post by itself, and perhaps the day will come when we might want to experiment in learning how to do just that.  In ancient times it was done by grinding the olive flesh into paste and then crushing it between mats of palm frond or grass mats, using pits carved out of rock and using small cranes with counterbalances to load stones on top of the mats.  The liquid is crushed out of the meat of the fruit and then the watery part separates from the oil.  Olives that are grown for their oil have up to half of their weight in oil.

Somebody is probably wondering about the designation "Extra-Virgin" for olive oil.  How can something be "extra-virgin?"  Kind of like being "extra-dead."  You either are or you aren't.  Actually it developed as a grade and has a very specific meaning.  Not only is it from the very first pressing of olives, but it has to have a certain subjective grade of aroma and taste, as well as a maximum level of fatty acid content no greater than 0.8 gram per 100 grams.  The first pressing of the olive oil was what Adonai commanded be for use in lighting the menorah and menorot in the Temple, and for use in formulating anointing oil.  In case you want to know, olive oil in Hebrew is "shemen zaiyeet" or "oil of olives."

I hope that in the future, I will be able to share pictures as I cultivate this tree and more like it.  The blooming and fruiting, the pruning and care.  By the way, if you live in the panhandle of Florida or Southern Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and can plant such trees in an area where it can stay well drained after rain, you might consider planting as many olive trees as you can.  I know I would.

Shalom Y'all

I Got Dinner And A Show

Twyla's mom and dad came for a visit this past week.  After we enjoyed a nice lunch, Twyla's mom did a presentation.  She gave me a book; one page at a time.  With each page came a gift corresponding with the page number.  I share this presentation here.

This is not a problem.  We have quite a few trees around here.  Oak, Maple, Poplar, Dogwood.  I can handle this.

Okay, the first thing was pretty easy.  This one made me think there was some work involved.  "Level???" Level ground in the North Georgia mountains?  I'd have to think about this.

Oh.  I thought she just brought that table for this special magic act.  Apparently this is my gift.

There was a basin with a tag on it.  Number four.  Cool.  It will be very nice to have a bird bath in the yard.  Oh, wait.  There's another piece of paper.

Plus a little bag with the number five on it.  A pretty little yellow saucer.  Maybe a little birdseed could go in there?  Oh, wait, there's another page being put in front of me.

And there's another bag with a bar of soap.  Okay, I haven't seen any raccoons around here, and even though they might wash stuff before they eat it, I don't think they use soap.  Oh, wait; there's another piece of paper.

There's a hook.  Now I'm confused.  Are the birds supposed to perch there, or do the raccoons hang up their coats?  Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

I suppose if I provide towels and some name brand colognes the raccoons will leave me some tips?

Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

There is bag number nine with a hand-made ceramic comb holder that even has a little drain hole in it, in case it rains.  Now I'm pretty sure this is for the raccoons so they can comb the ticks out of their fur, but I'm pretty sure that I will have to spend a lot of time showing them how to hold the comb and use it correctly.

Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

Bag number 10 has a mirror in it.  I don't think raccoons have ever seen a mirror before and besides that, I don't think they are all that concerned about their personal appearance.  Or maybe it's so the raccoon can see the bear trying to sneak up on him while he's washing?

Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

So that's what the bucket with the number eleven tag is for.  I thought maybe Twyla's parents were worried we don't have indoor toilets up here in the mountains.  I guess they thought the raccoons need a place to go before they wash up.

Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

One last bag with number 12 on it.  It has this cute little porcelain on steel pot with a straight handle.  If the raccoons want to cook something before they eat it, that's all fine and well, but I am not going to be responsible for teaching them how to start a fire.  Like I need to be hassled by the Dept. of Natural Resources or some forestry ranger.

Oh, wait, there's another piece of paper.

Oh.  Well, that's different!  So, all this was for little old me.  I didn't know I was getting all that bad out there in the garden.  (Ha!!  Sometimes I get so grungy working in the garden I look like I need a fire hose turned on me for 15 minutes.)

You are probably wondering about the finished product from all this, so below are the after action pics.

I cheated on leveling off a piece of ground.  I just used rocks to level the table.  This is one of the maple trees down near the road, not far from the mailbox.

Now I'll be able to see the raccoons trying to sneak up on me while I'm washing up.  In reality, this mirror actually was used outdoors by my wife's grandmother for years.  It truly is a family heirloom.

Gotta admit that looks mighty inviting.  I really am going to enjoy using that when the weather is hot.  On the days that I don't, I'll bet the birds around here are going to enjoy it.

Twyla's mom has her own kiln and fires her pottery in her garage. It actually says "comb" on it, so I won't forget what it's there for.  "Ima" is always looking out for me.  Of course, she has lots of practice looking out for Twyla's dad.   It's nice to know I won't have to keep that comb in my pocket while I'm working.  But I may have to rethink that if I find any raccoon hairs in it.

Here's the finished product as folks will see it from the road.  I'm such a show-off.  I'm sure I'll get some questions at the next neighborhood pot-luck supper.

Another anniversary passed for my having entered into this world.  Baruch HaShem, I am enjoying pretty good health for being half a century old.  That's pretty amazing when I think about it.  Even more amazing is that my wife's parents are not only still with us, but they are in excellent health for being octogenarians.

It's extremely nice to have someone put that kind of time and thought into a gift.  Hopefully, my next post will be about the gift that my lovely wife got for me.  That one really tickled me.  I love looking at it everyday.  It's kind of growing on me.

Shalom Y'all

Arachnophilophobia

Yeah.  Arachnophilophobia.  Or is it Misarachnophilia?  You see, I have a love/hate relationship with spiders.  I have no problem working outside and having all kinds of bees buzzing around me.  Over the years, I've noticed that honeybees especially, could not care less that I'm working around them, as long as I don't make any overly aggressive moves toward them.  Carpenter bees and bumblebees and most wasps don't really pay much attention to me either.  I won't let them build nests too close to the house though.  I don't mind letting a full grown praying mantis crawl on my bare arm.

Wolf Spider

But spiders give me the creeps.  Discovering a spider crawling on my clothing can make me dance like I'm at the end of a taser gun.  I guess that's because at least 99 percent of all spiders you can find in this area have venom. I've been stung by honeybees, although I don't recall it happening since I was in my teens.  Last year, some yellowjackets built a nest in the strawbale that the zucchini was growing in, and I didn't discover it until I went to prop the bale upright as it was collapsing from decay.  I shoved my bare left arm against the bale while using my right hand to position a large log under it.  Suddenly it felt like a hundred burning darts had punctured my arm.  I was in agony for several hours.  The following day there was not a hint of evidence that I'd ever been stung.  I still hate the little %^&* buggers.

When we posted here before about beneficial insects in the garden, we completely forgot to mention spiders, but of course, spiders are not insects.  They are in another whole class by themselves.  The class arachnida.  Ticks and mites are also in this class and I don't much like them either, although they don't seem quite as scary.  If it were not for the venom thing, we would love spiders.  We don't kill spiders outside the living quarters around here if it is practical not to do so.  That's because spiders are so much more effective at killing the truly bad bugs that we don't want around here.  Spiders don't hunt us humans.  They don't want to suck our blood. They especially don't want to eat any of our precious plants.  All they want to do is either hunt down and capture other bugs or set elaborate traps to capture them.

If spiders are not an example of intelligent design, then such a thing does not exist.  It would be amazing if all spiders only spun one kind of silk and all of them made the same kind of webs.  Nothing could be further from the facts.  Most people think of spider webs as the typical two-dimensional, spiral pattern screen created to catch flying insects.  It should boggle the mind that a tiny creature that never had a course in engineering knows that anchoring only three points creates a flat plane of stability upon which to build such a net. Then they may place more anchor lines for added strength, but always in the proper position to maintain a flat plane.  A spider web with droplets of dew in the tall grass looking like a diamond encrusted hair net is a beautiful sight.  That web is designed with two very different kinds of silk. The radial arms are of a non-sticky kind that the spider knows are the safe lines to run along.  The spiral strands are made from a very sticky formula even though they come out of the very same spinnerets.  Some of the silk that the spider spins has very little to no elasticity  when it needs a strong cable.  But the sticky spiral strands have a chemical structure that lets them stretch quite a bit without breaking.  All the better to enhance the tangling effect on the prey.

A Golden Orb Spider

When I lived in Florida, even up in the North Central area right on the famous Suwannee river, we used to spend a lot of time in the woods when the weather permitted.  Once in a while you would come to a spot in the woods and if you weren't paying enough attention you might walk into something that might make you lose control of your bladder.  We were squirrel hunting one time in the fall.  I was talking to my hunting partner and walking with my head sideways when I ran my face right into what felt like very light fishing line stretched across the trees. It made me stop and jerk away.  It was the bottom part of a gigantic web of the golden orb spider.  The web was built between two pine trees about 20 feet apart.  The spiral part was about six feet in diameter, and right there in the middle of the nest was the spider.  It looked very similar to the picture, except the abdomen had large black bands across the yellow. In full spread, the spider was at least 5 inches long from foot tip to foot tip, or however you say it.  I've never seen a spider so big since then.  And I don't want to.  Back then I didn't think about conservation the way I do now and I dispatched the beast with a blast from my .410 shotgun.

Funnel web spiders build something entirely different.  These spiders are very scary to me because they are so venomous.  It makes sense that they are, since their web is not designed to do any actual catching of prey.  Like the spiral web, it serves as home, but that's the only similarity.  The funnel style is an elaborate surveillance network.  That cave like opening that is very apparent in the picture is just visible enough to get your attention.  The vast majority of the funnel web spider's web stretches far beyond that opening and is very fine and delicate.  The spider sits hidden inside it's little lair reading and interpreting the signals that get sent down the line from creatures that are touching it's amazing array of sensor wires.    The spider can tell approximately how big the insect is and probably has it encoded in its DNA to be able to identify the exact species based on its movements.  When the prey gets close enough to the entrance, the spider darts out and injects a very powerful and lethal dose of poison and then drags the helpless insect back into the hole for dinner.  I can go outside right now and find a couple of funnel web nests in my straw bale garden if I want to.

Atrax Robustus  G'day, mate!

I'm just glad we don't have something on the same danger level as the Sydney Funnel-web Spider from Australia.  This little guy is considered one of the three most dangerous spiders in the world due to it's venom's toxin level.  This spider can kill you.  Note the fangs in the picture.

Brown recluse, Loxosceles reclusa

The most common spider that I see in my garden is the wolf spider.  They don't seem to build webs of any kind.  They crawl all over in the garden and tend to blend into their surroundings, only becoming visible when disturbed enough to move to safety.  They chase down and capture their prey, so they should be good for the garden; not waiting for the bad insects to come to them.  Their venom is supposed to be only painful and irritating, but not having any long lasting effects.  This is in great contrast to the spider that informed people fear most; the brown recluse or Loxosceles reclusa.  This spider's venom is so bad it causes necrosis in the flesh where it bites. It causes the skin, fat, and even muscle tissue to die.  In the positive sense, the poison tends to stay localized to the bite area, but that just means it's not likely to kill you.  Yes, you could die from a Loxosceles bite, but it would be due to the secondary infection, such as gangrene or staph.



W A R N I N G ! ! ! 



Before you scroll down any farther, I must warn you that the pictures below are graphic.  They show the results of bites from the Loxosceles or what is also known as the fiddle head spider.  If you are easily grossed out by such things, this is where you will want to exit the article or scroll past it very fast.

 Loxosceles is also known as the fiddle head spider.

The first picture shows the initial stages of blistering and decay from a bite.

This is about a day after a Loxosceles bite with later stage necrotic damage.

An example of having to have necrotic tissue removed prior to skin grafting.  This damage was all from a Brown recluse spider.

That is why I don't like spiders.  But I do tolerate them.  I do appreciate that they provide a lot of good to my garden.  So, I will just go on leaving them alone and steering as clear of them as I can.

Another Example

Hopefully it will warm up some more this afternoon, and I will be able to get back outside and work on some gardening.  We woke up to 42° F this morning.  That's just ten degrees above freezing.  I can almost hear my tomatoes and peppers shouting that they are on strike right now.

In the meantime, I came across this story over at Bayou Renaissance Man's blog, and I see it as another example of what happens in a command economy; a communist, totalitarian, we-are-experts-simply-because-we-conned-the-sheeple-into-voting-for-us example of why we need less government, not more.

In countries with various degrees of centralized government, some bureaucrat or official by whatever name, who has never had any experience in the field to which he has been put in charge, will make decisions that impact thousands, tens of thousands or even millions of people in one fell swoop.

If you don't understand what I mean, let me be clear.  Imagine a country with a billion people where they are free to make their own decisions what to grow and how to grow it based on the demand from the people who want their produce, their own experience and expertise, and the motive that the better a job they do, the more profit they will make from it.

On the other hand, imagine millions of people who will see their food costs skyrocket because someone, who won't suffer even a little bit, decides to order things be done a certain way whether it makes sense to the majority of people or even one individual who knows better.

Now imagine a bureaucrat like that, in an office thousands of miles away, who doesn't know you and doesn't have any reason to care about you, making decisions about what kind of medical care you get, what kind of food you can eat, and whether or not you will pay $2.50 for a gallon of gas or $5.50 or $8.

The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen.

Doomsday Debacle

I could have waited until May 22nd and posted on this subject, but I want to take a stand now and make sure everybody who reads my blog knows that I think Mr. Fitzpatrick is an embarrassment to Christianity.  He is doing the very thing that Scripture warns not to do.

Oh, I don't mean predicting Messiah's return.  That's just part of it. He is teaching a bunch of false doctrine with his book.  His biggest problem is that he is causing the Bible and The Creator to be mocked.  Granted that pagans will mock the Bible anyway, but "Christians" are not supposed to give them the reason and ammunition to do so.

I'm not ready to post a full expose on Mr. Fitzpatrick's egregious theory.  I downloaded the PDF file of his book and have only made my way to page 148 of a 384 page book.  I've already found so many errors I can't stand it.  It will not be easy limiting myself to just explaining why his doomsday prediction alone is wrong.

Stay tuned.    Shalom Y'all.

On Romans & Olive Trees: Part 3

This is the third post in a study of Paul's letter to the believers in Rome.  You can start at the beginning by clicking here.

The eleventh chapter of Romans contains some things that should shut the mouths of a lot of pastors and teachers who are out there blaspheming by teaching garbage like “replacement theology.”  Let’s look at this first and then move to the next thing.

Paul introduces the chapter with this: “I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He?  May it never be! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.  God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, . . .”

There are many more passages that make it clear that God would never abandon Israel.  Not the land, nor the people as a corporate body.  In a previous post I spoke of God’s fulfillment of Israel becoming a nation on the exact day of the end of their last punishment for not keeping His Torah, May 14, 1948.  We also have other prophecies about Israel that have yet to be fulfilled, such as Ezekiel 38 & 39.  So if you hear some pastor or teacher telling you that the church has replaced Israel or gives you the telltale clues that they believe in “Dominion theology,” run for the exit.

Even though Paul is grieved by the number of his Jewish brethren who will not recognize Yeshua as Messiah, he reveals in verse eleven that the purpose is to spread the gospel to the gentile world.

Then Paul gives us this beautiful, vivid illustration of the Gentile relationship to the Jews and the Torah.  Gentiles are like a wild olive branch that is being grafted in to the main trunk of a well established tree.  This is truly a great picture.  In the world of plants, there are some plants that barely last a season.  They might live long enough to create seed and die for the next crop to germinate in the spring.  An olive tree is one of the few species that lasts for centuries and even millennia.  Yes.  An olive tree can be several thousand years old.  At least some of the olive trees in the very garden where Yeshua sweated drops of blood are still growing there today.  An olive tree takes a lot of care to become established but once they are, they can produce quite a lot.

If you want to produce a new variety of olives quickly and easily,  you can graft an existing shoot onto an older well established tree.  You don’t rip out a well established tree to plant a new sapling.  And olive trees, like most food producing plants require pruning and cultivation to be productive.  The Messiah also used grape vines as an illustration of this principle.  Paul uses the olive tree because in prophecy, the olive tree is understood to represent Israel, as well as the fig tree.  In this letter, Paul warns the Gentiles to remember their status as being grafted in to the tree.  The tree hasn’t been destroyed, and in fact, it is the roots of the tree that support and give life to the new graftees.  He also states that if the non-productive branches of the tree can be chopped off and discarded, so can the newcomers.  The newly grafted branches don’t change everything by becoming a part of the well-established tree.  It can take a while for the graft to fully “take.”  The existing old olive tree that is producing good fruit continues to produce good fruit because all the right things are being done by the Master Gardener and the tree accepts it.  Another very, very interesting thing about olive trees is that an old, well established tree can be cut down, or even burned down, level with the ground, seeming to be totally destroyed, and yet it’s root system will put up shoots in a few years.

The eleventh chapter of Romans makes it clear that there is a partial blinding of Israel regarding the identity of Messiah until all those of the Gentile world are gathered in.  But the zealous Pharisee named Paul understands that these Gentile converts are coming to the saving knowledge of Messiah AND to obedience to Torah.  Without the obedience to Torah, the Jews would have nothing to be jealous about.  In short, there is no new religion for the Gentiles who come to follow Messiah.  Yeshua said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."

We must keep in mind that Yeshua Himself said He came to save the lost sheep of the house of Israel.  In Matthew 15 we have the story of a Canaanite woman who comes to Yeshua to have her daughter delivered from a demon.  Yeshua not only tells her that he was sent to Israel only, but he further insults her by saying that it is not good to throw the children’s bread to the dogs.  Hyperbole?  A set up?  Sure.  But it makes the point.  God wants His chosen ones first and He has no intention of abandoning Israel.

Paul gets to the heart of the matter in verse 11 of chapter 11:  “I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they?  May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous.”

In order for us to feel the full weight of what Paul is saying here, we would have to be very familiar, or should I say well studied, in the Hebrew Scriptures.  The book of Hosea is especially helpful here.  The time of the prophet Hosea was more than 100 years before the Babylonian captivity; about 750 to 720 years before Messiah came.  Adonai was so fed up with the idolatry of Israel that He commanded Hosea to go and find a prostitute to marry.  This is to symbolize how God sees Israel’s idolatry.  He severely punishes the Northern Kingdom to near utter annihilation. Adonai’s apparent mercy on Judah is because that is the line of Messiah and Judah seemed to try to hold to Torah.  Taking the whole of at least the first two chapters, we see that God is so angered by that generation that He wants to divorce her until she turns from her harlotry.

Is it not interesting that God created this world with sex and marriage, reproduction and progeny and parenting to give us tangible, emotional ways to relate to Him?  It is precisely because Adonai loves all of his created children that he chastises them to try to get them to come back to Himself.  Chapter 3 of Hosea is so obviously prophetic about the conquering Messiah and the end times.

“For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, and without ephod or seraphim.  Afterward the sons of Israel will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His goodness in the last days.”  (Hosea 3:4,5)

This passage tells us a couple of very important things: A time would come, and we’ve seen most of it come to pass, where Israel had no real political or civil leadership of their own and no Temple for religious service to Adonai.  Now, as I type this, there is increasing and fervent interest in Israel and among other Jews about Yeshua the Nazarene.  Israel has been restored as a nation with self rule. The only thing we need to see now for the anti-Christ to be revealed is a Temple (2 Thess. 2:1-4).

In verse 17 & 18 of Romans 11, we read, “But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the rich root of the olive tree, do not be arrogant toward the branches [natural Jews]; but if you are arrogant, remember that it is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you.”    Some Christians need to read this verse every day for a month until it sinks in.  This is one of the clearest statements in the New Testament to tell Gentile believers, “Hey, listen up, Yeshua did not come to create a whole new religious system.  He came to make a way for you folks outside of Judaism to become a part of God’s Kingdom. That means you are supposed to learn God’s ways from them, the Jews, not them learning from you.”

Oh yes, I know that just shocks the snot out of most Christians who read that. But if you disagree, then search the Scriptures and show me the text that says that previous paragraph is wrong.  For heaven’s sake; keep reading verses 19 through 29 and Paul is even more emphatic about warning Gentiles that the grafted in branches are merely that and that the ultimate purpose is the salvation of Israel.

So far, we’ve made it up to chapter 12 of Romans in three posts, and still I can’t find anything in Paul’s words (actually the words of the Ruach HaKodesh) that tell me that the Torah has become void or that we can disregard the commandments.  This again is in keeping with the words of the Master Himself in Matthew 5:17-20.  If you know something that I don’t, you can leave a comment, or email me.  The address is in the sidebar.

You can move on to part IV in this series by clicking here.

Setaceous Hebrew Character

You find the strangest things while doing research.

Stopped at one of the local plant nurseries this past week just to look, but both myself and the KOALA  (Keeper Of All Lovely Attributes), a.k.a. Twyla, have a soft spot for really nice plants when we find them and they are really cheap.

Chocolate Mint left, Lemon Mint right

We got a lemon mint plant and a chocolate mint plant.  If you are thinking that mint is mint, sorry, but you'd be wrong.  I have a regular or probably a spearmint  plant that is growing in the yard already, but this lady near the lake had these in some pots out front, and I recognized the lighter, yellower color of the one species and knelt down to pinch off a bottom leaf.  I crushed and rolled it between my thumb and forefinger and it smelled almost like someone had zested a lemon.  It's wonderful.

Regular mint in one of my veggie beds

She lifted up a small pot of a purplish, brownish stemmed plant with the distinctive mint shaped leaves and announced that it was the chocolate kind.  I pinched off a leaf and repeated the process and was rewarded with that strange but wonderful scent of a cross between chocolate and mint.  I don't know how someone figured out how to breed these awesome varieties, but I am grateful.


Yeah, yeah, I know.  What in the wide world of sports does this have to do with a Setaceous Hebrew Character?  I'm getting there.

Along with a few other good buys, she had these little six-packs of tiny deep blue flowers.  Almost a blue-violet.  The petals look like tiny, fragile snips of velvet fabric and the color seems to glow in direct sunlight.  The pictures I found at Wikipedia just do absolutely no justice to the real flower.  She called them lobelia.  At the time, I didn't care and didn't even think of the name.  Twyla and I both just think they are beautiful.  This variety is suited to a somewhat shady spot and so we got them to go in the big manhole ring near the back steps.  They can go in after we finish harvesting all the radishes that are there now.

Lobelia erinus on my back porch, a.k.a. Edging Lobelia or Trailing Lobelia

Lobelia erinus photo courtesy of Wikipedia

On the way home, I remembered from my herbal medicine research days that Lobelia is the genus of plant that has several medicinal uses, and if this plant were truly in that genus, if not the species, I needed to know about it.  Well it is.  It is not the most well known species, which also goes by the name Indian Tobacco and has very pale flowers and grows taller.  But it is still in the family.  This blue version comes from the southern African continent, and is called Lobelia erinus.   It stays low and makes a beautiful covering bed.  Medicinally it has several uses, but you need to be very careful.  If I were a lawyer, I'd tell you not to even consider using this stuff.  To give you an idea, the American, taller, pale blue flower version of this is known by several other names: Asthma Weed, Indian Tobacco, Pukeweed, and Vomitwort.  Does that give you any ideas?

However, in small, controlled doses, it can be used as an expectorant and a relaxant for muscle tension.  It has sedative qualities.  It is also both a diuretic (makes you pee) and it's a diaphoretic (makes you sweat).  There are many reasons why sweating is good for you.  Failing to sweat is not healthy.  Your skin is the largest organ in/on your body and is a big part of eliminating impurities.  (When is this guy going to get to the Hebrew Character thing?)

Setaceous Hebrew Character Moth

In reading about Lobelia, I discover that there is a specific little moth who's caterpillar feeds on the plant; the Setaceous Hebrew Character, (Xestia c-nigrum).  It was named this, because to whoever got the naming rights, the prominent black marking on the wing, at least on the left side, looks like a 15th century version of the Hebrew letter Nun (pronounced "noon").  And in case you were wondering, Setaceous means bristle-like or having bristles.

Aren't you glad you didn't stop reading until you got to this part?

Continuing with the entertainment, we have the next photo which shows how creative Twyla can be with different things.  We were at a garage sale months ago when she spotted one of those industrial mop wringers that ride on the side of a mop bucket and said she wanted it.

"What for?"  (Silly me.  What does it matter?)

"I've got an idea."

Only the daisies and the fuchsia colored Sweet Williams are real plants.  The ivy is silk.  Twyla refers to such an arrangement as "artifisus," a term she coined years ago for mixing fake flowers or other elements with the real thing to create the look she wants.  

In other news . . . 

Remember when I talked about praying mantids in an earlier post?  Well, I discovered that I was a little too soon on the estimate.  Turns out that during my gardening work just yesterday, I was near the boxwood shrubs at one end of the house and a couple of tiny ones caught my eye.  I mean really tiny.  Barely a half an inch long.  You would almost mistake them for ants if you weren't looking carefully.

Those are the fingertips of my left hand in the shot to give you the perspective of how small this critter is.  And as I looked around, I discovered there were about a hundred of them within about a cubic yard.  I didn't see an egg case anywhere, so I don't know where they came from.  They were there to feed because the boxwood was blooming and attracting ants, tiny black flies, bees, etc. and it was a banquet.

When I get back to another post on gardening or plants, I have something very special to share.  Stay tuned to this blog.

Shalom Y'all

Gardening Progress May 11, 2011

I have been growing stuff for years.  All kinds of vegetables, shrubs and trees that I like, and Tea Roses, which for those of you not heavily into gardening, are those big domesticated varieties.  But what amazes me is how excited I get every time I go out and see new things growing and thriving.  You would think that the thrill would somehow diminish over time, but it never does.  I go out and look at the new little tomatoes on the vines that are now almost the size of golfballs and I grin from ear to ear and act giddy in front of my wife.

My biggest tomato right now

There might be a few other people like us who have their garden in early, but they are few and far between.  We had one frost about a week ago that had us out covering anything that might suffer damage, and it was a lot of rushed work, which is never fun, but it was worth it.

This is straw bale gardening heaven

When I look at how well all of the plants are growing, I know that unless some strange tragedy strikes, we are going to have a great harvest.  I'm hoping that in another month we will be feasting on our own vine ripe tomatoes.  And let me say something about the term, "vine ripe."  Just because you leave some hot house tomatoes on some vines and ship them to the supermarket that way does not make them vine ripe.  Such tomatoes at premium prices may have a slightly better taste than the flavorless orbs that were picked green and shipped in cold storage, but they taste nothing like a tomato that I pick full red off my own vine, or get at the road side stand by someone who grew it locally the same way I would.

The world is full of people who only think they've tasted a tomato.  That sounds like a bold statement, but it's true nonetheless.  Which brings me to something else worth repeating.  NEVER refrigerate tomatoes.  I cannot over-emphasize this enough.  NEVER refrigerate tomatoes.  At least not good ones.  Those bland pieces of, er, umm, . . . those impostors from the supermarket; it doesn't much matter what you do with those.  Here's why:
There is a compound in tomato called Z-3 hexenel, which accounts for the tomato's scent and taste (well, that is, if it was left to ripen on the vine and wasn't refrigerated). The development process which turns tomato's linolenic acid to the Z-3 that makes our mouth and nose sing is hindered by cold. If you drop the temperature on a tomato to below 54° F for several hours, you kill the hexenel.  The longer the tomatoes stay in refrigeration the more of the hexenel you eliminate.

Since most any produce you buy in a supermarket has been kept as cold as is practical in order to prevent spoilage, you aren't going to get really good tasting tomatoes.  It's just not practical from a commercial standpoint.  No produce distributor is going to have separate, specially regulated temperature storage and trucks for tomatoes, apart from the same facilities used for lettuce and other things that need cold to last long.

Butter crunch leaf lettuce in front, Brussel sprouts behind growing in the leftovers of last years straw bales

That chicken wire is two feet tall and is there to discourage the two chickens from nibbling on them.  Out of all the chickens there were two that the other chickens just wouldn't stop picking on;  one of the black sexlinks and the little bantam.  I just let them out of the arks so they could roam and not be terrorized by the others.

Those are four of my cabbage plants in the back row that are just starting to form heads.  To the right of them are Romaine lettuce. I actually prefer the leaves of cabbage prior to heading.  They are deep and rich with green and have a subtly different flavor.  They are still tender, and most delicious when gently sauteed with some turkey ham.  (If that's not considered Kosher, I'll need a Rabbi to tell me why.  And, no, I'm not interested in keeping Glatt Kosher.

Twyla made her regular cole slaw recipe using the riper loose leaves of cabbage one time recently.  The slaw was such a deep, dark green that you wouldn't think of it as cole slaw.  The flavor was much stronger, although not hot, or spicy, like some cabbages can be, but the flavor was still too strongly different for Twyla.  I really liked it after mellowing out and blending in the fridge for 24 hours.
Those are bell pepper plants in the foreground.

Remember my post, Tater Talk?  Here is the cage as of today with another thin layer of straw and compost.  As a reminder, this cage is about 3' wide, by 7' long, and 2' tall.

I have two other beds of potatoes for experimental comparison.  One bed is a terraced spot in the back which was filled in with a mixture of some compost and a lot of rich soil that I dug up from under the dogwoods and hardwoods.  It's almost like peat moss.  The other bed is out front next to the corn.  It is simply the plain red clay dirt but with most of the granite rocks removed.  This is all for me to have real empirical evidence for what works best.  There's just something in my nature of the scientist who wants experimental proof for things.

As for the clay soil bed, I will try to only add plain mulch straw on top around the plants, and only in small amounts.  The goal will be to merely cut down on the weed growth.  Maybe it will, and maybe it won't.  I won't add any other soil amendments and no fertilizer.  I want to see just how much of a difference it makes to just let them grow with as little help as possible.

To the right is a closer view of a couple of the potato plants sprouting up through the straw.  When they get a couple of inches taller, I'll throw in an inch or two more of composted leaves and such.  I think I'll put in small amounts of chicken manure mixed with straw, but only in very tiny amounts.

Young potato plant

The close up is of one of the potato plants in the back terrace bed of compost and humus.  It almost looks like a variation of radish, but that will change as the plant matures.  It seems that red potatoes have a deeper green leaf as compared to the russets.

This is a side view of the rear potato bed.  I intend to keep adding more humus and maybe some other top soil to this area as they grow.  I may even experiment further by adding small amounts of 10-10-10 commercial fertilizer during the season.  It may seem a bit chaotic behind the bed there, but perhaps you can make out the beautiful daisies growing there.  A lot of wild flowers grow on the steep slope behind the house, along with lots of blackberries, which are looking really good this year.

This is a pic of one of my pea patches further down from where the potatoes are.  The white blossoms in the background are all blackberries.  Much of the rest of the greenery are wildflowers.

That's enough for today.  I've got things that demand my attention.  Maybe I'll have some time later to show you what I've done with some roses.

Shalom Y'all