Catch The Bird But Watch The Wave

This contextual biblical reading of Luke 18:18–30 (the encounter between Jesus and the rich ruler) foregrounds the political and economic context of the Pacific Island Countries and Territories (PICTs). The reading carefully explores the biblical text’s context, an exploration that includes looking at specific intertextual sources and engaging scholars from Asian and African contexts. The reading is then applied to a contextual biblical approach to poverty in Samoan society. The contextual biblical reading resituates the ruler in the Lukan narrative within the context of the household and the institutional constraints of its ecological environment. The theoretical framework for the contextual biblical reading is guided by the Samoan proverb seu le manu ae taga’i ile galu (catch the bird and watch the wave), symbolizing responsibility and restraint in biblical interpretation. At the end of the contextual biblical reading, a new way of reading Luke is presented, and three broad propositions are suggested for further consideration. The main argument of this deep contextual reading of the Lukan passage is that the rich ruler offers a different form of “following,” which is possible by “living responsibly with wealth.”

"Beyond the Reef" is about the South Pacific Island of Samoa and its people where the author lived and worked for 14 years as a Teacher, Bookshop Manager and a travelling Inspector of Village Schools. During that time he was expected to be proficient in the Samoan language and understand its culture and customs. He reflects on the manner in which these Polynesian people responded to a succession of onslaughts by representatives of the White Man's world, explorers, traders, missionaries, colonial servants and a horde of American troops during the 2nd World War. The author arrived in Samoa in 1954.

Example in this ebook CHAPTER I “And now the goddess bids the birds appear, Raise all their music and salute the year.” Wyatt. “The birds sing many a lovely lay Of God’s high praise and of their sweet love-tune.” Spenser. IF we had to distribute the Seasons among the birds that are called “British,” selecting a notable fowl to represent each, we could hardly overlook the claims of the cuckoo, the nightingale, and the swallow to distinction. But, after all, these are not “thorough Britons.” They only come to us for our summer, and when that goes they follow it. Though great numbers of them are British-born, they are at best only Anglo-Continental, Anglo-Asiatic, Anglo-African, and Inter-Oceanic. But our resourceful little islands give us native birds, all our own, that amply serve the Seasons, and represent, with sufficing charm, the changing Four. We have the thrush, the blackbird, the skylark, and the robin, four of the sweetest birds that the round world can show— “The Throstle with his note so true.” Shakespeare. “The Mavis mild and mellow.” Burns. “A few stars Were ling’ring in the heavens, while the Thrush Began calm-throated.” Keats. The thrush is pre-eminently our bird of spring. While the snow-drops, the “Fair Maids of February,” are still in early bloom, and before the crocus has lit its points of flame or the primrose its pale fires, and while “the daffodils that come before the swallow dares” are scarcely in their bud, the thrush has burst forth in full song, its burden the “news of buds and blossoming.” There is little that is green yet in copse and hedge: few flowers worth a child’s picking are to be seen. But he is too full of his glad evangel to be able to keep from singing, and from the tufted larch “Rarely pipes the mounted thrush.” Some naturalists want us to call it a migrant, and in proof of their argument, tell us of the multitudes that pass over Heligoland at a certain time of the year. But against this, let every one who has a garden where thrushes build, bear witness how, in the hardest winters, the dead birds are picked up among the laurels, starved or frozen to death. This alone demolishes the migrant theory. That numbers do leave England in winter may be true enough; it is the overflow of population. Indeed, if the superfluous songsters did not go away (and the Wild Birds’ Protection Act remained in force), we should be smothered with thrushes. I know, for instance, of a little “place” in the country, some thirty acres all told, garden, shrubberies, orchards, spinneys, and meadow, where birds are tempted to come by the planting of fruit bushes and strawberry-beds in all directions, by the numbers of elder trees and mountain ash set out, by the encouragement of blackberries and dog-roses wherever they can be allowed to grow, and where birds are tempted to stay in winter by liberal scatterings of grain-foods and table-scraps. Within this little estate there were one year forty nests of thrush and blackbird. Now supposing these birds bred only once in the year, which is very improbable, and reared only three birds apiece, which is equally so, and that half were killed or died during the year, there would then be left twice as many thrushes as in the year before. Forty pairs would become eighty; eighty, a hundred and sixty; a hundred and sixty, three hundred and twenty, and so on till five years later there would be over ten thousand pairs of thrushes (allowing all along for the same excessive proportion of casualties), breeding on thirty acres, and if each pair hatched five birds, there would be fifty thousand thrushes all together To be continue in this ebook

"We all notice the first swallow almost as soon as the first cuckoo; for though the one bird's note catches the ear, the flight of the other arrests the eye as certainly. And what a flight it is! Has it ever been computed how many hundred miles it flies every day? For hours they are on the wing, flying at the rate of a mile a minute, and always with exquisite grace..." 'Birds of the wave and woodland' is a nature themed novel dedicated to the birds of Britain, both the indigenous ones and those that fly in from elsewhere during the seasons of the year. The book examines the unique features of several of the well-known species, giving an insightful look at them in a lighthearted manner.

This contextual biblical reading of Luke 18:18–30 (the encounter between Jesus and the rich ruler) foregrounds the political and economic context of the Pacific Island Countries and Territories (PICTs). The reading carefully explores the biblical text’s context, an exploration that includes looking at specific intertextual sources and engaging scholars from Asian and African contexts. The reading is then applied to a contextual biblical approach to poverty in Samoan society. The contextual biblical reading resituates the ruler in the Lukan narrative within the context of the household and the institutional constraints of its ecological environment. The theoretical framework for the contextual biblical reading is guided by the Samoan proverb seu le manu ae taga’i ile galu (catch the bird and watch the wave), symbolizing responsibility and restraint in biblical interpretation. At the end of the contextual biblical reading, a new way of reading Luke is presented, and three broad propositions are suggested for further consideration. The main argument of this deep contextual reading of the Lukan passage is that the rich ruler offers a different form of “following,” which is possible by “living responsibly with wealth.”

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