JPF Home Page Forums Lyric and MP3 Feedback MP3 Feedback Forum Pearls - All I HAVE TO OFFER

https://soundclick.com/song/15138290

Less than perfect, yes I know
Not much to show
Gleaning meaning of timeless reading
Wisdom’s afterglow
Like an apple for example
Or the worm within
Forbidden fruit is tainted truth
No man without sin

Judging me, blaming you
Hypocrites all
Heated vows and furrowed brows
Still… comes the fall
Less than perfect, yes I know
Damned all the same
Blinded eyes and selfish pride
All of us to blame

A timeless melody
Of unbroken wisdom
Words by which we prosper
A mirror for the soul
We are all forgiven
That’s all I have to offer
Pearls before swine
That's all I have to offer...

Tireless tongues yammering guile
Voices all resound
Woman’s vanity and man’s pride
Know no bounds
All that’s spoken by spirits broken
Can’t be unheard
History now holds to account
Every uttered word

A timeless melody
Of unbroken wisdom
Words by which we prosper
A mirror for the soul
We are all forgiven
That’s all I have to offer
Pearls before swine
That's all I have to offer...

Very good Japov. Enjoyed the biblical vibe...nicely done!
Bill

Bit different from what I have heard from you in the past Tony....maybe I'm not listeneing enough..dunno

Has good parts but not sure if I like the entire vibe...slow and a bit lumbering is what I take away.

Lyrics wise, it does work. But you and I think differently.

For example, I think Eve got the short end of the stick....conscious awareness....what a gift to human kind.
Without it, you cannot live the life you do, create the music you do.
In fact....if man had no conscious, self awareness, we would not be Homo Sapiens
There would be no Bible, no attempt to lead moral lives

Had Eve not eaten the apple, what would that have looked like? Eternity in the Garden of Eden ...just the two of them?
Blissfully unaware of the world beyond the garden??

Lol...

The "Alpha and Omega" God knew He would be crucified BY HIS OWN CHILDREN the moment He decided to create the Earth...

But, He did it anyway.

Let that tickle your "conscious self awareness" for a while.

BTW;
God allowed Adam to name everything He created, but Adam didn't name himself until he met Eve

Japov,

This was a mesmerizing listen! Ethereal music compliments vibe really well--but you always achieve that quite well. Not sure, but I wouldn't mind hearing a little more music build midway, (maybe even some reverberated distant kettle drums/clashing orchestral cymbals) then descrecendo and return to as you have again with minimal music for ending--might be worth experimenting.

Very cool!

steady-eddie

It's always a good sign when someone just wants to hear "more"

I'm sure if we were working together, you would have added all that lol.

Thanks Eddie

JAPOV, I didn't hear your song. I'm cutting in on this dance to try to answer John's questions about Eve, etc.

John, there's actually not much written about the Fall, just a chapter. On the other hand, Abraham's life gets 14 chapters, he being the "father of all those having faith". That shows what Yahweh considers important for us to know.

Nevertheless, many are fascinated by what's called "the primeval world", life since the Garden, through the Flood, and up until the Tower of Babel. (Genesis chapters 3-11. Abraham's account is Genesis 12-25)

I'm one of them.

The question of eating the fruit wasn't one of having conscious awareness or not, but of either obeying the Creator, Yahweh, or disobeying Him. Satan claimed Eve would become like God if she ate of the tree. But Satan's claims and promises are like the Joker's...they're either outright lies, or they come with a BIG catch. In this case, Adam and Eve became aware alright, they became aware that they had a defiled conscience before their Creator. God decides right and wrong, not His creatures.

Since Yahweh is a God of Holiness, Adam and Eve were sentenced to death, along with all their descendants. Man was completely incapable of delivering himself from the fate he himself had caused.

What would've happened if Adam and Eve hadn't disobeyed? The Bible doesn't say, and there are alot of fanciful speculations out there. Genesis 1 does say that Adam and Eve were to be fruitful and fill the earth. This implies man's Paradise dominion might have spread earth wide.

There's no way to know for sure.

But to say without such disobedience we wouldn't attempt to live moral lives, is like saying unless I cheat on my wife, I can't attempt to be faithful to her.

The Bible is a book of history, history that has happened, and that will happen. Would history have been different if the first humans had been obedient? Sure. Would there be a record of it? Who knows?

Here's what we do know...Jesus is the Son of God, the 2nd Adam. His sacrificial death repurchased mankind from their death sentence, cleansing the consciences of all who have faith in Him.

I don't want to flood you with verses, but look up these sometime, Luke 3:23, 38, 1st Corinthians 15:45, John 20:31, Romans chapter 5, 8:1.


And for those who question what caused evil and why God permits it, read Ecclesiastes 7:29 and also Job chapters 1 and 2. Altogether, it'll take less time to read this material than it takes to watch Jeopardy and Wheel.

Great "Kickoff", Grouch!

I've been hoping JV would reply...

I didn't post to be argumentative. What he said is a common objection. There's even an old Star Trek episode about it. (It completely misrepresents the Genesis account, but that's been Hollywood since the Ben Hur era.)

So, I thought it deserved a reply.

Lol...."But to say without such disobedience we wouldn't attempt to live moral lives, is like saying unless I cheat on my wife, I can't attempt to be faithful to her."

not quite what I said but I do like the simile.


what I said was firstly........if man had no conscious, self awareness, we would not be Homo Sapiens
.......We would not be "wise" man. That is a simple fact.

How exactly we got there (ie "post Garden") has a simple answer for a Bible literalist but it is far more complex if you examine civilization before the Bible.
Best history which is "proximal in geography" comes from Sumeria, where many concepts and it appears, some early Bible stories originated.
Noah's Ark, Jonah and the Whale, concepts of heaven and hell. etc etc can be read in their writings which are definitely dated before the Bible

Then archeoligical evidence of Hominid activity around the world for hundreds of thousands of years shows us "outside Eden" for a very long time.
Then physical evidence via Mitochondrial DNA takes us back to a "Genetic Eve" who is all of humanity's common female ancestor....some 300,000 years ago

Perhaps a lot of this was passed over in Genesis by its authors...??

So the line you took issue with was that we use our conscious awareness to navigate our way through life, sifting through all kinds of events including the concept of right and wrong.
There we(I think most of us) try to do the right thing according to the values we set for ourselves...which the fault filled beings we are tend to be different if someone is watching.
So the idea of the serpent is a powerful one. That sets the outside boundries of evil, while God sets the realm of of good.

But I took the tack of thanking God for our conscious awareness, our desire to sing and rhyme.....

In the end, my song is intended as provocative art...think about it

And you did...and made me think more

hi, John. I'm a little pressed for time. I don't mean to b curt.

that stuff about "awareness" is just another way of saying "I think therefore I am", which is just stating the obvious. Adam and Eve knew it was wrong to disobey Yahweh, they did, were punished, and here we are.

the Pentateuch is 3500 hundred years old, but the history it records reaches back to the "beginning". I think you're referring to the Gilgamesh epic. the fact that ancient myths and traditions have accounts in common with the Bible, is in the Bible's favor, not in its fault. Flood legends are worldwide. As mankind dispersed after the Flood, those accounts went with them, as they were still fresh in their minds. These accounts also include the extended lifespans up until the Flood.

usually people who bring up the Sumerians, etc, are unfamiliar with the nuts and bolts of those religions. They also bring up the similarities in Hammurabi's Code and the Mosaic Law. that's because in areas of conscience, stealing adultery, murder...there will be points of agreement in most cultures. (Paul explains this in Romans 2)

however, the way to separate the wheat from the chaff is in the first three commandments...monotheism and the forbidding of idolatry. Every single false religion of that day (and most now, including pseudo-Christian ones) was polytheistic, and required the use of images. This was expressly forbidden by Yahweh in both Judaism and continued after the first advent of the Messiah.

also, many of those religions (if not all), were totally bonkers. They were the great-grandfathers of the Egyptian, Canaanite, Babylonish, Greek, Roman, Hindu, Aztec gods.

see Genesis 2:4...the worship of Yahweh is the oldest, and only true religion. Yahweh is now worshipped through His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ. That religion's precepts began to be translated in the 2nd or 3rd century BC into Greek, and has now been translated, and delivered to people in 1000s of languages. Every used bookstore in Tucson has dozens of copies of the Bible in Spanish and English. Copies of the Koran? take a guess.

and the "Genetic Eve"? That just corroborates Genesis, where Eve is called the "mother of all living". (Chapter 3) The 300, 000 years? Those dates shift all over the place. What was taught about Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons 50 years ago is now acknowledged as false. (It's funny watching old TV shows where they talk about Neanderthals "evolving". It's known now that they mated with "modern" man. when I was a kid, I thought it was all real.)

ps I Googled Jonah and Sumeria and got what I expected. Anyone familiar with Jonah can see that's bogus and that the Sumerian religion was fantastical, demonic BS.






as

Clearly, I am an idiot and a hypocrite for not only reading a religion back-and-forth on a songwriter site, that is destroying itself with such, but I have elected to drop in and give my 2 cents. Guilty and foolish but, at least, self aware.

But Robert, you have casually dismissed, what I personally believe to be, the most profound five (or so) words in the history of Western Philosophy and thinking...written by Descartes. So I felt an uncontrollable urge to counter an unproductive and incorrect dismissal.

It is not just a statement of the obvious. It says that all that we know for sure is that... we think (actually we may DOUBT our existence) therefore we are (so, the doubt is proof that the doubt and also ourselves does exist).... And that everything beyond that comes through the senses (perception) and carries some degree of speculation and biased interpretation with it.

To an empirical and critical mind, unwilling to simply accept anything, just because someone said, someone said, it's true...that statement is the starting point (bedrock) for every thought and experience that an empirical mind has. I can't prove that God exists, but I have proof that I do and further proof, is that scalding hot water will burn and disfigure my skin. So, things build upon such realities.

And John, You have a critical mind and I enjoy reading your thoughts. QUESTION: At your age, how can you STILL arrive at being a lib-tard? "Liberal" if you prefer.

Another thing that I know...I think, therefore I am...and beyond that simple fact, this thread will go deeper and deeper into the fog and stay there. So I plan to drop this 2cents and withdraw once again.

Martin

I meant no harm, but I think that phrase is just pretentious naval gazing. I knew it hurt to bump my head when I was 3.

if you're looking for body-cam footage of God, you're not going to get it. But reason teaches it, as well as the most reliable written document. Creation and the Scriptures are like the best song in the universe...creation is the melody, the Bible specifies what the melody is expressing.

Lastly, God wants us to live by faith. That's how we show what's in our hearts, which is what Adam and Eve did by disobeying under ideal conditions, and what Jesus did by remaining sinless under the most arduous conditions imaginable, which He volunteered for. (see also Job 1 & 2 for a sterling example of an imperfect man's integrity.)

Not for nothing, but creation has more flaws in it than perfection... Whoever designed the universe was a brilliant painter and artist, with an eye for self destruction

Did God create the asteroids that pummel the earth and destroy all life on it ? And allow them to pummel the earth. It's a question that will be ignored and not answered.

As for faith,faith is based on something. You dont have faith for no reason, in case of Christians,the faith is based on the stories of the Bible, which were written by human beings, and it's not even known who wrote them.

That said , there's a lot of evidence pointing to a spiritual realm, check out Dr Parnia work on near death experience.

Check out Donald Hoffman's work on the nature of reality, fascinating .

I believe in Jesus. I don't believe in Moses

Perhaps in the end all that matters is that we don't die spiritually. However that is achieved

Couch the importance of that statement is profound because it is as Marty said about doubt and even aspiration, I think, I question, I can become.

I also know you did not mean to dismiss it.

And I thank you for coming in with your Biblical scholarship.

but I do not mean to make this a debate about religion or faith or people's personal beliefs

My apologies for starting that.

I recently wrote a song, Thank You Eve, that has the theme was taking and that was on my mind when I wrote what I did.

Q;
When Adam and Eve were living in obedience to God, and in direct communion with God, do you think they were just being "religious"?

Q;
If the ultimate Christian hope and desire is for God to return to us in the person Jesus Christ, shouldn't we make a very important distinction between faith and belief?

Q. If Adam and Eve were the first two people on Earth, who wrote the story? With no language or writing.

Q if Jesus returns to us, will anybody believe him?There would be no way anybody claiming to be Jesus, could pass modern day scrutiny.

In stone age times, peasants weren't exactly critical thinkers. Which leads to why it worked in those times.

Ever notice the red sea no longer parts? Nothing like that happens today, because it never happened then either

So you wouldn't believe a guy right in front of you who claimed to be Jesus, but you believe a guy from 2000 years ago, all handed down through the Bible. You wouldn't even know Jesus or God, if it wasn't for the hand written Bible.

And dont get me wrong I accepted it as real and the truth too for a long bike and it still lingers.

The comfort it provides people can never be matched.

It took me a long time to question rationally. Never really questioned any of it, it was just there.

Now I'm in the middle of logic and hope

Hmmmmmn...
Do us a favor, Dom... define "logic".

Seriously, I'm not being obtuse.

Logic= the ability to recognize bullshit from fact.

Explain how Adam and Eve were the first and only two people on Earth, yet somehow all the details of their story is written down in a book

We'll get to that... First we must be certain that we are debating the same subject.


So, you believe that the word "logic" is synonymous with words like truth or good?

No, there's nothing good or bad about the word logic, it's a thought process.

Most of us use it every day, even when recording or writing songs, playing guitar.

Who wrote the story of Adam and Eve????

Q. Who wrote Adam and Eve story...


It won't be answered. Cause to answer it is to reveal how silly it is to be taken as fact.

I had professors of theology used to say that most of the old testament were stories made up to explain the unexplainable.

Not to be taken as actual happenings, but to possibly explain Gods intention...

So a bit of poetry....

But then, if Adam and Eve is fictional, why wouldn't parting of the red sea be fictional? Or Noah's ark, or walking on water, or turning water into wine or stone into bread.

Most Christians don't ask questions and if they do they ask with a propensity to say.... Ahh yes ok.

Who wrote Adam and Eve?

Excellent. Now, how do you know if something is truly "logical"?

Still won't answer...

Ok, I'll play dumb. If you don't answer any of my questions that's gonna be it

Let's say Jesus arrives today, He says things like...I am who am.... My father in Heaven is the supreme being... I am the truth the light and the way.

I am the alpha and Omega....

Ok. So now, your thinking this out "logically"

Your first thought would be .. bullshitt, he is not the second coming.

But by what process would you determine if this is in fact Jesus again, or a nut job, or just a spiritual guy who others are saying it.

Now if you're being honest with yourself, what would be your first reaction.... No that's not Him...
How would you know?

So then somebody writes down the supposed Jesus story, and 2000 years later, somebody reads this story and says yes that's the second coming...

In other words logic would prevent you from believing in the second Jesus

But because the first coming was so long ago, and removed from any modern scrutiny, it passes as infallible truth.

How many years have we been having this conversation, Dom?

How many times have you derailed any "logical" train of thought with dismissive juvenile platitudes?

You keep proving, time and times again, that you have no interest in legitimate philosophical interaction... Yet, you never fail to troll me.

Your questions are obvious, redundant, and purposefully adversarial. I don't answer because I simply don't have to.

I obviously know something about the Bible that you don't.

Ok you closed this conversation

Thank You, Dom.

I welcome anyone else to continue this topic in a more meaningful manner...

It is, as you all know, my favorite subject

You know I'm a fan, Tony, but this isn't one of my faves of yours. Not much of a melody, although I like the atmospherics, including the ethereal voice in the background. I find the lyric a bit unapproachable. It takes quite a while to say not a whole lot.

Having said that, it seems to have sparked a lot of discussion here, so maybe I'm just too lazy to pick through it. Hey, even the great upholstered one has dropped by to spread some pearls of his own. As one of the swine, I won't get into the theological undergrowth in search of spiritual truffles and content myself with snuffling around for acorns elsewhere.

I'm not up for a religious debate , Good song Tony

Remix...

https://soundclick.com/song/15138290

Well there is a reason you have 162 likes at JPF.
I like the creative dry bone bongo desert sweep, with rich biblical language.

All the heavy weights, came in for a word or four, and the discussions kept level headed. Interesting reading.

For me though , the next one up, My Other Life?
Really Good.
Bill

Two more and I think I have a legitimate concept album

Thanx Bill