Ballade of Charles Sanders Peirce: That Common Measure of the Number Three (An Addition to "The Apology Box")

      Ballade of Charles Sanders Peirce

A "candle" burns a finger, lights a room--

The only sense that "candle" has is how

It might unfold in our experience.

Experience is "firstness" unified.

It's "secondness" upon division.  And

It's "thirdness" in relating separate parts.

Three categories mix.  We'll often see

That common measure of the number three.

A "candle" is a sign one can dissect.

Such word's a signifier pointing to

An object and a meaning of the word.

Since arbitrary, words are symbols though

Resemblance also signifies (icons)

As does participation (indices).

In parts and types of signs, again we see

That common measure of the number three.

We'd waste our time to doubt a sign unless

We're given cause within experience.

If so, we question what is plausible.

We then inquire what might be probable.

That done, we then examine likelihood.

In threes, hypotheses, deductions, and

Inductions wrestle doubt.  Again we see

That common measure of the number three.

James erred in his conception of the truth.

Instead, life's trinities are tilting toward

Real truth that casts a shadow we can see:

That common measure of the number three.


© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Pope Urban II's Double Sonnet: Red Fields and Lucious Palaces (Addition to "The Apology Box")

        Pope Urban II’s Double Sonnet

                               I.

Although we were God's advocate below,

We were a child of Adam, too, brought low

By sin.  We therefore beg forgiveness though

We did our duty.  Bravely, we brought low

The infidels.  Our rhetoric called men to

Jerusalem with swords in hand as Christ

Himself commanded.  Fields ran red with sliced-

Up children, men, expectant mothers, too--

The serpent crushed within the egg can't grow

To blaspheme God or strike at others.  Though

Much bloody work, we had no choice.  Our trust

As shepherds left no option--shepherds must

Protect their lambs.  The Eastern fields ran red

With menaces that shepherds rightly bled.

                                    II.

We tended, too, our wandering sheep inside
The one true church. Thus, to our eastern side
We led the roaming churches back to Rome
While bringing, too, more unity at home

Among the many Occidentals who

Now shared a common venture.  Joined anew,
They focused on a foreign infidel

And Grace that comes from others sent to Hell--

Though we regret our actual person could

Not quit Rome's luscious palaces.  We would

Have joined the foreign danger, blood, and grind

Had our position not kept us behind.

A headless body could not wage a war.

We were the head and lodged in Rome therefore.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016
  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Wittgenstein's Sonnet: No Pictures See Themselves (Addition to "The Apology Box")

    Wittgenstein’s Sonnet

When I was young, words worked a different way.

We hung them round like pictures on a wall

To replicate real objects.  Words used ink

Instead of photographic plates and dyes.

In replication either method worked

So long as illustration captured truth

By rendering objects as they really are.

What more to say?  It all seemed obvious

Until I pictured pictures without us.

No pictures see themselves, their objects, or
A world that is unfiltered by a mind.

Words and their objects are no different.  Thus,

Duck-rabbits now play games within the mind
Where certainty's more difficult to find.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Double Sonnet of William James: Grace That Brings Good Order in the Head (Addition to "The Apology Box")

            Double Sonnet of William James

                                   I.
  
Descartes, pure mind and body can't be kept

Apart as claimed.  Drawn from experience,

They share a common nature, common sense

That both derive from shared experience.

I am therefore a monist.  I accept
That all is drawn from pure experience:
The body, mind, and all relations.  Hence,
Truth, too, must come from shared experience.

Truth is what works in shared experience.
With free will, physics is indifferent.  Hence,
Determinism turns on how we find

An absence of free will.  Because we find
Determinism horrid, we are led

To free will's higher order in the head.

                            II.

Descartes, why suffer needless doubt except

When something fails to work.  There's little sense

In doubting for the sake of doubt. I've kept

So many years of James I see no sense

In doubting James.  Efficiencies accept

That James exists until experience

Astounds such thinking--I of course accept

Doubt when thought stumbles with experience.

For me, religious doubt makes little sense.
Belief in God disturbs no physics.  Hence,

If God brings better order to my mind,

I'd err denying God.  Of tender mind,

I savor God and angels overhead,
And grace that brings good order in the head.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Ishmael's Sonnet: Built As "Normal" Boys (Addition to "The Apology Box")

            Ishmael’s Sonnet

                        

They called me Ishmael.  I was a first

Who wrestled with the "bastard" name though I
Was built as "normal" boys.  With Mother, I

Was cast into the desert.  Struggling first,

 

I'd often hide myself.  I'd lie about

My essence in some feint of normalcy

That let me pass.  As I was outwardly

A normal boy, I need not always out

Myself.  And yet the loss of me within

Such phantom lives did further damage. In

Such feints I slandered parents, slandered, too,

The Lord whose kingdom lay within me, too.

I therefore washed my mouth.  "I am" replaced
The "stain" of "bastard" washing had erased.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Simon Magus: Beyond Your Heaven and Beyond Your Hell (Addition to "The Apology Box")

        Simon Magus's Case*

Stand back, Jehovah!  I do not concede
Your jurisdiction over me. Instead,
I’ve secret knowledge shared among the wise

Of greater gods that reign above your head
And rest unstained by your Creation here.

Before this secret knowledge made me wise,

Men used to drag me to your temples where
They made me watch the helpless lambs within

Writhe as men slit their bleeding, bleating throats.

It was no better outside than within. 
There children starved and there poor animals

Would tear themselves apart in roles you made

Of prey and predator.  I saw the scrolls

Recounting other evils you had done.

You made the devil.  You made man without

A sense of right and wrong then punished him

For disobeying orders not to learn

That difference giving knowledge of your wrongs. 

You tainted Lilith and her progeny

Though she obeyed and never bit the fruit.

You baited Cain to murder by your whim

Of arbitrary anger at his gift.

You killed by indiscriminate deluge

Both beasts and infants that could not have sinned.

The common language of survivors you

Destroyed at Babel where (to add insult)

You forced your syllables on men though you

Had once told Adam he could name the world.

You tortured Abraham with felony,

Made him conspire with you to kill his son.

You baited Sodom with slick angels so

You might destroy again--this time with fire.
You burned up infants, animals, and turned

Flesh salt before a husband's frightened eyes.

You tortured your good servant Joseph in

A foreign land whose tongue he did not know

In a repeat of Babel’s cruelty.

Your mind on Egypt then, you unleashed plagues

So horrid I would rather not recount

The sufferings of men or beasts whose blood

You craved on doors or threw down from the sky

Or swallowed up attached to chariots

Beneath the crashing waves that closed on those

Not choked in waters turned to blood before.

For forty years you marched men in the sand

Where you dispensed bizarre rules governing

Such things as beards and testicles of priests.

You called these “laws” so you could claim the right

And pleasure of your awful penalties.

Bored with the desert, you then turned to war

Both in the taking and the keeping of

A “promised land,” an oxymoron of

Word rightly kept to steal another’s ground.

Not only does such evil bring you down.

Your very mouth betrays you, too: "I am

A jealous god!”  Such jealousy requires

An object.  By your own admission you

Have competition and are not supreme. 
Consistent with us both, I thus reject

Your sovereignty Jehovah.  I would dwell

Beyond your heaven and beyond your hell.

*Simon Magus was a Gnostic who tried to solve the problem of evil by creating another and better realm beyond the one in which we live.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Witch of Endor's Double Sonnets: I Accept No Words for Me Except My Own (Addition to "The Apology Box")

    Witch Of Endor’s Double Sonnets

                            I.

I can't deny that I've known sorcery.

Men's words have cast their spells transforming me

Into a "witch" through verbal alchemy

Purporting to change essences of me.

I am a medium I will admit

But there's no shame or villainy in it.

How can it be an evil if I lend

A tongue to Heaven?  Hypocrites defend

The man who does the same when they declare

A "prophet" in their midst though they would tear

A woman into shreds who has the gift--

Unless of course a woman is more swift

In raising Samuel's ghost when trembling men

Must see it quick.  It's right to use her then.

                       II.

At men's request I raised up Samuel's ghost
That wore white veils across its sunken head
And mouth:  "Saul and his sons will soon be dead!"

Saul blanched and swooned. Now done with Samuel's ghost,

Men scorned my charity.  Not needed more,
I was a witch again good men abhor
And suffer not to live--though oddly men
Who have such powers are most godly men.

I  spat upon their terms, spat out my own,
And recognized no languages where few

Monopolize all prophets for themselves

In "piety" no doubt attempting to
Monopolize all profits for themselves.
I accept no words for me except my own.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Sonnet of John The Baptist (Addition to "The Apology Box")

             John The Baptist’s Sonnet

                    (A nomadic herald)

My one principal was God and as

His agent my one principle was God.

One principal and principle meant I

Ignored all call of urban artifice.

God tailored camels for a desert life.

Therefore, I clothed myself in camel skins--

How could mere John design a better wrap? 
With similar logic, I would not  rethink

The locust beans and honey God served there

That I preferred to any urban fare.

I was God's pristine voice that wilderness

Kept pure enough for Christ himself to hear--
Though urban folk were deaf and  Salome
Would have the mouth, not words upon a tray. 

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Ballade of King John (Addition to "The Apology Box")

                   Ballade Of John Lackland*

            (English king & Richard I's brother)

Although I spilled much blood in France, I would

Have spared it had I means.  But they gave me

No choice.  Vast English lands within France could

Not spurn their sovereign with impunity.

When Anjou, Maine, Poitou and Brittany

Rebelled, I therefore fought.  What choice had one

Who held the crown, who must thus faithfully

Protect the English realm?  God's will be done.

Yet, when the fighting came home, too, I would

Not fight those barons who might murder me

And bring down England, too.  I understood

Consent under duress is legally

Not binding.  With such practicality

I saved the crown and nation.  Having done

So, I proved John would ever faithfully

Protect the English realm.  God's will be done.

Likewise, I fought that "Innocent" who would

Behind misnomers do his treachery

(Like wolves in sheep skin).  Therefore, I withstood

That scheming Roman priest across the sea

Who smelled our English lambs here grazing free.

He would have fleeced them had the Lord picked one

Less faithful, had the Lord not ordered me:

"Protect the English realm!" God's will be done.

O Lord, I only ask for serving thee

Long days for Albion.  When anyone

Presents a threat, King John will forcefully

Protect the English realm.  God's will be done!

*According to various sources, the poet’s 24^th great-grandfather through Thomas Yale and 26^th great-grandfather through Anne Lloyd Yale.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016
  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Ezekiel: The Universe Leaps Over Heart & Head (Addition to "The Apology Box")

Ezekiel’s Double Sonnet

                                                               (A prophet of the exile)
                         I.

A rift ran down the middle of my soul

With halves that tugged perpetually at war

And kept me torn as both a priest and man.

I found that rules and that exceptions can

Be true at once.  Though contradictory,
We must have justice, must have mercy, too,

And must have death although we hear the din

Of dusty bones redressing into skin.

A nation must be punished for its sin,
A nation made of aggregates where one
Thus bears the guilt of all although no one
Is guilty for the deeds another's done:

The father's never guilty for the son
Nor is the child for what the father's done.

                        II.

God's scroll was written to be read. Yet, God
Fed me the message, too.  Sad to the ear
Words somehow tasted honeyed to the tongue.

In honeyed thought, I thought of being young
In Israel again although I knew
That logic stays me.  God, though, had free hand

To seize my hair and whisk me off to stand
Outside the temple walls. I found a hole
Within one wall and peered in where I saw

Beyond facades, beyond exterior awe
To inner awe that dwarfed all things that we
(However wise) have ever felt or said.

The universe leaps over heart and head
Whose terms of course can't curb a universe
Whose essence always brings it back to God.

 © Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here. 

The Brexit Vote Was "No" Not "Yes"

In any reasonable sense of a "federal" referendum, the United Kingdom did not vote to quit the European Union.  (I put "federal" in quotes because I know that the United Kingdom is not a federation in the American sense.  However, I use the term because I believe that the United Kingdom must figure out a workable federalism if it is to survive.)

Caesar, Antony, & Brutus (Additions to "The Apology Box")

     Julius Caesar Joins His Cousins

Hail cousins in Olympus!*  Like you, I

Have intervened throughout the world.  I warred

Not just in Rome but in far regions, too,
As god in man no doubt is prone to do.

Why not go far in war since I must war

Regardless?  God and man are opposites

And thus could not keep truces long in me.

They often warred and shook me violently.

I wondered how the two in me were mixed:

Were they both loose?  Were they together chained?

Was one a cage that kept the other pent?

Did they conjoin in some third element?

However joined, despite all paradox,

I came. I saw. I conquered.  I now thank
Rome's daggers that the incarnation's past,

That I'm a pure and quakeless god at last.

*He was an epileptic whose family claimed descent from Venus.

            Brutus’s Defense

Did we do murder?  Not on Caesar’s watch.
Crime is defined within some rule of law.
His tyranny suspended rule of law.

Did we do evil?  Not in killing him

When reason would instead condemn the hands

Refusing reason and its pure demands.

We rescued reason when our blades brought down

The despot flaunting it.  And if we should

Now balance pain, we find the common good

We did outweighs the suffering Caesar felt.

We should be stoic, too, and recognize 

That fate spins narratives and thus denies

The choice required for blame.  And yet so what?

The finest reason never dulls the pain
As past replays itself time and again:

The awful cries, the sounds of blades against

The spine, the red spurts, then the vacant stare
As rigor mortis seizes Caesar there.

I am no hypocrite.  I've suffered, too,
In righting Rome vile Caesar had abused.
I need no flogging.  I'm already bruised.

            Marc Antony’s Defense

Will future generations laud my name?

No. History is pillage victors own.

The vanquished are deprived of it--and yet

I stand before the gods with no regret

Or fear.  The judgment of the gods, I know,

Is never swayed by pillaging below.

Before I fell, in Athens they hailed me

As a new Dionysus.  They were right.

I saw beyond convention.  Nature was

My measure--not some antique prejudice

That drew a line between the West and East.

Uncritical acceptance in me ceased:

I freed my mind and heart to analyze

All things in truth, not prejudice.  I spurned

The ancient, awful bigotry of Rome
Permitting one the lowest Roman wife

Yet banning Cleopatra as a bride.

Pure truth advised me, too, when Caesar died.

I would not profit from his murder.  I

Embraced the bloody vessel that once held

Great Caesar and I promised my revenge.

Whatever evil men might say of me,

I was a loyal friend who also dared

To free both mind and heart Rome once impaired.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here. 

Langdell Defends Langdell With A Villanelle (An Addition To "The Apology Box")

Though I've gone after Langdell several times in prose (Exercising Common Sense, Razing Langdell, and Days of Auld Langdell), I've not attempted it in verse till now.  The Villanelle seemed a good form and I felt he would speak of himself in the third person were he writing it.  Of course, even in the more polished form of a villanelle, I still disagree with Langdell's thoughts on casebooks, experienced teachers, law's nature, and more.  Law is not a certain science.  Law practice experience makes better, not worse law professors.  Theory is blind if separated from practice.  Practice is empty without theory.  Law schools are therefore elevated rather than "dumbed down" by teaching practice and theory both.  The hypocrisy of Langdell's practicing for fifteen years while saying practice taints is of course not lost on me either.  I couldn't bear including a photo of the man so I have instead substituted a page from his infamous contracts casebook.

Daniel: Nighttime Hieroglyphics in the Head (Addition to "The Apology Box")

        Daniel’s Sonnet

   (A Jew “exiled” in Babylon)

Through deepest faith, I tapped night's lexicon

That Nimrod changed. Confusion fell upon

More than the day when Babel’s Tower fell.

The language of the night collapsed as well,

And dreams took dialects they’d lacked before.

New gibberish infected night.  Therefore,

Men needed me to translate dreams that hid

Night's messages to them.  Of course, I did.

And when God wrote upon the wall instead

Of nighttime hieroglyphics in the head,

I was the only person who could read

The markings and convey what he had said.

I revel and reveal with words.  They are
Mind's whiskey, its key, and its reservoir.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Augustine: Faith Must Come First (Addition to "The Apology Box")

          Augustine’s Lines and Acrostic

                     (A bishop of Hippo)

Si fallor, sum! I no doubt must exist
However fraught with error since to err

I must be there to do the errant thing.
Pure skepticism therefore can't be true
And truth I set off early to pursue. 

The Manicheans moved my ears with tales

Of light and dark in endless war they proved

Through daily combat of the light and dark,
Through daily rise and fall of suns and stars,

Through all our politicians and our priests

Forever mixed in virtue and in vice--

Such Manichean proof was powerful for

A youthful head untrained in reason or

How easily a fact can be a whore.

In time, I learned the syllogism and

Abandoned Manichean foolishness--

By definition good lacks evil.  Hence,

The good and evil cannot be conjoined

In such theatric struggle.  Thus, I turned
To logic and more careful use of words,

Learned rhetoric, but soon I wanted more--
I'd not forgotten my "si fallor, sum!"  
Through Plato I found changeless Truth and Good
Which briefly brought great pleasure though it vexed
Me next.  If real is really past all change

(Which seems required, too, if God foreknows all),

Must that not mean that everything was set

In stone from the beginning?   Thus poor Eve

Was forced to sin, the serpent to deceive?
I flailed about until I could perceive:

All inquiry of course fails where I am

Beliefless.  Credo ut intelligam--

How can I seek an answer unless I

Am clear first on the means with which to try?
Faith must come first to put some terms in place
That we can use for parsing up a case.

Gathering up my thoughts, I thus confessed

Raw sin throughout my life.  In faith, I'd rest

And pray for undeserved last clemency

Content to rest in God's hands knowing the

Election might have long passed over me. 


© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

Mary Magdalene (Addition to "The Apology Box")

            Mary Magdalene’s Apology

Though fathers of the church might not recall,
I was his favored ally over all--
Though I had awful moments I admit.

I saw the seven horrid faces of

The demons driven out.  Pride lurched out first.

It smirked as it looked back at me.  It kissed

Its gilded mirror, dropped its glass, then spread

Its filthy, gaudy tail.  It stretched its wings

And took its pompous exit on the breeze.

Then Envy slithered out, a serpent scaled

With eyes instead of plates.  Each lens scanned round

From different angles not to miss a grudge.

Its filthy fangs were always poised to strike

With venom ever dripping.  Thus, the snake

Ingested greater poison than its prey.

Then Gluttony with well-worn teeth chewed its

Way out of me and tumbled on the ground

To roll away in its growing sphere of flesh.

Then Idleness crawled out.  Its wrinkled robes

Were stained and filthy.  It could barely hold

Its head upright until it found a bed.

Then heaving-breathing Avarice crawled out

So loaded down with precious things it could

Not stand. Despite the wealth it bore, its clothes

Were worn and fit it poorly.  Sweating, it

Crawled off distraught--it never hauled enough.

Then lion-headed Wrath leapt out of me.

Its awful roar was followed by a spray

Of blood its flailing limbs slung as it ran.

Then last of all sprang hairy Lust.  (Perhaps

I’m most remembered for the last since it

By chance became the final one to leave.)

O Lord, I tremble still to think about

Those awful spectacles as each came out.

And yet once freed of seven demons, I

Could kneel to wash my master’s feet.  I could

Anoint his head with oil and laud him well.

Then when his fortunes changed, I could as well

Stand by him as they nailed him up.  And when

Some armored angels swept him up from Hell

I could run out and spread good news to all--
I was his favored ally after all.           

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

P.S. In the Rhetoric to Lettie, I speculate on how Christ might have confided in his favorite disciple:

    Jesus Confides in Mary Magdalene

The kingdom is within.  Search for it there.

The sinner is the one who in despair

Awaits the day his chariot should come.

The kingdom is not coming.  It is here.

There are no portents, earthquakes, storms to fear

Before arrival.  Simply look within.

Tell others that the kingdom is within,

That first it’s small like seeds or leaven in

The dough but has its powers to expand.

Be mindful of the present or you’ll miss

Brief miracles of leavens such as this.

Live in the “am,” not in the “will” or “was”

And revel in the kingdom found within.

There can be no forgiveness for the sin

Of self-rejection.  Broken can’t be right.

Commit yourself at once, do not delay

To act on what you’ve found.  Though others say

That faith suffices, fruit defines the tree.

Embrace your enemy and do no deed

You’d not have others do to you.  Once freed

From difference, inner light uncovered shines.

Be humble and be open as a child.

Be curious and never be beguiled

By rules or “prophets” that snuff out the light.

For light will show whenever two are one,

Whole mountains can be moved.  Division gone,

Whole mountains cannot claim their former place.

Know rules serve us.  When bending must be done,

Bend rules to light, not light to them.  Don’t sin

By elevating Sabbaths over light.

Though I must leave you soon, I still shall shine:

My light remains in you as yours in mine,

And therefore separation never comes.

Split any piece of wood and I am there.

Lift any rock and you will find me there.

Set any table.  You will find me there.

Have bread and wine in common to recall

The need to share both food and drink with all—

And do this for your fellow flesh and blood.

As I have done, reach out to heal the sick—

Though not just those with fevers.  Heal heartsick

And troubled spirits, too.  Do miracles.

Though I have set upon a painful course,

I choose it freely--right could never force

A faultless one to pay another’s fine.

No innocents are sacrificed though I

Am willing for the sake of truth to die.

That’s what the Cross should symbolize for you.

I’m neither Paul, nor Pope, nor Protestant.

I am before they came, before they went.

I am before their Sabbaths as are you.

 © Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The Nicodemus Paradox (Addition to "The Apology Box")

            Nicodemus's Double Sonnet

I saw the merit of that holy man.  I showed

Him bold respect in public and I sat

Beside him as my teacher.   I raised up

My hand in public when I was confused

By his instruction:  “How could an old man

Be born again?”  I asked.  He answered me.

When hypocrites would kill him in the name

Of “God” and “Church,” I interposed myself

And spoke in his defense.  I took the risk

Without a moment’s hesitation, and

When they had murdered him, I helped embalm

And carry the cadaver to a tomb.
With greater powers, I would have helped him more.
But born without them, I could do no more.

Why did I yet remain a “Pharisee”?

There only is one true assembly of

God’s people.  Words cannot change that.  I'd not

Concede my notion of a "Pharisee" to frauds.
Instead, I would protect it by my deeds

That would instead preserve exalted words.

I worshiped with God’s words while others lied

With them.  It was confusing.  Yet, I fought

And even gave my quandary a name:

The “Nicodemus Paradox.”  If we

Use “Church” with scoundrels it’s hypocrisy

Yet if we give them “Church” it’s blasphemy.

With greater powers, I would have wrestled more.
But born without them, I could do no more.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016

The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.

How the "Ten" Commandments Refute Originalism & Fundamentalism (With Some Help From Herod, Caiaphas & Ahab's Additions to "The Apology Box")

Conservatives often like to claim that texts speak for themselves.  A review of the Ten  Commandments is an easy way to see how such claims are false.  First, such a review nicely shows that we must interject our own judgment even before we start reading a text because we first have to decide what the text is.  When we look for "Ten" Commandments in the Bible, we won't find such a neat list.  Instead, we'll find two places in the Bible (Exodus 20:1–17 and Deuteronomy 5:4–21) which support such a list though we could come up with a different number depending on what we expressly include (for example is not bowing down to other gods included in not putting other gods first or is it a separate command?) and depending upon how we group what we find.  The number 10 is thus in that sense arbitrary.  

Second, once we've used our judgment as to the content and number of the list, reading the commandments still requires much interpretation.  For example, read literally they say that we cannot kill.  That would mean we could not cut down a tree much less kill a wild beast attacking us.  Of course, no reasonable person would take these words that literally and thus no honest person who is reasonable would claim we don't have to use our minds and hearts when we read a text.  Instead, what we generally want to do when reading the words of others is to figure out what the speaker meant by those words.  This involves engaging in what philosophers of language call pragmatics, a topic that I have written about elsewhere.  Have Ahab, Herod, and Caiaphas really tried to understand and follow speaker meaning in the poems that follow? 

Third, the Ten Commandments also remind us of another wrinkle in cross-language cases.  The Commandments are in an ancient language that most of us cannot read.  We must thus rely on translations, and translations also involve judgment and often are erroneous or questionable at best. Anyone who tells us that we can and should take a translation literally and without question is thus wrong on multiple levels.