Nick Groom. Twenty-first century Tolkien: What Middle Earth means to us today. Atlantic Books: London, 2023. pp xxiii, 451.

Nick Groom, the author of Twenty-first century Tolkien, approaches Tolkien from almost the opposite side to myself; in terms of what we each think is significant about Tolkien the Man, The ...

One of the questions that arises early for readers of the Book of Mormon is how Lehi, who is not a Levite and certainly not a descendant of Aaron, can offer sacrifice (1 Ne. 2:7), a privilege which, in the Torah as we have it, is restricted to those lineages.

The simplest answer is that this whole concept of an ...

It seems impossible (for many reasons) for us to make ourselves feel good, or even better, most of the time - certainly not all of the time. Indeed, to focus on our feelings seems like the wrong approach altogether. And indeed it is! (although our feelings are nonetheless always relevant).

Higher consciousness (i.e. ...

Perhaps it is driving the principle too far to say that Being with God is less than Being with Self?

It is something which depends on the way we understand this statement. If we give-up our own individuality in order to be God's own Self - as some, it seems, are trying to do - we simply become God's own Self again, ...

It is the convention of map reading to place North at the top of the page. But everyone knows that this has no bearing on anything beyond convention. For example, if we ascend in a hot air balloon and look down at the fields and roads bellow, then "up" is not where north is: "Up" means ascending higher into the sky. ...

On the night of August 27, 1986, Whitley Strieber had an experience in which he heard nine very loud knocks in three groups of three. He recounts the story in his 1988 book Transformation:I returned to the house, took a shower, and then went downstairs to do some reading. Dr. [John] Gliedman had given me his essay ...

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James Tissot, La flagellation de dos (1886-1894)

This is from the Passion narrative in John 18:38-19:6.

[38] Pilate . . . went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, "I find in him no fault at all. [39] But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: will ye ...

In my reading for 2022, I drew these two cards for the birdemic: the Four of Swords for the beginning of the year, and the Sun for the end.

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My interpretation was as follows:

The Four of Swords often indicates rest and recuperation, corresponding to the widespread sense at the beginning of the ...

On a post by Wm Briggs, about artificial intelligence, a commenter with the monniker "ItsAllBullshit" writes: "AI is a smoke screen for what they really want to do, control who works where. If you are familiar with the way that algorithms work, you will understand that AI today is simply an inefficient ...

John Fitzgerald and I have compiled a book from our posts on the Albion Awakening blog and Bruce Charlton has written an introduction for it.

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The paperback version can be found here.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1708664955

for the UK market

and here for the American ...