{"id":73988,"date":"2020-05-02T07:24:42","date_gmt":"2020-05-02T04:24:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=73988"},"modified":"2020-05-02T07:24:42","modified_gmt":"2020-05-02T04:24:42","slug":"the-circle-of-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-circle-of-hope\/","title":{"rendered":"The Circle Of Hope\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"73988","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":70715,"related_cahpter":"471","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Big cat biblical scholarship\r\n\r\n","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Elton John and Tim Rice, on the one hand, and Naftali Herz Imber, on the other, provide perspectives on Ezekiel\u2019s relationship with the mixture of contemplation, anticipation, and optimism that we call hope.\u00a0 What Imber had to say about hope based on Ezekiel 37 was meaningful, to be sure, but listening to Tim Rice\u2019s words with Elton John\u2019s music while reading Ezekiel 19 adds more nuance to the topic.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ezekiel 37 tells us about the mass of dry bones that express a lack of any hope.\u00a0 Imber takes their words &#8212; \u201c<em>avda tikvatenu<\/em>,\u201d \u201call our hope is lost\u201d \u2013 and, in keeping with the divine command to Ezekiel to tell the bones that their redemption will come, adds words to create a poem that became Israel\u2019s national anthem, articulating the powerful but simple message that hope has actually not yet been lost.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Chapter 19 of Ezekiel references hope in a different context.\u00a0 Here Ezekiel tells us of a mother lion\u2019s reaction when, distraught about the capture of one of her cubs (referring according to many commentators to Jehoahaz, the deposed king of Judea), she has \u201clost her hope,\u201d \u201c<em>avda tikvata<\/em>.\u201d Knowing that the unfortunate little lion isn\u2019t the only one in the pride, the feline matriarch nudges a different cub \u2013 this one perceived as one or another of the other Judean kings \u2013 to the top of the heap.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the John-Rice hit \u201cThe Circle of Life\u201d from the Broadway show <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Lion King,<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the rock stars\/Bible-scholars-despite- themselves turn the verse around (unknowingly, we might presume), sharing the thought that \u201cin the circle of life . . . it\u2019s the band of hope.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The song invites us to consider in lion-inspired terms the idea that we all work toward our respective destinies even though we don\u2019t know what life has in store for us and even as we recognize that we can\u2019t ever accomplish the entire task that faces us. Against the echo of this big-cat pop-philosophy, Ezekiel 19 has us wonder about the fickle mother that pins her hope first on one of her offspring and when that one falls short in the face of challenges turns on a dime to another one.\u00a0 What is hope, if it can be so easily lost?\u00a0 What is hope if it\u2019s conditioned on the strength and luck of someone whom we imagine, maybe without basis, will prevail on our behalf?\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rice and John leave us with a thought that should discourage us from being too hard on Ezekiel\u2019s confused and bitter lion mom, reminding us that \u201c[t]here\u2019s\u2026 [m]ore to find than can ever be found.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":73990,"id":73990,"title":"ez19-lion king","filename":"ez19-lion-king.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-circle-of-hope\/ez19-lion-king\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"ez19-lion-king","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":73988,"date":"2020-05-02 04:24:10","modified":"2020-05-02 04:24:21","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":639,"height":388,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king-300x182.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":182,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","medium_large-width":639,"medium_large-height":388,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","large-width":639,"large-height":388,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","1536x1536-width":639,"1536x1536-height":388,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","2048x2048-width":639,"2048x2048-height":388,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","post_full_size-width":639,"post_full_size-height":388,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","home_baner-width":639,"home_baner-height":388}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"The Circle Of Hope\u00a0","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"Big cat biblical scholarship","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":73990,"id":73990,"title":"ez19-lion king","filename":"ez19-lion-king.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-circle-of-hope\/ez19-lion-king\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"ez19-lion-king","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":73988,"date":"2020-05-02 04:24:10","modified":"2020-05-02 04:24:21","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":639,"height":388,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king-300x182.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":182,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","medium_large-width":639,"medium_large-height":388,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","large-width":639,"large-height":388,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","1536x1536-width":639,"1536x1536-height":388,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","2048x2048-width":639,"2048x2048-height":388,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","post_full_size-width":639,"post_full_size-height":388,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez19-lion-king.png","home_baner-width":639,"home_baner-height":388}},"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73988"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73988"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73991,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73988\/revisions\/73991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}