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Further Proof Civilization Is Declining...


So_crates
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1 hour ago, So_crates said:

 

On YouTube, no less...

Wow....just wow....talk about an actual WTF...I wonder if Craig and the way will start fighting in court now that hes using their copyrighted material....hold up...lemme get my popcorn..but...it speaks volumes that martindale's youtube channel has 164 followers...

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I remember when that "show" was put on in the WOW auditorium. OMG. We in research were rolling our eyes, or rather puking behind the scenes because we knew the "research" behind it was bogus. So did WJC, but he didn't confront LCM about it, just let it go ... one more nail in the coffin as far as I was concerned. I include details about this in Undertow. It was definitely a turning point.

Ugh. Found out later, including in the well researched book,The Cult That Snapped, that there was much "hanky panky" going on with cast members, some strong testimonies in the book regarding LCM and the woman who played "the seed of the serpent." Disgusting and very sad, indeed.

 

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30 minutes ago, penworks said:

OMG. We in research were rolling our eyes, or rather puking behind the scenes because we knew the "research" behind it was bogus. So did WJC, but he didn't confront LCM about it, just let it go ...

Odd, isn't it? I would think if the BOD and the ministry executives truely believed the ministry had the Word of God, they would fight tooth and nail to keep it pure. Instead, they bite their tongues and go along with it.

Also, where were the gift ministries? Aren't the prophets tasked with the job of keeping the MOG on the straight and narrow?

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ckeer, Jun 16 2005, 02:38 PM , "Athletes of the Spirit" thread.

"I assume you are talking about the movie Staying Alive and the Show within the movie- Satans Alley. I remember LCM saying he used it as a basis for Athletes- I think I remember him showing clips from it at an explanation/ teaching about AOS."

TheHighWay, Jun 16 2005, 11:52 AM, same thread.

"Do you all remember that Loy-boy accused Sly of stealing his ideas for this movie from their original Athletes ROA production?

Supposedly that was part of the reason Loy wanted to do a full-blown AOS... he stated he wanted to "do it right" and thumb his nose at Hollywood's devil spirits.

Oh my... talk about ego."

Bob, Jun 17 2005, 11:23 AM, same thread.

"Here's what I recall Craig saying about AOS and Staying Alive:

Sometime in the late 70's / early 80's, TWI did a skit on the ROA stage about AOS. Supposedly, someone from Hollywood was in the audience watching, liked what he saw, and copied it for use in Staying Alive.

Loy got ticked off when Staying Alive came out, said they copied their ROA skit. So Loy copied, verbatim, the Satan's Alley section for AOS.

If anyone can be sued for copyright infringement, it would be TWI by the producers of Staying Alive."

outandabout, Jun 17 2005, 12:53 PM.

"LCM came through San Diego one time around 1984-85. He used a scripture about learning things from "a little bird."

In other words, the devil could transmit info via devil spirits. Thus, the original Athletes from ROA was given to the people who made "Stayin Alive." Therefore, TWI could take what they did in the movie and use it because it originally came from TWI.

Uh huh... of course it all made sense to me at the time because LCM said it.

He also was on his Seed of the Serpent trip. His big example was Steven Spielberg."

TheHighWay, Jun 17 2005, 09:35 PM.

" I was in-rez the year they were working on AOS, and every time Craig came to town (Emporia) he would talk at great length about every aspect of the production... his thought processes, the reasons behind all the costumes and dance moves, blah-dee-blah-blah... I'm sure I have the specifics somewhere in my notes, but off the top of my head, he stated that Sly Stallone was clearly "influenced" because at the time he and his wife were planning the timing of the conception of their child with star charts and the like. Because Sly was "influenced" he was getting insight into how to put "Satan's Alley" together accurately... ruling spirits, underling spirits, the decadence,writhing, etc. Craig said he wanted to do it from a Godly, Biblically accurate perspective. (essentially showing the devil up, not that he put it like that)."

-------------------------------------------------

My list of ripoffs from that thread:

"I caught the "Satan's Alley" segment.

They could have sued his head off.

"Satan's Alley" features:

the scaffolding

the villianess in red

the villains in masks

the grasping/writhing

the "hero" in white

the rising podium section

the grunting/yelling sound effects

the jumping combat

the flying kick

the white light representing the presence of God

the one-one-one combat towards the end with the guy's shirt off"

==============

Rascal, from the thread on the Passion of the Christ,

Mar 24 2004, 11:39 AM

"This reminds me of the whole athletes of the spirit fiasco....

LCM came to the advanced class ...he was so excited about having seen the *staying alive* movie with John Travolta....there was a scene where in the production John Travolta was doing involving a battle with devil spirits....Lcm was all hepped up about how twi could do it better ....more accurately more skillfully more dramatically...yada yada ...and thus the conception of aos was born...simply because HE, lcm wanted to show the world how twi could do it bigger and better than Holly wood ever could......

You know........even vpw couldn`t dissuade him from it....

That was the way it always was when I was in twi....if they hadn`t done it first....it wasn`t worth doing...

Twi`s critisisms are so childish."

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1 hour ago, WordWolf said:

Twi`s criticisms are so childish."

And I'm confident he was still projecting. :wink2:

No doubt Loy and twi could have gotten sued, but I doubt the major studio(s) cared because who knew about the spirits of the athletes besides people in the cult?

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On 7/16/2023 at 8:18 PM, So_crates said:

Going deeper into Athletes of the Spirit lore, here is the scene from Stayin' Alive the the ministry production pays homage to:

 

You have unraveled a great mystery for me - I never understood why people would say AOS was a rip-off of Staying Alive.  I kept thinking I saw the movie and there wasn't anything like the "seed dance" in it.  Now I realize that I was actually thinking of the movie Saturday Night Fever where Stayin' Alive was the opening song.  I never knew about this movie which surprises me because I love to watch dance movies (Footloose/Kevin Bacon, Dirty Dancing/Patrick Swayze, Flashdance/Jennifer Beals [with the help of body and dance doubles] dancing to What a Feeling).

So when I saw this scene above from the movie Staying Alive, it all made sense except after 30 seconds, I couldn't stand to watch any more - it so reminded me of AOS plus I just could not understand why such a similar dance, setting and costumes would be in a major motion picture.  My momentary confusion was because of having seen the AOS video first and so often that it felt like the movie was copying it (instead of the other way round) which was a real freaky feeling.  Since then I've watched a bit more but I haven't decided whether to watch the whole movie to see what the storyline for the Satan's Alley dance was.

Anyway, still trying to figure out which athletic sports have any of the moves shown in AOS - if you know of any, please enlighten me. 

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"Anyway, still trying to figure out which athletic sports have any of the moves shown in AOS - if you know of any, please enlighten me."

Obviously, the blocks and kicks (and unassigned strikes) were taken from martial arts.  Possibly the only thing lcm added to the moves was the thing they used to represent speaking in tongues-  some sort of wind-sprints used in US football practice.  Whereas the other 8 moves representing manifestations had some sort of practical aspect- a block, an evasion, a strike-  this was the only one that, by itself, actually did nothing whatsoever. (In hindsight, it was accidentally a perfect symbol of what we were told was "speaking in tongues", but that's another subject and you can contact me about that.)   

In whatever guidebook I read at the time, it said the foot-stomping thing in that move was supposed to represent "the energizing of the holy spirit."  So, in later moves, when people did that foot-stomping thing, it was supposed to represent people doing SIT. 

At the time, I wanted to complain about what moves were assigned to what.  In particular, "word of knowledge" - divine revelation of information-  and "word of wisdom" - divine revelation of practical application communicated.   In AOS, WOK was represented by a block, and WOW was represented by an evasion.  Personally, I thought it should have been the other way around-  word of knowledge allowing entire events or actions to be bypassed (an evasion)  and word of wisdom being a direct interception of information and an immediate redirection of thought- a block.   Under the circumstances, it's hardly worth mentioning compared to all the actual errors, ripping off a movie wholesale,  rewriting Scripture to pretend it said something it did not (Ephesians 6:10-17 in particular), but I thought it was worth mentioning as a point of interest.  Also, lcm had a sequel planned. The first production carried forward through "the Gathering Together" all the way to the "New Heaven and New Earth" in Revelation 21.  What was left to do in a second production?     (When I mentioned that a bit later, Raf suggested a sequel could have been used to try to correct all the errors of the first one.)

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So, for those people who want to read previous threads discussing Athletes of the Spirit (AOS), there's several, and I found a few.

https://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/topic/16069-rocky-horror-athletes-of-the-spirit/

Rocky Horror Athletes of the Spirit.

 

https://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/topic/6753-athletes-of-the-spirit/

Athletes of the Spirit.

 

https://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/topic/298-bg-leonards-book-foundationsplagiarism/

"BG Leonard's book, Foundations Plagiarism"

 

https://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/topic/25483-aos-new-topics-same-as-old-topic/

"AOS New Topic's Same as Old Topic."

 

https://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/topic/24790-are-we-athletes-of-the-spirit-or-soldiers-for-christ/

"Are We Athletes of the Spirit or Soldiers for Christ?"

 

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4 hours ago, WordWolf said:

"Anyway, still trying to figure out which athletic sports have any of the moves shown in AOS - if you know of any, please enlighten me."

Obviously, the blocks and kicks (and unassigned strikes) were taken from martial arts.  Possibly the only thing lcm added to the moves was the thing they used to represent speaking in tongues-  some sort of wind-sprints used in US football practice.  Whereas the other 8 moves representing manifestations had some sort of practical aspect- a block, an evasion, a strike-  this was the only one that, by itself, actually did nothing whatsoever. (In hindsight, it was accidentally a perfect symbol of what we were told was "speaking in tongues", but that's another subject and you can contact me about that.)   

In whatever guidebook I read at the time, it said the foot-stomping thing in that move was supposed to represent "the energizing of the holy spirit."  So, in later moves, when people did that foot-stomping thing, it was supposed to represent people doing SIT. 

At the time, I wanted to complain about what moves were assigned to what.  In particular, "word of knowledge" - divine revelation of information-  and "word of wisdom" - divine revelation of practical application communicated.   In AOS, WOK was represented by a block, and WOW was represented by an evasion.  Personally, I thought it should have been the other way around-  word of knowledge allowing entire events or actions to be bypassed (an evasion)  and word of wisdom being a direct interception of information and an immediate redirection of thought- a block.   Under the circumstances, it's hardly worth mentioning compared to all the actual errors, ripping off a movie wholesale,  rewriting Scripture to pretend it said something it did not (Ephesians 6:10-17 in particular), but I thought it was worth mentioning as a point of interest.  Also, lcm had a sequel planned. The first production carried forward through "the Gathering Together" all the way to the "New Heaven and New Earth" in Revelation 21.  What was left to do in a second production?     (When I mentioned that a bit later, Raf suggested a sequel could have been used to try to correct all the errors of the first one.)

Which leads to the obvious, unfortunate truth that martindale didn't really know just what in the actueal heck he was talking about.

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5 hours ago, WordWolf said:

"Anyway, still trying to figure out which athletic sports have any of the moves shown in AOS - if you know of any, please enlighten me."

Obviously, the blocks and kicks (and unassigned strikes) were taken from martial arts.  Possibly the only thing lcm added to the moves was the thing they used to represent speaking in tongues-  some sort of wind-sprints used in US football practice.  Whereas the other 8 moves representing manifestations had some sort of practical aspect- a block, an evasion, a strike-  this was the only one that, by itself, actually did nothing whatsoever. (In hindsight, it was accidentally a perfect symbol of what we were told was "speaking in tongues", but that's another subject and you can contact me about that.)   

In whatever guidebook I read at the time, it said the foot-stomping thing in that move was supposed to represent "the energizing of the holy spirit."  So, in later moves, when people did that foot-stomping thing, it was supposed to represent people doing SIT. 

At the time, I wanted to complain about what moves were assigned to what.  In particular, "word of knowledge" - divine revelation of information-  and "word of wisdom" - divine revelation of practical application communicated.   In AOS, WOK was represented by a block, and WOW was represented by an evasion.  Personally, I thought it should have been the other way around-  word of knowledge allowing entire events or actions to be bypassed (an evasion)  and word of wisdom being a direct interception of information and an immediate redirection of thought- a block.   Under the circumstances, it's hardly worth mentioning compared to all the actual errors, ripping off a movie wholesale,  rewriting Scripture to pretend it said something it did not (Ephesians 6:10-17 in particular), but I thought it was worth mentioning as a point of interest.  Also, lcm had a sequel planned. The first production carried forward through "the Gathering Together" all the way to the "New Heaven and New Earth" in Revelation 21.  What was left to do in a second production?     (When I mentioned that a bit later, Raf suggested a sequel could have been used to try to correct all the errors of the first one.)

Thank you WW! I've been enlightened (reminded of) that there are athletic activities other than the ones I see constantly being watched on TV in my home like baseball, hockey, golf, soccer, tennis and football (apparently there's not much interest in basketball) :biglaugh:.  I also have forgotten about the "teaching" blabbering LCM did in AOS.  My unpleasant reaction to seeing Staying Alive's dance put me in a pretty pessimistic mood about all things AOS.

Thanks also for bringing scripture into your reply - always love to see that :love3:

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I once showed this to someone very close to me, who knew some of my past. For many childhood memories, it's hard to bring them all up at once. They come in waves. A lot of it I don't remember until some other event joggles one loose.

Anyway, this was on YouTube elsewhere, the one dubbed in French, and I showed it them: "Hey, look at this. We used to watch this all the time when we were kids."

Almost immediately they looked back at me with eyes of concern and maybe horror. This surprised me. Incredulity or mockery — I expected. But not the concern, almost a kind of sadness.

"You watched this as children?"

"Yep."

"Are you okay???"

I just had to laugh — I never thought about AOS that way. Looking back now, this is some demented stuff even for an adult to look at. But at least we can tell it's all nonsense.

But I said, yes, I'm okay now — though I wasn't for a long time. Thanks to experiences like these, I feel more compassion for my former self now. I suffered a lot through no fault of my own. Looking at that kid as if they were my own child. No way they'd be watching this garbage. Or even less so being told it's true.

It got me thinking. No wonder I was constantly afraid of being attacked by invisible beings at any and all times! I was afraid of the dark for many years! I was afraid of any scary TV show or movie. To us those weren't fictional — they are real spirits, and the only way to stop them was to speak in a foreign language we did not understand. Which I pretended at, but secretly knew I was not doing for real, not like everyone else, who was definitely speaking angelic languages and not just making it up.

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In all the years since AOS first came out, I have never heard anyone talk about the music.

It has always been my opinion that AOS had the best of the best music.

I have thought of it as being some of the best music of the 20th Century. 

It is still very inspiring to me.  I'm lucky that I didn't see the video enough to be stuck with the visual AOS scenery in my mind as I listen to it.

The general story is also very inspiring: a twig leader protecting his people. Too bad it overemphasized the idea that devils can  be defeated with dance, music, and colorful costumes.

I was even happy that Craig jumped into it as an obvious amateur, in that it can be inspiring for us to take on unusual activities we thought we were not qualified for.  I know that seeing Craig teaching with his amateur dancing stuck in my brain as something positive.  I was, at that time, a genuine dance phobe, but maybe Craig softened my fears there, and somehow 10 years ago dance became the most fun hobby I ever found.

 

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Several times I have reported that AOS was inspired by a play called "The Struggle of the Magicians" by Gurdjief.  I know that VPW read P.D. Ouspensky's "In Search of the Miraculous" because he told me himself, personally.  Ouspensky was Gurdjief's popularizer around 100 years ago. He wrote his book in 1949.

Below are the first three occurrences of the word "magicians" in this book.  There were 9 passages altogether, but these should show that the main inspiration for AOS came from this book.

Also to be seen here, besides the story line, are some of the comments that Craig would put on the SNS tapes as they were developing and practicing for AOS, and how the performers get to learn special things about their spiritual walk.

Page 13

From London, through Norway, Sweden, and Finland, I arrived in Petersburg, already renamed "Petrograd" and full of speculation and patriotism. Soon afterwards I went to Moscow and began editorial work for the newspaper to which I had written from India. I stayed there about six weeks, but during that time a little episode occurred which was connected with many things that happened later.

One day in the office of the newspaper I found, while preparing for the next issue, a notice (in, I think, The Voice of Moscow) referring to the scenario of a ballet, "The Struggle of the Magicians," which belonged, as it said, to a certain "Hindu." The action of the ballet was to take place in India and give a complete picture of Oriental magic including fakir miracles, sacred dances, and so on. I did not like the excessively jaunty tone of the paragraph, but as Hindu writers of ballet scenarios were, to a certain extent, rare in Moscow, I cut it out and put it into my paper, with the slight addition that there would be everything in the ballet that cannot be found in real India but which travelers go there to see.

Soon after this, for various reasons, I left the paper and went to Petersburg.

There, in February and March, 1915, I gave public lectures on my travels in India. The titles of these lectures were "In Search of the Miraculous" and "The Problems of Death." In these lectures, which were to serve as an introduction to a book on my travels it was my intention to write, I said that in India the "miraculous" was not sought where it ought to be sought, that all ordinary ways were useless, and that India guarded her secrets better than many people supposed; but that the "miraculous" did exist there and was indicated by many things which people passed by without realizing their hidden sense and meaning or without knowing how to approach them. I again had "schools" in mind.

 In spite of the war my lectures evoked very considerable interest. There were more than a thousand people at each in the Alexandrovsky Hall of the Petersburg Town Duma. I received many letters; people came to see me; and I felt that on the basis of a "search for the miraculous" it would be possible to unite together a very large number of people who were no longer able to swallow the customary forms of lying and living in lying.

 

P 16-18

It is difficult for me to reconstruct the beginning of the conversation with G.'s pupils. Some of the things I heard surprised me. I tried to discover in what their work consisted, but they gave me no direct answers, insisting in some cases on a strange and, to me, unintelligible terminology.

They suggested reading the beginning of a story written, so they told me, by one of G.'s pupils, who was not in Moscow at the time.

Naturally, I agreed to this; and one of them began to read aloud from a manuscript. The author described his meeting and acquaintance with G. My attention was attracted by the fact that the story began with the author coming across the same notice of the ballet, "The Struggle of the Magicians," which I myself had seen in The Voice of Moscow, in the winter. Further—this pleased me very much because I expected it—at the first meeting the author certainly felt that G. put him as it were on the palm of his hand, weighed him, and put him back. The story was called "Glimpses of Truth" and was evidently written by a man without any literary experience. But in spite of this it produced an impression, because it contained indications of a system in which I felt something very interesting though I could neither name nor formulate it to myself, and some very strange and unexpected ideas about art which found in me a very strong response.

I learned later on that the author of the story was an imaginary person and that the story had been begun by two of G.'s pupils who were present at the reading, with the object of giving an exposition of his ideas in a literary form. Still later I heard that the idea of the story belonged to G. himself.

The reading of what constituted the first chapter stopped at this point. G. listened attentively the whole time. He sat on a sofa, with one leg tucked beneath him, drinking black coffee from a tumbler, smoking and sometimes glancing at me. I liked his movements, which had a great deal of a kind of feline grace and assurance; even in his silence there was something which distinguished him from others. I felt that I would rather have met him, not in Moscow, not in this flat, but in one of those places from which I had so recently returned, in the court of one of the Cairo mosques, in one of the ruined cities of Ceylon, or in one of the South Indian temples—Tanjore, Trichinopoly, or Madura.

"Well, how do you like the story?" asked G. after a short silence when the reading had ended.

I told him I had found it interesting to listen to, but that, from my point of view, it had the defect of not making clear what exactly it was all about. The story spoke of a very strong impression produced upon the author by a doctrine he had met with, but it gave no adequate idea of the doctrine itself. Those who were present began to argue with me, pointing out that I had missed the most important part of it. G. himself said nothing.

When I asked what was the system they were studying and what were its distinguishing features, I was answered very indefinitely. Then they spoke of "work on oneself," but in what this work consisted they failed to explain. On the whole my conversation with G.'s pupils did not go very well and I felt something calculated and artificial in them as though they were playing a part learned beforehand. Besides, the pupils did not match with the teacher. They all belonged to that particular layer of Moscow rather poor "intelligentsia" which I knew very well and from which I could not expect anything interesting. I even thought that it was very strange to meet them on the way to the miraculous. At the same time they all seemed to me quite nice and decent people. The stories I had heard from M. obviously did not come from them and did not refer to them.

 "There is one thing I wanted to ask you," said G. after a pause. "Could this article be published in a paper? We thought that we could acquaint the public in this way with our ideas."

"It is quite impossible," I said. "This is not an article, that is, not anything having a beginning and an end; it is the beginning of a story and it is too long for a newspaper. You see we count material by lines. The reading occupied two hours—it is about three thousand lines. You know what we call a feuilleton in a paper—an ordinary feuilleton is about three hundred lines. So this part of the story will take ten feuilletons. In Moscow papers a feuilleton with continuation is never printed more than once a week, so it will take ten weeks—and it is a conversation of one night. If it can be published it is only in a monthly magazine, but I don't know any one suitable for this now. And in this case they will ask for the whole story, before they say anything."

G. did not say anything and the conversation stopped at that.

But in G. himself I at once felt something uncommon; and in the course of the evening this impression only strengthened. When I was taking leave of him the thought Hashed into my mind that I must at once, without delay, arrange to meet him again, and that if I did not do so I might lose all connection with him. I asked him if I could not see him once more before my departure to Petersburg. He told me that he would be at the same café the following day, at the same time.

I came out with one of the young men. I felt myself very strange—a long reading which I very little understood, people who did not answer my questions, G. himself with his unusual manners and his influence on his people, which I all the time felt produced in me an unexpected desire to laugh, to shout, to sing, as though I had escaped from school or from some strange detention.

I wanted to tell my impressions to this young man, make some jokes about G., and about the rather tedious and pretentious story. I at once imagined myself telling all this to some of my friends. Happily I stopped myself in time. —"But he will go and telephone them at once. They are all friends."

So I tried to keep myself in hand, and quite silently we came to the tram and rode towards the center of Moscow. After rather a long journey we arrived at Okhotny Nad, near which place I stayed, and silently said good-by to one another, and parted.

 

Page 23,24

I once asked G. about the ballet which had been mentioned in the papers and referred to in the story "Glimpses of Truth" and whether this ballet would have the nature of a "mystery play."

"My ballet is not a 'mystery,'" said G. "The object I had in view was to produce an interesting and beautiful spectacle. Of course there is a certain meaning hidden beneath the outward form, but I have not pursued the aim of exposing and emphasizing this meaning. An important place in the ballet is occupied by certain dances. I will explain this to you briefly. Imagine that in the study of the movements of the heavenly bodies, let us say the planets of the solar system, a special mechanism is constructed to give a visual representation of the laws of these movements and to remind us of them. In this mechanism each planet, which is represented by a sphere of appropriate size, is placed at a certain distance from a central sphere representing the sun. The mechanism is set in motion and all the spheres begin to rotate and to move along prescribed paths, reproducing in a visual form the laws which govern the movements of the planets. This mechanism reminds you of all you know about the solar system. There is something like this in the rhythm of certain dances. In the strictly defined movements and combinations of the dancers, certain laws are visually reproduced which arc intelligible to those who know them. Such dances are called 'sacred dances.' In the course of my travels in the East I have many times witnessed such dances being performed during sacred services in various ancient temples. Some of these dances are reproduced in The Struggle of the Magicians.' Moreover there are three ideas lying at the basis of "The Struggle of the Magicians.' But if I produce the ballet on the ordinary stage the public will never understand these ideas."

I understood from what he said subsequently that this would not be a ballet in the strict meaning of the word, but a series of dramatic and mimic scenes held together by a common plot, accompanied by music and intermixed with songs and dances. The most appropriate name for these scenes would be "revue," but without any comic element. The "ballet" or "revue" was to be called "The Struggle of the Magicians." The important scenes represented the schools of a "Black Magician" and a "White Magician," with exercises by pupils of both schools and a struggle between the two schools. The action was to take place against the background of the life of an Eastern city, intermixed with sacred dances. Dervish dances, and various national Eastern dances, all this interwoven with a love story which itself would have an allegorical meaning.

I was particularly interested when G. said that the same performers would have to act and dance in the "White Magician" scene and in the "Black Magician" scene; and that they themselves and their movements had to be attractive and beautiful in the first scene and ugly and discordant in the second.

"You understand that in this way they will see and study all sides of themselves; consequently the ballet will be of immense importance for self study," said G.

I understood this far from clearly at the time, but I was struck by a certain discrepancy.

"In the notice I saw in the paper it was said that your 'ballet' would be staged in Moscow and that certain well-known ballet dancers would take part in it. How do you reconcile this with the idea of self-study?" I asked. "They will not play and dance in order to study themselves."

"All this is far from being decided," said G. "And the author of the notice you read was not fully informed. All this may be quite different. Although, on the other hand, those taking part in the ballet will see themselves whether they like it or not."

"And Who is writing the music?" I asked.

"That also is not decided," said G. He did not say anything more, and I only came across the "ballet" again five years later.

 

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1 hour ago, Mike said:

The general story is also very inspiring: a twig leader protecting his people. Too bad it overemphasized the idea that devils can  be defeated with dance, music, and colorful costumes.

Criminy! The "general story" is specific nonsense. I'd ask why you don't simply realize a person (twig leader) doesn't really provide "spiritual protection" for "his people." S/he may pray for his/her friends but excellence arising from intention might rather highlight GOD protecting people. No? Yes?

Stories didn't overemphasize anything, IMO. Victor's private interpretation skewed both the writers/performers and the audience understanding. In terms of story, which can effectively teach or impress or illuminate in an observer's mind and understanding, there was no overemphasis. There was only distorted understanding of the function of storytelling.

Sorry if I sounded too condescending. :evilshades:

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2 hours ago, Logicisgreatstuff said:

I once showed this to someone very close to me, who knew some of my past. For many childhood memories, it's hard to bring them all up at once. They come in waves. A lot of it I don't remember until some other event joggles one loose.

Anyway, this was on YouTube elsewhere, the one dubbed in French, and I showed it them: "Hey, look at this. We used to watch this all the time when we were kids."

Almost immediately they looked back at me with eyes of concern and maybe horror. This surprised me. Incredulity or mockery — I expected. But not the concern, almost a kind of sadness.

"You watched this as children?"

"Yep."

"Are you okay???"

I just had to laugh — I never thought about AOS that way. Looking back now, this is some demented stuff even for an adult to look at. But at least we can tell it's all nonsense.

But I said, yes, I'm okay now — though I wasn't for a long time. Thanks to experiences like these, I feel more compassion for my former self now. I suffered a lot through no fault of my own. Looking at that kid as if they were my own child. No way they'd be watching this garbage. Or even less so being told it's true.

It got me thinking. No wonder I was constantly afraid of being attacked by invisible beings at any and all times! I was afraid of the dark for many years! I was afraid of any scary TV show or movie. To us those weren't fictional — they are real spirits, and the only way to stop them was to speak in a foreign language we did not understand. Which I pretended at, but secretly knew I was not doing for real, not like everyone else, who was definitely speaking angelic languages and not just making it up.

OTOH, your reflection on your impressions, experience, and your friend's impressions say a lot. Thanks for saying it.

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"It has always been my opinion that AOS had the best of the best music.

I have thought of it as being some of the best music of the 20th Century."

 

These are challenging, if hilarious, sentences to read. They are telling.

 

I invited my son to join me at the movies last week. He wasn't keen on the particular film because his mom saw it and she said it was not good. When pressed, he admitted she didn't like it because it depicted some human behavior she disagreed with -- she hated it because of this.

It was an opportunity to teach on criticism -- criticism of film, music, architecture, food, coffee... whatever.

I quoted the excellent essay On Connoisseurship by the wine writer Matt Kramer, "A Connoisseur is one who can distinguish between what he or she likes, and what is good. The two are by no means always the same."

 

Edited by Nathan_Jr
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1 hour ago, waysider said:

Yeah, it's right up there with George Gershwin and Rachmaninov.

I was thinking more of Schubert and his amazing masterpiece "Rosamunde."    

Like AOS, the play that Schubert wrote that music for bombed and closed in a week, but the music lived on.  Like in AOS, the melodies are riveting in Rosamunde.

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Just rewatched part of the video where craig was teaching his fellowship how to fight deebil spurts...that production is awful....the only thing ?

 

yep...

 

 

yoiu guessed it

 

 

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