Sometimes: "There Really Ain't No Contradiction"

The Writings of the Babylonian Exile comprise hundreds of years of discussions on how to interpret the Scriptures these exiled folk and their kids and ancestors brought with them into the diaspora. The Sages often disagreed on how to read those texts. But ... Pages following pages of disagreements are not untypically settled by one of two brief expressions:

לא פלוגתא ... (Lo Plugta) ... 

There really is no contradiction, at least if you look at it right.

and 

תיק׳׳ו ... (Taiku) .... 

A complete answer will, alas, have to await the arrival of Elijah, 
(ie, "no time soon," inc ase you were waiting on a quick answer.)

Like Sextus Empiricus, a founder of the Pyrrhonian Skeptics, these Masters were willing to accept that a question, after all, is most often either too complicated for there to be a single answer or, else, the answer to complex questions often arrives in only-apparently contradictory semantic packages. Message? It's not necessary to know the absolute Capital-T Truth! 'Specially since y'can't.

I'm not rightly certain about what this has to do with getting on in years but I seem to have less patience as the Fourth Quarter deepens for witnessing gratuitous enmities that arise from a conviction held by this or that believer. Taliban smashing Buddhist Idols. Abraham smashing his Dad's! It's my birthday, today, and I feel surrounded in this World by folk who are thoroughly convinced of their rightness ... of their truth. And when I even hear about such folk -- never mind when I meet them -- I feel a pain in the area of my heart ... or is it my esophagus. I don't imagine to know, for certain, but I experience this heaviness which sometimes seems to drive me right into a cardiac arrhythmia.

Now! That really sucks.

After all, I can't do much about it but, still, it seems to upset me ... makes me sad. Chances are it's only obvious to M ... and to myself, of course ... and to those who may read my words.

It may be very different for other Last Quarter types ... they may choose a different path than becoming a radical Skeptic. I'm radical, that is, about not being radical about my beliefs ... except that Olde Time Skepticism!

I guess that was Howard's Paradox, but -- off the cuff -- all the following really get to me.

Radical -ists of any religious ism, including Aetheism ... except, that is, Skepticism.

Radical Laborists and Radical Capitalists;

Radical Animal Rights folk and Rabid Meat Eaters;

Radical Choicests and Radical Lifers;

Rad Democrats and Rad Republicans;

Jingoed Nationalists and Unwavering Internationalists;

Angry Whites and Angry Blacks; and

Pissed off Feminists, Susan Schaffley and Male Chauvinists.

I could go on. Maybe I will? ... ... My better angels say: Nah!

I'll just sign off ... and plan to head off to Babylonia for my next Birthday.

With luv ...

Angry Olde-Birthday-Man Howard