- What does the phrase 'Old friend from home' mean?
- In #35 "Bartlet's Third State of the Union" the phrase "An old friend from home" was used to summon people surreptitiously from a party. In #41 "Bad Moon Rising" Charlie is able to pull Leo out of a meeting with the phrase.
- Miriam Diesendruck writes about the first mention: "Leo needed certain people extricated from the post-State of the Union celebration quietly. It clearly means something like "There's a very serious situation requiring your immediate presence. Drop everything now, don't say anything, and come here."
- Susannah Nix of Inside the Bartlet White House, confirms the previous mention, which we didn't remember.
- Katie Floyd writes on the phrase "Old Friend From Home." "In each occasion the term was used
as an 'Old Friend' of Leo's. Indeed Bartlet is an 'Old Friend.' In
Bartlet's Third State of The Union, Margaret told the people she needed to
exit without a scene that 'Leo would like them to meet an old friend of
his.' Meaning Leo needs them to meet with the President. When Charlie told
Margaret to say it was regarding an 'Old Friend' again, it was regarding the
President."
- Why did Zoey fill out her college entrance forms for Georgetown when she was 17 [#41], but not start college until she was 19?
- The forms mentioned in #41 were specifically for Georgetown ("Zoey had to fill out a family history form for Georgetown and because she was 17, a parent had to sign it") - The following is speculation:
Lets say, for the sake of argument, that Bartlet took office in January 1999 (the year hasn't been officially established but we need a point of reference). If Zoey started college at 19 in January of 2000, then she graduated from high school around June of 1998 when she was 17. In June of 1998, her father would have been deeply involved in running for President but in September when she may have been planning to actually start college, he would have been the nominee. Although, that wouldn't have stopped her from going to college, she may have decided that she didn't want the hassle when she wouldn't even know at that time, if he would win or lose the bid for the presidency. So even though all her forms had been filled out and she was ready to start school, she may have put everything on hold at the last minute in September. What she did for the next year and a half, we don't yet know. But then she finally started college when she was 19.
- What was it Charlie read from at Mrs. Landingham's memorial service [#44]?
- Linda Craugh came up with the Book, Chapter and Verse as: Wisdom 3:1-4. But this raises more questions.
- Where is the Book of Wisdom in the Bible?
The Book of Wisdom is only in the Catholic (and Orthodox Christian) versions of the Bible.
- Where is it in the Catholic version?
Linda Craugh answered that question: "Old Testament, between Song of Songs and Sirach."
- Why would Charlie read from a book exclusive to Catholics, if the service was to be non-denominational?
Now, that is a question since it had been established that Mrs. Landingham wasn't Catholic and there has been no indication that Charlie is. Maybe, realizing that a funeral is for the living not the dead, Charlie chose his reading for the person most affected by this death: the Catholic President Bartlet. Or Charlie could have gone to a Catholic school even without being Catholic and remember this verse from school and think it appropriate for this situation.
- Why isn't the Book of Wisdom in other versions of the Bible?
Susan E. writes: "Only Catholics and Orthodox Christians
have that particular book in their Bible. Protestants don't accept Wisdom and several other books because they can only be found in Greek translations."
The Encyclopaedia Britannica refers to it as The Wisdom of Solomon and says of it: "It is an apocryphal work (noncanonical for Jews and Protestants) but is included in the Septuagint (Greek translation of the Old Testament) and was accepted into the Roman canon."
The New American Bible (Catholic Bible Publishers, 1978-1979 Edition) says: "The Book of Wisdom was written about a hundred years before the coming of Christ. Its author, whose name is not known to us, was a member of the Jewish community of Alexandria in Egypt. He wrote in Greek. . . . At times he speaks in the person of Solomon, placing his teachings on the lips of the wise king of Hebrew tradition in order to emphasize their value. . . . The primary purpose of the sacred author was the edification of his co-religionists in a time when they had experienced suffering and oppression. . . ."
However we did hear from several Protestants who say that that Book of Wisdom is sometimes referred to:
- James Squire wrote: "As a Lutheran protestant, I thought you should know that the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America uses
the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible and the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod uses the
Revised Standard Version (for the most part), and the Oxford annotated
edition of both versions does indeed include the Apocrypha, including
the Book of Wisdom. We don't consider it a part of our primary canon,
but we do consider it to be a valuable writing. I suppose you could say
we consider it to be a part of a secondary canon."
- Also Kenneth Taylor wrote: "Since the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, a.k.a. the National Cathedral, is an Episcopal church, the reading from Wisdom is appropriate. In Burial of the Dead, Rite II (from the Book of Common Prayer, 1979), Wisdom 3:1-5, 9 is an option for the Old Testament lesson."
- Did Catholics finish the Lord's Prayer with "For Thine is the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory, forever and ever" in 1960 [#44]?
- We got several emails after this episode was first broadcast
saying that the episode was wrong in claiming that Catholics don't finish
the Lord's prayer with the section that starts "For Thine is the Kingdom.
. ." These people claimed they said this every Sunday during Mass. Well
we finally heard from someone who had an answer (the kind where everyone
is right).
Joe Devney sent us the following information to consider in this regard:
-
The Lord's Prayer (or "Our Father") has two versions, Catholic and Protestant.
The chief difference between the two is the one that young Jed Bartlet
pointed out: only the Protestant version includes the phrase, "For Thine
is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever," immediately
before the concluding "Amen."
-
In the Catholic mass today, the "power and glory" text is recited by the
congregation, but not in the same place as in the Protestant Lord's Prayer.
The traditional Catholic prayer ends with "but deliver us from evil." The
priest then says a few more sentences before the congregation recites the
phrase. (The concluding phrase is not used outside of mass, for instance
when praying the rosary.)
-
Young Jed Bartlet made his comment in 1960. The second Vatican council
(1962-1965) authorized "significant changes in the text, forms, and language
used in the celebration of the mass." The "power and glory" response was
one of the changes to the liturgy that came out of the Council.
-
My sources for this information include the Encyclopaedia Brittanica,Luther's
Small Catechism, a Catholic missal from the 1940s, and my experiences
as a Catholic school student throughout the 1960s, including serving as
an altar boy during the time when the liturgy was changing.
So, in 1960 Bartlet was stating something true then but changed in the
following years.
- July 17, 2005 - Remember how in "365 Days", Annabeth is advising Charlie on how he needs a better name if he wants to push the Earned Income Tax Credit? Well, we were reminded of that when we read an article in today's New York Times Magazine called "The Framing Wars":
 The article is about how the Democrats are now following in Republican footsteps in paying attention to how they talk about something, how they "frame" --- how they communicate --- their side of the debates. Previously, they "had allowed Republicans to control the language of the debate, and that had been their undoing." If they take control, they can "frame" the issues, which consists of, "choosing the ;aguage to define a debate and,, more important, with fitting individual issues into the contexts of broader story lines." It goes on to talk about "the father of framing" being George Lakoff, a linguistics professor at Berkeley who during the last Presidential election got frustrated enough to try to distill his theories into a "book about politics and language" titled, Don't Think Of An Elephant!/ How Democrats And Progressives Can Win: Know Your Values And Frame The Debate: The Essential Guide For Progressives. (This is available in paperback for $8, which is #23 in Books at Amazon at the moment or in a more recent DVD/Book for $15.30, with a forward by Howard Dean in an introduction by Don Hazen.
|
Questions
