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Noah in Islam

Noah, also known as Nuh (نُوحٌ), is recognized in Islam as a prophet and messenger of God. He is also believed to be the first messenger sent by God. He is one of the Ulul 'azm prophets. Noah's mission was to warn his people, who were plunged in idol worshipping. God charged Noah with the duty of preaching to his people, advising them to abandon idolatry and to worship only God, and to live good and pure lives. Although he preached the Message of God with zeal, his people refused to mend their ways, leading to building the Ark and the Deluge, the Great Flood. In Islamic tradition, it is disputed whether the Great Flood was a global or a local one. Noah's preaching and prophethood spanned 950 years according to the Quran, ahadith and tafsir.

Praise
Noah is praised by God in the Qur'an, which shows his great status amongst the prophets. In 17:3 of the Qur'an, God states: "He was indeed a grateful servant." The Qur'an also states in a later chapter: "Indeed, Noah cried out to Us, and how excellent are We in responding! We delivered him and his family from the great distress, and made his descendants the sole survivors. And We blessed him ˹with honourable mention˺ among later generations: “Peace be upon Noah among all peoples.”"

And also in 3:33, the Qur'an states: "Indeed, Allah chose Adam, Noah, the family of Abraham, and the family of ’Imrân above all people ˹of their time˺.

Story
According to the Qur'an, Noah was inspired by God like other prophets—such as Ibrāhīm (Abraham), Ismā'īl (Ishmael), Ishaq (Isaac), Ya'qub (Jacob), Isa (Jesus), Ilyas (Elijah), Ayyub (Job), Harun (Aaron), Yunus (Jonah), Dawud (David) and Muhammad—and was a faithful messenger. Noah had firm belief in tawhid (the oneness of God), and preached Islam (literally "submission," meaning submission to God).

He continuously warned the people of the painful doom that was coming and asked them to accept one God instead of worshipping idols such as Wadd, Suwa', Yaghuth, Ya'uq and Nasr. He called the people to serve God, and said that nobody but God could save them. He said that the time of the deluge was appointed and could not be delayed, and that the people had to submit to God.

God commanded Noah to build a ship, the Ark, and as he was building it, the chieftains passed him and mocked him. Upon its completion, the ship is said to be loaded with pairs of every animal, and Noah's household, and a group of believers who did submit to God. The people who denied the message of Noah, including one of his own sons, drowned. The final resting place of the ship was referred to as "Al-Jūdiyy" or a "Munzalanm-Mubārakan" (مُنْزَلًا مُّبَارَكًا). Noah is called a grateful servant. Both Noah and Abraham were taught the prophethood and the scripture. According to Shi'a tafsir (exegesis), God commanded Noah to take all species that he needed on the ship. The commentary by Prophetic descendants explains the verse to mean eight animals.

Traditional narrative in Islam
According to Islam, he was a prophet, sent to warn mankind of that region and his people to change their ways. He conveyed the message for over 950 years. Islamic literature recounts that in the Generations of Adam, many men and women continued to follow Adam's original teachings, worshiping God alone and remaining righteous. Among Adam's descendants there were many brave and pious men, greatly loved and revered by their respective communities. Exegesis goes on to narrate that, upon the death of these elders, people felt enormous grief and some felt prompted to make statues of these people in remembrance of them. Then gradually, through the generations many forgot what such statues were for and began to worship them, (as the Shaytan (Satan) slowly deceived each generation) along with many other idols. In order to guide the people, God appointed Noah with the duty of being the next prophet to humanity.

Early preaching
According to Islamic belief, Noah began preaching to his people both verbally and through example. He would praise God consistently and he urged his people to do the same, warning his tribe of the punishment they would face if they did not mend their ignorant ways. The Qur'an states that Noah repeatedly told his people:

Though a few were moved by Noah's words, the powerful and wealthy members of the tribe refused to hear his call. The unbelievers at the time were impelled to rebel by various evil motives. Firstly, they were extremely envious and jealous of men superior to them in any way. Secondly, the people were ignorant of the weak and lowly, who were frequently superior intellectually, morally and spiritually. As a result of their ignorance, they were arrogant and mocked all who they felt were inferior to them. They would ask Noah, "Shall we believe in you, when the inferior follow you?" Noah would respond: "Their account is only with my Lord, if you could (but) know." When Noah preached the faith of God to them, all they did was revile the messenger, abuse the Message, and refer to the whole warning as a lie. He then went on to explain the Prophetic Message in greater depth, ensuring them that it was not a message of destruction but it was a message with the mercy from God, and that their acts would lead to destruction if they did not accept the faith. He questioned them, asking why they would not accept what would benefit them in the near future. Noah went onto further, and told his community that he asked of no reward from them, telling them his only reward would be from God. But his people threatened him with being stoned.

Accusation
As time passed, Noah became firmer in his preaching. When the unbelievers began insulting those who accepted God's message, believing that Noah would send those faithful away to attract the wealthy unbelievers, Noah revealed that they—the arrogant and ignorant rich—were the wicked and sinful ones. His people accused him of being soothsayer or diviner. Noah declared that he was by no means a mere fortune-teller, pretending to reveal secrets which are not worth revealing. Noah also denied accusations claiming he was an angel, always maintaining that he was a human messenger. When the people refused to acknowledge their sinfulness Noah told them that it was not Noah, but God that would punish them - however God pleased.

Prayer
The Qur'an states that Noah prayed to God, complaining that his preaching only made his people disbelieve further. Noah told God how they had obstinately refused to accept the message, so that the light of the truth should not affect their thinking. Noah told God how he had used all the resources of the classical preacher, conveying the message both in public places and with individuals in private. Noah spoke of how he had told the people the rewards they would receive if they became righteous, namely that God would supply plentiful rain as a blessing, and that God would also guarantee them an increase in children and wealth.

Building of the Ark
According to the Quran, one day, Noah received a revelation from God, in which he was told that no one would believe the message, aside from the few who had already submitted to God. Noah's frustration at the defiance of his people led him to ask God to not leave even one sinner from the people he was sent to; not the whole earth like in the Bible. Although there is no proof that God accepted his prayer (as there are many examples of accepted prayers, such as in case of Yunus,  Lut (Lot),  Suleyman (Solomon)  etc., even Noah's prayer in some other shape was accepted ), God decreed that a terrible flood would come (and yet, Qur'an doesn't say it came to cover whole Earth) and He ordered Noah to build a ship (فلك) which would save him and the believers from this dreadful calamity. Ever-obedient to God's instructions, Noah went out in search of material with which to construct the vessel. When Noah began building the Ark, the people who saw him at work laughed and mocked at him even more than before. Their conclusion was that he was surely a madman; they could not find any other reason why a man would build a huge vessel when no sea or river was nearby. Although Noah was now very old, the aged patriarch continued to work tirelessly until, at last, the Ark was finished.

Family
Little is known of Noah's personal history before his call to prophecy. However, Ibn Kathir records him to have been the son of Lamech and grandson of Methuselah, one of the patriarchs from the Generations of Adam. Noah was neither the leader of the tribe nor a very rich man but, even before being called to prophecy, he worshiped God faithfully and was, in the words of the Qur'an, "a devotee most grateful".

Noah was married to a woman whose name is not mentioned in the Quran. Some Islamic historians such as Al-Tabari have suggested that the name of Noah's wife was Umzarah bint Barakil but this cannot be confirmed. Most Muslims simply call her by her midrashic name Naamah.

The Quran states that Noah's wife was not a believer with him so she did not join him. The sons of Noah are not expressly mentioned in the Qur'an, except for the fact that one of the sons was among the people who did not follow his own father, not among the believers and thus was washed away in the flood. Also the Qur'an indicates a great calamity, enough to have destroyed Noah's people, but to have saved him and his generations to come. Noah's wife (Naamah) is referred to in the Qur'an as an evil woman. When God emphasizes upon the notion that everyone is for themselves on the Day of Judgement and that marital relations will not be to your aid when the judgement takes place, the Qur'an says:

"Allah sets forth an example for the disbelievers: the wife of Noah and the wife of Lot. Each was married to one of Our righteous servants, yet betrayed them. So their husbands were of no benefit to them against Allah whatsoever. Both were told, “Enter the Fire, along with the others!”" In contrast, the wife of the Pharaoh of the Exodus, Asiya, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, are referred to as among the best of women. This adds to the notion that, on the Last Day, everyone will be judged according to their own deeds. The "Stories of The Prophets" explain that the son who declined to embark was a non-believer.

Searches for Noah's Ark
Searches for Noah's Ark have been reported since antiquity, as ancient scholars sought to affirm the historicity of the Genesis flood narrative by citing accounts of relics recovered from the Ark. With the emergence of biblical archaeology in the 19th century, the potential of a formal search attracted interest in alleged discoveries and hoaxes. By the 1940s, expeditions were being organized to follow up on these purported leads. This modern search movement has been informally called "arkeology".

In 2020, the young Earth creationist group the Institute for Creation Research acknowledged that, despite many expeditions, Noah's Ark had not been found and is unlikely to be found. Many of the supposed findings and methods used in the search are regarded as pseudoscience and pseudoarchaeology by geologists and archaeologists.

Ashure

There is a Turkish dessert in remembrance of Noah, which is called Ashure or "Noah's pudding". It is made out of grains, nuts, and dried and fresh fruits. These are believed to be the few ingredients left on the ark, used by Noah and his family to celebrate the end of the flood.

Tomb

There are several sites that are claimed to be the Tomb of Noah:
 * Noah's Mausoleum in Cizre, Şırnak, Turkey
 * Noah's Mausoleum (Sunni Islam) in Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan
 * Karak Nuh, Beqaa, Lebanon

References in the Quran

 * As one of the first messengers:, , , , , , , ,
 * Noah's preaching:, , , , , , , , , , , ,
 * Challenges for Noah:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
 * "The grateful" Noah:
 * Noah's wishes granted:, , ,
 * God destroyed Noah's people:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
 * Noah was saved on the Ark:, , , , , , , , , ,
 * Appraisal for Noah:, ,

title: Noah in Islam


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R. J. Yeatman

Robert Julian Yeatman (15 July 1897 – 13 July 1968) was a British humourist who wrote for Punch. He is best known for the book 1066 and All That, a tongue-in-cheek guide to "all the history you can remember", which he wrote with W. C. Sellar.

Yeatman was born in Chelsea, London. He spent some of his early years in Oporto, the principal city and port of northern Portugal, where his father worked as a port wine merchant, a family business connected with Taylor's Port. From 1911 he was educated at Marlborough College. In World War I he was commissioned into the Royal Field Artillery. Serving in France, he won the Military Cross and was severely wounded. After the war he attended Oriel College, Oxford, where he met Sellar. Yeatman then worked as a journalist before becoming advertising manager for Kodak Ltd.

When asked to convert his BA from Oxford into an MA, Yeatman could not find the fee owing to debt, and hence he is recorded in 1066 and All That as "Failed M.A., etc. Oxon".

With ambitions to be a writer, Yeatman contributed humorous pieces to Punch from 1926, with 1066 and All That published in 1930, which was an immediate success. Three further joint ventures with Sellar followed: And Now All This (1932), Horse Nonsense (1933), and Garden Rubbish (1936), all selling well but without the popular success of 1066.

Yeatman rejoined the army in 1940, serving as a captain in the Royal Artillery, then working for the Ministry of Information from 1943 until 1949. Afterwards he was employed as a copywriter, retiring in 1962.

A biography of R J Yeatman, written by his son Bill Yeatman, is available at www.agoodmanforallthat.com

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: R. J. Yeatman


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Hud (prophet)

Hud or Hood or Eber in other traditions, (هُودٌ) was a prophet and messenger of ancient Arabia mentioned in the Quran. The eleventh chapter of the Quran, Hud, is named after him, though the narrative of Hud comprises only a small portion of the chapter.

Historical context
Hud has sometimes been identified with Eber, an ancestor of the Ishmaelites and the Israelites who is mentioned in the Old Testament.

Hud is said to have been a subject of a mulk (مُلك, kingdom) named after its founder, 'Ad, a fourth-generation descendant of Noah (his father being Uz, the son of Aram, who was the son of Shem, who in turn was a son of Noah):

"The ʿĀd people, with their prophet Hud, are mentioned in many places. See especially, and . Their eponymous ancestor ʿAd was fourth in generation from Noah, having been a son of 'Aus, the son of Aram, the son of Sam, the son of Noah. They occupied a large tract of country in Southern Arabia, extending from Umman at the mouth of the Persian Gulf to Hadhramaut and Yemen at the southern end of the Red Sea. The people were tall in stature and were great builders. Probably the long, winding tracts of sands (ahqaf) in their dominions (46:21) were irrigated with canals. They forsook the true God, and oppressed their people. A three years famine visited them, but yet they took no warning. At length a terrible blast of wind destroyed them and their land, but a remnant, known as the second ʿĀd or the Thamud (see below) were saved, and afterwards suffered a similar fate for their sins. The tomb of the Prophet Hud (qabr Nabi Hud) is still traditionally shown in Hadhramaut, latitude 16 N, and longitude 49$1⁄2$ E, about 90 miles north of Mukalla. There are ruins and inscriptions in the neighborhood."

- Abdullah Yusuf Ali

The other tribes said to be present at this time in Arabia, were the Thamud, Jurhum, Tasam, Jadis, Amim, Midian, Amalek Imlaq, Jasim, Qahtan, Banu Yaqtan and others.

The Quran gives the location of ʿĀd as being Al-Aḥqāf (ٱلْأَحقَاف, "The Sandy Plains", or "The Wind-curved Sand-hills"). It is believed to have been in South Arabia, possibly in eastern Yemen and/or western Oman. In November 1991, a settlement was discovered and hypothesized to be Ubar, which is thought to be mentioned in the Qur'an as Iram dhāt al-ʿImād ("Iram of the Pillars" or "Iram of the tentpoles"), and may have been the capital of ʿĀd. One of the members of the original expedition, archeologist Juris Zarins, however, later concluded that the discovery did not represent a city called Ubar. In a 1996 interview on the subject, he said:

"If you look at the classical texts and the Arab historical sources, Ubar refers to a region and a group of people, not to a specific town. People always overlook that. It's very clear on Ptolemy's second century map of the area. It says in big letters "Iobaritae". And in his text that accompanied the maps, he's very clear about that. It was only the late medieval version of One Thousand and One Nights, in the fourteenth or fifteenth century, that romanticised Ubar and turned it into a city, rather than a region or a people."

The Moroccan mystic Abdulaziz ad-Dabbagh gives detailed information about Hud: According to him, alludes to the fact that Hud was sent to the second ʿAd tribe, which lived after Noah. The first 'Ad tribe had a messenger named Huwayd, whose message was to be revived by Hud, and the tribe was destroyed with stones and fire by God. Hud was Eber's son (see Eber in Islam for his genealogy) and Iram was the name of one of the tribes of 'Ad, specifically the one Hud was sent to (see Iram in the Qur'an).

Narrative in the Quran

This is a brief summary of Hud's narrative, with emphasis on two particular verses:

The people of ʿĀd were extremely powerful and wealthy and they built countless buildings and monuments to show their power. However, the ʿĀd people's wealth ultimately proved to be their failure, as they became arrogant and forsook God and began to adopt idols for worship, including three named Samd, Samud and Hara. Hud, even in childhood, remained consistent in prayer to God. It is related through exegesis that Hud's mother, a pious woman who had seen great visions at her son's birth, was the only person who encouraged Hud in his worship. Thus, the Lord raised up Hud as a prophet for the ʿĀd people.

When Hud started preaching and invited them to the worship of only the true God and when he told them to repent for their past sins and ask for mercy and forgiveness, the ʿĀd people began to revile him and wickedly began to mock God's message. Hud's story epitomizes the prophetic cycle common to the early prophets mentioned in the Quran: the prophet is sent to his people to tell them to worship God only and tells them to acknowledge that it is God who is the provider of their blessings The Quran states:

"11:50 And to the people of ’Âd We sent their brother Hûd. He said, “O my people! Worship Allah. You have no god other than Him. You do nothing but fabricate lies ˹against Allah˺. 11:51 O my people! I do not ask you for any reward for this ˹message˺. My reward is only from the One Who created me. Will you not then understand? 11:52 And O my people! Seek your Lord’s forgiveness and turn to Him in repentance. He will shower you with rain in abundance, and add strength to your strength. So do not turn away, persisting in wickedness.” 11:53 They argued, “O Hûd! You have not given us any clear proof, and we will never abandon our gods upon your word, nor will we believe in you. 11:54 All we can say is that some of our gods have possessed you with evil.” He said, “I call Allah to witness, and you too bear witness, that I ˹totally˺ reject whatever you associate 11:55 with Him ˹in worship˺. So let all of you plot against me without delay! 11:56 I have put my trust in Allah—my Lord and your Lord. There is no living creature that is not completely under His control. Surely my Lord’s Way is perfect justice. 11:57 But if you turn away, I have already delivered to you what I have been sent with. My Lord will replace you with others. You are not harming Him in the least. Indeed, my Lord is a ˹vigilant˺ Keeper over all things.”"

Miracle
According to a tafsir from Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya in his book of analysis, Madaarij Saalikeen, which has been quoted by Ibn Abi al-Izz in his syarh (commentary) of Al-Aqida al-Tahawiyya, Hud has a miracle, which is pointed by the verse of 54-57:

"(54-55) "All we can say is that some of our gods have smitten you with evil." He replied:" I call God to witness, and you be witness too, that I am clear of what you associate (in your affairs) ... Apart from Him. Contrive against me as much as you like, and give me no respite. (56) I place my trust in God who is my Lord and your Lord. There is no creature that moves on the earth who is not held by the forelock firmly by Him. Verily the way of my Lord is straight. (57) If you turn away, then (remember) I have delivered to you the message I was sent with. My Lord will put other people in your place, and you will not be able to prevail against Him. Indeed my Lord keeps a watch over all things.""

- Qur'an, Surah 11 (Hud), Ayat 54 –57

Both Ibn Qayyim and Ibn Abi al-Izz, examining this chain of verses as the occurrence when Hud fought alone against entire nation of 'Ad, the entire city was about to harm him both psychologically and physically, only to be defeated by miraculous power shown by Hud, which resulted from his firm belief to the protection from God. Umar Sulaiman Al-Ashqar, a Salafi scholar of Tafsir, quoted this literation in his book, while his brother, Muhammad Sulaiman Al Ashqar, professor of Islamic University of Madinah, also implied his support of this narrative about Hud's miracle, in his own tafsir, Zubdat at Tafsir Min Fath al Qadir. The miracle is further highlighted by Firanda Andirja, lecturer of Al-Masjid al-Haram. According to a tafsir of the whole Surah Hud by scholars, the 'Ad were a powerful empire that preceded the era of Abraham and Nimrod, and they were tyrannically oppressive towards other civilizations at that time.

Calamity upon ʿĀd
After Hud has been left alone by the people of ʿĀd for a long time. The majority of them, however, refused to pay any notice to his teachings and they kept ignoring and mocking all he said. As their aggression, arrogance and idolatry deepened, God, after plenty of warning, sent a thunderous storm to finish the wicked people of ʿĀd once and for all. The destruction of the ʿĀd is described in the Quran:

"Then when they saw the torment as a ˹dense˺ cloud approaching their valleys, they said ˹happily˺, “This is a cloud bringing us rain.” ˹But Hûd replied,˺ “No, it is what you sought to hasten: a ˹fierce˺ wind carrying a painful punishment!” It destroyed everything by the command of its Lord, leaving nothing visible except their ruins. This is how We reward the wicked people."

The King Saud University from The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia stated the interpretation from Al-Tabari of Quran were narrated about the disaster which caused the extinction of ʿĀd. Wahbah al-Zuhayli, Salih bin Abdullah al Humaid, Imam of Grand Mosque of Mecca, along with the officials of Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Dawah and Guidance also agreed the verse were speaking about the punishment from God towards ʿĀd peoples.

Meanwhile, another Quran verse that describe further the characteristic of winds that bear calamity were Adh-Dhariyat: "And in ˹the story of˺ ’Âd ˹was another lesson,˺ when We sent against them the devastating wind."

Exegesis experts translate Ar-Rīḥ al-ʿAqīm (ٱلرِّيْح ٱلْعَقِيْم) literally as "fruitless wind" or "barren wind", a wind that does not bring benefit or any positive reaction to any biological existences. According to Arabic linguists and tafseer experts who examined al-Aqeem, its literal form is "sterile" in this verse's context, which correlates the antithesis of common characteristic of natural winds that usually benefitted the natural cycle, or any biological progressions or reproductions, whether for humans, animals or plants.

In addition for its barren characteristic, another verse also described additional features about the catastrophic tornado which decimated the 'Ad is in Surah Al-Qamar: "Indeed, We sent against them a furious wind, on a day of unrelenting misery,"

Exegesis experts describe ar-Rīḥ ash-Sharshar (ٱلرِّيْح ٱلشَّرْشَر, the cold and harsh wind) as literally freezing yet possess thunderous deafening voice, and according to Tafsir Ibn Kathir, the strength of such punishing winds alone has squeezed the peoples of Ad inside out, until their intestines came out from their rectum and mouths. Nevertheless, modern contemporary scholars such as Al-Tahawi, Wahbah al-Zuhayli, and other scholars from Islamic University of Madinah and Saudi religious ministry has interpreted the verses of Al-Qamar from 18th verse to the 20th verse were narrating the story about the process of the calamity upon ʿĀd.

In the hadiths
There are several hadiths from various chains that became supporting materials regarding Calamity that has fallen upon the ʿĀd peoples, such as:
 * Abdulaziz al-Tarefe gave commentary in his book, Aqida al Khurasaniyya, regarding Hadith came from Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, where Muhammad has mentioned the threat of Kharijites: From this one's stock there will be people who recite the Quran, but it will not pass down their throats. They will sever from Islam and leave the worshippers of Idols alone; but if I live up to their time I shall certainly kill them as 'Ad were killed (by Hud). The Hadith has recorded in Al-Nasa'i, Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim, and Sunan Abu Dawood, which all graded authentic by Muhammad Nasiruddin al-Albani.
 * Another mention of the calamity of 'Ad from Hadith came from the narration of Ibn Abbas and recorded in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim during the battle of the trench, when the polytheists coalition army encampment were struck by storm, that Muhammad as said: "I have been made victorious with As-Saba (easterly wind) and the people of 'Ad were destroyed by Ad-Dabur (westerly wind)."

Place of burial

Several sites are revered as the tomb of Hud. The most noted site, Qabr Hud, is located in a village in Hadhramaut, Yemen, and is a place of frequent Muslim pilgrimage. Robert Bertram Serjeant, in his study of the pilgrimage rite to the tomb of Hud, verified on the spot the facts related by Al-Harawi, who described, at the gate of the Mosque, on the west side, the rock onto which Hud climbed to make the call to prayer, and mentioned the grotto of Balhut at the bottom of the ravine. Around the tomb and neighborhood, various ancient ruins and inscriptions have been found. However, as is often the case with the graves of prophets, other locations have been listed. A possible location for his qabr (قَبْر, grave) is said to be near the Zamzam Well in Saudi Arabia, or in the south wall of the Umayyad Mosque in Syria. Some scholars have added that the Masjid has an inscription stating: Haḏā Maqām Hūd (هَٰذَا مَقَام هُوْد, "This is (the) Tomb of Hud"); others, however, suggest that this belief is a local tradition spewing from the reverence the locals have for Hud.

In other religions
Hud is referred to in the Baháʼí Faith as a Prophet who appeared after Noah and prior to Abraham, who exhorted the people to abandon idolatry and practice monotheism. His endeavors to save His people resulted in their "willful blindness" and His rejection. (The Kitab-i-Iqan, The Book of Certitude, p. 9)

Judaism and Christianity do not venerate Hud as a prophet and, as a figure, he is absent from the Bible. However, there are several pre-Quranic references in Palmyrene inscription to individuals named Hud or possessing a name which is connected to Hud as well as references to the people of ʿĀd. The name Hud also appears in various ancient inscriptions, most commonly in the Hadhramaut region.

References in the Qur'an

 * ʿĀd people built their land:, ,
 * Arrogance of the ʿĀd people:, ,
 * Hud's prophecy:, , , , ,
 * Persecution of Hud:, , , , , ,
 * Destruction of ʿĀd:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

title: Hud (prophet)


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User:Thinthief

Hey this is me. Nothing to see here. Visit my home page for more (or less) info.

title: User:Thinthief


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W. C. Sellar

Walter Carruthers Sellar (27 December 1898 – 11 June 1951) was a Scottish humourist who wrote for Punch. He is best known for the 1930 book 1066 and All That, a tongue-in-cheek guide to "all the history you can remember," which he wrote together with R. J. Yeatman.

Early life
Sellar was born at Golspie in Sutherland, the descendant of Patrick Sellar who had taken a leading role in the Highland clearances and a relative of William Young Sellar, a Scottish classical scholar.

He won a scholarship to Fettes College where he was Head Boy in 1917. He left school at the height of the First World War, and joined the British Army. Having attended an Officer Cadet Unit, he was commissioned in the King's Own Scottish Borderers as a second lieutenant on 31 October 1917. He took a degree in modern history at Oriel College, Oxford (which, as recorded in 1066 and All That, was awarded through an aegrotat in 1922).

It was at Oriel that he met his contemporary Yeatman, and struck up a lifelong friendship. Although the two produced brilliant work together, they were entirely different personalities: Sellar was somewhat shy and introverted, although he enjoyed acting. He wrote melancholy poetry in addition to dry humour.

Teaching career
On leaving Oriel, Sellar worked as a schoolmaster at his old school Fettes, leaving in 1928 when he moved to Great Marlow in Buckinghamshire in the hope of becoming a full-time writer.

However, the financial burdens of bringing up two daughters led him to take a job at Canford School in Dorset from the start of the school year in 1929, and he went on to teach at Charterhouse School from 1932 until his death. At first he taught history, but later moved to teach English and he became Housemaster of Daviesites from 1939. He used his own ration and money to buy extra food for the boys of the House during World War II, which made him very popular.

During the period 1946-1950 he was again teaching history at Charterhouse, and even in his late years Sellar retained his sense of humour, for example putting on as the school play one year two trials. The first, in which he was somehow simultaneously the King of Spain and the Lord Chief Justice of England, was the trial of Christopher Columbus (played by the Head Boy) for the heinous crime of discovering America. The second, in his words "the most important negligence trial in history" was of course the trial of Guy Fawkes "in that he did fail to blow up the Houses of Parliament". The boys (Charterhouse was all-male in those days) all loved this (and also his habit of throwing blackboard rubbers at the headmaster!).

Writing
Sellar had begun to contribute to Punch in 1925 when three humorous short stories of his were published (he also contributed to other journals around this time). His collaboration with his old University colleague Yeatman, who was also writing for Punch, appears to have begun in 1928 during his period out of teaching. The first part of 1066 and All That appeared in Punch on 10 September 1930, taking its title from Robert Graves' autobiography Good-Bye to All That. Sellar's contribution is particularly noted in the comic exaggerations and name confusions; his knowledge of English literature also inspired the book's many literary allusions and pastiches.

After completing the book, Sellar worked with Yeatman again on a sequel, And Now All This, a parody of general knowledge, including subjects as diverse as geography, knitting and topology.

The 1933 book Horse Nonsense was credited to the two but is largely the work of Yeatman, while Garden Rubbish and Other Country Bumps is also credited to the two but largely Sellar's work.

Publications

 * 1066 and All That (1930), ISBN 0-413-61880-3
 * And Now All This (1932), ISBN 0-413-56080-5
 * Horse Nonsense (1933), ISBN 0-413-73990-2
 * Garden Rubbish and other Country Bumps (1936), ISBN 0-417-02050-3

title: W. C. Sellar


text:
Salih

Saleh (صَالِحٌ) is a prophet mentioned in the Quran who prophesied to the tribe of Thamud   in ancient Arabia, before the lifetime of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. The story of Salih is linked to the story of the She-Camel of God, which was the gift given by God to the people of Thamud when they desired a miracle to confirm that Salih was truly a prophet.

Historical context

The Thamud were a tribal confederation in the northwestern region of the Arabian Peninsula, mentioned in Assyrian sources in the time of Sargon II. The tribe's name continues to appear in documents into the fourth century CE, but by the sixth century they were regarded as a group that had vanished long ago.

According to the Quran, the city that Saleh was sent to was called Al-Hijr, which corresponds to the Nabataean city of Hegra. The city rose to prominence around the 1st century AD as an important site in the regional caravan trade. Adjacent to the city were large, decorated rock-cut tombs used by members of various religious groups. At an unknown point in ancient times, the site was abandoned and possibly functionally replaced by Al-'Ula. The site has been referred to as Mada'in Salih since the era of Muhammad and was named after his predecessor Salih.

Saleh is not mentioned in any historical texts or in any of the Abrahamic scriptures that precede the Qur'an, but the account of Thamud's destruction may have been well known in ancient Arabia. The tribe's name is used in ancient Arabian poetry as a metaphor for "the transience of all things".

Quran

According to Muslim tradition, the people of Thamud virtually relied upon Saleh for support. He was chosen by God as a prophet and sent to preach against the selfishness of the wealthy and to condemn the practice of shirk (idolatry or polytheism). Although Saleh preached for a sustained period of time, the people for Thamud refused to hear his warning and instead began to ask Saleh to perform a miracle for them. They said: “O Ṣâliḥ! We truly had high hopes in you before this. How dare you forbid us to worship what our forefathers had worshipped? We are certainly in alarming doubt about what you are inviting us to.”

Saleh reminded his people of the castles and palaces they built out of stone, and of their technological superiority over neighbouring communities. Furthermore, he told them about their ancestors, the ʿĀd tribe, and how they too were destroyed for their sins. Some of the people of Thamud believed Saleh's words, but the tribal leaders refused to listen to him and continued to demand that he demonstrate a miracle to prove his prophethood.

In response, God gave the Thamud a blessed she-camel, as both a means of sustenance and a test. The tribe was told to allow the camel to graze peacefully and avoid harming her. But in defiance of Saleh's warning, the people of the tribe hamstrung the camel. Saleh informed them that they had only three more days to live before the wrath of God descended upon them. The people of the city were remorseful, but their crime could not be undone, and all the disbelieving people in the city were killed in an earthquake. Al-Hijr was rendered uninhabited and remained in ruins for all time thereafter. Saleh himself and the few believers who followed him survived.

The story is expanded upon in Sūrat an-Naml, whilst the she-camel is not mentioned explicitly here, it states that nine men plotted to kill Salih and his whole family, a crime for which they were struck down by God three days later.

Muslim tradition
Muslim writers have elaborated upon the story of Saleh and the she-camel. Early Islamic tradition often involved a motif of the camel miraculously emerging from stone, often accompanied by a calf, and the production of milk from the camel. Al-Tabari states that Saleh summoned his people to a mountain, where they witnessed the rock miraculously split open, revealing the camel. The she-camel had a young calf. Saleh informed the Thamud that the older camel was to drink from their water source on one day, and they were to drink from it the next day. On days when they were not allowed to drink water, the camel provided them with milk. But God informed Saleh that a boy who would hamstring the camel would soon be born to the tribe, and that child was evil and grew unnaturally fast. The camel was indeed killed, and its calf cried out three times, signaling that the Thamud would be destroyed in three days. Their faces turned yellow, then red, then black, and they died on the third day as predicted.

According to some Islamic scholars, the mother of Ismail, Hajar, was a granddaughter of Saleh.

A similar tradition is related in an eighth-century commentary on Islam by John of Damascus and is also mentioned in the works of Ibn Kathir.

title: Salih


text:
Pérotin

Pérotin was a composer associated with the Notre Dame school of polyphony in Paris and the broader ars antiqua musical style of high medieval music. He is credited with developing the polyphonic practices of his predecessor Léonin, with the introduction of three and four-part harmonies.

Other than a brief mention by music theorist Johannes de Garlandia in his De Mensurabili Musica, virtually all information on Pérotin's life comes from Anonymous IV, a pseudonymous English student who probably studied in Paris. Anonymous IV names seven titles from a Magnus Liber—including Viderunt omnes, Sederunt principes and Alleluia Nativitas—that have been identified with surviving works and gives him the title Magister Perotinus (Pérotinus the Master), meaning he was licensed to teach. It is assumed that Perotinus was French and named Pérotin, a diminutive of Peter, but attempts to match him with persons in contemporary documents remain speculative.

Identity and career

Pérotin, about whom little is known, most likely lived around the end of the 12th and beginning of the 13th century and is presumed to have been French. The closest thing to a contemporary account of his life comes from two much later reporters: a brief mention attributed to the music theorist Johannes de Garlandia in his De Mensurabili Musica, and four mentions in the works of a late 13c English student known as Anonymous IV. At one stage Anonymous IV was thought to be a pupil of Johannes de Garlandia, but this is unlikely, and the name is a misnomer, derived from the title of notes by Charles-Edmond-Henri de Coussemaker, Anonymus IV. These were probably notes taken by the student in lecture. including this paragraph: "These rules were used in many older books; this was so during and after the time of Perotinus the Great. Nevertheless, they did not know how to distinguish these notes from those which will be presented shortly. This was so even since the time of Leo, because two ligated notes were put for the durational value of a brevis longa, and in a similar manner, three ligated notes were quite often used for a longa brevis, longa. People say Maître Leonin was the best composer of Organum (optimus organista), he composed the Great Organum Book for the gradual and antiphonary in order to prolong the divine service. This book remained in use until the time of the great Perotin who abridged it and composed clausules and sections that were many in number and better because he was the best composer of descant (optimus discantor). This Magister Perotinus made the best quadrupla, such as Viderunt and Sederunt, with an abundance of striking musical embellishments [colores armonicae artis]; likewise, the noblest tripla, such as Alleluia, Posui adiutorium and [Alleluia], Nativitas etc. He also made three-voice conductus, such as Salvatoris hodie, and two-voice conductus, such as Dum sigillum summi Patris, and also, among many others, monophonic conductus, such as Beata viscera etc. The book, that is, the books of Magister Perotinus, were in use in the choir of the Paris cathedral of the Blessed Virgin up to the time of Magister Robertus de Sabilone, and from his time up to the present day."

There have been many speculative attempts to identify Pérotin with members of the Notre Dame administration, but these have not generally been accepted. Of the several people with that name (Petrus) that have been suggested, the commonest are Petrus Cantor (died 1197), who was a theologian, and another Petrus who was Succentor at Notre Dame ca. 1207–1238. Of these two, Petrus Succentor has been suggested as more probable, in part on chronological grounds, and partly because of the succentor's role in overseeing the celebration of the liturgy in the cathedral (whose choir was dedicated 1182), but this is purely speculative, resting on an assumption that the composer held some important rank in the cathedral hierarchy.

Pérotin is considered to be the most important member of the Notre Dame school of polyphony, a group of composers working at or near the cathedral in Paris from about 1160 to 1250, creators of the ars antiqua style. The dates of Pérotin's life and works have long been a subject of debate, but are generally thought to be from about 1155/60 (or earlier) to around 1200/05 (or later), based on the evolution of French choral writing during this time (see Works), in particular, his apparent absence from the flowering of the French motet that occurred after 1210.

Pérotin was one of very few composers of his day whose name has been preserved, and can be reliably attached to individual compositions, most of which have been transcribed. Anonymous IV called him Magister Perotinus (Pérotinus the Master). The title, employed also by Johannes de Garlandia, means that Perotinus, like Léonin, earned the degree magister artium, almost certainly in Paris, and that he was licensed to teach. However, only Anonymous IV employed the epithet Perotinus Magnus (Perotinus the Great). The name Perotinus, the Latin diminutive of Petrus, is assumed to be derived from the French name Pérotin, diminutive of Pierre. However "Petrus" was one of the most common names in the Ile de France during the High Middle Ages, making further identification difficult. The diminutive was presumably a mark of respect bestowed by his colleagues. The title Magnus was a mark of the esteem in which he was held, even long after his death.

Notre Dame School

The reign of Louis VII (1137–1180) witnessed a period of cultural innovation, in which appeared the Notre Dame school of musical composition, and the contributions of Léonin, who prepared two-part choral settings (organa) for all the major liturgical festivals. This period in musical history has been described as a paradigm shift of lasting consequence in musical notation and rhythmic composition, with the development of the organum, clausula, conductus and motet. The innovative nature of the Notre Dame style stands in contrast to its predecessor, that of the Abbey of St Martial, Limoges, replacing the monodic (monophonic) Gregorian chant with polyphony (more than one voice singing at a time). This was the beginning of polyphonic European church music. Organum at its roots involves simple doubling (organum duplum or organum purum) of a chant at intervals of a fourth or fifth, above or below. This school also marked a transition from music that was essentially performance to a less ephemeral entity that was committed to parchment, preserved and transmitted to history. It is also the beginning of the idea of composers and compositions, the introduction of more than two voices and the treatment of vernacular texts. For the first time, rhythm became as important as pitch, to the extent that the music of this era came to be known as musica mensurabilis (music that can be measured). These developments and the notation that evolved laid the foundations of musical practice for centuries. The surviving manuscripts from the thirteenth century together with the contemporaneous treatises on musical theory constitute the musical era of ars antiqua. The Notre Dame repertory spread throughout Europe. In Paris polyphony was being performed in the late 1190s but later sources imply that some of the compositions date back as far as the 1160s. Although often linked to the construction of the cathedral itself, construction commenced in 1163 and the altar consecrated in 1182. However, there was evidence of musical creativity there from the early twelfth century.

Léonin's work was distinguished by two distinctive organum styles, purum and discantus. This early polyphonic organa was still firmly based on Gregorian chant, to which a second voice was added. The chant was called the tenor (cantus firmus or vox principalis), which literally “holds” (Latin: tenere) the melody. The tenor is based on an existing plainsong melody from the liturgical repertoire (such as the Alleluia, Verse or Gradual, from the Mass, or a Responsory or Benedicamus from the Office). This quotation of plainchant melody is a defining characteristic of thirteenth century musical genres. In organum purum the tenor part was drawn out into long pedal points, while the upper part or duplum contrasted with it in a much freer rhythm, consisting of melisms (melismatic or several notes per syllable, compared to syllabic, a single note per syllable). In the second, discantus, style, the tenor was allowed to be melismatic, and the notes were quicker and more regular with the upper part becoming equally rhythmic. These more rhythmic sections were known as clausulae (puncta). Another innovation was the standardization of note forms, and Léonin's new square notes were quickly adopted. Although he developed the discantus style, Léonin's strength was as a writer of organum purum. The singing of organa fell into disuse by the mid thirteenth century. Associated with the Notre Dame school, was Johannes de Garlandia, whose De mensurabili provided a theoretical basis, for Notre Dame polyphony is essentially musica mensurabilis, music that is measured in time. In his treatise, he defines three forms of polyphony, organum in speciali, copula, and discant, which are defined by the relationship of the voices to each other and by the rhythmic flow of each voice.

Magnus liber organi
Léonin compiled his compositions into a book, the Magnus liber organi (Great Organum Book), around 1160. Pérotin's works are preserved in this compilation of early polyphonic church music, which was in the collection of the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. The Magnus liber also contains the work of his successors. In addition to two-part organa, this book contains three- and four-part compositions in four distinct forms: organa, clausulae, conducti and motets, and three distinct styles. In the organum style the upper voices are highly mobile over a tenor voice moving in long unmeasured notes. The discant style has the tenor moving in measured notes, but still more slowly than the upper voices. The third style has all voices moving note on note, and is largely limited to conductus. The surviving sources all commence with a four-voice organal setting of the Christmas Gradual, Viderunt omnes fines terrae, believed to be Pérotin's, as most likely did the original Liber. However, the manuscripts and fragments that survive date well into the thirteenth century, meaning that they are preserved in a form notated by musicians working several generations following Léonin and Pérotin. This collection of music constitutes the earliest known record of polyphony to have the stability and circulation achieved earlier by monophonic Gregorian chant.

Forms and style
Louis VII was succeeded by his son Philip II in 1179 and his reign was marked by integration and revision of the cultural shifts that had transpired under his father. It was during this time that the compositions of Pérotin first appeared, and a shift towards a more predominant discantus style. Pérotin is best known for his composition of both liturgical organa and non-liturgical conducti in which the voices move note on note. He pioneered the styles of organum triplum and organum quadruplum (three and four-part polyphony) and his Viderunt omnes and Sederunt principes et adversum me loquebantur Graduals for Christmas and the feast of St Stephen's Day (December 26) respectively are among only a few organa quadrupla known, early polyphony having been restricted to two-part compositions. With the addition of further parts, the compositions became known as motets, the most important form of polyphony of the period. Pérotin's two Graduals for the Christmas season represent the highest point of his style, with a large scale tonal design in which the massive pedal points sustain the swings between consecutive harmonies, and an intricate interplay among the three upper voices. Pérotin also furthered the development of musical notation, moving it further from improvisation. Despite this, we know nothing of how these works came about.

In addition to his own compositions, as noted by Anonymous IV, Pérotin set about revising the Magnus liber organi. Léonin's added duplum required skill, and had to be sung fast with up to 40 notes to one of the underlying chant, as a result of which the actual text progressed very slowly. Pérotin shortened these passages, while adding further voice parts to enrich the harmony. The degree to which he did this has been debated due to the phrase abbreviavit eundem by Anonymous IV. Usually translated as abbreviate, it has been surmised that he shortened the Magnus liber by replacing organum purum with discant clausulae or simply replacing existing clausulae with shorter ones. Some 154 clausulae have been attributed to Pérotin but many other clausulae are elaborate compositions that would actually expand the compositions in the Liber, and these stylistically resemble his known works which are on a much grander scale than those of his predecessor, and hence do not represent "abbreviation". An alternative rendering of abbreviavit is to write down, suggesting that he actually prepared a new edition using his better developed system of rhythmic notation, including mensural notation, as mentioned by Anonymous IV.

Two styles emerged from the organum duplum, the "florid" and "discant" (discantus). The former was more typical of Léonin, the latter of Pérotin, though this indirect attribution has been challenged. Anonymous IV described Léonin as optimus organista (the best composer of organa) but Pérotin, who revised the former's Magnus liber organi (Great Organum Book), as optimus discantor referring to his discant composition., In the original discant organum duplum, the second voice follows the cantus firmus, note on note but at an interval, usually a fourth above. By contrast, in the florid organum, the upper or vox organalis voice wove shorter notes around the longer notes of the lower tenor chant.

Compositions

Anonymous IV mentions a number of compositions which he attributes to Pérotin, including the four-voice Viderunt omnes and Sederunt principes, and the three-voice Alleluia "Posui adiutorium" and Alleluia "Nativitas". Johannes de Garlandia states that the Magnus Liber commences with Perotin's four-part organa, and makes specific reference to the notation in the three-part Alleluya, Posui adiutorium. Other works are attributed to him by later scholars, such as Heinrich Husmann, on stylistic grounds, all in the organum style, as well as the two-voice Dum sigillum summi Patris and the monophonic Beata viscera in the conductus style. (The conductus sets a rhymed Latin poem called a sequence to a repeated melody, much like a contemporary hymn.) By tradition, the four-part pieces of the Notre Dame school have been attributed to Pérotin, leaving the two-part pieces to Léonin. The former include the three-part conductus Salvator hodie. The latter is placed in the Mass for the Circumcision in a 13th-century French manuscript. Of these, the best known works are his Viderunt omnes and Sederunt principes. These have been described as representing the peak of musical development of the time.

Most of Pérotin's works are in polyphonic form of discant, including the quadrupla and tripla. Here the upper voices move in discant, as rhythmic counterpoint above the sustained tenor notes. This is consistent with Anonymous IV's description of him as optimus discantor. However, like Léonin, he is likely to have composed in every musical genre and style known to Notre Dame polyphony. Pérotin's dates of activity have been approximated from some late 12th century edicts (Statuta et donationes piae) of the Bishop of Paris, Odo (Eudes de Sully) (1196–1208), in 1198 and 1199. Rebuked by Peter of Capua, the papal legate of the time, the bishop sought to reform the rituals around the Christmas season, forbidding the boistrous costumed performances that existed at the time, in particular, the Feast of Fools. His preference was for elaborate music in its stead, calling for performance in organa triplo vel quadruplo for the Responsory and Benedicamus and other settings. The bishop's edicts are quite specific, and suggest that Pérotin's organum quadruplum Viderunt omnes was written for Christmas 1198, and his other organum quadruplum Sederunt Principes was composed for Saint Stephen's Day 1199, for the dedication of a new wing of the Notre Dame Cathedral. If written after this, they could not have been written till late 1200 or 1201, since for most of 1200 France lay under an interdict of Pope Innocent III which suppressed the celebration of church services. Hans Tischler dates the revision of the Magnus Liber to around 1180/90. Between the accounts of Anonymous IV, the episcopal edicts and the arrangements in the Magnus liber, the key compositions appear to be corroborated and assigned to this period.

Pérotin composed music to at least five of the poems of the Chancellor of the cathedral, Philippe le Chancelier (Philip the Chancellor). Philip, also a canon there, held that title at the cathedral from 1218 till his death in 1236, suggesting a possible later date for Pérotin's setting of the former's Beata viscera (ca. 1220), or at least a terminus ante quem. Others believe this poem was written much earlier, and hence place Pérotin's death as no later than 1205, the bishop's edicts implying that Pérotin's work was well before this. Philip appears to have written a number of poems with the intention of them being set to music by Pérotin, and with him is given credit for the development of the motet.

Works

Anonymous IV identified seven works, that he presumably considered worthy of singling out, and these represent the only direct attribution. Subsequent authors have attributed works on stylistic and chronological grounds. These include Friedrich Ludwig (1910), Heinrich Husmann (1940), Hans Tischler (1950) and Ethel Thurston (1970). Husmann added an additional nine three-part organa, and five clausula to which Ludwig added numerous other clausula. Other authors have attributed all the three-part organa in the Magnus Liber to Pérotin, which is unlikely. Nevertheless, two of the only three known four-part organa can be attributed to him.

Key: Anonymous IV (A), Johannes de Garlandia (G), Tischler (Ti), Thurston (Th), Husmann (H). Numbers refer to folios in the F manuscript of the Magnus liber.

 * Four-part organa
 * Viderunt omnes, continued with organal motet Homo cum mandato (A)(Ti)(Th)(H) F1
 * Sederunt principes, with organal motet De Stephani roseo (A)(Ti)(Th)(H)
 * Sederunt principes, continued with organal motet Adesse festina (A)(Th)(H)
 * Three-part organa
 * Alleluia nativitas (A)(Ti)(Th)(H) F31
 * Alleluia, Posui adiutorium (A)(G)(Ti)(H) F36
 * Alleluia, Dies sanctificatus (Ti)
 * Alleluia, Pascha nostrum (Ti)(H)
 * Alleluia, Dilexit Andream (H)
 * Stirps Yesse (Ti)
 * Virgo (Ti)(H)
 * Sancte Germane(H)
 * Terribilis(H)
 * Exiit sermo (H)
 * Conductus
 * French conductus motet Se i'ai ame: Ex semine (Th)
 * 3 part Conductus Salvatoris hodie (A)(Ti)(Th)(H) F307
 * 2 part Conductus Dum sigillum summi patris (A)(Ti)(Th)(H) F344
 * 1 part Conductus Beata viscera Marie virginis (A)(Ti)(Th)(H)
 * 5 Benedicamus Domino (Ti) (3 (H))
 * 3 part clausulas
 * In odorem (H)
 * Et illuminare (H)
 * Et gaudebit (H)
 * Et exaltavi (H)
 * 2 part clausulas (numerous (H))
 * Doubtful
 * 4 part Clausula Mors (H)

Influence
Pérotin has been described as the first modern composer in the Western tradition, radically transforming the work of his predecessors from a largely improvisatory technique to a distinct musical architecture. Pérotin's music has influenced modern minimalist composers such as Steve Reich, particularly in Reich's work Proverb.

Recordings

 * for discography, see

 * (audio and visual)
 * Gothic Revolution – Sacred Music The Sixteen, Harry Christophers, Simon Russell Beale CORO DVD
 * Messe de la Nativité de la Vierge. Ensemble Organum, Marcel Pérès. Harmonia Mundi 901538 (1995).
 * Perotin. The Hilliard Ensemble, CD ECM New Series, 837–751–2
 * Sacred Music From Notre-Dame Cathedral, Tonus Peregrinus; Antony Pitts, CD NAXOS 8.557340 (2005)
 * Sacred Music From Notre-Dame Cathedral, Tonus Peregrinus; Antony Pitts, CD NAXOS 8.557340 (2005)

title: Pérotin


text:
Courtney Hodges

General Courtney Hicks Hodges (January 5, 1887 – January 16, 1966) was a decorated senior officer in the United States Army who commanded First U.S. Army in the Western European Campaign of World War II. Hodges was a notable "mustang" officer, rising from private to general.

Born in Perry, Georgia, he began studies at the United States Military Academy but dropped out after failing Geometry. He joined the Army in 1906 as a private, rapidly advanced into the noncommissioned officer ranks, and obtained a commission after passing a competitive examination in 1909. As a young man, Hodges served under Colonel John J. Pershing in the Pancho Villa Expedition and became part of the first rescue mission in U.S. military aviation history when he helped save a stranded aviator. He was a battalion commander in France during World War I, and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for extraordinary heroism.

In 1943, he was sent to England to serve under General Omar Bradley. Hodges was deputy commander of First Army during the D-Day invasion. Two months later, he was appointed First Army's commander. Under Hodges, First Army had 18 divisions, the most under the immediate command of any general in the European theater of World War II. First Army liberated Paris, was the first Allied army to enter Germany, and cut Nazi Germany in two by advancing east to link up with Soviet forces who advanced west.

Early life and military career
Hodges was born in Perry, Georgia on January 5, 1887. He was the fourth of eight children. The Hodges family traces its roots back to England and Hodges' branch arrived in America in 1750. After the American Revolution, they moved to Houston County, Georgia. Courtney's father, John became the proprietor of the local newspaper, Houston Home Journal. Hodges attended Perry High School and graduated in 1903. Later he enrolled at North Georgia Agricultural College (now known as the University of North Georgia). He became a member of the Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity. After his first year at North Georgia, he received an appointment to the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point.

He would have graduated with the Class of 1909, but he dropped out after a year because of an inability to comprehend geometry. He then worked at a grocery store for a year.

In 1906, Hodges enlisted in the United States Army as a private and was assigned to Company L, 17th Infantry at Fort McPherson, Georgia. He quickly rose to the rank of sergeant, and in 1909 performed well on the competitive examination for prospective officers. He was appointed a second lieutenant of Infantry in November, just a few months after his West Point classmates graduated, and was assigned to the 13th Infantry. In his early career he served with the future Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, in the Philippines and future General George S. Patton in Mexico.

Pancho Villa Expedition, World War I and postwar years
Hodges served in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in San Antonio, Texas and in the Philippine Islands. His first significant military operation was under the command of Brigadier General John J. Pershing, who led an expedition into Mexico to capture Pancho Villa after the Mexican bandit had raided the town of Columbus, New Mexico in the spring of 1916. This less-than successful mission included the first US army use of aircraft in combat. Hodges recorded a footnote in history when he was detached to rescue a stranded aviator, the first such rescue mission in U.S military aviation history.

Hodges served with 6th Infantry Regiment, 5th Division, during World War I, which America entered in April 1917 (see American entry into World War I). He rose to lieutenant colonel and commander of a battalion in the 6th Infantry, in the St Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne campaigns of 1918. For the latter campaign, he led a scouting expedition across the Meuse River and penetrated the German lines, maintaining a bridgehead through 20 hours of constant fire from the enemy. Their location became the lead point of the American advance across the Meuse. Over the course of the war he earned the Distinguished Service Cross for extraordinary heroism while leading an attack across the Marne River.

After occupation duty in Germany, Hodges spent the years 1920 to 1924 on the staff at West Point before attending and graduating from the United States Army Command and General Staff College in 1925. He then served as an instructor at the United States Army Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia until 1926, and in a similar capacity at the Air Corps Tactical School at Maxwell field, Alabama until 1929.

For the next four years, he was a member of the Infantry Board at Fort Benning. Hodges then completed the United States Army War College in 1934. In 1938, he became an assistant commandant of the Army Infantry School, before becoming commandant in 1940. While he was there he formed a friendship with Omar Bradley, who would feature prominently in Hodges's future military career.

World War II
In May 1941 Hodges was promoted to major general. He was given various assignments, including Chief of Infantry, until he received command of the X Corps, which was stationed stateside, in 1942. In 1943, having been promoted to lieutenant general, he continued to command X Corps and then the Third Army. When the Third Army moved from the United States to England for the projected invasion of Europe, command of the army passed to General George Patton. Hodges was named deputy commanding general of the First Army under Lieutenant General Omar Bradley.

During Operation Overlord in June and July 1944, Hodges served under Bradley as the deputy commander of the First Army. In August 1944, Hodges succeeded Bradley as the commander of the First Army, taking over when Bradley moved up to command the 12th Army Group. Hodges served under the command of Bradley and General Dwight D. Eisenhower until Nazi Germany's surrender in May 1945. By the time he took command "it was the largest and most experienced American field army on the Western Front. Consisting of the V, VII, and XIX Corps and controlling nine divisions, it had approximately 250,000 men."

Hodges' First Army moved quickly across France, helping to liberate Paris on August 25, 1944 and then led them through France, Belgium, and Luxembourg on their way to Germany. General Hodges' troops were the first Allied troops to penetrate Germany, having reached the German border (northwest of Trier) on September 11, 1944. These troops were the 5th Armored Division, part of Major General Leonard T. Gerow's V Corps. During the failed British attack on Arnhem, Operation Market Garden, supply priority was given to the Anglo-Canadian 21st Army Group, and the First Army was diverted to the north of the Ardennes to stage limited attacks to draw German defenders south, away from the target sites.

Hodges' troops had a major role in blunting the Wehrmacht's major counteroffensive in the Ardennes: the Battle of the Bulge. When the German advance cut the First Army off from the 12th Army Group and Bradley, his First Army was placed under the temporary command of the Anglo-Canadian 21st Army Group, under Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, along with Ninth United States Army, on 20 December 1944. The First Army reverted to the 12th Army Group on 17 January 1945.

Before, during, and after the Battle of the Bulge, the First Army fought the Germans in the Battle of Aachen, and the parallel 5-month long Battle of Hurtgen Forest to the south east of Aachen, as part of the main US effort to breach the Siegfried Line and advance through Germany to the Roer River. Hodges led First Army to liberate most of Luxembourg in three days, from September 9 through to September 12, 1944. The city of Aachen was captured on 22 October, but the German counter-offensive and the Battle of the Bulge took place before the other objectives could be completed. Once the Battle of the Bulge was won, the Hürtgen Forest was taken and on 10 February the Rur Dam was finally captured. The overall cost of the Siegfried Line Campaign in American personnel was close to 140,000 casualties.

By March 7, 1945, the 9th Armored Division of the First Army captured the Ludendorff Bridge at Remagen. The First Army was the first enemy of Germany to cross the Rhine since the Napoleonic Wars. By the time the bridge collapsed after 10 days, the First Army had built two heavy duty bridges across the Rhine and established a bridgehead 40 kilometers (25 mi) long, extending from Bonn in the north almost to Koblenz in the south, and 10 to 15 kilometers (6.2 to 9.3 mi) deep, occupied by five U.S. divisions. They advanced slowly, waiting for Montgomery and the 21st Army Group to launch Operation Plunder across the Rhine on 23 March.

Together with U.S Ninth Army, the First Army trapped over 300,000 German troops in the Battle of Ruhr Pocket. A month later, Hodges' troops of the First Army met elements of the Soviet Red Army near Torgau on the Elbe River. Hodges was promoted to the rank of four-star general on April 15, 1945, thus becoming the first of two soldiers in the history of the United States Army to make their way from private to general, the other being Walter Krueger who served in the Southwest Pacific Theater. Bradley said of Hodges, "No other leader and no other armed force unit in World War II is entitled to greater credit than that which belongs to the quiet, modest General Courtney Hicks Hodges and his First Army".

Eisenhower referred to Hodges as the "spearhead and the scintillating star" of the United States advance into Germany, and sought to ensure that Hodges was properly recognised for his achievements despite "being seemingly overlooked by the headline writers."

After the end of World War II in Europe on May 7, 1945, Hodges and the First Army were ordered to prepare to be sent the Pacific Theater for the proposed invasion of Japan in late 1945 to March 1946. However, that move became unnecessary when the Japanese Empire surrendered, with the official surrender documents signed in Tokyo Bay on September 2, 1945. Hodges was one of the very few individuals present at the surrenders of both Nazi Germany in Reims, France, and of the Japanese Empire at Tokyo Bay.

Post-war life
After World War II, Hodges continued command of First Army at Fort Jay at Governors Island, New York, until his retirement in March 1949. He later acted as the Military Advisor to Sir Owen Dixon, United Nations Mediator to Kashmir.

Personal life
On June 22, 1928, Hodges married a young widow, Mildred Lee Hodges (Mildred Lee Buchner). He reportedly courted her by inviting her along to walk his dog and go shooting. They had no children.

Death and legacy
Hodges died in San Antonio, Texas, in 1966. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery, Section 2, Grave 890-A.

In Perry, Georgia, the State Route 7 Spur, a former section of U.S. Route 41/State Route 7, was named General Courtney Hodges Boulevard. A road in Dinant (Belgium) is named Avenue Général Hodges. In Maastricht (Netherlands) the Generaal Hodgesstraat is named after him.

Although he possessed fine military reputation as a firm and skilled commander, Hodges was quiet and little known to his troops despite significant efforts to enhance his image and popularity. In his postwar memoirs, Omar Bradley who knew Hodges as well as anyone, wrote:

"A spare, soft-voiced Georgian without temper, drama or visible emotion, Hodges was left behind in the European headline sweepstakes. He was essentially a military technician whose faultless techniques and tactical knowledge made him one of the most skilled craftsmen in my entire command. He probably knew as much about infantry and training as any man in the army. But he was unostentatious and retiring, Hodges occupied an almost anonymous role in the war. Yet as a general's general his stature among our U.S commanders was rivaled only by that of William H. Simpson. For Hodges successfully blended dexterity and common sense in such equal portions as to produce a magnificently balanced command. I had implicit faith in his judgement, in his skill and restraint. Of all my Army commanders he required the least supervision."

Still, Hodges has been criticized for his performance during the Battle of Hürtgen Forest. One historian called it one of the "most ill-conceived and unnecessary offensives of the whole northwest Europe campaign", adding that Hodges "lacked tactical imagination" and that "it was a miracle that he retained Eisenhower’s confidence".

Awards
Hodges' honors and awards included:

Foreign orders and decorations

 * Order of the British Empire (Military) Ribbon.svg Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (United Kingdom)
 * Legion Honneur GO ribbon.svg Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour (France)
 * Order of Leopold (Belgium) Ribbon bar.svg Grand Officer of the Order of Leopold (Belgium)
 * Order of the Bath UK ribbon.svg Companion of the Order of the Bath (United Kingdom)
 * ARG Order of the Liberator San Martin - Grand Officer BAR.png Grand Officer of the Order of the Liberator San Martín (Argentina)
 * Order of Suvorov 106x30.png Order of Suvorov (USSR)
 * Ordre de la couronne de Chene Chevalier ribbon.svg Order of the Oak Crown (Luxembourg)
 * Croix de Guerre 1939-1945 ribbon.svg Croix de Guerre 1939-1945 with palm (France)
 * BEL Croix de Guerre 1944 ribbon.svg Croix de Guerre 1939–1945 with palm (Belgium)

Distinguished Service Cross citation
The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Lieutenant Colonel (Infantry) Courtney Hicks Hodges (ASN: 0-2686), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving with 6th Infantry Regiment, 5th Division, A.E.F., near Brieulles, France, November 2–4, 1918. Lieutenant Colonel Hodges personally conducted a reconnaissance of the Meuse River, to determine the most advantageous location for a crossing, and for a bridge site. Having organized a storming party, he attacked the enemy not 100 paces distant, and, although failing, he managed to effect the crossing of the canal after 20 hours of ceaseless struggling. His fearlessness and courage were mainly responsible for the advance of his brigade to the heights east of the Meuse.

Division: 5th Division, American Expeditionary Forces General Orders: War Department, General Orders No. 3 (1919)

title: Courtney Hodges


text:
Lot in Islam

Lut (لوط, ), also known as Lot in the Old Testament, is a prophet and messenger of God in the Quran. According to Islamic tradition, Lut was born to Haran and spent his younger years in Ur, later migrating to Canaan with his uncle Abraham. He was sent to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah as a prophet, and was commanded to preach to their inhabitants on monotheism.

Though Lut was not born among the people he'd been sent to preach to, the people of Sodom are still regarded as his "brethren" in the Quran. Like the Biblical narrative, the Quran states that Lut's messages were ignored by the inhabitants of the cities, and Sodom and Gomorrah were subsequently destroyed. The destruction of the cities is traditionally presented as a warning against homosexuality in Islam as well as other things.

While the Quran does not elaborate upon Lut's later life, Islam holds that all prophets were examples of moral and spiritual 'righteousness'.

Family
Muslims maintain that Abraham's father was Aazar (آزر), which could be derived from the Syriac Athar, who is known in the Hebrew Bible as Terah. Abraham had two children, Isaac and Ismael, who both later became prophets. Abraham's nephew is said to have been the prophet Lut, who was one of the other people who migrated with Abraham out of their community. Abraham himself is said to have been a descendant of Nuh through his son Shem.

Quranic narrative
The Quran states that one day, a group of angels visited Abraham as guests in the guise of men in order to inform him of the fact that his wife Sarah was pregnant with Isaac. While there, they also told him that they had been sent by God to the "guilty people" of Lut to destroy them with "a shower of stones of clay". Lut and those who believed in him, were to be spared, but his wife was to die in the destruction, with the angels stating that "she is of those who lag behind". The Quran also draws upon Lot's wife as an "example for the unbelievers" as she was married to a righteous man but refused to believe in his message and was thus condemned to Hell.

The people of the twin cities transgressed against the bounds of God. According to the Quran, their sins included inhospitality and robbery they hated strangers and robbed travellers, apart from other abuses and rape. It was their sin of sexual misconduct as well which was seen as particularly egregious, with Lut strongly chiding them for approaching men with sexual desire instead of women. Lut told and tried to help them to abandon their sinful ways, but they ridiculed him and threatened to evict him from the cities. Lut prayed to God and begged to be saved from the consequences of their sinful acts.

Then three angels, disguised as handsome males, came to Lut as guests. He grieved the men, as he felt powerlessness to protect them from the people of the cities. The cities' residents becoming aware of the visitors demanded that Lot surrender his guests to them. Distressed and fearful that they would incur the wrath of God, suggested rather lawful marriage to his daughters as pious and purer alternatives to their unlawful wishes, and perhaps as a source of guidance. But they were unrelenting and replied "You certainly know that we have no need for your daughters. You already know what we desire!", referring to his male guests.

The exegetes Ibn Kathir, Qurtubi and Tabari do not read 'daughters' to mean Lot's literal daughters. They argue that since a prophet is like a father to his nation, Lot was directing the evildoers to turn away from their sins and engage in healthy and pious relationships with the daughters of the nation, i.e. women in general.

The angels then revealed their true identities to Lot and said to him, “Indeed, we will save you and your family, except your wife; she is to be of those who remain behind" They advised Lot to leave the cities during the night, telling him not to look back. Keeping his faith in God, Lot left the cities in the darkness of night, bringing with him his followers and believing family members. Finally, morning came, and the Decree of God passed whereupon the Quran reads, “When Our command came, We turned the cities upside down and rained down on them clustered stones of baked clay,“ And thus was sealed the fate of the twin cities, falling into destruction and despair and marking the end of the civilisations of Sodom and Gomorrah.

Other mentions in the Quran
Lut is referenced a relatively large number of times in the Quran. Many of these passages place the narrative of Lut in a line of successive prophets including Noah, Hud, Salih and Shuayb. Islamic scholars have stated that these particular prophets represent the early cycle of prophecy as described in the Quran. These narratives typically follow similar patterns: a prophet is sent to a community; the community pays no heed to his warnings but instead threatens him with punishment; God asks the prophet to leave with his followers and the community and its people are subsequently destroyed in a punishment. Elsewhere in the Quran, Lut is mentioned alongside Ismael, Elisha and Jonah as men whom God favored above the nations.

Homosexuality
All schools of Islamic jurisprudence state that homosexual sex is a sin, based in part on the story of Lot. Because the Quran states that Lot berated his people for sexually pursuing men, in addition to attempting to assault strangers, the incident is traditionally seen as demonstrating Islam's disapproval of both rape and homosexuality (even though it's never explicitly said why Lot actually berated those men). Lot's struggle with the people of the twin cities is seen as either concerning homosexuality in general or specifically homosexual anal sex. These interpretations have sometimes widened to condemn homosexuality beyond the physical act, including psychological and social dispositions.

Monument
Many Muslims believe that Bani Na'im in Palestine houses the tomb of Lot in the center of the town. The tomb is located within a rectangular mosque with an inner court and minaret. The lintel of the mosque's northern gate is built from stones dating to the Byzantine era when a church had possibly stood at the site. Bani Na'im's association with Lot predates Islam, as the works of the Catholic scholar Jerome in the 4th century CE state that the tomb is located in a town named Capharbaricha, which is likely the former name of Bani Na'im.

Tradition holds that the tomb of his daughters is located on a nearby hill. To the southeast of Bani Na'im is a shrine dedicated to Lot, known as Maqam an-Nabi Yaqin ("Shrine of the Truthful Prophet"). Local legend claims Lot prayed at the site and that the imprints of his feet are still visible in a rock there. Similar alleged footprints of prophets and other holy men are found at Islamic shrines throughout the Middle East.

title: Lot in Islam


text:
User talk:Thinthief

Welcome to Wikipedia!
Hello Thinthief, welcome to Wikipedia! Thanks for all your contributions. Here are some useful links in case you haven't already found them: If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my talk page. I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian!
 * MediaWiki User's Guide
 * How to edit a page
 * How to write a great article
 * Naming conventions
 * Manual of Style

—Noldoaran (Talk) 03:13, Dec 17, 2003 (UTC)

title: User talk:Thinthief


text:
Dennis Tito

Dennis Anthony Tito (born August 8, 1940) is an American engineer and entrepreneur. In mid-2001, he became the first space tourist to fund his own trip into space, when he spent nearly eight days in orbit as a crew member of ISS EP-1, a visiting mission to the International Space Station. This mission was launched by the spacecraft Soyuz TM-32, and was landed by Soyuz TM-31.

Life and career
Tito was born in Queens, New York. He graduated from Forest Hills High School in New York City. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Astronautics and Aeronautics from New York University, 1962 and a Master of Science degree in Engineering Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute satellite campus in Hartford, Connecticut. He is a member of Psi Upsilon and received an honorary doctorate of engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute on May 18, 2002 and is a former scientist of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Tito was appointed to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Board of Commissioners in the 1990s and led the board to support the landmark 1994 state ruling protecting Mono Lake from excessive water diversions by the city.

Investment career
In 1972, he founded the Wilshire Associates, a leading provider of investment management, consulting and technology services in Santa Monica, California. Tito serves an international clientele representing assets of $71 billion. Wilshire relies on the field of quantitative analytics, which uses mathematical tools to analyze market risks – a methodology Tito is credited with helping to develop by applying the same techniques he used to determine a spacecraft's path at JPL. Despite a career change from aerospace engineering to investment management, Tito remained interested in space.

In 2020, Tito sold his interest in Wilshire Associates.

Personal life
Dennis divorced from his wife Suzanne Tito in the early 1990s, to whom he had been married since the 70s. They had 2 children together. She had been CFO of Wilshire Associates at the time they moved into their mansion in Pacific Palisades in 1990 with their children, that they had been building since 1987.

Dennis was married to Elizabeth Pavlova Tito, a Russian investor and Stanford alumna. They lived at Pacific Palisades in Los Angeles.

From 2016 to 2019, Dennis was married to Elizabeth TenHouten.

Since 2020, Dennis has been married to Akiko Tito, an engineer, pilot, investor, who has had interest in spaceflight since childhood. She was born in Tokyo, has an economics degree and moved to New York in 1995, raising a child prior to her marriage to Dennis.

Spaceflight
In a project first arranged by MirCorp, Tito was accepted by the Russian Federal Space Agency as a candidate for a commercial spaceflight. Tito faced criticism from NASA before the launch, primarily from Daniel Goldin, at that time the Administrator of NASA, who considered it inappropriate for a tourist to take a ride into space. MirCorp, Goldin and Tito are profiled in the documentary film Orphans of Apollo. When Tito arrived at the Johnson Space Center for additional training on the American portion of the ISS, Robert D. Cabana, NASA manager, sent Tito and his two fellow cosmonauts home, stating, "...We will not be able to begin training, because we are not willing to train with Dennis Tito."

Later, through an arrangement with space tourism company Space Adventures, Ltd., Tito joined the Soyuz TM-32 mission which launched on April 28, 2001. The spacecraft docked with the International Space Station. Tito and his fellow cosmonauts spent 7 days, 22 hours, 4 minutes in space and orbited the Earth 128 times. Tito performed several scientific experiments in orbit that he said would be useful for his company and business.

Since returning from space, he has testified at the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space and the House Committee on Science, Subcommittee on Space & Aeronautics Joint Hearing on "Commercial Human Spaceflight" on July 24, 2003. Ten years after his flight, he gave an interview to BBC News about it.

Inspiration Mars Foundation
In February 2013, Tito announced his intention to send a privately financed spaceflight to Mars by 2018, stating that the technology is already in place and that the issues that need to be overcome are only the requirements of the rigor of a 501-day trip on a psychological and physical level for the human crew. However, in November 2013, Tito and other Mars Inspiration team members admitted that their plan was impossible without significant levels of assistance and funding from NASA.

SpaceX Starship’s second commercial spaceflight around the Moon
On 12 October 2022, SpaceX announced that Dennis and Akiko Tito will be on the crew of the second commercial spaceflight of Starship around the Moon.

title: Dennis Tito


text:
Limonoid

Limonoids are phytochemicals of the triterpenoid class which are abundant in sweet or sour-scented citrus fruit and other plants of the families Cucurbitaceae, Rutaceae, and Meliaceae. Certain limonoids are antifeedants such as azadirachtin from the neem tree.

Chemically, the limonoids consist of variations of the furanolactone core structure. The prototypical structure consists of four six-membered rings and a furan ring. Limonoids are classed as tetranortriterpenes.

Citrus
Citrus fruits contain the limonoids limonin, nomilin and nomilinic acid, while both neem seeds and leaves contain the limonoid azadirachtin, although higher concentrations are present in the former.

Chisocheton erythrocarpus
Eight previously unknown limonoids were identified via spectroscopy in the fruits of Chisocheton erythrocarpus gathered in Malaysia. These compounds were dubbed erythrocarpines after the species epithet. The same study tested several preparations of C. erythrocarpus extract as larvicidal agent against Aedes aegypti mosquitoes; they found that 1000 ppm of DCM extract resulted in 100% mortality of larva 24 hours after exposure.

title: Limonoid


text:
Konstantine Gamsakhurdia

Konstantine Gamsakhurdia (კონსტანტინე გამსახურდია) (May 3, 1893 – July 17, 1975) was a Georgian writer and public figure. Educated and first published in Germany, he married Western European influences to purely Georgian thematic to produce his best works, such as The Right Hand of the Grand Master and David the Builder. Hostile to the Soviet rule, he was, nevertheless, one of the few leading Georgian writers to have survived the Stalin-era repressions, despite exile to a White Sea island and several arrests. His works are noted for their character portrayals of great psychological insight. Another major feature of Gamsakhurdia's writings is a new subtlety he infused into Georgian diction, imitating an archaic language to create a sense of classicism.

Konstantine Gamsakhurdia's son, Zviad, became a notable Soviet-era dissident who was subsequently elected the first President of Georgia in 1991, but died under suspicious circumstances in the civil war in 1993.

Early life and career
Born into a petty noble family in Abasha in western Georgian province of Mingrelia, then under Imperial Russian rule, Gamsakhurdia received his early education at the Kutaisi gymnasium and then studied in St. Petersburg, where he quarreled with Nicholas Marr. He spent most of the World War I years in Germany, France, and Switzerland, taking his doctorate at Berlin University in 1918. As a Russian subject, he was briefly interned at Traunstein in Bavaria, where Thomas Mann sent him chocolate. Gamsakhurdia published his first poems and short stories early in the 1910s, influenced by German Expressionism and by French Post-Symbolist literature. While in Germany he regularly wrote for German press on Georgia and the Caucasus, and was involved in organizing a Georgian Liberation Committee. After Georgia's declaration of independence in 1918, he became an attaché in Georgia's embassy in Berlin, responsible for repatriation of Georgian World War I prisoners and placing Georgian students in German universities.

Gamsakhurdia met the 1921 Bolshevik takeover of Georgia with hostility. He edited the Tbilisi-based literary journals and for a short time led an "academic group" of writers which placed artistic values above political correctness. Gamsakhurdia published his writings in defiance of growing ideological pressure, and went on to lead a peaceful protest-rally on the anniversary of Georgia's forcible Sovietization in 1922. In 1925 Gamsakhurdia published his first and one of his most impressive novels, The Smile of Dionysus (დიონისოს ღიმილი), which took him eight years to write. It tells the tale of a young Georgian intellectual in Paris who is detached from his native society and remains a complete stranger in the city of his ideals. This novel, like his earlier works, was partially "Decadent", and did not please the Soviet ideologists, who suspected Gamsakhurdia of fostering discontent.

Later life and works
After the suppression of the 1924 anti-Soviet uprising in Georgia, Gamsakhurdia was excluded from the Tbilisi State University where he taught German literature. Soon he was arrested and deported to the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea where he was to spend a few years. On his release, Gamsakhurdia was forced to keep silence. On the verge of suicide, the writer fought his depression by translating Dante. Early in the 1930s, he obtained Lavrentiy Beria's protection and was able to resume writing, with an attempt at "socialist" novel Stealing the Moon (მთვარის მოტაცება, 1935-6), a story of love and collectivization in Abkhazia. Next came the psychological novella Khogais Mindia (ხოგაის მინდია, 1937), yet another appeal in classical Georgian literature to this Khevsur myth. Beria was critical of these works, though. Soon Gamsakhurdia was arrested for an affair with Lida Gasviani, a young charming Trotskyite director of the State Publishing House, but interrogated and released by Beria who told him ironically that sexual relations with enemies of the people were permitted.

Gamsakhurdia survived the Joseph Stalin-Lavrentiy Beria purges, which destroyed a large part of Georgian literary society, but resolutely refused to denounce others. He had to pay a tribute to the Stalinist dogma, conceiving a novel on Stalin's childhood in 1939. However, as the first published part of this work was not approved by the authorities, it was promptly discontinued and withdrawn from public libraries.

At the height of the Stalinist terror, Gamsakhurdia turned to the more favored genre of historical and patriotic prose, embarking on his magnum opus, the novel The Right Hand of the Grand Master (დიდოსტატის მარჯვენა, 1939), set in the early 11th century around the legend of the building of the Cathedral of Living Pillar against a broad panorama of 11th-century Georgia. It deals with the tragic fate of the devoted architect Konstantine Arsakidze, from whom King Giorgi I commissions a cathedral, but Arsakidze becomes the king's rival in love for the beautiful Shorena, a daughter of the rebellious nobleman. The clash of powerful human passions, between illicit love and duty, culminates in the mutilation and execution of Arsakidze at Giorgi's behest. The story conveys a subtle allegorical message, and the harassed artists of Stalin's era can be recognized in Arsakidze.

Gamsakhurdia's major post-World War II works are The Flowering of the Vine (ვაზის ყვავილობა, 1955), which deals with a Georgian village shortly before the war; and the monumental novel David the Builder (დავით აღმაშენებელი, 1942–62), which is a tetralogy about the venerated king David the Builder who ruled Georgia from 1089 to 1125. This work won for the author a prestigious Shota Rustaveli State Prize in 1962. Gamsakhurdia also wrote a biographical novel about Goethe, and literary criticism of Georgian and foreign authors. Publication of his memoirs, Flirting with Ghosts (ლანდებთან ლაციცი, 1963) and of his testament (1959) was aborted at that time. He died in 1975 and was interred at his mansion which he called a "Colchian Tower", refusing to be buried in the Mtatsminda Pantheon because he detested that Jesus and Judas were buried side by side there, referring to the proximity of the graves of the national writer Ilia Chavchavadze and his outspoken critic and political foe, the Bolshevik Filipp Makharadze, who is believed to have been involved in Chavchavadze's assassination.

Novels

 * დიონისოს ღიმილი; English translation: The Smile of Dionysus (1925)
 * გოეთეს ცხოვრების რომანი; English translation: Novel of the life of Goethe (1930)
 * მთვარის მოტაცება; English translation: Kidnapping the Moon (1935—1936)
 * ევროპა გალიაში; English translation: Europe in the Cage (1937, Unfinished)
 * ბელადი; English translation: The Leader (1938—1939, Unfinished)
 * დიდოსტატის კონსტანტინეს მარჯვენა; English translation: The Right Hand of the Grand Master (1939)
 * დავით აღმაშენებელი; English translation: David the Builder (1946—1958)
 * ვაზის ყვავილობა; English translation: Flowering of Vine (1956)
 * თამარ; English translation: Tamar (Unfinished)

Selected novellas and short stories

 * საათები; English translation: Hours
 * დედავ, მისტიურო ქალო!; English translation: Mother, Mystical woman!
 * დამსხვრეული ჩონგური; English translation: Broken Chonguri
 * ნაპოლეონი; English translation: Napoleon
 * სიბრძნე სიცრუისა; English translation: The Wisdom of Lies
 * ტაბუ; English translation: Taboo
 * ქალის რძე; English translation: Woman's Milk
 * ქართული ჩაბალახი; English translation: Georgian Chabalakhi
 * დიდი იოსები; English translation: Great Ioseph

title: Konstantine Gamsakhurdia


text:
Francis Alexander Shields

Francis Alexander Shields Jr. (May 16, 1941 – April 25, 2003) was an American businessman and an executive at Revlon in New York City. He was the father of actress Brooke Shields.

Early life
Shields was born in New York City. He was the eldest son of Francis Xavier Alexander Sr., a top-ranking American tennis player and Davis Cup winner, and Italian Princess Donna Marina Torlonia di Civitella-Cesi. He was of Italian, German, French and English ancestry. After his parents' divorce, his father married Katharine Mortimer in 1949.

He attended the Buckley School in Manhattan and St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire. He attended in the University of Pennsylvania. While at Penn, he captained the crew that rowed in the Henley Royal Regatta in 1962 and was a member of St. Anthony Hall.

Career
Shields started his career with Loeb Rhoades. He then worked in sales and marketing for Revlon and Estee Lauder and was a part time exotic car mechanic. He also worked for Handy Associates, an executive recruiting firm in New York City.

He formed his own real estate firm, Frank Shields Associates, in Palm Beach, Florida in 1989.

Personal life
In 1964, Shields married Maria Theresia "Teri" Schmon. They had a daughter, Brooke Christa Shields in 1965. They divorced when their daughter was five months old.

In 1970, he married Diana "Didi" Lippert, former wife of Thomas Gore Auchincloss (son of Hugh D. Auchincloss). They had three daughters: Marina Torlonia Shields, Olympia Torlonia Shields, and Christina Torlonia Shields.

An avid hunter and fisherman, Shields spent much of his free time at Canoe Creek, at a camp he owned in rural west Florida.

He was a longtime member of The Brook, The Bath and Tennis Club in Palm Beach, Florida, Piping Rock Club, and The Racquet and Tennis Club.

In 1980, Shields founded the Power Ten, a New York nonprofit organization supporting youth rowing and making contributions to the U.S. National rowing team and U.S. Olympic rowing team through the National Rowing Foundation and Row New York.

In 2003, Shields died in Palm Beach, of a "protracted illness" at the age of 61. After his death, the National Rowing Foundation offered the Frank Shields Fellowships.

title: Francis Alexander Shields


text:
Confidentially Yours

Confidentially Yours (Vivement dimanche !; known as Finally, Sunday! in other English-speaking markets) is a 1983 French comedy mystery film directed by François Truffaut. Based on the 1962 novel The Long Saturday Night by American author Charles Williams, it tells the story of Julien Vercel (Jean-Louis Trintignant), an estate agent who is suspected of murdering his wife and her lover. As Vercel is hidden in his office, his secretary Barbara Becker (Fanny Ardant) investigates these suspicious murders. It was the last film directed by Truffaut before his death in October of the following year. The film had a total of 1,176,425 admissions in France and was the 39th highest-grossing film of the year.

Plot
Julien Vercel, an estate agent in the south of France, is hunting for ducks by the lake, while a man named Massoulier, who hunts in the same area, is shot dead. Julien returns to his office unaware but is soon questioned by the police. He learns that he is the main suspect, because when he left the hunt, he saw Massoulier's parked car, turned its lights off to save the battery and closed one of the door upon which he left fingerprints. Furthermore, the deceased Massoulier and Julien's wife, Marie-Christine had a secret relationship. When he confronts his wife later at home, she nonchalantly confirms her adultery. While Marie-Christine hides, Julien is taken to the police station for a second interview but is released with the help of his lawyer, Clement who drives him home. In the meantime, Marie-Christine has been murdered. Julien is now the prime suspect. In an effort to prove his innocence he wants to go to Nice, where his wife previously worked, but his secretary, Barbara Becker, argues that she should do the research on his behalf. She does so cunningly when her boss falls asleep in the office. Barbara is secretly in love with her boss, whereas Julien seems to have been indifferent to her.

While Julien hides in his real estate office instead of surrendering to the police, Barbara, who travels to Nice, starts investigating the past life of Marie-Christine. She learns that Marie-Christine's real name was Josiane Kerbel, that she has been married to a gambler, and that she lost a great deal of money gambling on horses. She married Vercel only to avoid drowning in debts. The tracks lead Barbara and Julien to a movie theater, then to a night club, and from there to the dark labyrinths of the prostitution area. Barbara and Julien mistakenly assault a suspicious man, believing him to be the real killer. It is revealed that he is, in fact, Massoulier’s brother. At the theatre, a box office clerk and former lover of Massoulier's, who accused Julien of murder on the phone, is stabbed to death. Barbara, at her wits' end, goes to see Julien’s lawyer and finally finds out the truth; Clement and Marie-Christine were lovers. He killed Massoulier because Marie-Christine asked him to, he killed her because she did not want to divorce Julien, he killed the clerk because she knew everything and he would have killed Julien after that.

Barbara and a savvy police officer work together to set a trap for the lawyer. Clement, who smells the trap based on the sound recording at the last minute, commits suicide in a telephone booth after having admitted everything on the phone, when he sees the approaching cops. Julien and Barbara finally get married by Massoulier's brother who is a clergyman.

title: Confidentially Yours