« As the light grows longer
The cold grows stronger
If Candlemas be fair and bright
Winter will have another flight
If Candlemas be cloud and rain
Winter will be gone and not come again
A farmer should on Candlemas day
Have half his corn and half his hay
On Candlemas day if thorns hang a drop
You can be sure of a good pea crop. »*
It seems that, at some point, people in Europe thought that the days halfway from Winter solstice to Spring equinox — i.e. in the middle of the winter, or half a quarter of the year — animals could be used for purposes different than alimentation or couture — yet, very practical and useful purposes.
It seems that German immigrants imported the custom to English North-America (this includes, of course, Canada); the first written reference we have of this celebration in the US is from 1841. It also seems that animals that hibernate are afraid of their own shadows — at least when they wake up from hibernation. And, finally, it seems that people believe cloudy humid days early in February mean that winter will be short and, paradoxically — at least for me —, warmer sunny days (like this peculiar weather we had in Mexico’s Central Basin, on February 2nd) mean harsh long winters.
Then, for me, Groundhog Day has always been — or mean — Groundhog Day (Hechizo del tiempo), a fantastic 1993 film that reflects on the passing of time, with Bill Murray and Andie McDowell in the leading roles of the story of a time loop. When I saw it for the first time (on open TV, surely on channel 5, dubbed to Spanish) it astounded me, it actually freaked me out, by showing the possibility of this bizarre — should I say “pop”? — eternal return.
Por otro lado, el día de la Candelaria sí pasa, termina, y suele olvidarse…
Candlemas (la Chandeleur, Candelota), well, however it is a holyday in the Christian calendar, the story behind the feast is all about Jewish traditions. On the one hand, in Mosaic Law, a woman who gives birth to a male child remains impure for forty days and at the end of the quarantine she has to go to the temple with her son. On the other hand, there is a peculiar and discussed translation of a prophecy delivered to the “just and devout man” who met Jesus at the temple’s entrance, Simeon the Righteous — a Christian saint con-fused with a legendary rabbi, Shimon HaTzaddik, (with two possible and debated identities, either Shimon I, 310-291 / 300-270 BCE, or Shimon II, 219-199 BCE).
It seems that Simeon’s prophecy and some other passages in the Pentateuch and in the Prophetical Books, originally written in Hebrew, present the problem of translating the word almah (עלמה), that means “young marriageable girl” — and, hence, unmarried. These details could imply that such girl would be a virgin, although almah does not literally mean that. Now, you can imagine (in fact, you may be living) the confusions provoked when the Septuagint translated almah as parthenos (παρθενος), i. e. “virgin” in greek.
According to the Orthodox Christian tradition, Simeon the Righteous was one of the seventy-two translators of the Septuagint. He hesitated when translating the word almah (as parthenos) from Isaiah 7:14,** and at that very moment he was promised by an angel not to see death until he had seen the Christ born of a virgin (by the way, his feast as a Christian saint is celebrated on February 3rd). So, when he held Jesus in his arms and recognised him at the temple, he uttered a prayer known as “Nunc dimitiis” (“Now I’m dismissed” or Now I am free, the latter is my free interpretation).
« Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine, secundum verbum tuum in pace:
Quia viderunt oculi mei salutare tuum
Quod parasti ante faciem omnium populorum:
Lumen ad revelationem gentium, et gloriam plebis tuae Israel. »***
This post is difficult to explain, I somehow needed to “make” it. It took me two and a half days to put it together:
- The illustration on top of the post is a 1478 drawing by Theodoros PELECANOS from the alchemical tract Synosius; it represents an Ouroboros and was taken from Wikipedia.
- * The first quoted text is an anonymous Scottish poem from which derives the North-American tradition of Groundhog Day, according to Wikipedia.
- ** For further information on Isaiah 7:14 (notice the curious numeric pattern) and on the controversy around almah, there is this Wikipedia article.
- *** The last quoted text is the “Nunc dimitiis” prayer in its Latin version as appears on Wikipedia; for diverse english translations of the Latin text see the link.
As you can see the text owes a lot to Wikipedia, but (especially in the Candelaria part) it also contains very valuable information collected from comments of R. A. COFFMAN and from the Bible of Jerusalem (Desclée de Bower, Bruxelles/Bilbao, 1967, for the Spanish edition). I sincerely apologise for any inaccuracy, error or misinterpretation.
There is, at least, one fun cinematic referrence to the dispute about the translation and interpretation of almah in Guy Ritchie (dir.), Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (Cerdos, diamantes y dos armas humeantes), United Kingdom, 1998, 107/120 mins.
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Hello again!, all fictionalities aside. I’ve been away for a while, and then I thought this day, these two celebrations, and this very post were a good way of coming back home; mostly now, when I was beginning to feel “home” stranger. So, let us make a welcome list to bring ourselves up to date:
- The Frenchman’s visit was a total blast — really, the explosion of the unexpected —, very nice, satisfying, bouleversante, challenging, shocking. It wasn’t easy. Since then, I owe a very good post to the event and the experience… I guess I still have to find the courage that such a post would take.
- The new seminar is huge, in every sense: it is full of people, projects and possibilities, but is also full, replete, of work and to-do’s… and I really don’t know how I will manage to complete the job properly (I’m trying though, hard).
- People go on with their blogs and I’m far behind with my reading: I have loads of comments to post. And, by the way, a parasite publicity page has clung to this one. I never knew how or when, it just appeared overnight. I apologise for it and if anyone knows what I should do to solve the problem, please, let me know.
- I have just bought Shemot (the “new” Mexican translation!), and still have four other quite expensive volumes to buy. While doing so, I’m trying to combine the work with it with the reading of Benjamin, Rosenzweig and Blanqui. By the way, Torah studying is becoming extremely interesting — and promising too.
- I have just completed — with Nat — our very own ‘David Lynch’s Essential Collection’ (the central pieces are the films of the trilogy, Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me and Mulholland Drive). So we’re ready and looking forward to that promissed discussion on Mulholland Drive (Lizz, ¡cuándo usted quiera!).
- And last but not least, El Colegio de México — or rather, the worker’s union, SUTCOLMEX — went on strike this Friday, February 2nd, for about five minutes. It may be silly for people who still have in mind the 1999 “student strike” at UNAM, but there was something about this mini-strike… anyway, it was exciting, everybody running, contradictory information circulating, speculations lingering and, finally, we just recovered some mosaics of the complete picture. A fine mid-winter experience.
Alas! This is the final post of the English-&-some-French series. We will be recovering other paths of communication (by the way, Blogger forced me to change to the new version of the service, so any unexpected change, error or failure, shall be due to that unfortunate event).
P. S. : Friday, February 2nd 2007, was also the 125th Anniversary of James Joyce’s birth-day. I just found about it today.
P. S. 2: I’ve already had two days to confirm that, this year, weather prediction using the Groundhog Day system seems to be accurate. Candlemas was hot, sunny, clear and windy while Saturday and Sunday have been cold, very cloudy and, surprisingly, rainy!
Ciudad de México 20070204 1647 - 16 Shevat 5767
