Something Our Courts Don't Need

A conservative friend sent me a story about a Pennsylvania state judge who apparently threw out an assault case where a Muslim beat up the plaintiff for wearing a costume purportedly of Mohammed.  The judge, it turns out, served in Iraq and at some point, became a Muslim.  There's been a lot of controversy, much more in Britain than here, about allowing religious communities to enforce their own laws. This case shows the danger in allowing this breach of separation of church and state.

We have seen instances of other religious groups seeking to use the local, state, and federal courts to enforce their particular codes. In New York, for example, some Orthodox Jews have tried to get secular courts to recognize decrees of rabbinical courts.  When this involves matrimonial cases, it is particularly inappropriate for the courts to give the religious courts any deference whatsoever, especially in view of the one-sided structure of Jewish divorce law.  It is equally improper to adopt any other religion's rules or accept their proceedings as having any legal standing.  Combining the state and ecclesiastical courts gave us the Inquisition.

It is very appealing to some to affect an attitude of supposed open-mindedness about allowing people to rely on their religions in a legal context.  But long historical experience confirms the danger of proceeding down this road.  We fought revolutions in both the United Kingdom and the United States to abolish the "divine right of kings"--an invention, regrettably, from the same King James I who commissioned the classic King James Version of the Bible. In recent years, popes have been offering apologies a few centuries late for the way their predecessors dealt with defendants such as Galileo. There's a play on at Theatre J in Washington about how the elders of the Jewish community in the Netherlands sought to excommunicate Baruch Spinoza, probably the most brilliant philosopher the Jews, or maybe anyone, has ever produced.

The bottom line on this subject is that people should be aware of how much trouble arises when the courts are pressed to recognize religious dictates or concerns of any kind. Every major religion, and the minor ones too, has features that are highly objectionable to others and often even to the religion's own adherents. In the worst case, the secular court gives a protective cover to the biases and beliefs of the religion. This is what happened when the ecclesiastical court in France convicted Joan of Arc and then tried to absolve itself of responsibility for her fate by turning her over to the "secular power" -- in this case, the English, who were only too happy to burn her for "religious offenses" as opposed to her waging war against them for her country.

Getting Darker of the Gods

Which, of course, is the literal translation of Goetterdaemerrung, fourth and final opera in Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung, and we thoroughly enjoyed seeing it Saturday in the movie house, with terrific HD sound, closeups, and fine singing and the fantastic music. I last saw this opera in concert version at Washington National Opera a couple of years ago, after that company found itself overwhelmed and unable to finance a full production that was originally planned. 

It's a shame that Goetterdaemerrung is so long and comes last, because I've always thought that it contains the most fantastic music of all the four Ring operas, including Die Walkure.  Some years ago, Georg Solti led the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in a concert performance of Act III at Carnegie Hall which emphasized the greatness of this opera, and Act III, which begins with that wonderful sound of the horns, in particular.

Orchestras often perform the segment of that act that is Siegfried's Rhine Journey separately. I'm not sure ir is really as mind-blowing as the final Immolation Scene, however. The cast was up to all challenges: Jay Hunter Morris is more than an acceptable Siegfried, Deborah Voigt has come into her own as Brunnhilde, and Hans-Peter Konig turns in a fine performance as the uber-evil Hagen.  The clueless pair--Gunther and Gutrune--were well-acted and sung by Iain Paterson and Wendy Bryn Harmer, who is certainly an attractive enough Gutrune to make Siegfried forget everything without the potion. 

I do not mean to forget perhaps the finest performance of all--the fabulous eight minutes at the start of the second act when the ghost of Alberich returns to reinforce his son Hagen's villainous purpose in the person of Eric Owens, who to me will now be the all-time Alberich, both in his acting and especially in his fantastic bass-baritone voice. Speaking of great voices, despite the weakness that is the major trait Gunther displays in the opera, one of the glories of the Solti Ring recording was Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the greatest of all lieder singers, performing the role.

Hard as it is to believe, in view of the ridiculous plot and all our negative associations with the philosophy Wagner espoused, the opera does capture your concern. I don't know that I will ever be convinced of the "holy fool" characters' worth--Siegfried and Parsifal (Gunther is just a run-of-the-mill idiot). In the end, it was fun for once to see that what was always regarded as Wagner's most unperformable stage direction--the Rhine overflowing its banks--was well within the capability of the Met's production to accomplish, but the fall of Valhalla that is supposed to accompany it--often not clearly distinguished from the collapse of the Hall of the Gibichungs--seemed a bit less than world-destroying.

One for the Money

A secret vice of mine is partially reading Janet Evanovich novels about her Trenton, N.J. bounty hunter Stephanie Plum.  I enjoy the setting--Trenton has an ethnic, all kinds of ethnic, neighborhood called the Burg--and the character but eventually the feeble plotting and somewhat ludicrous behavior of many of the characters (other than Stephanie) gets to me and I put the paperback down, rarely to return to it.  There are now 18 of this series--17 in paperback.  

Tonight Eileen and I went to see One for the Money, the first movie made from one of these mysteries--as I said, the plotting is so thin that you can barely call them mysteries; Graham Greene's term, entertainments, is the most appropriate descriptive. The movie stars Katherine Heigl, who admittedly is not very believable as the half-Hungarian, half-Italian Stephanie, and various lesser-known players, with Debbie Reynolds stealing many scenes as her grandmother, making this character more credible than in the novels.

The critics universally panned the picture and the small theater in the multiplex where we saw it was not well filled.  Everyone's review dumped on Heigl and the writing and the directing and just about everything and everyone else. I'm not the easiest person to win over for a movie but I think they all are wrong. This movie is just plain fun.  There's none of what I usually despise like stupid slapstick or childish fun and games.  

The dialogue is pretty decent and the good lines came from the better parts of Evanovich's first novel of the series. Those of us who read most of them appreciated the playing of her two male friends, Morelli and Ranger.  Both were nicely played. So what if the Italian Morelli was played by Jason O'Mara?

I used to think movie critics are the worst species of critic--they run in packs and have no feel for what the reasonably intelligent viewer is seeking.  This confirmed all my old prejudices against most of the movie critics I have read. They were so busy crowing about a boring outing like Hugo that they couldn't appreciate some simple enjoyment that this one provides. The one critic I usually find worth reading (because of course I tend to agree with him) is Roger Ebert; as far as I can tell, he hasn't reviewed it as of today.