keeper-of-the-flames

[keeper-of-the-flames]

happy pride

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Oh I am MAD. This certification course was broken into two collections of videos and quizzes instead of all together in one chunk like normal. So when I only did half of it last night and finished what I thought was the other half just now, only to learn I’d only finished the actual first half and needed to open the next set of lecture videos and quizzes for the real part 2. So if I want to keep my pace of three hours of course work a day, I’ll have to really be doing 4.5 to make up for the shortfall

😭

[keeper-of-the-flames]

[keeper-of-the-flames]

[keeper-of-the-flames]

[keeper-of-the-flames]

I looked at run4theirlives boulder's social media, and there was nothing at all on it about supporting the war (or opposing the war). There were Israeli flags but it wasn't even really about Israel or Zionism. It really was just focused on the hostages.

But the pro-Palestine movement has been insisting for months that speaking about the hostages = encouraging the war. Something I have tried to push back on at every opportunity. It's hard for me to articulate why but this just demonstrates so clearly how twisted this all is.

Like what does it boil down to other than people thinking "it is evil to care about Israelis?"

[keeper-of-the-flames]

You’re welcome! I always love when people show different versions of Revan cause it seems like they aren’t as deeply remembered alongside later BioWare protags.

Gift commission from @gncgalactus for @invincibleinck! Happy birthday!

Commission info: https://cadhla182.tumblr.com/Commissions

[keeper-of-the-flames]

continuing my series of nature-themed portraits — this time with Saga and Alan, paired with moonflowers and night-blooming cereus: two flowers that only bloom in dark

[keeper-of-the-flames]

you heard it here first folks

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Papercut for Shavuot

[keeper-of-the-flames]

shavuot aka jewish holiday of cheescakes, flowers and fruits

[keeper-of-the-flames]

during Shavuot this year, i saw so many that were celebrating the holiday, making jokes about dairy and goyim who don’t understand our customs. the behavior of other Jews on Shavuot has always been profoundly inexplicable to me–i’ve never been able to understand it and every year it catches me off guard.

the sixth of Sivan has always been so much darker for me and my family then it was for other Jews. we eat siete cielos, kahi, and matzah with milk for chalav; we read the Azharot; we all stay up late and read from the Mishnah in an attempt to never be overwhelmed by greatness but to stand beside it instead. but our Shavuot has always been much darker than the Shavuot that others celebrate, and it’s important to understand that Shavuot is a day of mourning for us.

it has been 72 years since the Farhud, riots led by Nazi sympathizers against Iraqi Jews. the Farhud killed 179 of our population, a population that had been in Iraq for over two thousand years after we fled the destruction of the Beit haMikdash. Jews had been treated fairly well by Muslims in Iraq for the majority of modern Iraq’s history, but the Farhud was the result of Nazi propaganda spreading in Iraq as well as a dangerous manifestation of Arab nationalism, eventually leading to violence against Iraqi Jews. 

the lead-up to this included Iraqi Jews being dismissed from their work, university quotas being put in place (meaning that only a certain number of Jews were allowed in university), and other discriminatory laws. after the Farhud in 1941, the status that Jews had in Iraq since King Faisal deteriorated more rapidly. Jews were not considered Aravim by Arab nationalists anymore and were therefore not included under their protection.

the death of 180 Jews, the injury of anywhere from one to two thousand, the destruction of Jewish homes…all this went on during Shavuot in Baghdad. my own relatives were eating as they usually did during Shavuot when they heard screaming from outside; their mother forbade them from leaving the house, but that didn’t stop several of them from being killed in the events of the Farhud. my mother never got to hear the words of many of her relatives; they were killed and thrown quickly into the mass grave of the Farhud. only a few among my Jewish relatives from Baghdad survived; many of them who later emigrated were from Qalaat Salih, not Baghdad.

even so, they recount the events of that Shavuot and its horrors vividly. my great-grandmother, who was lucky enough to survive (and was old enough to provide good details), even wrote down her account of what happened during the Farhud; she gave it to my savta, who later passed it down to my mother, who later passed it down to me. it’s horrific, to say the least, and you cannot read it without getting a real sense for how terrifying that Shavuot was. knowing what happened that Shavuot in 1941, even if you do not read the letter, is enough to change your view of the festival.

while i celebrate it, it is a day of mourning for me. i must mourn for who would have been my great-uncles; i mourn for every Jew killed and every Jew who emigrated in 1950-1951 (and those who stayed behind and watched their people be hanged). i celebrate it in the Jewish way because i am a Jew. i have not let go of that. it is a day of commemoration for me, but also a day where i have to remember  those who were killed by Nazi Germany, even so many miles away.

Kutal al-Yahud still echoes in our minds and for that reason, Shavuot will never just commemorate the day that G-d gave us the Torah, but also the day that we were slaughtered in a way that the Torah did not prepare us for.

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Manuscript Monday: The Megillah of Ruth

Inspired by illinoisrbml‘s post on the Esther scroll in their collection, we’re presenting Mizzou’s Ruth scroll for Shavuot.

In Jewish tradition there are five megillot (scrolls) that are read on five different holidays. All of them unrolled using a single roller, instead of two traditionally attached at each side of the scroll.

The Book of Ruth is read on Shavuot, the Festival of Weeks, which occurs seven weeks after the beginning of Passover, in late May or early June.  This year, Shavuot began on Saturday, May 23, and ends today.

Among Biblical characters, Ruth is one of the most beautiful. Born a Moabitess, she married a Jew, Chelion, son of Elimelech and his wife Naomi. After Chelion’s and Elimelech’ s death, she faithfully stayed with Naomi, and followed her elderly and fragile mother-in-law back to Bethlehem, where Naomi was from. It was long and dangerous journey, for Ruth it was much safer to return to her parent’s home, but she said to Naomi:

Be not against me, to desire that I should leave thee and depart: for whithersoever thou shalt go, I will go: and where thou shalt dwell, I also will dwell. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. (Ruth 1:16)

Ruth is equally revered by Jews and Christians, because she is one of the ancestors of King David, and thus mentioned in Gospel of St. Matthew in the genealogy of Jesus Christ.

Other scrolls with one roller should be: Book of Esther, read on Purim; Song of Songs – on Passover; Lamentations of Jeremiah the Prophet.– on the 9th day of Av; and Ecclesiastes – on Sukkot.

- Alla Barabtarlo

[keeper-of-the-flames]

I’m so super late but– DickKory Week AU Day!!

It’s not an OTP until you au them in The Little Mermaid for me, so I chose the style and one of my favorite scenes. I kept it close to the Disney style but reeeeally tweaked the anatomy a bit. Still them though!

[keeper-of-the-flames]

WOAH! Nice work!!!!

Gift commission from @gncgalactus for @invincibleinck! Happy birthday!

Commission info: https://cadhla182.tumblr.com/Commissions

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Americans invented tbe worlds burgled and burglars to apply to robberies because the concept of losing their burger is the scariest thing to them

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Hey remember how I said that A: Khelif was being targeted by transmisogyny regardless of the presumptive "TME" label and B: insisting that she is intersex when she has denied being so was dangerous because I didn't trust anti-trans and anti-intersex governing bodies to not exclude or ban her on a technicality?

And then I got harassed for over a week about how pointing this out was in itself transmisogyny?

So very interesting about that...