#DO NOT TAKE IT AS GOSPEL

[katabay]

THEY SAY THERE IS A CARPENTER FROM THE PROVINCE PERFORMING MIRACLES IN THE CAPITAL

another scene and some sketches of the fake byzantine empire ocs! thomas is a carpenter, john is a merchant. there's an emperor (two, actually) in here, looming ominously over everything.

(I call it the fake byzantine empire because the setting is playing with byzantine history that spans across three centuries, but it's also pulling from things like Statius' Thebaid and later medieval literature. folk catholic horror, probably. doctrinal debates and schisms are in here)

on the topic of nameless and unknown saints, tho, sometimes I think about this excerpt from an essay in Closet Queeries and the time I was on my way to Tanjay and saw an abandoned chapel along a road with a statue of a saint I didn't recognize inside

Closet Queeries, essays by J. Neil C. Garcia

⭐ places I’m at! bsky / pixiv / pillowfort /cohost / cara.app / tip jar!

[faeriefully]

C. S. Lewis is credited for popularizing the three Ls explanation for the logic of Christ’s divinity.

Taking the gospels and Christ’s own words, there are only three options. Christ is either a Liar, a Lunatic, or He is Lord of all (God incarnate).

Why is this the only logical conclusion?

Christ Himself claims to be God.

In the book of John we find many “I Am” statements made by Christ.

“He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins.””

‭‭John‬ ‭8‬:‭23‬-‭24‬ ‭ESV‬‬

*note that the “he” is an addition for English translation. The Greek does not contain it. It is Ego Eimi: I Am that I Am.

—

“So the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I Am.” So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.”

‭‭John‬ ‭8‬:‭57‬-‭59‬ ‭ESV‬‬

—

“Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”

‭‭John‬ ‭6‬:‭35‬ ‭ESV‬‬

—

These two, along with others “I Am” statements in the book of John, are constructed in the Greek as Ego Eimi.

“The Greek construction lying behind this phrase is very important. To emphasize the “I” in an “I am” statement, writers and speakers would use the construction ego eimi meaning “I, I myself, am.” This is done very rarely in the Bible but ego eimi is the construction we find behind every “I AM” statement in the gospel of John. Significantly, the ego eimi construction is also found in the Greek translation of Exodus 3:14 when God declares of Himself: “I AM WHO I AM.” Over and over again when Jesus utters these “I AM” statements, He is making reference to His own deity. No first century Jew who was trained in the Scriptures would have missed this.”

— R. C. Sproul

—

Why does this matter?

Because, if Jesus is claiming the name of God, claiming to be divine, to be able to forgive sins, then there is a lot of weight on the validity of his statements.

Jesus is claiming to be God.

This means:

He is either a liar— a blasphemer in which is was correct for the Jews to attempt to kill Him. It would also mean that He is not a “moral” teacher whose lessons should be obeyed. Nothing He says is of trustworthiness. He is an enemy of God. And we should not believe, obey, nor follow His teachings. He is incapable of forgiving sin. He is a sinner. He cannot provide righteousness on our behalf. He cannot atone for sin nor bear the wrath of God without perishing. He is temporal. He is dead. He offers no salvation.

Or

He is a lunatic. A madman who believed Himself to be God and a blasphemer. Nothing He says is of trustworthiness. In which, again, it is correct for the Jews to attempt to kill him. He is an enemy of God. And we should not believe, obey, nor follow His teachings. Again, he is a sinner, incapable of providing substitution or forgiveness. He is dead. He is temporal, unable to atone for anyone, not even himself. He offers no salvation for anyone.

OR

He is Lord.

He is telling the truth. He is the Bread of Life. He is the Light of the World. He is the great I Am. He is the good shepherd. He is the lamb slain before the foundation of the world— capable of forgiving sin, able to intercede for us. He is our comforter. He is our caretaker. He is perfect, incapable of sin, deceit, lies, or failure. He is infinite and eternal, capable to bear the wrath of God without perishing for all His people’s sins, present, past, and future.

He provides righteousness and salvation for all who place their trust in Him.

He is God, our savior.

—

If Jesus is not God, there is no salvation.

Listen to our Lord who calls you,

“All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.””

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭11‬:‭27‬-‭30‬ ‭ESV‬‬

-

Come. Repent. Cast your burdens and your sin upon Jesus, our God who can remove your iniquity and comfort your grief.

[deoidesign]

Hi, how did you learn to draw Steve's physique?

Ohh what a complicated thing to answer...

When it comes to how I learned to draw anything, it's hard to say anything too specific since it's always a culmination of many years of assorted study and practice... but I can try to do my best to explain some of the biggest things that helped me learn, some tips I keep in mind, and maybe at least some places to start/delve further.

(just a little disclaimer it's not like my drawings here are going to be 100% medically accurate.. they're just to illustrate concepts!)

The main thing about learning various physiques is understanding anatomy. Which feels obvious, but I don't mean proportions; these are important, but perhaps more important is understanding the skeleton and how it moves and learning where muscles connect to bones and where fat grows on the body. When you understand how these function on a more mechanical level, depicting form and movement in a way that feels natural comes in tow.

For instance, understanding things like the pronation and supination of the radius and ulna, as well as the fact that muscles can ONLY contract or relax, will help you understand a bit better which muscles will be flexed and which will not while someone moves. It's inherent to the positioning based on the structural makeup of the body... It's not like you NEED to memorize all the muscles and bones, of course, but understanding and gaining at least a passive familiarity with the concepts really helps.

In tandem with this concept is the way parts of the body flow into eachother. Muscles ALWAYS come in groups because they can only contract. Whatever muscle is there to lift something, there is a muscle on the other side to pull that bone back down. What this results in is a series of straight edges next to curves, which gives us a lot of really lovely "s curves" and dents and folds and so on and so forth just naturally occurring.

I would suggest at least learning the "bony landmarks", which are bones (usually) visible on the surface of the body. things like the iliac crest, the great trochanter, the 7th vertabrae, the acromion process... These can be used to help you understand the parts of the body as angles and relationships, rather than trying to remember lengths and sizes, which vary immensely... (since you asked about steve, he can be our model... also study these on your own don't just take my word for it haha, these are the ones I personally keep in mind)

I've done the same thing with body hair... learning where it grows and in which directions... It helps me make up variations without needing reference, because I have a set of rules I can follow.

The biggest thing that helped me understand all this on a much deeper level was my ecorche course. I sculpted this guy. We started by sculpting the entire skeleton to understand the bones, and then we added muscles on top. Not every single muscle, of course, but the "artistic muscles" AKA the ones which directly affect the surface of the body. Doing this let us see where muscles connect, because we would make a shape, put it on the bone where it actually goes, and then you get to see how other muscles overlap that.

This helped me, perhaps, more than anything else. But I also didn't just start with this course, I had been drawing for years before I even took it. I had been in school for years before I took it. Not that I think it wouldn't be helpful to someone just starting out, but I do think that the more you know going in, the better an in-depth course like this will help you and stick with you. Classes are also expensive, though so I'm not really like... recommending you pay potentially thousands of dollars to take one... But it did help me a lot, personally.

I also, of course, have done many figure, gesture, and master studies...

These just help you quickly gain a stronger understanding of generalized anatomy, and gives you real life examples of and practice with of how people move and balance.

What all this does when combined, is gives me a very solid ability to depict movement and form in a way that feels relatively natural from my subconscious without the need for reference.

The rest of how I've learned to draw his physique is honestly mostly just stylization. I understand the body, and this is how I am depicting it for his level of musculature.

And as I move into depicting him in other ways, either moving in comics or in animation, realistically rendered, or extra stylized, these concepts inform every step of that process for me! When he keeps the same/similar relationships between parts, he gets to still look like himself.

It ALSO really helps when putting clothes on, because the way cloth falls and bunches and lifts is all directly related to the form it is on... So the more you understand that form, the more you can depict clothing and movement in a way that feels natural.

This is all, of course, true when I draw anyone, you asked about Steve so I'm trying to mostly show with him! But because I'm just drawing from raw information of general anatomy rather than trying to study one body type at a time, it allows a lot more "give," I think!

Like, here's most of the cast from TTA so far... actually, they're not as varied as I thought they were nevermind LMAO ignore this part

But, it also makes monster and alien design much easier! It's a lot easier to come up with non-human anatomy when I understand human anatomy, because I can manipulate the knowledge I have...

There is infinite more to study in the world of anatomy... The complexity of the human body goes extremely deep. For our purposes as artists, we need only depict a fraction of it, but more information rarely hurts the process.

I'm sure there's something in here that's wrong on a technical level, I'm mostly going off of memory. But that's kind of my point - I understand enough generally and conceptually that when I am missing something and need to find reference for it, I understand what I'm looking at. It's much easier than trying to learn AND draw at the same time.

I hope even one thing in here helped you! Sorry it's so long.

[magicalgirlfia]

I just got the art book and (roughly) translated this page of New Squidbeak Splatoon info.

See the translations are in the “readmore” because I don’t want to spoil anyone.

[chamerionwrites]

See I honestly do find the prequels-era Jedi an interesting (and at times painfully recognizable) portrait of institutional violence in that...they aren't cackling villains. They're mostly sympathetic well-intentioned individuals who via a combo of traditionalist inertia, ideological blinders, proximity to power, a dash of plain old arrogance and a liberal seasoning of end-justifies-the-means compromise end up being at best indifferent to and at worst deeply complicit in some pretty heinous injustice. I don't even think this is a completely against-the-grain reading on my part. At the end of the day it's a pretty mild critique, but it's hard to argue that the PT is entirely uncritical of the Jedi imo.

Unfortunately the narrative is never interested in really sinking its teeth into that. And even more unfortunately, a chunk of the fandom will clutch its pearls in horrified outrage if anybody else is interested in sinking their teeth into that

[natsmagi]

my thoughts on the new event by the way If u even care

text ID below

"hi is this where i go for when i need to let my insane ramblings out of my system. Well anyway im starting to think the point of the lost ballade shuffle is moreso these characters exorcising their past traumas. i dont know alot about yuzuru or niki so i cant really speak on them but for tsumugi rei and madara itd make sense since the lyrics of the song seems to imply that They are the lost children. they are the lost children who have endured all this hardships. rei, tsumugi, madara and yuzuru had rather abusive and dehumanizing upbringings (again idk niki lore</3). theyre lost children robbed off their lives. i wonder if their scenes when the spirits came loose showcases how they coped about it in a way too? like mama is seen interacting with many of the members, which is fitting considering his whole deal being related to "having connections," since his family followed the shinkai cult and made the wishes come true. tsumugi seems alot more lonely, carrying his weight by himself to the point where it seems his body is beginning to give out. which is consistent with tsumugis character and how he often self-sacrifices and doesnt let others in much. rei seems alot more grand, focusing on the bigger picture and not himself, analyzing the situation to better know how to approach. such as him looking at the tomb thing with a more calculative gaze, and then giving that same look to the radio tower, implying that maybe thats whats been causing all of this. this is also consistent with reis character in how hes viewed by many as a savior. a prodigy that can fix everyones struggles, without stopping to view rei as his own individual the song itself feels very much like. People who are clinging to bad habits. wandering around aimlessly because with how they were raised this is all they know. never telling anyone of their hardships. never letting anyone in. completely isolating themselves, because the people who were meant to raise them never taught them how to live, so all they know is "watching over the world" and then in the end they exorcised themselves of their pasts, not letting that define them anymore. u can see it esp w tsumugi in how, minus the hush towards the camera, he never once smiled during the mv until the purified spirits were floating around him like hes finally at peace im so normal about this i swear"

[bonefall]

Hi Bones!! Thank you for you hard work on this project and for sharing it with us!

I've seen your posts about weird representation of society (regarding the "natural order of things") in xenofiction, especially in lion king, so I wanted to ask:

could you recommend any xenofiction media that has all (or most of the) animal species sapient? Or is the only solution to make just one or two species sapient while the others (especially prey) are plain animals?

Really sorry if you've seen this ask from me before - my account had a weird laggy period when I couldn't send or receive messages and asks, so I don't know if you got the previous one! I just know that now it's fixed so I double all the asks sent haha

Honestly I'm not totally sure! If any 3rd person has some good recommendations for "every being is alive" xenofiction types, feel free to weigh in.

If you want to jump in with me though, I am following the webcomic Africa. It updates every Wednesday. Africa is about a mother Leopard on the verge of a great ecological disaster, the relationship between her children and the animals around her, and the strength of both instinct and choice as the characters face an uncertain future.

Since it's ongoing, I still don't know how it's going to end and can't judge it as a full work! But it's absolutely fascinating and I think the author is doing a fantastic job so far. Bonus points for the way it portrays humans, btw.

No more spoilers though, if you're interested, it's on Webtoons.

(I'm also planning to read Oren's Forge soon. Ask me about it again in a few months over on Bonebabbles and I'll give you my thoughts)

As an aside though, funny you mention it because like... ever since I was a kid I've had a story I want to tell with the premise. It's a scintilla I've kept close to me for well over a decade but haven't done anything official with. So this is actually a theme I've thought about a lot.

It's rare to see it done well though because like... its very premise butts heads with reality. The "natural order" that an animal follows is not something it moralizes. A tiger doesn't have the capacity to think about how fucked up it is to kill to stay alive, the deer doesn't know that if its population isn't controlled it will destroy the forest.

They're animals. They don't HAVE that agency. Your dog does not care about being sterilized. A snake doesn't differentiate between a pinky and an adult mouse except in terms of if it will fit in its mouth. But the minute you put human morality in there... they have the ability to reason, create and agree on the rules of a society, make choices about MORALITY.

If nothing is going to change about their world, you just end up putting human arguments about "natural order" in their mouths and, well... start telling a parable justifying this "natural order."

(Genuine) Does what I'm saying make sense? Animals DON'T rationalize or negotiate. HUMANS do.

So the minute you're approaching a world with that logic, like it or not, you are invoking those "arguments from nature." And you're putting them in a being that is not fully an animal or a human, but an anthropomorphic mix which CAN rationalize but WON'T make an effort to change their world.

(Which is why tbh the best examples i know of are works with a theme of "change.")

OH WAIT I also remember another that's interesting!! Leafy: Hen into the Wild actually has a fascinating take on it. It's not interested in "moralizing" or really being about an animal society. It's a very emotional sort of movie, and it's about joys in adversity, the freedom that choice gives you, how bad things are going to happen and you can never completely prevent them.

INTENSE movie emotionally, the ending will wreck you (especially in the English translation which leaves out a really important theme making it feel abrupt x_x) but it's really good. Check that one out.

OH and also You Are Umasou. That one has more pitfalls imo (it does try to moralize a bit) but it's super unique as a movie. And is about dinosaurs.

[realbeefman]

the thing about the umbrella academy is that if they just let aidan gallagher be a LITTLE bit in the writer’s room like let him stand on the edge and make suggestions the results would be so glorious… that guy was living in the skin of five hargreeves before the tv show was even conceptualized he was born to play that role he’s BEEN insane about tua. and yet when he says things like “yeah i purposefully played five as if he had a crush on young viktor because i think there is a romantic love lost between them and a mourning of what couldve been” they CENSOR HIM!!! that man is that show’s greatest asset and they refuse to let him fully unfurl his freak flag

[meteorstricken]

I want to take a moment to speak frankly and somewhat personally. Historically, I've praised FFXVI for having an excellent trauma narrative, and for the most part, I still think that's true.

But in this moment, during the final fight with Ultima, I feel it falls short. Clive tells Ultima that he could have never known suffering and implies that if he had, as humanity has, that he'd know that suffering results in togetherness and strength.

In most trauma survivor communities, it's considered a grave taboo and even outright cruel to suggest that one owes their strength to suffering. It's considered a form of toxic positivity. In those selfsame communities, one anecdote you might hear repeated from a great number of trauma-informed clinicians is that part of what makes trauma so terrible is that survivors are not infrequently abandoned, sabotaged, or preyed upon as a direct result of the horrors that befall them--even blamed for it--and tragically, by the very shoulders that should have been there for support. By the very hands that should have lifted them up. That is, anguish and suffering often beget more of the same and bring alienation, despair, and learned helplessness.

Clive is wrong here about his well-supported experience being the norm, and he's dead wrong to connect togetherness and strength as symptomatic of having truly suffered. While I can certainly point to a cohesive string of story events that tell why he ultimately came to rely on this line of thinking, as a trauma survivor myself...this last fight always stings, because I invariably start to feel like I too am on the receiving end of his condemnation. Some of the things Clive says to Ultima are things that people have said to me in the past nearly verbatim. (I have since received apologies from those individuals as they've become better educated, but... their words still haunt me.)

That is no small part of where I found my "sympathy for the devil", so to speak.

And if you want an idea of what trauma recovery might sometimes come to feel like when, all too often, you've received the opposite of support--when the very people, communities, and institutions meant to ensure your survival and recovery have instead turned on you, betraying their intended purpose; when your strength and will to live renew or persist but by your own stubbornness and unwillingness to stay down...well...It's a thing that can wax bitter, counterdependent, and full of rage.

[hilacopter]

*on the floor trembling through gritted teeth* this made me grow as a person. this made me change for the better. good things have come out of this.

[jellicle-chants]

Guess what I just found in my drafts that I meant to publish like... a year ago 🥴🙃🥲 Anyway, have some details about my CATS Speakeasy AU! I'm really hoping to get back around to this in more detail sometime soonish, so better to study up now...

Munk is the adopted son of Old Deut, who raised many such foundlings and in general created a safe place for anyone who didn't have one. In the narrative of the AU, he's trying to solve one of Macavity's plots (probably some kind of kidnapping situation). He also takes care of Jemima, who was left on his doorstep in an echo of his own origin. Plato tags along as his apprentice, although he's not often helpful with his two younger brothers, Tumblebrutus and Pouncival, getting in his way.

The titular speakeasy, The Smitten Kitten, is co-run by Deme and Bomba, as a way to get back on their feet after escaping from Macavity (along with Alonzo, who plays piano). Tugger is also here, doing miscellaneous jobs and generally being an obnoxious flirt. Romances are undefined as of now but definitely happen.

Bustopher Jones is a British expat who moved to the US with his housekeeper (and requited crush) Jennyanydots, in a misguided attempt to straighten out his godchildren/wards, Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer. It does not go well, especially when Munk needs to call on the twins' troublemaking abilities to infiltrate Macavity's lair.

Some other things I've worked out, but haven't managed to integrate into the main plot yet:

Jellylorum and Asparagus (Gus Jr) run a struggling off-Broadway theatre started by their father. In between shows, they rent out the stage to Cassandra and Misto, who alternate their acts, and a spare dressing room to Coricopat and Tantomile. The twins, Cass, and Misto all met in the circus, but split off because of mistreatment and nonpayment. Victoria joined Misto's act after failing to find work as a ballet dancer elsewhere, and the two now brand themselves as siblings. The group don't mean to take advantage of the siblings, but attendance is inconsistent, to say the least. Of course, Jelly and Gus Jr would never kick them out — they know their father would loathe to see the building closed even temporarily.

Skimbleshanks is a trolley driver. (I know this entry is comically short compared to the last one, but I imagine he'd just pop up occasionally throughout the story. Sometimes simpler is better.)

I really want to fit Algernonny (my OC) in here somewhere, but I haven't settled on anything yet. Maybe he drives a bookmobile??

Olivetti (my other OC) is a bit easier to place, since he'd be a reporter, but I'm not sure what effect he'd have on the story at large.

Some relationships (familial, platonic, and romantic) I want to emphasize:

None of Munk/Tugger/Mac are related, nor are any of them directly related to Old Deut. In my eyes, Macavity has always worked better as an entity lurking in the shadows than someone who is well-known and emotionally tied to the other characters.

Re: the Smitten Kitten bunch, I haven't untangled who I want them and Munk to end up with (or maybe they just all end up together?). There will definitely be some one-sided Platugger flirting because I can. (Algie/Alonzo is also a done deal, but that doesn't mean Alonzo doesn't get to participate here too.)

I haven't decided whether I go the Victeazer or Tantoteazer route yet. I'm leaning towards Mistojerrie though as a new thing for me.

Asparagus and Skimbleshanks will end up being a thing, because I can't get enough of them two <3

I haven't decided if I want Jenny to be Plato (etc.)'s mom. It would be easier to tie that household into the main goings-on that way, but also (if you couldn't tell) I'm trying to improvise on a lot of these characters and come up with new relations -- at least for the ones for whom I don't already have a ship I'm attached to.\

[sarafangirlart]

Real talk but why is Perseus villainized so much in Medusa retellings? Yeah he’s kinda a dick when written by Ovid but he’s not a straight up evil monster. It’s not like you can’t make both Medusa and Perseus sympathetic.

[milo-hypno]

I think a very important thing about Etho and Mumbo's dynamics, especially in shipping, is just how much Mumbo idolizes Etho. Like- he still gets flustered about him. they have been on the same server for seven years, and he still gets very awkward around him, and bashful almost? Like, in Secret Life, I haven't seen the episode since it came out but when he got the task to be Etho's maid, he was like- apprehensive. Don't quote me on this but I even think he says like, "Oh no", and seems to act even more anxious than usual.

(My best guess for this is because like, Etho is- A, an og minecrafter, he's Etho, but also because of the things he's done for redstone - especially early on?)

Meanwhile, Etho is- well, Etho. A little cagey? Again, going off of my memory in Secret life, he almost has the vibe of like- treating Mumbo like a bug. Not in a derogatory way, but in a fascinating if not "why are you here" way

i think the secret to a good ship dynamic of them is just like. the most painful awkwardness ever. followed by etho slowly warming up to Mumbo's presence like a stray cat, while Mumbo becomes more comfortable with him.

[bibleofficial]

i’ve been up like 3hrs & 2/3 of each hour has been me shitting & suffering like

[servenas-inner-fangirl]

Stop putting your liveblog posts in the main tags it’s incredibly annoying and clogging up the whole feed

Or if it's annoying you could block my tag for that?

I only post at max once a day so I don't see how it could clutter up the whole feed. But I'll put it under a Read More so it'll be shorter. But re: putting it in the main tag, I don't really see where else I'm supposed to put it?

Also why on anon, you couldn't be rude in person?

[battle-subway-ghost]

Hey ghost could you enlighten me on the best way to hold a ratt

@psyonicscream

How to hold rattatas? Yeah, sure.

Firstly, don’t grab ‘em by the scruff or tail. They don’t like that, obviously. And it can hurt them pretty badly. If it’s an absolute emergency and you can’t get ‘em any other way, then it’s not the end of the world, just don’t do that regularly.

To actually hold rattatas, you’re gonna want to scoop em up from underneath. Two hands on each side of the little guy. Support their front and back with your hands. That’s my favorite way at least.

Another way is to pick them up with your hand under their chest area, and use your other hand to support their hind legs.

They also like sitting on people’s shoulders, so you can just let ‘em climb up there too. Be careful with that, though.

(Also make sure your rattata’s comfortable with it- some rattata just don’t like being held at all, or only like being held one way.)