Biffen's Millions by P. G. Wodehouse

Source of book: Borrowed from the library

It’s no mystery that I love P. G. Wodehouse. From the Bertie and Jeeves books, to the Psmith stories, to the Golf tales (especially the golf tales), his wit, humor, and absurdity never fail to make me chuckle. Here are my previous Wodehouse posts:

Introduction to Wodehouse

The Adventures of Sally

Uncle Fred in the Springtime

Thank You, Jeeves

So anyway, this book was recommended by my friend and colleague Kurt, who shares my love for literature - and specifically my love for Wodehouse and Anthony Trollope.

This particular book isn’t part of any series, and is one of the author’s later works. It is also published under the title of Frozen Assets. (Many Wodehouse books had different titles in the United States and the United Kingdom. Go figure.)

Why this book? Well, it involves a fun legal issue.

Edmund Biffen Christopher, aka “Biff,” is a typically feckless Wodehouse young man. He discovers that his godfather has died, leaving him millions in his will. With a condition.

Biff must make it to age 30 without being arrested. This is a daunting task, because Biff has a tendency to drink and afterward to insult or fight with policemen. In Paris, this was not such a big deal, but in London, they seemed to take it far too seriously.

Biff’s friend Jerry Shoesmith, another young man of limited means and even more limited brains, becomes responsible for getting Biff through the next few weeks so he can inherit. Biff’s sister (with whom Jerry has naturally fallen in love) assists him, while the Godfather’s rich and greedy brother conspires with a private investigator, a lawyer, and a few other characters to get Biff to fall.

Hilarity, and a game of “musical trousers” ensue. (Yes indeed, various characters are left trouserless at the worst of times. This is Wodehouse, after all…)

Other legal issues touched upon are the difference between criminal theft and civil conversion, and the fine distinction between insanity and eccentricity. Wodehouse also takes the time to tease the French and the Americans and get a dig at restricted diets and those who wish to talk about nothing else.

There are some great lines of course. Here are my favorites. The opening scene, for example:

The Sergeant of Police who sat at his desk in the dingy little Paris police station was calm, stolid and ponderous, giving the impression of being constructed of some form of suet.

In fact, the whole opening chapter, wherein poor Jerry attempts - unsuccessfully - to get his lost wallet back from the Paris police is a gas. Also, too familiar to any of us who work with government bureaucracy.

Or Biff and Jerry discussing Biff’s proclivities.

“It’s a pity you have this urge to punch policemen.”

“It’s just a mannerism.”

“I’d correct it, if I were you.”

While Wodehouse doesn’t feel the need to be strictly accurate in his interpretation of the law - that might get in the way of a joke - he does come up with some lines that I would love to use in court some day.

After the evil brother, Tilbury, accuses Biff of using undue influence, Jerry opines, “Obviously there can’t have been anything like that in this case, because you haven’t seen your godfather in three years. You can’t influence people by remote control.”

It was also fun to see a reference to another favorite book. Tilbury’s lackey Pilbeam discovers some of the godfather’s eccentricities from a source.

“His editor told him to go interview your brother, so he wrote asking if he could make an appointment, and your brother wrote back naming a day. His letter was written in red chalk.”

“In what?”

“Red chalk. Each word outlined in blue chalk. Like Hyman Kaplan.”

Seriously. If you have never read Leo Rosten’s “Kaplan” books, you really should do so. Nice of Wodehouse to name-check a fellow humorist.

Wodehouse also makes an astute observation about attorneys.

London solicitors come in every size and shape, but they have this in common, that with a few negligible exceptions they all look like some species of bird. Jerry Shoesmith’s Uncle John, for instance, the guiding spirit of Shoesmith, Shoesmith and Shoesmith of Lincoln’s Inn Fields, resembled a cassowary, while elsewhere you would find owls, ducks, sparrows, parrots and an occasional ptarmigan. Lord Tilbury’s legal adviser, a Mr. Bunting of Bunting, Satterthwaite and Miles, could have mixed without exciting comment in any gathering of vultures in the Gobi Desert, though his associates would have been able to expose him as an imposter when mealtime came, for unlike the generality of vultures he had a weak digestion and had to be careful what he ate.

This is doubly good because I have a local colleague who in fact does look exactly like a vulture. Strikingly so. I shall now go and analyze the other birds in our local bar. Anyone have a suggestion for my own analogue?

One final quote, about Tilbury, after a bitter disappointment.

He was musing bitterly on Providence. A moment before, he had been telling himself that Providence, always on the side of the good man, had gone out of its way to insure that he should prosper as he deserved, and Providence, he now saw, was not the Santa Claus he had supposed but a heartless practical joker who raised the good man’s hopes only to dash them to the ground.

Classic Wodehouse, but also a bit telling. Too many times we ourselves have this assumption. Just a thought.

Anyway, I highly recommend Wodehouse. Jump in anywhere, of course, but I particularly recommend starting with Jeeves.

Divine Vintage by Randall Heskett and Joel Butler

Source of book: Borrowed from the library

Divine Vintage: Following the Wine Trail from Genesis to the Modern Age was written by a biblical scholar (Heskett) and a wine expert (Butler), who shared an interest in wine and in biblical history. (Credentials: Heskett has advanced degrees in the field from Yale and the University of Toronto. He is also the president of Boulder University. Butler is the president of the North America branch of the Institute of Masters of Wine, and was one of the first two certified Masters of Wine in North America. He has experience as a wine importer and writes for a variety of wine publications.)

This book was written to explore the history of wine and winemaking as it grew out of areas in eastern Turkey and the Caucasus and spread throughout the Western world. This history is interwoven with the myriad references to wine and grapes throughout the Bible. The authors do a good job of filling in the social and political history of the era - I found that my understanding of the writings of the prophets, for example, was deepened by knowing the economic implications of wine and wealth. The background brings to life the parables in Isaiah and also in the Gospels, revealing nuances which are lost on those of us far removed from that culture. I was also reminded of just how intertwined Christianity and Judaism are with wine, from the grapes of the promised land through the omnipresent metaphors throughout the Old Testament, to the very central sacrament of the Christian faith: communion (or eucharist, for those of other denominations).

In fact, after reading the book, I don’t believe the authors are exaggerating when they state that:

Wine’s fundamental importance as a key protagonist for the evolution of society from rootless and nomadic to settled, spiritual, and cultured informed our writing of this book. In our judgment wine is the heart, soul, and body of Western Civilization; it magnifies our best virtues and noblest ideas, yet its excessive use equally diminishes our humanity and dignity.

The first half of the book is as I have described it above, a history. The second part is devoted to specifics about modern winemaking in the Mediterranean, from Greece to Israel. This second part will be of interest primarily to wine geeks (like myself), and can be skipped by those who really don’t care about the difference between malvasia and viognier or the effects of limestone versus volcanic soils. Since individual wineries and wines are described, I would consider this book a good resource for travel. Alas, most of the wines are difficult or impossible to obtain outside of their home countries.

My perspective on wine is strongly influenced from my cultural background.

I was born and raised and continue to live in the United States, which has an “interesting” history when it comes to alcohol. Furthermore, many of my ancestors on both sides were Mennonite once upon a time (as in 100 years ago), and Mennonites, like many conservative Christian denominations, have generally abstained completely from alcohol. One might say that this segment of American Christianity has gone by the adage of “don’t drink, smoke, or chew, or go with girls who do.”

So, if you go back to my great grandparents’ generation, nobody (respectable at least) in my family drank. Around that time, however, my ancestors left the Mennonite sect, and joined more mainstream evangelical denominations such as the Christian and Missionary Alliance. It wasn’t really until my parents’ generation that things loosened up a bit. Society in general stopped making the assumption that Christians abstained, and only sinners and Catholics imbibed. This change has continued over the decades, and alcohol is only a litmus test in the most fundamentalist of circles. (I even saw in the news that some Mennonites were opening a winery.)

So, in my own experience, alcohol was occasionally consumed at extended family gatherings, generally in moderation. (Every family has someone - the crazy aunt by marriage or something - who gets tipsy once in a while.) This was a generally positive experience, which jarred a little with some of the anti-alcohol teachings that one would hear from time to time.

The worst of these was the Baptist fib that the wine in Jesus’ day wasn’t fermented but really grape juice. We didn’t believe that one - after all, why warn against drunkenness on grape juice? But there were and still are a few crazies that claim this. (The authors note in their preface that they will not treat “pointless clams that promote abstinence from alcohol or assertions that the wine in the Bible was not fermented.”

When I came of age, one of my big discoveries was wine. (My parents were sensible in their approach to this, never making it into a tempting forbidden fruit. I had a glass of wine with my dad as my first taste, and we would always use moderation. My dad’s tale of cleaning someone’s vomit out of his car in his youth was enough to make drunkenness unattractive.)

I have been a foodie for a long time. I learned to cook when I still had to use a chair to get high enough to use the stove, and cooked regularly during my teen years. Even before I could drink, I used sherry in cooking; so when I was able to make wine part of the meal, I felt like I had another tool in the chest. The pairing of wine and food fascinates me, and I think I am pretty decent at it.

So there is the history.

It stands in contrast to the experience of millenia before and after the birth of Christ where wine and wine making were an everyday part of the religious experience. The breaking of bread, and the sharing of wine.

I suspect that my perspective would have been different if I had grown up in, say Italy. Or, on the other hand, if I had been a child of alcoholics. I do not want to give the impression that I condone drunkenness. If anything, we lawyers are likely to see the downside to the loss of inhibitions. However, some of the stuff that gets taught in certain churches (and in some curriculum) seems misguided to me. The claim that alcohol is a poison and that it is as sure to lead to dissolute behavior as hard drugs is a bit of a stretch, for example.

Some things I liked about this book:

I liked the authors’ commitment to avoiding the “Bible as infallible history book” approach. Or, perhaps more accurately, the “letterist” approach to dates. (The most popular version of this counts the named persons in the various genealogies and their years and decide that creation took place no more than 6000 years ago. One could do extended discussions on both the problems of this as exegesis and as history.) Thus, the Biblical events are placed within a reasonable estimate of history as determined by a variety of sources, and the authors don’t try to make more of what the Bible says than is warranted by the text itself.

It was interesting to read about the first evidence of wine, which date back about 9000 years ago. Wine cultivation appears to have originated in the areas in Turkey not too far from Mount Ararat. The earliest evidence points to the use of wild grape vines that had male and female plants (similar to kiwi fruit). Eventually, hermaphroditic plants were discovered (or bred, perhaps), and these varieties came to be cultivated. Over the next several millennia, wine spread from this area throughout Europe and Asia, along with what we consider Western Civilization.

I’ll also mention the story of Melchizedek as one that appears different after getting some background. First, this is the first mention of wine in connection with Abram. Second, the Hebrew word for the god that Melchizedek served as priest is closely related to the word for the god of wine as worshiped at the time. (This story is intriguing for many reasons, not least because it shows some of the early development of the a monotheistic worship from a polytheistic culture.)

Likewise, it was fascinating to learn of the way that wine went from being a luxury available only to the rich, who tended to use it in excess at parties which were an orgy of drunkenness (see the tale of Belshazzar), while excluding the poor; to commodity available to the masses by the time of the New Testament. In fact, this economic divide makes passages about social justice in the prophets take on an entirely different light, because of the way wine is both a description of the inequality and excess, and is used as a metaphor by the writers for wrath, judgment, and yet also blessing and abundance.

Classism hardly disappeared by the time of Saint Paul, of course. The authors’ description of the bacchanals common among the wealthy of the time fits perfectly with Paul’s complaint against the Corinthians that the rich would get drunk at the love feasts while the poor went hungry. This was a continuation of the bad aspect of that culture, and Paul pointed out that it was contrary to the spirit of Christianity, wherein all would share as equals, and the sharing of the bread and wine would point to a universal need for communion with Christ.

One final thought has stayed with me as well. The agricultural foundation of the ancient nation of Israel was three crops: grains, wine, and olive oil. These are mentioned throughout the Bible, but are specifically named as the blessings of God in Psalm 104:15.

[W]ine that gladdens human hearts, oil to make their faces shine, and bread that sustains their hearts.

Grapes, olives, and grain. The blessings of God.

Odd historical note:

As I noted above, the second half of the book will be boring for those not really familiar with wine and viticulture. One of the things I found the most fun was reading about ancient grape varieties which are uncommon today.

Anyone who has browsed the wine aisle at the supermarket can tell that the modern market is dominated by French varietals. Thankfully, there is getting to be more than the trifecta of Cabernet, Merlot, and Chardonnay available, but one still has to look for the unusual.

I mentioned malvasia above, because I have been able to try that unusual Mediterranean variety.

The most fascinating variety from this second section is one called “limnio.” This was mentioned in connection with a winery near Thessaloniki which produces this grape. Limnio may be the most ancient of grape varietals still in production. It is mentioned by Aristotle, writing more than 2300 years ago; and, even earlier, by Homer.

Note on Prohibition:

One of these days, I need to write up my theory that America’s obesity epidemic is primarily the result of slavery (in the Caribbean) and Prohibition.

The Christmas Wars, or How to Use Christmas as an Excuse to be a Jerk

Nothing like a fine whine at Christmas. It seems to go with the season these days, along with the politicalization of everything.

So here is what got this one started. Rachel Held Evans posted this on her blog...

...and a friend of mine re-posted it on his or her Facebook page…

...and predictably, a commenter decided to disagree:

[Name withheld]: OK, I can agree that someone wishing me Happy Holidays is not persecuting me personally. But since the chart is a slap at anyone concerned about the removal of Christ from the "holidays" I guess I don't see it as such a great chart. Call me crazy, but secularism doesn't need anymore [sic] defenders, IMHO.

...and I chimed in with this link…

It went downhill from there.

[Name withheld]:  [T]hat wasn't my point. I was just ruminating on why Christians would be joining in the making sport of people who think secularism has gone too far, or in the case of the Patheos article, that don't believe the govt should be forcing them to enable people to trash their values. I mean, sure, a Christian joining in the ostracizing of "exttremist" [sic] Christians is likely to get a nice article in the NY Times ... but like I sad [sic], secularism doesn't need any help bashing the Truth.

...and later, after I pointed out that this kind of entitled attitude was exactly why articles like this were needed:

Thank you, Tim, for demonstrating WHY Christian views are headed for the minority…

…Your point sounds great when you twist the idea of simply not serving someone who wants to use your service to send a public message attacking your faith into expressing moral outrage about someone who doesn't "share" your values.

I will leave it to my readers to speculate about which specific instance in the Patheos link this commenter was referring. It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. But the sentiment applies as well to the Christmas Wars™. Not familiar with the Christmas Wars™?

Somewhere along the line, a significant segment of Evangelical Christianity came to the conclusion that saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” was a personal affront to their faith - a "slap" if you will, and an example of the supposed war on Christianity and God and all. “Happy Holidays” was an attack on the faith. This was serious. Terrible. How could we let this happen?

Now, I’ll be honest. Christmas these days is ridiculously commercialized. The marketing machine portrays Christmas as little more than a bacchanalia of overconsumption overlaid with a treacle of charitable feeling. And yes, I am sick of hearing Mariah Carey long before Thanksgiving.

So yes, I am sympathetic to the argument that Christmas has travelled far from its spiritual roots as a celebration of the Advent. Much of modern commercial Christmas makes me gag. On the other side, yes, I know Christmas also has borrowed from pagan and secular sources too. ALL holidays tend to do this. They reflect the past and the present in a weird, messy amalgam. It’s how humans work. There is no other way to logically explain fruitcake.

The complaints about the commercialism of Christmas aren’t exactly new, however. The Puritans (during the English Civil War) attempted to outlaw Christmas celebrations for this reason. This act was one of several that soured the populace on the whole Puritan experiment. The Puritans vastly underestimated the popularity of Christmas celebrations, and eventually paid the political price.

And what about one of the most famous Christmas stories of all time? Charles Dickens expressly fought against what he perceived as the corruption of Christmas in his ever popular tale, A Christmas Carol.

This is all nothing new. In fact, one might even say that diatribes against the commercialization of Christmas (often while participating in said commerce) is itself a Christmas tradition.

So anyway, a decade and a half or so ago, this became a "Thing." See that “x-mas”? That is the secularists taking the Christ out of Christmas.

(Actually, this is baloney. The use of “x-mas” dates to the 16th Century, and the use of “X” as an abbreviation for “Christ” dates back even further. The Greek letter “Chi” - our X - is the first letter in the Greek for Christ, and was used as an abbreviation in that language.)

Hear them saying, “Happy Holidays”? That’s because they want to eliminate Christ from the celebration.

Now, it is true that a number of corporations and businesses did consciously decide to use the more inclusive term. After all, the United States, while predominantly Christian, does contain Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Atheists, and others. Why not wish them all happy celebrations? More customers are a good thing, right? But no, this is a deliberate attack on Christians.

Now, I think one can interpret things a few different ways. Obviously, there is the “they’re trying to eliminate the Christian origin of the holiday” approach.

There is another one that comes to mind for me:

Perhaps “they” are trying to commercialize the other holidays just like Christmas.

A little irony perhaps? If Christmas can drive consumption, why not Hanukkah? Why not Ramadan? Why not the Winter Solstice?

Does anyone else find it a little inconsistent to rail against the commercialization of Christmas and yet complain that the commercialization isn’t exclusively Christian?

Shamelessly stolen from Slate.com’s delightfully apropos 2005 screed by the late Christopher Hitchens, who gets right to the heart of the insecurity underlying the Christmas Wars.

So, what does one do about these evil merchants, trying to destroy the faith? Boycott, of course!

The American Family Association has a handy guide for you. (Oh, lookie there! That's the vile hate group that led to me leaving our last church and Evangelicalism as a whole!"

Or, as I would describe it, “How to use Christmas and your faith to act like an asshole.”

(Just to be clear, this does not represent all of Evangelical Christianity. Conservative Christian weekly World Magazine’s Jeanie Cheaney called out the AFA for this.)

Because really, this looks like a toddler tantrum.

“It’s MY holiday. MINE! MINE! MINE! This is about ME! My religion! YOU can’t share the happiness of this season! Bad, bad secularists!”

If other people want to broaden the good will, or - horrors - fail to remind people that this is all about Jesus, then we must fight them. We must give grief to stressed retail clerks who are trying to do their jobs. We must use our economic power to force them to Jesusify (is that a word?) everything again. Because this is OUR holiday. Mine! Mine! Mine!

The entitlement is just appalling to me. I guess we Christians have been so used to being the dominant force in culture that we can’t really handle losing influence. The thought of our “values” being ignored is just too terrible to contemplate. So we end up doing silly things to try to regain our dominance.

And we do look rather silly. It’s embarrassing. It makes us seem insecure in the extreme.

One wonders if one could even function as a minority in a society with this attitude? We only do business with people who agree with us? That only works if your customer base is really big. I suspect that Christians in those places where they are a minority can’t really afford to to be officious assholes to their customers.

And really, would it change anything that matters if corporate clerks were to say “Merry Christmas” exclusively, or if advertisements were to hawk “Christmas” sales rather than “Holiday” sales? Is someone really going to say, “Gosh darn, I always thought December was just another holiday season, but now that I heard someone say Merry Christmas, I’m going to become a Christian!”?

Or maybe this is just about extending the middle finger to everyone else, and then complaining that we are being “persecuted.” Complaining that the malevolent forces of “secularism” have destroyed our nice little Christian nation. I guess it is easier than examining why a once ubiquitous faith has failed to capture the hearts and minds of succeeding generations. It’s easier to play the victim and blame those of us who aren’t out there fighting the Christmas Wars™ for causing the decline. To say that those of us who find this attitude to be whiny and entitled are somehow “compromising” with the secularists. As if things would have been better if more of us had been Assholes for Christ.

I suspect most people (if not all) know the Christian origin of Christmas. In fact, since a majority of the population in our country self-identify as Christians, they probably are celebrating it in part as a religious holiday.

Others may not believe in the religious component, but celebrate because it is a fun holiday. (Sort of like why my family wears green on Saint Patrick’s Day, despite being neither Irish nor Catholic.)

And there will be others who celebrate other holidays at this time. And a few poor souls who choose to celebrate nothing.

And you know what? I wish them all happiness as well.

“Happy Holidays” isn’t an insult to me or my faith. Some will repeat it by rote, but I suspect most people are trying to be nice. They may even sincerely wish that I have a happy holiday.

A few times, I have been wished a Happy Hanukkah. I have been wished a happy Winter Solstice once, I believe. (No Ramadan yet…)

I did not find it to be an insult. The Winter Solstice may or may not have been a statement, but I would rather hope that December 21st is a good day for me. In fact, I plan to mention the day to my kids. Not because I am a pagan, but because it fits with their current astronomy studies. And really, we flagrantly stole some pretty fun ideas from the Winter Solstice and made them Christmas traditions. Bwahaha!

I do not feel that this is a “compromise” with secularism. Rather, I feel that it is keeping with the true spirit of the original Christmas.

The people who walk in darkness

           Will see a great light;

           Those who live in a dark land,

           The light will shine on them.  

    You shall multiply the nation,

           You shall increase their gladness;

           They will be glad in Your presence

           As with the gladness of harvest,

           As men rejoice when they divide the spoil.

         For You shall break the yoke of their burden and the staff on their shoulders,

           The rod of their oppressor, as at the battle of Midian.

         For every boot of the booted warrior in the battle tumult,

           And cloak rolled in blood, will be for burning, fuel for the fire.

         For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us;

           And the government will rest on His shoulders;

           And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

           Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

         There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace,

           On the throne of David and over his kingdom,

           To establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness

           From then on and forevermore.

           The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this.

A light to the darkness. The yoke and the rod of the oppressor broken. The implements of war burned for fuel. Justice and righteousness - and above all peace.

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, and good will toward men.”

This spirit is reflected in the greatest stories we tell of Christmas time.

Saint Nicholas, one of the signatories of the Nicene Creed, who gave gifts to the poor and fought against oppression.

Ebeneezer Scrooge, who hoped the poor would die quickly and decrease the surplus population; but was transformed by his encounter with his past, present, and future and the spirits of Christmas, so that he thereafter “kept Christmas well.”

The Grinch, a modern take on Scrooge, who finds that taking away the trappings of Christmas is ineffective at taking its heart.

And the greatest story of them all, of the God who gave up all the trappings of His glory, came to earth as a human, to a world that rejected and murdered Him, and gave the greatest gift to those who didn’t appreciate it: eternal life.

And thus, I find the Christmas Wars™ to be so contrary to the spirit of Christmas - and indeed to the spirit of my faith.

I don’t see a celebration of the greatest gift and the greatest love as a reason to complain about a lack of cultural dominance. I don’t see it as an opportunity to marginalize the celebrations of other faiths - even if I don’t agree with those creeds. I don’t see holiday greetings as an opening for a verbal war.

And I certainly don’t take “Happy Holidays” as a hostile act.

If you wish me “Happy Holidays,” I will say “Thank you,” and express my wish that your holidays be happy as well. I may just wish you a Merry Christmas as well, because I hope that your Christmas may be merry, whether you celebrate it or not.

I’ll steal from the Irish, again, because I love this one:

The light of the Christmas star to you

The warmth of home and hearth to you

The cheer and good will of friends to you

The hope of a childlike heart to you

The joy of a thousand angels to you

The love of the Son and God's peace to you

And also, since I am no fan of the materialism and commercialism that accompanies Christmas, I will be subversive in my own way, by linking to an article by a man who has been a great influence on my life since my youth through his writing. Ladies and gentlemen, I present:

Dave Barry’s 2013 Christmas Gift Guide

And finally, a bit of music from Handel on the text above, one of my favorite bits of music ever written. 

Quick note:

The commenter I have quoted above demonstrated his philosophy in his comments rather clearly (including in some additional comments I have omitted). There are multiple “buzz words” that reference Dominionist and Reconstructionist ideas. This might be an interesting future post - how the rise of Reconstructionism colors, and in some cases drives, the culture wars.

Quick note on the late Christopher Hitchens:

I disagree with Hitchens on many things, the most central of which is the existence of God, obviously. On the other hand, I have always appreciated the way he stood up for freedom of speech in the face of threats from radical Islam. I also appreciate the way he can cut through religious hypocrisy. I wish more Christians would get their heads out of their own echo chambers and actually listen to how we sound to others.  Reading Hitchens once in a while would be a good start. 

Another one December 2017: 

https://johnpavlovitz.com/2017/12/05/im-christian-says-happy-holidays/