The Origins of Schlange

(Post 16)

(Note: Somehow my post editor is having issues. Most of my whitespace (Blanklines between paragraphs, 5 spaces in front of a new paragraph, or anything else that I've tried to use to make my paragraphs look nice) is disapearing every time I save. Sorry, but you'll have to bear with me.)

As part of giving my blog a facelift I'm changing my profile. I'm putting the old contents of what was in my profile here and editing it:

Schlange A. Taube nearly sounds like a real name doesn't it? Why did I pick it to post under? I've got a buddy Schmetterling who got me interested in blogging (his blog is The Eccentric Sage). He's got a unique pen-name and I was jealous.

He told me that his came about because of an experiance with a fellow who was a great fan of Tolkien. Apparently, Tolkien has an insignia that places his initials (JRRT) over the top of one another in a cool way. This fellow wanted something cool like that for himself, so he worked one out with his initials. Schmetterling subsequently made one that looked like a butterfly and thus created an alias (Schemtterling is German for butterfly).

We explored using the same method for me. We started superimposing the letters in my name over the top of each other to see what we could get in the way of a picture. We came up with several possibilities, one of note being the dollar sign ($). The one we went with looked something like an "A" hooked into the back end of a snake. That made me "A snake." Because everything sounds cooler in German we looked up the German translation of snake: "Shlange." That has pizzazz so I kept it. However, I didn't want to feel like an evil villain all the time so we started looking for something to go with it. Somehow I remembered Matthew 10:16, and that gave us a dove to go with my serpent. It also gave me a good name for my blog. Dove in German is "Taube." Stick an "A" that looks like a snake into the center of a German SnakeDove and what do you get? Schlange A. Taube, at your service.

-Schlange

The Proud Schlange Icon

(Post 2)

*Drum roll*



And there it is! The Proud Shlange Icon. Wave it proudly.

Thanks to Schmetterling for showing me how to put an icon of my own design next to the URL, and thanks to Th for showing Schmetterling.

A New Beginning

(Post 1)

Ah ha! (as in Ah ha! You found my blog, and this is it's first entry, and that's really worth something... especially if you are well acquainted with A. A. Milne, the well renowned creator of the well loved Winnie The Pooh.)

So here I am, Schlange A. Taube, the well unknown creator of this blog: Wise Yet Harmless. "Why wise?" you may ask, "And when is wisdom harmful?" and better yet, "How can we know that S. A. Taube can be described by either adjective?" These are all excellent questions.

I refer you to Matthew 10:16 in the Holy Bible:

16 Behold, I send you forth as ^asheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore ^bwise as serpents, and ^charmless as doves.

And there you have it. An admonition from Christ to be both WISE and HARMLESS. I suppose that wisdom might be cleverness and carefulness, perhaps calculating. In the context of the verse and chapter wisdom might be a type of cunning which saves us from those who are out to get us. The admonition then, is to out maneuver you foes without having malicious intent or laying traps. Later in the chapter an example of true wisdom in both this and the conventional sense is given:

19 But when they deliver you up, ^atake no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall ^bspeak.

20 For it is not ye that speak, but the ^aSpirit of your Father which speaketh in you.

For the physically persecuted the challenge was to get along as best they could, and when they were delivered for judgment to say the things God placed in their hearts and to trust that He would take care of things in his own way and time. Really this was an admonition to trust the timing of God in making things right. He could take care of things immediately or in the far distant future; perhaps even after the suffering or death of the wronged. The trick was to trust that things would work out right in the end and then to give credit to God for the things He accomplished using individuals.

The idea is the same for us. Trust God. Do your best, be obedient, and when you are caught in a snare trust God. He'll take care of things.

So, I suppose what I want in my blog is this: I want to encourage peaceable wisdom. That doesn't necessarily mean I have any, I just want to encourage it.

Note, however, that this blog isn't going to be about religion or morals or tips for success - though some of those things may appear. If that's what you're looking for I suggest you go to the scriptures - the prophets know what they are talking about. This blog is really for me to babble about anything that's on my mind. It's a place to keep my soul, not the deepest or most sacred parts, but the fringes... the things that float to the conscious surface of my being. My goal in naming this soul keeper "Wise Yet Harmless" is really to keep that maxim in the forefront of my mind as I write, and as you read. Much of what you read may not really be wise at all. Some of what you read may be potentially hazardous. In the end though, I hope that what is accomplished is a drawing of both the writer and reader to searching for harmless wisdom.

Happy thinking,

-Schlange