{"id":364,"date":"2015-02-17T00:28:50","date_gmt":"2015-02-17T05:28:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/?p=364"},"modified":"2015-02-19T14:43:05","modified_gmt":"2015-02-19T19:43:05","slug":"through-the-door","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/2015\/02\/17\/through-the-door\/","title":{"rendered":"Through the door"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"minaret\"<\/a>One of the most interesting things about being in Riyadh–and I felt this in Rabat as well– is going over to religious time. The muezzins call the faithful to prayer five times a day–their voices strong and musical and the response tempered and low-pitched. You can hear this call and response all over the city. Western time was created in the spark of industrial revolution and is punctuated by whistles and bells–this time is much older and has a very different rhythm.<\/p>\n

I \u00a0am including here Matthew Arnold’s poem, which was a favorite of my parents, and which reflects on the beginning of the “scientific” age.<\/p>\n

DOVER BEACH<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\n
The sea is calm tonight.<\/div>\n
The tide is full, the moon lies fair<\/div>\n
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light<\/div>\n
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,<\/div>\n
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.<\/div>\n
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!<\/div>\n
Only, from the long line of spray<\/div>\n
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,<\/div>\n
Listen! you hear the grating roar<\/div>\n
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,<\/div>\n
At their return, up the high strand,<\/div>\n
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,<\/div>\n
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring<\/div>\n
The eternal note of sadness in.<\/div>\n
Sophocles long ago<\/div>\n
Heard it on the \u00c6gean, and it brought<\/div>\n
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow<\/div>\n
Of human misery; we<\/div>\n
Find also in the sound a thought,<\/div>\n
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.<\/div>\n
The Sea of Faith<\/div>\n
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth\u2019s shore<\/div>\n
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.<\/div>\n
But now I only hear<\/div>\n
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,<\/div>\n
Retreating, to the breath<\/div>\n
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear<\/div>\n
And naked shingles of the world.<\/div>\n
Ah, love, let us be true<\/div>\n
To one another! for the world, which seems<\/div>\n
To lie before us like a land of dreams,<\/div>\n
So various, so beautiful, so new,<\/div>\n
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,<\/div>\n
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;<\/div>\n
And we are here as on a darkling plain<\/div>\n
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,<\/div>\n
Where ignorant armies clash by night.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the most interesting things about being in Riyadh–and I felt this in Rabat as well– is going over to religious time. The muezzins call the faithful to prayer five times a day–their voices strong and musical and the response tempered and low-pitched. You can hear this call and response all over the city. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":531,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/531"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":387,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364\/revisions\/387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/riyadh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}