[HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: apple in Eden
Aberforth's Goat
Aberforths_Goat at Yahoo.com
Thu Nov 29 12:42:53 UTC 2001
David encouraged us to
> Note it has our
> family quality of talking elegantly and knowledgeably around the
> problem, without actually coming up with the answer
That email was hysterical! Don't you think your father would like to join
HPfGU? I don't think it would matter whether he's actually read the books
...
This discussion has caught my interest as well. I spent fifteen whole
minutes nosing about the internet and have come up with several sagacious
considerations:
(1) Malum can be either a substantival adjective meaning "evil"
(malus -a -um) or a neuter noun meaning "apple." Since the tree in question
was the tree of "good and evil" - particularly evil, as it turned out -
either a pun or a misunderstanding could easily have resulted.
(2) The Latin word poma, was (as I understand it) originally used in the
more general sense of "fruit," but came to be used for apple. (As in Pomme,
Fr.) Hence, another good chance for misunderstandings and puns. (I read
this - I've no idea whether it's true. It had certainly extended its
semantic domain by the time those devious French got ahold of it.)
(3) In greaco-roman mythology, the garden of Hesperides had apples of gold,
guarded by a terrible dragon. (Zeus gave them to Hera as wedding gift,
Hercules stole one, Hippo-whatever-the-rest-of-his-name-is tricked Atlanta
was several more. At this point, they sacked the dragon and opened up a
high-class supermarket, which explains where the rest ended up.) Anyway,
someone may have gotten confused between Adam and Hercules. (After all: they
both had trouble with women.)
(4) Some famous medieval painter I've never heard of portrayed the tree of
good and evil as an apple tree. Once he had done it, everybody wanted one.
(A picture with naked people standing next to an apple tree, I mean.) It got
to be a convention and assumptions were made about apple trees.
(5) Apples were a lovers' gift in ancient Rome - something like roses today.
Assuming Adam and Eve were lovers (they *were* naked after all), it made
sense for Eve to give one to Adam. Assuming they weren't yet (but Eve was
trying to inveigle Adam down the garden paths of amour), it *really* made
sense for Eve to give Adam one.
(6) There was another one that began with some Semitic noise that sounds
like our indo-European noise "apul" but has a fascinating anatomical
reference. I spent a good five minutes reading that one until I got a
headache, which I used as an excuse to give up.
Notes:
- These six theories may be used individually; mixing and matching is even
more fun, though.
- I thought of the first point all by myself; all the rest I gleaned from a
couple of google searches. Since I haven't bothered to cite properly, and
read very quickly, all persons whose thoughts were - or may have been - or
*should* have been - correctly or incorrectly used should feel free to sue
me.
- If anyone else would also like to sue me, but feels excluded by the
statement above, he, she or it (in the case of apples or language groupings)
should consult with its, her or his lawyers, who will gladly provide the
necessary extension of the above.
Baaaaaa!
Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray, who had never realized that apples are
so ... well ... *exciting.* And who has also been meaning to write a note
about how much he loves being a part of this bunch of wonderful, crazy
people but is out of time.)
_______________________
"Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been
bravery...."
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