Augustus struggles with Christianity. Although not a religious Jew, he resisted giving Christianity an honest consideration, even though he found much attractive in Luke, the church, and Jesus. The resurrection was the main problem he could not accept.
A young woman in the church, Keziah, caught Augustus' eye, and he fell in love with her. To improve his chances with her, he bribed a government official to obtain the release of her father from false imprisonment over a tax issue. This, when discovered by the government, almost brought the entire research and writing project to a stop when Luke is accused of planning the crime Augustus committed.
Claudius Aurelius has Luke confined to Jerusalem, until a new governor comes to Israel and Aurelius makes a trip to Rome. Luke and Augustus go to Galilee for an intensive seven months research before Aurelius returns.
As the work progresses, the political situation in Jerusalem grows worse. At the end of three years, the massive biography is done. The first events of the Jewish revolution causes Claudius Aurelius to make one last attempt to destroy Luke's work. In the end, Luke must rely on God, with many praying for him, to not lose everything he worked for.
The next post will tell the status of the book.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Doctor Luke's Assistant
For the next few posts, I'll talk about my other works in progress. Documenting America will likely be my main focus for a month or so, but I want to get some thoughts down on these other things.
Doctor Luke's Assistant is a novel about the writing of the gospel of Luke, told through the point of view of a Jewish scrivener he hires as a research assistant. Luke returns to Israel to write a massive biography of Jesus, intending for it to be multiple volumes. Knowing he, as a Gentile, can't get in to certain places or talk with certain Jews, he hires a Jew for the job. Augustus comes from a Jewish family that was partial to Roman rule, and far away from the practice of Judaism. He works for Luke only because he has lost his job with the Roman government. So the expected circumstances are not there: Luke, the Gentile, follows the teaching of a Jewish rabbi, while Augustus, the Jew, prays to no God.
Beginning in Bethlehem, Luke and Augustus research Christ's life in a series of interviews, document searches, and a lot of luck--that is Augustus calls it luck, while Luke calls it answers to prayer. Over a three year time frame, the book is written. It is the size of the Bible we know now, or larger when the research notes are added. In a month Luke will sail to Rome with the finished product.
During the three years, the researchers are hounded by both the Roman government and the Jewish establishment, neither of whom want the book written. Augustus chances to run in to a school chum who works for Rome, and another one who works for the high priest. He doesn't see that these two are bringing reports back to their employers, who can then harrass Luke and Augustus. The situation with Rome is not helped when Luke runs afoul of Cladius Aurelius, a scheming, corrupt assistant to the governor. Aurelius dogs Lukes steps and does much to hinder the work. Still, the book is written.
Later I'll write more on this, about how Augustus nearly causes the work to cease.
Doctor Luke's Assistant is a novel about the writing of the gospel of Luke, told through the point of view of a Jewish scrivener he hires as a research assistant. Luke returns to Israel to write a massive biography of Jesus, intending for it to be multiple volumes. Knowing he, as a Gentile, can't get in to certain places or talk with certain Jews, he hires a Jew for the job. Augustus comes from a Jewish family that was partial to Roman rule, and far away from the practice of Judaism. He works for Luke only because he has lost his job with the Roman government. So the expected circumstances are not there: Luke, the Gentile, follows the teaching of a Jewish rabbi, while Augustus, the Jew, prays to no God.
Beginning in Bethlehem, Luke and Augustus research Christ's life in a series of interviews, document searches, and a lot of luck--that is Augustus calls it luck, while Luke calls it answers to prayer. Over a three year time frame, the book is written. It is the size of the Bible we know now, or larger when the research notes are added. In a month Luke will sail to Rome with the finished product.
During the three years, the researchers are hounded by both the Roman government and the Jewish establishment, neither of whom want the book written. Augustus chances to run in to a school chum who works for Rome, and another one who works for the high priest. He doesn't see that these two are bringing reports back to their employers, who can then harrass Luke and Augustus. The situation with Rome is not helped when Luke runs afoul of Cladius Aurelius, a scheming, corrupt assistant to the governor. Aurelius dogs Lukes steps and does much to hinder the work. Still, the book is written.
Later I'll write more on this, about how Augustus nearly causes the work to cease.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Finding Inspiration in Old Documents
The next document I wrote on was a speech by Carl Schurz before the Massachusetts legislature in the pre-civil war years. The subject of the speech was True Americanism. Although Schurz was from Wisconsin at the time, he travelled to Massachusetts to address the legislature on an issue then before them. He contrasted America to the Roman Empire. I found the speech uplifting and inspiring. I immediately thought of how this could be worked into a Documenting America column, and wrote the piece. Once again it was deemed worthy by the local paper, and was published.
After this came two letters, one from James Madison to George Washington, then Washington’s reply, during the Articles of Confederation era (1783-1789). Madison was concerned that the colonies were going astray from the ideals upon which the Revolution was based, and were not living up to the Treaty of Paris. Washington concurred. I found these letters to have inspiring and informative information, so wrote a pair of articles and they were published.
The program for guest editorials allowed only one per quarter, appearing in the Sunday Op-ed section. About this time the editor who was a friend from church moved away, to Washington state, and continuance of the guest editorial program was in question. I decided to back off this for a while and concentrate on other areas of writing interest. I now wonder if I made a mistake, and should instead have continued to write the columns, and do the research for self-syndication. More on that in my next post.
After this came two letters, one from James Madison to George Washington, then Washington’s reply, during the Articles of Confederation era (1783-1789). Madison was concerned that the colonies were going astray from the ideals upon which the Revolution was based, and were not living up to the Treaty of Paris. Washington concurred. I found these letters to have inspiring and informative information, so wrote a pair of articles and they were published.
The program for guest editorials allowed only one per quarter, appearing in the Sunday Op-ed section. About this time the editor who was a friend from church moved away, to Washington state, and continuance of the guest editorial program was in question. I decided to back off this for a while and concentrate on other areas of writing interest. I now wonder if I made a mistake, and should instead have continued to write the columns, and do the research for self-syndication. More on that in my next post.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
The Premise Behind "Documenting America"
The people of the United States of America don’t know their history. This fact has been proved over and over by surveys, man-on-the-street interviews, and scientifically structured studies. Too many of our citizens are ignorant—and choose to remain ignorant—of the forces and people, the trends and the decisions, that built upon each other to forge this great nation.
If they would just read—read the documents that tell us about our past. I’m not talking about the well-known documents such as the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysburg Address. Our nation has been papered with an incredible number of documents, from diaries to letters to presidential proclamations to Supreme Court decisions to sermons to newspapers to pamphlets to editorials to too many to name.
My newspaper column, Documenting America, pulls documents from America’s past, analyses them, and ties them to some current event or issue. Using a mixture of document excepts, analysis, and interpretation, with each column readers will learn a little bit of American history they didn’t know (or long ago forgot), think about how what is in that document affected the building of our country, and consider whether and how those principles still apply. As much as possible, I try to end with an upbeat thought.
In this blog, I will discuss the process of how the column came together, what’s coming up in future columns, and possibly some additional analysis of a document featured in a past column.
If they would just read—read the documents that tell us about our past. I’m not talking about the well-known documents such as the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysburg Address. Our nation has been papered with an incredible number of documents, from diaries to letters to presidential proclamations to Supreme Court decisions to sermons to newspapers to pamphlets to editorials to too many to name.
My newspaper column, Documenting America, pulls documents from America’s past, analyses them, and ties them to some current event or issue. Using a mixture of document excepts, analysis, and interpretation, with each column readers will learn a little bit of American history they didn’t know (or long ago forgot), think about how what is in that document affected the building of our country, and consider whether and how those principles still apply. As much as possible, I try to end with an upbeat thought.
In this blog, I will discuss the process of how the column came together, what’s coming up in future columns, and possibly some additional analysis of a document featured in a past column.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
I Blog, Therefore I Am
Herein I enter the Blogosphere, with my personal blog that will, hopefully, deal with my writing life as it develops, as well as other interests. With time, I may find that splitting this into different blogs is the better way to go. A separate blog for writing, for genealogy, for politics, for Christian interests. We'll see how this goes.
At first, I will write some posts about my proposed newspaper column, Documenting America. This may be the first work I am able to get published. The Benton County Daily Record published four of these in 2003-2004 in the guest editorial program, which tells me it is probably a viable concept.
Later, I'll talk about my fiction ideas, still later some non-fiction ideas, and of course poetry. Should anything I write appear to be nearing publication, I'll talk about it more.
This blog will be the first piece of my web presence, later to be joined by a home page, specific, non-blog pages for specific items, and hopefully message boards for specific documents. Of course, at present all of this is pie-in-the-sky, but better to get the basics going now and build everything slowly as success demands. If nothing else, making frequent posts will be writing practice and discipline buildings. Having the blog to feed might just help me break the computer game habit. Possibly I'll even add some engineering stuff.
Time to add a post I prepared a few weeks ago about Documenting America.
At first, I will write some posts about my proposed newspaper column, Documenting America. This may be the first work I am able to get published. The Benton County Daily Record published four of these in 2003-2004 in the guest editorial program, which tells me it is probably a viable concept.
Later, I'll talk about my fiction ideas, still later some non-fiction ideas, and of course poetry. Should anything I write appear to be nearing publication, I'll talk about it more.
This blog will be the first piece of my web presence, later to be joined by a home page, specific, non-blog pages for specific items, and hopefully message boards for specific documents. Of course, at present all of this is pie-in-the-sky, but better to get the basics going now and build everything slowly as success demands. If nothing else, making frequent posts will be writing practice and discipline buildings. Having the blog to feed might just help me break the computer game habit. Possibly I'll even add some engineering stuff.
Time to add a post I prepared a few weeks ago about Documenting America.
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