What the Meaning of “Is” Is.
By Lay Speaker Turner Stokes
August 27, 2006

In a recent email, Bill Sydnor assumed that I was somehow referring to what is known as E-Prime, a subset of the English language, when he thought about what the meaning “is” might be. Actually, my intention is to point out that what our universe “is” is a matter of mixed opinion. That is to say, there is both a natural universe and a supernatural universe according to one school of thought, and there is only a natural universe according to another school of thought. As many of you already know, my opinion favors the latter, that is to say, a universe without a god or gods – no supernatural world or supernatural entities – a neutral, uncaring universe. From what I’ve observed, there seems to be a broad range of opinions on this matter within this congregation. But should that really matter? For centuries and centuries the debate has continued and shows no sign of ending.

When our congregation addresses the truly important issues of the day, does it really matter which end of the spectrum we occupy as individuals with respect to the definition of ultimate reality? Does it really matter when viewed through the lens of Unitarian Universalist Principles, Traditions and Purposes and our Mission Statement? While composing these words, I was moved to browse on the Internet to the Principles and Purposes page of the Unitarian Universalist Association’s Boston web site¹ and print out the page, where we find these words:

Grateful for the religious pluralism which enriches and ennobles our faith, we are inspired to deepen our understanding and expand our vision. As free congregations we enter into this covenant, promising to one another our mutual trust and support.

I believe these words speak for themselves.

Let's get back to Bill's suggestion that I was referring to E-Prime. Robert Wilson, in his internet article entitled Toward Understanding E-Prime², tells us that we can write and speak without using any form of “to be”, calling this subset of the English language E-Prime or English Prime.

For example, Wilson suggests that we consider the two statements, “The electron is a wave.” and “The electron is a particle,” written in Standard English. By using “is”, a form of “to be”, the two statements appear to contradict one another even though both statements, taken individually, are true.

When the statements are written in E-Prime [without using a form of “to be”] as, “The electron appears as a wave when measured with instrument-l” and “The electron appears as a particle when measured with instrument-2”, they obtain a clarity that is unattainable in Standard English.

Maybe this new knowledge about E-Prime will make us more conscious of what might be the clarity or lack of clarity of written or spoken words using various forms of “to be”, such as “is”, “are”, “am”, “was”, “were”, “will be” and “shall be”. I know that in the future, I’m going to be more careful with my words and somewhat more probing of the words of others.

Clarity of the spoken or written word is perhaps a good segue to a critical matter of our day. It’s the situation in the Middle East. When I go to the local mall and contrast that experience with the images that are coming to us from Iraq, Lebanon, Israel and the areas occupied by the Palestinians, it makes me think about the contrast between the relatively easy lives we enjoy and the abject misery that so many folks in the Middle East endure. Let’s pause for a moment or two and try to imagine what many of their lives are like today.

I wonder what it's like to go to the mall in Israel, and wonder if you're going to die there. I wonder what it's like to be a Palestinian and not be able to go to the other side of town, because there’s a 25 foot high wall that separates you from it. I wonder what it's like to go back to what used to be your home in Lebanon and find that it's suddenly gone. It simply doesn't exist anymore.

I have a friend who just recently went to Israel for two weeks as part of a 20 person peace group. He personally witnessed the effects of the wall which are described in an article entitled Divided and Conquered by Scott McConnell in The American Conservative where we read that, “In Ha’aretz, the liberal Israeli paper that prints news that seldom appears in the American mass media, columnist Amira Hass writes, ‘Palestinians living under the Israeli occupation are imprisoned in a thicket of physical, corporeal barriers of all types and sizes (checkpoints, roadblocks, blockades, fences, walls, steel gates, roads prohibited to traffic, dirt embankments, concrete cubes) and by a frequently updated assortment of bans and limitations.’“³

McConnell’s article gives us no great reason for optimism. Even though most Hamas voters accept a two state solution, Hamas’s attitude remains a sticking point and they show no real signs so far that they “can come to terms with the reality of Israel.”³

In a recent internet article, Israel’s Barrier to Peace, author Chris Hedges, former Middle East bureau chief for The New York Times, writes, “B’tselem, a leading Israeli human rights organization that documents conditions in the occupied territories, recently estimated that the barrier will eventually stretch 703 miles around the West Bank, about 450 [miles] of which are already completed or under construction. (The Berlin Wall, for comparison, ran 96 miles.) B’tselem also estimates that 500,000 West Bank residents will be directly affected by the barrier (by virtue of residing in areas completely encircled by the wall; by virtue of residing west of the barrier and thus in de-facto Israeli territory; or by virtue of residing in East Jerusalem, where Palestinians effectively cannot cross into West Jerusalem).”⁴

It wasn’t until my friend described what he actually saw there that I really gave serious thought to what is happening in the Middle East. And I’m certainly not claiming to really have a complete understanding of the total situation. But I’m surely going to give it my best shot. When I’m seeking real in-depth coverage and analysis of recent events, I go to my latest copy of The New York Review of Books. And quite often to Google on the Internet. I don’t bother too much with the network news or with Time, Newsweek or U.S. News and World Report except maybe in a doctor’s or dentist’s waiting room. I’m probably sounding like some sort of egghead news snob but let’s face it, it’s hard to find real truth coming from the corporate controlled news industry.

It was in The New York Review of Books that I first encountered what I considered meaningful in-depth coverage of the Palestine/Israel controversy in an article entitled The Storm over the Israel Lobby⁵ by Michael Massing. It’s actually a review of an article entitled The Israel Lobby⁶ by professors John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, which was published in the March 23, 2006, issue of the London Review of Books.

Reaction to the London Review article was mixed. Massing tells us that it “has been debated in the coffeehouses of Cairo and in the editorial offices of Haaretz. It's been called 'smelly' (Christopher Hitchens), 'nutty' (Max Boot), 'conspiratorial' (the Anti-Defamation League), 'oddly amateurish' (the Forward), and 'brave' (Philip Weiss in The Nation). It's prompted intense speculation over why The New York Times has given it so little attention and why The Atlantic Monthly, which originally commissioned the essay, rejected it.”⁵ [was it too hot to handle?]

The crux of Massing’s New York Review article is that that there are enough factual errors and quotations out of context in the London Review article that the position taken by Mearsheimer and Walt is weaker than it otherwise might have been. They also are faulted “for exaggerating Israel's military superiority over the Arabs, falsely accusing Israel of adopting a policy of expelling Arabs in 1948, downplaying Palestinian attacks on civilians, and overlooking Israel's general acceptance of a two-state solution from Rabin on.” ⁵.

The basic thrust of the London Review of Books piece (eighty-two pages, forty of them footnotes) is that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, otherwise know as AIPAC, has what amounts to undue influence on US foreign policy. Mearsheimer and Walt point out that, in “1997, Fortune magazine asked members of Congress and their staffs to list the most powerful lobbies in Washington… AIPAC was ranked second behind the American Association of Retired People, but ahead of the AFL-CIO and the National Rifle Association. A National Journal study in March 2005 reached a similar conclusion, placing AIPAC in second place (tied with AARP) in the Washington ‘muscle rankings’”⁶. They go on to tell us that, the “Lobby also includes prominent Christian evangelicals like Gary Bauer, Jerry Falwell, Ralph Reed and Pat Robertson, as well as Dick Armey and Tom DeLay, former majority leaders in the House of Representatives, all of whom believe Israel’s rebirth is the fulfillment of biblical prophecy and support its expansionist agenda; to do otherwise, they believe, would be contrary to God’s will.”⁶

Massing concludes his New York Review of Books article by stating that, “Despite its many flaws, their [Mearsheimer and Walt’s] essay has performed a very useful service in forcing into the open a subject that has for too long remained taboo.”

My last example is an internet article by Jamie Glazov, who is Frontpage Magazine's managing editor. It’s entitled Suicide Killers and contains an interview with French filmmaker Pierre Rehov concerning his latest documentary, Suicide Killers, which “explores the psychology of suicide bombers. It’s based on interviews with the victims of suicide bombers, the families of suicide bombers, would-be bombers themselves, and experts on suicide killer mentality.”⁷

I downloaded and watched the Suicide Killers trailer⁸ [It’s about 3 minutes of video.]. Be prepared for numerous noisy explosions. One of the talking heads remarked that suicide bombers are merely platforms that move the explosives from one place to another.

The interview contains some of what I regard as extreme views although it’s hard to ignore the ring of truth that they display. For instance, Pierre says “For thousands of years, men developed this absurd concept that sacrificing sexuality, which is the most fulfilling of all pleasures, would appease the God of death, or Death itself. While evolving, the modern man started to moderate the importance of this sacrifice. This is not the case in Islam, where sex out of marriage is a severe offense to the law, where a girl can be slaughtered by her own father or brother if she has lost her virginity, or if she wants to marry someone who has not been chosen by her family.”

“The result of all this pathology is that you end up with 16 to 20 year old men, with a strong libido, who have never approached a woman, don't even know what they look like, consider them as evil, and have this high level of energy, literally ready to blow themselves up out of frustration. It then becomes very easy to convince them that they have a duty to destroy impurity, symbolized by the Occidental world, and that they will be rewarded by 72 virgins in the afterlife. Their entire society is built on the absolute belief in this afterlife, so much better than the miserable life they have on earth -- thanks to the teachings of their leaders.” ⁷

So what do we have here? We have what seems to be an endless supply of young males ready to blow themselves up in order to destroy their enemies in the name of their god and be rewarded repeatedly in the afterlife with what they have been denied as mortals. On the other side we have a military machine with modern weapons and plentiful financing, at least up to a certain point. And my opinion, the peace process has been forgotten. Is their any room for optimism here?

Stay tuned.

¹ http://www.uua.org/aboutuua/principles.html
² http://www.nobeliefs.com/eprime.htm
³ http://www.annadwa.org/articles/divided&conquered.htm
⁴ http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/20060725_israels_wall/
⁵ http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19062
⁶ http://www.lrb.co.uk/index.php
⁷ http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=20505
⁸ http://www.pierrerehov.com/sk_trailer_wmv_s.htm [Suicide Killers trailer]