Dr. Waterman's Desk

An old desk of an American theologian ("日本語" speaker) / Check out another blog please "Comments by Dr Marks"

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American citizen but a foreign native born in southern Germany, raised in northern Japan. He holds a Ph.D. degree in biblical theology (Center for Advanced Theological Studies, Fuller Theological Seminary). Dr. Waterman mainly lives in Los Angeles, California. He studied various subjects (philosophy, sociology, etc.) and languages in Japan and in America (Hirosaki University, University of Tokyo, Fuller Theological Seminary, and other institutions). Email: markwaterman(at)fuller(dot)edu. Some call him "Dr. Marks".

Monday, March 02, 2020

African Iris アフリカン・アイリス

My friends, thank you for taking the time to identify this flower!
This is an uninvited flower, i.e., a kind of voluntary flower (seeds?) from somewhere to my front garden and backyard by winds or birds. Uninvited but a beautiful flower! Whatever the reasons for coming to see me, I appreciated "her" presence (^^). After your quick responses and helpful hints, I have surveyed some flower and plant books on the Internet.
As a result of my humble research, I have concluded that this is surely an "iris." So did many of you!
According to the Internet information, California is a famous land of "iris," which has so many varieties in the world; and, especially, they call various kinds of iris grown in the land of California "Californian iris" or "Pacific Coast iris." But I couldn't find out the exact flower type in the list of Californian irises. All of a sudden, however, I noticed an image which is very similar to my iris. It's called Not Californian but "African" iris. Yes, this is African iris!!!


Wednesday, July 20, 2016

ウォーターマン博士が歌ってる♫ Dr. Waterman Sang an Old J-Pop 「学生街の喫茶店」

Published on Jul 17, 2016


An old J-pop "Gakuseigai no Kissaten" (Coffee House of University Quarter) sung in Japanese by Mark the Busker from Heidelberg with his guitar and Jun's piano and viola.


Mark the Busker is a street musician from Heidelberg, Germany. Coincidently the original singer was also called "Mark," although his real name was Mamoru Horiuchi (1949-2014) , a member of Japanese band GARO.


Picture was taken by Dr. Nico Jesse, Dutch medical doctor and photographer (1911-1976). Probably the picture shows a cafe filled with youth at Quartier Latin, Paris, in 1960s.

Friday, August 07, 2015

トォリスク村の元住人および子孫による年会案内

 
The organization of Turisk Jews and their descendants in Israel
The Samuel and Rachel Boymel Mamorial Wing
 
Dear Friends, on Friday 8.28.15 we will be holding the annual memorial ceremony next to the Rachel and Samuel Boymel Holocaust Research Center in Memory of Turisk Shtetl.
This year we will be commemorating the 73 years that have passed since the terrible massacre of our dear ones, the Jews of Turisk. We will mark the destruction of Turisk, a shtetl with 850 years of a great Jewish tradition.  
 
Itinerary:
10:00 -10:30    Gathering followed by a visit to the Boymel Wing
10:30-10:45     “Yizkor” followed by a ceremony of reading out the names of the deceased, our family members.
10:45-11:00     Ben-Zion Wainer will update us on the activities and a talk will be held on the publishing of the book “Yizkor Turisk”.
11:00-11:15  Words by Maya Van-Ech, Director of Moreshet, Mordechai Anielevich  Memorial
11:15-12:15     Lecture by Mrs.TALI SHNER:” Family heritage trip”
12:15-13:00    Dr Haim Mendelson: Publishing of the book "Zichron Kehilat Turisk" (Turisk's memorial community)
Dear friends, please inform your family members of all generations about the day and time of the memorial service and the importance of the participation of the third and fourth generations. We are sure most of you will make an effort to come.
 
For information: Ben-Zion Wainer - 04-6775201
                        Yankale Greenshtein – 054-2122060; yacovgr10@walla.co.il
 
Sincerely,
The active team

Monday, March 16, 2015

"Hava Nagila"



Dancing team made up of Jews, Christians, and Muslims :D

(From Ynet)

Friday, January 09, 2015

Flying into the Sky

空の彼方へ



Can you recognize a bird in the sky?  Okay, and do you know the bird's name?  Click on the picture and you can see the detail.  It's a seagull, which is flying to the west.  Yes, to the west, to the Pacific Ocean! 

Friday, October 21, 2011

Associated Pictures with Comments by Dr Marks (Oct 21, 2011)


Picture/s is/are associated with the blog http://d.hatena.ne.jp/DrMarks/20111021/p1
Sorry, texts of the blog are written in Japanese only.

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Monday, April 04, 2011

Holocaust Remembrance Day (Announcement)

ホロコースト記念日(お知らせ)

Sunday, May 1, 2011 is Yom HaShoah Ve'HaGevurah "Community Wide Holocaust Remembrance Day in Los Angeles, California (Los Angeles Holocaust Monument at north end of the Pan Pacific Park between Beverly Blvd. and Third Street). The park is adjacent to the Grove and Farmers Market of Fairfax area.

The theme is "In Their Own Words: Diaries from the Holocaust" and the keynote speaker will be John Loftus, who is a former US Government Prosecutor and Army intelligence officer, Nazi hunter, and the author of several books. In this occasion, an exhibit will be on display "From Father to Daughter: The legacy of Carol Deutsch (Antwerp 1894 Buchenwald 1944).

For further information, please write to the Office, Los Angeles Holocaust Monument, 5150 Overland Ave., Suite A, Culver City, CA 90230, or call 310-821-9919.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Do You Know a Shtetl Named Turisk?

トゥリスクという名のユダヤ人の町を知っていますか?




The Yiddish word “shtetl” means “town.” Turisk (טריסק) was a shtetl in southeastern Poland, as it then was called, now northwestern Ukraine. The shtetl has gone away since the summer of 1942. True, the town Turisk (Turiis'k) still exists with some thousands population of Ukrainian; but the old town Turisk no longer exists in terms of a shtetl where Jews were major residents. In fact, Turisk had been a Jewish shtetl since 1097, according to a historical document of Russia.

I found this shtetl named Turisk in one of Isaac Singer’s novels. As is often indicated, Sholem Aleichem used fictitious names in his works; in contrast, Singer tended to use real names. In his novel “The Old Man,” Turisk was a center of Hasidic Judaism, where the hero of the novel Moshe Ber studied when he was young. I was interested in this shtetl because I had no knowledge of the town so that I tried to find it out on online maps but I couldn’t reach any plausible town “Turisk” by name.

No such town on the map, only I arrived at a Website instead after an hour struggle. It is an Israeli Website entitled “Turisk” (www.turisk.org) run by Mr. Ben Zion Wainer, who had been a resident of the shtetl, technically assisted by his grandson (Ben-Ami Yassour). The site is great! It contains Turisk’s history, pictures, testimonies, maps, etc. I’m sure you will find something in it, whoever you are—a Jew or a non-Jew.

Mr. Wainer was born in Turisk in 1921. He left Turisk in December 1940, when the Soviet Union took over the land for Hitler’s sake as a result of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact or the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union. That’s how he survived. (Personal communication; not published in the site.) Now I’m wondering if a lady named Reisele Wainer who was killed on a day of the last days of the shtetl was a close relative of Mr. Wainer’s. A testimony of the site makes mention of her name (written by Sam Boymel, Cincinnati, Ohio).

Looking at the map above, we can find the Ukrainian town is now named “Turiis'k” (“Triysk” is another variation.) This is a map from Google. Click on the Google icon at lower left corner of the map so that you may find the details of the vicinity, if you like to do so. One of big cities near Turisk is Kovel or Kowel, located to the north of Turisk (a 20 km away). You can also see the historical maps prepared by Mr. Wainer and his grandson Mr. Yassour on the site “Turisk” (I myself requested Mr. Wainer to upload the historical maps(www.turisk.org/en_maps.php).)

This beautiful old shtetl by the River Turia was invaded, looted, and burned by the Nazis in the summer of 1942. All the Jews who then stayed in Turisk perished together with the shtetl, except for a few survivors, if any. I wrote this article of Japanese version in my Japanese language only blog site for the Japanese readers who do not want to read English. To the Japanese article, therefore, I added some expanding contents translated from the testimonies in the site of “Turisk.” You English readers, however, do not need such redundant information.

Now, suffice to say, visit the site “Turisk” (www.turisk.org) and, if you think we should do so, re-tell the story and history, please. Thank you.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Professor Sueo Takeda: A Japanese Philosopher Who Wrote Two Books in German (1)

竹田壽恵雄教授:ドイツ語で2冊の著書を残した哲学者 〔1〕

Sueo Takeda (竹田壽恵雄1915 – 1998) was one of distinguished Japanese philosophers who wrote their books in European languages. He received the best education in philosophy at the Tohoku University under the supervision of Dr. Satomi Takahashi before WWII and later at Kyoto University under Dr. Tokuryu Yamauchi. For many years, Takeda served as professor of philosophy at Shinshu University, Matsumoto, Japan. He also gave lectures at the University of Bonn as visiting professor in 1962.

The books I am going to introduce here are his two books, Kant und das Problem der Analogie: Eine Forschung nach dem Logos der kantischen Philosophie (Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969) and Die subjective Wahrheit und die Ausnahme-Existenz: Ein Problem zwichen Philosophie und Theologie (Elementa 23; Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1982) .*1)  These books were written in German, although the other books, including a novel entitled Haishin [背神Against God ], were published in Japanese for the Japanese readers. In his works, as we can see in these two German books, Prof. Takeda developed his not only philosophical but also theological insights. Interestingly, however, we cannot know if he was a Christian or not, despite his obvious sympathetic expressions to Christianity .*2)

*1: Unfortunately, this book was suffered from the so-called “double-publication,” i.e., the book was bound with another book cover entitled Die Idee der Chrono-Ontologie by mistake. If you or your libraries have the wrong title book by this author, you can ask a correct cover book for replacement to the publisher: Rodopi, Tijnmuiden 7, 1046 AK Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
*2: According to his daughter Prof. Mariko Takeda, the author Sueo Takeda never received baptism: Personal communication.


In the first book, Kant und das Problem der Analogie: Eine Forschung nach dem Logos der kantischen Philosophie (Kant and the Problem of Analogy: A Research into the Logos of Kantian Philosophy), the author attempts to give us a new interpretation of Kant, focusing on the problem of “analogies of experience” derived from the concept of Kantian philosophy, which has been regarded as one of the most significant and notoriously difficult problems depicted in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Takeda, maintains that, as Jesuit theologian and philosopher Erich Przywara once wrote, analogy is not a restricted and weak logic of Kantian philosophy but a strong and strict logical system (Takeda calls the system “Logos” in some Japanese way of usage) for the sufficient interpretation of Kant’s philosophical systems.

According to Takeda, the word “Logos,” which has developed itself in the history of philosophy, is an index of the human ideology or world spirit in history. Logos develops by itself due to the maturity of human beings and the world. Therefore, the history of Logos is the topology (the science of place or location = Topos) of human beings and the world. However, this is not the Hegelian history of dialectic development. The Hegelian system itself is rather regarded as a temporal (limited by time)Topos of the development of Logos (1-2).

The book consists of four main chapters: (1) Thing-in-itself and “the theory of experience,” (2) Analogies of experience and idea, (3) Teleology, and (4) Transcendental logic and Analogos. The author, however, posits some premises in his Introduction to the design of his discussion prior to the main chapters above, which are somewhat strange to the Westerners, i.e., an idea that the development of human mind is the evolution of Logos. This Logos, according to Takeda, closely relates to the interpretation of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason in terms of the analogy.

To be continued.

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Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Please Visit My Japanologists Only Page

しばらくの間日本語のみの分家を訪問ください

Click on → http://d.hatena.ne.jp/DrMarks/