Question: What purpose does the retelling of the Joseph story serve in the sections of the Qur’an you’ve read?

There are potentially several purposes to retelling the story of Joseph in the Quran. One important reason might been to directly connect the Quran to other holy books such as the Bible. This would allowed Muslims to show the religious transition from previous holy books that were corrupted through the passage of time and their new holy book. Another reason might have been to simply retell a story to an audience and given them a better understanding of God’s intentions. In the beginning of the tale, Joseph is blessed with the ability of prophecy by God and though he suffers for it, getting thrown down a well and spending a significant period of time in jail, by the end of the story, Joseph is essentially the king’s adviser as a result of his God-given abilities.

There is a stark contrast between the way that evildoers are portrayed in the Odyssey and the Ramayana. In the Odyssey, the suitors, who are the evildoers, are portrayed to be cowardly scoundrels who should not be respected. At the end of the Odyssey, Odysseus slays the suitors and their bodies were simply thrown outside without a proper burial. In the Ramayana, the reader is led to dislike Ravana, the main evildoer, but is also led to respect Ravana in some sense. Ravana is described as a great warrior with massive strength and we are told he has received a boon from Indra, the god of gods. At one point in the story, Hanuman thinks to himself, “Ravana would indeed have been a good man if he had thus got Sita too, to be his wife.” When Rama defeats Ravana, Rama has great respect for the dead body and allows Ravana’s brother, Vibhisana, to give Ravana proper funeral rites and take the throne of Lanka.

There is a nearly paradoxical relationship between affectionate mercy and swift justice in the Qur’an, a parallel view of God as both a nurturing creator and a powerful deliverer of retribution. In the Feast, it is written, “Be mindful of God: He is swift to take account,” a phrase that is echoed multiple times throughout the selection, conjuring an image of an omnipresent deity watching his creations with constant vigilance, a keen eye aware of any possible moral transgressions. However, in lines following, God is said to “wipe out” the sins of anyone who keeps up with prayer and almsgiving. The text points out that God forgives those who are “mindful of him,” an interesting concept that all shall be forgiven, at least on the level of the soul, if an individual attempts to ask for forgiveness and acknowledge that he stands in shame before his creator. Yet the concept of mercy only seems to apply to the soul and mind; corporally, sinners still face grave punishments at the hands of other men who act in keeping with the laws God has set forth. (“Cut off the hands of thieves…as a punishment for what they have done,” is a directive set forth in the Qur’an, though it is quickly followed by, “God is most forgiving, most merciful.” Sinners must pay a price, it seems, though ultimately, they will be forgiven on a level higher than that of bodily mutilation.) The text specifies that God has “no intention to cleanse” those who are entirely misguided with no real belief in their heart; faith is twofold in the Qur’an, an internal passion, trust, and devotion coupled with an external display of certain rites and rituals.

There is an intriguing distinction in the Ramayana between death of merit and honor and death of a convenient release from suffering. In Book Five, the Sundara, a captive Sītā reflects on her time away from her husband and finds herself miserable, pining for an escape from the misery she has endured. She considers taking her own life, debating with herself whether or not death at that present moment would be morally acceptable. She rationalizes that “untimely death is not attained here either by man or a woman,” coming to the conclusion that her suicide would be impure, as it was motivated by her missing her spouse. Still, she finds herself tying a noose and weighing her options and though her human heart screams for release, her knowledge of honor and expectations coupled with many “auspicious omens” dissuaded her from ending her life and her “despair abated.” This death would have been dishonorable and thus impure; Sītā resultantly refrains from suicide. This is in sharp contrast to her death (and subsequent rebirth) at the end of the tale. At the conclusion of the Ramayana, upon Rāma denouncing Sītā for her time with Rāvana (despite Rāvana having kidnapped her, making any form of relationship between them entirely non-consensual), Sītā walks into the fire, hoping that the flames that engulf her will “protect” her, self-immolation proving her purity to her husband. Yet soon after, Sītā is returned to Rāma by the gods, who claim there is “no fault” in her; though her time spent with Rāvana may have had corporeal transgressions, her thoughts were pure as her “heart was set on” her husband. This depiction again emphasizes the taking of one’s own life as a precautionary measure, an act done to safeguard one’s soul, love, honor, or purity. There seems to be a conscious distinction between suicide with purpose and suicide as selfishness. Sītā’s contemplated case presented in the epic was dishonorable and thus unfulfilled while her consummated act of self-destruction was a sacrifice of selflessness and liberation.

The retelling of the story of Joseph displays God’s great power. God has a plan for Joseph to become great and blesses him with the gift of interpreting dreams. Joseph’s brother’s know that Joseph is special and become jealous of him. The brother’s try to spoil God’s plan by throwing Joseph down a well. But, Egyptians rescue him from the well and bring him to Egypt as a servant. When Joseph reaches maturity, he interprets a dream of the pharaoh. Because of this dream interpretation, Joseph becomes an advisor to the pharaoh and saves all of Egypt from a famine. This shows that, “God always prevails in His purpose, though most people do not realize it.”

Why does the Qur’an place such great emphasis on gardens and/or feasts?

The Quran is like the bible to people who are Muslim, it is like a belief and value system. People that truly believe in The Quran and follow what it says will then be accepted into the “Gardens”. The gardens is a sort of paradise that Muslims get to go to in their afterlife. It’s known to be this blissful place, where everything is beautiful and men and women can exist eternally. The Quran talks about feasts because after Muslims are done fasting, they feast as a form of celebration and gathering. The Quran places emphasis on this because people need to feel like they are abiding The Quran for a reason. Believers want to be accepted by God so that He may then accept them into the gardens after death. Everyone wants to get into heaven and the Quran says that in order to be accepted, they must be holy and if they sin, they must do penance.

Compare The Odyssey and The Ramayana.

The stories The Odyssey and The Ramayana are similar in many ways but the characters themselves are a bit different. In both of the stories, characters are able to do some sort of magic. In The Odyssey, Athena was able to disguise herself as another person. In The Ramayana, Viswamitra taught Rama some chants so he could be able to summon powerful weapons whenever he wanted to. Also, in The Odyssey and The Ramayana, both of the women stayed faithful to their husbands. Penelope did not give in to the suitors when they were trying to woo her and all Sita spoke about when she was captured by Ravana was her husband. Rama even tested Sita when he rescued her from Ravana to make sure that she was truly loyal. Even though their stories were similar, they had very different characteristics. When Rama left the kingdom after he was banished, he decided to let Sita go along with him. When Odysseys went away to war for many years, he left behind his wife and family. Also, Odysseys used his cunning and a deceitful ways to get out of trouble, the story mostly focused on how much he lied rather than his violence. Rama, on the other hand, was an honest man that used his holiness and knowledge to come out winning in the end.

Love comes in many different forms. Whether it be within a man and woman, man and another man, or woman and another woman; love is feeling compassion and happiness with another person. Sappho makes it clear that love is truly based on feelings and emotions. She continuously uses metaphors throughout each of her poems to portray love. In Poem 16, the first line says “Some men say and army of horse and some men say an army on foot and some say an army of ships is the most beautiful thing on the black earth. But I say it is what you love” (Poem 16, 1-4). Love is something that brings her happiness and when there is no love and her heart is broken, she wishes to be dead. Sappho is quite the opposite from Lysistrata whom wishes to create a pact with the women of Sparta and Athens to withhold an important element of love, sex, from their husbands. Lysistrata isn’t very empowered by love and thinks of herself as an independent individual rather than a shadow behind a man or spouse for that matter.

Describe how Plato, Sappho, and/or Catullus conceive of love (and/or friendship). You can choose to only discuss one of the three works or compare two or three of them. You can also choose to focus more specifically on either the lover or the beloved if you like.

Sappho’s notion of love is filled with negativity; anger, jealousy, alienation. Moreover, she strays from the traditional sense of love and instead embraces homosexuality, a subject that I would imagine was condemned at the time. Poem 94 “I simply want to be dead / Weeping she left me” portrays the powerful feelings Sappho had for another woman, but the lack of reciprocity from her female lover leaves her feeling alienated and angry. In Poem 16, Sappho emphasizes that love is more important than war, and yearns for her lover Anaktoria, who is now gone — “I would rather see her lovely step / and the motion of light on her face / than chariots of Lydians or ranks / of foot soldiers in arms.” As shown in fragment 51, Sappho is able to express these extreme feelings of love when she says “I don’t know what to do / two states of mind in me.” She masterfully evokes a sense of distance from her lover and herself.

Analyze a literary device–most likely an image or metaphor–or series of devices you find in Plato, Sappho, or Catullus.

In Sappho poems, we can find out she was a lesbian through the metaphor and subtext. She likes to use first person point of view to describe what she was doing in the poem, in order to interpreted her passion and love with men and women. For example, “For many crowns of violets and roses at my side you put on”(poem 94 p641). She uses crowns of violets and roses as a metaphor to express her homo-sensual romantic relationship between she and her women lovers. Since the crowns of violets and roses are represented the women sexual organs. The lesbian love(according to oxford dictionary the word lesbian is derived from Greek Lesbios, from Lesbos, home of Sappho.) is also expressed through the poems. Sappho shows us her desire on other beautiful women. In fragment 112, she states “… you have the bride for whom you prayed gracious your form and your eyes as honey: desire is poured upon your lovely face…” She is so jealous on that groom who is going to marry a beautiful bride. The word between the lines shows us her love and lust are way beyond sexuality.