BS: How Long Is Eternity

Subject: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:27 PM

A very, very,very long time ago, about 50 years past. I was on the Alter when our Priest gave a talk about Eternity. Now as a youngster we are all marker with certain thing that we just don't forget. Well here is what he said.

"A butterfly flies around the world ever tenth year and lightly brushes the rock of Gibraltar. When the rock has finally worn down. Eternity would have just begun". Then he got into hell and all the suffering and all that. Any provocative thoughts?
Beer (adrien)

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:33 PM

Dang. There was a song I heard about 45 years ago that dealt with that theme. It was about a mountain and how a bird (?) came every now and then, rubbed its beak on it and wore the mountain away and that was but a trice in the grand scheme of what eternity was. I can hear the melody in my head but cannot get enough words of the song to Google and locatye it. HELP!

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:35 PM

The guitarist/singer did it in D, and it went from D to C, back to D. HELP!!! I'm gonna be awake in five hours thinking about this. I am an old man. I need rest.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:36 PM

Wonder if my Guru stole it from the song.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:36 PM

It was done by a duet in the ZigZag basket house in NYC back in 1964/5. Girl and guy. The guy played guitar.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:38 PM

go go go go man , you'll get it.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:39 PM

Song Title: Land of Oden
Song:
In the land of Oden,
there lies a mountain,
Ten thousand miles, in the air
From edge to edge
This mountain measures,
Ten thousand miles square

A little bird comes a winging
Once every thousand years or so
Sharpens its beak on teh mountain
And then he swiftly flies away

And when this mountain
has worn away
that in eternity will be
But one single day.

In the land of Oden,
There lies a mountain
Ten thousand miles in the air
In the air
In the air.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:39 PM

That isn't exactly the lyrics they sung, but it's close. Dang.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:43 PM

In the land of Odin there stands a mountain

One thousand miles in the air

From edge to edge this mountain measures

One thousand miles square

A little bird comes awinging once every million years or so

To shapen it's beak on this mountain

Then it quickly disappears

For another million years

Thus when this mountain is all worn away

This of eternity will be one single day

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:46 PM

That isn't it exactly, either, but it's close. OK. Now I can go sleep. I hope.

It's possible they did an arrangement to make things scan a bit better. Seems it's an Australian song, but I ain't too sure about that, either. Ad, thanks for reminding me about this. It was a great song, and they ssang it so well they always got good baskets. The guy was named Gene (I think) but I don't recall the gal's name. Old age ain't all that great, but it is better than the alternative.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 18 Mar 08 - 11:56 PM

You sleep well but i will be wondering in my thoughts if my Priest was.....Oh1, what the hell, it doesn't matter anymore. it was a great speech then and I never will forget it. Even if he borrower it.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST,jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 12:00 AM

>>"A butterfly flies around the world ever tenth year and lightly brushes the rock of Gibraltar. When the rock has finally worn down. Eternity would have just begun". Then he got into hell and all the suffering and all that. Any provocative thoughts?<<

My thought was, "that is one durable butterfly."

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 12:02 AM

LOL

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 12:30 AM

Found these, pretty much the same, posted HERE, apparently a camp memories type site. Also found the same lyrics at another songbook site, along with some other songs which I remember my sister singing in Girl Scouts. Here ya go fwiw:

Odin

In the land of Odin,
there is a mountain,
one thousand miles in the air.
From edge to edge,
this mountain measures,
one thousand miles square.

A little bird comes a winging
once every million years or so.
Sharpens his beak on the mountain,
and then he quickly disappears.

And when this mountain,
has worn away
this to eternity shall seem,
but one single day.

In the Land of Odin,
there stands a mountain,
one thousand miles in the air, in the air.

Because a friend tells her baby girl the legend of Odin and sings this song to help her fall asleep. -Larken

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Janie
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 12:33 AM

Eternity is about 2 minutes long when you are 6 months pregnant, gotta pee, and there is no bush or bathroom in sight.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Amos
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:34 AM

"Lord, how long is etrnity to you, in Your Greatness?"

"But a second."


"Lord, what does a billion dollars in human wealth seem like to You?"

"Like a penny."

"Lord, would you give me a penny??"


"Sure -- in a second..."

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: open mike
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:45 AM

it is almost as long as infinity is large--
0nly always one more second..or inch or....

infinity is to space as eternity is to time...

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Slag
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:50 AM

Eternity isn't looooong. No. Eternity is.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:57 AM

"How Long Is Eternity"

About siz inches...

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 05:10 AM

The priest was of course wrong. Eternity would not even have begun, in fact it can never begin, or at least if it can begin, you're always at the beginning. You can't have a hundredth of infinity.

Most of these paradoxes are simply the result of lazy thinking, substituting "ages and ages" for eternity, and "lots and lots" for infinity.

What happens when an irresponsible force meets an immoral object?

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Megan L
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 05:15 AM

drat and here wis me thought it wis the day after the twelth o never

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: alanabit
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 05:55 AM

It sounds like the sort of priest, who was trying to bully and scare people into compliance with his own patriarchal heirarchy. He sounds like the sort of prat, who makes atheism look so profoundly appealing.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Slag
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 06:28 AM

"When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time will be no more..."

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: bobad
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 07:16 AM

"Judas pointed down the road
And said, "Eternity!"
"Eternity?" said Frankie Lee,
With a voice as cold as ice.
"That's right," said Judas Priest, "Eternity,
Though you might call it 'Paradise.'"

BD

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Jean(eanjay)
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 07:40 AM

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

Auguries of Innocence
William Blake

Always reminds me of the film Endless Night (from the book by Agatha Christie) with Hywel Bennett, Hayley Mills, Britt Ekland.

Every night and every morn,
Some to misery are born,
Every morn and every night,
Some are born to sweet delight.
Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.

Auguries of Innocence
William Blake

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: jacqui.c
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 08:08 AM

Those are the sort of questions that kept me from sleep as a child. I stopped myself trying to work that one out after a while. Too scary!

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: John O'L
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 08:09 AM

When I was very little, back in the 1950s, my dad had a book which I think was called The History of the World or something equally ambitious, and I can't remember who wrote it, if I ever knew. Anyway I loved the foreword, and committed it to memory:

High in the north in the land called Svithjod there stands a rock. It is a hundred miles high and a hundred miles wide. Once every hundred years a bird comes to the rock to sharpen its beak. When the rock has thus been worn away a single day of eternity will have gone by.

That's it, word perfect, after all this time.
Not eternity, granted, but the rock must be getting noticably smaller by now.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Jeri
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 09:33 AM

Bruce: Thread on Land of Oden, with some talk of its past.

Eternity doesn't baffle me as much as where the universe ends does. Maybe it's because I don't really understand time anyway, but I think I've got a pretty good concept of space.

We think the stars are forever, because our own lives are so short in comparison. If a butterfly thought, it might just look at us as eternal beings. They don't think about things like that though. I'm pretty sure they just flit around all day looking for nectar or a butterfly with reciprocal parts to make more little butterflies. Except they probably don't know it makes more butterflies, it's just something that feels right at the time, sorta like what happens with humans after a few beers. Butterflies just come by it naturally.

They also try to not get eaten by birds. They probably don't think about things like reincarnation or afterlives or anything else that complicated. I'll bet they don't much like the idea of being eaten by a bird though. I don't think they worry at all though. They just flee. They flit, they flee, and they mate.

Humans are both blessed and cursed with the ability to think big thoughts. The world is a place of infinite mystery and beauty when we can imagine what butterflies think. It's can be a scary place when we imagine tomorrow and being eaten by birds and knowing forever will keep going on without us Butterflies have it easy.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 09:50 AM

On a variation of "If a tree falls in the forest....."

If we all got vapourized by a rogue comet - is that the end of eternity?

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Amos
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 09:52 AM

I think the reason it is a baffling thought to some is because it violates common sense, but more importantly they have been pointed in the wrong direction to consider eternity -- as though it could be conceived by piling all you can see "out there" on top of itself over and over to endlessness.

The right direction for the discovery of eternity is within. Relatively speaking.



A

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:01 AM

Kat, your find is closer by a long shot than any of mine. Thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bobert
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:04 AM

Waitin' for doctors to call back...

...or the "12th of Never", whichever comes last...

B

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:13 AM

Jeri: Thanks for that link. I was unaware that it had been recorded at all.

Peter and Gordon? Whoa.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: john f weldon
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:27 AM

Geez, you folks can come up with a dreary topic, especially for those of us who are not that young, and would have to start doing a heck of a lot of Good in the few remaining years to make up for the sins of the past.

The trouble with eternity, is that even Heaven would seem like Hell if it goes on long enough. If Heaven is perfect, then it can't change, and if it stays the same, no matter how jolly, it will become mighty dreary after a few aeons.

So I'm planning to come back as an otter. They seem to have fun.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:32 AM

∞^∞

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bert
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:42 AM

Eternity isn't long it's WIDE.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Becca72
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:45 AM

John O'L....wouldn't be H.G. Wells, would it? I believe I have a copy somewhere

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bee
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 10:48 AM

Me, I'm just shocked to find out those weird rumours the other kids told me about Catholics may have been right! Beer: you were on the altar while the priest sermonized!?! %o

Damn, maybe those kids were right about where babies came from, too.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 11:00 AM

Yes I was there. For to long maybe. But even though he scare the heck out of us, he was a good person if you get the drift. But lets not go there as this thread is not about the wrongs of the church and some of their their teachings but about eternity.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Jeri
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 11:11 AM

Hey - cool! Bill made butterflies!

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bert
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 11:17 AM

Nice one Jeri.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Bee
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 11:21 AM

Beer, I was teasing, about the visual implied by your 'on the altar' phrase, as opposed to 'attending' or assisting', and had no intention of bringing up rights or wrongs. Sorry it didn't come across.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Beer
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 12:21 PM

I guess my response didn't come across well either. I didn't take it as any personal dig. I also found your post funny.
All the best on the last day of winter.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:09 PM

"butterflies" hmppff!

^►☺^◄

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST,Bill D
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:11 PM

Ooops...wrong browser.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Peace
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:26 PM

"What happens when an irresponsible force meets an immoral object?"

You get the President and Vice President of the USA.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: GUEST,Neil D
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:29 PM

Forever and a Day

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 01:37 PM

Immeasurable.

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 02:08 PM

It would be interesting to collect all the stories that attempt to tell the length of eternity (which, as Little Hawk says, is immeasurable). The "Land of Oden" description is particularly good, and I think that's more-or-less the one I heard in catechism class - to define how long heaven would last. Our Wisconsin Dominican nuns didn't dwell on hell very much. They assumed we were all going to heaven.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: How Long Is Eternity
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 19 Mar 08 - 02:11 PM

size doesn't matter