The Tale of a Time Being

 In The Merchant and the Alchemists Gate by Ted Chiang, I was heavily intrigued by the long phrase that Abbas said which is "if our lives are tales that Allah tells, then we are the audience as well as the players" because I had realized that we are ultimately "living these tales" of our life to learn "their lessons" as we look back in time (56). The reason I that understanding the lessons the tales of our life offer us is important because it allows us to realize that nothing can be really changed from its set course and that is perfectly fine. We can not change the past because we play our part in it and we can not change the future because from a outsider point of view we are simply playing out what is fated rather than what we (as players) may assume is fated. 

    To dive into the concept that we can not change the past because we play our own part in it, we can look towards Abbas' understanding of his "hidden role in" his own tale as he couldn't change anything but only learn more about what was fated (52). For instance, when Abbas realized he couldn't change the fate of his wife dying, he had come to understand that his wife (in her last moments) was happy "she spent" her life with Abbas (55). Abbas had been able to expand his understanding of the past by learning that his wife (even when they had just fought greatly) still loved him and realizing that she still loved him just as he still loved her was enough to free him from his "anguish" and "further suffering" (46). The significance of Abbas' understanding is that "nothing erases the past" but we can come to repent, atone, and finally forgive what has happened through expanding our understanding of the past in its entirely. 

    While understanding more about the past can free us from suffering and our regret, the future is already set in stone and  while we assume that we are changing future (that we perceive) we are in actuality following our fated course in eyes of an a outsider watching our life (our tale). We can look at Ajib's tales to understand  how trying to change our perceived future is in actuality following our fated course. Ajib had believed that his poor (in his eyes)looking older self could not "have wealth and not enjoy it", so he had taken his older self's savings in order to change his future (28). However, taking those savings from his older's self as us (the outsiders and readers of the Ajib's tale) was the very reason that Ajib older self had lived the way he did when younger Ajib saw him. To outsiders and readers of Ajib's life, Ajib hadn't changed anything of what he perceived to be the future rather he had provided the very reason why the future happened in the first place.  Understanding that Ajib did what he fated to do when he thought he was changing it is important because we come to realize that what we believe is changing our fate is in actuality following what has been set in stone. One character that realizes the part they play in the future is Raniya, as she protects Hassan from being robbed of the necklace he would give to her in the future. Raniya's action in coming back to the past was actually a part of the fated course in the future of Hassan and her, as she realizes "the answer was clear" to how (as an example) older Hassan knew how to be so confident in the bed because of her being in the past to teach the younger Hassan before he met younger Raniya.

Overall, Abbas' statements about how we are both the audience and the players in our own tales as we learn certain lesson holds true and is important for our understanding of lessons from our past and how we act for the future. For example, when Abbas went back to past, he was an audience to the fate of his wife that he could not change but because he was in audience he was able to learn more about his wife's feelings for him regardless of their fight or her fated death which allowed him to be let free of his suffering and anguish even though she was not saved as he hoped. For Ajib and Raniya, they were both players in their future tales, as their interactions in trying to change the future  or what could've been a different future became the very reason why the future they lived in or perceived happened in the first place. All three examples are important because they highlight how we can learn from our past without needing to change it while we trying to change the future is in actuality following the fated course and that is completely fine.










  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Descartes

  In our class reading, "Descartes" we are introduced to the science behind the human emotions and laughter. Philosophical thinker, Descartes makes a controversial point that laughter usually stems from a place of ridicule and scorn. Even the laughter that stems from joy is because there are small traces of scorn attached to it. Furthermore, Descartes leaves us with, "And it is not wrong to laugh when we hear the jests of another; these jests may even be such that it would be difficult not to laugh at them; but when we ourselves jest, it is more fitting to abstain form laughter, in order not to seem to be surprised by the things that are said, nor to wonder at the ingenuity we show in inventing them. And that makes those who hear them all the more surprised" (Descartes 25). I think this idea is the most thought-provoking of them all, as I apply Descartes' philosophies to real life. How come we are so comfortable laughing at others, yet become sensitive and defen...
Read more

"Let it Snow"

The chapter, "Let it Snow" by Sedaris, is yet another example as to why Sedaris' book is not what it seems. My expectation for this chapter was for Sedaris to reflect on a childhood snow day spent with his siblings. Rather, Sedaris tells us the comical, yet troubling, account of a snow day spent trapped outside his house. Clearly feeling overwhelmed and exhausted from the pressure of having to entertain children during a blizzard, Sedaris’ mother takes an atypical approach to parenting–locking her children out of the house. “Selfish mothers wanted the house to themselves, and their children were discovered years later, frozen like mastodons in blocks of ice” (Sedaris 88). Sedaris and his siblings respond to their mother’s cold heart by having their sister Tiffany lay in the street, hoping she’ll get hit by a car, which will of course, teach their mother a lesson. The chapter ends with Sedaris’ mother trudging outside in no snow gear to go and get them, and the children as...
Read more

The Future Can Be Changed Now

            Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie makes compelling arguments throughout   Dear Ijeawele  for how to raise a daughter to become a feminist. However, the most compelling one she makes, and the one that exists beneath all the others is this: the changes people make now can serve to create a better future. Through her allusions to Chizalum’s adolescence and adulthood, Adichie tells her readers that the decisions people make in the present can positively or negatively impact their futures, and the futures of their children.               In her twelfth suggestion, Adichie urgers her friend to teach her daughter about sex and start early. This simple act, being open and honest with one’s daughter about the nature and realities of sex, can have a lasting impact. Adichie writes, “Tell her that her body belongs to her and her alone, that she should never feel the need to say ye to som...
Read more