#hardedge

[oneabstractaday]

Gm 👋 Abstract #303 | 30th March #abstractart #abstractartist #digitalart #digitalartist #nftart #nftartist #nftclub #minimalistart #minimalism #hardedge #hardedgeabstraction https://www.instagram.com/p/CqaVQ6OseP1/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[donotdestroy]

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.”— Carl Jung

1/1 NFT Abstract Art 0001 Series: The Darkness of Other 2020 Size: 5400 x 7200 pixels (18 x 24 in.) RGB, JPEG Resolution: 300 pixels/inch

Both physical and NFT items are now available in our store

[hearthomelesbian]

[ID: A screenshot of Tifa and Aerith holding onto Cloud's arms in Final Fantasy VII Remake. End ID.]

Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith (Final Fantasy VII)

[ivan-fyodorovich-k]

!! Cloud with Hardedge!

and the Hardy-Daytona!!

[final-fantasy-as-literature]

Heya, this is a short post about the text on the Hardedge in Final Fantasy VII (1997) and Final Fantasy VII Remake (2020) and Rebirth (2024). that should contain no spoilers besides the general location of Hardedge.

That was written as I drafted this. No spoilers, but it got long. TL;DR: the four character phrase on the Hardedge originates in poetry about the mind and relates to decisiveness and suddenness in awakening, and is largely used in literature about the mind outside of the popular euphemism it represents. I can't say that the devs intended it, nobody can but them, but I prefer it to most interpretations.

If you look into 一刀両断 written on the Hardedge, you will quickly see it pointed out that it is used euphemistically in Japanese in a way similar to the way "break/break up" is used in English for relationships. You will also see people suggesting it just means "what it says on the package" in different words.

I think that second one is an especially unsatisfying explanation for why it's there. It sounds like seeing "This machine kills fascists" on Woody Guthrie's guitar and going, "Oh, he must have a good swing." The first one is also just a lame threat to have on a sword.

If you look into the origin of the phrase, though, you'll find that it, like a lot of idiomatic language in East Asia, comes from Buddho-Taoist literature.

Hanshan's, Shide's, and Fenggan's poetry is the earliest I can find using it. Every online Chinese dictionary I consulted said the chengyu 一刀兩斷 originated with Hanshan's 一刀兩段截, and it doesn't appear in any earlier texts in the Tang Poems from a quick text sesrch. Some online Japanese dictionaries credit the earliest form to Zhu Xi and don't point out literary use differing from everyday, but that's not correct in either direction.

The poem containing it is connected to the mind. Here it is in Chinese and with English from The Poetry of Hanshan (Cold Mountain), Shide, and Fenggan as translated by Paul Rouzer:

上人心猛利

一聞便知妙

中流心清淨

審思云甚要

下士鈍暗癡

頑皮最難裂

直得血淋頭

始���自摧滅

看取開眼賊

鬧市集人決

死屍棄如塵

此時向誰說

男兒大丈夫

一刀兩段截

人面禽獸心

造作何時歇

The most superior have minds acute and fierce;

Once they hear something marvelous, they know it at once.

The middling types have minds clear and pure;

After they ponder it, they say, “Quite essential!”

The lowest of all are blunt and benighted;

It's hardest to crack their stupid hides.

Only when their heads are soaked in blood

Do they know they're doomed to destruction.

Just see the unrepentant robber—

In the bustling market people come to see him die.

His corpse is thrown away like dirt—

To whom can you speak at such a time?

"Stalwart fellows," "great men":

With one chop they are cloven in twain.

Human faces, but with a bestial mind—

When will they erase their wicked deeds?

I also want to use a piece of another of Hanshan's, for which I've also included Rouzer's translation:

我有六兄弟

就中一箇惡

打伊又不得

罵伊又不著

處處無柰何

耽財好淫殺

見好埋頭愛

貪心過羅剎

I have six brothers,

And one among them was wicked.

We beat him—it did no good;

We berated him—it didn't take.

Hopeless in every possible way,

Greedy for wealth, fond of wild slaughter;

When he saw what he liked, he blindly wanted it,

A covetous mind worse than any demon.

The second poem allows me to admit freely that I am not competent enough to interpret the first fully while explaining what I do know about it. What I want to highlight is that reading East Asian literature without at least a cursory knowledge of popular beliefs and practices in East Asia can leave you with a severely limited understanding of a text.

Both poems are about 心 (xīn), which is often translated as heart or mind, but many scholars translate it as heart-mind. This is because it does literally mean heart, but this comes with the cultural context of the heart being the locus of cognition and cognition being both reasoning and emotive. Where one in Europe or the Americas today might think with their head and feel with their heart, a Buddhist in what is now China ruled under the Tang might reason and feel with their heart-mind. If you've ever noticed that some media from East Asia can really go hard in some points talking about "heart," this could be what you're missing that makes it odd. It could also just be odd.

In any case, this already takes one word within the texts and adds centuries of meaning, but the second poem drives this through from the beginning. Heart-mind is also one of the six internal senses in much of Buddhism in East Asia that make up part of a worldview external to the literary that I cannot do justice to here. As this poem is about heart-mind, though, the "six brothers" possessed by the poet in conjunction with hopelessness, greed, and anger which resemble the three poisons makes it clear that this poem leans towards Buddhist or Buddho-Taoist allegory. If the heart-mind is "wicked," taste, smell, touch, sight, and hearing can't beat or berate it into submission, it will suffer the three poisons, succumb to the waterfall of desire, and suffer itself worse than any demon.

The poet then goes on to help this brother recover and surpass even a bodhisattva in behavior. As there is a footnote following the poem which says,

The six brothers are likely the six forms of consciousness (Skt: vijñāna: eye, ear, mouth, nose, body, mind), and the evil brother is probably the mind—the one that can cause the most trouble.

I don't think my claim that being unfamiliar with the cultural context of the text will worsen understanding is outlandish.

With that said, the first poem is clearly about the mind from the beginning, but it begins with what I believe is allusion to Laozi:

上人心猛利

一聞便知妙

中流心清淨

審思云甚要

下士鈍暗癡

頑皮最難裂

The most superior have minds acute and fierce;

Once they hear something marvelous, they know it at once.

The middling types have minds clear and pure;

After they ponder it, they say, “Quite essential!”

The lowest of all are blunt and benighted;

It's hardest to crack their stupid hides.

This appears to mirror the three students or scholars of the Dao, or the Way, in 41 of Daodejing, of which I've taken the translation and text provided by Anthony C Yu in the introduction to the 2015 Revised Edition of his translation of Wu Cheng’en's Journey to the West simply because it is at hand:

上士爾道, 勤而行之。中士閘道, 若存若亡。下士聞道, 大笑之; 不笑, 不足以為道。

The superior student who hears about the Way practices it diligently. The middling student who hears about the Way now keeps it and now loses it. The inferior student who hears about the Way laughs at it loudly; If he did not laugh, it would have fallen short of the Way.

The poet has, however, refocused the Daoist text towards the mind and not the Dao. Additionally, where Laozi continues to evidence what is often said to be the non duality of most East Asian belief systems by making metaphors of things like highest virtues coming from lowest vales, Hanshan continues about those "inferior minds:"

直得血淋頭

始知自摧滅

看取開眼賊

鬧市集人決

死屍棄如塵

此時向誰說

Only when their heads are soaked in blood

Do they know they're doomed to destruction.

Just see the unrepentant robber—

In the bustling market people come to see him die.

His corpse is thrown away like dirt—

To whom can you speak at such a time?

Having set up an allusion which enfolds all things into the Dao, Hanshan uses Buddhist conceptions of the mind to do what seems to me, not an expert in Buddhist and Daoist literature, a criticism of the material and bodily focus of Daoism alone. For Laozi, all three are students, but Hanshan's third doesn't even have a heart-mind. This third kind, in less serene phrasing, is a numbskull that can't tell their head is cracked until the blood's running down their chin, and they care about what they did just as much when people come to watch them die as they do when their body is as good as dirt.

Here he continues on the opposite end:

男兒大丈夫

一刀兩段截

人面禽獸心

造作何時歇

"Stalwart fellows," "great men":

With one chop they are cloven in twain.

Human faces, but with a bestial mind—

When will they erase their wicked deeds?

Where a disciple of Laozi might expect to extend their life as they study the Dao, Hanshan's superior and middling don't hide "bestial minds" behind thick human skin. They both know in a moment or instant and are cloven in two as quickly. Additionally, I want to note that an extremely literal translation might render that last line as something like "When will creation end?" but I don't want to get deeper into the different translations. My language use is not that strong yet, and I'm not sure that translation interests me.

If, and a heavy if, my assessment were correct, I might expect to see the chengyu or variations on it used in texts exploring xīn and the improvement of it. I happen to have one such text right here that people might be beginning to recognize me for, but I'll check a few other East Asian texts first. As Yogachara Buddhism has been mentioned by the development team, let's look at a few Yogachara or Yogachara-influenced texts.

Xuanzang's Cheng Weishi Lun is the first other text I checked, being one of the earliest and most influential in East Asia, but I found no form of the chengyu within. This makes sense, but is disappointing. Next, I returned to Hanshan, but the previous poem is the only one I found within his works that contained the chengyu in any form, even nascent. Moving forward, it seems it mostly appears in fiction within texts traditionally seen as exploring xīn and related concepts. None of 一刀兩段截 nor 一刀兩段, nor 一刀兩斷 appear in any form in Dream of the Red Chamber, Water Margin, Tale of Genji, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Investiture of the Gods, and as many transcribed adaptations of them as I could find and tolerate searching did not include the chengyu. However, returning to texts exploring xīn with Yogachara foundations or influence reveals the chengyu again.

The first I will share is a thirteenth century Chan master's, Gaofeng Yuanmiao's, Three Essentials as translated by Jeffrey L Broughton in The Chan Whip Anthology. This will be in a form noy used in Final Fantasy VII, but I will return to one. Though this one is used twice as a footnote and is not the focus, it is useful here:

若謂著實參禪。決須具足三要。第一要有大信根。明知此事。如靠一座須彌山。第二要有大憤志。如遇殺父冤讐。直欲便與一刀兩段。第三要有大疑情。如暗地做了一件極事。正在欲露未露之時時。

If you are thinking of making a genuine hands-on investigation of Chan, you absolutely must possess the Three Essentials. The first essential is having the faculty of great confidence. You know perfectly well that there is this matter—it is as if you are leaning against an unshakeable Mt. Sumeru. The second essential is having the determination of great fury—it is as if you have encountered the scoundrel who killed your father, and immediately you want to cut him in two with one thrust of your sword. The third essential is the sensation of great indecision-and-apprehension [about the cue]—it is as if you have in secret committed an atrocious act, and it is the very moment when you are about to be exposed, but you are not yet exposed (127)

This text seems to reinforce the idea that the chengyu can be used to represent decisive and sudden samadhi. Here we see it in a separate form, however. To see it in the same form as in Final Fantasy VII, it is much easier to return to fiction.

As many of the Chinese resources I checked kindly pointed out, two forms appear in Journey to the West. The first is in Chapter 9 against the Tang Monk's mother as 一刀兩斷, and the second is in Chapter 92 against the Tang Monk as 一刀兩段. Since the first is in the form usually treated in the euphemistic way and used in Final Fantasy VII (as 一刀両断) we'll see if it leans towards Buddho-Daoist allegory of the mind displaying a disparity of virtues and a sudden samadhi or if it is just euphemistic for ending a relationship or finishing a thing.

As context, Yin Wenjiao and Chen Guangri are married and traveling across a river with the help of two boatmen, Liu Hong and Li Biao. Lady Yin is pregnant with a child that will be named Xuanzang and who will become the Tang Monk, the monk that is tasked with gathering the pilgrims and starting the eponymous journey. Liu Hong sees how beautiful Lady Yin is, however, and kills Guangri to have her. The phrase is used after this.

I've pulled the Chinese attributed to Wu Cheng’en from the Project Gutenberg ebook of 西遊記 (with modern editing by Leong Joana Kit Ieng) and the English from Yu:

小姐見他打死了丈夫，也便將身赴水。劉洪一把抱住道：「你若從我，萬 事皆休﹔若不從時，一刀兩斷。」

When the lady saw that they had killed her husband, she made a dive for the water, but Liu Hong threw his arms around her and caught her. "If you consent to my demand:' he said, "everything will be all right. If you do not, this knife will cut you in two!" (Volume 1, 220).

It is clearly the first, as it is a threat from a boatman that just succumbed to desire and harmed a man who did good deads without realizing he had sealed his own fate in doing so. Guangri is questioned by a dragon he had helped, and he reveals the crime against himself and Lady Yin. Yu provides no footnotes indicating any kind of wordplay he couldn't maintain or clarification at all, so I feel this understanding is fair. This is in an alternate form, but it is the same phrase as the previous.

With all of this said, I'm not sure I'm happy with how people are interpreting Yogachara Buddhism and Jungian collective unconscious being mentioned. This, the decisiveness and nonduality of samadhi in "one sword, two cuts," has equivalents or origins in both areas. The form said to be euphemistic for relationships is also quite commonly used for mental and spiritual decisiveness in literature. Moving the Hardedge to Wall Market is sensible to me, then, because it means this phrase associated with mental and spiritual decisiveness has been given to the legendarily indecisive protagonist within a realm of temptation just before he will wish to cut in two with one knife.

[preposterousgreen]

AU in which Angeal haunts the Buster Sword so that he can keep delivering mentorly advice (and terrible puns) to Zack. Subsequently, Zack joins him, and together they annoy Cloud with dad jokes so much that, when he starts making eyes at Hardedge, it is more out of desperation for a break from the commentary than any interest in upgrading his combat stats.

Cloud is forced to admit, however, that Angeal backseat-bakes a mean loaf of bread.

[midnightshadcws]

Hello!!! Thought you'd appreciate that I went out of my way to buy a miniature yellow lily so I can be a degenerate Clerith lover in the real world and not just the virtual one 😆 (and yes he is wearing Hardedge and that is the Daytona bc I am long past the point of saving 😆) Anyway, hope you're having a lovely day! 😘💕

Oh my God, wait! These are incredible! I am looking forward to get some too! They look incredible! am completely in love! 🩷 Hope you're having a lovely day too!

[burlveneer-music]

Wadada Leo Smith and Orange Wave Electric - what a lineup!

Trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith with Orange Wave Electric, an all-star electric band including guitarists Nels Cline, Brandon Ross and Lamar Smith; bassists Bill Laswell and Melvin Gibbs; electronic musician Hardedge; percussionist Mauro Refosco; and drummer Pheeroan akLaff. Throughout 2022, Wadada Leo Smith celebrated his 80th birthday with one of the most prolific and creative year’s worth of releases in his – and perhaps anybody’s – history to date. Lest anyone should imagine that this breathtaking run was in any way valedictory, the now 81-year-old Smith returns with his first of several planned releases for 2023. The exhilarating Fire Illuminations, due out March 31, 2023 on Smith’s own Kabell Records label, features his newly assembled ensemble Orange Wave Electric.

Ever innovative in his quest for new methods of composing, guiding, and creating improvised music, Smith crafted the five expansive compositions on Fire Illuminations in the studio from a series of recording dates conducted and edited over the course of nearly four years. He cites such precedents as the groundbreaking work of Jamaican reggae and dub innovator Lee “Scratch” Perry and Miles Davis classics like Bitches Brew and On the Corner. Album Cover Image by Einar Falur Ingólfsson

[zerolympiustrife]

San Japan 2023 stuff! part 3

Action figures, video games, and prop weapons, oh my! I actually purchased the Hardedge (a FFVII weapon) prop in the dealer’s hall.

[happypeachsludgeflower]

I love non sequiturs. They’re wonderful.

Others may say that they’re a clunky way to awkwardly change the subject—that they’re inelegant and fail every stealth check possible, but really?

They’re a blunt, hardedge way of saying “no I’m done talking about this topic anymore and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

They’re just such a power move honestly.

Have you ever looked an angry 6ft something man in the eye and said, “There’s a species of single celled organisms that live in almost uninhabitable lakes and has seven genders,” and just watched as befuddlement crosses his face and he then experiences the five stages of grief in five seconds because he knows he’s now going to have to listen to me explain polyploids in excruciating detail once more because I deemed him to be an asshole.

It’s so satisfying.

[meltykarasu]

Final Fantasy VII Remake Advent Calendar — Dec. 2

I think that FFVII Remake's commitment to expanding out the story of Final Fantasy VII starts after the Mako Reactor and showing more of the horrified reactions to the event, but it really picks up once you get back down into the Sector 7 Slums.

The slums are a living, breathing environment, and Chapter 3 is dedicated to showing you that by opening with a quick tour of the area and then filling your plate with a litany of side quests that take place over a day not covered by the original game — a brief span of time between Mako Reactor bombings that simply did not exist originally.

This is mostly further gameplay tutorial — going over the ancillary systems that weren't covered in the opening, primarily shops, resting, and weapons. Actually, let's talk about weapons.

Every weapon has a particular niche. The starting weapon is an all-rounder, and each one after that is tuned to a particular playstyle. But each also comes with their own weapon skill. Only by using that given weapon for a time will your character learn that skill permanently, creating incentive to rotate your weapons as you get them. For instance, the new sword Cloud gets, the Iron Blade, is defense-focused and comes with the powerful Triple Slash skill, which is much better than one or even two slashes.

You can also upgrade your weapons with SP, earned on level up. These are powerful and important to keeping early game weapons relevant — no longer does it become a situation where you may as well give up your Mithril Saber for the brand new Hardedge because one of these has better damage. Instead all weapons can be relevant through upgrades and playstyle.

Okay, back to the actual plot.

Tifa showed Cloud around and there was plenty of romantic tension to go around as they worked on getting Cloud a reputation for mercenary work with the neighborhood watch. Chadley, an intern for Shinra who wants to take it down from the inside, enlisted Cloud to help him develop new Materia (a worthwhile gameplay reward). Johnny, a strange side character from the original game, showed up and was rescued by Cloud and Tifa from Shinra troops before he could blab about his suspicions. Cloud fought and scrapped through the day against increasingly dangerous foes.

He also rescued some cats.

Barret called an AVALANCHE meeting and determined that Cloud would not be part of the next bombing before proving him with the remainder of his pay. While waiting for the meeting to conclude, Cloud became a darts pro and shot up the leaderboard to number 1.

Cloud was approached by hoodlums looking for Barret. Evidently, they were not hired by Shinra, creating the question of who exactly had hired them. Jessie appeared at Cloud's apartment to offer him a Summon materia — and another job that night, leading to the next chapter.

See you tomorrow!

[rukriyaevivere]

〘 The Lost Crown 〙Mr. Hardedge or Whatshisface ┊ #2

Is this guy what some people call a “tsundere”?

Video’s Live! Watch the full episode on my channel! 🦘︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵ Mon | Wed | Fri | 7 PM. AWST ═════════════════════════ Game and background music belongs to their rights holders. Proper credit listed on our YouTube channel. ══════════════════════════

[donotdestroy]

UPDATE: It’s finally on the blockchain! The offer is now available—let me know if you’re interested. with Foundation

The Unified Field of Consciousness Series: Gravitational. 2023 Digital art 3000 x 4500 px Software: Adobe Illustrator

Created by the human mind and handcrafted.

Both physical and NFT items are now available in our store.

[monterraverde]

🌟 + majima!!

“What more can I say about him that I havent already? He’s strong and dependable, funny, but under that hardedge criminal facade, he’s really soft and gentle… I feel safest when I’m with him, and I’m happy he’s chosen to spend the rest of his life with me.”

[invisibleforts]

The concrete reefs were stratified with light -- dim blue lights of televisions in darkened living rooms, bright white lights of ballrooms, multicoloured lights from parties. Pornies leered in pink neon and a subtle breeze played idly with bits of confetti in the gutters ... In the distance the severe lineaments of the street converged in a patina of glamorous scales, refracting neon lights, headlights, streetlights, and metal; glints diffused through a cloud of cigarette smoke steam from manholes, and carbon monoxide. ... Gasohol cars purred to his right, skyscrapers stood hard and cold and hardedged in the street lighting overhead. The streets were almost empty. John Shirley, The City Come A Walkin'

[bondesioartistblog]

"Angles" www.creativepaintings.net

Acrylic Paint, Abstract (Hardedged) On stretched Canvas.

Size: 24 X 20 Inches

Shipping: Free within The United States of America.