#powerful pastor

[varlaisvea]

’this one’

ok i am kind of a dork about ta’agra. i am a ~linguist by education, and in eso, ta’agra has definitely gotten the most love out of all of tamriel's languages, enough such that it has understandable grammar and root words. (enough such that you can kiiind of figure out a general idea of what zerith-var is saying a lot of the time!)( if you've read the amount about ta'agra that i have!) (a normal fanfic writer amount, which is obiously a lot but, as with all elder scrolls lore topics, is insignificant compared to the real ta'agra fans out there). (but for real imagine being a language dork and having a video game give u a lil language dork treat for being a dork about its made up language. elder scrolls babey.). i’ve always been interested in how khajiit refer to themselves, because they have multiple ways of doing so, and—this being the elder scrolls—the choices people make in this regard are culturally meaningful. someone may say “I/me” or “this one” or their name/nickname, and the choice says a lot about the character, their background, and their mindset.

"this one", as a phrase, actually has deep and nuanced historical, cultural, and linguistic lore. because this is the elder scrolls.

as far as personal pronouns, zerith-var and the characters in his flashback stories only use I/me to refer to themselves. one could simply assume that language usage changes over time (khajiit in the 4th era in skyrim, don't really use it, for example). but, this being the elder scrolls, of course this (ultimately extremely minor) lore discrepancy is explained: zerith says “this one” is a more accurate translation for the way the personal pronoun (I/me) is used in the modern day, but it’s completely absent in his time. he doesn’t like “this one” at all: he observes that while ta’agra and cyrodiilic have mixed significantly over time, in his era, they were ‘mere acquaintances.’

so, it's an effect of khajiit mixing more with the rest of tamriel after a few decent centuries without a major war or catastrophic plague, but it's also more than that. languages are frameworks that both inform and convey the speaker's cultural perspective, and using "this one" reflects a desire to express something that "I/me" does not. in terms of how the word is used grammatically, the translation of “ahziss”, the ta'agra personal pronoun, is most accurately “I/me/my." but the literal meaning of "ahziss" is more accurately "this one" or "one person [of a group]" (although canon vs fanon is murky here). so, implicit in the ta'agra personal pronoun is the fact that the speaker is part of a whole—ie, they are saying me, this particular member of the group (the khajiiti people), or this particular khajiit (me). i imagine this is why some khajiit use "khajiit" as a personal pronoun; that also seems like a pretty reasonable approximation of what it sounds like "ahziss" means. this being the elder scrolls, khajiiti mythology also reflects this concept of the individual always being a part of the whole through the lunar lattice—you can see why it might be important to someone to convey something like that in their speech, when referring to themselves.

if this were not the elder scrolls, the lore related to this phrase might end at grammar and history (or well before that), but we are playing a game franchise whose name itself references the truly absurd amount of lore it has. so obviously we must consider the modern usage of the term, in order to really round out the lore about 'this one.'

nobles, like Khamira and Gharesh-ri, tend to speak with a distinct upper-class accent, and exclusively refer to themselves as I/me. The same is true of many scholars, mages, and wealthy people. this seems to suggest that well-educated, wealthy, and cultured khajiit are speaking a more "proper" tamrielic. southern elsweyr is more cosmopolitan (at least the parts that remain, which are largely cities), and people from the south tend to consider themselves more worldly and refined than their northern counterparts. accordingly, this 'upper class' and 'more tamrielic' manner of speech seems associated with a southern accent. this is consistent enough in the game that you can hear the torval curiata in zerith-var’s quests speaking with a southern accent, but using ‘this one’, and it’s kind of jarring.

currently elsweyr has been devastated by the knahaten flu, but historically the south was a wealthy, multicultural coastal trading economy (plus skooma and elegantly organized crime). the north has always been largely badlands inhabited only by baandari nomads, with a more modest agrarian trading economy in the two (formerly three) cities in the north, which are constantly invaded by cyrodiil over the centuries, and cut off from the rest of elsweyr by a massive canyon (and now also a condemned city). so (sorry to any non-americans but i can only make analogies referencing places i know), the north is like if vermont was an ancient desert with dragons in it, while the south is like if bethesda maryland was a post-apocalyptic jungle w/ dragons in it.

soo lower-class, rural, and less-educated khajiit, as well as khajiit from the northernmost part of elsweyr, seem more likely to use 'this one', and there's a lot of overlap in those groups. it's just part of the way people talk-- many people seem to use 'this one'/'I'/their name to convey shades of meaning. using "this one" or your name both require consequently referring to yourself in the third person, which has a much different vibe than referring to yourself in the first person. using your full name, or your name plus your title, or your nickname, or "this one" all have different vibes, and say different things about how you would like to define yourself in that moment. different people mean different things with their choices, but your choice can convey levels of intimacy, public vs private speech, formal or informal, etc.; it's all about feeling and personal preference.

razum-dar is probably the khajiit you talk to the most, and he is interesting to pay attention to--he is as calculating in his use of language as he is with everything else. to the player and to queen ayrenn, he mostly calls himself "raz" (suggesting that's what he uses with people he considers friends), and he usually only uses "I/me" when he is expressing a genuine emotion--ie, almost never. he uses "this one" to humble and formalize his speech when speaking to nobility or in an official capacity, but he also defaults to it when he's in the field. he is impressively cultured, well-read, and politically savvy, but he keeps those "this one"s generous when talking to others, especially high elves. being from merryvale, he has a fairly obvious northern accent, so he is happy to play the part of the lazy redneck sleaze he knows people will presume him to be--he counts on people underestimating his intelligence, and uses it to his advantage.

when the elder scrolls is great, it's because they don't shy away from depicting eg racism, they make their racism function accurately within the culture they have created, and the in-universe racism is fully baked right into "this one".

the cyrodiilic perspective is the in-universe cultural norm in tamriel, and the cyrodillic idea of what a khajiit is like would be informed by the khajiit they would most often interact (and racism). that would be farmers from rimmen and riverhold at a grain market, or baandari traders, who talk and act even more Like That and are even more ~exotic. so, it makes sense that an exaggerated northern accent with copious "this one"s is often used as a sign that someone is being lazy, dishonest, false, or patronizing. think of Pacrooti and Fezez; both have the obsequious khajiiti huckster manner of speaking, underscored by every over-the-top khajiiti idiom in the wiki. They never say "I" or "me", which means they are always referring to themselves in the third person, which in English implies deception. it tacitly admits you are using a persona with some separation from yourself and a good amount of falseness, especially if you let slip that you understand the concept of "I" well enough to insincerely call a stranger to whom you are trying to sell something "my friend." (Fezez even uses "khajiit" as a personal pronoun, which is part of the persona in his case, but also people still do talk that way a sometimes--it seems to be old-fashioned; mostly used by elderly folks, baandari, and people in truly remote backwaters.)

i feel like you can see what zerith var disliked about 'this one'. like, even setting aside the fact that as a person, he cannot comprehend a definition of 'I' that does not already contain within it the concept of the lunar lattice (which is azurah's love, which connects all khajiit to one another, even the ones whose souls were thought beyond saving.) like you can see where that alone would be incomprehensible to his understanding of his own existence. but even aside from that.

he is observing how people treat each other in this time, both good and bad. so he must see the ways khajiit experience racism, and how that racism differs from place to place. his life was such that he never even had to consider the unthinkable question of how to convey what 'I' means to you, let alone how to convey that in a language you now must speak for your own survival. like how do you explain 'when I am talking about myself, I mean me, this person who is honored to be part of an eternal whole, and so completely humbled to be a link in that lattice that they must speak of themself in the third person.' and like, my mans understands how they got there, but he also sees it getting mocked and associated with all the negative stereotypes of modern-day khajiit. which he also cannot help but see reflected in the actions of khajiit, both because he is now experiencing a multicultural society for the first time ever and thus seeing khajiit through an observer's eyes for the first time, and because you totally actually do meet plenty of khajiit who lean into that persona, in fact most khajiit in any type of merchant or service role, anyone who is trying to sell you something, throw some of it into their personality.

and now despite the fact that he is a two thousand year old monk with the power to resurrect the damned in order to offer them true peace, and he has been here for like twenty minutes, he's already felt the weight of 2000 years of history and 2000 years of racism by having to contend with the existence of that phrase. i get why he's like 'nah not for me'

anyway surely this is a normal amount of things to know and ways to feel about a simple phrase in a fictional language!

[ceilidho]

I feel like I’m fighting a one woman battle against romances where the guy is a rich businessman …..die a thousand deaths, you genuinely awful trope. I only give a fuck about regular ass people with regular ass jobs

[tieyourlacesman]

God is testing me. Is this what Abraham felt like?

[roseworth]

i LOVE dream talk its my favorite conversation topic ever. whenever someone starts a sentence with "last night i had a dream" i am tuned in and listening. tell me everything i will never get bored of hearing the shit that happens in your dreams

[thepersonalwords]

In my prayer journey I’ve been motived by many lesser aspirations like guilt, approval before others and even a ego-driven desire for church growth. Of course, a passion for revival can even trigger more prayers. Yet, in the long run, we must remember that there is a difference between seeking revival from God vs. seeking God for revival.

Daniel Henderson, Old Paths, New Power: Awakening Your Church Through Prayer and the Ministry of the Word

[cartoonnonsensegirl]

Favorite Anime Ships

Yumiella x Patrick (Villainess Level 99)

Sei x Albert (The Saint's Magic is Omnipotent)

Arnold x Rishe (7th Time Loop)

Kyoutarou Kakei x Tsugumi Shirasaki (A Good Librarian Like a Good Shepherd)

Nasa Yuzaki x Tsukasa Yuzaki (Tonikawa)

Izumi x Shikimori (Shikimori's Not Just a Cutie)

Noah x Raeliana (Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke's Mansion)

Shingo x Miu (Mashiroiro Symphony)

Cecilia x Lawrence (Saint Cecilia and Pastor Lawrence)

Kiyoka Kudou x Miyo Saimori (My Happy Marriage)

Anne x Challe (Sugar Apple Fairy Tale)

[nerianasims]

THAT

FUCKEN

BLEW

[aj-lenoire]

david didn’t become a preacher after the world ended because he found god. no one needed teachers anymore, no one was sending their kids off to school to learn math. the only way he could keep power and authority—and specifically power and authority over children—was by turning himself into a holy man.

[goyastardream]

Hey it's wip time again yay

First up is a wip for a warriors comic page don't tell the people on my clangen blog shhhhh

I'm also working on some character icons/designs for TH, and I want them to be animated in some form. This piece of work is called Erebus (he's in the UF sci-fi fantasy story). Evil dictator "demigod" who kinda slays but also happily oppresses his own species lol He's also the one the guys in the post below kill😭 He is not as big a pushover as he looks he did take out half of them

Then there's this one for Felix who we've seen before. This is the scene where he gets his face slashed by Beth but it's not gonna matter in the long run bc he's about to die anyways

I had a lot of trouble with Erebus in particular today lmao so I think that's where I'm leaving them for now, plus I still got owed art.

I've also been having the knee I injured years ago start acting up and making me limp around campus like a cripple so that's fun too, but I bought a new brace that should help. Hope y'all enjoy a peek into my creative process though lol

[meegan420]

Thank you :) for praying for @tinyshe and her family!

@tinyshe

[ihadtried]

I used to be so afraid right after I deconstructed that I would return to the church. That suddenly I would have to leave behind this new life I loved and enjoyed so much, be sucked back into the tiny box that was my religion. Give up everything I was only just starting to experience. Delete my blog and block my new queer friends and repress repress repress repress.

And now four years later every time I hear a passage from the Bible it sounds more and more ridiculous. It looks more fake with every passing day.

I’m just so much happier

[homoqueerjewhobbit]

One of the main reason I like writing omegaverse is that it's so deeply stupid and embarrassing. It's just a ridiculous set of tropes. I love it so much but we all have embrace the fact that it's so, so silly.

And that's great! It takes alllll the pressure off. No matter how seriously I take this, I'm not letting my parents read it, I'm not sending it out to traditional publishers, I'm not gonna get nominated for a Hugo.

If I finished one of my other, more serious WIPs and I was embarrassed by the result, I would be devastated. It would fundamentally undermine my entire sense of self. But I don't have to worry I'll be embarrassed by this when I'm done because it's omegaverse, so I already am!

The stakes are just so much lower.

[vox-anglosphere]

A peaceful Cotswold village and farmhouse on a sunlit winter's day

[disneydatass]

Why are you so angry all the time? Why do you lock yourself away from the world? Why are you not living your life they ask?

I answer with my own set of questions. How can I live in a body that doesn’t work? In a house divided? In a mind that constantly races? How can I go out and try to make a living when I know off the back of my labor my money goes to funding genocide? How can I think positively and go out and have fun when children are being gun downed for going to school, the movies, the mall? Is this survivor’s guilt? It can’t be. I don’t feel guilty for surviving. I feel rage and sorrow that I have to survive. I should be living. We should be living. One shouldn’t have to struggle to eat, drink, and have basic healthcare and rights.

[craigtowens]

Andrew Murray On Preaching

Andrew Murray shares some insights that all pastors and preachers would do well to carefully consider.

“When the Lord chose His twelve disciples, it was ‘that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach’ (Mark 3:14). A life in fellowship with Him prepared them for the work of preaching. …  “The law of their first calling remained unchanged: their unbroken fellowship with Him was the secret of their power to preach and to testify of Him. …  “The same principle stands for all…