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Question
Read the following extract from Leigh Hunt's poem, ‘Abou Ben Adhem’ and answer the question that follows:
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Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold, |
- The poem begins with a blessing. What is this blessing? Explain its significance. [3]
- Explain in your own words the following lines and phrases from the poem: [3]
- ‘Making it rich and like a lily in bloom,’
- A look made of all sweet accord
- A great wakening light
- What was the angel doing in Abou Ben Adhem’s room? What did Abou ask the angel? [3]
- Why did Abou say to the angel, “Write me as one that loves his fellow men”? (Give the context) [3]
- Explain the last line of the poem: ‘And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.” If you had to give the poem a different title, what would you call it? Give a reason for your answer. [4]
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Solution
- In Leigh Hunt's poem, "Abou Ben Adhem," the blessing referred to at the beginning is the "exceeding peace" that Abou Ben Adhem experiences upon waking and finding an angel writing in a book of gold. This profound sense of peace emboldens him to speak directly to the angel, an act that signifies his comfort and fearlessness in the presence of a divine entity.
Significance of the Blessing:- Spiritual Serenity: The "exceeding peace" highlights Abou Ben Adhem's inner tranquility and contentment, suggesting a life lived in harmony with his values and beliefs. This peace is so profound that it empowers him to interact confidently with the supernatural, reflecting his spiritual maturity and depth.
- Catalyst for Interaction: This peace serves as a catalyst for the interaction between Abou Ben Adhem and the angel. It is this calm and serene state that allows him to engage meaningfully with the angel, leading to significant spiritual revelations and further blessings as the poem progresses.
- Contrast to Fear: Typically, encounters with supernatural beings in literature are marked by fear or awe. However, in this poem, the blessing of peace removes any such fear, allowing a dialogue that is both bold and curious, setting the tone for a positive and enlightening interaction.
- Indicator of Virtue: The peace might also signify the purity of Abou Ben Adhem's character. It suggests that he is a virtuous and righteous man, which is later confirmed by the angel's revelations about those who love God and are loved by God.
Overall, this initial blessing of peace is crucial for setting the thematic tone of the poem, emphasizing the virtues of peace, love, and divine favor, which are central to its message.
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In Leigh Hunt's poem "Abou Ben Adhem," the angel is found writing in a book when Abou Ben Adhem wakes up. This book, described as being golden, signifies its importance and divine nature, often interpreted as a ledger of those who love God.
Upon seeing the angel, Abou Ben Adhem's curiosity and boldness, prompted by his peaceful state of mind, led him to engage directly with the celestial being. He asks the angel what it is writing. The angel replies that it is listing the names of those who love the Lord. Intrigued by this response, Abou further inquires if his own name is included in the list. The angel tells him that his name is not on that list. Subsequently, Abou Ben Adhem requests that the angel write his name as one who loves his fellow men. This exchange highlights Abou's selfless character and his priority of humanistic values over direct divine adoration.
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In Leigh Hunt's poem "Abou Ben Adhem," the below phrase enriches the narrative with vivid imagery and deep symbolism.
This line refers to the profound and enlightening realization or insight that comes to Abou Ben Adhem, possibly through his interaction with the angel. The "great wakening light" metaphorically represents a sudden clarity or understanding, akin to an epiphany that illuminates his mind and soul. It signifies a transformative moment of spiritual awakening, possibly guiding Abou to a higher level of consciousness or a deeper spiritual path.
These descriptions not only enhance the poem’s aesthetic and emotional depth but also contribute to its spiritual and moral undertones, depicting moments of divine interaction, enlightenment, and the beauty of spiritual purity.
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In Leigh Hunt's poem "Abou Ben Adhem," the below phrase enriches the narrative with vivid imagery and deep symbolism.
This phrase describes the angel’s expression when interacting with Abou Ben Adhem. The term "sweet accord" conveys a sense of harmony and pleasant agreement. It suggests that the angel's look is gentle, peaceful, and full of benevolence, reflecting a deep understanding and a serene connection between the angel and Abou Ben Adhem. This look might also symbolize the angel's approval and support of Abou's curious and bold approach, highlighting a bond of mutual respect and kindness.
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- Abou Ben Adhem's request to the angel, "Write me as one that loves his fellow men," reflects a fundamental aspect of his character and philosophical outlook. When he learns from the angel that his name is not included in the list of those who love God, instead of showing despair or pleading for his name to be added, he asks to be recorded as someone who loves humanity. This request highlights several key points about his personality and values:
- Humanism: Abou Ben Adhem prioritizes human love and compassion over direct devotion to God. His request suggests that he believes loving and serving his fellow humans is a form of spiritual expression and perhaps even a way to show love for God indirectly.
- Self-Identity: His request reflects a self-awareness of his role and what he values most. Abou is confident in his identity as a lover of humanity, which he views as his most significant contribution and legacy.
- Inclusivity: By asking to be written as one who loves his fellow men, Abou is emphasizing an inclusive and universal approach to goodness and virtue, which transcends religious or sectarian lines. This approach is welcoming and open, focusing on the universal value of kindness and brotherhood.
- Spiritual Insight: This moment also underscores a spiritual insight that true devotion and righteousness might be measured by how one treats others, an idea that resonates with many religious and moral teachings around the world.
Abou Ben Adhem's interaction with the angel, therefore, serves as a profound statement on the importance of humanistic values in religious and spiritual life, suggesting that love for one's fellow humans can be as sacred as love for God.
- The last line of Leigh Hunt's poem, "Abou Ben Adhem," which reads "And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest," reveals a significant and uplifting twist. This line comes after Abou Ben Adhem asks the angel to write his name as one who loves his fellow men, rather than as one who loves God directly.
- The angel returns the following night and shows Abou that his name now not only appears in the book of those who love God but actually leads all the others. This suggests that his genuine love for humanity, his altruism, and his selflessness have elevated him to the highest place in the divine ledger, even above those who might focus solely on their devotion to God. It underscores the idea that loving and caring for one's fellow humans is deeply valued in the eyes of the divine, perhaps even considered the highest form of love.
- If I had to give the poem a different title, I might call it "The Highest Love." This title reflects the poem’s central message that love for fellow human beings is perhaps the highest form of love and devotion, transcending even direct worship or adoration of God.
- It encapsulates the theme of universal love and its divine recognition, which is eloquently conveyed through the story of Abou Ben Adhem and his interaction with the angel. This title would highlight the moral that true greatness and spiritual leadership come from selfless love and benevolence towards others, aligning with the poem's emphasis on the impact and value of humanistic virtues.
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In Leigh Hunt's poem "Abou Ben Adhem," the below phrase enriches the narrative with vivid imagery and deep symbolism.
This line describes the book that the angel is writing in, presumably a holy or divine ledger. The metaphor of a lily in bloom suggests purity, beauty, and a flourishing state, implying that the book is not only filled with sacred content but is also blossoming with goodness and spiritual wealth. It indicates that the names recorded in the book are thriving in their spiritual journey, much like a lily reaching its full and beautiful bloom.
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The potential of nature, of discovered and undiscovered elements in our world, persuades us to probe into some of her mysteries and what they may tell us. Prepare yourself then for a true odyssey of the Earth around us.
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Air France Plane Misalng Near Bermuda Triangle The date was January 8, 1962. A huge 4 engine KB50 aerial tanker was enroute from the east coast to Lajes in the Azores. The captain, Major Bob Tawney, reported in at the expected time. All was normal, routine. But he, his crew and the big tanker, never made it to the Azores. Apparently, the last word from the flight had been the usual routine report, which had placed them a few hundred miles off the East Coast. |
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The Sea of Lost Ships The ships below represent samples of the many vessels that have mysterioualy vanished in the Bermuda Triangle .
Many US warships are listed missing by the US Navy between 1780 and 1824 , including the general Gates , Hornet , Insurgent , Pickering , wasp , wildcat and Expervier .
The Rosalle was built in 1838 of 222 tons of wood . In 1840 , she was found deserted but in ship shape near the Bahamas .
Ellen Austin's Encounter disappeared in 1881 in the Triangle |
Bermuda Triangle Theories
The Bermuda triangle is a stretch over the Atlantic Ocean, measuring less than a thousand miles on any one side. The name 'Bermuda Triangle' remained a colloquial expression throughout the 1950s. By the early 1960s, it acquired the name 'The Devil's Triangle.' Bordered by Florida, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico, the location became famous on account of the strange disappearance of ships, as well as aircrafts in the area. A number of supernatural explanations have been put forward with regard to the mysterious disappearances.
However, many probable logical explanations for the missing vessels include hurricanes, earthquakes, as well as magnetic fields, which render navigation devices worthless. However, most people do not like to accept such boring explanations and instead opt for more interesting options like alien abduction, giant squids, or getting sucked into another dimension.
Supernatural theories
| Death Rays from Atlantis. Rays from the magic crystals, left from the time of Atlantis, deep down in the sea are responsible for the strange sinking of ships. However, several underwater expeditions have revealed places under the ocean that look man-made, but no such crystals have been found. In fact no real proof that Atlantis existed, has been ever found. |
| Sea monsters. The presence of sea monsters was the most widely believed explanation especially in the earlier times, when their existence was believed to be true. |
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Presence of a time warp. People claim to be lost in the time warp while going through the region. |
| Alien abductions. The Bermuda Triangle is a collecting station from where aliens take our people, ships, planes and other objects back to their planet to study. |
Scientific Explanations
Magnetic Compass
According to the scientists in the US Navy, this area is one of the only two in the world, where a magnetic compass points to true north rather than magnetic north. This probably caused some navigators to go off course, which is very dangerous because many of the islands in 'The Triangle' have large areas of shallow water where vessels can run aground. They can also sink a long way down as some of the ocean's deepest trenches, from 19 ,000 to over 27 ,000 feet below sea level, are found here.
Unpredictable weather
Since the island is situated in the Atlantic Ocean, the weather is influenced by several factors and can change instantly. That means that at one moment the weather is stable, and at another it becomes extremely turbulent accompanied by strong currents of wind along with the hurricanes.
Formation of methane in the sea.
Methane can lower the density of water, leading to the sinking of ships. Similarly, methane can cut out an aircraft engine leading to crashes.
Bermuda Triangle Survivors
These witnesses constitute a long list of pilots, sailors and fishermen.
1. It is interesting to note that Christopher Columbus was one such witness. He wrote in his memoir on how his compass acted strangely while sailing through the Bermuda Triangle. He along with another shipmate witnessed a glowing globe of light that seemed to hover over the sea.
2. It is said that when clouds or fog enter the Bermuda Triangle, strange things start happening. Such a phenomenon has been witnessed with the Philadelphia Experiment in which the USS Eldridge vanished and reappeared later miles away, with some of the crew men warped into the hull of the ship.
3. In 1901, Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain stepped into a mist and claimed to arrive at a time period before the French Revolution. It is said, that the mist and the ominous clouds might be the key to time travel or entering into other dimensions.
4. Even a great pilot like Charles Lindbergh witnessed unusual events while flying in the reaches of the Bermuda Triangle. It is said that when he was making a nonstop flight from Havana to St. Louis, his magnetic compass started rotating. His Earthinductor-compass needle jumped back and forth erratically. This has now all been revealed in his autobiography.
5. Another eyewitness account is that of Bruce Gernon, who flew his plane, a BonanzaA36, into the Bermuda Triangle and encountered a non-threatening mile and a half long cloud. As he neared, the cloud seemed to come alive. It became huge and engulfed his plane. However, a tunnel opened up in the cloud and he went through this tunnel. It had cloud trails swirling around his plane. He also reported that while going into this tunnel, he experienced zero gravity and the only thing that kept him in the cockpit was his seatbelt.
Whatever be the actual reason, there is an involvement of more than one fact.or behind the disappearances of ships and aircrafts in the Bermuda triangle region.
The Bermuda triangle continues to evoke a lot of interest. Most people like to read about it. In fact., in the last few decades, island of Bermuda has emerged as a major tourist destination as well; mainly, due to its close proximity with the Bermuda Triangle.
We will ponder your proposition and when we decide we will let you know. But should we accept it, I here and now make this condition that we will not be denied the privilege without molestation of visiting at any time the tombs of our ancestors, friends, and children. Every part of this soil is sacred in the estimation of my people. Every hillside, every valley, every plain and grove, has been hallowed by some sad or happy event in days long vanished. Even the rocks, which seem to be dumb and dead as the swelter in the sun along the silent shore, thrill with memories of stirring events connected with the lives of my people, and the very dust upon which you now stand responds more lovingly to their footsteps than yours, because it is rich with the blood of our ancestors, and our bare feet are conscious of the sympathetic touch. Our departed braves, fond mothers, glad, happy hearted maidens, and even the little children who lived here and rejoiced here for a brief season, will love these somber solitudes and at eventide they greet shadowy returning spirits. And when the last Red Man shall have perished, and the memory of my tribe shall have become a myth among the White Men, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe^ and when your children’s children think themselves alone in the field, the store, the shop, upon the highway, or in the silence of the pathless woods, they will not be alone. In all the earth there is no place dedicated to solitude. At night when the streets of your cities and villages are silent and you think them deserted, they will throng with the returning hosts’that once filled them and still lover this beautiful land. The White Man will never be alone.
Let him be just and deal kindly with my people, for the dead are not powerless. Dead, did I say? There is no death, only a change of worlds.
Read the extract given below and answer the question that follow.
What is the condition laid by the speaker before he accepts the white man’s proposition?
“So that is what you are doing out here? A marshal!” “My dear Miss Fairchild,” said ’ Easton, calmly, “I had to do something. Money has & way of taking wings unto itself, and
you know it takes money to keep step with our crowd in Washington. I saw this opening in the West, and—well, a marshalship isn’t quite as high a position as that of ambassador, but—” “The ambassador,” said the girl, warmly, “doesn’t call any more. He needn’t ever have done so. You ought to know that. And so now you are one of these dashing Western heroes, and you ride and shoot and go into all kinds of dangers. That’s different from the Washington life. You have been missed from the old crowd.” The girl’s eyes, fascinated, went back, widening a little, to rest upon the glittering handcuffs. “Don’t you worry about them, miss,” said the other man. “All marshals handcuff themselves to their prisoners to keep them from getting away. Mr. Easton knows his business.” “Will we see you again soon in Washington?” asked the girl. “Not soon, I think,” said Easton. “My butterfly days are over, I fear.”
Read the extract given below and answer the question that follow.
Why do marshals handcuff themselves to their prisoners?
What items of food did Golu take before leaving his home for the Limpopo river?
How does father react to the mother's warning?
Match the following.
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unprecedented space tragedy |
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certified flight instructor |
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space mission |
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super specialisation |
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encyclopaedic knowledge |
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awe-inspiring |
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in this age |
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Look at the following phrases and their meanings. Use the phrase to fill in the blank in the sentence given below.
A fund has been _____________ for the soldiers’ families.
Find out the meaning of the following words by looking them up in the dictionary. Then use them in sentences of your own.
smearing
Complete the following sentence by providing a reason:
In Act III, Scene II of the play The Tempest, Stephano and Trinculo are angry with Caliban as they struggle out of the filthy pool because ______.
Complete the following sentence by providing a reason.
Beethoven amputated the legs of his piano because ______.
