is a great person. Incidentally, Who is Ayn Rand? was published when TheBrandens were in Rand's favor, so I doubt it contained anything with which Rand would disagree.

...(but naturally not limited to)....

.... whether the music we like and choose to listen to is an expression of our souls (which is what I have always thought) or is it true, do you think, as Russell Stendal believes, that the music we listen to guides us to, or prepares us for, an end point which is a "cult' or practice typified by the type of music we choose to listen to?

I am reading a book called The Book of Daniel (Closed Up and Sealed) by Russell Stendal at the moment which is about The Book of Daniel (one of my favourites).

Nebuchadnezzar, the pagan king of Babylon, builds a full golden statue after Daniel explains the king's dream of a statue made of various materials which is then shattered and replaced by a mountain. Daniel prophesies that the dream is symbolic of the future kingdoms of the world with each material having a respective symbolic meaning: Babylon is the golden head, the Medes and Persians are the silver arms and shoulders, Greece, is represented by the bronze torso, the Roman Empire is represented by the iron legs and today's time, democracies, are represented by a mix of clay and iron for the feet - and remember that Daniel was written arguably, either 600, 6 or 2 BC so it is a pretty amazing prophecy. The shattering of the statue, incidentally, is symbolic of the "end time" and the mountain is the Kingdom of God that replaces all the other kingdoms.

Anyway, in a wish to change the course of history, Nebuchadnezzar builds a statue all of gold and has it decreed that "when ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, psaltery, dulcimer and of every musical instrument, ye are to fall down and worship the statue of gold that Nebuchadnezzar the king has raised up: and whoever does not fall down and worship shall the same hour be thrown in to the fiery furnace." (Daniel 3:5) This was Nebuchadnezzar's way of testing everyone and uniting Babylon religiously, politically and economically in the hope that the future of the world would not be in accordance with his prophetic dream which Daniel had interpreted.

The point of this post is what Russell Stendal then wrote as an aside from the actual story, about music, which I thought was worth repeating since I would be very interested to hear your comments. He also mentions altruism - but this is only as an (albeit important) aside to his thoughts about music.

"Many people think there is no problem with listening to any type of music. One thing I have noticed is that music tends to prepare the way for spiritual things to be transferred or imparted. I remember accompanying my eighty-year-old grandfather on a cruise..where they played the music of the twenties', thirties', and forties' for the elderly. Even though the rhythm was soft, the spirit and the lyrics behind the music was the problem. I remember that one of the most played songs on the ship was Frank Sanatra's "I'll Do It My Way." If we are going to do it our own way, it will be contrary to God's way.*

"So everyone was supposed to fall down and worship at the sound of the music. Many people are not aware of the music they listen to and they do not realise what kind of cult is at the end of the way they have chosen. There is music that prepares a person for sexual licentiousness; there is music that prepares you to worship the money god; there is music that prepares poeople to do things "their own way", instead of doing it God's way. There is also music that practically guarantees to put the person in a state where God no longer has any access to their thoughts and feelings because this music blocks it all out. It is music where it is no longer important to understand the lyrics."

* "It is different when someone wants to do things God's way: God's way of doing things is that we seek the good of our neighbour and the good of the Kingdom of God and that we not seek our own good. When we do not seek our own good, we are in direct opposition to the world system."

(I hasten to add here that, although I know my head will be cut off for this Randian heresy, I know from experience that not seeking your own good does not mean that you don't actually ever achieve things for your own good - the fact is that you do and these things are usually way better than anything you could have sought for yourself from your own limited imagination.)

Babs is a whore able person.

Heh. Didn't she complain that Nathaniel's bio made her out to be the Whore of Babylon?

Babs is a whore able person..

Only these operettas - like the stoccato sounds of military marches and the syncopated rhythms of popular foreign tunes she had heard and loved in childhood - could offer her the life-giving reality of a world untouched by pain.

This seems to me to be an insult to Rand. Rand is talking about benevolence being expressed in culture and art and Babs equates this with military marches? Is that woman ever right?

Here's a more complete example of what Ayn Rand saw in the music of Lehar, et al:

Fritz's singing between 15' 24' and 19' 00" is as great as you'll ever hear from anyone. An unassailable antidote to Slayer-filth and its pervasive ilk.

"A still, inviolate happiness, almost unbearable in its intensity."

It is reported that Fritz went up to Mario's table at a restaurant in Hamburg in 1958 and asked to be photographed with him. The photograph has never surfaced. If it ever does, I shall know I've died and gone to Heaven.

Objectivism is failing because so-called Objectivists do not understand any of this.