I have been fascinated lately with Angolan folk tales, and their wisdom and their relevance to our contemporary lack of collective wisdom.
Earlier, I posted The Leopard in the Tree, about the value of hospitality - and not extending it to the point of self-endangerment. Later, I posted The Parable of Quick Man and Careful Man, a comment on how meticulous habits can be deadly when haste is called for. And the third posting was The Marriage of the Daughter of Sun and Moon.
Today's story is about how Dog came to live with Man.
Now, let it be told that dogs don't get a lot of respect in Angolan folktales. The character, Dog, is a metaphor for servility - he is a slave to his appetites and for this reason easily controlled and despised. For this reason he is raised from the other beasts - but it is not to showcase his quality. Oh, no. Not at all.
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Jackal and his kinsman, Dog, live together in the bush. Jackal and Dog are hungry. Jackal tells his kinsman, Dog, "Go to the houses of Man, and get fire, so we may burn the grass and catch locusts to eat." Dog agrees to do so.
Dog arrives in the village. He enters a house; there he finds a woman feeding a child with mush. Dog sits down next to the fire; he sees a brand that he could take with his mouth but he ignores it.
The woman finishes feeding her child; she scrapes the pot. She takes mush and feeds it to Dog. Dog eats. He thinks, "Why, am I all the time dying with hunger in the bush? In the village there is good eating." So Dog settles there.
Meanwhile Jackal, who has been waiting, looks for Dog, who was sent for fire. Dog does not appear, because he now lives with Man.
That is why Jackal howls, and why people say that when he does so, he is saying "I am surprised, kinsman Dog! You were sent for fire to feed us both! But you were seduced by food for yourself!"
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I picked this story because of news that some of our Republican brethren, some of whom are new to Washington, just aren't all that into curbing their impulses. I refer of course to stories such as this one about John Kyl skimming the taxpayer till for $200 million in earmarks, and Rand Paul, Tea Party hero, inking a sweet book deal.
Yep. Dogs getting domesticated, every day.