Christmas Podcast ｜ The Wisdom of Fairy Tales
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Summary
Jack and the Beanstalk is a classic children's fairy tale, written by Hans Christian Andersen and written in the late 19th century, and written about the adventures of a young boy named Jack and the beanstalk.
Transcript
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hello and merry christmas to you uh by popular acclaim i wanted to do another segment on
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children's fairy tales the first one we did a few months ago was about fairy tales that were
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oriented towards girls and i wanted to do one about the fairy tales that were oriented towards
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boys and i thought i'd pick a classic or a couple of classics actually uh jack and the beanstalk
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to to start with and talk a little bit about that one and and what it means and you know we have a
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nice little ladybird copy of the book here and we have some uh hans christian anderson books uh stories
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that we're going to get into so i won't read all of them to you i promise and i'm sure you won't be
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falling asleep but we're going to be talking a little bit about the flying trunk and the little
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tin soldiers a little tin soldier as good examples for boys to learn about so jack and the beanstalk
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you all know it um jack is a bit of a lazy boy he lounges around the house all day he doesn't help
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his mother but he's kind-hearted and decent and you know he does his best and then as his mother who's
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a widow becomes more and more broke she decides that he has to sell the cow because they have
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nothing left and that's the last thing that they've got so he's pretty desperate and he goes to the
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market to sell the cow but instead of getting money for it he sells it for magic beans now the choice of
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beans is interesting because it's a dead thing containing life within it um so essentially what jack has done
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his son is exchanged life for death and choose adventure and choose risk and choose to put his
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life on the line but his mother obviously as a good woman thinks that this is absolutely foolish
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that he was completely reckless and that what he did was absolutely stupid so she shouts at him
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and sends him up to the uh to his room without any dinner and the next morning he wakes up and there's
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a giant beanstalk there and the first thing that he does is just climb the beanstalk he doesn't know
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why it's there he doesn't know where it leads to and when he gets to the top he finds an incredibly
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desolate place without a single tree without a single blade of grass and he's on his own and he's
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walking this road that seemingly has no end but he's inspired along the way by a woman who knows his name
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and tells him that there's a giant living at the end of this road and that that giant deserves to be
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punished it was it says in the text we've got here that he was actually the ogre that killed his own
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father and stole all of his possessions so this there's there's history here there's history there
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and there's history in two ways you could argue that this was inserted into the story to give it a
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christian justification rather than simply going and slaying ogres but i don't think that this is
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necessary i think it is very much in human nature uh for brave men to go and slay monsters as part of
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their rise to greatness it's the theme obviously of saint george's story but it's also a universal
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theme that a good man has to combat great evil it's like in the hobbit as well uh where bilbo has to go
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and uh he's not initially intending to slay the dragon but he has to go and face smaug and recover
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some of the um some of the wealth that he's hoarded for himself exactly exactly and it shows you the
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nature of evil that it's hoarding endless wealth and all it cares about is that wealth and you are meant
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to go and and fight against it uh it's it's about the call to adventure and that's and that's what like
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the the those those magic beans represent a potentiality exactly exactly exactly and to
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achieve that potentiality you're risking your life and you're choosing the dead thing in the belief
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that you can revive it so there is this element to it that sort of adds to the flavor of the story and
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that sort of shows you what is our nature as men
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and then he gets to the ogre's castle and there's a woman there and he begs and he says i'm tired and
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hungry and desperate please feed me and let me sleep and she's like no no you're you're in the land of
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the giant now you're in the land of the ogre he's going to kill you if he finds you you shouldn't be
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here but he was desperate enough to try anyway and that kind of tells you something about when you
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are at your best which is sometimes when you're at your lowest uh so there is this nice juxtaposition
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there between jack's personal despair and the fact that it leads him to to to a greater good
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and the ogre comes in and we all know the beautiful line fee foe fi fum i smell the blood of an english
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man be he alive or be he dead i'll grind his bones to make my bread and the ogre's wife being a good and
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gentle soul actually lies to him and says no no there are no englishmen here you're just imagining things
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and jack is looking at this and he's absolutely terrified but he doesn't do anything and she just
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puts a massive meal in front of him and he just starts shoving food into his mouth and eventually
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because he is a glutton and all he cares about is material things he orders his wife to bring him
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the magic chicken the magic hen which which lays golden eggs and he just keeps on barking at the
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chicken and he doesn't even say thank you to his wife for bringing him the hen so it sort of shows
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you something about the nature of evil that it is naturally ungrateful that it's naturally lacks
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any appreciation for service for dedication for loyalty and it kind of shows you why his life
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why his wife would lie to him i mean if you don't sort of if you're not in any way grateful to your
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wife if you don't show her any appreciation you have a bit of a problem there you have a bit of a problem
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there and and by all respect she seems to be quite a dutiful wife yes for the most part i mean she's
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doing everything that he says you could say that it's out of fear but from his perspective i mean
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she's doing everything that she should right exactly so you need to hold your end of uh uh hold your
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virtues as well exactly exactly uh that's why in in the bible it says you become one flesh and if you hurt
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your wife it's like hurting your own flesh you you are one you know um but anyway jack steals the
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hen that lays the golden eggs and he goes to his mother and climbs down the beanstalk and now they're
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no longer living in impunery they're no longer hungry and starving they have something and in a way
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you could think about the hen that lays the golden eggs as a business or as a skill or as a craft that
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he mastered so he goes on this long difficult path which is always the path to learning the path to
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knowledge is always lonely and it's always difficult and you can't master anything unless you go through
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a very difficult journey and you put yourself in danger through you put yourself in danger as well and
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you may say well you know i'm if i'm learning a skill i'm not putting myself at the danger of being
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eaten by a giant but you are putting yourself at some personal danger of things like failure if you're
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trying to do something that's business-like exactly fail your family you could fail yourself by letting
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yourself down on a more public level if you do something like i do like play guitar and play music
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you could humiliate yourself yes in front of other people in front of your peers so there is always
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danger involved in that is overcoming is always the ultimate uh victory is this is the uh sense of
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overcoming and that's a reward in itself exactly exactly um but then jack having achieved the
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success he began to long for more adventure which is again an innate characteristic in boys and in men
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it's sort of what makes us builders we want to compete we want to attain greater things and very
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often we have to compete with ourselves and comfort i mean it says here they were able to live very
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comfortably and he had no need to worry they lived happily in this way for many a long day but after
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some time he began to long for more adventure this is the thing you know around this uh around this time
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obviously like fuentes has been in the news all all the time recently he does kind of drive a lot of
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the discourse but one of the clips that was going around that people were taking out of context i think
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was this discussion that he was having on wife guys and yes girl dads as they're described and he was
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being very very uh insulting to them but i think what he's insulting is not necessarily that they are men who
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have families and have duties that they uphold to their families it's that they in in pursuing those
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duties they have completely lost all sense of masculine drive as i know their only goal that they
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want to pursue is to be a husband and a father and that's great and if you're good at that that's great
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that's a fantastic duty to uphold but as a man you should have more romantic drives purely beyond that
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because comfort in many ways can be its own prison yes if you're an intelligent man with a very active
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mind getting yourself set for life can be the worst thing for you and it's why so many men later in life
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when they retire and they have no goal to pursue anymore their kids have moved out they're living
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comfortably with their wife there's nothing driving them anymore it's why a lot of the time they end up
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dying so soon after yes because even if you're retired you can still find other things to do for
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yourself and if you lose if you lose that drive that piece of yourself dies that piece of your
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masculinity dies exactly you shouldn't be comfortable with comfort you should strive and that's what the
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story is saying that's the the example that it is setting in the minds of men don't be satisfied with
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the first bit of comfort that you achieve keep on going seek further adventure seek further knowledge
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and so jack does exactly that he climbs the beanstalk again and he goes to the ogre's wife but this time
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he disguises himself so he's learned a new trick to disguise and in a way to deceive he's gained the gift of
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the gab and he's able to convince the wife of the ogre that the first boy who stole the the hen that lays the
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golden eggs was absolutely awful and who would do such a thing and it's genuinely terrible that something
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like that would would be done uh he chatted so pleasantly to the ogre's wife that she felt she
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could not refuse him a meal she let him come in so that's something about what you need to learn you first
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master a skill but then you next master communication and people and this is the message that's hidden
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in this fairy tale that you don't stop just mastering one skill you then go on to the next one
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and in this case it's it's it's mastering people which is very important as a young man like jordan
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peterson said with men there's always an underlying threat that violence can break out so learning how to
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navigate that obviously in this case he's talking to a woman but he's entering the ogre's castle yes
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he's putting himself in danger against another domineering alpha male exactly to master language
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and how to communicate with people so that you can avoid getting into violent situations if you can
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exactly exactly exactly and so he gets into the ogre's castle again
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and again we have the fee-fo-fi-fum i won't do the impression again um but this time scared me the
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first time but this time the ogre is counting stacks and stacks of gold coins counting massive
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riches yes exactly and you see the look on his face of just he's so taken by the wealth that he's
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accumulated that he doesn't see anything else and he can't show his wife any respect and that means
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that he can't show anybody around him any respect so he's just fascinated by this wealth and again he
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eats and drinks and does everything that that he enjoys and counts his money and falls asleep and when
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he falls asleep jack strikes again but this time the burden is heavier he's carrying in a way more
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responsibility because he's gained that wealth or you could read it that way and he as a dutiful son
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takes this wealth and he takes very good care of his mother as you all should call your mom as carl keeps
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saying especially around christmas be very good to your mom around christmas so his mother is clearly
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worried about him that he's gone on these adventures and he's gone to the ogre's castle again and she
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makes tries to make him promise never to go again but no he's still he's still not satisfied your mom
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will also do that yes that's the sort of stuff that my mom does the sort of stuff that i've pursued over
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the years including this job it was all very oh are you sure you're putting yourself up in like in
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the public eye doing this sort of thing but ultimately you do have to take those risks for yourself
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your parents and your mom can be a good guide for you if you really are doing something stupid
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they'll let you know but ultimately you have to make those decisions exactly exactly exactly you
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want to teach your boys to grow up to be the kind of men who will seek out adventure not stupid
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adventure but meaningful adventure and so having mastered a craft with with with the hen now jack has
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accumulated this enormous wealth um and he has these bags and bags of gold coins and he upgrades his
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home and he takes better care of his mom and he gets her good food and good clothing and she asks him
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you know don't go again to meet the ogre but no no no no no and again they were content for a while but
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he was longing for more adventure and so he goes up to the ogre's castle one last time and he walks down
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this desolate road which is truly scary and full of despair but he finds himself at the gates of the
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ogre's castle and he deceives the ogre's wife one more time uh and it's sort of it's not a good christian
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message that you should be able to be deceptive but it is a good message for a boy that you must be
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articulate you must know how to communicate you have to find a way to bend people to your will to
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make them do things that they don't necessarily want to do uh so you have to exercise that judgment
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and this time there is a magic harp and the harp uh plays music on its own
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and it obeys its master if it's told to play it'll play and if it's told to stop it'll stop
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and you can think you know what does this represent uh maybe art in general maybe the
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ability to appreciate art maybe a certain spiritual development that lets you appreciate
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beautiful things and everything else has been material thus far it's been the business it's been
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pure wealth now this could be perhaps representative of a uh higher class spirit yes yes exactly yes
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exactly a noble spirit an aristocratic spirit exactly one that takes care of the people around
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one that sort of guides and protects and guards uh the vulnerable things that we love so yes
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yes but the harp starts screaming when jack starts tries to steal it and it calls for its master and
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it's an ogre you know uh luckily for jack the ogre is overfed and lazy and he's extremely tired so he
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doesn't manage to catch up with him quickly and jack manages to make a run for it um and it shows you you
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you know meeting great danger meeting an ogre yeah you're you're going to run from some monsters
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sometimes but accepting that the ogre is much bigger than he is and much stronger than he is and he
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can't find him fight him head on he gets to the bottom of the beanstalk faster and calls his mother to
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bring him the axe and it sort of shows you how you are how you need to have the ability to cooperate
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with others against great evil i suppose i guess the mother's role has sort of changed a little bit and
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maybe become a little more masculine um you wouldn't normally call on a woman to bring your weapons but
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here he is but maybe that is what a good woman does she you know sews her husband some armor or she
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helps him sharpen his his axe and knife or so that there is this ambiguity about her role and it is it
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it is his mother so perhaps it's uh it's kind of the familial bonds and ties being reciprocated yes she's
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seen the danger that he's in and whatever fears and worries that she's had before she knows that
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she needs to step up now yes as well and maybe also just telling young boys as well um if you do
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get yourself in a pinch you still can rely on your mom yes yes and maybe part of what a mother does
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is let her son sharpen his claws let her son practice things that make him stronger and help him do that
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this is more the role of the father but the mother has to be permissive enough to allow the father to
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exercise to exercise this role and so jack gets the axe and he swings at the beanstalk
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and he fells it and the ogre falls to his death and evil has been defeated and justice has been
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restored because jack took the time to walk down the desolate road three times he mastered speech
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he mastered a craft he gained wealth he gained power and now he could slay great evil and it's maybe not
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by directly confronting it but he built all of the tools that are needed in his arsenal to be able to
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defeat great evil and it came from a spirit of adventure and it came from the willingness
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to trade the cow a symbol of fertility and fecundity for beans which are dead and to use them to bring
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about life so it has these deeper meanings that your boys should know about and they won't appreciate them
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when they're six but you keep teaching them this kind of stuff and eventually they learn
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moving on to another story this one is a called the flying trunk
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and it's about the son of a banker who is in the opposite situation of jack jack is poor and his
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mother is a widow but this one his father dies and he inherits massive wealth and instead of being
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responsible with it he will make kites from banknotes and play ducks and drakes with gold coins
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and he completely wastes all of his money to the point where he's broke and all he has is a bathrobe
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and a pair of slippers and all of his friends abandon him and he's got nothing now one friend brings
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him an old trunk and tells him pack your stuff and leave but he's got nothing so he himself sits in the
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trunk and lo and behold it's magic and the trunk carries him and flies away with him inside it
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and it sort of tells you something about wasteful men men who will overspend money and have no concern
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for tomorrow and instead of being responsible and developing a skill they just fly into fantasy land
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and allow their imagination to carry them away towards things that they haven't earned and they
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haven't achieved and indeed that's exactly where he ends up he ends up in turkey which you know from
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the perspective of of anderson um this is a distant faraway fantasy land that's where he's ended up in
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the land of imagination and the trunk lands next to a city and he goes into the city and finds a wonderful
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castle and what's in this castle what's in this palace well it's the king's daughter and a fortune teller
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her father had said that she is going to have her heart broken and so her father built a giant castle
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with very high walls to make sure that nobody could approach her and deceive her
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but obviously it fails because the banker's son flies in his magic trunk and goes to uh
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her lodging while she's sleeping on a sofa and creeps in and charms her and convinces her that he's a
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magic that he's a wizard who flew in from the sky in order to love her and marry her and she invites him to
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meet her parents and she tells him they love to hear stories you need to tell them your best tale and if you do
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they will let you marry me and he does exactly that he tells them a fantastical tale but first she gives
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him a gift it's a sword covered in gold coins so in a sense it's about men who rely on their own women
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to provide rather than men who are protectors and can provide he doesn't come in with his own sword
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he's given a sword and along with a sword a bunch of gold coins
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he's a classic trickster isn't he exactly he's got no ties i think one of the other things of him
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floating floating away he literally has no ties to the world he can go exactly wherever and where
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whenever he wants he coveted his wealth and it brought him no lasting friendship with anybody but
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doesn't really care because he's a cosmopolitan he can uproot himself and take himself wherever he wants
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exactly exactly exactly exactly so he takes the sword with the gold coins comes up with a fantastical
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tale obviously completely the product of fiction and fancy and imagination and he goes to the court of
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the king and he tells them a wonderful tale and it's so wonderful that the queen the princess's mother
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says yes yes you shall certainly marry our daughter we will have the wedding on monday
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and they just let her rush into this not knowing exactly who he is not knowing where he came from
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just on the basis of a tale and there is rejoicing in the town and so what does he do he
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has to maintain the fiction he has to maintain the fantasy so he takes the gold coins that are on the sword
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and he buys new clothes and he buys fireworks and he flies in the magic trunk again and lets off the
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and everybody's impressed the turks were amazed to be sure they said this is a real turkish wizard who
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will marry our beautiful princess everybody falls for it everybody believes him but you know he leaves
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the trunk in the woods and he returns to listen to what's being said and they're all impressed he's a
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wizard with a beard like flowing water wrapped in a cloak of fire and you can see that this is stroking
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his ego that he's beginning to believe his own lies and be pleased with himself and he's not connected
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to these people at all and he doesn't care that he's deceiving them because exactly as you said he's
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a sort of wandering cosmopolitan with no fixed friendships the flash gate is what he is he's a flash
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git yes he goes back to the woods and he wants to get his magic trunk but his fireworks have set it
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a light and it sort of shows you that when you keep on lying and trying to deceive it's not an accident
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that the fireworks that he was using to be deceptive destroy the last thing that he had which is his
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ability to present himself as someone that he is not yeah the only thing of any real value exactly to
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somebody like him other people it might be his integrity his honesty his ability to actually craft or
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or maintain things no for this it was all about the show the aesthetic the surface level and and
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and it's really telling that instead of being like jack and going on the long and difficult and lonely
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road he just moves from one circle of flatterers who are only there for his money to another circle who are
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only there because of his fantasies so it's sort of telling that he didn't when he became broke when
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he lost everything it didn't teach him a lesson being at his lowest being hungry and desperate and alone
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like jack didn't get him to learn a skill or to learn how to speak to a woman or to sort of gain anything
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all he had was the gift of the gab and that's all he used and with his trunk burnt he couldn't marry
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the princess anymore so she's waiting for him still and he roams the world telling tales
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do you know what i think this might have inspired because it really reminds me and this is going to
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be maybe a bit of an off kilter comparison have you ever watched the simpsons episode marge versus the
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monorail no really it's one of the more famous ones it's where the the town of springfield is visited by
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this complete huckster right who tells them that they're going to get great wealth and lots of
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publicity and loads of tourists come in if they build a monorail like he says and he says oh my monorails
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they've put this town this town and this town on the map and it's all nonsense he's he's selling them
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a pack of lies yes and they build the monorail and of course it's all completely and it goes to show
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like the kind of like fun moral messaging the shows like the simpsons used to be able to have back in
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the 90s but he they they build the monorail it's a disaster the whole thing is built improperly
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homer is made the conductor of it and that was a terrible idea in the first because it's homer
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and uh the things breaks don't work so on this first maiden voyage you could say it sets off
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and it goes way too fast there's no way to stop it so they have to come up with
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uh an improv to an improvised way of trying to stop it and they managed to and they saved the day
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but they go to the guy who sold it to them in the first place to find out what was going on
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how to stop it and he's of course gone right he's he's taken off with the money as he can he's got the
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next flight over so that he can just get out of town as quickly as possible and that's what
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happened with the previous towns but the irony being and the way that he gets his comeuppance
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of course there's a the flight that he takes has one quick stop off at the last town he visited
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who were also screwed over so that town finds out that he's stopping by and the plane stops and as the
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joke is they're all waiting for him on the runway the door opens to let a few passengers off and they
00:30:12.320
all just rush in right and uh and and uh get their revenge on him yeah yeah i feel i feel like it's
00:30:19.120
a cautionary tale right it's a great cautionary tale and he's embodying that same kind of exactly i
00:30:24.160
forget the name of the character maybe it's lyle or something but he's embodying that same trickster
00:30:30.080
archetype which is telling you if some guy is coming in and selling you the world for pennies
00:30:36.400
then that's not what you're going to be getting exactly and and it's also telling you that if you
00:30:41.920
are the kind of person who is going around selling fantasies and making promises you can't keep you
00:30:48.880
will have to end up permanently wandering from place to place with no friends and you won't be able to go
00:30:54.320
back to where you were before because you'll have just made enemies there exactly exactly exactly so
00:30:59.840
there's a nice warning message to it um he inherits this inherits this massive wealth and he just
00:31:22.240
and then the last story that i wanted to cover uh was the little tin soldier
00:31:27.040
and this is another beautiful one i think because it goes nicely with jack and the beanstalk and and
00:31:35.760
and you'll see why in a minute so this little boy gets a gift for his birthday and it's a box of tin
00:31:43.040
soldiers but the last one has only one leg and that's the story that that story is all about him
00:31:54.160
because for some reason the one-legged soldier gets put in front of a or doesn't get put back in the
00:32:05.040
box where he's supposed to go at night instead he gets put in front of a castle with a lake in front
00:32:11.680
of it make it made of a mirror and a box and the prettiest thing of all was a little paper girl who stood on one
00:32:19.600
leg like a dancer she wore a silk dress and in her hair was a shiny tinsel rose
00:32:26.720
and he instantly falls in love with her and he wants to marry her
00:32:31.360
but the man immediately understands his own responsibilities he says to himself i live in a
00:32:38.320
box with all the other soldiers and that is no place for her just the same i would like to know her
00:32:44.640
better so he has a sense of honor and duty towards the woman from the outset and but and he accepts
00:32:54.400
that he's not in a great position because he's living in a box with a bunch of other soldiers
00:33:00.080
but he still decides that he's going to commit to this love that he feels and he stands there and
00:33:06.960
he gazes at her and he does nothing and then when it's time for bed all of the other toys
00:33:15.440
are put away but the ones that aren't just go around playing and having a wonderful time
00:33:20.800
uh nutcrackers dancing birds singing crayons coloring but the only two who did not move were
00:33:29.360
the tin soldier and the little dancer so in a way when everybody is playing and having a great time
00:33:36.320
they did the responsible and dignified thing and in their case the responsible and dignified thing
00:33:43.280
is just to stand there and in a way that that is part of what marriage is
00:33:50.000
because it is very difficult and the only thing that you can do to make a marriage work is to
00:33:57.840
be there and to commit so there is this message hidden here about their love that while everybody
00:34:05.680
else was having a party they just did their duty towards each other and they were there for each other
00:34:11.360
and it did involve them doing anything particularly exciting and a lot of days in marriage are not
00:34:16.320
particularly exciting but you're there and you're doing your bit trust me the most sometimes the
00:34:21.840
most exciting bit will be when the kids are in bed i know the feeling brother and you just get to sit
00:34:28.320
down for five minutes and you finally get a moment to catch up with one another yes and it is the it's
00:34:34.640
the least glamorous thing in the world yes and you know you'll be you'll have opportunities to do fun
00:34:40.720
things but on a normal mundane day that's going to be the thing that keeps you close to one another
00:34:48.000
yeah as well that's the thing that's going to is though it's that solid connection that you build
00:34:52.480
with one another in those quiet moments absolutely but then the devil uh in this tin box that's sort of
00:35:05.360
sitting there there's a goblin and he pops out and says to the soldier keep your eyes to yourself
00:35:13.440
so there's an element of jealousy obviously he wants the little paper girl for himself
00:35:19.040
but the tin soldier pretends not to hear him he sort of ignores the evil and he focuses on doing
00:35:27.280
the duty that he was doing but for the modern audiences watching this this is uh your your favorite
00:35:35.120
uh your no i won't make that comparison i won't make that comparison uh that that girl that you know
00:35:42.800
that you have you exchange looks with this is the beta orbiter circling around her trying to keep
00:35:50.560
other men away from her because god damn it if he just respects her enough and keeps other creepy men
00:35:58.160
away and one day she'll reward him right that's what's gonna happen one day she'll fall in love
00:36:03.920
with me because i just respect women so much that's a great point actually that's a really good point
00:36:09.440
uh but things don't go very well for our one-legged tin soldier he's put on the windowsill
00:36:17.440
and the window flies open and maybe it's the wind and maybe it's the goblin but he falls in the street
00:36:23.360
below and he's lost and the boy goes to look for him but it's raining and so a couple of other boys
00:36:30.240
find him and they make a paper boat and they put the one-legged tin soldier on the boat and they let him
00:36:37.840
drift in in a canal um and he ends up flowing into a dark drain pipe and there's a rat there demanding
00:36:51.760
his toll and you have to think about the river sticks you have to think about the passage you know
00:36:59.280
from life to death and again the willingness to go on great adventure and in this time the story tells
00:37:06.480
us again and again that the tin soldier is afraid and he wishes that he had the dancer by his side
00:37:13.120
but he was all alone and so he thinks i must be brave whatever he happens whatever happens to me
00:37:20.160
and he's only got one leg so what does he do he stands firm in his place meaning that he's doing his
00:37:30.480
duty that's all he can do is stand there as opposed to cower or fall and he does his duty and he stands
00:37:39.360
and he gets chased by the evil rat and the drain flows into a canal
00:37:47.360
and he's thought about the dancer and he stood more firmly than ever so at every step this man is facing
00:37:55.120
death and poor him he's the only soldier with one leg he's not the best soldier he's already in a got a
00:38:01.760
handicap exactly he's already handicapped he's already in in a very difficult position as things stand
00:38:07.920
and he's been like that all his life but what does he do he stands more firmly than ever because he's
00:38:16.560
approaching death and then a fish eats him after his boat sinks and it swallows him and he must assume
00:38:29.360
that this is the end because he thought that he would never see the pretty little dancer again
00:38:35.360
so as a soldier he's constantly thinking about that which he loves
00:38:40.560
and his duty towards the ones he loves is what keeps him standing firmly and you see this connection
00:38:50.720
between the love for what is behind you motivating you to stand firm in the face of what is in front of
00:38:58.560
you and that's the key thing that you need to be able to have men who are willing to fight they need
00:39:07.040
societies behind them that love them they need women behind them that love them and because he has that
00:39:15.040
even though he's only got one leg he's standing firm and the greater the danger is the more firmly he
00:39:23.040
stands even when he's literally in the belly of the beast even when he's literally in the belly of the beast
00:39:30.960
and he accepts his fate he accepts that he's never going to see her again but he's still standing as
00:39:36.560
firmly as firmly as he can but like jonah he is delivered from the fish because the fish somehow
00:39:45.600
gets caught and it's sold in the market and a cook prepares it for dinner and finds the boy's toy and
00:39:54.080
it turns out that he ended up at the same house where he had been at the start of the story so in a way
00:40:02.160
this is a story about deliverance this is a story about being saved by carrying your cross and doing
00:40:09.440
your duty and facing greater danger with greater firmness and that's the message that's in it
00:40:19.200
and he's lifted up and he's taken to the nursery in a way heaven
00:40:23.600
in a real way this is a story of the fall from heaven going through the belly of the beast having
00:40:32.640
stood firm in the face of danger and then deliverance and he's in the same room that he was there before
00:40:40.160
and he sees the little dancer standing on her toe it's also in a sense trusting in fate yes in the way
00:40:47.360
that fate will lead him to deliverance trusting in providence yes not in a blind fate but in a
00:40:54.160
benevolent providence he still he still had his duties to uphold but if he had faltered at any
00:41:02.000
point then he wouldn't have been delivered but because he upheld his duties because he stood firm
00:41:08.000
and was brave and showed bravery in the face of danger exactly that's what allowed fate to guide him through
00:41:15.360
exactly exactly he cooperated with providence by doing his own duty and he was rewarded for it
00:41:25.600
but then the saddest part of the story is there a very strange thing happened the little boy picked
00:41:32.560
up the tin soldier and threw him into the fire he did not say why maybe it was the goblin who made him do it
00:41:40.240
almost at the same time a door opened and the wind blew the little paper dancers straight to the tin
00:41:48.320
soldier in the fire together they burned into one flame and were gone i mean again this is a story
00:41:59.040
about marriage this is a story that you will become one flesh but as you become one flesh you also
00:42:06.960
age and expire together and you are consumed by the flame of life together and all that's left for of
00:42:14.960
him of the soldier a little lump of tin in the shape of a heart and of the dancer was her tinsel rose now as
00:42:45.360
her. She doesn't betray her man. He's literally a cripple with one leg, and he faces danger that
00:42:57.320
a little tin soldier cannot imagine. A rat chasing him for tolls, rapids and waters that
00:43:05.320
threaten to drown him, a fish that actually swallows him, and then he's delivered.
00:43:11.600
And at the end of that deliverance, he's still consumed. Life gets you even if you live a good
00:43:19.520
life. But there's a beautiful tin heart that's left, and there is a rose, but it's aged and it's
00:43:27.400
black now. And that's what survives. The symbols of love survive. And you can think of them as
00:43:34.480
heirlooms that they pass on to their children. You can think of them as the continuity of life.
00:43:40.260
You could think of the tin, you know, maybe it'll be made into another tin soldier.
00:43:45.180
But it gives you this beautiful image of the duty that you have, of the need to trust in providence
00:43:54.100
and do your duty in the face of insurmountable odds. And part of your duty is to be like Jack
00:44:01.080
and to go and seek out these crazy adventures and to challenge an ogre and find a way to kill him.
00:44:07.480
And what destroys you on this path is to be like the banker's son, to waste your time talking,
00:44:14.820
to waste your resources, to do nothing of value, to learn no skills, but instead to rely on deception
00:44:20.920
after deception after deception. But even if you do your duty, you will end up being a melted piece
00:44:29.000
of tin. But at least it'll be in the shape of a heart. I just find these stories beautiful.
00:44:37.560
And that's exactly what you need to be teaching your sons.
00:44:44.360
Yeah, there we go. So Merry Christmas to you all. I hope you have a wonderful time and you have a
00:44:50.120
great new year. Thank you so much for watching and we'll see you again in the new year.