Mighty Hunter Research Articles

Nimrod

Each fall from 1984 to 2007 a group of Lutheran pastors in Texas gathered at the ranch of another pastor to hunt white-tailed deer during the opening week of the annual hunting season. Called “Nimrod” after the ancient Babylonian king identified in the Bible as “a mighty hunter before the Lord” (Genesis 10:9), also an acronym for “November Invitational Ministerial Recreational Outdoor Diversion,” the event provided opportunities for recreation and fellowship for active and retired clergy, centered around the hunt. To the casual observer hunting is not an immediately obvious pastime to bring Christian ministers together. This ethnographic study examines the place of hunting within Christian theology and explores how the annual deer hunting retreat in fact created an ideal opportunity for clergy to escape from the social constraints of their professional lives while engaging in the deeply meaningful practice of harvesting wild game.

Louis the Pious and the Hunt

History remembers Charlemagne not only as a great conqueror but also as a mighty hunter. It is largely thanks to Einhard that we have this image of Charlemagne as a second Nimrod, the “robustus venator” of Genesis 10.8–9. In the Life of Charlemagne (Vita Karoli), Einhard mentioned hunting on no fewer than five occasions, making it a notable leitmotif that distinguishes the work from Einhard's literary model, Suetonius's Lives of the Caesars. In Einhard's eyes, Charlemagne's frequent hunting embodied the essence of Frankish manhood; he wrote, “He often exercised himself with riding and hunting, which came naturally to him, since there can hardly be found another people in the world that can equal the Franks in this art.” Einhard's emphasis on Charlemagne as a royal hunter was something new in early-medieval historiography, since earlier chroniclers, like Gregory of Tours and Bede, had mentioned hunting kings infrequently and only in passing. But the Vita Karoli was to cast a long shadow, and a number of subsequent early-medieval writers were to adopt Einhard's motif of the king as huntsman.

Kanegelo ya Nimirode : re lebelela diphihlelelo ta gagwe ka lefsa : original research

The Nimrod story : reconsidering his achievements The Ham/Nimrod story has been used to oppress Black people in South Africa and the USA. This paper looks afresh at Nimrod and attempts to restore his dignity and that of black people. This will be done in five stages below. Firstly, we briefly highlight the identity of Noah's children in order to place into context Nimrod, who is the focus of this study. Secondly, we examine the negative portrayal of Nimrod by certain scholars. Thirdly, we discuss the use of Ham/Nimrod's story in the oppression or enslavement of black people. Furthermore, we will critique such a use of the story to oppress black people. Fourthly we discuss Nimrod's achievements. The focus here will be on his three major achievements as a great ruler, mighty hunter and builder. The aim of this section is to counter the negative interpretation that Nimrod has previously received. In addition, we will offer a positive interpretation of the curse on Ham/Cush/Nimrod. Fifth and, finally, we will spell out the significance of the Nimrod story for those who have been oppressed and enslaved on the basis of this text. The focus here will be on South Africa.

Hunting Kings

Nimrod, the builder of cities from Babel to Calah, was the first “mighty man” on earth, a “mighty hunter before the Lord.” So were other Near Eastern, North African, Far Eastern, European, and New World kings. They hunted everything from lions to guanacos, on four of six continents, from the beginning to the end of recorded time. But why? Hunting provided meat, and perhaps military exercise; but most kings subsisted on domesticated animals and plants, and delegated their wars to specialists. Besides, chasing animals cost money and time, and more than a few kings were killed or maimed in the act of bringing down game. The costs seem to outweigh the benefits. Much about human history seems to have been adaptive. Royal hunts do not. Hunting was the human adaptation on the savannah for hundreds of thousands of years. But it seems to be a vestige most kings can't shake.

Tracking the Drive

You don't have to be a mighty hunter to buy a CD‐ROM drive, but the search will require patience and time. You can follow one of two avenues to obtain a reader: disc title providers or drive manufacturers.

Nimrod the Astronomer

‘Nimrod was a mighty hunter before the Lord’ (Gen. 10.8). This scriptural passage is familiar to many, but to historians of medieval astronomical literature Nimrod assumes a different profession. He stands as the principal character in a mythological astronomical handbook, the Liber Nimrod, cast in the form of a dialogue between the astronomer Nimrod and his disciple, Ioanton. This metamorphosis of Nimrod the Astronomer and his emergence into the medieval West is an interesting topic in its own right and one which this essay will examine.

THE CONSTELLATION ORION

An article in the June number of these Publications gave a short description of Scorpio, one of the most prominent of the constellations of our summer evening sky. There is a certain degree of propriety in making Orion the subject of the next sketch in this series, for it is one of the best known and most brilliant configurations in the winter evening sky, and is, further, associated with Scorpio by the relationship of avoidance. Orion disappears at the western horizon as Scorpio rises in the east, a fact which the ancient mythologists explained as due to the mighty hunter's fear of the scorpion by whose sting he was slain. Even though translated to the skies he still flees from his venomous pursuer. Orion is always pictured as a giant wielding an uplifted club, with one hand and, in lieu of shield, holding a lion's skin over the other arm. In Bayer's Uranometry (1661) the club is held in the left hand, but the more familiar drawing is the one here reproduced from Flamsteed's Atlas Coelcstis (1729). The hunter faces the gigantic bull, Taurus, whose head and shoulder are indicated by the Hyades group, and the cluster of the Pleiades, and is followed by his faithful dogs Canis Major and Canis Minor, marked, respectively, by Sirius, the brightest, star in the sky, and Procyon, another star of great brilliance. Figure 1 gives an outline of the entire constellation, but when we think of Orion we generally have in mind only the region outlined by the four bright stars Betelgeuze (a), in the giant's right shoulder, Bellatrix (γ), in his left shoulder, Rigel (β), in his left foot, and Saiph (κ), in his right knee. Within this quadrilateral are the bright belt stars, the little line of stars in the hunter's sword, and also the richest parts of the great

I.—Cave Hunting in Cyprus

From the days when Nimrod began to be “a mighty hunter before the Lord,” down to those in which our friend Fred. C. Selous shot ‘big game’ in Africa, the hunter has always occupied a specially exalted position and enjoyed a much envied notoriety in all countries. But alas for the wild animals! they are now rapidly becoming exterminated by man, and their place on the prairie, the pampa, the veldt, and in the forest will soon know them no more.

Sette Anni di Caccia Grossa é Note di Viaggio in America, Asia, Africa, Europa

ENGLISHMEN are, perhaps somewhat too inclined to believe that great game shooting is a special prerogative of the Anglo-Saxon; but the publication of the present work, together with the recently issued English translation of Count Potoeki'e “Sport in Somaliland,” should do something to dissipate this mistaken notion. Count Felice Scheibler may, indeed, be said to be a “mighty hunter,” and the frequent mention of his name in Mr. Rowland Ward's “Records of Big Game” will suffice to show that many of the animals that fell to his rifle have yielded trophies of more than usual size. As is indicated in the title of the volume before us, the author's seven years' hunting included experiences of the great game of all the four continents of the world although in Asia his travels were limited to India and Ceylon, and in America to the United States and the Dominion of Canada. A well written and well illustrated record of such extensive experiences could not fail to be of interest, not only to his brother sportsmen, but likewise to naturalists; and the present volume may be truthfully said to fulfil both these conditions. The 250 text-figures with which the work is embellished are for the most part reproductions from photographs taken respectively by the author, Prince di Teano, and Mr. Seton Karr, and are remarkable alike for the manner in which they have been executed and the care with which they have been printed. A large number of these illustrations deal with animals which were shot by the Count, and although most of these were taken after death, yet they frequently portray very clearly some of the more striking characteristics of the particular species. The views of scenery and hunting scenes are, moreover, specially good, and will give to stay-at-home readers an excellent idea of the nature of the districts in which sport was obtained, and of the mode in which various animals are hunted. Of especial interest is the photograph, on p. 176, of recently captured elephants crowded into a kedda, while those representing the elephant tamers at work are scarcely less attractive. Some of the titles to the illustrations, such as “II bufalo record,” are perhaps a little comic, but Italian, like French, has not yet evolved a sporting language of its own. Sette Anni di Caccia Grossa é Note di Viaggio in America, Asia, Africa, Europa. By Comat Felice Scheibler. Pp. xv + 525. Illustrated. (Milan: U. Hoepli, 1900.)