The Prodigal Son

The Prodigal Son - Story Summary: The story of the Prodigal Son, also known as the Parable of the Lost Son, follows the parables of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin. Jesus is responding to the Pharisees' complaint: "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them." Jesus tells the story of a man who has two sons. The younger son asks his father to give him his portion of the family estate as an early inheritance. Once received, the son promptly sets off on a long journey to a distant land and begins to waste his fortune on wild living. When the money runs out, a severe famine hits the country and the son finds himself in dire circumstances. He takes a job feeding pigs. He is so destitute that he even longs to eat the food assigned to the pigs. The young man finally comes to his senses, remembering his father. In humility, he recognizes his foolishness, decides to return to his father and ask for forgiveness and mercy. The father who had been watching and waiting, receives his son back with open arms of compassion. He is overjoyed by the return of his lost son! Immediately the father turns to his servants and asks them to prepare a giant feast in celebration. Meanwhile, the older son is not one bit happy when he comes in from working the fields and discovers a party going on to celebrate his younger brother's return. The father tries to dissuade the older brother from his jealous rage explaining, "You are always with me, and everything I have is yours."

The Pardoner's Tale

"The Pardoner's Tale" (Middle English: The Pardoners Tale) is one of the The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. The story is in the form of an exemplum: the Pardoner first explains the theme he will address, then tells his story and finally draws the conclusion he had already mentioned in his introduction. The tale is based on a folk-tale of Oriental origin, although many variations exist. Three drunken and debauched men set out from a pub to find and kill Death, whom they blame for the death of their friend, and all other people that previously have died. An old man they brusquely query tells them they can find death at the foot of a tree. When the men arrive at the tree, they find a large amount of gold coins and forget about their quest to kill Death. The three men draw straws to see who among them should fetch wine and food while the other two wait under the tree. The two men who stay behind secretly plot to kill the other one when he returns, while the one who leaves for the town poisons some of the wine with rat poison. When he returns with the food and drink, the other two kill him and drink the poisoned wine — also dying as a result. Thus all three do find 'death' under the tree. The tale is meant to illustrate what the Pardoner identified as his theme, the Latin phrase radix malorum est cupiditas (greed is the root of all evil).

Godfather Death By: Grimms

A poor man has twelve children, and works just hard enough to feed each of them everyday. When his thirteenth child was born, the man decided to find a godfather for this child. So he runs out into the highway, and found God walking on the highway. God asked to be the godfather, promising the child health and happiness. The man, after finding out that the man was God, declined, saying that God condoned poverty, and was ignorant that God rewards suffering in Heaven. Then the man met the Devil on the highway. The Devil then asked to be the godfather, offering the child gold and the worlds joys. The man, after finding out that the man was the Devil, declined, saying that the Devil deceives mankind. The man, still walking down the highway, meets Death. The man decides to make Death the child's godfather, saying that Death takes away the rich and the poor, without discrimination. The next Sunday, Death became the child's godfather. When the boy came of age, Death appeared to him and lead him into the woods, where special herbs grew. There, Death promised the boy to make him a famous physician. Death then explained that whenever the boy would visit an ill person, Death would appear next to the sick one. If Death stands at the persons head, that person is to be given the special herb found in the forest, and cured. But, if Death appears at the persons feet, any treatment on them would be useless, as they would soon die. The boy soon becomes famous, just as Death had foreseen, and received plenty of gold for his amazing ability to see whether a person would live or die. Soon, the king of all the lands became ill, and sent for this famous physician. When the physician went to see the king, he noticed immediately Death standing at the foot of the kings bed. The physician felt pity for the king, and decided to trick Death. The physician then turned the king in his bed so that Death was over his head, and gave him the herb to eat. This healed the king, and sped his recovery. Soon after, Death approached the physician, expressing his anger for tricking him and disobeying Deaths rules. But because the physician was Death's godchild, he did not punish him. Death did then warn that if the physician was to ever trick him again, he would take his life. Not much later, the kings daughter became ill as well, and the physician went to see her as well. It was there that the king promised his daughters hand in marriage and inherit the crown if he was to cure her. When the physician visited the princess, he saw Death at her feet. But the physician ignored this, as he was captivated by the princesses beauty and thoughts of being her husband. He then turned the princess so that Death was at her head, then fed her the herb. Just as the princess was coming around, Death grasped the physician by the arm and dragged him to an underground cavern. In this cave were thousands upon thousands of candles, each melted at different lengths. Death explained that the length of the candle showed how much longer a person has to live. When Death showed the physician his candle, he noticed that it was very short, showing that he didn't have much longer to live. The physician pleaded with his godfather to light a new candle for him, so that he may live a happy life as king and husband to the beautiful princess. Death reconsidered, and gathered a new candle to pass the flame of his godchild. Just as he was going to light the new candle, Death took his revenge on the physician by letting the flame of the first candle fall. As soon as the candle extinguished, the physician fell to the ground, dead.

Joseph and His Brother’s The story begins in Egypt, in the marketplace of Avaris where Joseph is sold as a slave to Potiphar, the Pharaoh's Chief Steward. Joseph, the favored son of the patriarch Jacob, was given

into captivity by his own envious brothers. A tireless and highly productive worker, Joseph wins his master's trust and is named steward of Potiphar's household. However, Joseph also unwittingly arouses the lust of Potiphar's wife. Luring him into her room one day, she orders Joseph to give her pleasure. But Joseph prefers punishment, even death, to betraying his master. As he flees from the room, the desperate woman tears off Joseph's garment and brandishes it as proof of her violation. As Potiphar questions him, Joseph begins to narrate the story of his past, a tale of suffering and hardship. We flash back to the time when Jacob and his family settled near the town of Schechem. It is a brief and unhappy stay, for when Jacob's daughter Dinah is ravished by the young prince of Schechem, Jacob's sons decide to exact revenge with a bloodbath - despite an agreement reached between Jacob and the Schechemites. As Jacob and his family flee, Rachel, Jacob's beloved wife, dies while giving birth to Benjamin. A few years elapse, and Jacob's older sons become increasingly resentful of their father's preference for Joseph. When Joseph turns seventeen, his father has a wonderful colored coat made for him, which further excites the jealousy of the brothers. When Joseph is sent to a distant pasture one day to look after his brothers, they seize him, tear off his coat, throw him into a dry well and, the following day, sell him as a slave to traders on their way to Egypt. This is how he enters the service of Potiphar. Despite his doubts about his wife's version of the "rape", Potiphar has Joseph jailed to vindicate his wife publicly. In prison, Joseph is assigned to attend two high court officials who are suspected of having stolen a bracelet from the Pharaoh. Tormented by dreams, the men ask Joseph for help. Joseph tells the cup-bearer that he will be reinstated, and the chiefbaker that he will hang. Two years later, the cup-bearer remembers Joseph when the Pharaoh is unable to obtain from his priests a rational interpretation of two anguishing dreams. Joseph is summoned and predicts that after seven years of plentiful harvest, Egypt will suffer seven years of famine. Convinced, the Pharaoh appoints Joseph as his chancellor and gives him a beautiful Egyptian woman as his wife. Joseph immediately begins to put aside a fifth of the country's harvest. After seven years a murderous famine strikes, driving people from nations near and far to come to Egypt to buy grain. Among the famished, Joseph recognizes his brothers. Testing them to see if they have changed, Joseph is satisfied and reveals his identity. Finally reunited with his beloved brother Benjamin and his father Jacob, Joseph reconciles with his family, and the Pharaoh invites them to settle in Egypt as overseers of his livestock.

The Legacy of the Moors

In the Square of the Cisterns, fronting the royal palace in the fortress of the Alhambra, was a deep Moorish well of clear, cold water. So famous was the well throughout all Granada that to it repaired water carriers from every quarter of the city, some bearing great earthen jars on their

own sturdy shoulders, others, more prosperous, driving donkeys similarly burdened. The well was also a great place for meeting and gossip. Each day, housewives, lazy servants, beggars— idlers of every age and condition—gathered on the stone benches to talk over the doings...

Submitted by: Julmaverick U. Derla

Submitted to: Ms. Aleli Labrador Reading Teacher

Date of Submission August 11, 2009