Our plan for our September meeting was to have a speaker from the Baha’i Faith but we have been unable to contact them. If anyone knows of a reliable contact person from Baha’i please let us know. Instead, after discussion time, we watched the final of three videos about Islam in which we saw the extent of the Empire and its various leaders including, probably the greatest, Suleiman. This video was mainly about the secular side of the Islamic empire when it was at its height. Suleiman expanded the architecture and culture of Islam with magnificent mosques and other engineering marvels extending from Spain in the west, Hungary in the north and most of the middle-east. Suleiman suffered the usual problems of the succession in an autocracy which included the terrible necessity of having his own son killed. It was not uncommon, when there was more than one son, for the potential rival to be killed even by his own brother. This was meant to prevent a splitting of the loyalty of the subjects.
Also interesting was learning about the place of the “harem” which was not the imagined “sexual free for all” for the ruler that some would have us believe. The Sultan spent a lot of leisure time with the women because it was an escape from the duties of court and only a strictly limited number of wives and concubines were there for his “pleasure”. Apparently the harem women were highly valued for their contribution into the management of court duties.
Our planned outing in October to the Anglican Benedictine convent has been cancelled due to illness at the convent. We are still going to the Winton Wetlands Hub for lunch and will have a guest speaker, if available. For this outing we will car pool, for people driving from Benalla, starting from the Dunlop campus carpark, (between the classroom and Aldi supermarket). We will leave the carpark at 12:10pm for lunch at 12:30 at the Hub.
Regarding the duration and start time of our regular Dunlop campus classes: it was decided at the September meeting that we change back to a two hour session with the option of an extra half hour if needed. The start time will stay at 1pm.
Mike Larkin
Also interesting was learning about the place of the “harem” which was not the imagined “sexual free for all” for the ruler that some would have us believe. The Sultan spent a lot of leisure time with the women because it was an escape from the duties of court and only a strictly limited number of wives and concubines were there for his “pleasure”. Apparently the harem women were highly valued for their contribution into the management of court duties.
Our planned outing in October to the Anglican Benedictine convent has been cancelled due to illness at the convent. We are still going to the Winton Wetlands Hub for lunch and will have a guest speaker, if available. For this outing we will car pool, for people driving from Benalla, starting from the Dunlop campus carpark, (between the classroom and Aldi supermarket). We will leave the carpark at 12:10pm for lunch at 12:30 at the Hub.
Regarding the duration and start time of our regular Dunlop campus classes: it was decided at the September meeting that we change back to a two hour session with the option of an extra half hour if needed. The start time will stay at 1pm.
Mike Larkin
