khe ma dul ka, Hi ma dul ka. Hi ma dul ka, jhe jhe mai sea h-e-ma-duten duty h-e-ma-duten duty h-e-ma-duten duty हे मा दूगा चे जे मा चे जे मा चे जे मा चे जे मा चे जे मा Okay, we're gonna put it all together, and since I brought my phone in, I'm gonna try this one, I felt guilty because I didn't use the duty bike system this morning, but I couldn't figure it out. Že žpenscreams Že žpenaves Že žpenaves Že žpenaves So I let them know that 20,000 subsequent leaks under the sea was originally not just a science fiction episodic piece that was te kisi? but that originally it was a political piece and that Jules Verne was responding to the oppression that he saw in the world then with colonialism but the publisher didn't think that they could sell any magazines with that so he pulled that out but then at the end of his life he wrote one final story the mysterious island and if you get through to the end of that there's this little cave and the venturers go into the cave and they find this old hermit and the hermit turns around and it's Captain Nemo and they ask Nemo where you been he says well I've been hiding here he said well we've all wondered who you are and he explained well I was an Indian king and my family and I led the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 and they were all lost I spent my life trying to create a world that I didn't see on the surface, an egalitarian world, a world where everybody would be treated as an equal so I got excited about that being from an ensemble theatre company and I also got excited about that because now I understood the wants and needs of my protagonist and I could work to create a piece that is episodic in its original form but try to apply a dramatic arc and so that is in a nutshell the exact same thing that folks at Looking Glass have been doing since we started taking works that are forgotten, pulling them off the shelf, dusting them off and seeing how those works can speak to us today how do we bring out why this story must be told in the here and now and there's a wonderful cross section there because early on we found that by doing that we could bring audience in because often times the books that we were really interested in were on the reading lists of the local schools so our first paid gigs were bringing in students during the day to see our work they weren't necessarily stylistically something the students were expecting to see but I think ultimately that was a good thing and it shocked them and made them come see the jungle or the other works that we were doing we were awful waiters at Looking Glass, we were horrible at it so we had to figure out how to fund our art and many of us came from educational backgrounds and it was a natural way to fund our art but also we found it was a natural place to put our artistry out into the world and it felt like a good match so really from the beginning Looking Glass has been fully gained purchase in a university setting we really never left many of us were from all over the planet but we came here to Chicago to go to school together up at Northwestern University and it's up in Evanston which is without traffic 30 minutes again that way unless you're studying law or medicine then it's 10 minutes that way no that way still so for me as a company member of a ensemble that is about to push 30 trying to figure out how to remain an ensemble and grow as individuals and help other artists grow their ensembles and hand over core values and principles and styles and our fetishes over to a new generation has been the crux right now for all of us we feel ourselves becoming the large institutions that we were railing against when we first fell in Chicago change charged and empowered and so that is we're firmly sitting in that place right now and trying to figure out what to do so in a way I'm talking about sitting in a university and what that means for ensemble but I'm also right now about to take the findings from what we did up at Lake Forest and bring it back to my ensemble we have our artistic retreat coming up in August and they're going to be wondering you're seeing this stuff before they are many of them because everyone flies in in August and we sit in a room for a week and lock the doors and when the black and white smoke comes up we have a season and so and we still do this quixotic process but the pressures are immense and so we're trying to find different ways of creating our art remaining an ensemble but that has different definitions for different members of the ensemble not just different definitions for other ensembles but even within our ensemble what it means to be ensemble is vastly disputed so that's kind of what we're talking about today all those things I couldn't figure out how to put that in a byline so that's what we're doing here today okay so once again I'm David Kozner I am a founding ensemble member of Looking Glass I was the first artistic director I direct, I act, I write, I teach all that good stuff like all of you do here's my core values and our company's core values we start with invention whenever you see a Looking Glass show there is something invented or reinvented the joke about Looking Glass is we're really good at reinventing the wheel but you could go down the street and buy one used and it works really well but we like to figure out a way to reinvent roundness we still believe in collaboration collaboration with fellow ensemble members collaboration with invited artists collaboration with our design team collaboration with our community parents in our education programs we even collaborate with our board it was easier before when we were the board and so it was no big deal to have the board in the room but now that we have community members coming in as our board they're finding that relationship and getting them excited and finding the buy-in in the inventing that we're trying to do is a big part of who we are our goal has always been to figure out why this story must be told and often times if we go back to our third core value of transformation that's usually where we find it how can telling this story how can putting this story into the world heal somebody bring new populations into the theater to feel the healing power of theater to feel the catharsis to feel the purge and to invent going back to the first word new ways of making that happen we were last night at dinner talking about has Aristotle is that still it is that still the way that we need to make things happen can we mix it up or is it look mixed up but then when you put the Rubik's Cube back is it still that same dramatic arc and that's what we continue to grapple with okay so this is normally this is the story that we tell people this is a show that I directed 2001 the Luna Mooda was conceived and directed by moi inspired by Tolo Calvino's the distance of the moon now I do get the credit as the conceiver but I conceived it with those five folks these are company members Laura Easton, David Catlin Laura Di Stasi, Tony Hernandez and down below Heidi Stillman our current artistic director and more often than not this is how we create we have company members and we're working together and we had three months of workshops and some illegal rehearsals that Union didn't know about and we had our three weeks of rehearsals everybody had to maintain the same weight during that entire time because as you can see that they are counter balancing each other so we all ate together and made sure that everybody was and this is this probably you probably recognize this this is the best idea in the room was coming from this group and when I would see someone try something like taking that straight ladder and sticking it upright 90 degrees into the middle of that curved ladder and it suddenly looked like a ship we wanted to make that happen we didn't know how we could make it balance but we knew that that was a really great idea and so suddenly we knew what we were doing for the next eight hours coming out of that play coming out of the trust that any one of those people could direct the show but they had in the previous artistic retreat given me the reins and so I was the guide I was the side coach I was the mentor for all of these folks that most likely have higher IQs than myself and so I knew how to use them and they trusted me to be used 90% of the time right there's that 10% where everybody is frustrated it's usually doing tech we can't get this thing to balance well you're the director you tell us whether we're going to cut it or not try it one more time then you got that so what behind them was a two dimensional image of the moon and I don't know if you can see from this picture there's rods coming out of it so we're not spending a lot of time on this show but they climb up on the moon and they do lots of circus tricks on that moon and that moon is that this was before we had our theater with the water tower pumping station this is at the roof page theater which is an old moose lodge so it's 80 feet deep so we can't deliver the moon all the way from the backstage and it came at the audience 40 feet towards them so you got the fun of the moon getting bigger and bigger and the moon was also an ensemble member in the show it was it had its wants and needs there was things it was willing to do and there was things that it did not give consent so that's that is how we work but it is also the story of how we work it's not always the way we work because we don't all live in Chicago anymore or we do but we all have kids and we have careers we're moving out as a universe and expanding and so we're trying to figure out how to maintain the ensemble aesthetic within the creation process so part of that also happens to be the other way we work which is because we were all educators as many of you are we spend time in universities now this isn't this is going to be the no-dumb moment where you probably all walk over to the next one because like well we all develop in universities that's why we're here is does that help us as an ensemble we've been doing it since the beginning the first show we did was through the looking glass I directed it it was in the Shanley shack which was where they kept the gardening equipment at Northwestern and so you would at that time I think it's now permanently cleared out but you used to have to clear it out put it around the back and do a show and then put it back in and that was there's young versions of all the looking glass folks in their skivvies and that's of course our namesake production it happened because Richard Christensen went to see the production and then there was a typographical error where they put the looking glass together and that's why our name is looking glass that's it we also did Stephen Brookoff's West at Northwestern University in 1988 and then brought it to what used to be the theater building which is now stage 773 lots of back flips and the wall flips the we were getting really excited about doing it ourselves and figuring out how we don't need flying by foil we're going to just fly through the air we're going to teach ourselves to fly Mary Siriman was getting her doing her graduate work at Northwestern at the same time so we were watching her shows and this is where we really started getting into the thing that theater people do we're a band of thieves we steal from other art forms so we just flat out said to Mary we want to steal your show will you come direct the odyssey with us of course that show there's many critics who claim that they saw that show I guarantee they didn't because usually there are about five people in the audience and two of them were boyfriends and girlfriends so I don't think they saw that but they went on to have another life what did get a lot of notice was Mary Siriman's six myths which started at Northwestern University we were as usual in 1997 having some financial difficulties and we were going to vote whether we would take the fall off I didn't think that was going to be a good idea so I asked Mary to expand metamorphosis and turn it into a big old show and she did it was supposed to run for five weeks she wanted to have water on stage they had flooded the barber theater at Northwestern so we had to figure out how to do it better I tried to hire a production manager who could do it better she couldn't so she stepped out of the way and I learned how to design pool and filtration systems and pumping systems and it ran for nine months and then went on to all the way to New York City second stage and then to Broadway from there and it was a joy to see something like that was the dream we saw her playing with it at Northwestern University brought it continued to grow it and then it had another life and then there it is playing in New York City in 2001 and doing that thing it was a theater to do it was playing there and it was there for those that needed healing and it spoke it spoke to them at that time Christine Dunford who spoke at the opening keynote directed the Jan Pataki manuscript found at Saragosa the picture doesn't do it justice it kind of looks like a skateboard ramp on one side that's outside of the picture there's lots of things that fly in and so this was originally done at Northwestern I think there was a dirt floor in that and so the great thing about testing things out in universities is you could try some really bad ideas and then pretend they didn't happen my problem is well where does that leave the university is that experimentation serving them or are they getting the short end of the stick are you truly present when you are developing a university or are you focused in one area script development and trying out some other things with student designers but are you really trying to get the ship to port that's my question are we fully treating this as if this is big girl art this is adult stuff we are really trying to make something that is going to change the world that's my question how do we make sure that we stay present that this isn't a means to an end but this is it we're making art right now I remember Bruce Norris when we first did Arabian Nights 92 and it was the audiences were coming we was no longer our boyfriends and our girlfriends the people were coming to see the show and we moved it to the old Remains Theater which is now the bed bath and beyond parking lot that I was telling some folks last night I can give you a tour if you want it was a gorgeous amazing theater with couches and an amazing bar and we got to move it there and we were doing eight shows a week and I remember we were absolutely exhausted and had never experienced what it meant to do four shows in a weekend and Bruce Norris who was playing music in the cast he was playing that harmonium he said what are you guys bitching about this is it this is what we are all trying to do right why are you and it just made me think about you never know when the moment is that moment could happen in Remains Theater that moment could happen in a black box theater or a classroom in the university why not treat every artistic moment as the moment because it might be them you are not in control whether it is the moment that might be the moment that might have been my moment right back in 92 I still look like this ever bar has been working on this if you know ever bar she runs a CSA farm up there she is completely off the grid she is Athena absolute goddess and she comes here to do shows with her company so she has been working on independent people this Icelandic epic she did a version of it at Carlton College shadow puppetry helping tell this story of a family imploding over decades what I am sad about is very few of our ensemble got to experience the realized version they didn't get to see this well they saw this picture but they didn't get to see what this picture is trying to capture so is it serving the ensemble to say go experiment over there and then come back with something finished is that serving ever is that is that keeping her respected within the ensemble I see some heads going like this so I must be hitting something so David Catelyn probably I imagine is maybe where all of you may have connected with looking glass cause he directed our looking glass Alice which has toured a lot and two as well it's five people but it looks like 25 people and so he's done some other work he did a version of Little Prince that originally was at Northwestern 2012 I believe I got that slide right very physical using this this page that was drawn on as the aviator does in the story and then was brought to down to looking glass at the water tower pumping station very I would say in a way this production looked the most like it's original realization at Northwestern I would say that we brought in there's a strong design program at MFA design program at Northwestern and David his thing is the people in the room are the ensemble so he we tend to have this loyalty thing going on at looking glass and that so whoever is in the room that's who we're loyal to so he tends to bring artists into the fold MFA students that I've been able to teach text analysis and he's working within collaboration classes and then he's inviting them to design for him and then they're coming to looking glass so that that's interesting right cause the good news about that is we get new blood new excitement, new experimentation the interesting news about that is well what about the designers that have been keeping the home fires burning at looking glass without that I say that question without it's a non rhetorical question I'm curious about that David recently did Moby Dick we received a grant to three companies did Blair Thomas the house theater and looking glass received a grant to each do their take on Moby Dick and so this was his take on Moby Dick that he originally did at Northwestern to our theater looking glass tends to because we only do three shows a year maybe we usually do a fourth bring back like a dance company we originally I was because our audiences were so small no one saw the original runs we bring it back I still feel that often times what happens is we will perform it here we take it on tour or co-production with other companies such as your companies out there last act of Luka Cattison was a original piece that I co-wrote there was some toy theater sequences that I developed while at Northwestern doing my graduate work and then also since Rebecca Gilliman was teaching in the the MFA writing program I snuck into class over there and she helped me with a script so then we come to 20,000 Leagues under the sea this is a show that we just finished doing at Lake Forest the goal was to create an immersive world where the audience felt like they were on the ship for those that know their work we did not depict the ship and we did not depict the final denouement leaving the ship on the deserted island everything occurred on the ship we were playing around with interactive technologies what the school didn't have in terms of season performers for whatever reason they had invested in a lot of equipment for anybody who's been up to Lake Forest College they actually don't have a theater it's an old cafeteria Hickson Hall so it feels like you're performing in Harry Potter except a small version of it so the shop is the old kitchen and the theater is the old hall so what we did was we turned that hall into a ship with back projections and front projections and interactive audio equipment so you can see here the audience is in and around and that is the footprint of the entire theater including the house we created a focal point but there was also action on ladders right next to the audience in the audience in the aisles even though that it has a quasi thrust design everyone is able to see the same images and that's something when you're obviously dealing with two dimensional art that you need to make sure you take into account so the idea was to again make the audience feel like they were on the ship and that they had to say that they had some agency and how the story would progress and so we would have screens that would come in that would change place when we were outside under the water but then it would open up to to pick the ship we also were playing with clock punk technology and playing around with that Jules Verne created a world that was colonial Victorian times but also in the future so we incorporated that clock punk style into the costume design the underwater one of the issues is when you put on a diving suit it's really hard to see people's mouths moving so we were playing around with how do we communicate physically in and around that so we played around with interactive video in using connex technology the famous organ on the ship it ended up being cut so we got into the performances but it was really cool and it was one of those moments where in a university setting where you only have three hours with your students and limited tech time some decisions had to be made and so that's an interesting the culture of creating art in a university setting there's just a different buy-in these are students that you're gonna be grading their papers later that night can you truly ask them to to put in the kind of hours that are required to get something like this to happen so for those not familiar with connex technology the woman playing aeronax and we'll talk about the fact that she's a woman in a second she walks up to the organ and the actor happens to be an accomplished pianist and so she was able to walk up and play at a certain point it just wasn't reliable someday in order to immerse ourselves in the water you could see that the screen that was pulled in front was actually scrim so we could front project put people in the water do images with the back projection so you can, the actors can emerge in the water either in front or behind the screens here Captain Nemo is attacking a very blurry sea spider made up by two ensemble members who are wearing LED lighting with that squiggles through I should have shown you a picture of sea spiders they actually look just like that except not blurry now here's what we did with the interactive audio that was soups interesting for any geeks like me in the audience we had, you can see in front of her there's a calculator pad so a calculator can take samples it can send MIDI information you can hook it up with lights you can hook it up with video it is an instrument it's just a digitally rendered instrument and you can what was interesting was in order to do that piano image before we had someone playing different, they were playing a keyboard on a chaosilator but a chaosilator is set up like a grid it's kind of like the chess that game that Spock plays it's a keyboard but you're doing this weird stuff to make it so we deconstructed a keyboard in order to she basically played Bach on the organ so it was interesting that part of me just wanted to go get a hammered organ and just put it back up there and just do it that way what happened was and I can't capture this in pictures the audience got to see one ensemble member creating the sound in a way that was live it wasn't just hitting a sample they were doing something that was amazing but they were supporting through a foley effect what was happening on the image so in a way this one moment to me was a success of the entire production of what we were trying to do in terms of ensemble aesthetic in terms of pushing the envelope we also the one thing that in terms of training that I'm most proud of is we spent a lot of time with fight choreography they do not have any kind of certification at Lake Forest College normally if you're working with a BFA program you get to work some students basically prerequisite training and they had none so that was the one area where just for the sake of safety that's where we spent a majority of our time on the fight choreography on the action choreography making sure that it was safe and in a way that also felt like a check in the positive side towards ensemble training then working together people without cuts and bruises and all their fingers and toes at the end of a show is the best outcome evaluation that one can have they worked together they're alive so this is the part where I feel the most guilty because I feel like are we using our students as guinea pigs are are they I think we thank them in the thank you part in the programs but what what are we saying to them that we are taking their work and we're putting it up on our theater it's something I think about it's something that I want to create I'm looking to create a writer to our bylaws in terms of how we treat our collaborators and what so that there's full disclosure in terms of what's going to happen I think a young 19 year old 20 year old is of course they're thrilled when they come and see it open and they feel a sense of connection I just feel that there's something that we need to do as ensembles to just voice that this is occurring ensembles are circles we look in and we turn the circle we look out what does that mean what does that mean when we're saying hey thank you for helping make our circle stronger and stay where you are so one of those things where stay where you are is we develop scripts within a university setting in order to in my mind bring 20,000 leagues from the 19th century into the 21st century we have to take a look at what is truly an egalitarian society what does it mean to be equal and when we're depicting a world where there's a single gender in that world and we're depicting that it just it feels disingenuous to me so I was reading I was reading some of George Elliott's work and I'm embarrassed to say that it wasn't until a few years ago that I knew that George Elliott was not George Elliott I just I keep a lot of stuff up here but that's just not something that it just somehow that got past me so luckily I learned about it in the I went to grad school and I learned about it and it stuck with me decade later that wait a minute if can Aaron axe be dealing with the same problem can Aaron axe in order to function as a marine biologist within the academy can she also be cloaking and so that's that's a a bit of violence that we added to the original that we put upon the original source text that she is in order to function within a greater society she had to hide her identity but then not only is she grappling with wanting to leave the imprisonment of the ship she's grappling with the fact that when she's found out that she is in fact biological woman by the others that she's accepted on the ship that it's no big deal that she's actually able to do what she does best and discover who she really is the issue with that is how do we make that not just a I don't know a little feel good dart that you're putting on there how do you really connect that to the entire dramatic arc how do you stretch that through the original source text I was uncomfortable if you know the story that Aaron axe kept a a cabin boy a servant an indentured servant a slave it's a Flemish boy so at least there was it's a different kind of slave than we're used to hearing about but it was a slave man the last so I excised that from this script but then I realized that I had taken away my and I consider Aaron axe the protagonist in more recent versions I had taken away the protagonists flaw there was she was she was perfect in every way so having her discover the sociopolitical rightness or wrongness of her choices in how she's able to function now was able to protect her in the world but then on the ship he took on a different function and he became her equal and so that was another revision of the original source text we brought Conce back and it became a very moving when Conce decides to stay on the ship at the end where Aaron axe leaves relationships in dramatic arc were very much applied within this episodic tale I cannot stress this enough the storytelling has to function as a theatrical piece and so using the university setting to make sure that it that it works despite mace into beginning acting despite limited virtuosic skills it has to work in the university production you have to make it with the building blocks that you have there you have to make it work and so because of that I would put that on the I would put another check on the success column in terms of trying to tell the story with what you have and making sure that the script is doing that for you okay so I want to make sure that we have time for some questions and one more demonstration so here's what's worked for looking glass we got to get started on the audio visual development but I feel like we since we were depicting tips of icebergs I get to use this over use this metaphor we literally were just seeing the start of what we can do I very much believe and I got myself in trouble in a panel discussion that happened here a year ago where I very much believe that for those that are looking for affordable theatrical venues we're all carrying one that and this isn't just giving up that there is a time and a place for the use of social technologies and because of current interactive functionality that it is a live space and I just call on us as ensembles to invent and grow and bring in this ensemble member that just like me and Moon this is an ensemble member and this is something that I tried to advocate for in our production I feel like the best ideas in the room from our living ensemble members may have overwhelmed this ensemble member at this point I think there's a lot more inventing and that needs to happen and hopefully will happen we were able to on a limited level work on choreographic style creation but because we're dealing because we don't have the physical trust in the room that's an area that I feel we need to develop we need to have an understanding with the universities that we're working with in terms of what what is the training what are the prerequisites what are those student bodies those cohorts bringing into the room and how can you as a leader as a guide make those limited abilities right make those limited abilities help you tell your story we talked about script development I'm back writing now I learned some things but we're doing some serious rewrites from this so the I would have to say this production is going to is going to be in the category of it's going to look very different from the university production at least it's going to sound different I actually think it might look very similar the design was successful and felt interactive the audience felt like they were on the ship now here's that positive thing we got the exposure to new artists Nathan Rohrer is a fantastic costume designer Brian Healy just is new to Chicago amazing designer they created some amazing stuff and I would love to work with them and so I'm going to be faced with the sort of moral dilemma of am I going to honor the work that Brian did or am I going to honor the fact that I smoked pot with John Muse in 1987 you know which which are we going to honor I think that the students obviously were thrilled to work in a professional manner to work with professional artists to try on what it feels like to be within a tried and true production process creation process and see that I am not going to give them all the answers and I am going to treat them as if I trust them to make choices and that took a long time that's a tough one because we if we are if we are training artists to fulfill visions outside of themselves because that's sometime your job that's one kind of software and it requires a different kind of software to ask them to be creating artists I don't know if human beings are are we naturally our own leaders or are we naturally followers the games we play say both and so it's it is our job as guides to let them know which game we're playing we're playing the leading game or the following game all the exercises I did with the students we do with our our own group I didn't adjust that in any way I treated the room of adults young adults like adults in order to do that this is where we have to be advocates and I know you all know this because when you're asked to go off and do your professional work in your universities and the fact that you say I'm going to go off and do my scholar research which is grading art you often say I need I need six to eight weeks right the people from the music department say hey two days in and out going to go play the Chicago Symphony and then I'm back got it done all right we have to advocate for the time that it takes to get this stuff done we have to advocate that in order to do this kind of work in a university setting three hours a night seven to ten ain't going to cut it it's actually it's not mirroring the professional experience that you're trying to get students ready for it becomes false creation I had to be more of an authoritative director to get this ship to port than I'm comfortable with we got a lot done I told you about some great successes but that's a part that even I've done this process over and over and over and over again and we still find ourselves because the prime directive is necessity being the mother invention and we got to get this show up but what did we miss because we skipped the process I was missing my posse I was missing all those people that are willing to keep their weight and their head shaved and all that other stuff for the show right that they had buy-in I was missing them when I'm when it ain't working and I'm out of ideas now with my own coming out of ideas and say hey let's stop we'll start again tomorrow morning well I didn't have that luxury there because there was no tomorrow morning there was just the three hours there there was just the here and now and so I I believe in myself I trusted myself but I wanted to be able to trust others in the room to get something done and that for me was I feel a failure on my part as a mentor and that's something that I want to continue to grow I think we all know what it means to work with young actors and I actually don't see this as a negative it's just is and I want us to accept that and again as I said before find what is right about them find what is their virtue and grab that and use that instrument so once again luckily some of my company members did brave traffic and came up and saw the show but now we what we discovered there is lost to the ethers we have these depictions but they are we are we all know what it's like to watch a show and video hi everybody back there my mom's watching from Santa Cruz, California so here's what I just want to leave you with know your girls and speak them loudly write them on a piece of paper in the rehearsal room so everyone knows why you're there including administrators from the moment that you get the opportunity to develop in a university setting and and you may need to state this time around what comes first the art or the ensemble ideals and if you have to say the ensemble ideals figure out what is the culminating event then because it's going to look different how can you make that a success a showing bits and pieces but if the university has a season and you're part of their season it's real it's art it can't be half-assed and you got to get that ship to port I just want to find new ways of getting the ship to port in the way the very reason that we started looking glass because we wanted to get it there with everyone there we wanted everyone to get there and say yay we did it and why is that important because we are showing an example of the very why must this story be told in our ensemble that we are expressing a group of people that are changed, charged and empowered and the characters they are playing if we get the dramatic arc right are changed, charged and empowered and then the ensemble that the audience that you invite in to be part of that ensemble I would never stage this here where there's a railing are you guys going to rush the stage at the end of this yeah don't do theater like this and yes you mean to how can make the audience feel like they are part of the ensemble make sure there's tons of communication not just with the person that hired you or if you are of that university your chair but make sure that the provost the dean understand what you are trying to do that this isn't same old same old this is a different experience and then finally be open to and respond to what's in front of you there are no caveats stop with the what should have those that football player who is a offensive and he played my Nemo his gift is he's used to getting pounded and getting back up and I got to I got to use that superhero quality that was his thing right I was able to appropriate that and say this is what we need in the theater as I said she's in the stem program there she's brilliant and she was able to bring that brilliance to her character that was right that was her virtue and how can we make that that's why she gets to be in the hall as super friends so what are you guys feeling like you want to do another demonstration thing you want to talk you want to get up and move or you want to talk I'm game for it either okay get up let me show you one thing we did anybody can do this we're done with a video I'll just need audio okay so I'm going to do an exercise with you and this is one way we dealt with the fact that you can't talk to people under water so this is a game this is a combination of exercises that our company stole from Pilabalus and then just stuff that the students made up so I need at least eight people to come up here but it can be more yeah come up on stage okay okay so has anyone ever done Pilabalus is flocking you done flocking oh good I'm going to show you how we take flocking and we take it to the next step so for those that haven't seen flocking do you want to do it over here or you got it so flocking for those that haven't seen it is there anybody that hasn't seen flocking if not very good so just once again this is how we use it so flocking thank you can I get three people so once you flocking the idea is that so imagine a mirror in front of us and so if I start in a neutral position and I move a bit they all move with me just trust that they're following right and if I welcome out they will welcome out with me but if I pivot more than 90 degrees we have a new lead this can be pivoted you can pivot with more force and pivot 180 degrees 207 degrees even people that do a 360 it's just the right path can I have four let's do let's do groups of three so 16 degrees so can I have a triangle here triangle here and a triangle here perfect okay great and the leaders are facing towards me pivot okay great you won't do leaders for long so what I want you to imagine that we are all under water just right now in the place just imagine the viscosity of the water feel that you can have your own agency that feels like you have to move through okay great this is one being this is a second being this is a third being so you are three different creatures meaning to communicate to each other so you would need to communicate to this group you would need to communicate to this group you are all exploring the water together we have three different characters nine people playing three different characters you need stuff is going to happen you are going to respond to each other you might enjoy each other's company you might be terrified of each other's company you might want to warn one person at the other one person use physical communication to get that done so when you switch that the new leader will be the new communicator we are going to start with silence and then I am going to add some music great so starting in neutral position first just explore the space the space and as you are exploring the space when you naturally feel that an interaction can occur you can acknowledge the existence of the other characters in this underwater world so the other group of three start to communicate with them how can you give them specific information what do you want to say to them how do you feel about what is occurring right now when the fireflies are for this profane country of silver and taverns and bars they glide out all the stars all we hear the seas will rise with these I am going to hand you this because my mom is old sorry it is just that anytime I ever try to talk about it even in this setting I find myself not really wanting to name it or say what it is because I feel weird about it I feel like oh I am trying to say oh I was part of that so if the artists at the time or in the publishing of the first edition or at any point could have just said in collaboration created in collaboration with I would be totally satisfied I don't need money or anything I am just very proud to have been part of a process that I never those of us that were there in the workshops at NYU that created something we never got that acknowledgement so just on that level it reminded me I was like oh yeah I had this feeling and that would be really all I would love to just have that yeah can you just say in terms of how you work this out with the students you guys are going to do this with looking last now are you going to did you script it do you take authorship when you guys do it I did come in with a script that I had been working on for two years there were at least there was visual text there was physical text that the students helped create with this one process there was less spoken text that they helped create but that's my issue text is text and I don't think we figure I don't think we as artists have figured out a way to honor those other text visual text graphical text we haven't figured out how to honor those that help us create that in the beginning looking glass used to say whoever was the writer and the ensemble credit we don't do that anymore I maybe it just doesn't look good on the on the marketing I don't know yeah it's one of the things that I was going to say we're working with our ensemble we have kind of like frantic assembly we direct in different capacities and we do devise with our ensemble and the thing that we've started to approach is because my ties to technology is like when you go see a movie there's so many people that are involved in just the look of Iron Man and they acknowledge that at the end of the movie and so every person who programmed one line of code is mentioned or thanked but the problem is that when you go to publicist or to put out a thing you can't say this 15 page thing is worried about number of letters and how many words so it always comes back to there's one of us that has to be this head person who gets all of that press and everything but it is such a collaborative thing it's still hard for us to navigate and I think that breaking it down and just doing this in collaboration with either physical collaboration or technological collaboration that's at least how we've been starting to approach it and I think that helps we experimented at Looking Glass with actually with the show that I directed the last act of Look at Catasem where I really needed I'd been writing it for some time and I needed to switch to being a director I had been co-writing with and the co-writer before we produced it she died and so we brought even more names so by the time we were done there were five writers on the byline well we felt good about doing that but then had to spend so much time communicating to Chris Jones and everyone else that this wasn't a nothing bad occurred right it's not that someone couldn't get the job done it's that this is how we created this time around and so it's interesting how the outside world views that kind of acknowledgement thanks I thought to add a thought and a question so I have a device theater company here in Chicago and we haven't had the opportunity yet to work with a university residency but we audition and we have many workshop phases to the creative process most of those people are coming out just out of undergrad or very very young and because some of those shows now have started to tour we have just come up with a blanket probably similar to what you guys did early days originally devised by and anybody who is a part of the workshop process from a designer to a movement director to an actual actor on the stage type of deviser is just listed and we just we just go to bat for that and we go on tour with whoever we go we say this 20 person list has to be on the program originally devised by and everybody has to be in there so I can't really speak because I don't know in what way that would be useful to list all the university and everyone who wrote a piece of code I don't know for us so we can sort of manage that but I think that that's and that's written into the contract and we sort of stole this from Cirque du Soleil that if anything that's created the company owns and the company will receive the financial benefits essentially of tours other than if you go on the tour and the company is paying you for your time and your work on tour and that way it's really hopefully resolving that situation for us that and actually it's because I had read about Superman and for years the two guys who created two kids from Cleveland from high school that created Superman were rob blind because of the rules in those days so they're not only were they not paid for their work but their names were never listed as the original creators of Superman which has made trillions of money dollars right so anyway that was my thought my question just is with this August retreat and the black and white smoke I was curious to know how many, I mean you guys have such a large ensemble and I just work so differently I really am the lead person who just brings in one idea every two years and we just work on that how many of these types of processes either with universities or not with universities or occur roughly each year and are brought to the table and then are sort of tabled if you could give us a rough estimate of how that number works sure and I'm also mindful that it's lunchtime so I'll stop it's a great question we are a company of creator artists so everybody comes to the table to do something and we used to have three week we used to spend a month doing this now we have five, six days and we also have to deal with membership and approve the budget and there's a lot of other stuff so we have given agency to our artistic leadership to pair down all the proposals to six to nine top top we also are this year possibly moving to deciding two seasons at a time at the very least we are deciding the opening show of the following season because we were just finding we just weren't able to raise the dollars for sponsorship and just weren't able to do the design process and the collaboration that we needed to get that opening show of the following season so we are about to experiment with that the good news about that is more people get a yes the bad news is those that get a no have to wait even longer and we do have a we are now 25 members and so that's that's a tough one and half of our company are our directors and so there's the way that we participate now more often is to direct and so there's less of an opportunity to be part of the ensemble so we're looking for new ways to function and collaborate I'll be around and happy to talk to any of you please contact me my information is just Google me and you can contact me find me I am would love to hear how you're getting all getting this done and figuring out how we're still trying to figure it out and remain an ensemble based company and not give not just become an institution like seems to be happening yay everybody yay


وأقولوا في القرآن ما جاءت به آياته فهو الكاريم المنزال وأقولوا قال الله جل جلاله والمصطفة الهدي ولا أتأوله الحمد لله رب العالمين والصلاة والسلام على عبد الله ورسوله نبينا وحبيبنا محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم وعلى آله وصحبه أجمعين السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته نبدأ as always by praising Allah by asking Allah to exalt the mention of Grand Pista ومسنجة محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم to his family and his companions so we're talking about the rights of the husband and the wife and we spent the last two episodes really looking at the generic way that the rights of husband and wife are kind of set out in Islam and looking at how we should approach the right of the husband and the right of the wife in Islam how we should be approaching it and the way that we should kind of understand this framework that Islam has set out for us in how the husband and wife deal with one another so now we're going to look at the rights that are equivalent now it isn't a precise science to a certain extent in the sense that there are ways you can see certain things to be equivalent there are ways you can see certain things to be slightly different or opposite to one another but generally looking at the things in which the scholars say there is equivalence there is مماثل اتامة complete equivalence between husband and wife the very first one we're going to look at is the statement of Allah this is in صورة النساء آيان number 19 and live with them with معروف so here the command is to the men regarding the women it's to the men regarding the women but this is a right in which the scholars say that there is equivalence both the men and women are commanded to live with each other in معروف بالمعروف in goodness so first of all this is mentioned to the men in relation to the women like the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said اتقوا الله في النساء هافتقوا أف الله with regard to women that is also equivalent right because men also have to have taqwa regarding women and women also have to have taqwa regarding their husbands so the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم emphasized it with regard to the husband towards his wife اتقوا الله في النساء هافتقوا أف الله regarding your women but it's also an equivalent right it's the husband has to have taqwa with regard to his wife and the wife has to have taqwa of Allah with regard to the husband but that's just a separate issue here we're going to talk about وعاشرهن بالمعروف living together بالمعروف so first of all let us ask ourselves the question what is المعروف we have already heard what Imam السعدي رحم الله تعالى said about المعروف in terms of العادة الجارية that is the customs that are ongoing in a particular country in a particular time for a particular husband and a particular wife I mean for him for her نمثلها you know for the likes of her and the likes of him that's the word معروف as it relates to customs but what about the word معروف as it relates to goodness some of the scholars they find it as saying it is كل قول حسن وفعل جميل وخلق كامل it is every good statement and every beautiful action and every perfect mannerism or perfect character and that is really really it's really scary in a way because that Allah commanded men to live with their wives like that and you feel that how do I achieve everything good in speech and everything beautiful in action and everything exemplary in character how do I how do I even try to achieve that but that's what Allah commanded you to live with them in that state that the way the man treats his wife and some of them said this is the greatest right of the wife over her husband وعاشره النبي المعروف but in reality it is a right that is equivalent because she also has to live with her husband in that so the husband and wife should be working together and striving together for what كل قول حسن every wonderful statement every wonderful speech could be you know the beautiful words he says to his wife he tells her he loves her she tells her she loves him he tells her you look beautiful she says you look lovely you look nice سبحان الله beautiful words قول حسن وفئة الجميل and actions which are beautiful فئة الجميل beautiful actions really really kind actions could be giving a gift could be the softness in treating with each in the way they treat with each other it could be smiling at each other and it could be intimacy with one another كل قول حسن every beautiful word and every every good word and every beautiful action and every exemplary character so that exemplary character it could be mercy it could be softness it could be gentleness it could be kindness it could be love every wonderful exemplary characteristic وعشروهن بلمعروف and that is what Allah commanded the men to be towards their wives and we understand that this is a right which is also a right of the husband over the wife that she lives with him in the best way so we have on one side beautiful speech or good speech beautiful action exemplary character on the other side we have what an Imam Sa'adi said regarding the word معروف which is to live in accordance with the customs of a the particular country and time in which you are and also in accordance with the status of that man and the status of that woman and their position and their what they have available the resources they have available to them now it's important to know when it comes to customs of course that customs don't overrule Islam rather Islam overrules customs so if there's a custom in a particular country which is contrary to Islam and when we talk about نشوز we might give examples of this where there is a custom which is contrary to Islam and brings problems into the marriage then Islam comes first but generally speaking the husband lives with the wife with the best of speech the most beautiful actions the most exemplary manners the wife she lives with her husband with the best of speech the most beautiful actions and the most exemplary manners and they live in accordance with the expectations of what is normal around them now what that just generally means is I mean first of all if the husband or wife agree on something there is no issue because it's بقو قلي باد right the rights of the servants there's no issue if they agree on something if they both don't like a particular custom and they don't want to follow it there's no big issue as long as it doesn't fall into that which is حرام but generally speaking how should they expect to be with one another so you look at what is normal what's normal what's expected in the country what's the kind of norms in the time the country for that kind of woman for that kind of man and that defines whatever is not defined by the sharia that's important that defines whatever is not defined it's not the case that we put the customs first as many people do and that causes huge problems in marriage they put the customs first and they put the Islamic stuff second so they say my custom says that my wife should uncover in front of my brother for example they say well الله said وعشروه النبي المعروف live with them in the way that is customary but here the custom contradicts what the Prophet ﷺ told us and what Allah ﷺ told us and so here we're going to say that that custom is invalid and not given any consideration at all rather the woman she has to be more careful around her brother-in-law than she would be around a stranger in the street as the Prophet ﷺ told us that the in-law is death and so we have to be very careful around the in-laws in terms of the brother-in-law the sister-in-law and how the relationship is between them that has to be that distance and that covering and the Hijab and so on but here we're just talking about how customs could conflict with Islam Islam always comes first but generally speaking what Islam doesn't define we go with what is customary and customs are important because they help to set basic expectations yes husband and wife may both not like a particular custom and culture and that's perfectly fine for them to leave it because they're not required to do it however it sets some basic expectations and our next Hadith and Bukhari and Muslim from the Hadith of Ibn Omar عن النبي ﷺ أنه قال ألا كلكم راعين وكلكم مسعول عن رعيته فالأمير الذي على الناس راعين وهو مسعول عن رعيته إبن عمر يقول المسجر وصلى الله عليه وسلم قال indeed all of you are shepherds i.e. all of you are responsible all of you are shepherds and all of you are responsible for your flock the أمير who is over the people like the governor or the ruler who is over the people is a shepherd and is responsible for his flock والرجل راعين على أهل بيته وهو مسؤول عنهم and a man is a shepherd over his family and he is responsible for them والمرأة راعية على بيت باعلها وولده وهي مسؤولة عنهم and a woman she is responsible for the house of her husband and his children and she is responsible for them she is a shepherd and she is responsible for them والعبد راعين على مالي سيديه وهو مسؤول عنهم and a slave is responsible for his owner's wealth or is a shepherd of his owner's wealth and he is responsible for it ألا فكلكم راعين وكلكم مسؤول عن رعية indeed all of you are shepherds and all of you are responsible for your flock so here I could have brought this to be honest in the segment of how to how we see the role of the husband and the wife but I actually wanted to bring it under the topic of الممثلة those things which the husband and wife are equal in in the sense that they are both equal in responsibility husband has responsibility the wife has responsibility they're not entirely equal in the sense the responsibilities are not the same they're not the same but they both have responsibility and it's not the case that one has responsibility and the other one has let's say clothing for example or one of them has responsibility and the other one has a house provided for them the reality is they both have responsibility they both have things that they are responsible for and it is the case that the husband is responsible the wife is responsible there are some differences in the responsibilities so the husband is responsible for his household for أهلي بيتهي that means he's responsible for everyone living in his household he's responsible for his wife for his children and so on he is fully responsible for them and he's a shepherd of them which means that he has a a degree of authority over them and that he is shepherding them kind of looking after them taking care of them and he is مسؤول on them so he will be asked يوم القيامة about them likewise the woman is responsible so it's not true to say that a woman doesn't have any responsibility or that she doesn't have any things that she will be asked about rather she is responsible for the house of her husband that he has provided for her we're going to talk about the provision of the house إن شاء الله تعالى في مباشرة مباشرة he's responsible for that and she's responsible for the house and she's responsible for the children and that is again a beautiful balance in Islam she is under her husband's responsibility but her children are under her responsibility and her husband's responsibility as a you know from overall like in terms of the umbrella responsibility but she is directly responsible for her children particularly in her husband's absence so here she's responsible for his house and she's responsible for his children and this is really important because it actually helps us with other things like when we talk about women working and things like that and we talk about the fact that whatever she does being with her husband's permission not being haram and so on but it can't be at the expense of the responsibility the مسؤولية that Allah عز وجل has given to her that is that she is مسؤول she is asked she is مسؤولة عن بيتي بعليها وولديه the house of her husband and his children so responsibilities exist for both husband and wife they're slightly different the husband's is slightly more comprehensive because it encompasses the wife and the wife doesn't encompass the husband but they both have responsibility and so some of the scholars mentioned this on the area of where there is equivalence because they both have responsibility it's not like one has one has responsibility the other one has a house and clothing and food provided rather they both have responsibility but the responsibilities are slightly and somewhat different because the husband's is overall for the entire household and the wife's is a subset of that for his house as in his property which includes his money and we've spoken about that previously in terms of حديث about the you know that he feels safe when he leaves his wife he feels safe about her and about the money and his property that he's left with her so she's responsible for his property that is under her care and she is also responsible for his children that are under her care and the children are going to be within her responsibility and she's like a shepherd to them so she's telling them what to do she's responsible for them and that's a nice balance actually because it tells you that beautiful balance between obedience to the mother and the wife's obedience to the husband and how those two balance each other out because that boy or that young man who is his wife is he's a shepherd for his wife his mother is a shepherd for him so there's a balance there in terms of of gender as well a balance in terms of a man obeying his mother and his father of course and a woman obeying her husband and the balance that is within that system that Allah سبحانه وتعالى has decreed for us so here responsibilities are something that both have and shepherding others are responsibilities that both husband and wife have equally even though there is a degree of difference in the area of responsibility الله عز وجل سل كل المؤمنين يغط من أبصارهم ويحفظوا فروجهم ذلك أزكى لهم إن الله خبير بما يصنعون وكل المؤمنات يغضضنا من أبصارهم ويحفظنا فروجهم ولا يبدين زينتهم إلا ما ظهر منها وليضربنا بخورهم على جيوبهم ولا يبدين زينتهم إلا لبعو لاتهن العاية الله عز وجل يقول أخبروا المؤمنين أن يجلونهم ويشعروا بخورهم ويشعرونهم ويشعرونهم بخورهم ويشعرونهم للمؤمنين to lower their gaze و to protect their chastity و to show their adornment except that which is apparent from it و to let them draw their their covering over or let them draw their head covering over their chests and let them not show their adornment except to their husbands and to the end of the eye their husband, their father and to the end of the eye here the equivalence is in guarding the chastity and lowering the gaze and that is an obligation upon the husband and an obligation upon the wife that each is satisfied with the other فحسب and that's it nothing more than that neither of them seeks to go beyond the limits that Allah عز وجل set فمنبتقا وراء ذلك فأولائك هم العدون whoever seeks anything beyond that whether it be زينة whether it be some of the other فواحش immoralities and evil things that people do are people watch and people do all of these things are موراء ذلك they're outside of what Allah عز وجل has legislated so Allah has legislated that the husband is satisfied with his wife and lowers his gaze except from her and that she is satisfied with her husband and she lowers her gaze except from him and that is one of the major محاولات of the marriage that we had spoken about that the husband lowers his gaze and that the wife lowers her gaze and we'd spoken about حديث يا معشر الشباب من استطاع منكم الباءة فالية زوج فإنه أغض للبصر وأحصان للفرج that whoever of you young men is able to get married let him marry because that is going to help him to lower his gaze and protect his chastity and that is something which is an equivalent there is equivalence in the marriage the woman lowers her gaze except for her husband and protects her chastity except for her husband and the husband lowers his gaze except for his wife and protects the chastity except for his wife and that is as we said one of the major purposes of the marriage to prevent and protect the two from a زينة and from another إلى المحرم looking at حرام and as we said this can we can take زينة as one aspect of it but he is when we talk about looking at حرام that's so common in these days that the husband hasn't taken on the responsibility that he's not going to look at the حرام he's got married he's got a wife he's not going to look at the حرام and the wife hasn't taken on the responsibility that when she's got married she's not going to look at the حرام and that is a big problem in our time when I said الله العفو و العافية we ask Allah for his pardon we ask Allah سبحانه وتعالى to keep us safe from those things so this is a right which in which there is equivalence لوري the gaze and protecting the chastity we're also going to cover a hadith narrated by البخاري المسلم فمن مغيره من شعبة قال ساعد ابن عبادة لو رأيته رجنة ما عم رأتي that ساعد ابن عبادة he said if I saw a man with my wife لضربته بالسيفي غير مصفح عنه I would strike him with the sword I wouldn't let that man go I would have struck him with my sword and I wouldn't have let that man go فبلغ ذلك رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم فقال اتعجبون من غيراتي ساعد فوالله لأنا أغيروا منه والله أغيروا مني The Prophet SAW said are you surprised by the غيراتي of ساعد by the protective jealousy of ساعد he said that if I saw a man with my wife I would take my sword and I would go for him and not let him go I would strike him and I wouldn't let him go The Prophet SAW said are you amazed by the protective jealousy of ساعد by Allah I am more protectively jealous than him and Allah is more protectively jealous than me من أجل غيراتي الله حرم الفواحش ما ظهر منها وما بطن ولا شخص أغير من الله الحديث The Prophet SAW said because of the غير of Allah the غير of Allah Allah made all immorality حرام whatever is apparent and whatever is hidden and there is no human being there is nobody who has more غيرة than Allah more غيرة than Allah سبحانه وتعالى So this here So this here in terms of a person refers to غيرة which we might translate to be protective jealousy as for Allah عز وجل then of course when we apply things to Allah سبحانه وتعالى we apply in a way that is befitting to his majesty and his perfection سبحانه وتعالى and the Prophet SAW explained the غير of Allah that Allah made حرام all immorality what is apparent from it and what is hidden and there is no one who is more protective of the limits and more hating of immorality and evil doing than Allah سبحانه وتعالى So here the reason I brought this حديث is that one of the things in which there is equivalence in is غيرة is that both the husband and wife should be protective over one another in a way that is in accordance with the law of Allah عز وجل shouldn't be a protective jealousy that leads to suspicion because Allah عز وجل told us يَا يُهَلَّدِينَ آمَنُ جَتَانِبُ وَكَثِيرًا مِنَظَّنْ إِنَّ بَعْضَظَّنِّ إِثْمَ or you believe keep away from a lot of guessing and suspicion because indeed some suspicion is sinful so it shouldn't be the kind of suspicion that is sinful but protective jealousy looking after each other and wanting each other to be far away from الفواحش from the محرمات from the filthy acts and immoral acts and a man taking care that his wife is covered properly and a wife taking care that her husband is not involved in something that would take away from his honor all of this is from the غيرة that the husband and wife are supposed to have for one another and we know the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم he said about عائشة رضي الله عنها يوم ماذا has حاد غيرا يوم ماذا has حاد غيرا when عائشة she hit one of the wives of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم sent a plate of food and عائشة she hit it on the floor and she broke the plate so this is something that the husband and wife are both required to have for one another within the limits set by Allah when it goes outside of the limits like when the plate broke then the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم took عائشة's plate and replaced the plate with the broken one but generally speaking when it doesn't within the limits the husband and wife are required to do to have that and I remember one of my teachers الله عز و جل preserve and protect him I remember him saying that the protective jealousy that a wife has for her husband saves him from so many fitan so many trials and tribulations so many problems the husbands is saved from because of that so many محرمات and فاحشة he would have fallen into if it wasn't for Allah and then the غيره of his wife that she says who are you talking to don't get involved with that person don't answer that question and that is what saves him from so many fitan from so many fitan and likewise her he keeps an eye on the way that she covers and the way that she interacts with people but it doesn't reach a level that goes into the حرام because غيره can go all over the limits set by Allah عز و جل and in that case it is not permissible and it has to be brought back into the limits that are set by Allah عز و جل like suspicion and when it reaches the level of suspicion in نبع the وضن the إثم some suspicion is sinful or when it reaches the level of accusations without right or when it reaches the level of stopping someone from what Allah has made permissible for them then this is all outside of what we're talking about the غيره that is praise worthy and the غيره that is something good the last right that we're going to talk about which in which there is some degree of مماثلة some degree of equivalence is the rights relating to the decisions over breastfeeding the children and this is something some of the scholars mentioned in this and I'm not going to go into too much detail because it's not very common in our time that we give our children to be fed by someone else it's usually the case that the mother is the one who feeds the child but Allah سبحانه وتعالى He said الله عز وجل said فإن أراد في صالا عن تراض منهما وتشاور فلا جناح عليهما وإن أردتم أن تستردع أولادكم فلا جناح عليكم إذا سلمتم ما أتيتم بالمعروف واتقوا الله وعلموا أن الله بما تعملون بصير الله عز وجل said in the ayat and if you wish to cease the feeding of your children I mean to wean your children the fisaal you want to wean them to stop them from the breast milk and to start them on food عن تراض منهما that the two, the husband and the wife are both in agreement of that وتشاور and they both consult each other فلا جناح عليهما there's no harm in them weaning the child if the husband and wife both agree and both consult each other and if you want to give your children to someone else to breastfeed then there is no harm if you give them you give them an amount of money in that which is معروف that which is good and that which is customary and have Taqwa of Allah and Allah is all seeing of what you do so here it's just a simple point that when it comes to the matters of the feeding of the child and the weaning of the child there is a degree of equivalence here that there is a degree of there has to be a تراضي between the husband and the wife and between there has to be a consultation between them in the matter of weaning the child and the matters relating to feeding the child or giving the child to someone else to feed and this is something which is as we said it's not as common in our time that we have to deal with some of these issues but perhaps the issue of weaning is one that we can give an example when the child is weaned whether it is two full years or whether it is less than that that is a matter that is has to be a consultation between the husband and wife and there has to be a mutual agreement between the husband and wife in that regard so that brings us to the end of this episode where we talked about some of the rights in which there is a great amount of equivalence or a lot of equivalence and in sha Allah we're going to go on in the next episode to talk about the rights in which there is a degree of them being opposite to one another one in exchange for another and in sha Allah that's going to come up in the next episode and Allah is the best والصلاة والسلام على نبي ينا محمد وعلى آلي وصحبي أجمعي السلام عليكم if you're enjoying these videos and you'd like to keep up to date with all of the courses we're going to be running make sure you head over to amauathome.com


Good morning. We thank the Lord because he has been so good to us all of this week. We are in day 7 and also the last day of our devotion in the morning. We have been running a series for the whole week, myself and my wife. And we have been having a theme that says let God be God. When we started, we saw a king, King Dairas, telling Daniel, my friend, they have duped me, but your God whom you serve continually will be able to save you. Then again we saw when Satan wanted to annihilate the Israelites, then God provides a way out unto them. And when Haman wants to finish Modikai, the king is just sleeping in the night and imagining how somebody saved him and say and then ask what can be done to such a man. God can provide a help unto you for a future that you cannot be able to understand. Then we saw someone in the Book of Esther how God worked with the children of Israel when this young girl is saying, I will go to the king. If I perish, I perish. By the way, in your challenges decide to remain with the Lord. If it means you perish, let it be nothing, better perish but stick with the Lord. Yesterday we saw a king who always loved to know the will of the Lord. This is Jehoshaphat. And when he is praying, he is telling God that your arm has might and power.  And we are saying most of the time you don't know what to do, your eyes need to be on the Lord. Then the Lord answered him by saying that just take a position, stand still, do nothing because the battle is not yours, it belongs to the Lord. Do you know the challenges you have in life, these things that troubles you? You may think that it is your personal problem, it is your personal battle, it is not your personal battle. It is because Satan is battling with God. So God is telling you surrender unto me so that I can battle it out on your behalf. So stand with the Lord, wait upon the Lord, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. And that is why today we will look at the book of Exodus 14 and a bit of 15 and see how the Lord is fighting our battles.  You understand it, the book of Exodus 14 is where the children of Israel are leaving Egypt and going to Canaan. And as they go they have a great trouble on the way that they have left but it is still reported that the children of Israel are running away. Then Satan enters the heart of Pharaoh and Pharaoh says that we are going for them. He left himself and with a team going for war, camels and all the like and soldiers. Then as they go the Israelites are seeing a great multitude coming behind them. I know you know this story and there is nowhere else they can run to because each side to the left or to the right there are mountains they can't go through it. In front of them there is the Red Sea and behind them Pharaoh is coming with people who are ready for war. Then they start crying and say telling Moses that there are no graves in Egypt.  Then God tells Moses in Exodus 14 verse 13, then Moses said to the people, do not be afraid, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. God, they don't know what they can do. Just the same way Josaphat was telling God, we don't know what we can do. By the way even our imagination is limited. We don't know what we can do but the Lord in several places now is telling us, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord.  So just be in him, wait and see his salvation. Stand still and see what God is going to do. In the long run it will be a testimony. So that verse is saying, Moses said to the people, do not be afraid, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord which he will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever. The Lord will fight for you and you will hold your peace. The Lord is willing to fight for you as you hold your peace. Then it continues. Then the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me, tell the children of Israel to go forward but lift up your road and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it and the children of Israel shall go on a dry ground through the midst of the sea. I indeed will harden the hearts of the Egyptians and they shall follow them so I will gain honor over Pharaoh and over all his army, his chariots and his husband. Then the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I have gained honor for myself over Pharaoh, over his chariots and over his husband.  I must gain honor over myself. By the way even all the things that you see in this world, Satan has brought sin. That sin is rampant everywhere. God will fight it until he will gain honor over himself. Stand with the Lord. When Luke 21 says, then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea and the Lord cost the sea to go back a strong east wind all that night and made the sea into dry land and the waters were divided so the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left hand and the Egyptians pursued and went after them into the midst of the sea the thing that I loved with that statement is that God is saying that Moses only stretched his hand but the waters were separated. There were waters on the left and waters on the right. Let me tell you there are so many theories that have come out that have been brought by Satan even to say that they did not go through the Red Sea. Some are saying they went, they stepped on the reeds that they passed and some are saying that this is a myth, it can't happen but let me tell you the Lord God of Israel has power to do this. How I wish you have gone to the coast lands and see the ocean and see the raging waves on the ocean, how they are powerful and that is how the sea is, powerful waves and water has a lot of power you would fear going into the waters and God is telling you that the water is divided and you can see a wall at the top there waves are raging at the top and you are seeing it on the right and on the left and you are down here, what is there is water it is something that is dreadful something you would not dare going into it by the way it needs faith to step onto that road that road is a difficult road you would not dare go through it but the Israelites believed God and what he said and they went through and when they went through what surprises me that the Egyptians are seeing that this thing can never be imagined Pharaoh could have seen this and said we have never seen such a thing and it can't happen maybe their God is so superior we never need to pursue these people but they just there, certain would just there and come when he is taking you to destruction he will just take you and you will be headstrong going for destruction then they follow in and then there is mud they can't reach them and there is a pillar of cloud covering their way they can't see until the Israelites pass over then they remain the Egyptians in the sea and all of them including Pharaoh died in the sea that is when God is saying you will know you will see it after I have gained honor over myself over Pharaoh sorry over Pharaoh and over the Egyptians and all his chariots he is telling you stand still and see the salvation of the Lord in your life wait upon the Lord the Lord wants to deliver you it might have been long but God is willing to deliver you so the last two verses Vasati and 31 is saying so the Lord saved Israel that day out of the hand of Egyptians and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the sea shore thus Israel saw great work which the Lord had done in Egypt so the people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses they saw the deliverance and they feared the Lord wait upon the Lord and see how the Lord is going to do his plans in your life and you will be surprised at the good plans that God has for you and you will fear him the more let God be God after this after this they sing chapter 15 I'll read verse 1 2 3 but I only need 3 but I'm reading all of them the next chapter which is 15 is saying then Moses and the children of Israel sang this song to the Lord and spoke saying I will sing to the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously by the way the Lord will bless you nothing to do but to praise his name I will sing to the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously the horse and the rider he has thrown into the sea the Lord is my strength and my song and he has become my salvation he is my God I will praise him my father's God I will exalt him just try to imagine verse 3 is my verse so I can hesitate a little bit in 30 seconds to say something try to imagine you know I come from a near water body which is is it the second largest fresh water lake in the world they tell me that it is 80 meters deep the deepest part then I think of the deepest lake they say is Lake Tanganyika which is 1.4 kilometers deep oceans can be so many kilometers deep and the sea is much more than that maybe they did pass through the deepest part which might be some kilometers deep but they might have passed only through somewhere which is 100 meters deep just imagine 100 meters water water making a wall of 100 meters going up on the right 100 meters of water on the left what if it is a kilometer you up there waters there and you are passing through after such deliverance you will tell God I will press you I will sing unto you because you have triumphed gloriously you have seen such kind of deliverance something you never imagined that is when you are telling God I don't know what to do Lord please deliver me so Vastari is saying 15 Vastari is saying the Lord is a man of war the Lord is his name by the way this is my Vast I like somebody who is going for war a man who will go into war and succeed the Lord is a warrior the Lord is his name my God is a man of war if Satan tries to come and battle me my warrior will come and he will triumph gloriously in all your challenges the Lord is coming to battle it for you believe this man believe he is a man of war in your problems in your challenges there is a man of war who wants to fight for you and he must win the battle our song 439 when you look at the second stanza I don't know whether it can be projected song 439 we are seeing the second stanza before we sing the whole song and pray it is saying I ask the warrior on the field this was his soul inspiring song with courage bold the sword I will the battle is not long then whip no more endure the conflict till thy works is done for this we know the prize is sure when the victory is won the battle is not long be confident that we are going to win the conflict God bless us