Skip to main content

Oral Tradition



Okay... Here are a few questions for preachers prompted by this post by John Byron: How many of these "pulpit legends" have you promulgated in your time? Who did you hear them from?

1. The “eye of the needle” refers to a gate outside Jerusalem.

2. The high priest tied a rope around his ankle so that others could drag him out of the Holy of Holies in case God struck him dead.

3. Scribes took baths, discarded their pens, washed their hands, etc. every time they wrote the name of God.

4. There was this saying among the sages: “May you be covered in your rabbi’s dust.”

5. Voltaire’s house is now owned by a Bible-printing publisher which is ironic given that he was famous for saying, “One hundred years from my day there will not be a Bible in the earth except one that is looked upon by an antiquarian curiosity seeker.”



6. Gehenna was a burning trash dump outside Jerusalem.

7. NASA scientists have discovered a “missing day” which corresponds to the Joshua account of the sun standing still.

All of these are, if not actually untrue, do not have any clear documentary proof that has been furnished ie. they would be flagged up as requiring sources in any Wikipedia entry. I hadn't heard the last one, but have passed on many of the others at one time or another. Indeed I shared one a few weeks ago and a colleague shared another during our Holy Week reflections. Anyone think of others?


And why is it that we preachers, who are supposed to be purveyors of truth are so slap-dash in our use of such anecdotes and illustrations? My fear is that this is likely to get worse. In this day and age of the internet, to misquote a proverb quoted by a preacher of a previous age, C.H. Spurgeon, lies and half-truths are sprinting round the world before truth has even attempted to get it's shoes on...

Shalom

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Woman of no Distinction

Don't often post other people's stuff here... But I found this so powerful that I thought I should. It's a performance poem based on John 4: 4-30, and I have attached the original YouTube video below. A word for women, and men, everywhere... "to be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." I am a woman of no distinction of little importance. I am a women of no reputation save that which is bad. You whisper as I pass by and cast judgmental glances, Though you don’t really take the time to look at me, Or even get to know me. For to be known is to be loved, And to be loved is to be known. Otherwise what’s the point in doing either one of them in the first place? I WANT TO BE KNOWN. I want someone to look at my face And not just see two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears; But to see all that I am, and could be all my hopes, loves and fears. But that’s too much to hope for, to wish for, or pray for So I don’t, not anymore. Now I keep to myself And by that

Psalm for Harvest Sunday

A short responsive psalm for us as a call to worship on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, and given that it was pouring with rain as I headed into church this morning the first line is an important remembrance that the rain we moan about is an important component of the fruitfulness of the land we live in: You tend the land and water it And the earth produces its abundance. You crown each year with your bounty, and our storehouses overflow with your goodness. The mountain meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are filled with corn; Your people celebrate your boundless grace They shout for joy and sing. from Psalm 65

Anointed

There has been a lot of chatter on social media among some of my colleagues and others about the liturgical and socio-political niceties of Saturday's coronation and attendant festivities, especially the shielding of the anointing with the pictured spoon - the oldest and perhaps strangest of the coronation artefacts. Personally I thought that was at least an improvement on the cloth of gold canopy used in the previous coronation, but (pointless) debates are raging as to whether this is an ancient practice or was simply introduced in the previous service to shield the Queen from the TV cameras, not for purposes of sacredness, but understandable coyness, if she actually had to bare her breast bone in puritan 1950s Britain. But as any church leader knows, anything performed twice in a church becomes a tradition. All this goes to show that I did actually watch it, while doing other things - the whole shooting match from the pre-service concert with yer wumman in that lemon-