Rat-a-tat-tat
Apr. 3rd, 2023 09:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphilo I hadn't realised it was Palm Sunday until one of the friends stood up in Meeting and reminded us. He then read a couple of Palm Sunday poems- neither of which I particularly like- and they gave me the chills. There's something in our make-up that responds- against our better judgement- to the beating of an antique drum...
This isn't a picture of Jesus but of the Quaker leader James Nayler who- in October 1656- entered Bristol on horseback- with a group of supporters- in a carnivalesque stunt which the authorities interpreted as a reenactment of Christ's entry into Jerusalem. It annoyed them considerably and they called it "blasphemy". Nayler was arrested, tried- and treated with great cruelty. One of his punishments was to be branded on the forehead with a "B" for blasphemer- as can be seen in the picture.
Quakers believe in the Inner Light- which is a slightly evasive way of saying that we are all Christs in potentia. Maybe Nayler was proclaiming his own godhead in the hope that others would be empowered to do the same.
He was giving us the good news. He was trying to wake us up.
It was show time.
Jesus was called a blasphemer too and suffered the consequences. It doesn't do to parade one's divinity before people who are convinced that there is a great gulf fixed between themselves and God.
Nayler survived his punishments- only to die at 42 after being mugged by highwaymen. He wrote things that Quakers still value. When I think of him I'm hearing that antique drum again, rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat....
This isn't a picture of Jesus but of the Quaker leader James Nayler who- in October 1656- entered Bristol on horseback- with a group of supporters- in a carnivalesque stunt which the authorities interpreted as a reenactment of Christ's entry into Jerusalem. It annoyed them considerably and they called it "blasphemy". Nayler was arrested, tried- and treated with great cruelty. One of his punishments was to be branded on the forehead with a "B" for blasphemer- as can be seen in the picture.
Quakers believe in the Inner Light- which is a slightly evasive way of saying that we are all Christs in potentia. Maybe Nayler was proclaiming his own godhead in the hope that others would be empowered to do the same.
He was giving us the good news. He was trying to wake us up.
It was show time.
Jesus was called a blasphemer too and suffered the consequences. It doesn't do to parade one's divinity before people who are convinced that there is a great gulf fixed between themselves and God.
Nayler survived his punishments- only to die at 42 after being mugged by highwaymen. He wrote things that Quakers still value. When I think of him I'm hearing that antique drum again, rat-a-tat-tat, rat-a-tat-tat....
no subject
Date: 2023-04-03 05:20 pm (UTC)'Art thou in the darkness? Mind it not, for if thou dost it will feed thee more. But stand still, and act not, and wait in patience, till light arises out of darkness and leads thee.'
no subject
Date: 2023-04-03 08:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-04-04 12:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-04-04 01:59 pm (UTC)