02.28.09
Irish prayer beads
Irish prayer beads
I said quite a while ago that I planned to put up some designs for Anglican prayer beads. I finally got my camera sorted out so here is the first one.
Design components:
- Invitatory and cruciform beads: 8mm apple green cats-eye beads
- Week beads: 8 mm light apple green glass beads
- Clear glass spacer beads used throughout. Celtic knot used as a three-way linker, no prayers assigned to it.
- Irish penal cross
- Double-sided medal with St Patrick on one side and St Bridget on the other.
The Irish penal cross dates from the early modern period in Ireland, roughly 17th century. It is called a penal cross because these were the penal times, when the practice of Irish Catholicism was suppressed and all too often backed up by prison sentences. Most surviving Irish penal crosses have a handmade look and vary in design because they were locally made.
The Irish penal cross is a type of icon crucifix. It usually has the same set of icons. There is not a lot of agreement on what some of the symbols mean because these things were obviously not written down during Penal Times.
Front icons:
- spiked halo: doubles as a halo and a symbol for the crown of thorns
- hammer: for the nails of the cross
- jug or chalice: last supper (bottom of cross)
- binding cords: represent the scourging
- spear: piercing of Christ’s side (left side of bottom)
- ladder: rung like steps on the right side of the cross represent a ladder to heaven
- INRI: across the top of the cross represents the sign nailed to the cross by the Romans
Back icons:
- cock and pot: variously said to be a butchered rooster that returns to life to crow the resurrection on Easter morning, or said to be related to a legend of Judas.
- three spikes: three nails used to attach Christ to the cross, in the typical v-shaped icon. This makes me wonder if it doesn’t double as a symbol of the trinity.
The Rosary Workshop has a page of antique (and some modern) Irish penal rosaries here. It appears that this form of a cross did first appear before the ‘Penal Times’ but the reality is that they were popular during the penal times. English suppression of Irish Catholic practices made them more popular by not allowing other alternatives to flourish.
I don’t really know or understand why Anglicans avoid this particular cross. As Episcopalians we didn’t have anything to do with the suppression of Irish Catholicism. Some of us, including me, have Irish Catholic ancestors. For me, this is an ancestral cross as much as any Anglican cross. I suspect that Anglicans in the US also avoid this cross because they avoid crucifixes in general and with so many icons of the passion, it makes people uncomfortable. Well, the passion isn’t supposed to make you comfortable.
All combined I like this set of prayer beads for Lent. The penal cross with its symbolism of the passion is ideal for Lent and Holy Week. Yet, the light green color also reminds of spring. The medal of St Patrick and St Bridget are not only there because they are the co-patron saints of Ireland. St Bridget’s feast day is February 1 and usually proceeds Ash Wednesday by only a few weeks (a few days last year). Before the calendar correction February 1 would have fallen two weeks later in the lunar year and the medieval Irish associated St Bridget’s day with the birth of spring lambs, appropriate for the ‘Mary of the Gaels’. St Patrick’s feast day, March 17th, always falls during Lent without exception.
02.06.09
Bishop Katherine Interview
An interview with Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori on science and creation among other things. This interview was taken during the selection process for Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in 2006.
02.02.09
Psalm 137: Dashing Little Ones
“Remember the day of Jerusalem, O Lord, against the people of Edom, who said, “Down with it! down with it!” even to the ground!”
O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy the one who pays you back for what you have done to us!
Happy shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock! (Ps. 137, BCP 792)
This last line is perhaps the most objectionable line in the psalter to modern Christians. Our lectionary leaves out these last three lines. I was reading a chapter by a Jewish poet last week and she discussed this psalm from the point of view of a Jewish non-violence activist. She used the King James version of the psalm and reading it over, I think the King James version makes the sentiment more clear and the tone is quite different.
Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom, in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof.
O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou has served us.
Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth they little ones against stones. (Ps. 136, King James version)
First the King James version makes it clear that it is the children of Edom, not the children of Babylon, who are cursed. It more clearly identifies the children of Edom as those upon whom the curse falls. Further, the first reference to the children of Edom clearly refers adults since only adults will be jeering a foreign army on to destroy Jerusalem. It endorses that their worst punishment is the destruction of their little ones. Edom is the daughter of Babylon, perhaps a minor ally of the Babylonians. Edomities were a tributary people of Israel, who the Jews said descended from Esau son of Isaac, therefore also descendants of Abraham. Edom today is in southern Israel, Jordan and perhaps part of the Siani. Basically it looks like Negav area of southern Israel but their capital was at Petra, currently in Jordan.
They were first defeated by King Saul and held tributary by the House of David. They rebelled against Israel several times ultimately siding with Nebachadnezzar II of Babylon whose destruction of Jerusalem triggers this psalm. Edom is allowed to extend its territory into Hebron where they remain for centuries. The exiles are vowing revenge against Edom, a people they had frequently defeated in the past, rather than the great power of Babylon. As a tributary people and descendants of Abraham, Israel must have expected them to stand with the Jews against Babylon/Perisans so there is a betrayal angle here as well. The first line of the psalm that places it in their Babylonian exile caused me to jump to the unwarrented conclusion that Babylon was being cursed. Recall that they will eventually see the Babylonian king Cyrus as a kind of Messiah for allowing them to return and supporting the rebuilding of the temple.
Second, and perhaps more importantly, the King James version states more clearly that this is kind for kind destruction, an eye for an eye, a child for a child. Give them what they gave us! While Christians can never support such revenge, it does take an eye for an eye to its fullest extent. It also reminds us that the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem would not have occurred without much blood shed and many innocent little ones killed, as always happens in war. How many innocent little ones die in violence around the world today? How much of that violence is done in retaliation for violence done their innocent ones? How many conflicts in the world today see children as an acceptable target? The poet I was reading last week, Alicia Ostriker, quoted Osama bin Laden’s first message to the Islamic world after 9/11: “They champion falsehood, support the butcher against the victim, the oppressor against the innocent child. May God mete them the punishment they deserve.”
In response to the last line of this psalm , “Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth they little ones against stones.” Ostriker writes:
And there we have it, human history, the justification of every blood feud, every literal dashing of children’s heads against walls by conquering armies, guerrilla armies, occupying forces, terrorist suicide bombers, Arab and Jew, Serb and Bosnian, Hutu and Tutsi, Irish Protestants and Irish Catholics… The righteous, with God on their aide, joyously washing their feet in the blood of the wicked. The righteous confident that they, and they alone, know God’s wishes, and are the only ones pure enough to carry out God’s will. …
The psalms are the prototype in English of devotional poetry and possibly lyric poetry in general. Let nobody say that poetry makes nothing happen. Let nobody say that poetry cannot or should not be political. We have the model before us. (p. 28-29)
References:
Alicia Ostriker, “Psalm and Anti-Psalm: A Personal Interlude” in Poets on the Psalms, ed. Lynn Domina. Trinity University Press, 2008
