Sunday 16 November 2008

Prophet

I have a story that I've been writing for a long time, to be honest, I mostly only add to it when it's my turn to read at writers' group.
The story is set in the town of Horse-sur-mer on the south coast of England, so it's probably what you'd call a comedy of manners. And it is, to be fair, a town of mostly women, or at least the women are mainly who you hear about.

The vicar in my town, changed the name of her church from St. Brigid to 'The Blessèd Deborah' for the Old Testament Judge of the same name, and of course, raises controversy - and more is to come.

Today's OT reading in church was about the Judge Deborah. To give a quick recap, Deborah summons Barak and tells him the time is right for him to lead the Israelites against their oppressor, Sisera.
Barak's a bit of a 'fraidy cat and says that he'll go if she goes, which she does, but she tells him that he won't get kudos for killing the big bad, because that honour would go to a woman.
But the woman who kills Sisera is not Deborah herself, but Jael, a Kenite and thus an ally of Sisera's people.

How did Deborah know what was going to happen? Because she was a prophet as well as a judge - the OT is bristling with them.
Prophet's not on that list of jobs the careers officer gives you to select from. Perhaps it's just been renamed. Psychic instead of Prophet. Shaman perhaps. Oh, we have them, but we explicitly set them aside from modern religion. To experience that level of communication with the world or with God, we have to step outside of the Faiths or embrace something older.

I can't help wondering if we are rendering our worship anodyne by ignoring the psyche. Behold, we have prayer, but let's stop at the words, we must not do it too deeply, for fear of being accused of witchcraft.

3 comments:

Kateryna said...

I can't help wondering if we are rendering our worship anodyne by ignoring the psyche.

***Behold, we have prayer, but let's stop at the words, we must not do it too deeply, for fear of being accused of witchcraft.***

Oh I love that!

Kateryna said...

ps. I would love to read your comedy of manners when it suits.

Schneewittchen said...

Thank-you Kat. I have thought of posting the story online as I do edits, maybe I will sometime. I'll let you know ;)