Buffy's Salon

Genesis & Biblical Hospitality

Abraham and the Three Angels

As early as the book of Genesis the Bible tells us that all human beings, including strangers, need to be treated with respect.

In Chapter 18 Abraham is visited by three strange men.  His reaction is to become the generous host par excellence, begging them to stay, preparing the best feast he can for them and sitting with them while they eat.  He does this on the (correct) assumption that thereby he is somehow entertaining God.  Note that he was given no warning that God was about to send visitors and the text merely describes the visitors as "three men", as oppose to, say, "three beings surrounded by a halo of shining light".  Here we see Abraham perfectly illustrating Hebrews 13:2:

Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.

If anyone didn't get the message we have Chapter 19 to provide a nasty alternative.  When the same men go to Sodom a horror story unfolds when, with one exception, every man in the town seeks to brutalise the strangers, violating every notion of hospitality.

If only this were a one-off story used just for illustration.  Yet who can deny that throughout the world there are, and always have been, those who have so little regard for other people that, if they think they can get away with it, they will not hesitate to behave in the most inhumane and monstrous way possible.  Their consciences are eased by the belief that the person they are violating is not one of them.  The strangers to Sodom were not Sodomites, so the men there reasoned that it was all right to abuse them.  Examples of what we tactfully call "ethnic cleansing" involve the torture and murder of one group of people by another because they are perceived as being not one of them, and therefore not worthy of the respect we show one of our own.

Abraham didn't look at the three strangers approaching and think "They're not from my group of people, I'm going to do them harm".  He didn't even think "I don't know who these people are, they may or may not be trouble. Live and let live; if I leave them alone hopefully they'll leave me alone."  He thought something like "Here are three strangers.  Let me behave towards them as if they were sent by God."

Later on in Chapter 24 we find Rebekah, on meeting a stranger, going beyond the call of duty on two occasions.  When asked by a man she had never met before for a drink of water, she not only gives him one but also provides sufficient water for all his camels.  Later, when asked for simply a room for the night, she (presumably backed by her family) provides shelter and food (a feast) for both man and camels. 

There are plenty of other verses in the Bible which urge us to practice hospitality to those outside our circle of friends and family.  The truth of the matter is that we are very suspicious of strangers, even when we mean them no harm.  How many of us welcome the ultimate stranger, immigrants, into our country or our neighborhood with open arms?

Hospitality means offering strangers:

• shelter
• food and drink
• basic comforts, such as water to wash in
• respect (let us at least find out more about them before we judge them)

It also means not waiting to be asked for help and giving more than is requested.  It means interrupting your busy schedule and it means being open to the message that has been sent to you.

Next time someone I don't know knocks on my door or approaches me outside my home I'm going to try to remember these things.

Fabblog Award

 

Thank you kindly to Vintage Kitten (Domestic Diva) for being sweet enough to give me such an pretty award!

The hardest part of receiving an award is passing it on.  This is not because it is hard to find worthy blogs, oh no, it's hard to choose only three or four!  All the ones I follow (see Recommended Blogs) I could happily award!  However, I appreciate I need to restrict myself so I am going to choose four very different blogs to whom I will pass on the fabblog award.

Most thought provoking blog - Chrysalis

Prettiest blog - Brocante Home

Best blog about sustainable living - Walk Slowly, Live Wildly

Best for bookworms - A Booklover's Journal

If you have the time and inclination, please pass the award on.  If not then just know you've had a pat on the back.

Little Dorrit

I can heartily recommend Little Dorrit, the latest Dickens adaptation by the BBC.  It's true that this is not going to be the most glamorous series you'll see this year (the two main sets being a debtors' prison and a neglected house that looks like it's about to fall down) but it does a good job of feeding both your mind and soul.

Because the story runs over 14 episodes there's plenty of time to explore the many eccentric characters and laugh at some of the more absurd scenes.  So much has changed since Dickensian times, and yet, so far as human nature is concerned, so little.

It's well cast.  Newcomer Claire Foy has the difficult task of bringing to life a very unmodern heroine as Amy Dorrit, for she is virtuous, selfless and meek, and yet clearly the strongest of all her dysfunctional family.  Matthew Macfadyen is wonderful as quiet but steady hero Arthur Clenham.  His face speaks volumes through the many absurd situations he finds himself in; it has to, for his character is a gentleman so he remains eternally polite and tactful throughout his disappointments and tribulations.

At the heart of the story is a mystery, or rather several mysteries that have become entwined around each other.  Seeking to manipulate these secrets for his own gain is Andy Serkis as the creepy villain, Rigaud.

One of the themes of Little Dorrit is how people are imprisoned, sometimes literally sometimes figuratively.  Mr Dorrit is bodily trapped in prison for debts he cannot pay, Mrs Clenham is trapped in her home by her frail body, Arthur Clenham is trapped by an old family secret he doesn't understand, the affable Affery is trapped in an abusive marriage, and so on.  Another theme is that of humbug, and how the demands and teachings of "society" deceive us with their false values and imprison us further.

History of Christianity in England: Joseph of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea Preaching to the Inhabitants of Britain

Legend has it that the first person to bring the Gospel to England was Joseph of Arimathea.  The story goes that he had been preaching in Gaul with the apostle Philip who sent him, with twelve disciplines, on to England.  He founded British Christianity and built the very first church, in Glastonbury.  (Another French legend credits Joseph of Arimathea with taking the Holy Grail to England.)  The Abbey at Glastonbury still claims to be the oldest above-ground Christian church in the world.

Allegedly he was a metal merchant who came to Cornwall to buy tin.  The story that he was in fact related to Jesus probably springs from the fact that, according to the Gospels, he took responsibility for the burial of Jesus' body.  It is even said that he visited England with Jesus when the latter was in his teens and this legend inspired the William Blake poem, well-known as the hymn "Jerusalem".

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the countenance divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among those dark satanic mills?

If this is true it means that England was one of the very first countries to embrace Christianity, certainly before Rome.  Alas, historians have found no writings about Joseph of Arimathea in England dating before the ninth century.  This lack of proof did not stop Elizabeth I from using Joseph's missionary work to show that the Church of England pre-dated the Roman Catholic church.  In 1559 she wrote:

This author testifieth Joseph of Arimathea to be the first preacher of the word of God within our realms. Long after that, when Austin came from Rome, this our realm had bishops and priests therein, as is well known to the learned of our realm by woeful experience, how your church entered therein by blood; they being martyrs for Christ and put to death because they denied Rome's usurped authority.

Find your Inner Female Icon Quiz

You are an Ingrid -- "I am unique"

Ingrids have sensitive feelings and are warm and perceptive.

How to Get Along with Me

• * Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me.
• * Be a supportive friend or partner. Help me to learn to love and value myself.
• * Respect me for my special gifts of intuition and vision.
• * Though I don't always want to be cheered up when I'm feeling melancholy, I sometimes like to have someone lighten me up a little.
• * Don't tell me I'm too sensitive or that I'm overreacting!

What I Like About Being an Ingrid

• * my ability to find meaning in life and to experience feeling at a deep level
• * my ability to establish warm connections with people
• * admiring what is noble, truthful, and beautiful in life
• * my creativity, intuition, and sense of humor
• * being unique and being seen as unique by others
• * having aesthetic sensibilities
• * being able to easily pick up the feelings of people around me

What's Hard About Being an Ingrid

• * experiencing dark moods of emptiness and despair
• * feelings of self-hatred and shame; believing I don't deserve to be loved
• * feeling guilty when I disappoint people
• * feeling hurt or attacked when someone misundertands me
• * expecting too much from myself and life
• * fearing being abandoned
• * obsessing over resentments
• * longing for what I don't have

Ingrids as Children Often

• * have active imaginations: play creatively alone or organize playmates in original games
• * are very sensitive
• * feel that they don't fit in
• * believe they are missing something that other people have
• * attach themselves to idealized teachers, heroes, artists, etc.
• * become antiauthoritarian or rebellious when criticized or not understood
• * feel lonely or abandoned (perhaps as a result of a death or their parents' divorce)

Ingrids as Parents

• * help their children become who they really are
• * support their children's creativity and originality
• * are good at helping their children get in touch with their feelings
• * are sometimes overly critical or overly protective
• * are usually very good with children if not too self-absorbed

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz

Thanks to BrocanteHome

Stand out from the crowd

Unique

I realised recently that I don't have to conform with the rest of society.

Most of us living in the modern world are 'sleepwalking'.  We go through various sets of actions without giving any profound thought to why and, indeed, whether this is what we really want to do.

When society (i.e. the media and those around us) tell us that something is cool most of us jump on the bandwagon of conformity.  (Interestingly, even intelligent and educated people can be gulled into thinking that confirming to certain trends are an expression of their liberated and intelligent thinking.)

Most sleepwalkers in Britain in 2009 will send their children to a state school to be educated, jet off to a resort twice a year for a holiday, dress as scruffily as possible, like everyone else, watch formulaic films full of overblown action and weak scripts, passively take part in the increased sexualisation of our society, wouldn't dream of going to church every Sunday when they could be shopping, think good manners are old-fashioned, spend inordinate amounts of money on their homes and cars, limit the number of children to 1 or 2, and then pay someone else to look after them as soon as possible so their mother can return to work.

Most of the time they don't question any of this.

This is not a polemic about modern times.  Throughout history most people have been sleepwalking through their lives, conforming to the society they happen to have been born in.

Sleepwalkers in England in 1909 would either begrudge sending their children to school when they could be out earning money or would ship them off to boarding school, they were mostly ignorant about any culture other than their own, dressed in ridiculously over-elaborate clothes, could be incredibly hypocritical about their sexuality, ignored the fact that children living in the same town as them were dying of malnutrition, went to church because everyone else did and, if they could afford it, paid other people to look after their children.

We sometimes sigh and wish we were living in more elegant/spiritual/pious/cultured/well-mannered/exciting times.  But we mostly conform.

Is fitting in with the rest of the society really our main criterion for how we should behave?

Wouldn't we be better asking:

• what's the right thing to do?
• how do I really want to live my life?

If we want to live like a woman of a different era, shouldn't we just do it?
If we want to live a life based on Biblical principles, shouldn't we just do it?
If you want to live in an EcoVillage, shouldn't we just do it?
If we want to travel through Europe in a horse drawn caravan, shouldn't we just do it?
If we want to educate our children at home, shouldn't we just do it?
If we want to live life without television, shouldn't we just do it?

Actually, what's stopping us?  Who cares if someone laughs?  Let them see to their own life and leave us to enjoy our own.

Winter Wellbeing

Swans on a Frozen Pond, January 2001

January can be a bleak month.  The joy and celebration of Christmas and New Year are over, but the darkness and cold remain for most of us. 

So here are ten ways to make the most of the hibernation season.  Don't let SAD get you down, embrace winter and make the most of it; remember the days are getting lighter and you have a brand new year ahead of you.

1. Eat foods that are naturally in season now, because these are the ones your body needs.  Think stews, soups, pot roasts and casseroles using root vegetables, beans and lentils.  Read some mouth-watering winter recipes.
2. Tempting though it is to stay indoors in a centrally heated home or office, make time to go outside for a brisk walk in the fresh air at least five times a week.  Natural light boosts your health and is key for healthy hormone production in women (say "no" to PMT). 
3. Use scent to lift your spirits, think of the power of citrus to wake you up or lavender to relax you.  Read more suggestions on scenting your day.
4. Cuddle up with: your loved ones, a furry throw, a soft blanket, crisp freshly laundered bed linen, cosy socks. 
5. Drink hot chocolate and read a classic romantic novel (a Jane Austen for choice).
6. Light some of those candles you've received as gifts throughout the year, and have been saving.  Have a romantic dinner, talk on the phone, or bathe by candlelight.
7. Catch up on some of the classic black-and-white movies you've never seen.  I recently watched Now, Voyager and The Lady Vanishes.  I also recommend Mrs Miniver or The Philadelphia Story.
8. If you have more time on your hands, take the opportunity to sort out the photos you've got piling up.  Put the best ones in albums, make a collage or frame them and hang them on the wall.
9. Audit your underwear.  Trinny and Susannah provide some good advice (for women only) on finding underwear that is right for your shape.  Their article makes up in helpful advice what it lacks in refinement. (Did you know an estimated 70% of women are wearing the wrong bra size?) 
10. The winter is a great time to do some baking, when you're stuck indoors anyway, and need some comfort food.  Nigella Lawson's book How to be a Domestic Goddess is dedicated to baking and the art of comfort cooking.  As she says The trouble with much modern cooking is not that the food it produces isn’t good, but that the mood it induces in the cook is one of skin-of-the-teeth efficiency, all briskness and little pleasure. Sometimes that's the best we can manage, but at other times we don’t want to feel like a post-modern, post-feminist, overstretched woman but, rather, a domestic goddess, trailing nutmeggy fumes of baking pie in our languorous wake.  A selection of her cake recipes can be found at her website.

Daily Meditation & Contemplation

Be Still

Meditation is one of the traditional Christian disciplines, along with fasting and prayer.  Meditation in this context means to focus the mind on a particular thought and it has a Biblical basis, for example see Joshua 1:8 or Psalm 1:2.  Early Christian monks would meditate by slowly reading a passage from Scripture, considering the profound meaning behind each verse.  This thoughtful reading and pondering often lead to prayer, sometimes asking God for insight into the reading, and then a  wordless and loving focus on God called contemplation.  This was known as lectio divina (sacred reading).

The benefits of meditation are numerous: as well as increasing knowledge and understanding of the Scriptures it calms the mind and soul and focuses all our attention on God.  We are disciplining our mind to focus on what is important, not only when we meditate but throughout the whole day.  It is very important that we learn to control our thoughts.  Why is it necessary to be at peace in order to grow closer to God?  According to the Taize community site:

Christ says: "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you" (John 15:12). We need silence in order to welcome these words and put them into practice. When we are agitated and restless, we have so many arguments and reasons not to forgive and not to love too easily. But when we "have calmed and quieted our soul", these reasons turn out to be quite insignificant.

Meditation is easier if we provide an environment that is conducive to tranquility and spiritual thought.  We should be able to lie, kneel, sit or stand, as we are moved.  Our senses should be guided away from trivial, worldly matters.  Many people like to light candles and look at the light rather than letting their eyes move around the room.  When we look at the candlelight we are reminded who it is that said I am the Light of the World.  Certain forms of music also help us to physically relax and focus the mind.  I love the Taize chants which can be sampled at their website, where one or two verses from the Bible are sung over and over again; a beautiful aid to meditation.

The Taize site also offers suggestions for daily Bible readings; today's is:

The Word was the true light that gives light to everyone. To all those who accepted him he gave the right to become children of God.  John 1:9-12

When reading and reflecting on these words Bible.org directs us to:

1. read reverently
2. read repeatedly
3. read creatively (which is to say, imagine what the author and the people of the day were experiencing and feeling, what the situation of the time was)

and to respond to what we have read:

1. with an open heart ready to acknowledge sin and confess it
2. with faith (For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard.  Hebrews 4:2)
3. with obedience (what good is interpretation without application?).

Finally we reach a stage of restful contemplation:

Calming our souls requires a kind of simplicity: "I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me." Silence means recognising that my worries can’t do much. Silence means leaving to God what is beyond my reach and capacity. A moment of silence, even very short, is like a holy stop, a sabbatical rest, a truce of worries.  from The Value of Silence

Further reading:

Biblical Meditation at Bible.org
Taize Community (Taize is a Christ-centred community in France, consisting of both Roman Catholics and Protestants, who welcome over 100,000 visitors a year who have come to pray, meditate and study the Bible.)