When did you last say ‘Touch wood’? Less likely, when did you last see a horse complete with brasses to ward off the devil? Hardy’s Bathsheba Everdene took a key to the Bible and consulted the first verse that came to hand. We have remnants of the great, almost majestic, world of magic that dominated the Middle Ages. We even have boxes of chocolate called Black Magic. Occasionally we find ourselves careful to avoid walking under a ladder. We probably have some vague recollection that it is unlucky to break a mirror.
Of course, none of us would say that we take these things seriously. And yet we find ourselves, particularly if we are athletic, taking little rituals seriously on the way to a contest. We are so much better informed than those ancestors of ours who practised alchemy and sought to turn base metals into gold. Nowadays we get our prescriptions and swallow our pills without any thought of consulting the zodiac or some other source of information about when treatment should start. We know that astrology has turned into astronomy. We remember Shakespeare’s Glendower saying: ‘I can call spirits from the vasty deep’ to be taunted by Hotspur with: ‘But will they come when you do call for them?’ Here we come to the real stuff of magic, conjuring – that is, trafficking with malign spirits.
No, we know so much better. But wait a moment. If we renounce the supernatural and explore the universe in evidential terms, we may find ourselves falling out of love with superstition and into a flirtation with determinism. For all their misunderstandings our ancestors were aware of the complexity of things. They may have replaced sheer guess-work with more imaginative speculation about many gods, Mars, Neptune, Venus etc. Or they deferred to super-magicians like Apollonius of Tyana, who was thought to be able to raise the dead, or Faust, who made a pact with the devil. But they did at least recognise that we are always on the brink of mystery, of something calling for an explanation.
The Christian Gospel presents a breath-taking claim that trumps all the theories. God become man and lived amongst us. Instead of studying the entrails or the flight of birds, we can examine documents that came into being as a result of an incarnation. ‘Have nothing to do with superstitious myths, mere old wives’ tales,’ said Paul (1 Timothy 4.7) We can do something better than touch wood.
If you have a comment on this post please send an email to Revd John King at johnc.king@talktalk.net Edited extracts may be published. To forward this to a friend click on the chain icon below.
تعليقات