by Jo Cox-Darling.
Let’s think about Genesis 26: 12-33 – it’s worth reading the passage either before or after reading on here. There are a few things to tease out in this passage:
- Woundedness often begins when there is a power imbalance. Isaac is asked to leave because he was too successful. Pay attention to power, how we use it, own it, offer it to others: but also notice the power in creation… this passage isn’t about two people, it’s about subterranean access to water!
- Who gets to name things? The Philistines had changed the names of the locations of the wells, and then poisoned them. But reverting to the original names, and unblocking them – symbolically, brings the people back into contact with God. This is about history and memory and spiritual sacred symbolism.
- When people get grumpy, Isaac uses names which remind the people of the quarrel, the dissent, and the conflict. The quarrel doesn’t stop the overall project, and God still offers a blessing to those who know themselves deeply enough to know what they are doing and how they are doing it.
- ‘The water is ours’ (v20) – the main argument is that the hole is Isaac’s, but the contents is the Philistines’…who owns the underground, the subterranean?
- Like pathetic fallacy in literature (where the weather reflects the internal emotions of the characters) – that device is used here. Recognise that what happens in the locality/soil – is what is also happening in the spirit/soul.
- v29 – remember that hurt people, hurt people.
What is it to dig where we stand? Alastair McIntosh suggests that ‘the great disease of our time is meaninglessness. If fresh wellsprings of hope are to be found…we must dig where we stand. We must get beneath the grassroots of popular culture and down to the eternal taproot. Here, new life can grow from ancient stock.’[1] In telling the story of land reform in Scotland he suggests that all acts of revolution, and action, and spiritual practice are acts of love, when they are done in true community together. Digging in to where we are, understanding the soil (literally), paying attention to what is present, and then working with that and with the people who are alongside us – it is possible to change the culture. ‘If we let ourselves be overwhelmed [wounded] – if we do nothing because we are thinking we cannot do enough – we misread, profoundly, the game of life. We miss each season’s fleeting blossom.’[2]McIntosh concludes by reminding us that the darkness is a place of gestation, and that if humankind is to have any hope of changing the world, we must constantly work to strengthen community with the soil, human society and with the soul. ‘We need spaces where we can take rest, compose and compost our inner stuff, and become more deeply present to the aliveness of life… In short – is any of this concerned with the blossom?’[3]
Questions for Reflection
- What is it to dig where we stand?
- Which (metaphorical) ancient wells are those that we need to unstop, today?
- What are those places and resources that we need to rediscover in order to bring us greater clarity of who God is, and who we are called to be?
This year’s SPECTRUM Conference, Wounded Wisdom was held at Highgate House in May and was attended by around 25 people. The subtitle was Discovering Healing and Hope – Words and Wisdom for these days, and the content addressed how our minds and bodies try to cope with the sense of woundedness and vulnerability which are a familiar result of wrestling with all that the news and daily life throw at us. The speakers were Jo Cox-Darling and Brian Draper, who also prepared papers for the Spectrum annual study guide, which we also share through on Theology Everywhere. This is part five of a series of six articles. Also see The art of vulnerability and This is my body and Love for the unloved days and The Place Where Beauty Starts.
[1] Alistair McIntosh Soil and Soul 2001 p2 Aurum Press
[2] Op. cit. p283
[3] Op. cit. p284
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