Categories: uncategorized
Date: 28 July 2005 08:29:07
I get frustrated by devotional material that whilst referring to a very short passage of scripture can develop it into an unbendable rule for living that seems to me to have nothing to do with what the passage is about. My theologically untrained mind seems always to be wondering...how do they know that?
I was thinking about this one night and the following story came to me, I wrote it down and hope you enjoy it.
You wouldn't call the unyielding crag a paradise but it's history is fascinating.
Macrami Island, situated in the north-west Atlantic Ocean, an eighteen hour boat trip from Reykjavik is inhabited by a unique order of Christian people.
These descendants of a lost mission have developed a culture that revolves around tying knots.
They tie knots everywhere, first visitors to the island are amazed to find the wharf is made up entirely of ropes tied together in elaborate knots.
Different knots are known to have different meanings and some knots used in the people's worship and meditations are considered deeply spiritual symbols.
The way the strands of rope intimately intertwine is truly moving to the populace of Macrami Island.
The people worship God but their liturgies and rituals all involve tying knots. (Some say it is possibly an influence from the Macramian culture that we sometimes refer to the wedding ceremony as “tying the knot”).
Their cathedral is a sight to behold, a glorious building made of knots, ropes knotted together, to form the walls and window frames...and the altar, it is claimed that dedicated Macramians spent fifty seven years prayerfully and carefully tying the knots for it.
Few visitors stay long on the island as the only, and all consuming, activity is to sit around and tie knots.
To understand the culture we are lucky to have the notes of historian D. Sheepshank, who spent some time studying the Macrami traditions.
He discovered, along with learning 108 different knots, a fascinating history.
The ancestors of the islanders were apparently pilgrims travelling by ship to the New World, there was a ferocious storm and their ship smashed into rocks on the end of the then uncharted island. Even as they struggled to launch the life-boats the ship's Padre was leading the deeply spiritual passengers in a time of veneration.
He stood up on the bow of the sinking ship, an awesome figure, “this is how God wants you to live your lives in this unknown place” he shouted and a huge wave swept him into the ocean as they heard his final words, barely discernable in the howling gale but speaking straight to their hearts “thou shalt not” (knot)................
You see here is a culture that developed where all the decisions about what they should do were based entirely on one small bit of scripture, and a huge mis-interpretation of it to boot.