Sunday Meditation: Splagchnizomai

For the Eighteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year A, we have concluded Matthew’s Discourse of the Parables, and now we continue on with Jesus’s Galilean ministry.  Today we are presented with Matthew’s version of the Feeding of the Five Thousand.  This passage has a lot more depth than a simple miracle that Jesus performs.  The homilies I will embed go into them in depth but let me point out a few details and thoughts that are either too briefly touched on or not touched on at all.

As we see, Jesus’ multiplication of the loaves alludes to a number of other feasts, both before Jesus on that deserted hill or after.  Let me just numerically list a few.  I don’t think this is comprehensive but it’s probably more than pointed out in any homily.

1.     The offering of bread and wine by Melchizedek upon Abraham’s victory following the Battle of Siddim.

2.     The manna in the desert during the Exodus.

3.     All the Jewish feasts of the Old Testament: Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Rosh Hashanah, Pentecost, Atonement, Sukkot.

4.     Elijah’s miracle of the unending supply of flour and oil for the widow of Zarephath.

5.     The banquet of Herod where he decapitates John the Baptist.  (Notice that this precedes Jesus’s feeding in Matthew’s Gospel and is in stark contrast.  Herod’s is the banquet leading to death, Jesus’s leading to life.

6.     The Wedding Feast at Cana.

7.     The Last Supper and the Institution of the Eucharist.

8.     The heavenly Marriage of the Supper of the Lamb in Revelations 19.

9.     The Eschatological Banquet, prophesied in Isaiah 25:6-8, and described in Luke 14 (Parable of the Great Banquet), Matthew 22 (the Parable of the Marriage Feast), and elsewhere.

We can see the connections of Jesus’s feeding as it echoes across the scriptures.  You will hear both homilists today connect this passage with compassion, and I don’t think that can be emphasized enough.  Jesus is moved in His Sacred Heart to pity.  Consider, He has just heard the news of His cousin’s death.  He goes away to meditate and pray.  The first thing He does when He sees the multitude is have pity.  He heals, and then He wants to feed them.

 

 

 

Today’s Gospel:

 

 

When Jesus heard of the death of John the Baptist,

he withdrew in a boat to a deserted place by himself.

The crowds heard of this and followed him on foot from their towns.

When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd,

his heart was moved with pity for them, and he cured their sick.

When it was evening, the disciples approached him and said,

“This is a deserted place and it is already late;

dismiss the crowds so that they can go to the villages

and buy food for themselves.”

Jesus said to them, “There is no need for them to go away;

give them some food yourselves.”

But they said to him,

“Five loaves and two fish are all we have here.”

Then he said, “Bring them here to me,”

and he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass.

Taking the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven,

he said the blessing, broke the loaves,

and gave them to the disciples,

who in turn gave them to the crowds.

They all ate and were satisfied,

and they picked up the fragments left over—

twelve wicker baskets full.

Those who ate were about five thousand men,

not counting women and children.

~Mt: 14:13-21

 

Both homilies today could serve as both exegetical and pastoral homilies.  I wasn’t sure which I should put in which slot, but I go with that of Archbishop of Detroit, Edward J. Weisenburger for the exegetical.

 

Archbishop Weisenburger:

Brothers and sisters, this is Archbishop Weisenburger, and this weekend is the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time. And our Gospel passage is the miracle of the multiplication of loaves and fishes. You may not know it, but it's the only miracle in all four gospels.  That's how intensely embedded it was in the minds and hearts of the faithful.   Now, to break open the inner meaning of this text, my remarks today are in two parts, which are simply: the context then and the context now.  First, the context then. The Gospel says that Jesus had just learned of the beheading of St. John the Baptist, which was no doubt a great blow to him.  He likewise was exhausted and trying to escape the crowds for a little rest and renewal. And even though it's late in the day, the crowds follow him. His disciples note that due to the late hour and the fact the crowds are hungry and without food, they urge Jesus to just send them away.  But instead, as we all know the story, Jesus multiplies those loaves and fishes, more like little crackers and some sardines for a child's lunch. And with what little he has, she creates a banquet. But please stop to think, the beheading of John the Baptist also took place at a banquet, Herod's banquet. The "feeding of the 5000" is meant to be seen in stark contrast to the banquet of Herod. Herod's feast was a celebration of arrogance, conspiracy, and murder.  Jesus' banquet was a celebration of healing, faithful obedience, and caring for others through the sharing of food and compassion. Moreover, Jesus' banquet is foreshadowing of the Eucharistic banquet. In  this way, it reveals that the celebration of   the Mass is always meant to be a countercultural sign of the Kingdom of God dawning in our midst.

 

Okay, that was the context then. But the words  from today's Gospel that haunt me are Jesus' rebuke to his own followers who want to send the hungry, weary crowds away. It's Jesus line, "No, you give them something to eat!"  It's that line that gets me every time…. Brothers and sisters, I would be the first to tell you, yes, the Church needs your financial commitment. I'm  not against anyone's support. But what both Jesus and a crotchety, but perhaps holy priest teach us is that there's something sacred, something life-changing, something humanizing, and something that helps fashion us into the divine when we encounter in a direct, immediate way our Christ in the poor.  No one in the end really can do it for me.  And in the end, you really shouldn't try   to do it for anyone else. It's a redemptive experience, an experience each of us needs, and an experience that can make all the difference in our own faith journey.

The ellipsis leaves off the story the Archbishop tells about the retired priest who feeds the homeless.  It would make the quote too long, but make sure you listen to it.  Feeding the hungry in person instead of just writing a check is a “redemptive experience” each of us needs.

Here is another new find as a homilist, this time from The Catholic University of the Philippines, the University of Santo Tomas run by friars of the Dominican Order.  Here is Fr. Christian Dale Dakila offering an insightful homily.

 

Fr. Christian:

One of the most beautiful lines in today's gospel is not the multiplication of the loaves. It is not even the miracle itself. The most beautiful line comes before the miracle. When Jesus disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them.  Before Jesus fed the crowd, he first saw them. Before he performed a miracle, he first noticed their suffering. Before he gave them bread, he first gave them attention.  The miracle of the loaves began not with power but with compassion.  The gospel tells us that Jesus had withdrawn to a deserted place. He himself was grieving the death of John the Baptist. He wanted solitude and silence. Yet when he saw the people, he did not see an interruption.  He saw wounded sheep longing for a shepherd. His heart was moved with pity.  Splagchnizomai (σπλαγχνίζομαι).  The original gospel word speaks of a compassion so deep that it comes from the very depths of one's being. It was literally moved to the gut.  And it is not simply feeling sorry for someone but it is allowing another person's pain to enter your own heart and perhaps that is what many people hunger for today. Not only bread or only money but only success. Many people are hungry for someone who will truly listen. 

Splagchnizomai is a movement of compassion inside the very core of our beings.  Today We might consider Splagchnizomai as being in the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  But you can see that the Gospel is referring to more than just a simple pity.

Fr. Christian:

The hunger of the human heart is deeper than physical hunger. This is why today's gospel remains relevant. The crowd was hungry for bread. But before Jesus multiplied the loaves, he spent the day healing them, teaching them, and accompanying them. He listened to their deeds, to their pain, to their hopes. The miracle started because Jesus paid attention.  Brothers and sisters, listening is becoming a lost art. Today we have more ways of communicating than ever before. Yet many people feel more unheard than ever before. We send messages instantly.  We can contact anyone in seconds. We can speak to thousands through social media. Yet many cannot find one person willing to listen deeply. Sometimes we are physically present but emotionally absent. We hear words but do not hear hearts.  We listen only long enough to prepare our reply. But Jesus teaches us another way. The Lord listens first and he acts. Perhaps this is why he tells his disciples something surprising.  The disciples say, "Send them away." Jesus says, "Give them some food yourselves." The disciples only see the problem.  Jesus sees the possibility. The disciples see scarcity. Jesus sees generosity.  The disciples count five loaves and two fish. Jesus counts willing hearts. And perhaps that command remains for us today. Give them some food yourselves.  Feed those who are hungry, lonely, grieving, confused. Feed those who are losing hope. And sometimes the first food we can offer is not advice. It is our listening. Sometimes people do not need answers, they need presence.

It’s not just physical hunger we are called to heal.  Listening is a form of care taking, especially for those lonely, those grieving, and those losing hope.  Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is despair, let me bring hope.

 

 

 

Sunday Meditation: When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd,

his heart was moved with pity for them, and he cured their sick.

 

 

I love this hymn, “Come to the Water.” 

 

 

O let all who thirst,

 let them come to the water.

 And let all who have nothing,

 let them come to the Lord:

 without money, without price.

 Why should you pay the price,

 except for the Lord?

 

 And let all who seek,

 let them come to the water.

 And let all who have nothing,

 let them come to the Lord:

 without money, without strife.

 Why should you spend your life,

 except for the Lord?

 

Let all who have nothing, let them come to the Lord, without price.

Faith Filled Friday: The Dancing of the Giglio

This requires a lot of context.  I’m going to try to give it briefly.  Start with the Italian city of Nola, a city that goes back to (328 BC) before the Romans conquered the Italian peninsula.  It’s a city in the Campagna region of Italy, the region from which I’m from.  Nola today I think would be considered a suburb of Naples. 

Fast forward to 410 AD, where the town of Nola selected a priest by the name of Paulinus to be their bishop.  Paulinus died in 431 AD.  Somewhere in between these years the Goths, a Barbarian tribe, invaded the Italian peninsula.  Men were taken as hostage and slaves.  Legend has it that a particular widow had her only son taken, and Bishop Paulinus offered himself as an exchange for that widow’s son.  It was accepted and for a number of years Paulinus was a slave working farms.  The legend has transformed the barbarian Goths into the “Turks,” probably during the Middle Ages when the Turks raided the Italian coast. 

As a slave Paulinus performed miracles for his masters, and the legend has it the Sultan took notice.  He asked about Paulinus’s background and learned he was a man of stature.  He offered Paulinus his freedom, and Paulinus got the release of all the captured men of Nola.  When he sailed back to Nola, the populace greeted him with swarms of lilies.  Lilies are called giglio in Italian, and so the Feast of the Giglio was started.

At some point the Feast of the Giglio incorporated a carrying a structure that symbolized the Giglio.  I don’t know the process in which this structure grew to be massive, but that is what happened.  It developed into a tradition.  Immigrants from Nola brought this tradition to the United States, and specifically to a region in Brooklyn, New York called Williamsburg.  The feast in Williamsburg has been going on since 1903!

One last thing to understand.  The feast day for St. Paulinus is June 22^nd.  The feast day of Our Lady of Mount Carmel is July 16^th.  Because feast celebrations run a couple of weeks long, the two feasts were merged.  The “Dancing of the Giglio” is performed as part of the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, and the devotions that come out of this feast have a Carmelite association.

You can read about the history of the celebration in Williamsburg, here. 

Now this video is going to give you what the feast, the Italian-American tradition, and the Dancing of the Giglio entails.

So here are some raw facts of the Giglio tower.  It’s seventy feet high—that’s six or seven stories.  It weighs eight thousand pounds!  It takes 122 men to lift it, traverse it, and dance it. 

The pastor at our parish on Staten Island, Fr. Eugene of St. Rita Catholic Church, grew up in Williamsburg, and many times has referenced it in his homilies, especially in our celebrations of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel.  It never dawned on me the full extent of this tradition.  This mid-July, he arranged for a bus to take a number of us interested to the feast.  We went for the vigil of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, the evening of July 15^th.  I believe this was the first night of the celebration.

First a few pictures.  Here is the Giglio before its initial coming out and dance.  You can see it is taller than the apartment buildings on the street.

Every year there are new decorations and holy images to the Giglio.  Here is some detail to this year’s construction.

Here is the initial coming out.  Enjoy the music!  It’s a mix of Italian and American.

 

Now over the course of the evening, they would slowly take the Giglio up the street in manageable spurts—remember the 122 lifters underneath are each carrying anywhere from 65 to 100 lbs—past Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church, up another street, and then return for the night.  Here is another clip.

 

You can hear the captain calling out commands in his Neapolitan dialect. 

Here is a picture of the lifters trying to get into position.

And here is a clip of the lifters and a “dance” from their point of view.

 

Finally inside the Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church.

A statue of St. Paulinus.

And on the side of the church, OLMC shrine.

Now you know how Italians get into their feasts.  Plus I didn’t even mention the food.  The zeppole were great!

 

St. Paulinus, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, pray for us.

LOTR, The Fellowship of the Ring, Post 4

This is the third post of a series of posts on J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.  This series focuses on the first volume of the trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring.

You can find the first post here. 

The second post here.

The third post here.

 

 

Summary: Bk1 Ch 4_5_6

Chapter 4: A Shortcut to Mushrooms

The next morning the hobbits awoke to find the elves gone, but they had left some of their delicious bread.  From the elves’ warning the night before, Frodo wanted to leave for Bucklebury immediately and insisted that the other hobbits let him go alone.  The other hobbits refused leaving him and reaffirmed their commitment to their journey.  Frodo then insisted that they take a shortcut through the forest rather than travel by the road.  As they started off, they heard a distant shrieking cry which made they move on.

Once they came to the end of the forest they were forced to turn southward and they came upon a section of land that was “well-ordered.”  They recognized it as the land of Farmer Maggot, a farmer who many years before had terrified Frodo with his dogs when Frodo was a lad.  Frodo then had been caught stealing some of Maggot’s wild mushrooms, and Frodo had never forgotten.  As they approached the house, they were confronted by Maggot and his three dogs.  After recognizing Pippin and then the others, Maggot invited them in for supper with his wife.  After supper and reminiscing discussion, Maggot with his sons decided to drive them in his wagon the five miles to the ferry.  At the ferry they met Merry who has been waiting for them.  Maggot had left them a surprise of mushrooms.

Chapter 5: A Conspiracy Unmasked

Merry led the others to a flat-bed ferry boat which he had moored at a bank, and climbing on board with the ponies they pushed off.  During the slow float across the river, Frodo felt his life transformed.  When they got to the other side, Sam and Frodo looked back across the river and could see a dark figure that had been following them. 

It was still some distance to go from the Brandywine River to Frodo’s house at Crickhollow, but that dark figure on the other side without a boat would have to spend a day to get to a crossing bridge and another day to get down,  The hobbits felt safe enough to spend one night at Frodo’s house before moving on.  Once they got to the house, where the fifth hobbit, Fatty Bolger, was waiting, Frodo felt it was just like home since the other hobbits had moved his old furniture in.  Each hobbit took a bath, singing and splashing each other, and they had a late supper.  Again Frodo wanted to leave the other hobbits behind because the quest was going to be too dangerous, but to his surprise the other hobbits revealed that they knew about the ring and the quest all along and insisted on going.  So they ate, drank, and sang a song of fellowship.  They decided in the morning to be off and not go by the road but through the Old Forest.  Fatty would not be going.

Chapter 6: The Old Forest

The hobbits got up very early in the morning and headed out.  Fatty Bolger was happy he would be staying behind. 

It was difficult making it through the forest, and it seemed that the surroundings were forcing them in directions they did not want to go.  At one point they realized the trees were shifting to guide them in a particular direction.  At another point the trees allowed them to pass into an opening in the forest, and the hobbits rushed through it.  Merry recognized the valley as leading to the Withywindle River, and they realized they were headed in the wrong direction.  So they veered northward, into a dense wood again. 

It was hot and they were tired.  They had been traveling a fortnight by now, and suddenly as they reached a bank of a stream drowsiness came upon them.  Frodo felt this was an unnatural drowsiness and wanted to move on.  But they laid down, Merry and Pippin down against a huge willow tree.  Sam got up to look for the ponies when he heard a plash.  Frodo was in the water, and when he got out said the tree had pushed him in.  When they looked for the others, Merry and Pippin were trapped inside the crevice of the big willow tree.  The tree had swallowed them up.  They didn’t have an axe, so they decided to try to burn the tree.

Suddenly they heard a strange singing and a man came upon them singing a nonsensical song.  It was Tom Bombadil, and when Frodo and Sam told him about Merry and Pippin, he yelled at Old Man Willow to let them out.  He broke a branch off the willow and started hitting the tree.  Tom started singing inside the crack and lo and behold the willow tree let Merry and Pippin out.  Tom invited the four house to his house for supper, and they accepted.  Tom moved too fast for the hobbits to follow but they followed his voice which continued to sing his nonsensical song.

###

Michelle Comment:

Tom Bombadil is almost like an angel, appearing suddenly when needed, and advising the hobbits 🙂

Ellie Comment:

What I noticed in these chapters was the emphasis on companionship and fellowship, which I think is very important not only in Catholicism but in Christianity in general. Frodo could have left alone, but his friends were there to support him and I think Tolkien wanted to show how important companions are for an individual.

 

I've also always thought of Tom Bombadil as Tolkien personified in his own book and looking at chapter 6 as well as future chapters, I think Tom Bombadil might be Tolkien, the 'subcreator' who knows a whole lot about what's going on but also he seems like some sort of God-figure, if I can call it that... but that's for future discussions. I think Tom Bombadil is a really fun character but one who has a lot of wisdom to share, somebody who doesn't judge and takes in these stray hobbits

My Reply to Ellie:

Yes, I think you're absolutely right. I planned to elaborate on that in the coming days. But you almost took the words out of my mouth.

Patrick Comment:

Does anybody connect Tom Bombadil with the concept of the Numinous presented in "The Wind in the Willows" chapter 7, "Piper at the Gates of Dawn"?

 

The god of nature, Pan, a satyr, appeals to the characters in that chapter. Early Christians saw Pan as a Christ-figure.

 

I mention this because Tolkien loved Kenneth Grahame as a child, and Tom Bombadil fits in the mold of mystical caretaker of nature.

My Reply to Patrick:

Patrick, I am not familiar with The Wind in the Willows (though I have a vague memory of reading some of it years ago) but you might be onto something there. The tree that swallowed Merry and Pippin was a willow tree and was referred to as Old Man Willow. Thanks for that insight.

Kerstin Reply to Patrick:

Tom Bombadil is one of the hardest characters to classify. The mystical caretaker of nature seems to me a favorite one especially from a secular perspective. But I find that too limited. He exudes the joy of life like no other character I know of. Always cheerful and fully aware of his surroundings, probably to a deeper extend than we are. He reminds me of the famous quote by St. Irenaeus, The glory of God is man fully alive. Tom Bombadil is fully alive. The negative things of life don't touch him because he is too alive for them. Julian of Norwich comes to mind as well, All shall be well, and all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well.

My Reply:

Let's hold off discussing Tom Bombadil. The very next chapter is devoted to him. Let's wait for the next section.

L Comment:

Thank you very much for the helpful summary, Manny. The sixth chapter really stood out for me with Tolkien's depiction of the awful unending confusion of the hobbits lost amid the quiet menace of the trees. I felt nearly as dizzy reading it as the poor hobbits must have been trying to find their way through the Old Forest! Tom Bombadil's nonsense verses again reminded me of George McDonald's character Curdie, who makes up nonsense rhymes to ward away goblins in 'The Princess and the Goblin'. I think Curdie is the purest human depiction of courage that I have ever come across in fiction.

My Reply to L:

You're welcome, and that is anoher allusion that is quite possible. I believe Tolkien was a fan of McDonald. I have not read McDonald's The Princess and the Goblin, from which Curdie is from, so I can't comment.

Kerstin Reply to L:

Oh that's a great comparison! I hadn't thought of that at all, and I lead the discussion on the book in 'Victorians!' last year, lol.

Now my follow-up thought would be, what is it about nonsense rhymes that wards off evil? I'll have to think about that.

My Reply to Kerstin:

That is a very interesting question. Late 19th and early 20th century English literature is populated with nonsense rhymes, both as stand alone poems or set pieces within novels. I'm thinking of Lewis Carrol's Alice in Wonderland which contains nonsense rhymes and the poetry of Edward Lear. You can read about nonsense verse here:

 

There are various forms of nonsense verse. Here are some that I can think of. One is employing words that make sense but together do not seem like a logical statement; second is employing language that is completely made up or are just phonemes; third is a combination of one and two; fourth is a creation of a whole language (here I'm thinking of James Joyce's Finnigan's Wake which is a whole novel in nonsensical language). There may be more. That article doesn't mention it, but I think nonsensical language is linked to folklore.

 

With Tom Bombadil, my guess is to set him apart from a common society. Shared language is at the basis of a shared community. Someone with his own language and sense is apart from the community or is from a community in one's past. Just like when we read Old English and it seems nonsense to us, so could a person who speaks in an older version of a language suggest a hereditary lineage.

 

Or he could just be crazy....lol. 

###

Have you noticed how in almost every single chapter, there is a meal shared between several persons? 

From chapter 2, on the last night at Bag Ends:

The four younger hobbits were, however, in high spirits, and the party soon became very cheerful in spite of Gandalf’s absence. The dining-room was bare except for a table and chairs, but the food was good, and there was good wine: Frodo’s wine had not been included in te sale to the Sackville-Bagginses.

 

‘Whatever happens to the rest of my stuff, when the S.-B.s get their claws on it, at any rate I have found a good home for this!’ said Frodo, as he drained his glass. It was the last drop of Old Winyards.

Later in that chapter, after being on the road and meeting the elves, the hobbits join them for supper.

 

Pippin sat up and rubbed his eyes. He shivered. ‘There is a fire in the hall, and food for hungry guests,’ said an Elf standing before him.

 

At the south end of the greensward there was an opening. There the green floor ran on into the wood, and formed a wide space like a hall, roofed by the boughs of trees. Their great trunks ran like pillars down each side. In the middle there was a wood-fire blazing, and upon the tree-pillars torches with lights of gold and silver were burning steadily. The Elves sat round the fire upon the grass or upon the sawn rings of old trunks. Some went to and fro bearing cups and pouring drink; others brought food on heaped plates and dishes.

 

‘This is poor fare,’ they said to the hobbits; ‘for we are lodging in the greenwood far from our halls. If ever you are our guests at home, we will treat you better.’

 

‘It seems to me good enough for a birthday-party,’ said Frodo.

Indeed, the next morning after the elves have departed, the hobbits had breakfast with the leftover bread.  In chapter 4, Farmer Maggot invites the hobbits in for supper with his family.

 

Frodo now accepted the invitation gratefully, to the relief of Pippin and Sam. The sun was already behind the western hills, and the light was failing. Two of Maggot’s sons and his three daughters came in, and a generous supper was laid on the large table. The kitchen was lit with candles and the fire was mended. Mrs. Maggot bustled in and out. One or two other hobbits belonging to the farm-household came in. In a short while fourteen sat down to eat. There was beer in plenty, and a mighty dish of mushrooms and bacon, besides much other solid farmhouse fare. The dogs lay by the fire and gnawed rinds and cracked bones.

In chapter 5, when the hobbits reach Frodo’s house at Crickhollow and have their splashing fun in their baths, they have a late supper.

 

They had supper in the kitchen on a table near the fire. ‘I suppose you three won’t want mushrooms again?’ said Fredegar without much hope.

 

‘Yes we shall!’ cried Pippin.

 

‘They’re mine!’ said Frodo. ‘Given to me by Mrs. Maggot, a queen among farmers’ wives. Take your greedy hands away, and I’ll serve them.’

There are more instances, and let’s not forget the novel starts with a birthday party and moves in short order to another birthday party years after.   This gathering for a meal is certainly more in the novel than just the natural need for people to eat at certain time intervals.  Tolkien, with this rhythmic punctuating of gathering for a meal, is raising the meal to something more than the obvious.  Can we think of it as a metaphor?  I would. 

So what does this metaphor stand for?  When people come together for a meal, they come together in a bond or through the meal they form bonds.  There is a shared goodwill between those at the table.  Family and friends come together for a meal.  You are in communion with those at the table.  Indeed, communion implies Holy Communion.  In Holy Communion one is in communion within the Body of Christ.  Notice at Mass the taking of Holy Communion comes after the Eucharistic prayer that stitches together the whole Church body (living and dead), after the community praying of the Our Father—if we share a Father, then we are brothers and sisters—and after we offer peace to all in the Body.  The holy meal follows that bonding process.  This is what I think Tolkien is suggesting with his rhythmic pacing of meals.  Those at table come into communion.  This is why such a good feeling is shared after the dinner with the elves.  This is why the hobbits have such shared fun in splashing each other as they bathe at Crickenhollow. 

One step then from communion I think is fellowship.  What is fellowship?  From Merriam-Webster’s, and I’ll only include the definitions that apply here:  (1) companionship, (2) community of interest, activity, feeling, or experience, (3) a company of equals or friends; an association, (4) the quality or state of being comradely.  

Fellowship, then, is being in communion of friends with a particular shared interest or activity.  The hobbits are in fellowship with each other with the shared interest of the quest to dispose of the ring.  This fellowship is formed, stitched, and sealed through the process of shared meals.  (Let me guess, there will never be a shared meal between the hobbits and orcs.)  The novel’s first volume is called “The Fellowship of the Ring.”  In time, if I remember correctly, I think the whole first volume is an enlarging of this fellowship. 

###

Kerstin Comment:

Yes! If I remember correctly there is only Gollum in the entire book who goes off and eats alone, but that won't be until "The Return of the King".

 

There is something so deeply mystical about sharing a meal. We do it all the time and don't think much about it. Yet it gives us sustenance far beyond the nourishment of the body. Who would ever think of having a get-together without a meal or at least some kinds of refreshments?

 

Thinking about this I am reminded of the Odyssey and how hospitality takes on a very different character than what we're used to today. The arriving stranger, mostly Odysseus or in the beginning his son Telemachus, is offered a meal first, then his name is asked, and what brings him to this particular place. The meal goes before everything else, even asking the stranger his name or who he is!

Bruce Comment:

Also the Iliad and American Indian stories have multiple stories of how a brave soul faces down death by walking fearlessly into an enemy camp to retrieve a daughter, wife, or even a corpse, and there stories nearly always include calmly sharing a meal with an enemy who respects your courage. The story of Leo the Great and Attila the Hun may be another version of this story.

 

Iliad, Blog 3, Visiting the Enemy Camp, Greeks vs Indians

 

The Warrior Cultures of the Iliad and the American Indian, Bravely Visiting the Enemy Camp