Did the tortoise really beat the hare? St Batholomew & 1662

The Hare and the Tortoise

Once upon a time there was a hare and a tortoise. The hare liked to run and jump and roll in the flowers. The tortoise stuck to the ground looking always to the front, never to the left, never to the right.

One day the tortoise began to argue with the hare.

"You have no direction. You are aimless. You are wasting your life," the tortoise said. The hare chewed on a dandelion to see what it was like.

"Whereas I on the other claw," the tortoise continued, "have purpose. I have drive. I have ambition." The hare began doing backward somersaults.

"And I can prove it!" the tortoise shouted, getting angry. "We will race through the wood to the river. The first one onto the bridge is the winner!"

And so that's how the race began. All the other animals gathered to watch and the crow, who was a bird and could fly, agreed to be the invigilator. When all was ready the squirrel opened a nut as a starting signal.

"Crack!" The race was on! The hare was into the wood in a couple of bounds. The tortoise moved slowly forward looking always to the front, never to the left, never to the right.

The hare ran halfway through the wood. Then the hare stopped to watch a cobweb dancing in a patch of sunlight. The sound of music drifted by on the breeze. The hare hopped off to investigate. The hare loved music. Music always reminded the hare of food. The hare began looking for some baby grass shoots to nibble. The tortoise continued, always looking to the front, never to the left, never to the right.

The hare found an old, hollow log covered in toadstools. It made a great hide away and for a while the hare hid in it imagining the fox was outside. After that it felt good to jump and stretch, stretch and jump, and jump some more.

The tortoise plodded on looking straight ahead. To the left there was a wild raspberry bush so heavy with fruit that its top was brushing the ground. To the right a fledgling fell from its nest to lie helpless caught in some undergrowth. The tortoise noticed neither.

After the jumping and stretching the hare felt hot and thirsty. So the hare ran to the river and had a drink. Then finding a shady spot the hare settled down for a nap.

The tortoise left the wood and neared the bridge, looking never to the left and never to the right. The tortoise reached the bridge, looking never to the left and never to the right. The hare woke up. The tortoise crawled onto the bridge, triumphant. The crow reported to the animals at the starting line that the tortoise had won. Some of them cheered and then they all went about their business.

When it got dark and there was no one to see the hare as he climbed up carefully from under the bridge and went home. The moon was very beautiful.

Source www.wisehat.com

Now while it is certainly true that the tortoise won the race did he gain the most from the experience? Did he give most to the experience? Sometimes it’s nice to turn truth upside down and to look at things from an entirely different angle. I'm a great believer in uncommon sense as opposed to common sense. I'm a great believer in seeking truth rather than just accepting what I am told is true, without question...

I recently enjoyed a trip to Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. It is an incredible place, full of the fineries of life. In the middle of my meanderings around the vast rooms I entered the chapel area. Towards the back of the chapel and just in front of the alter stood a dark looking figure, a statue. In one hand it seemed to be holding what looked like some kind of blanket or cloth and a in the other some scissors. The figure intrigued me, so I looked a little more closely and searched for some information about it. I soon found it.

The sculpture is called “Saint Bartholomew, Exquisite Pain” it is a bronze figure standing two and half metres tall and is the creation of the controversial Turner prize winning artist Damian Hirst. He says that the inspiration for the piece “comes from memories I have of woodcuts and etchings I remember seeing when I was younger. As Saint Batholomew was a martyr who was skinned alive, he was often used by artists and doctors to show the anatomy of the human body and this is also what I’ve done. He holds his own skin over his arm and he holds a scalpel and a pair of scissors in his hands so that his exposure and pain are seemingly self-inflicted. It’s beautiful yet tragic and like Saint Sebastian his face shows no pain. I added the scissors because I thought Edward Scissorhands was in a similar tragic yet difficult position – it has a feel of the rape of the innocents about it.”

The 24^th of August is St Batholomew’s Day. On this day in 1572 there was a terrible massacre of defenceless Protestants in France. This became known as “Black Batholomew’s Day”. The Great ejection of 1662 is also sometimes referred to by the same name. Unitarians and other “dissenters” are currently commemorating the 350^th anniversary of this event. It was really the starting point of denominational non-conformity in England, from which the Unitarian and Free Christian tradition, to which I have chosen to belong, has developed. Next Saturday in Knutsford we Unitarians, from the Manchester District Association, will be re-enacting the events of 1662.

On St Bartholomew’s day 1662 The Church of England was reconstituted under the Act of Uniformity. This meant that every clergyman in the land would be expelled from his charge if he did not declare assent to everything contained in the revised Book of Common Prayer. Also anyone who had not obtained Episcopal ordination during the period of the Commonwealth was commanded to obtain an oath of canonical obedience. Many refused and as a result 2000 clergy were expelled from the church.

St Batholomew’s Day 1662 is regarded as the “Genesis” of English descent and it is from this refusal to subscribe to the book of common prayer that the seeds for the Unitarian denomination were sown. I believe that this principle of non-subscription is the central characteristic of the free religious tradition to which I have chosen to belong. To use advertising speak, it is our unique selling point. There is no requirement to subscribe to any pre-determined beliefs and practices to be a member of a Unitarian congregation. Each individual follows the dictates of their conscience in matters of faith.

Now I’m not here give a history lecture, this is not the purpose of this blog. That said it is important to understand the “rock from which we were hewn”. The key to the Unitarian religious path is freedom, freedom to believe as one's conscience dictates, but to do so in community with others who may see things differently. The seat of authority, in terms of religious belief lies within the individual’s conscience and not from other human created authorities. It is always worth remembering that all religions, just as all nation states, are human created. No one set of people are chosen above any others, although many have claimed to be.

I love the re-telling of the famous hare and tortoise tale by Aesop. Now the original moral of the story is “Slow and steady wins the race”. Of course in this re-telling the tortoise obviously still wins the race. He never once takes his eye off the goal he just keeps on taking one step after another without once looking to the left and the right. He reaches his destination well before the Hare does. Actually we are not told if the hare ever reached his destination. He receives a little applause and then everyone just gets on with their business. As somebody once said “Today’s headlines are tomorrow’s fish and chip paper”.

Now while I believe that there is great wisdom in Aesop’s original fable, there is also some wonderful truth to be revealed in this re-telling. The tortoise never once wavers from what he knows to be true; his gaze never deviates; he sees nothing but the finishing line, he keeps his eyes firmly set on his goal on the final destination. Is this the only way to live? Surely by always looking straight ahead we miss out on so much of the beauty and wisdom that is on offer.

It’s the same with truth I believe. How many folk are absolutely fixated on what they believe is true. So much so that they never look to the left or the right and take in what they are surrounded by, for the fear that it might deviate them from their path. I am always wary of absolutist truth claims, mainly because they lack humility. Sadly absolutism seems to be on the increase. We see it amongst the religious and we see it amongst the secular. The voices of intolerance do seem to be getting louder and louder.

The religiously inclined who believe that they have a direct link to God and know not only what God’s will for them is, but also what it is for anyone else appear to me to be suffering from arrogance, from hubris. Who has the right to say that they are chosen above anyone else, come off it?

Sceptics are no better. To belittle someone’s genuine faith by calling it a superstition or merely a crutch is disrespectful. It certainly does not honour their humanity. No one can ever truly know what it is to have walked in another’s shoes, to have lived their life, to have experienced what they have experienced, or to have seen what they have seen. It seems to me that the absolutists whether secular or religious are like the tortoise and are too fixated on their truth, so much so that they cannot appreciate the beauty of the truth that so many others are uncovering and experiencing, while they just stare, half blindly, ahead.

The question I need to keep on asking myself and I think everyone needs to keep on asking themselves is “are we tortoises or are we hares?”

I believe that the faith tradition that I serve is more like the hare. It is a faith that is open and is therefore fed by all the senses, including the sixth one. It is an ever evolving tradition. It is rooted in Liberal Christianity, inspired by the life and teachings of Jesus. The chalice symbol exemplifies this perfectly. It is a kind of cross, but an evolving one with the flames reaching out much further to a place way beyond any human imagination. So while it is rooted in the Liberal Christian tradition it has evolved beyond this starting point to embrace truth from a myriad of sources. That flame burning in the cup of love, the cup of sacrifice is deeply symbolic of the roots from which it has grown or from the rock from which it was hewn. The flames seem to symbolise something more too, something eternal, something way beyond human created earth bound limits, religious or secular.

It is said that we shall know the truth and that the truth will set us free. If this is true then surely it is everyone's task to seek that truth and to share that truth and set one another free. Our vision should never be limited by what is directly in front of us. Why you may well ask? Well because we will miss out on so much if it is. We will not see the whole truth, so how on earth could we then hope to be free?

Did the tortoise really win that race?

More lessons from Transylvania: Symbols

Transylvanian Unitarian Symbol

During my recent visit to Transylvania I was invited to preach at the anniversary service of our sister congregation of Maros St George. While preparing I was asked to wear a badge depicting the symbol of the Transylvania Unitarians. Tamas, the minister explained to meaning of the images  on the badge. They are deeply symbolic it would seem.

There are four distinct features to the symbol: a dove, a serpent, a mountain and a golden crown. The dove symbolises peace; the serpent symbolises wisdom; the mountain symbolises height; the crown symbolises kingship. It is inspired by a passage from Matthew's Gospel chapter 10 v 16 “Behold I am sending you forward as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be therefore wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” In this passage Jesus is warning his disciples of the dangers that they will face in carrying their message of radical love, to a wounded world. He is saying that they will be no safer than lambs amongst wolves; he is saying that they must employ wisdom in the way they impart this message, in a hostile world.

The Transylvania Unitarians have adopted this symbol because they have needed to be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves. Throughout their history they have always been a minority group and have faced persecution, from both religious and secular sources because of this. During the sixteenth century the threat came from many sides. Other none trinitarian thinkers of the time, such as Michael Servetus, were burned at the stake for proclaiming their heresy. Somehow the Unitarians in Transylvania survived, some might say miraculously. How did they survive? Well probably because they took head of this simple message, they were as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves. A message that they still need to take heed of today.

At the centre of their symbol is a dove, an important image in the Judeo-Christian tradition. It makes its first appearance in the story of Noah’s Arc. Noah sends out a dove to find land, eventually it returns with an olive branch. This symbolises the re-birth of life, something very important to Transylvanian Unitarians. They are very much tied to the ground, to the soil and the cycles of life.

The dove of course is the symbol of peace. A dove is gentle, but only when it is free, when it can fly as it is meant to. A dove can become aggressive if enclosed in a cage. The dove symbolises the soul, our essence, our being. The dove symbolises our soul's need to remain open to all that life offers. We all need the openness of innocence in order to live peaceful, harmless and gentle lives. The dove is standing on a mountain, on solid rock. This symbolises the ethical heights that we need to reach in order fulfil our human potential and appreciate the earth on which we all stand. The rock is also symbolic of stability. To reach our potential we need to stand on solid ground.

I see parallels between the soaring of the dove to the top of the solid mountain and the chalice symbol, that identifies Unitarians globally. The flames of the chalice reach out beyond the cup of love in which the fire is set. This reminds me of the words from that beautiful Unitarian hymn "Spirit of Life"

The serpent symbolises wisdom. In the bible it first appears in the story of Adam and Eve. It reveals the forbidden knowledge of life and death. For this the serpent is cursed to sneak around on its belly near to the rocks. The wise serpent lives close to the water, the source of life and for this it is respected by people of desert cultures. They consider the serpent to be very wise indeed.


When we think of serpents or snakes we think of danger. Some can be venomous and can kill, but their venom can also heal. The serpent is indeed a source of life and death; it does carry the knowledge of life and death and it is of course the gaining of this knowledge that leads to the loss of innocence.

In the Transylvanian symbol the serpent is in a cirlce, a ring. This symbolises eternity, and the continual rebirth of life. As they say in Transylvania “life is eternal and the soul is invincible, we can be reborn every day” The dove stands within the circle. The wisdom of the circle protects the innocence of the dove. The message is to remain wise and innocent in order to live a full life.

There is a golden crown at the top of the Transylvanian symbol. This is the crown of the only Unitarian king in history John Sigismund, who by signing “The Edit of Toleration” in Torda in 1568, gave Unitarians protection. This meant that they were not wiped out as they were in other parts of Europe.

The crown is no ordinary crown, it is golden, it symbolises the God or Goddess, the creator of the universe. It also carries the message of infinite and perfect happiness, a goal worth striving for; it is a source of aspiration for the Transylvanian Unitarians. They believe that we can all be kings and queens, that we can all wear the crowns.

What a powerful image this Transylvanian Unitarian symbol is. It teaches that we can all reach the summit of the mountain and wear the crown of happiness. A difficult journey no doubt, but one worthy of taking. It also teaches that we can attain this if we are wise enough to remain innocent and aspire to that perfect happiness.

I learnt a lot in Transylvania

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Our lives are surrounded by symbols. Symbols are far more than pictures; they carry a story within them that is bursting to be let out. The great twentieth century theologian Paul Tillich talked extensively about symbols. He believed that they were more than simply signs pointing somewhere; they also possessed, within them, an element of qualities that they were pointing to. The purpose of the symbol is to open us up to deeper levels of reality that cannot be grasped by other forms of communication. They therefore reach the parts that words alone cannot. They enable us to connect to an ultimate reality (his name for what religions call God). They are seen as a window to a transcendent reality, rarely touched. The symbols are of course not the reality itself, just as the word describing it is not the reality either. They do though reveal something of this greater reality, that is called God.

The Transylvanian Unitarian symbol describes almost perfectly the soul of those beautiful people that I spent a short time with, last Autumn.

As a student minister I spent a year at the Unitarian Chapel and One World Centre in Oldham. Outside the chapel is a sign. It reads, “open to all who wish to worship with an open mind, in a spirit of freedom, reason and tolerance. We do not hold the same beliefs; rather each person is encouraged to develop his or her faith in a continuing search for truth.” I believe that this speaks powerfully and coherently to the Unitarian tradition that I am a part of.

The Unitarian faith is ever evolving, as all life is evolving. It has its roots in the Liberal Christian Tradition, inspired by the life and teachings of Jesus. Our symbol, the chalice exemplifies this perfectly. It is a kind of cross, but an evolving one, with the flames reaching out much further to a place way beyond our imaginations. So while we are rooted in the Liberal Christian tradition we have evolved beyond this starting point and embrace truth from a myriad of sources. 

A flame burning in the cup of love is deeply symbolic of the roots from which we were formed, but the flames seem to indicate something more, something eternal, something way beyond the limits of human vision. I see parallels with both the dove and the serpent and that golden crown of the Transylvanian symbol here. There is freedom in the flames, there is wisdom yet to be unearthed in those flames and there is that crown that we can all aspire to. I also see the rock on which all this stands; the solid base that sustains us as we reach further, to who knows where.

This is religion in its truest sense, this searching together, this working together, and this giving together. Each individual Unitarian adds to that flame and also takes from it. It is this continual communal search and struggle that is the rock, or the cup on which the Unitarian free religious faith is built. Where this leads, no one can know, certainly not I.