Page 25 - LOTN Advent issue 57

FAITH AND CULTURE

wisdom. By way of comparison:
The bee is small among living creatures, but what she
Monastic produces is the best of sweet things (Sirach 11:3).
A previous article mentioned how the bee is held up in
the Greek text of Proverbs as an example of hard work that
Lessons from the is also orderly and wholesome and honourable (Prov 6:8,
LXX).
As for honey: that is referred to in holy scripture over 70
Beeatitudes times.
Eat honey, my child, since it is good! (cf. Proverbs 24:13).
Signs of the practice of serious apiculture in the world
of the Ancient Near East can be found in the Prophets
"A work of art; and yet no art of man, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Jeremiah speaks of storage of honey,
Can work, this work, these little creatures can." together with wheat, barley and oil (41:8). Ezekiel mentions
Geffrey Whitney honey as a trading and export commodity (27:17).
In the third of a series of fascinating articles Fr Benedict Honey makes a very nice present, as we all know. So the
Hardy OSB of Pluscarden Abbey reflects on the occurance Patriarch Jacob, fearing the hostility of “the man” – actually
of bees and their honey in scripture, in particular in the Old his son Joseph - in Egypt, sends him in advance a gift of
Testament. These articles, which have been abridged, first honey, “the best produce of the land” (Gn 43:11). Similarly
appeared in 'Pluscarden Benedictines', a quarterly magazine in the First Book of Kings, the wicked King Jeroboam sends
produced by the monks of Pluscarden Abbey. a jar of honey to the prophet Ahijah, hoping to receive from
him in return some good news about the future of his sick
BY FR BENEDICT HARDY child. In this case the bribe does not work at all. All the news
is bad, and the child dies.
ees and their honey occur rather frequently in Where honey is abundant, there is happiness, health,
Holy Scripture: though what they symbolise can contentment and delight!
vary considerably according to context. Since nothing could be more delightful than the Word of
B For the ancient Hebrews, it would seem that the Lord, the Psalmist naturally compares it with honey.
bees symbolise in the first place violent, even irresistible The words of the Lord are sweeter than honey that drips
aggression. Anyone who has experienced a determined from the comb (Ps 18/19:10).
attack by large numbers of angry bees will readily How pleasant is your promise to my palate! Sweeter than
understand the power of that image! So in the first Chapter honey to my mouth! (Ps 118/119:103)
of Deuteronomy, as Moses reviews the history of Israel’s Ben Sira speaks of honey as if in the person of Wisdom:
wanderings since the Exodus, he reminds the people of Memories of me [Wisdom] are sweeter than honey;
an early defeat they had suffered near Kadesh. They had inheriting me sweeter than honeycomb (Sirach 24:20).
refused then to heed the Lord’s instructions, given through Or as the Book of Proverbs teaches:
Moses, and on their own initiative had decided to take on Kindly words are like a honeycomb; sweet to the taste,
the local Amorites. wholesome to the body (Prov: 16:24).
The Amorites, says Moses, who live in that country of hills,
came swarming out against you like bees, pursued you and
beat you from Seir to Hermon (Dt 1:44; cf. also Nb 14:39-45).
The Prophet Isaiah takes up this image of bees (with
flies or mosquitoes as well) as representing overwhelming
aggression, applying it to an imminent Assyrian invasion,
coordinated also with one from Egypt.
The Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the source of the
streams of Egypt, and the bee that is in the land of Assyria (Is
7:18).
The same image recurs also in the Psalms; only here this is
only to illustrate the power of the Lord’s help:
Nations were swarming around me: in the name of the Lord
I cut them down.
They swarmed around me pressing upon me: in the name of
the Lord I cut them down.
They swarmed around me like bees, they flared up like a
brushwood fire;
in the name of the Lord I cut them down (Ps 117/118:10-12).
In quite another mode, the peace-loving scribe Ben
Sira holds up the bee as a symbol of the deceptiveness
of appearances. The poor, he says, should not be under-
estimated, far less despised. They also may possess true

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