Are you washed in the blood of the lamb?
November 21, 2005 7:30 AM
Are you washed in the blood of the lamb? Please help me understand what this notion means.
This is one of my favorite gospel songs, and I've got several different versions of it. It's a pretty standard bluegrass song. I understand the metaphor involved, Jesus' blood as a symbol of his mercy and his power to redeem those who worship him, but since I'm not a Chrisitian I'd like to know if there's a layer of theology that I'm missing. My understanding is that in the sacrament of communion wine and bread are actually transformed into Christ's blood and body. Similarly Jesus is said to have turned water into wine. Does this song allude to a similar transubstantiation in reverse? I ask since I know so little about the subject and the lyrics are so explicit about the white garments and the cleansing power that I'm left wondering if the action described exceeds the metaphor. Even extra-theologically, are there legends about Christ's blood turning into water similar to the legends of the wandering Jew or the Holy Grail?
This is one of my favorite gospel songs, and I've got several different versions of it. It's a pretty standard bluegrass song. I understand the metaphor involved, Jesus' blood as a symbol of his mercy and his power to redeem those who worship him, but since I'm not a Chrisitian I'd like to know if there's a layer of theology that I'm missing. My understanding is that in the sacrament of communion wine and bread are actually transformed into Christ's blood and body. Similarly Jesus is said to have turned water into wine. Does this song allude to a similar transubstantiation in reverse? I ask since I know so little about the subject and the lyrics are so explicit about the white garments and the cleansing power that I'm left wondering if the action described exceeds the metaphor. Even extra-theologically, are there legends about Christ's blood turning into water similar to the legends of the wandering Jew or the Holy Grail?
From, Washed in the Blood of the Lamb: A Sermon preached by Dean Breidenthal on All Saints Sunday, November 13, 2002.
In the passage from Revelation, John of Patmos observes a great multitude, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands, worshipping and praising God. These are the saints, who, he goes on to say, have “washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:14).
posted by ND¢ at 7:52 AM on November 21, 2005
In the passage from Revelation, John of Patmos observes a great multitude, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands, worshipping and praising God. These are the saints, who, he goes on to say, have “washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:14).
posted by ND¢ at 7:52 AM on November 21, 2005
Being "washed in the blood of the lamb" is from Rev 7:14, where the multitude of saved believers are seen praising God.
It has nothing to do directly with transubstantiation (which, by the way, is not a universal doctrine to all Christians), but uses a metaphor similar to its base passage, the "this is my body, this is my blood" spiel, in that Christ's shedding of blood is a sacrifice which atones for all sin. In this case, the metaphor is not one of ingesting, but of washing.
On preview: I am slow.
posted by brownpau at 7:53 AM on November 21, 2005
It has nothing to do directly with transubstantiation (which, by the way, is not a universal doctrine to all Christians), but uses a metaphor similar to its base passage, the "this is my body, this is my blood" spiel, in that Christ's shedding of blood is a sacrifice which atones for all sin. In this case, the metaphor is not one of ingesting, but of washing.
On preview: I am slow.
posted by brownpau at 7:53 AM on November 21, 2005
While St. Augustine is one of the masters of Theology, long story short (from a Catholic; I dunno how other denomination see it):
Essentially the Last Supper is a continuation of the Jewish Passover. IIRC, they pass the cup around 3 times. There is yet to be a 4th time that the cup is passed around, and this will be at the fulfillment of the covenant (remember that a lot of the OT is prophesy for the Lord to come again, thus fulfilling God' covenant). At the Last Supper, Jesus' celebration of the Last Supper is a prelude to the fulfillment of the covenant where they will drink blood (remember, He turns the wine into His blood here). For more reference on this, I recommend Scott Hahn's The 4th Cup. OK, once again, fast forward to His crucifixion where blood is spilt. This is the blood that was to be spilt.
Also, the symbolance of the lamb is that blood's lamb was posted on Jews' doors to prevent the final plague from killing their first born. In a similar way, Jesus' blood, as a sacrificial lamb, is meant to save us from our sins.
There's much more to it, but I have to run and I think I got the basics there.
posted by jmd82 at 7:54 AM on November 21, 2005
Essentially the Last Supper is a continuation of the Jewish Passover. IIRC, they pass the cup around 3 times. There is yet to be a 4th time that the cup is passed around, and this will be at the fulfillment of the covenant (remember that a lot of the OT is prophesy for the Lord to come again, thus fulfilling God' covenant). At the Last Supper, Jesus' celebration of the Last Supper is a prelude to the fulfillment of the covenant where they will drink blood (remember, He turns the wine into His blood here). For more reference on this, I recommend Scott Hahn's The 4th Cup. OK, once again, fast forward to His crucifixion where blood is spilt. This is the blood that was to be spilt.
Also, the symbolance of the lamb is that blood's lamb was posted on Jews' doors to prevent the final plague from killing their first born. In a similar way, Jesus' blood, as a sacrificial lamb, is meant to save us from our sins.
There's much more to it, but I have to run and I think I got the basics there.
posted by jmd82 at 7:54 AM on November 21, 2005
They believe that Christ was crucified to atone for the sins of humanity just like animals (like lambs) used to be sacrificed. But in order for his blood sacrifice to purify (wash) you of your sins, you have to accept it and believe in it. So even though the crucifixion was for everyone, people who don't accept it haven't been purified by it. It means "have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior."
posted by leapingsheep at 7:55 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by leapingsheep at 7:55 AM on November 21, 2005
We used to sing that one in my parent's backwoods Church also. I am not qualified to get into the theology of it all but in theory 'being washed in the blood of Jesus' makes you clean. If you really want to know there is also "pow'r in the blood." (funny my workplace blocks this site because it it 'hate speech')
I made it through my formative years without ever being baptized. I now am proud of my lack of 'taint of the blood of the Lamb.'
Name me another religion which commands you to eat and drink the body of your savior and be washed in his blood.
posted by elastic.scorn at 7:59 AM on November 21, 2005
I made it through my formative years without ever being baptized. I now am proud of my lack of 'taint of the blood of the Lamb.'
Name me another religion which commands you to eat and drink the body of your savior and be washed in his blood.
posted by elastic.scorn at 7:59 AM on November 21, 2005
There's much more to it
Yes- there's an important central concept missing. The analogy is from animal husbandry. Great explanation here:
"Each year at the lambing time, there are lambs and ewes which do not make it. A ewe whose lamb has died is filled with milk, but will not nourish any other lamb she does not recognize as her own. An orphaned lamb could starve because no ewe will accept and nourish it. So the shepherd takes the dead lamb, slits its throat, and pours its blood over the body of the living lamb. Recognizing the blood, the ewe will now nurse, and save the orphaned lamb."
So, by metaphorically washing themselves in Christ's blood, believers separate themselves from their earthly roots and become part of the divine family of Christ. It's a homely, rural analogy that would have made immediate sense to the ancients.
posted by Miko at 8:12 AM on November 21, 2005
Yes- there's an important central concept missing. The analogy is from animal husbandry. Great explanation here:
"Each year at the lambing time, there are lambs and ewes which do not make it. A ewe whose lamb has died is filled with milk, but will not nourish any other lamb she does not recognize as her own. An orphaned lamb could starve because no ewe will accept and nourish it. So the shepherd takes the dead lamb, slits its throat, and pours its blood over the body of the living lamb. Recognizing the blood, the ewe will now nurse, and save the orphaned lamb."
So, by metaphorically washing themselves in Christ's blood, believers separate themselves from their earthly roots and become part of the divine family of Christ. It's a homely, rural analogy that would have made immediate sense to the ancients.
posted by Miko at 8:12 AM on November 21, 2005
I'm told it also relates to farm practices.
If you have a lamb whose mother dies, and a ewe whose lamb dies, you can wash the living lamb in the blood of the slain lamb so that it smells "right" to the ewe for long enough for her to accept the lamb as her own and nurse it even though it should be unacceptable. From there, analogies abound. Whether this was a real practice, purest bullshit, or something in between, I have no idea.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:17 AM on November 21, 2005
If you have a lamb whose mother dies, and a ewe whose lamb dies, you can wash the living lamb in the blood of the slain lamb so that it smells "right" to the ewe for long enough for her to accept the lamb as her own and nurse it even though it should be unacceptable. From there, analogies abound. Whether this was a real practice, purest bullshit, or something in between, I have no idea.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:17 AM on November 21, 2005
Fudge.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:17 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:17 AM on November 21, 2005
That reminds me, I also seem to remember mention somewhere of a popular pagan ritual in which men would stand in a pit while a decapitated cow was tipped over them so they could bathe in its blood for strength and power. Hebrew and Christian mythos may have drawn on that as well.
posted by brownpau at 8:23 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by brownpau at 8:23 AM on November 21, 2005
Pulling back for some meta-theology: the death of Jesus was problematic for the early Christians. Here they were, proclaiming this guy the Messiah -- supreme Jewish hero extraordinaire -- and he goes and gets himself killed like a common criminal. They had to find a way to explain an ignoble death as a spiritual triumph. Thus, the metaphor of Christ as the lamb of God, his resurrection as triumph over death, the power of his blood, his eventual return, etc are used to explain how Jesus's apparent defeat was actually a victory.
posted by junkbox at 8:46 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by junkbox at 8:46 AM on November 21, 2005
The above are right, except brownpau (sorry). The key is linking them together. Sheparding parables abound in the bible (lost sheep, etc.) and a lamb's blood was symbolically put over the doors for the angel of death to pass over. The Last Supper was actually during the Jewish Passover so the spilling of Jesus' blood was well understood as somewhat of a necessary condition. The Bible is very layered and highly metaphorical no matter what the fundamentalists say.
posted by geoff. at 8:51 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by geoff. at 8:51 AM on November 21, 2005
Hey, you would consider me a fundie but I agree there are tons of metaphoric and layered things in there. Simple on the surface but very very detailed... there are depths and depths. Which is why religious threads frustrate me so much since so many nonbelievers quote scripture in totally uncontextual ways....
posted by konolia at 9:38 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by konolia at 9:38 AM on November 21, 2005
Thanks for that background, Miko (and ROU_Xenophobe)—very illuminating!
posted by languagehat at 10:28 AM on November 21, 2005
posted by languagehat at 10:28 AM on November 21, 2005
Note that lambs sacrificed in the OT had to be utterly without blemish or they wouldn't be accepted. This relates to the complete sinlessness of Christ in order to be accepted as a recompense sacrifice for the people.
Our 'unrighteousness' (whether we have kept God's standard or not) separates us from God like a deep chasm incapable of being crossed. But Christ, who was righteous (kept God's rules completely) according to God's standards, makes an unnblemished sacrifice that allows the sinner to cross the chasm on Christ's merit, not the sinner's own. Critics of Christianity often frown upon its assertion that Christ is the only way, but to the contrary, joy is made because a way has been made where there had not been one formerly. Prior animal sacrifices only covered the debt for a time, whereas Christ's is permanent erasure of the records. Consider getting an extension on paying taxes -- it is only for a time before the tax is due later, but Christ would be the person to step in and pay your taxes for you, when you could not. The people of the Old Testament were relying on God to save them from what they owed, and their sacrifices were acknowledgement that debt was owed, waiting for the messiah/final-sacrifice to come later to cover it all.
The reason Christ is the 'only' way is that Christ has been the only unblemished person capable of making a worthy sacrifice to bridge the gap, on our behalf. This way, the sinner cannot rely on his own strength, nor brag about how much better he is than another, because all can cross the chasm on Christ's merit alike. Making an excuse for sin, such as rationalizing it, is making one's own reasoning the justification for it rather than Christ's, yet one must believe (trust it to be so, rather) that all of one's sin (failure to keep God's standards) are covered, excused, and 'washed clean' tabula rasa by the sacrifice of Christ for us and none other excuse.
To receive forgiveness of sin by Christ is simply done by the trust in Christ to cover it, nothing else. A simple, non-formula prayer seals the deal, such as, "God, I put Christ as the complete payment for the sin I have comitted, and trust that Christ's righteousness replaces my unrighteousness when my life is reviewed at judgement. I thank you for it, Amen." Having done this makes one a Christian (miniature Christ, having one's record of wrongdoing replaced by Christ's record of upkeeping), nothing else.
There are dozens of disagreements of scripture's interpretation on various stances on various and sundry political-like issues, but Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and etc. all agree that Christ is the complete substitution for worthiness for heaven.
The idea that "faith without works is dead" is an indicator whether one has active faith, by whether he has works -- because works are a natural evidence of this active faith. Such as an indicator of whether one is highly excited about [insert topic], evidence would be that he tells people about it, seeks new perspective on it, and enjoys its continued function -- not contrariwise, where one must work on telling people, seek new perspectives on it because he's supposed to, in order to "work up to" giving the impression to others he is excited. Lack of these things is an indicator he is likely not excited about it so much. Similarly, a fire gives off heat and light naturally, but the combination of heat and light does not equal fire. An absense of heat and light would be an absence of fire, as it were. Thus, faith without works is an idle or 'dead' faith, whereas an active one would include works like prayer and witnessing. It is not a standard under which Christians are oppressed to follow by command, it is merely an if-then indicator of the level of one's trust and belief in salvation.
Sacraments are largely a Catholic entity, while many Protestant churches (such as Southern Baptists) do not recognize transubstantiation (the actual change from wafer to flesh, wine to blood) but merely in symbolism. In the way that a table is a part of a carpenter, eating a wafer (or anything for that matter) would be eating part of the farmer, in a sense. Since Christ is described as the one thru whom all things were made, the wafer/wine is thus the flesh/blood of the savior, Christ. It is also a time to deeply reflect on how much we have is not because of our own efforts -- particularly salvation, since it's totally Christ's work and none of ours. The sense that animal sacrifice used to cover up sin temporarily is now replaced with Christ's permanent sacrifice, once and for all. In a sense that food and drink nourish the body, Christ nourishes the soul.
Consider the similarity of Adam & Eve's attempt to cover their nakedness with leaves, but God took the lives of a few animals, shedding the blood of such, to cover their shame instead with their furs and hides. This might be the first evidence that blood was needed to be shed in order to adequately compensate for guilt and disobedience, rather than man's own feeble attempts at covering his faults on his own ideas.
Also, Here are a few remarks about blood and its references in scripture. I hope that helps some, if I was not overly verbose.
posted by vanoakenfold at 10:42 AM on November 21, 2005
Our 'unrighteousness' (whether we have kept God's standard or not) separates us from God like a deep chasm incapable of being crossed. But Christ, who was righteous (kept God's rules completely) according to God's standards, makes an unnblemished sacrifice that allows the sinner to cross the chasm on Christ's merit, not the sinner's own. Critics of Christianity often frown upon its assertion that Christ is the only way, but to the contrary, joy is made because a way has been made where there had not been one formerly. Prior animal sacrifices only covered the debt for a time, whereas Christ's is permanent erasure of the records. Consider getting an extension on paying taxes -- it is only for a time before the tax is due later, but Christ would be the person to step in and pay your taxes for you, when you could not. The people of the Old Testament were relying on God to save them from what they owed, and their sacrifices were acknowledgement that debt was owed, waiting for the messiah/final-sacrifice to come later to cover it all.
The reason Christ is the 'only' way is that Christ has been the only unblemished person capable of making a worthy sacrifice to bridge the gap, on our behalf. This way, the sinner cannot rely on his own strength, nor brag about how much better he is than another, because all can cross the chasm on Christ's merit alike. Making an excuse for sin, such as rationalizing it, is making one's own reasoning the justification for it rather than Christ's, yet one must believe (trust it to be so, rather) that all of one's sin (failure to keep God's standards) are covered, excused, and 'washed clean' tabula rasa by the sacrifice of Christ for us and none other excuse.
To receive forgiveness of sin by Christ is simply done by the trust in Christ to cover it, nothing else. A simple, non-formula prayer seals the deal, such as, "God, I put Christ as the complete payment for the sin I have comitted, and trust that Christ's righteousness replaces my unrighteousness when my life is reviewed at judgement. I thank you for it, Amen." Having done this makes one a Christian (miniature Christ, having one's record of wrongdoing replaced by Christ's record of upkeeping), nothing else.
There are dozens of disagreements of scripture's interpretation on various stances on various and sundry political-like issues, but Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and etc. all agree that Christ is the complete substitution for worthiness for heaven.
The idea that "faith without works is dead" is an indicator whether one has active faith, by whether he has works -- because works are a natural evidence of this active faith. Such as an indicator of whether one is highly excited about [insert topic], evidence would be that he tells people about it, seeks new perspective on it, and enjoys its continued function -- not contrariwise, where one must work on telling people, seek new perspectives on it because he's supposed to, in order to "work up to" giving the impression to others he is excited. Lack of these things is an indicator he is likely not excited about it so much. Similarly, a fire gives off heat and light naturally, but the combination of heat and light does not equal fire. An absense of heat and light would be an absence of fire, as it were. Thus, faith without works is an idle or 'dead' faith, whereas an active one would include works like prayer and witnessing. It is not a standard under which Christians are oppressed to follow by command, it is merely an if-then indicator of the level of one's trust and belief in salvation.
Sacraments are largely a Catholic entity, while many Protestant churches (such as Southern Baptists) do not recognize transubstantiation (the actual change from wafer to flesh, wine to blood) but merely in symbolism. In the way that a table is a part of a carpenter, eating a wafer (or anything for that matter) would be eating part of the farmer, in a sense. Since Christ is described as the one thru whom all things were made, the wafer/wine is thus the flesh/blood of the savior, Christ. It is also a time to deeply reflect on how much we have is not because of our own efforts -- particularly salvation, since it's totally Christ's work and none of ours. The sense that animal sacrifice used to cover up sin temporarily is now replaced with Christ's permanent sacrifice, once and for all. In a sense that food and drink nourish the body, Christ nourishes the soul.
Consider the similarity of Adam & Eve's attempt to cover their nakedness with leaves, but God took the lives of a few animals, shedding the blood of such, to cover their shame instead with their furs and hides. This might be the first evidence that blood was needed to be shed in order to adequately compensate for guilt and disobedience, rather than man's own feeble attempts at covering his faults on his own ideas.
Also, Here are a few remarks about blood and its references in scripture. I hope that helps some, if I was not overly verbose.
posted by vanoakenfold at 10:42 AM on November 21, 2005
When discussing the symbolism of sheep and lambs in the Bible beyond the direct agricultural meaning of "Washed in the blood", there's much to understand. It's an enormous topic. As geoff points out, these metaphors pervade Christianity and Judaism. It's not coincidental; it was the stuff of daily life for the people of Moses, and all things sheep were universally understood. That's why the sheep analogies are so common.
But the symbolism is multi-layered, and sheep analogies represent many different ideas. It helps to keep learning about the development of the role of animals in the belief structure of Judeo-Christian people. I had some understanding of this already, but have done some more looking around to shore up my sense of the chronology of the development.
Animals and sacrifice have been closely bound throughout most of human history. Nearly every ancient culture practiced it in some form or other. Sacrifice was a way of appeasing or supplicating gods. Any food (milk, wine, meat, grain, fruit) could be offered as a meal for the gods. Usually, sacrificing was done in fire: because the offering was burnt until only ask remained, it was assumed to have been consumed by the gods. Appeasing the gods, supplicating, asking for intervention, giving thanks: all were preceeded by a sacrifice.
Human sacrifice was not altogether uncommon in early times. Child sacrifice was a practice of pre-Biblical people. The Semites, the people who became the Old Testament tribes, understood animal sacrifice as a stand-in for human sacrifice, allowing them to reject human sacrifice. The story of Abraham and Isaac can be read as the allegory for that idea -- God means only to test Abraham's faith, he doesn't actually need a human to die. An animal will do instead as long as the faith is flawless. So the precedent for viewing Christ's death as sacrifice was set from thousands of years before the event.
There's a phenomenal explanation of all this in the Sacrifice article of the Catholic Encyclopedia, including how the effects of animal sacrifice were reasoned to be applicable to the sacrifice of Christ on the cross.
The "Passover' was a celebratory festival to commemorate the annual migration from winter pastures in the hills back into the villages, where crops could be grown. To ensure a safe trip, shepherds would usually sacrifice a newborn lamb. The trip, called the "passover", reminded early Jews of the Exodus from Egypt and became an annual reenactment. As part of the Passover, Jews were to dot the lintel of their doors with lamb's blood. This was conflated with the story of persecution in Egypt, where blood on the door the evidence demanded by Pharoah that all first-born Jewish sons had been killed. "We have made our sacrifice" is what it says.
Christians generally believe that the sacrifice of Christ was the last necessary blood sacrifice God will ever demand - that this one bought a "pass" for the rest of us for all time. Saved people are 'washed in the blood of the Lamb', the Lamb being Jesus standing in for the traditional sacrificial lamb of course, and thus will be recognized by God as part of the family. Catholics believe that communion wine is transubstantiated to be actual sacrificial blood, while other Christians don't necessarily. The important idea behind both is that the sacrifice of Jesus remains available for everyone to take part in, even those who don't live in his time.
All very interesting, all very complicated and nuanced. Just to make it clear, I'm not a fundie, I'm a folklorist. Which makes it all the more interesting. I relish the idea of contemporary Americans who follow practices of nomadic, robe-wearing, lamb-killing, goat-milk-drinking, blood-smearing Jewish shepherds without very often wondering why.
posted by Miko at 10:56 AM on November 21, 2005
But the symbolism is multi-layered, and sheep analogies represent many different ideas. It helps to keep learning about the development of the role of animals in the belief structure of Judeo-Christian people. I had some understanding of this already, but have done some more looking around to shore up my sense of the chronology of the development.
Animals and sacrifice have been closely bound throughout most of human history. Nearly every ancient culture practiced it in some form or other. Sacrifice was a way of appeasing or supplicating gods. Any food (milk, wine, meat, grain, fruit) could be offered as a meal for the gods. Usually, sacrificing was done in fire: because the offering was burnt until only ask remained, it was assumed to have been consumed by the gods. Appeasing the gods, supplicating, asking for intervention, giving thanks: all were preceeded by a sacrifice.
Human sacrifice was not altogether uncommon in early times. Child sacrifice was a practice of pre-Biblical people. The Semites, the people who became the Old Testament tribes, understood animal sacrifice as a stand-in for human sacrifice, allowing them to reject human sacrifice. The story of Abraham and Isaac can be read as the allegory for that idea -- God means only to test Abraham's faith, he doesn't actually need a human to die. An animal will do instead as long as the faith is flawless. So the precedent for viewing Christ's death as sacrifice was set from thousands of years before the event.
There's a phenomenal explanation of all this in the Sacrifice article of the Catholic Encyclopedia, including how the effects of animal sacrifice were reasoned to be applicable to the sacrifice of Christ on the cross.
The "Passover' was a celebratory festival to commemorate the annual migration from winter pastures in the hills back into the villages, where crops could be grown. To ensure a safe trip, shepherds would usually sacrifice a newborn lamb. The trip, called the "passover", reminded early Jews of the Exodus from Egypt and became an annual reenactment. As part of the Passover, Jews were to dot the lintel of their doors with lamb's blood. This was conflated with the story of persecution in Egypt, where blood on the door the evidence demanded by Pharoah that all first-born Jewish sons had been killed. "We have made our sacrifice" is what it says.
Christians generally believe that the sacrifice of Christ was the last necessary blood sacrifice God will ever demand - that this one bought a "pass" for the rest of us for all time. Saved people are 'washed in the blood of the Lamb', the Lamb being Jesus standing in for the traditional sacrificial lamb of course, and thus will be recognized by God as part of the family. Catholics believe that communion wine is transubstantiated to be actual sacrificial blood, while other Christians don't necessarily. The important idea behind both is that the sacrifice of Jesus remains available for everyone to take part in, even those who don't live in his time.
All very interesting, all very complicated and nuanced. Just to make it clear, I'm not a fundie, I'm a folklorist. Which makes it all the more interesting. I relish the idea of contemporary Americans who follow practices of nomadic, robe-wearing, lamb-killing, goat-milk-drinking, blood-smearing Jewish shepherds without very often wondering why.
posted by Miko at 10:56 AM on November 21, 2005
a "pass" for the rest of us
Oops. I tried really hard to avoid the Proselytizing Plural Pronoun. I'm not proselytizing, but that one got by me after reading all this stuff. Sorry.
posted by Miko at 11:28 AM on November 21, 2005
Oops. I tried really hard to avoid the Proselytizing Plural Pronoun. I'm not proselytizing, but that one got by me after reading all this stuff. Sorry.
posted by Miko at 11:28 AM on November 21, 2005
Excellent, excellent answers all around. Thanks so much. When I read Miko's comment the song suddenly became richer in a hundred ways. And vanoakenfold, thanks for adding a great answer to this previous folklore question (where many of the same members also answered). (It's nice that questions stay open now.)
posted by OmieWise at 12:55 PM on November 21, 2005
posted by OmieWise at 12:55 PM on November 21, 2005
Totally about agriculture:
ROU Xenophobe wondered if the orphaned lamb story was a real practise or purest bullshit.
I grew up on a fairly large (by NZ standards, even) sheep farm, and it is very common to have orphans at lambing time and foster them where possible onto a ewe who has lost her lamb. There are always more orphans than foster-mums, which leads to a lot of bottle-feeding!
Most ewes were relatively easy to persuade - they are so driven by the mothering instinct, and hungry lambs are persistent! We would generally pen a docile ewe up in a comfy dark corner with the lamb and leave her to it.
I have never heard of blood being used to carry the dead lamb's scent. I am fairly sure that would freak out most animals.
WARNING - FOLLOWING IS ICKY
In the case of a stubborn ewe we would rub the orphan with the sticky pelt of the dead lamb, or in extreme cases, skin the dead lamb and tie the pelt to the orphan, removing it after a couple of days. The idea is that the scent mingles, and also that the ewe bonds when she licks her new lamb clean.
Although, if you had to go to that much trouble, it was unlikely that the ewe was ever going to properly take to the orphan, and it was kinder to all involved to bottlefeed.
Wow. I tend to never think about these things now. Repressed childhood stuff : )
posted by Catch at 4:46 PM on November 21, 2005
ROU Xenophobe wondered if the orphaned lamb story was a real practise or purest bullshit.
I grew up on a fairly large (by NZ standards, even) sheep farm, and it is very common to have orphans at lambing time and foster them where possible onto a ewe who has lost her lamb. There are always more orphans than foster-mums, which leads to a lot of bottle-feeding!
Most ewes were relatively easy to persuade - they are so driven by the mothering instinct, and hungry lambs are persistent! We would generally pen a docile ewe up in a comfy dark corner with the lamb and leave her to it.
I have never heard of blood being used to carry the dead lamb's scent. I am fairly sure that would freak out most animals.
WARNING - FOLLOWING IS ICKY
In the case of a stubborn ewe we would rub the orphan with the sticky pelt of the dead lamb, or in extreme cases, skin the dead lamb and tie the pelt to the orphan, removing it after a couple of days. The idea is that the scent mingles, and also that the ewe bonds when she licks her new lamb clean.
Although, if you had to go to that much trouble, it was unlikely that the ewe was ever going to properly take to the orphan, and it was kinder to all involved to bottlefeed.
Wow. I tend to never think about these things now. Repressed childhood stuff : )
posted by Catch at 4:46 PM on November 21, 2005
This thread is closed to new comments.
and what is meant by being
'washed in the blood of the lamb'?
posted by blue_beetle at 7:34 AM on November 21, 2005