#ancient analogies

Would you rather be like:

a)      A shelter in a vineyard

b)      A hut in a melon field

c)       A city under siege

d)      All of the above

e)      None of the above

According to Isaiah 1:8 the answer is a resounding e.

I was reading the first chapter of Isaiah tonight with a 10 year old buddy of mine and we read it very slowly. After reading the first verse and the funny names of the king he told me he was going to say “huh?” a lot and he was true to his word.

Late in the second verse I read, “they have rebelled” and he said, “huh?”.  I said, “they fought against God” and he nodded in understanding and I continued.

Early 3^rd verse I read, “manger” he said, “huh?”  I said “the barn where the donkeys sleep” and he nodded, I continued.

Mid 4^th I read “given to corruption!” he said, “huh?” I said, “lying, cheating, stealing” he nodded, I continued.

This went on for about 20 minutes and in total we read 16 verses. The biggest hang up was in verse 8 when we were presented with the shelter hut and city scenarios described above.  Both a and b seemed like good options, especially in light of c.  We were confused because the sentence listed them together as if they were all negative.

We sought the wise council of some other adults in the area.  We presented each scenario individually and without context and they all agreed that a and b sounded rather nice and c unanimously awful.  After we showed that the adjective statements were grouped together the wise council had a similar reaction to ours; the three circumstances were meant to reflect a negative situation but we weren’t sure how. After some speculation the conclusion was that further research was in order.

Thank you Google

After a quick search I learned that a shelter in a vineyard and a hut in a melon field were temporary structures built in their respective locations (as you might expect) to provide protection from the sun for those who stood guard in the field protecting the crops from thieves.  These structures were usually isolated and therefore prone to attack. Thus the melon hut and vineyard shelter do fit in nicely with a city under siege.

Ahh… I’m glad that’s settled,

If you were hoping for part two of TheBest Analogy Ever you will have to wait, maybe tomorrow will be the day for that exciting sequel.  Today’s events however, may have moved the hut and shelter into my top 100 all time analogies and I think it could crack the top 10 if we all try to bring them back into our collective lexicon.  So next time you are feeling vulnerable or if you are being literally or figuratively attacked, rather than saying “Eek – I am under attack” perhaps try, “Oh my – I feel like such a melon hut right now.”

Who knows, if it hits Twitter and Facebook we could take this thing viral!