Historical Setting: Jarrow, 794 C.E.
He asked about the infant, and I asked the question back to the three old fellows gathered on the benches here.
“Why would an ealdorman keep a baby here?”
The man with no teeth answers first.
“He thaid it were hith own thun.”
The owner of cows, Tam, still smelling of fresh milk from his morning chores has an explanation.
“He envied those of us with children, and said he also needed a ‘legacy.’
Toothless said, “He took one look at Tam’th richeth — cowth and five thunth and nary a tithe needed pay for them and he envied.”
Tam said, “He’d collect the king’s tithe from me in churned butter and straw bales, but my sons are a value far better than land or riches. Children are better than all the riches of earth. They promise a future. I think he saw I was rich in legacy and not even paying the taxes of a rich man.”
“Let me guess” I added, “without the ealdorman here now, you’ve delivered the butter to the monastery.”
Tam answers, “The monks came for it themselves.”
The other says, “The ealdorman’s envy ate him up. He told everyone he thuffered from luthting for legathy.
Tam added, “He weren’t seeing the value in the wife or daughters, just the legacy of sons.”
I ask, “Didn’t he expect a son would come with a mother?”
Toothless belts a laugh.
Maybe they know what I know. The ealdorman had no comprehension of family. The tiny infant that was conceived, not in love, and most likely not even in lust, was the object of greed. Legacy through sons wasn’t a taxable treasure, and the ealdorman took this tax loop-hole very personally when his greedy eyes fell on Tam with three cows and five sons, and apparently, he decided the inescapable emptiness of his life could be filled by legacy. He had no notion of his own need for love.
Envy miss-leads us so easily. We see simple happiness in another and we give our envy the name of whatever it is that person has. Tam pays the king’s due for his land, and yet the ealdorman saw Tam was happier than others. And he wanted what Tam had. Tam had a legacy. Tam had sons. But envy is always a flawed map to happiness.
Dear God, release us from the measure of the neighbor’s stuff, that we may see beyond the treasures and find the happiness in the love itself, for neighbors and selves, and for family.
(Continues Tuesday April 21)
Lazarus Ink 