The Providential Seed Corn – and the Puzzle of Thankfulness

November 24, 1965
Plainfield

Also,
November 20, 1977
Lakeland

The Providential Seed Corn – and the Puzzle of Thankfulness

In November – December 1620, before deciding to settle Plymouth, the Pilgrims reconnoitered other parts of Cape Cod. In his unorthodox book of the Pilgrim adventure, SAINTS AND STRANGERS, George Willison has a fascinating chapter, “Babes in the Wilderness.” Monday, the 13th of November, 1620, was a day when the women went ashore to wash the heaps of clothes and bedding soiled in the long voyage. Sentries guarded them while excited children ran up and down the beach. Some men repaired the longboat; others dug clams on the tidal flats to make a succulent feast.

Two days later, sixteen men led by Captain Myles Standish, set off to explore the best possible place of settlement. Soon they glimpsed five or six Indians, whom the Pilgrims called “Savages,” but the Indians darted off into the woods. The Pilgrims pursued; and if the native Americans had hostile intentions, nothing could have been easier than an ambush. But there was no trap.

Near what is now Truro, on Cape Cod, Captain Standish and his company came on several clearings which the Indians had used as cornfields. They noticed sand piles covered with grass rugs, which although the first pile they investigated was a grave, others proved to be underground enclosures for corn stored in large baskets – three or four bushel capacity. This of course was the Indian seed corn being stored for next year’s crop. The Pilgrims simply helped themselves to other people’s property without permission and with no compensation. Willison writes, “This was just plain larceny of course, but the Pilgrims were inclined to regard it as another special providence of God. And in a sense it was, for without this seed corn the would have had no crops the next year and all would have starved to death. As it was, they just barely managed to squeeze through.” (p. 150)

When one thinks about it, this is a variation on a thanksgiving theme, is it not?

Can taking other people’s property, just because one needs it, be called the “providence of God?” The question may seem irreverent, because haloes have been shining over Pilgrim memories for quite a while, but supposed it happened to you today? Suppose some ragged invaders of a different skin color helped themselves to your stores of food at the beginning of Winter? And it was food you could not possibly replace? The Pilgrims were people of the Book – the Bible, we are told. What happened to the commandment “Thou shalt not steal?” Judgment at this distance of 345 years is unnecessary and futile.

But we might well think back with gratitude on the forbearance of the Americans to these invaders. Slaughtering the Pilgrim Company would not have been difficult. Continued harassment would have caused an utter failure of the Company, particularly that first dreadful Winter. Furthermore, the continued history of relations between colonizers, and later our nation with the Indians reflects little glory and much shame upon us for the broken treaties, the imposed degradation and nearly complete extinction of the American Indian cultures by the invaders from Europe.

So in moments such as these, we would feel some sense of repentance; we would not only admire the Pilgrim fathers, but also the Indian brothers, for without the forbearance and peaceful attitudes of these so-called “savages,” the Plimoth Plantation would have been no more enduring than that ill-fated colony of Englishmen on Roanoke Island in Virginia.

Such gratitude may be a variation on a theme, but an aspect we should recognize more than we do.

And so they survived.

Attached:
November 21, 1954
Bridgeport

The Religion of the Third Feast

When the settlers at Plymouth gathered the following year to give thanks, to feast and to enjoy the friendship of their Indian neighbors, an American tradition began. Because we are Americans, we are emotionally conditioned to think of Thanksgiving as a celebration born on the shores of Massachusetts Bay, [345] years ago. That’s a long time ago. The tradition of a government of free men under self-imposed laws that was born in the cabin of the Mayflower at the beginning of that great adventure was a heritage that grew and culminated in the American Revolution with goals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; was a tradition that then exerted a cleansing moral force on some of the infections of tyrannies that had hung on: slavery, voting franchise for everyone regardless of wealth or poverty or sex, free public education, and new in our time the legal removal by the Supreme Court of the stain of discrimination because of skin color. There are many ways that the Pilgrim tradition has enriched us, freed us, and put pressure on us to discipline ourselves.

But the Thanksgiving tradition is older than the Pilgrim’s feast in 1621. Thanksgiving is an ancient ceremony with roots in the very beginnings of our ancient Hebrew religious culture.

The reading from the old scripture of Leviticus (23/ 33/38) tells the story of the Feast of Tabernacles (or Booths). This scripture is the written record of ceremonies even more ancient. The Feast of Tabernacles, or Sukkat (Succoth) was the celebration of the final harvest home of the fruits and olives. It was a time of rejoicing. In early times the whole Israelite population lived for a week in the open, sheltered by temporary tents of palm branches. As time went on their descendants observed the ceremony in various ways. When the temple was built in Jerusalem, Sukkat became a time of pilgrimage to that most holy place where sacrifice was offered. In many Jewish homes, even to this day, the rooms are decorated to take on the appearance of booths. Our harvest feast of Thanksgiving is in one sense the Americanized version of the old Hebrew feast of Tabernacles.

This Feast was the third of the great religious festivals when Pilgrims marched to Jerusalem. Christianity has many parallels. The first feast, Passover, became Easter for Christians. The second, the Feast of Weeks, is somewhat less known in America, but in most Christian countries is observed as Pentecost, or Whitsunday.

Thus the meaning of Thanksgiving stirs our feelings because not only does it appeal to our patriotism, and to our pride in the faith, courage and resourcefulness of the Pilgrims, but also because Thanksgiving stirs our religious feelings at depth. (More than that one of the days when human affection is ...)

In addition, the intensity of our emotions is reinforced because this Autumn ceremony of thankfulness for harvest home is not alone the product of our Hebrew and Pilgrim heritage.

The Pilgrims may have been as much inspired by the Indians as their Hebrew heritage. A. Hyatt Verrill, explorer, scholar of Indian cultures, author of many books, who died in New Haven just a few days ago, made a very interesting claim in his book, THE REAL AMERICANS. Mr. Verrill noted that the “Indians’ seasonal dances and ceremonies (were) numerous and of many kinds ... in the Eastern states the Algonquin tribes such as Delawares, Shawnees, Iroquois, Mohicans, Massachusetts ... and others hold a great autumnal or crop ceremonial feast. (Hundreds of years before the Pilgrims landed) The Indians gathered to give thanks to the Great Spirit and lesser deities for abundant crops, good hunting and fishing. Dances were held ... Drums of a special form were thumped .. A new fire symbolic of a fresh start in life was kindled and there was a great feast with venison roasting ears, wild turkeys, squash pumpkins, pudding.” Mr. Verrill believed that it was from this great Indian ceremony that we derive our Thanksgiving.

One of the most shameful, as well as least known sections of American history has been our inhuman treatment of the Indian tribes who lived on the North American continent when the Europeans began colonization. When history is looked at with some objectivity – when we forget the way we have been conditioned by the “western” movies and the lurid books – we become aware that the Indians of this continent were friendly and hospitable to the newcomers. They were far more friendly to the Europeans than the third and fourth generation Americans were to later immigrants from across the sea. The causes of so-called Indian massacres can be found in broken treaties, in natural retaliation against the brutality, ignorance and greed of the white men who came across the sea. If the Indians had not been friendly it is obvious that there could have been no settlements established.

When the Pilgrims held their great feast of thanks to God they were under the influence of Indian culture as well as Hebrew culture – and the culture of the American Indians was far more advanced than we have ever realized or admitted. The Indian tribes were deeply religious. For the most part they lived in peace with other tribes. Their family life was wholesome and taught high values to the growing children.

One of their Thanksgiving prayers has been translated thus:

“We give thanks for the corn and beans and quashes that give us life;
We give thanks for the wind which moves the air and blows away diseases;
We give thanks for the sun which has looked on us with a kindly eye;
We give thanks for the moon and stars which give us light when the sun is gone;
We give thanks to the Great Spirit, who is all goodness, and who directs all things for the good of his children.”

Furthermore, the religion of the third feast has even deeper roots than already described. Nearly all peoples, all over the world, have had harvest ceremonies and feasts. The wonder of growing things that are nourishing and pleasant to the taste has always gripped the imagination of human beings. Persons survive because of growing things. The record of history, and the events of pre-history which we can assume from tribal memories, folk songs and remnants of ancient ritual – all these confirm the intensity with which seedtime, growth and harvest have always captured the religious feelings of persons of all-time, everywhere.

As far as can be learned, not all harvest festivals were the same everywhere. Variations occurred because of such factors as the most important food crop, the climate, and the relative state of cultural advancement. However, the essential rituals in primitive harvest ceremonies were: 1) propitiatory rites, 2) observances to secure fertility, 3) the offering of first-fruits.

Most of our beliefs are survivals, refined and enlightened, of these primitive expressions. The universal elements of Thanksgiving or harvest festival still basically express the same emotions. We are false to our human heritage if we discard or ignore these basic feelings. But w are also traitor to humanity if we ignore the advances and enlightenment won for us by human beings who refined the barbarisms by unselfish acts and by radiant influence, causing more light to shine on ancient symbols and sacrifices.

Thus the religious meaning of Thanksgiving can best be apprehended by looking at the ancient and primitive ways, and then taking them to our hearts with the refinements of the best of civilization.

First the people of the pre-historic past observe the ingathering of the crops with propitiatory rites. They believed that all things were occupied by spirits. There was the corn-spirit; the tree spirit; the spirit of every vegetable. The people believed that when these were taken for food, the spirits would be angered unless they were placated. So ceremonies grew around the harvest. The corn spirit had to receive some attention or it might be angry at the persons who harvested the golden ears. The vine and tree had to be placated when the grapes and fruit were taken for human use.

Out of this primitive fear of the spirits of growing things has grown, gradually, the spirit of thankfulness to the Power people call God. This world, our home, furnishes us with food, warmth and shelter. There is a spirit of mysterious growth. It does not matter too much, I suppose, if we call that spirit God, Yahweh, Allah, Manitou, or whatever. In the city, particularly, where we are too far from the soil, we have a particular need to remember to be grateful for life and for the harvest which sustains it. Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful for harvest home – for harvest home means life for us and all we love.

The second of the worship elements that the primitives observed was the ritual to insure that the fields would be fertile another year. The rites were primitive. Many peoples included the sacrifice of a human being, the ashes of the sacrificed one being scattered on the fields so that the following year a good crop would grow. As persons gradually became conscious of the value of human life, there was refinement in ritual until animals were sacrificed, and as time went on even that custom was abolished.

But even though the sacrifice of human life no longer would be tolerated, the basic obligation of conservation and restoration of the “holy earth” is ours nevertheless. More and more we must realize that the organic elements of the soil must be restored if abundant, nourishing crops are to be continued. We live in a world where the net population is increasing at a fearful rate. If ever our world is to see a relaxing of tensions between the “have” and the “have-not” peoples, there must be an adequate food supply. Conservation of the soil, forests, water supply, restoration of the mineral elements of the soil removed by crops, all measures which will increase food supplies must be taken in our world if human life is to continue.

(Constant struggle between competing interests)

The battle that Theodore Roosevelt fought and won for conservation in early 20th century America can be lost in our day if we forget the necessity of keeping forest reserves, game preserves, water supplies flood-control and power achievements beyond the power of greedy, short-sighted men.

[Editor’s note: the following is in the Bridgeport sermon, but apparently excised for Plainfield and Lakeland:

There are additional perils. The new noun in our language, “fall-out” refers to the fact that as a result of atomic and hydrogen experiments, many places in the world, even our own country, have experienced rainfalls of radioactive dust. So far, we are told, except for the unlucky Japanese fishing vessels, these “fall-outs” have not been [of] sufficient intensity to represent a danger to human life. A good many people, even the conservative and militant Winston Churchill, are greatly concerned that if these fission experiments continue, the fall-outs will be deadly enough to poison our soil, to make the fruit and all growing things, for which we are thankful, deadly for human beings.

We may have to make a different kind of sacrifice than the primitive peoples to [ensure] the fertility of the earth. We may have to take steps that will halt the rain of death; even if these steps mean that we may have to revise our accepted ideas about individual sovereignty and our notion that we have the right to tell the rest of the world to go hang.]

The third primitive ritual observed in the shadowy and ancient past was the offering of the first fruits to the god and gods. Not only were the fruit and vegetables brought to the altar; and the fatted calves burned in the altar flames; but in more fearsome days the very first child of a man and woman was consecrated to a fiery death in the gaping mouth of Moloch.

Early peoples felt these heartbreaking acts were necessary to appease the anger and desires of the gods they worshiped. No longer do we roast our first-born at the altar of religion. (Although the Mars still receives his tributes). We do not decorate our altars with fruit and vegetables. When churches did, of late years it was for the purpose of feeding those who were in need.

As men advanced in understanding they recognized that rather than destroying humans and vegetables on the altar as a thing pleasing to God, they increased their responsibility for the welfare of their fellow human beings. (Amos: “I hate, despise, but let, righteousness,” etc.)

Thus the Hebrews in their Feast of the Tabernacles refined and humanized the meaning of the festival. In addition to the more original elements of harvest ritual and thanks, the Feast of Tabernacles became the occasion when the Hebrews remembered with gratitude the wanderings of their ancestors who roamed the wilderness for many years, sheltered by tents. The booths (or tents) in houses or in the fields where the Israelites should dwell for 7 days in commemoration of the feast is a reminder to them that their ancestors thought enough of their unique religion and culture to want to be freed from the chains of slavery; to venture into unknown perils for the sake of freedom and for the chance to live their lives in the way they believed to be right. “Let my people go,” said Moses to Pharaoh. When Pharaoh hardened his heart, the people went anyway. They sought freedom. Their courage is one of the great parts of our heritage as well as the heritage of the Jewish people.

Philo, the Alexandrian, one of the greatest Jewish philosophers who lived [around] 200 BC, said of this harvest festival of tabernacles, “it teaches equality, the first principle and beginning of justice ... (as well as) the witnessing of the perfection of all fruits of the year, and the giving of thanks to the being who has made them perfect.”

Thus the first-fruits in our day must be a recognition that life is given to us for moral uses: that God is best served by serving the needs of our fellow-men.

We are all tempted at times to be like the boy in the nursery rhyme (with a little poetic license)

“Little Jack Horner, sat in a corner,
Eating a (Thanksgiving) pie.
He put in his thumb and pulled out a plum,
And said, what a great boy am I.”

But that is not the best of our heritage. From the Jewish people, and from their moral growth that added justice and righteousness to the necessary components of the harvest festival came also the idea of the synagogue. This is a time in Jewish congregations when the institution of the synagogue receives special recognition. We would do well to be glad that the Jewish people evolved this institution for it was a fore-runner of real democracy. In the synagogue all men were equal in the sight of God; no priest, no person or privilege could claim special distinction; all souls were equal as they sought to learn more of what religion is and what religion does. The church fellowship has incorporated many of the best ideas of the synagogue; democracy in church policy; the value of every person; the necessity of learning the facts of religion as well as learning to respond emotionally to religion.

So amid next Thursday’s celebration of family, food and the spiritual fragrance of happiness together, may it be that we will experience a drive to real thanksgiving – be part of conserving a world of hope for all persons; a drive to be working members of a world synagogue dedicated to learning more so that all people may obtain justice and a satisfactory life in which everyone can rejoice and give thanks in freedom to the God who is the creator of all persons everywhere in the world.