Nightwalk
12-25-2006, 07:46 AM
http://i13.tinypic.com/33njinb.jpg
The Passion of Jesus Considered as an Uphill Race
Entered to race, Barabbas was scratched.
The starter was Pilate. He pulled out his waterclock (or clepsydra), which got his hands wet, unless he'd simply spat on them. And he dropped the flag.
Jesus broke at full speed.
According to that very good sports commentator, Saint Matthew, it was common practice in those days to flog bike sprinters at the start, the way a coachman does with his hippomotors. This whipping acts as a hygienic massage the same time as it stimulates. So Jesus started off in fine form, but immediately had a flat. A stretch of track seeded with thorns popped his front tire all the way around.
You can see an exact resemblance of this veritable crown of thorns in bike shop windows today as part of an ad for puncture-proof tires. Jesus, however, didn't have any, racing only with ordinary single-tube tires.
The two thieves, obviously in the know and thus "thick as thieves", took the lead.
It isn't true that there were any nails. Those three things usually seen in the ads were actually a tire-changer, called a "Jiffy".
First of all, you should know about the spills. Before that, you have to picture the apparatus itself.
Today's bike frame is a relatively recent invention. It was first seen around 1890. Beforehand, the body was made out of two tubes welded together perpendicularly to each other. It was commonly referred to as "the right-angle" or "the cross" bike. Jesus, after his blow-out, trekked up on foot, shouldering his bike, or, if you like, his cross.
The scene is reproduced in contemporary etchings, from snapshots. But, it seems, the sport of biking, as a result of the well-known accident - putting a thorny , troublesome end to the Passion, and even updated by a similar accident, almost on the anniversary, by Count Zborowski on the Turbic slopes - was banned for a while by official state decree. That's why whenever glossy magazines reproduce the celebrated scene they imagine rather fanciful bikes. They confuse the cross of the machine's body with the cross made by it's handlebar. Jesus is portrayed with his hands spread apart on the handlebar, and, by the way, Jesus rode lying flat on his back, in order to minimize air resistance.
Note too that the machine frame, or cross, just like bike wheels to be seen as of this writing, was made of wood.
A small number have wrongly insinuated that Jesus' machine was one of those two-wheeled bikes without pedals, fashionable at the beginning of the century. Hardly the way to win an uphill race. According to Saint Bridget, Gregory of Tours, and Irenaeus, cyclophile hagiographers of yore, the cross was furnished with a configuration which they called a "suppodaneum". You don't have to be a big scholar to translate this as "a pedal".
To the point, Lipsius, Justinian, Bosius, and Erycius Puteanus all describe another accesory which, according to Cornelius Curtius, circa 1643, can still be found on Japanese crosses: a jutting out on the shaft, made of leather or wood, which the rider straddles like a horse - evidently the saddle.
Moreover, such description wouldn't be too unfaithful to the definition the Chinese people give today for a bike: "A little mule, led along by it's ears, and spurred on with a shower of foot blows".
We'll abridge our narration of the race itself, as it's been recited in detail by specialized works and exhibited as sculptures and paintings to be seen in ad hoc monuments.
There are fourteen curves to the very tough Golgotha course. Jesus took his first spill at the third curve. His mother, in the stands, started to fret.
His very good trainer, Simon the Cyrenian, who but for the thorn accident would have "led" from in front, also cutting the wind factor, carried the machine.
Tho' not carrying anything, Jesus sweated profusely. It's uncertain whether or not a female spectator wiped his face. We do know for sure that Veronica, a lady reporter, snapped a shot of him with her Kodak.
The second spill came at the seventh curve, across slippery pavement. At the eleventh, he tripped a third time, on a rail.
Common Israelite Tom, Dick, and Harrys cheered him on, at the eighth curve, waving their handkerchiefs.
The well-known, deplorable accident occured at the twelfth curve. At the time, Jesus was in a dead heat with the two thieves. It's known, too, that he continued the race airborne - but that's another story.
Translation from the French by Gary Fletcher
The Passion of Jesus Considered as an Uphill Race
Entered to race, Barabbas was scratched.
The starter was Pilate. He pulled out his waterclock (or clepsydra), which got his hands wet, unless he'd simply spat on them. And he dropped the flag.
Jesus broke at full speed.
According to that very good sports commentator, Saint Matthew, it was common practice in those days to flog bike sprinters at the start, the way a coachman does with his hippomotors. This whipping acts as a hygienic massage the same time as it stimulates. So Jesus started off in fine form, but immediately had a flat. A stretch of track seeded with thorns popped his front tire all the way around.
You can see an exact resemblance of this veritable crown of thorns in bike shop windows today as part of an ad for puncture-proof tires. Jesus, however, didn't have any, racing only with ordinary single-tube tires.
The two thieves, obviously in the know and thus "thick as thieves", took the lead.
It isn't true that there were any nails. Those three things usually seen in the ads were actually a tire-changer, called a "Jiffy".
First of all, you should know about the spills. Before that, you have to picture the apparatus itself.
Today's bike frame is a relatively recent invention. It was first seen around 1890. Beforehand, the body was made out of two tubes welded together perpendicularly to each other. It was commonly referred to as "the right-angle" or "the cross" bike. Jesus, after his blow-out, trekked up on foot, shouldering his bike, or, if you like, his cross.
The scene is reproduced in contemporary etchings, from snapshots. But, it seems, the sport of biking, as a result of the well-known accident - putting a thorny , troublesome end to the Passion, and even updated by a similar accident, almost on the anniversary, by Count Zborowski on the Turbic slopes - was banned for a while by official state decree. That's why whenever glossy magazines reproduce the celebrated scene they imagine rather fanciful bikes. They confuse the cross of the machine's body with the cross made by it's handlebar. Jesus is portrayed with his hands spread apart on the handlebar, and, by the way, Jesus rode lying flat on his back, in order to minimize air resistance.
Note too that the machine frame, or cross, just like bike wheels to be seen as of this writing, was made of wood.
A small number have wrongly insinuated that Jesus' machine was one of those two-wheeled bikes without pedals, fashionable at the beginning of the century. Hardly the way to win an uphill race. According to Saint Bridget, Gregory of Tours, and Irenaeus, cyclophile hagiographers of yore, the cross was furnished with a configuration which they called a "suppodaneum". You don't have to be a big scholar to translate this as "a pedal".
To the point, Lipsius, Justinian, Bosius, and Erycius Puteanus all describe another accesory which, according to Cornelius Curtius, circa 1643, can still be found on Japanese crosses: a jutting out on the shaft, made of leather or wood, which the rider straddles like a horse - evidently the saddle.
Moreover, such description wouldn't be too unfaithful to the definition the Chinese people give today for a bike: "A little mule, led along by it's ears, and spurred on with a shower of foot blows".
We'll abridge our narration of the race itself, as it's been recited in detail by specialized works and exhibited as sculptures and paintings to be seen in ad hoc monuments.
There are fourteen curves to the very tough Golgotha course. Jesus took his first spill at the third curve. His mother, in the stands, started to fret.
His very good trainer, Simon the Cyrenian, who but for the thorn accident would have "led" from in front, also cutting the wind factor, carried the machine.
Tho' not carrying anything, Jesus sweated profusely. It's uncertain whether or not a female spectator wiped his face. We do know for sure that Veronica, a lady reporter, snapped a shot of him with her Kodak.
The second spill came at the seventh curve, across slippery pavement. At the eleventh, he tripped a third time, on a rail.
Common Israelite Tom, Dick, and Harrys cheered him on, at the eighth curve, waving their handkerchiefs.
The well-known, deplorable accident occured at the twelfth curve. At the time, Jesus was in a dead heat with the two thieves. It's known, too, that he continued the race airborne - but that's another story.
Translation from the French by Gary Fletcher