Despair is the prompt for Thursday. These prompts have only just come out, as Linda Hill asked for more suggestions the other day, and the rest of January’s list is slowly being populated. I hope my word gets picked!
Just Jot It January is by Linda Hill (with help from her friends). You can jot something down for the prompt anywhere, any time, just post it on your blog before the end of the month (so it seems). You can read the full instructions here.
Despair – Jan 18th
This is linked back to Carol Anne‘s blog and to Linda’s post for the day.
Instant thoughts on ‘despair’…
I can think of several literary connections, like Giant Despair, and possibly some more references in the Psalms!
One thing that sticks with me from school, is that Judas’s sin was not betraying Christ, but despair that he would never be forgiven, which was why he committed suicide. I don’t know how garbled I got that, but since I was a teenager, with more appreciation of nuance, I’ve had a lot of sympathy for him.
Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice also had some sympathy for him.
Jesus Christ Superstar is one of my favourite musicals. It never grows old (maybe because the story is as old as time, or at least two millennia). The point of view is great.
Judas is in charge of this story–and he makes full use of it to explain: he was stitched up. Jesus had to have a betrayer, or else he would not die to take away ‘our’ sins. God set it up from the start. Set Judas up, that is. Well, and Jesus, too, as he shows in the song ‘Gethsemane’.
But was it despair that led you to kill yourself, Judas? Or maybe something much more complicated?
Boy, I haven’t thought about that movie for a long time. I can’t remember enough of it to say what I think of it. I had forgotten that about the nature of Judas’s sin, if I ever knew/thought about it. The whole issue about suicide and despair as being sin (because of a lack of trust in God, I think is how the reasoning goes) has always itched at me.