Dispatch 99 : A Telling Moment

Dispatches

Volume 11 : April 18, 2021

I WILL refrain from writing a general commentary on the Funeral of His Royal Highness The Prince Philip Duke of Edinburgh. I was greatly moved. I also learned something that has strengthened my faith a thousand-fold.

It came at that moment when the Dean of Windsor delivered eloquently, quietly and yet with a sense of power that I will not try to describe, the main Reading. The Dean informed the Family and the Watching World that he was reading from Ecclesiasticus 43 : 11 - 26.

Some of the verses were familiar. Yet, this seemed to be opening up dimensions, providing us with a superlative account of Nature, the Power of Nature, yet, constantly reminding me that the Most High was a step ahead of Nature.

Rarely, have I been so moved by a reading of Scripture.

Last evening, I decided to watch the BBC shortened version of the Funeral and was disappointed when - did I blink? - we seem to have missed the Moment of the Service, as we cut to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s much shorter reading from the New Testament of a conversation between Christ and Martha and then straight to the Choir’s rendition of Psalm 104.

In the Service, Ecclesiasticus 43 : 11 - 26 was followed immediately by Psalm 104.

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One has to have an ear for the word when sung rather than spoken. Once I had read Psalm 104 I could understand what I was listening to. That is no criticism of the Choir. But that reading did not come until very late last night.

I popped down to the study. I needed to read Ecclesiastes and I needed my main Bible, heavily annotated by me over a lifetime, and pulled it out from all of the other Bibles on the shelf.

Forgive me, but I am no scholar. Thus, when the Dean of Windsor referred to Ecclesiasticus I simply thought the Dean was using ancient language. I had completely forgotten that in my Bible the Book of Ecclesiastes has only 12 chapters.

I found several verses, but, simply put, truncated.

Fortunately, the internet speedily informed me of this apparent dilemma.

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The Dean of Windsor had read from a book that the Protestant Church had removed in 1800. I openly exclaimed to my desk, What? What perfidy is this?!

I am a member of the Anglican Church and, therefore, Protestant, and Her Majesty the Queen is the Head of the Established Church (as we know it, here, in the United Kingdom), Defender of the Faith. I prefer to think Defender of Faiths.

Right. I now need to find a full recording of the Service and I was delighted to so do, courtesy of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), and was able to revisit the Reading by the Dean.

I then retired.

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I picked up my prayer book - the book of common prayer - and only the slightest flicking of pages alighted on to Psalm 104.

I read it.

That Moment yesterday morning was now dovetailing perfectly with a New Moment in the watches of the night.

Great peace was my companion.

And as one who loves ships and the sea (as well as aviation), it was as if the Prince Consort had beautifully touched the world’s rudder, to regain perspective, to align ourselves afresh.

It also did something else : regardless of what christian fundamentalists of any denomination might say, I must now read the Apocrypha in full. I need to have the whole picture, not a censored version of ancient writings which, we know too well, depends upon what’s currently ‘in’ and what’s currently ‘out’.

My utterance before the side-lamp went out?

Thank you, Sir!

18 April 2021
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Liverpool

April 18, 2021

In the Watches of the Night

(January 2026)

© 2022 Kenneth Thomas Webb

The Lament … one of the most moving moments of a World’s Farewell

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Windsor Castle The Present Arms The Nation and the Commonwealth