Church Burns

Oh I do like playing with words! Actually this piece is not at all about Pentecost, or even about a church building being on fire, but about Robert Burns and his writing that relates to Church!

In the years of his life, from 1759 to 1796, the church was a major facet of community life. So its not surprising that Burns wrote about the church, and about its people.

I was surprised to discover a few years ago that Burns wrote versions of the First and Ninetieth Psalms, and perhaps his most obvious work about a church person could be Holy Willie's Prayer. But he wrote many other pieces with less obvious connections to the church, such as To A Louse (as he watched one crawling on a woman's hat during the sermon), or Tam O' Shanter (where the ruined Alloway Kirk was full of witches and warlocks having a ceilidh).

Burns was bold enough to write an Address to the Unco Guid, or the Rigidly Righteous. It is prefaced by his own version of Ecclesiastes 7:16. The NIV reads, "Do not be over-righteous, neither be overwise - why destroy yourself?"
Burns writes,
"My Son, these maxims make a rule,
And lump them ay thegither;
The Rigid Righteous is a fool,
the Rigid Wise anither:
The cleanest corn that e'er was dight
May hae some pyles o' caff in;
So ne-er a fellow-creature slight
for random fits o' daffin."

By request, a glossary:
dight, pronounced dicht, meaning clean, wipe, or winnow.
pyles, same as piles.
caff, meaning chaff.
daffin, meaning acts of silliness or foolishness, acting daft.

The Address itself contains eight verses along the lines of Jesus' saying in Matthew 7:3, "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?" It makes an enjoyable read, so long as we don't feel too Unco Guid ourselves!

I think that Robert Burns and Jesus of Nazareth have probably enjoyed poking fun, or perhaps just laughing together, at the over-righteous of this world, not merely during Burns' short life on earth, but all the while thereafter.