Today, the 14th of January was celebrated throughout the Middle Ages as the Feast of the Ass. It is generally seen as related to the ever popular Feast of Fools, but in this variation celebrating all sorts of variations on donkey stories, attached specifically to the story of the holy family going to Egypt, and the donkey they rode on…
Some, particularly Carl Jung think it derives from a pagan holiday Cervulus which was observed on the first of January.
What I especially like that during the mass, it is claimed that when it came time to say amen, the people would instead bray…
It brings to mind a critique I once read about C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, saying that to make the Christ figure a lion was missing the point of Jesus, who would better be portrayed as a donkey, and his companions would be broken in many different ways.
As one of the broken, I rather like that.
And so a tip of the hat to the donkey.
In all her glory…
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