Aaron
Holiness on the head,
Light and perfections on the breast,
Harmonious bells below, raising the dead
To lead them unto life and rest:
Thus are true Aarons drest.
Profaneness in my head,
Defects and darkness in my breast,
A noise of passions ringing me for dead
Unto a place where is no rest:
Poor priest, thus am I drest.
Only another head
I have, another heart and breast,
Another music, making live, not dead,
Without whom I could have no rest:
In him I am well drest.
Christ is my only head,
My alone-only heart and breast,
My only music, striking me ev'n dead,
That to the old man I may rest,
And be in him new-drest.
So, holy in my head,
Perfect and light in my dear breast,
My doctrine tun'd by Christ (who is not dead,
But lives in me while I do rest),
Come people; Aaron's drest.
This poem presupposes familiarity with Scripture, and with typology as a way of interpreting Scripture and applying it to the inner life. Exodus 28 is a detailed description of the High Priests garments and the details are woven throughout the poem. This poem is a meditation for priest's as they robe before conducting worship.
The priest is called as one whose headline vocational quality is holiness. The entrepreneurial priest, the techie savvy priest, the theologically radical priest, the socially engaged priest are all very well, but this 17th Century priest resets the list of essential qualities and skills for serving God; holiness comes first, seen in a life of light and harmony, truth and love. As they move the bells hanging on the chest are gospel bells calling the people to live the resurrection life of those who have died to sin and risen in Christ to newness of life. All that in one stanza stuffed with imagery quarried from the King James Version of Exodus.
Then the reality check; profaneness, not holiness, is the priest's lived experience of contradiction. The stanza is an exact reversal of what should be. Instead of "harmonious bells" of the Gospel there's the cacophony of his own sins. This is pure Romans 7, "O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"
But there is another head in whom the Christian lives. The great exchange of Christ's righteousness for human sin runs through stanzas 3 and 4. There is the music of resurrection, the new clothes of the one clothed in Christ; the old man is dead, the one who is in Christ is a new creation. Herbert is playing a theological concerto from the script of Exodus 28 interpreted through Paul's letters. The phrase "alone only" signals the singularity of the personal relationship between the Christian head, heart, breast, and Christ who renews the mind, the will and the affections.
The last stanza describes the humble readiness of the priest, dressed to serve both Christ and Church. The doctrine is well tuned, the musical metaphor recalling harmonious bells summoning the people to celebrate the living Christ who vivifies the Christian believer and vitalises the Christian church.
This poem is hard work. You have to allow for a deeply pious priest, acutely self-aware of his own failings, but persevering in his faith that he is clothed in Christ, his righteousness is God's gift, what he believes, preaches and lives is tuned and energised by the living Christ within. You don't have to be a priest to know exactly what Herbert is talking about. Read those two central stanzas again, and continue through Lent assured of the living presence of Christ in your life.
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