The World Turned Upside Down

Notes on digging

And then I understood that he was to do the greatest labour and the hardest toil that there is – he was to be a gardener, digging and ditching, toiling and sweating, and turning the earth upside down, and digging down deeper, and watering the plants in a timely way.

It is an enduring image, to turn the world upside down; to upend the social fabric, topsy-turvy. In the Acts of the Apostles it is the early Christians who do so, these that have turned the world upside down, replacing the decrees of Caesar with those of another king, one Jesus. Is there a hint of Saturnalia here, the day of misrule in the Roman calendar, when slaves are served by their masters, a week of carnival and merriment? The festival of Christmas seems to have been settled in December in order to align with the pagan feast and provide cover for illegal worship, but if anything it is the Roman emperor who is king for a day, his brief misrule an affront to the natural kingship of Christ. The world has to be turned upside down in order to be put in its right alignment.