Early Friends quickly shed the common names for
days of the week and months of the year, instead referring to them by
number. Sunday was “first day”, Tuesday “third day”, and so
on. Likewise, July became “seventh month”, November “eleventh
month”… you get the idea.
The usual explanation given for this is that the
names themselves were of pagan – that is, pre-Christian – origin,
giving regard to, variously, Germanic deities (like Woden and Thor),
heavenly bodies (like the Sun and Moon), Roman deities (like Janus
and Mars), and deified Roman “emperors” (Julius for Julius
Caesar, not technically an emperor, and Augustus for his heir,
generally recognised as the first emperor). I suspect the last four
months, as named in English, would meet with early Friends' approval
– except they were misnamed, and naming them in English is much
more in line with plain speaking. It would be interesting do delve
into early Quaker sources and try to get to the bottom of the
practice, but for now we will accept the usual explanation as enough
to be getting on with.
Now, some Friends and Meetings still follow this
tradition, at least when dealing with other Friends. What we in
Britain typically call “Children's Meeting” is known in many
North American Meetings as “First Day School”, though the amount
of religious instruction, or any sort of instruction, is variable
whichever name it is known by. It is tempting to be sidetracked into
giving my view of the appropriateness of religious instruction for
Quakers, at least in the liberal tradition, but that shall have to
wait for another post. In Britain, it is unusual to find a Friend,
and even more unusual to find a Meeting, where there is still an
insistence on these “plain names” for the days and months.
There's an obvious pressure against doing so, especially when one
must interact with those who use the conventional, secular, “worldly”
names.
Today, many liberal Meetings are accepting of a
wide range of views and beliefs, including pagan. There would seem to
be no religious pressure to throw off these profane names. Also, the
vast majority of the Christian world seems to see no problem with the
origin of the names, and insisting on having a problem with them
starts to just seem like you are being awkward.
Of course, I'm sure some stick to them for a
similar reason to some sticking to the use of the old T-form second
person pronouns (“thee” and “thou”, or sometimes just
“thee”). That would be the desire to cleave to the traditions of
your own community, however little it might be. Of course, sometimes
it might also be bloody mindedness, and sometimes it's a sincere
agreement with the principle of the thing, acting out of conscience.
There's also clearly a proportion of cases where it is a matter of
“we are are Quakers, let us do things in a particular Quakerly
way”, a way to set oneself apart and, dare I say it, to feel
superior.
I'm not keen on the idea of Friends using
particular distinctive language just because we always have, or just
to set ourselves apart. What sets us apart from “the World”
should be our actions, our practices, our carriage – our being
“patterns and examples”. Not us using strange words where there
are perfectly good everyday words. Doing things a certain way just
because we always have is very much a matter of “empty forms”.
So, is there any other reason, a reason that passes muster by my
personal standards, for us to use these historic terms?
We have an example of a far greater population
than that of Quakers renaming their days and months, well into the
modern era. Revolutionary France introduced the Republican Calendar,
which was partly a component of their efforts towards decimalisation
(with the seven-day week replaced with a ten-day décade), and
partly an effort to reduce the influence of religion in public life,
and remove any royalist hangovers. The days of the décade were
simply numbered, albeit not with everyday number words – the first
day of the décade was primidi,
the fifth quintidi,
and so on. The months (still twelve of them, but they all had thirty
days) were named for the weather or agricultural activities around
Paris. In an attempt to further erode the influence of the church,
they also provided an alternative to the calendar of saints,
assigning each day of the year either an animal (every quintidi), an
agricultural tool (every décadi), a plant/fruit/vegetable/flower
(every other day, except in the month of Nivôse, which started
around the winter solstice), or a mineral (every other day in
Nivôse). Initially, Christmas fell on Chien
(dog), quintidi 5 Nivôse (it drifted away due to the calendar's
idiosyncratic method of handling leap years).
A further five
days, not having days of the décade or belonging to any month, were
included at the end of the year as a series of five national
holidays. Where an extra day was needed to keep in line with the
autumn equinox, the day on which the year must begin, a sixth such
day was added. These days each celebrated a different characteristic
that republicans thought well of: virtue, talent, labour,
convictions, honours (in the sense of awards), and in leap years, the
revolution itself.
Now, I think even
the staunchest adherent of the idea of separating ourselves from the
world, at least symbolically, would think twice about Quakers
adopting an entirely separate calendar. Short of establishing an
exclusive colony – and the most well-known Quaker colony was quite
deliberately not exclusive. Even then, even were such a colony to
have remarkably little contact with the rest of the world, we must
interact with people who are using the Gregorian calendar, and thus
we save ourselves a lot of bother by not using any alternative, but
staying with the civic standard. The republican government of France
faced not only the barrier to adoption of international trade and
communication, but also the fact that most of the population didn't
see the point in changing the calendar, and they wanted to keep the
seven day week so the rest-day corresponded with the day they had
their main religious observances. Many labourers also preferred one
rest day per seven days, rather than one and a half per ten days
(every quintidi was supposed to be a half-day, and every décadi a
rest day). The calendar did outlast the first French Republic, in
name as well as in form, but not by long, and it had not been
enthusiastically adopted at any point. The décade was abandoned
somewhat earlier.
(It was restored
for a matter of days under the Paris Commune of 1871, but that hardly
bears notice.)
So is there any
good reason to maintain, or restore, the practice of Quakers
numbering the days and the months? Is it somehow more plain to use
numbers, rather than recognisable names? Is there anything
objectionable about the names?
I cannot say that
it is more plain, in my own conscience, than the names that are
customary in wider society. To speak plainly is to be easily
understood, speaking without ostentation or beating about the bush. I
struggle with it sometimes myself, as I am somewhat given to florid
language. The use of “thee” and “thou” by early Friends was
about equality as much as plainness, but it was avoiding the
ostentation of referring to someone in the plural in order to show
respect. The fact that the t-form, the familiar singular, was already
falling out of use in much of England complicates matters, though our
Religious Society was born in the north of England, where the t-form
persisted in some places, among some people, well into the 20th
century. Speaking in a way that is unlikely to be understood by those
outside one's in-group is not speaking plainly; it is frank jargon.
Using numbers for
months would be less confusing than for days of the week, of course,
as people generally are used to that nowadays, what with our short
formats for writing dates (even if we might disagree, between
countries, on the exact format). The big problem with numbering days
of the week is that you will have trouble getting agreement on which
day is which. When Friends were first establishing their ideas,
everyone knew that Sunday was the first day of the week. Now, for a
lot of us, we think of Monday as the first day of the week, as it is
when the cycle of the week begins; Sunday is part of the weekend,
not the weekstart. Not
only would we cause people to have to mentally count out the days,
they won't even know when to count from.
Likewise, I see
nothing objectionable in the names themselves, whatever their origin.
Words are not forever tied to their linguistic roots, and people do
not think of Woden when they speak of Wednesday. In my experience, in
English, no-one really things of the root of any of them except
Sunday, which is entirely obvious and unavoidable in its origin. But
no-one really cares.
There is one
argument that I can see, and that actually stems from our testimony
concerning times and seasons. Every day is equal, spiritually
speaking. There is so significance to days of the week except that
which we give them, and we should avoid giving them any except that
which arises from administrative concerns. Indeed, I consider it
unfortunate that we routinely hold our Meetings for Worship on
Sundays, though the general expectation that religious observances
happen on Sundays do make it convenient. I understand that Sikhs in
culturally-Christian countries generally hold their most significant
Gurdwara services on a Sunday for similar reasons.
What can we do to
rob the days of the week of their significance? I don't know.
Frankly, I don't know that the possibility gives a good enough
reasons, but perhaps
the abandonment of the familiar names might do something in that
direction.
It's a lot of
confusion to be dealt with in the hope of that outcome, though.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Did you enjoy this post, or find it interesting, informative or stimulating? Do you want to keep seeing more of these posts? Please consider contributing to my Patreon. More information is available in the post announcing my use of Patreon.
Did you enjoy this post, or find it interesting, informative or stimulating? Do you want to keep seeing more of these posts? Please consider contributing to my Patreon. More information is available in the post announcing my use of Patreon.