Turtles Unite

Some of you have read this blog from my old Xanga site, but I thought it would be worth my students discovering the origins of my turtle Testudo. Note the drawing of the turtle on my site. That is from my Alphabet Book, Turtles Not Mentioned in the Bible. This is an out-take from the letter “V” which is for “Vashti Vanishing” from the first chapter of Esther.

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Turtles United
Most of my friends know that I draw turtles. I’ve been doing that since my years at University of Maryland. UofMD’s mascott is a terrapin, or turtle. I worked in the graduate library, and outside my third story window I looked down upon this statute of a turtle all day long. So naturally I created a cartoon character of this terrapin. Occasionally I would work on archival photographs for the library, which was my job. I was pursuing a degree in photojournalism at the time.

How I got to Maryland is a story in itself, but we can look into that at another time. “Testudo” was the name of the terrapin statue that guarded the entrance to the library, and that name became my character’s name. Testudo is Latin for tortoise, tortoise shell, hence protective covering. New World Dictionary defines testudo as, “a movable shelter or screen with a strong arched roof, used by ancient Roman soldiers.” But what caught my eye was the number two definition which states, “a protective covering over a group of ancient Roman soldiers, formed by overlapping their shields above their heads.”

Now many of you have already realized the significance of this discovery, but just in case it escapes you. Paul in Ephesians 6 uses Roman military language to describe a spiritual armour, and the shield is referred to as, “the shield of faith.” This shield of faith is mentioned in the passage in the following manner, “In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish ALL the flaming arrows of the evil one.

I recently became curious about the word, “ALL” in this passage. How could my lone little shield of faith extinguish ALL the flaming arrows of the evil one. Actually I was painfully aware of how ineffective my shield was. And that was when I had my revelation. Paul never intended me to be holding up my pitful, lone, little shield above my head all by myself. Only an arrogant western mind would think that out on the battle field the one lone soldier; Braveheart, The Marine, Dirty Hairy and a thousand other western iconic lone heroes are battling single-handedly a bazillion bad guys all at once. Paul is intending us to see this “shield of faith” in the context of Roman soldiers who form a protective covering by overlapping their sheilds above their heads in order to extinguish ALL the flaming arrows of the evil one.

I wonder how many christians have been lambasted by the evil one because they are out there on the battle field with their little lone shield of faith, and then they crucify themselves for not having enough faith to extinguish ALL the flaming arrows!

Well, I for one, have had enough. I say, “Turtles Unite!”

Oh, did I forget to mention that the “over arching” theme (pun intended) of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is that of unity.