Life & Work Magazine
Life & Work Magazine


1 mins

Burns and hypocrisy

The Very Rev Dr John Chalmers , in his contribution to the February edition of Life and Work [The beginning of wisdom], writes of the time when preachers made much of references to hellfire and brimstone in endeavours to instil fear in their congregations, also a time of ‘three-mile prayers, an’ hauf mile graces’. Dr Chalmers made mention of the poem of Robert Burns ‘The Holy Fair’, in which the poet satirised that form of preaching, and the fact that the Rev John Russell, minister at Kilmarnock and later in Stirling, was one of its well-known exponents. Mention was also made in the same poem of the Rev Alexander Moodie, minister of Riccarton:

‘For Moodie speels the holy door, 

Wi’ tidings o’ dam-ation , 

Should Hornie , as in ancient days, 

‘Mang sons o’ God present him, 

The vera sight o’ Moodie’s face, 

To ’s ain het hame had sent him 

Wi’ fright that day.’

Dr Chalmers leaves no doubt on where he stands on the matter when he states that ‘there is no future in any notion that you can frighten people into a life of faith’.

Clearly in the time of Burns , in many of the church services, it was made clear that the wages of sin inevitably included hell and damnation. Burns is sometimes cited as having subjected the Church of Scotland of his day to profound criticism. His satire and wit, however, were largely directed not at the institution as such, but rather at the hypocrisy so often associated with it at that time. Ian W Thomson, Lenzie, East Dunbartonshire

This article appears in the April 2021 Issue of Life and Work

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This article appears in the April 2021 Issue of Life and Work