One particular animal seems to have been in the news this week. For very different reasons, monkeys have caught the headlines. First of all there was the monkey standing for the mayoral elections in Hartlepool - with the ear catching name of H’Angus. H’Angus is named after an alleged incident a couple of centuries ago in that town when a monkey is said to have been hanged during the Napoleonic wars because he was thought to be a French spy. The monkey is now the mascot of Hartlepool football club and a former mascot wearer, Stuart Drummond, stood for mayor of that town and was duly elected on Thursday.

The second monkey comes in the form of an old sock turned into a puppet used in the ITV Digital advert. Radio 4’s Dead Ringers programme had an impersonation of the comedian in the advert phoning a monkey sanctuary to see if they could take in the monkey now that the bailiffs have been called into the collapsed ITV Digital. It was one of those moments of comic genius when someone comes at a story from a particularly odd angle!

Both monkeys seem to have something to say about hopes and shattered dreams. For the parent companies the ITV Digital monkey is a reminder of their shattered dreams for this commercial venture. Digital TV may be a bit shaky at the moment, but I doubt for one moment that this is the end of it. The Hartlepool monkey, now the elected mayor, says something about political dreams and hopes. That people bothered to vote at all is a promising sign. That they voted for an independent candidate says something about their lack of confidence in the establishment candidates. Signs of hope and shattered dreams mix together there.

There was no mention of monkeys in our readings, but they both speak of a vision for the future, of a hope for the future, when what is lacking now will be restored. Neither the readings nor the monkeys give us images that are cynical or despondent. They both say something about new life even if it looks very strange, but that new life comes and is seen in places where dreams have previously been shattered.

In the first reading (Zech 8:1-13) Zechariah is looking on a scene of the Temple in Jerusalem being rebuilt. This is dated around 520 BC, following the Israelite people’s return after many years in exile in the middle of the 6th century BC. The Babylonian army had overrun Jerusalem, destroyed the Temple and carried off many of the people into exile. Psalms like ‘By the rivers of Babylon we sat down and wept when we remembered you O Sion’ come from that time (Psalm 137). Some years later the people were allowed back, and some time after that they were allowed to rebuilt their temple. The book of Zechariah has its origins in this period and in this passage he offers visions of hope for those frustrated at how slow the rebuilding was proving to be.

Zechariah gives us promised images of children playing again in the streets. People will return to the city. Jerusalem shall again be regarded as a holy place, a religious centre. The elderly will live in peace and feel safe to sit in the streets watching the world go by. It is an image of a harmonious and civilised society. It is an image of security and stability.

If we stand Zechariah’s words alongside the reading from the book of Revelation (Rev 21:22-22:5), we get an interesting mix. Revelation seems to be moving us beyond a physical temple and the dreams of its rebuild, to a metaphorical temple, the very dwelling place of God. Again the Temple may well have been destroyed; this time by the Romans in AD 70. The book of Revelation is often dated around AD 95, though some passages seem to be much earlier.

The book of Revelation looks to a vision of heaven. There is no need for a temple there because God is there. Temples are substitutes for the real thing, they are supposed to point us to the God whose presence they announce. Too often they become substitutes for the living God in a negative sense and as such offer dreams that can only ever be shattered.

There is a reminder that no earthly kingdom can ever meet all our dreams. We have a longing within us that can never really settle because there will always be something to strive to improve. These past few days have shown us that politically we can never be complacent. There are dangerous forces at work in the shape of the British National Party and the election of some of them to local councils should alarm us all. But their views are all the more worrying because they find a ready resonance in many more people’s minds; their distortion of genuine concerns exposes too frequently a shadow side of the British psyche.

Building Jerusalem in England’s green and pleasant land is a familiar motif from William Blake’s rousing hymn. But what form does this Jerusalem take? Is it a place of justice and humanity? Is it a place that refuses to look for easy scapegoats and is outward looking? Is it a place that is suitably longing that it will be open to the uneasy voices that keep us on track, like the plumb-line that keeps the rebuilding straight?

The two monkeys which have been in the news this week have in very different ways highlighted something of our hopes and dreams. Sometimes these dreams are shattered, as with ITV Digital, or particular ambition being rejected by the electorate. The dreams we pursue reveal something of what we believe lies at the root of the very purpose of life. Behind this there must be a hope which calls us onward as we seek to shape our rebuilding of Jerusalem in this green and pleasant land. After our readings this is itself to be based on nothing less than a vision of the dwelling place of God.

© Ian Black 2002

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