Holy Island

Holy Island is located just off the coast of England's northerly-most town, Berwick-upon-Tweed. If you look at a map, the town is in the upper, right corner of the country just a mile or two from the border with Scotland. The largest of the Farne Islands, Holy Island is important for several reasons. King Oswald, ruler of the tribal kingdom of Northumbria in the early 600s, sent a request to the monastery of Iona on the far western coast of Scotland to send someone to build a Christian monastery in his land in order to convert his people. By 635, an Ionian monk named Aidan (later canonized a saint) had built a "Saxon-style" church of heavy oak timbers on the island and founded the monastery called Lindisfarne. The type of Christianity practiced in Lindisfarne followed that of Iona; namely, they both performed "Irish" or "Celtic" rites. These were different from Roman Catholicism in a number of specific ways. For example, and most easily seen, they used the Celtic tonsure for monks; instead of shaving the little spot at the back of the head as did the Romans, the celtic church shaved the front of the head to a lateral line reaching from ear to ear. The celtic church used a different liturgical calendar, and, therefore, celebrated important holy days and events on different dates from he Roman church. Most importantly, they calculated the date of Easter using a unique formula. The Irish church claimed to have the right to follow these and other practices because their version of Christianity had actually been evolving since the second century (Thomas Cahill writes about this conflict in his entertaining book "How the Irish Saved Civilization"). The monastery at Lindisfarne and the monasteries just 35 miles to the south at Jarrow and Wearmouth where Bede would write constituted the front lines in the battle to see which practice would prevail among Christians--the former being Celtic and the latter being Roman. It's strange to me that many modern Christians seem simply to accept that elements of their religious practice have always been in existence--in fact, these elements were hammered out over centuries, and Holy Island is a seminal site in this process.

Another reason why Holy Island is so special is because of St. Cuthbert. By nature a hermit whose only wish was to live out a life like that of St. Jerome (a great saint--drafter of the Latin Vulgate--who had preceded Cuthbert by less than 200 years), Cuthbert was elected by his peers to be the Prior and Bishop of Lindisfarne. To Cuthbert fell many of the negotiations between the Celtic and Roman Catholic churches. Bede writes that Cuthbert was both a holy saint whose life brought many miracles and a scholar whose compromising spirit kept the church together and "catholic."

Finally, there is that famous illuminated manuscript called the "Lindisfarne Gospels." A Latin text of the four Gospels, this may be the single most famous illustrated book in European history. If you have ever seen a page from an illustrated text, chances are that it's this one. It is a treasure of art and devotion; the illustrations are clearly inspired by the celtic tradition with the letters, figures, and border art being filled with the, now-traditional, Celtic knot configuration. Sometime around 700, a monk named Eadfrith, its primary if not sole artist, oversaw the creation of the Lindisfarne Gospels in the scriptorium of the monastery there.

All of this is a lot of history, I know, but I wanted to explain the importance of the place. So, I went. Holy Island is a tidal island--that means that twice a day when the tides are in, it is a true island and cannot be accessed from the mainland. In order to get on the island, you have to have a look at the tide chart for the month and carefully time a visit. I had to rise at 5:45 in order to catch a bus to Berwick. Once there, I rode a city bus down to the causeway that leads to the island and was dropped off at the end of its route--leaving me just about one and a half hours before the sea came in. Then, I walked the six miles across the sand to Holy Island just as Cuthbert must have many times. The day itself was full of cold fog, and visibility was about two miles on the coast. The way to Holy Island is marked with tall, pine poles stuck deep in the sand of the tidal basin. At three places along the way, the locals have constructed the notorious "white houses"--little elevated, covered platforms that serve to rescue anyone caught on the sand when the tide comes in. The tide quickly floods the area, and every year two or three people are trapped--sometimes because the tide comes in with a wind and actually fills the basin more quickly than predicted.

Lindisfarne Abbey was abandoned in 1537 at Henry VIII's order disbanding all fraternal organizations. The skeletal walls of the old abbey and the collapsed walls of the monastery living quarters leave you to wonder what life was like for these men. The remains of most of Aidan's 7th century church have been covered by the newer (11th century!) Church of Saint Mary, but some of the original outline is in evidence. On a hill a mile away rests the fortress built by Queen Elizabeth I in 1560 to protect the northern reaches of her kingdom; it attracts far more visitors that do the abbey ruins, yet what transpired within its quiet walls was far more influential in Western culture. From a little hill next to the abbey, you can look to the southwest and see a much smaller island with a cross on it. Late in his life, Cuthbert retired from his elevated post as bishop and, against the pleading of his peers, moved to a small, stone hut on this unnamed Farne Isle where he died. About six hours after I arrived, the tides receded--I was no longer trapped by the sea, and I walked off the island. About half a mile away, still on the wet sand, I turned around for a farewell glance at Lindisfarne as a late afternoon snow began to fall.