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4 - PROPHECY and HOUSING
Israel,
Judah and Jerusalem itself
became increasingly vulnerable to the powers of Babylon and Assyria and
experienced conquest, exile and loss of home and temple. Prophets
proclaimed that these events were symbolic of
a fundamental lack of justice in
society and urban desolation caused by extravagance became a strong
image. Today housing both raises and reflects social issues. Yet the
prophecy of judgment is balanced by vision of restoration,
and house-building appropriate to meet needs is a sign of hope.
4.1 Scriptural Materials: Prophetic References to
Housing
Amos
Amos
prophesied in
Israel
in
the 8th century BCE. His images include those of housing. The moral law
has been rejected and there will be fire in
Jerusalem
(2:4-5). At
Bethel
winter houses, summer houses and great houses will come to an end (3:15).
In
Israel
houses of hewn stone have been built but levies of grain have been taken
from the poor (5:11). Both the great house and the little house will be
trampled to pieces (6:11).
The songs of the temple will become wailings (8:3). Amos sees the image
of a plumb-line against a wall; that is the judgment of God (7:7-9). The
day of God's judgement will be a day `of darkness. not light; as if
someone.. went into a house and rested a hand against the wall, and was
bitten by a snake' (5:18
-9). But, a late editor adds, there was ground for
hope: the ruins of the booth of David were raised up, there was
rebuilding (9:11).
Micah
Micah prophesied in
Jerusalem
and
Judah
in
the late eighth and early seventh centuries BCE. Houses are coveted and
taken away; householders are oppressed (2:2). Women and children are
taken away from pleasant houses (2:9).
Jerusalem
will become a heap of ruins and the temple mount revert to woodland (
3:12
).
Rulers and chiefs abhor justice and build
Zion
with blood and
Jerusalem
with wrong (3:9-10). This people, once redeemed from the house of
slavery. must come again to do justice and love mercy (6:4,8).
First
Isaiah
Micah's contemporary, Isaiah, also prophesied in and of Jerusalem,
under siege and reduced to the state of a shelter in a cucumber field,
both people and their work consumed by fire (1:7-8. 31). The social
structure is destroyed and leadership is refused `because in my house
there is neither bread nor cloak' (3:7). The spoil of the poor is in the
houses of the elders and the princes (
3:14
). Large and beautiful houses will have no occupants
(5:9).
Samaria
too was affected; defiantly, its people rebuild brick houses with hewn
stone and replace sycamores with cedars (
9:10
).
Even
Tyre
'whose merchants were princes, whose traders were the honoured ones of
the earth' experiences judgement (23:8). The Holy One says to Israel
`... because you reject this word.... this iniquity shall become for you
like a break in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse, whose
crash comes suddenly in an instant (30:12-3). As always there is
promise: `I am laying in
Zion
a
foundation stone, a tested stone, a precious corner stone... And I will
make justice the line and righteousness the plummet' (28:16-7) and `My
people will abide in a peaceful habitation, in secure dwellings and in
quiet resting-places' (32:18).
Jeremiah
Jeremiah's
prophecies are dated in the late seventh and early sixth centuries BCE.
His theme is the same, judgement and hope. `Run to and fro through the
streets of
Jerusalem
,
look around and take note! Search its squares and see if you can find
one person who acts justly and seeks truth - so that I may pardon
Jerusalem
'
(5:1). The religious problem is that gods have become as many as the
towns of
Judah
and as the streets of
Jerusalem
(
11:13
) and kings and others have used their rooftops to
offer sacrifices (
19:13
).
The house of the king of
Judah
has become like an uninhabited city (22:6). The prophet addresses
himself directly to Shallum, son of King Josiah:
`Woe
to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms by
injustice;
who
makes his neighbours work for nothing, and does not give them their
wages;
who
says `I will build myself a spacious house with large upper rooms',
and
who cuts out windows for it, panelling it with cedar
and
painting it with vermilion.
Are
you a king because
you compete in cedar?
Did
not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness?
Then it was well with him.
He
judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well.
Is not this to know me? says the Lord.' (22:13-6).
Despite
this judgement, God says in relation to the temple `Amend your ways and
your doings and let me dwell with you in this place' (7:3). Jeremiah is
sent down to the potter's house, watches him at work and sees the nation
as clay in God's hands, to be destroyed or to be built (18:1-11). The
positive note dominates: ' I have loved you with an everlasting
love....... I will build you and you shall be built, O virgin
Israel
'
(31:3-4). Jeremiah completes his prophesying when he puts his money
where his mouth is and enacts his faith by making positive use of his
legal right to buy family property at Anathoth (32:6-8), looking forward
to the time when `Fields shall be bought for money, and deeds shall be
signed and sealed and witnessed, in the land of Benjamin, in the places
around Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah....... for I will restore
their fortunes says the Lord' (32:44).
Second
and Third Isaiah
In the sixth century BCE the second and third contributors to the book of
Isaiah are visionaries of restoration. God will not forget
Zion
.
her walls are continually before him, her builders will outdo her
destroyers (49:14-7). Her stones will be set in antimony, foundations
will be laid of sapphires. pinnacles will be made of rubies, gates of
jewels and the whole city wall of precious stones (54:11-12). The bonds
of injustice will be loosened she will bring the homeless poor into her
house (58:6-7), she will be called the restorer of streets to live in
(58:12) and God her builder will marrv her and rejoice over her (62:5),
urging her `build up, build up the highway, clear it of stones (62:10).
The people of
Jerusalem
'shall build houses and inhabit them... They shall not build and another
inhabit..... They shall not labour in vain..... They shall not hurt or
destroy' (65:21-5).
Background
to the texts
These
prophecies originated over a period of some 200 years, from Amos in the
mid eighth century BCE, through the fall of
Jerusalem
experienced by Jeremiah, to Second Isaiah's vision of the return from
exile c. 540 BCE. Malchow (1996 p34) points out that Amos, Micah, the
contributors to Isaiah, and Jeremiah were all people of relative means,
who risked trouble with their upper class compatriots in siding with the
poor in their plight. Archaeological evidence of social change is given
by de Vaux 1961 pp72-3). At Tirsah, tenth century houses were a11 of the
same size and arrangement: by the eighth century bigger and better built
houses for the officials of the monarchy were in a different quarter
from the huddled-together houses of the poor.
4.2
Building Materials: Issues in Housing
Housing today can be viewed first as a series of specific issues and
needs and second as a structural question.
Specific
issues and needs
An issue closely associated with social justice is that of homelessness.
Balchin (1975 p271-2), on the basis of Department of the Environment
statistics, states that between 1979 and 1993 the number of homeless
households went up from 56750 to 134190. The latter was thought to
represent some 400000 people, in addition to whom there were an
estimated 80000 single homeless not included in official statistics. The
housing charity `Shelter' had estimated that between 7000 and 20000 of
the single homeless were sleeping rough. The causes of this increase in
homelessness were complex and controversial. including family break up,
young people leaving home early, emptu dwellings, pockets of demand in
immigrant areas, re-possession due to mortgage arrears and reduction in
newly-built social sector housing from 56300 in 1980 to 43300 in 1993.
In Balchin’s judgement (Balchin 1995 p 277), government funding of
Rough Sleepers' Initiatives amounting to £200m had only a very minor
effect on the total problem of homelessness
The
elderlv homeless are an increasingly important group. On the basis
of Department of Environment statistics, Hawes (1997 p8) sees the
proportion of elderly among the unintentionally homeless increasing,
steadily if unspectacularly, from 4.49% in 1992 to 5.13% in 1995.
Partnership breakdowns and inter-generational family conflict accounted
for 65% of cases and mortgage problems for 25%. Street homeless
accounted for 1%. In a qualitative study of the sick
homeless, Robinson (1998 p24) found evidence that many of this group
did not know of, or were not told of, or were unable to take up the
priority entitlements to housing that they have under legislation.
The
growing number of older people in
the population presents questions about housing. Cobbold (1997 p23)
maintains that a good case can be made for requiring Lifetime Homes
standards in relation to mobility and access for the (elderly) disabled
to be incorporated in all new social housing. He sees this as a better
approach than the present high expenditure on adaptations. The Building
Research Establishment (Research Focus No 29 p9) and its industrial
partners are working on proposals to improve the design and automatic
control of windows as a part of design for a person's whole life. In
parallel with the concept of the lifetime home, it is necessary to
nurture the best ideas from healthcare, architectural and technological
perspectives relating to nursing home and similar residential
accommodation for older people. Vallins and Salter (1996), and the
various contributors to their book, show the importance of the built
environment and of sensitively-conceived space in terms of human
well-being. The significance of these issues will come to the fore as
part of The Millennium Debate of the Age and of the LTN Year of Older
Persons in 1999.
The
structural question
The Inquiry into British Housing chaired by The Duke of Edinburgh,
reporting in 1991, pointed to his concern for housing, `Although most
people in Britain are well-housed a substantial minority live in very
poor conditions or are homeless. Clearly all is not well with housing in
Britain and I am certain that everyone would like to see a system of
housing finance and provision that is simple, fair, effective and
economically sustainable.' (Duke of Edinburgh 1991 p7). The report
comments on the demise of private rented accommodation, causing
increased demand in the owner-occupier sector, where in the worst year
under review, 1990, buyers with average new mortgages were committing up
to 40% of their income to repayments, with severe consequences for some
of them (Duke of Edinburgh 1991 pl4).
The
Duke of Edinburgh's general sentiment was reiterated in the Secretary of
State's Foreword to the 1995 White Paper Our
Future Homes, `The aim of our housing policy is to ensure that a
decent home is within the reach of every family (quoted by Holmans 1995
p3). The most recent forecasts are that up to 4.4 million dwellings may
need to be built between 1991 and 2016 (Cmnd 3471, 1996). The debate is
widespread concerning the geographical areas in which such numbers of
dwellings should be built and whether as many as possible should be in
inner city and similar areas.
A key issue is always who benefits financially from the development of
land, that is who receives the `development gain'. Verhage and
Needham
(1997) compare traditions of practice in
Britain
and The Netherlands. In
Britain
the developers have assembled parcels of land and they and the vendors
have benefited most. In The Netherlands, the municipalities have
assembled the land, with the effect that the community as a whole,
including the vendors. rather than developers have benefited, builders
being simply builders, not developers or speculators. In The Netherlands
practice now is changing in the direction of the British system.
4.3
Comparison of Materials
The scriptural material is literary; it is a structure, or series of
structures, of words. Its purpose is to influence. The material itself
relates to 200 years of history and the period over which it was
compiled was longer. Therefore it has perspective. The prophets
themselves were interpreters of the times in which they lived. The
compilers were guardians of the interpretations. The dominant note is
that of the strong, often harsh critique. The people, the states of
Israel
and
Judah
and the city of
Jerusalem
,
were in deep political and military trouble. This, the prophets
maintained. was because society had gone wrong. It had lost its sense of
justice. In terms of money and property it had become too
differentiated. It had lost its cohesiveness and lost touch with its
religious roots. Concepts of covenant had given way to those of
consumption. Religious and social breakdown was most severely judged for
the consequences it had for the poor, the widowed, the old and the
alien. All this was clearly visible in the differentiated ways houses
had come to be designed and constructed and in the consequent desolation
of homes and streets. The reality with which the prophets deal is
social; the image is that of the built environment. Real and justified
though the criticism is, that does not invest it with the quality of
Scripture. It becomes scriptural because it points with equal clarity
towards the possibility, and by faith the certainty, of restoration,
renewal and hope. Such change will be exemplified in building. The pain
of rubble and exile will give way to the peace of re-building and of
home.
The material on contemporary housing is economic, demographic, social,
architectural and, to connect all these, political and managerial. It is
part of a snapshot of
UK
society's struggles to see that all its people are adequately housed.
This struggle is against considerable odds; changes in types of need and
means and affordability of provision, cascade over each other. We are
confronted with a series of official and academic reports and studies
which try to clarify elements of the situation and suggest ways of
dealing with problems which are expected to work if the scenarios on
which they are based turn out to be reasonably correct. Running through
all the particular considerations is a three-way debate between voices
in society which speak out of or on behalf of the various needs;
industry and professions who both need and desire to earn fees and make
profits out of meeting needs and responding to opportunities; and the
mechanisms of government and politics which struggle to manage
situations and achieve an appropriate outcome. On the surface, it is
management and pragmatism, bricks and mortar. But arguably not many
would dissent from the sentiments of The Duke of Edinburgh and the
Secretary of State as expressions of civilised humanity; and few would
not be uneasy about a society that is breaking down, in both senses of
the expression, into ever smaller household units. The language is not
that of religion but the issues are. Hope is expressed through the
resilience necessary to go on facing up to the implications of new
statistics.
In
writing about the prophets, Brueggemann (1978 and 1986) makes much use
of the concept of imagination. They were the `imaginisers' of society,
criticizing it and energizing it (Brueggemann 1978 chs 3-4). They
realized that `Only a move from a managed world to a world of spoken and
heard faithfulness permits hope' (Brueggemann 1978 p68). With the help
of archaeologists, historians and textual scholars, we can discern
something of the concrete world behind the prophetic scriptures.
Conversely. bringing our own concrete world to the imaginative criticism
and energy of Scripture we can imbue statistics and arguments with
fuller meaning.
4.4
Historical Continuities
Between Building today and Amos, the earliest of the prophets considered,
is some 2800 years of history.
House
The first and most obvious connection across this long period is that of
the simple house itself.
Historians of building technology can trace the use of materials at
different times and in different
localities; approaches to the design of foundations. roofs and walls; and
ideas concerning room
layout, the provision of services and other matters of design. Any
English housebuilder, sensitive to subtle variations in practice due to
local conditions, would be at ease with language used by Fritz(1995)
when he says of houses in Ancient Israel:
`As a rule, the foundations were built of stones to a height of 60-80cm
above the floor level, in order to protect the wall against spray from
water. The rest of the wall was then built using mud bricks. In the
mountains, the whole of the ground floor was built of stone, and mud
bricks were only used for the upper floor. By contrast, brick-built
structures predominated in the coastal plain, and occasionally the
foundations consisted of mud brick or a compressed layer of the sandy
floor which exists there. The width of the walls in the case of domestic
architecture fluctuated between 60 and 80 cm, with both sides of the
wall carefully positioned and only the space between them filled in.'
(Fritz 1995 p136).
Technology does not move in step with time. In 1946, the Egyptian
architect Hassan Fathy engaged in a somewhat troubled project to build a
village for the poor at Gourna....... His materials were traditional but
his context contemporarv. Any building manager anywhere, at any time,
knows the frustrations:
`I
was determined to get as much work done as possible on the production of
building materials. I knew that the Aswani masons, once started, would
cause houses to spring up like mushrooms if they only had the
bricks......... My raw materials (except straw) were now assured, so it
only remained to bring them together. Since there could as yet be no
sign of the lorries, I began... to see about hiring some animals......
To keep things moving I continued buying straw in small
quantities........ We had to start again from the beginning by inviting
tenders for the supply of straw...... In spite of these annoyances work
started very well, and we built most of the marketplace...' (Fathy 1995 pp154-5,161,163).
Writing
of the medieval period in
Europe
,
Rybczynski (1986
pp23-5,29) draws a sharp distinction between the housing of
the poor and that of citizens or burghers of the free, walled towns. The
former were often little more than hovels in which to sleep and were
without water or sanitation. It is immoral to think of such concepts as
`home', `comfort' or even 'family' in relation to such bare existence.
The town houses of the better off merchants and tradesmen were
narrow-fronted because of shortage of space but consisted, typically, of
a shop or work area and a large hall-like living and sleeping area,
perhaps with a wall tapestry or some pieces of furniture, in addition to
beds. Prosperity led to a reasonable standard of domestic comfort.
Bathtubs, privvies, drainage and cesspits made for a healthy
environment. Interestingly, Rybczynski (1986)
points out that the benchmarks for design and
specification standards in living accommodation were set by St Bernard
in the Rule for Cistercian monasteries:
'The Rule described work schedules
in detail as well as the layout of the building which followed a
standardized plan like businessmen's hotels today........ Each complex
included a lavatorium, or
bathhouse, fitted with wooden tubs and with facilities for heating the
water; small basins with constantly running cold water for hand-washing
before and after meals were outside the refectory......... the reredorter, a
wing containing latrines, was built next to the dormitory (the dorter). The
wastewaters from these facilities were carried away in covered-over
streams, in effect underground sewers.'
(Rybczynski 1986 p29)
Communities
of concern
There
is a continuity of community amongst those who build houses for ordinary
people, including those for the most disadvantaged. Similarly, there is
a continuity of community amongst those who care about housing, both
because it is a primary human need and because how a society enables its
people to be housed is a reflection of, or a mirror to, its beliefs and
commitments about the value of people and about all aspects of social
justice in the community.
The
example of the prophets, and the prophetic literature, are the direct
inspiration of church-led housing and related initiatives. In a paper
for the Christians in Public Life
(CIPL) programme Davies (1993
ppl-2) points to four themes of prophecy which he
believes it is essential for us to understand if we are to share
authentically in it. First the prophet is a genuine conservative
standing for values which are in danger of being abolished by
'progressive' individuals who stand to benefit from change. Second, the
prophet represents God's intervention on behalf of those who get least
advantage from things as they are. Third the prophet intervenes to
remind government of its unfulfilled agenda. And fourth, the prophet is
the one who looks forward in hope. To fulfil these tasks,
the prophet must engage with public issues. As an example, Davies (1993
p2) takes the growth in land values that usually accompanies the opening
of a motorway. It is the whole community that develops the motorway, but
the lucky individuals nearby who gain much of the benefit. At the same
time, affordable housing ceases to be available to the creators of
wealth such as farmworkers, because so much is paid for land. The
situation may not be as stark as Davies paints it but the issue of how
benefit is allotted is a matter of both prophecy and development policy.
God's
action
A prophetic note was struck by Leech in a paper to a seminar in
London
in
March 1998 on the Theologv of
Homelessness. The theological task, he argued, is to `Seek to
discern the workings and will of God within the concrete historical and
social situation in which we are set' (Leech 1998). Doing this involves
prayer, listening, questioning, engaging (avoiding the traps of
neutrality). involving people in the practical decisions and solutions
for their own problems, and relating to the context with all its minute
particulars. This is not just good community practice; it is theological
and scriptural because it looks for the activity of God in the
situation. That is precisely what the prophets did. The continuity with
prophetic times is not only through the activities of human agents but
through the activity of God himself. The mark of a true theology of
homelessness is the emphasis it places on welcome and hospitality.
Hostels for the homeless which many churches set up today are connected
to the monastic tradition of hospitality. As the sixth century Rule of
St Benedict puts it: 'Let all guests that come be received like Christ.
for he will say: I was a stranger
and ye took me in. And let fitting honour be shown to all..... The
guest house shall be assigned to a brother whose soul is full of the
fear of God. And let there be a sufficient number of beds ready
therein..' (McCann 1997 pp57-8).
4.5
Ethical Discussion
In this Section the dominant ethical note is that of responsibility.
Society has responsibilities in relation to housing, part of which is
exercised by professions and industry. Alongside this, people of God
have a responsibility-in the tradition of the prophets, for vigilance
and speaking.
Response
and responsibility
Starting the analysis in this Section with
prophecy has forced us to view housing in all its aspects as an issue as
of morality. The prophetic texts force on us the inevitability of the
judgement of God. Amos' plumbline is held up to all
societies, and all within those societies, to evaluate their
attitudes and policies concerning housing. The issue is not whether
housing is a moral or ethical matter but of how we respond to the fact that it is. Whoever we are, our ethics is
in our response. The form our response takes is guided by our sense of
responsibility.
Public
and industry
responsibility
In taking their courageous stand, perhaps against the interests of their
own social group, the prophets were showing a form of responsibility,
firstly to God and secondly to - or for - the good of the people.
Jeremiah maintained that Shallum was an irresponsible king of
Judah
whereas his father Josiah had been responsible. The father judged the
cause of the poor and needy - that is to say he was concerned for
justice for them - whereas the son competed among kings for possessing
the highest quality cedar work. This is not a discussion about whether a
palace should be well-appointed; it is a judgement about a king who is
set on outshining his peers while neglecting the needs of his people.
The UK
housing system relies greatly on the initiatives of house-builders and
developers. Judgement about the exercise of responsibility does not have
to be retrospective; it can be prospective, as the following quotation
from the Archbishops' Commission on Rural Affairs (1990) indicates:
`A major role in the provision of affordable housing has been given to
the private sector. As the statutory sector is emasculated, so the
private housebuilder is invited to meet the challenge. We note with
cautious optimism.... the statements that have been made in this area,
notably by the Housebuilders' Federation. A very great responsibility
lies with the private sector to replace what has been lost by the sale
of council houses. We share the scepticism of many people who argue that
some private builders have seized upon "homes for locals" as a
convenient "sugar on the pill" for what would otherwise be
unacceptable private housing development. At the present all we can say
is that the case on both sides remains unproven and the onus of proof
lies firmly with the developer and builder.' (Archbishops' Commission on
Rural Affairs 1990 p100).
In
1998, faced with high targets for growth in housing supply, even if the
much discussed -1.4 million by 2016 is rejected, the House-builders'
Federation takes a responsible part in the discussion. It suggests that
`Unless substantially more social housing is provided, households on low
incomes will be the most disadvantaged by the failure to meet housing
need. Many will have to live in overcrowded or cramped conditions
because they are unable to afford larger accommodation'. (New
Homes because Britain deserves better HBF 1998). The same
publication argues strongly that it is part of the private sector's role
to build houses of higher standards to meet consumer aspirations at the
top of the market. From the point of view of the prophetic scriptures,
there is a dilemma here. The House-builders' Federation quite properly
emphasises the needs of poorer people and argues that there has to be a
social and community contribution to meeting their needs: such needs
cannot justly be met in the housing marketplace as it is. At the same
time the House-builders' Federation is backing the pursuit of ever
higher standards by those who can afford them. There must be a point at
which the `stone when brick would have been appropriate' (Amos
5:11
)
situation is reached, and the enclaves of the better houses become an
acute contrast with those of the poorer houses. The prophetic word does
not say `don't do this' but it does prompt thought and steadiness.
Responsibility carries with it the need to think about the importance of
moderation and the possible adverse effects of extreme attitudes. One
can only conjecture whether the remnant that returned to
Jerusalem
rebuilt the grander houses as they had been or whether the re-building
was more modest, if only because materials had been stolen and
replacements could not yet be afforded. The ethic of moderation is
Aristotelian rather than necessarily Christian but it seems to make
sense in this context.
Company
responsibility
Behind every house-building company are shareholders, those who have
invested in it. The ethics and responsibilities of investment are
complex. One can go with Sternberg (1994 p32) in
her contention that `The defining purpose of business is to maximize
owner value over the long term'. To do anything that detracts from that
is simply wrong. Given, for argument's sake, this view, house-building
companies have a choice of two strategies. The first is that they
conduct the whole of their business to give maximum return to
shareholders over, say, a five year period. All dealing in land and in
completed houses is directed to that end. Decisions on where and what to
develop start and end at that point. The kinds of housing needs there
are and the kinds of solutions possible, are of concern only to the
extent that they have to be understood in order to meet the commercial
objectives of the company. Alternatively, the company can take a longer
and wider perspective. It may foresee long-term commercial benefit in
investing in schemes and approaches relating to lifetime homes or it may
see benefit to its reputation, profitability and productivity if it
involves itself in helping to solve the issues of homelessness. Even so,
the guiding purpose is still to benefit the owners, the shareholders.
The alternatives to following Sternberg are to adopt a business ethics
stance of communitarian or virtues-based nature in which the company considers
obligations to community for their own sake and virtuous
behaviour for its own sake. The prophetic prompt to investors is that
they (we) must take courage to think about these matters and not be
swept along by the prevailing economic philosophy, because, as Collier (1992) says,
the prevailing philosophy can be an idolatry-.
'The
symbolism of economics has become quasi-religious, a conflation of
values with value, which plunders the symbolism of Christianity to
dignify its ideology. Precisely because the culture of economism is a
quasi-religion, with a pretence of encompassing the totality of life and
of bringing happiness and fulfillment, we find ourselves obliged from a
Christian point of view to denounce it as a dehumanizing idolatry, which
worships profit made by the strong at the expense of the weak and is
dead to the word of a God who hears the cries of the poor.' (Collier 1992 pp121-2)
Enacted
ethics
Oddly, taking too narrow a view of ethics can
itself be a disbalance and even a form of idolatry. In his paper on
'welcome' as a key to a theology of homelessness, Leech (1998) told the story of the artist in residence at his East London parish where
much work is done for the homeless with external financial support.
Funders were very reluctant that their funds, donated as they saw it, to
provide funds for accommodation, food and such matters, should in any
way be used to support an artist. What the artist did was work with the
homeless, teaching them to express themselves graphically and helping
them to see themselves in her pictures of them. Leech's argument was
that she was giving back to people something of their own human dignity,
and that that was as an essential part of service as roofs and beds. It
was the enactment of a theology of welcome and humanity.
4.6
Metaphorical Interplay
City
as book and body
Housing,
the areas where people live, is a major component of any city. Grey
(1995 pl), writing for the Human
City Initiative sees the city as, at once, `the locus of the
immensity of human problems.... poverty, crime, violence...' and `the
focus of so much human creativity and visionary activities... and human
dreaming'. This is the city which is at once both inhuman and utterly
human. It is the city of buildings and current activities. In addition
to being its `real' self in this way, it is also 'a text of the symbols
of culture - a text because it is possible to "read" what a
society thinks of as important.' (Grey 1995 pl). We read the cityscape
as we read a book. Conversely, we can read the Word of the prophets,
read it as though it were the design brief and the management philosophy
for the city. On one hand the buildings and activities of the city
become words, and perhaps the Word, to us, while on the other the words
which comprise the Word become ideas to be expressed in designs and
development plans for housing, as much as for everything else.
Grey
takes the metaphor further because the human city is not only a city for
human beings, it is as it were itself a person. The housing area with
its houses, bungalows, flats, open spaces, parks and associated
community buildings, becomes a person with lungs, heart, mind and hands.
When we see it as a person, we see that it has a right to dignity, a
right for an artist to reveal its potential to itself. The homeless, or
the inadequately or inappropriately housed, are not blots on the
townscape, they are wounds on the face of a person. When the private
development industry either cannot or will not meet properly the demands
made on it, particularly the demands of justice, the personhood of the
city is as incomplete as though it had a limb missing. Persons are
persons in part because they have advanced skills and propensity for
communication. God speaks his Word through the prophetic literature in
the life of the church, to the city and to its housing areas, a word
perhaps of critical judgement or perhaps of energizing hope. God's
communication is in his listening as well as in his speaking; his word
can be one of silent address. Of work in the city, Grey (1995 p2) says
`We have to learn to work with all the ambiguities, failures, tragedies,
half-truths........ It is more about listening, silence, openness to the
goodness in unexpected places'.
`House
' and 'home'
The prophets use the word house in the accepted
sense, to mean the structure that gives shelter and privacy and they
speak of the king's palace as his house.. They also speak of the people
as the `House of Israel' and of the temple as the `House of the Lord'.
The palace is the king's home,
Israel
the people with whom God dwells. and the temple as the place of God's
dwelling. This language using house contrasts with the tents of the
desert, the tribes of
Israel
and the tabernacle of God. The latter is the language of an itinerant
people who have not yet found a home and a land; the former is the
language of a settled people. The tragedy identified in prophecy is that
through idolatry and unjust living,
Israel
was throwing away the gift of home. Desolate streets and destructed
structures were problems enough but the problem of losing the blessings
of a morally well-ordered, settled community around a resident and just
God were enormous and unnecessary.
Rybczynski
(1988) comments that in the seventeenth century in the
Netherlands
the merchant's family became important and with that the house. Ham or
hejm, home, `brought together the meanings of house and of household, of
dwelling and of refuge, of ownership and of affection.'Home' meant the
house, but also everything that was in it and around it, as well as the
people, and the sense of satisfaction and contentment that all these
conveyed. You could walk out of the house, but you always returned
home.' (Rybczynski 1988 pp61-2).
The
house-building industry has to walk a tightrope between talking of
houses and talking of homes. Building houses is a matter of business,
design and technology. Houses are manufactured products the supply and
demand for which can be calculated, along with the consequent costs.
House is a hard term for a hard commodity. In the
USA
,
the industry refers to itself as the home-building industry; at times
the
UK
has copied that practice. To some extent the reasons have been good.
What the builder now sells is often more than a bare house; it is
carpeted and equipped, ready to be occupied. The garden area is
reasonably decently finished if not partly laid out. What is being sold
is well on the way to being a home. Others argue that homes are not made
by builders and designers but only by people themselves. The quality of
the home in the sense of relationships and life may bear no relationship
to the quality of the hardware of the house and its surroundings. In the
UK
the ambiguity between house and home persists. Perhaps that is good, for
in the ambiguity the critical prophet can ask `What exactly is it you
are doing?'
In the same way that being overrun and expecting to go, and for some
actually going, into exile, meant both the loss of house and of the less
tangible home, so today the term homelessness carries the connotation of
both `houselessness' and homelessness. The connotation is always awful
but especially so when it is the elderly, the sick or the disabled who
are homeless. The prophets who foresaw the return were filled with joy
about it. In his paper, Leech (1998) took the image of `homefulness' as
the reversal of homelessness. He was looking not just for 'housefulness'
but for the security of home and the realization in particular lives in,
in his case,
East
London
of
the unfailing love and welcome of God. House and home are metaphors for
each other. Together, they are a metaphor for the welcome of God.
4.7
Emergent
Axiology
Timeless
and basic
Section
3 concluded with comments on the one-off nature of
Windsor
and Solomon's
Jerusalem
and suggested that they were essentially transient. There is a sense in
which ordinary houses are much more short-lived and transient. On the
other hand the concept of house as dwelling for all people, whether
monarchies and other institutions come or go, is likely to persist as
long as humanity itself. The need for shelter, like that for food, is
basic and critical for survival. The value of house as shelter is in its
timeless basicness. Similarly the value of home, as a place to belong,
particularly for the poor, the sick and the old, is basic and
non-negotiable. So, our prophetically inspired concern for homefulness
and our rejection of homelessness, and home inappropriateness, operate
at the most basic level of being human. The injustices of inadequate and
inappropriate housing - bearing in mind strictures about
over-specification - are affronts to our collective humanity. It follows
that all concerns about housing, all commitments to it, all careers and
all business and social efforts to engage with it, are encounters with
the human. In the scriptural perspective, encounter with the human
either is, or is inseparable from, encounter with the divine. The
axiological principle at stake is that through all the complexities of
contemporary research and practice, we must hold on to the human which
is at the heart of housing. That is not transient; for all practical
purposes it is perpetual.
Unnamed
workers
Again, in examining
Windsor
and Solomon's
Jerusalem
,
we encountered bronzeworkers and plasterers who were named people. Apart
from kings, the prophetic literature does not name people. While the
story of house-building could be told biographically in terms of people
such as John Laing, Godfrey Mitchell (Wimpey) and Norman Wates, that
would be unprophetic because it is the ordinary people themselves living
in ordinary houses, concerned about housing for their sick and elderly,
who are the masons, bricklayers, carpenters, plasterers and others, who
do the building. The labour force is unnameably large yet a
prophetic-type awareness requires that each member of it should be given
the dignity of being treated justly. Not to do so, is to stimulate
prophetic criticism.
It is clear that valuing always the human that is at the heart of
housing, and valuing each unnamed and unnamable individual, is, to use
Brueggemann's terminology, the imaginative bringing of the managed world
into a world of spoken and heard faithfulness that permits hope. (Brueggemann
1978 p68)
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