The Shepherds

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 80, 28 December 1935, Page 19

The Shepherds

“And. there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night.”— St. Luke.

You will remember in last week’s story of Bethlehem, it told of the shepherds’ village nearby, beneath the hills and near the fertile plains.

To-day the shepherds have changed but little from Bible days; they are friendly and hospitable. Daily the men drive their flocks of sheep or sometimes milch goats and donkeys out on to the plains. When the village pastures have been expended, the shepherds go far into the wilderness and, with no caves or any shelter from the weather, they club together and from morn till eve keep a vigilant watch over their flocks. The wilderness is an open desert, with dry tussocks of grass upon which the beasts feed. After the evening meal the chief sets the watches, for it grows dark suddenly in this land of short twilights, and, taking for a guide a bright star, he measures with outstretched arm its course through the sky. Each span represents a watch in which two of the shepherds will keep guard together. The first guards, with rod and staff, move about the outside edge of the flock. Now and then the yelp of a wild jackal or striped hyena causes the sheep to hustle as if they will stampede, but reassuring calls from the watchers quickly restore quiet. The other shepherds lie down to rest, spacing themselves in a wide half-circle round the fold. The first three watches bring midnight to deepen the starry skies, with the distant mountains silhouetted against the sky. With the dawn, the shepherds stir and there, outlined against the pinkness of the sky, is the city of the Nativity—Bethlehem. The night vigils over, the men start off in the dawning with their flock)?, each in a different direction. The men each have a call for their sheep, which sounds exactly alike to the uninitiated, but the animals never mistake their master’s voice to follow a stranger.

It is an ancient custom among the keepers of Hocks to congregate at some stream or fountain to partake in common of the food sent out to them from the villages, but the shepherds are not as many nowadays, for forage is short in the wilderness and there are not nearly as many sheep to be found there as in Biblical days.