I am going to tell you a story. More to the point, I am going to tell you a nursery rhyme, though I dare say that its origins are far beyond that of a mere cradle tale. This story has been told from mother to daughter and from father to son for more than two hundred years in history and may even have been told to you when you were just a child, but I am here to tell it again, and this time you will hear it in full truth. Yes, the tale to be told has become as corrupt and crooked as the sourse of which it comes.

Inside thousands of books, and perhaps even thousands more minds, there is engraved a simple, yet so defiled, narrative of two people. Lacking its original fragrance, the story's so simplistic ambiance overshadows a much deeper truth. In it current form, the story is as follows.

Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water
Jack fell down and broke his crown
And Jill came tumbling after.
Up got Jack, and home did trot As fast as he could caper
He went to bed and bound his head
With vinegar and brown paper.

Ah, yes! Now you understand. Jack and Jill, perhaps the first character in history you ever knew. This story refers to King Louis XVI who was beheaded and Queen Marie Antoinette who followed his fate soon after. What a lovely story for children to be reciting as though it had a happy ending. Seeing this, history sought to better its ending by adding in the last two lines. I, however, have a different view point on the story. Though it acurately, yet poorly, defines what happened in 1793, it better tells a story of two people later on in history.

As Daniel once did in ancient babylon, the story holds a prophetic, more poetic, value. Short though it may be, seeking understanding in every word will reveal a much broader story. Previous to the first line, Jack and Jill had a history with each other. They did not simple find themselves at the bottom of a hill of which they decided to carry a pail up. To be walking up such a hill they must have been holding hands as they later both tumbled down, suggesting that both were somehow connected. One might suggest that they had been holding onto the same pail, but for appeasement of the story let us suggest the former understanding. To be holding hands, they were more than friends, they were in love. Working together in a unified effort to accomplish a work showed that they had a deep appreciation of both hard work and deep love. (when two are in love, a sign of such is that they labor together)

Further than so mentioned, the work they were involved in must have been a religious one for the following reason. Often in history, the representation of a pail of water, or going to a well, brings to mind the story of Christ meeting the sameritan at the well of Jacob. Many times this is representative of a ministry or any furthering of christian good will. So Jack and Jill must have both been very religious in attitude. Already we see a deeper picture of who these two people were. Both worked hard at three things: the love of labor, the love of one another, and the love of christ, though obviously not in that order.

Introducing the story straight away, the narrarater summerizes an entire epic event in a short, so very underrated sentence. They went up a hill. Yes, but was that really so very easy? Looking on just to the next sentence suggest the negative. Nobody falls down a hill that is small in grade or gradual in any way. Take note that our main character, Jack, broke his crown, or his head upon falling down. Sure, one could trip on a small hill, but to break the skull would have been much harder and having a very steep, very rugged hill would have been far more likely. The hill in question is not a physical hill, rather it is as deep in meaning as the rest of the story. Being so, it is comprised of many struggles overcome; for a hill denotes a great effort to triump over.

The story does not give us the luxory of exactly what happened while traversing the great prophetic hill, but to have reached the top of such a hill must have meant that at the end of it all, (rather, the end of good fortune) they must have succeeded in unimaginable ways. Quickly turning to the next progression in the story, Jack and Jill both fetched the water in the well, and seeing as how most intelligent people do not spend much time atop hills, they both had nowhere to go, but down. Directly after having been at the top of their struggles, Jack is the first to unexpectantly fall. He being the first to do so is of little significance aside from historical progression. Falling in this point of the story did not signify failure, but rather impatience. If Jack had taken full note (as well as Jill) that the hill was that treaturous, then the folly might not have accured, though time and unforeseen occurence does happen. This impatience of his resulted in his receding back through all of the progress that was made between him and Jill. As he fell slowly down, he would have seen all the accomplishments of his, equally as slowly, unfold just as it had been put together.

Second to Jack falling, we see that Jill as well fell. Though happening almost immediately thereafter, this bit of history may not have occured until some time after Jacks fall. Her fate, however, seems to be equal, though opposite, of Jack's. Finding themselves at the bottom together did not prove to be of any encouragement either. By this point Jack had already been injured at heart and Jill would have been the first to move on to her original state. Jack, as we see, found himself limping, not home, but rather to another residence. How do we know? Firstly we know that Jill was not there to help as it was Jack that had to cure his own wounds. Also, Jack would not have been home (or to his original state) because he was forced to bind his own head (or his mind) with materials contrary to what was common in medicine.

The last lines give a remarkable history of the final relationship between the two and unfortunatley the story is cut short just prior to the big cliffhanger, the paramount of the story. Obviously the two separated paths in a very sudden way towared the end of the story and it is clear that both had lost strength that it took to overcome the hill still beside them. What is not told is the story of what Jack did next. Though the future of Jill is unknown, Jack's story continues while wounds to the head are still present. After regaining strenght enough to consider what had happened to him, he revisits the place of his original failure. Climbing back up the hill, this time without the cumbrence of Jill, he searches and later finds what it was the caused his fall. It was the root of a nearby tree. This root he believed did not exist at the time of his original traversal, but now looking at it with greater knowledge of life he was able to see the truth...that there was truly something there that he did not see before. This was only a start because now he had to correct the problem, he had to follow the root to the origin, the reason for the truth.

Going back to a beginning aspect of the story, there is something left out, but not forgotten. The pail that both Jack and Jill carried held nothing at the start of their journey, and held water just prior to the cataclismic fall. The water means that which feeds truth, as physical water nurishes our health, helping our minds to think and understand. The water leading to truth no doubt fed the tree and the root that felled Jack. The fact that Jack, and even perhaps Jill, dropped the pail and water in the act of falling, suggests that the truth nurishing substance never made it to the root, or truth. In short, the reality that Jack had not seen, that being of truth, was unseen due to lack of wisdom...lack of water.

Having found this life altering fact, Jack proceeded back down the hill, this time with an aura of patience. I say this is a cliffhanger because we do not know what occured next. Did Jack return to his original life with the newly found wisdom and truth or did he instead look to again ascend the fateful hill? The answers will not come soon...but will be very anticipated.

Posted in: on Monday, September 04, 2006 at at 10:22 PM