Honey In Humor

The nation has, at this writing, been amazed to discover how dependent life is on the bees.  A tragedy has occurred in nature since the turn of the new millennium that has caused dramatic decline in the bee population.  Programs are in design to recover the decimation, and crops are endangered because of the loss.  City dwellers are being permitted to create hives in their backyards.  The fear of being stung has given way to the realization that without the bees we are bereft of honey for food, but of the enormous service performed by bees in flight from bud to bud to give pollination to crops and reproduction.  Without them there are major crops that will fade and die.  The fear of loss must give way to the large service from those odd little insects that fly, even when mathematicians must work to explain how much flying can be done with so modestly styled wings.  He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh – and help us.

That thought brings me to the topic for today, Humor.  One of the best statements in defense for humor that I have ever encountered comes from my favorite columnist on business life and management – Harvey Mackay: A good sense of humor helps to overlook the unbecoming, underlook the unconventional, tolerate the unpleasant, overcome the unexpected and outlast the unbearable. (An effective humorist could have a great time using humor to honor the person who came up with the coinage: underlook.  Here is a fellow who couldn’t think of a word he wanted so coined one – or assumed it. He may not know that it would be better than the one he couldn’t think of.)  We might well immortalize a person with such humor.  Sometimes entertainers, better at comedy than humor, use roasts for such purpose.  Comedy is a subdivision of humor, but comes from reduced parentage, to entertain, sometimes to laughter, sometimes to embarrassment.  Jesting between friends is more akin to humor than is comedy that is so well rewarded by the public.  Some persons, like Will Rogers, could enter as a humorist or comedian.  He is well remembered as a humorist – not as a comedian.  The humorist inspires thought: the comedian laughter.  There appear some of both factors in many statements – so to justify the relationships.  However, humor may be used to overcome some of the damage of demeaning experiences that may include jokes and jests.

Purity of humor, even comedy in its proper form, is assumptive of affirmative benefit. We discover that it could be used as a weapon, commonly practiced in day to day living in put-downs of others in our lives.  Put-down is common in political humor, which turns to negative accusation, may become scurrilous, and has been sufficiently vicious on occasion to invite duels and deaths.  All this suggests that it ought to be given some attention, and used as it was meant to be used to lighten whatever needs to be lightened in the context of the humor – perhaps to lighten the spirit.  The solution is not to abandon it, but to know its healing benefits when managed in an affirmative spirit, a spirit of understanding even wisdom.

I remember reading about the humor of Christ, especially from writings of some theologians/philosophers, like Elton Trueblood.  One occasion noted by culture students of ancient Israel, was the story from Jesus of the event when the observer was critical of another but missing the more dramatic beam that projected from his own eye.  Jesus gained not only interest in the important issues as against the lesser, but that image would likely have inspired smiles from persons so moved by oral speech that they would conjure an impossible event that would strike them as funny in the extreme.  It isn’t humorous to us: it was to them.  Many speakers talking to foreign audiences find their humor falling flat.  The local humor is different.  The problem occurred for me in addressing a Hong Kong audience of Chinese.  About half were bilingual.  When I made a humorous reference there was immediate response from the local people.  When the interpreter translated my words there was a subdued response from the remainder.  The translator was becoming irritated that the English gained larger response than the native language.  I modified a bit so as to reduce incongruity.  Humor is for good fellowship in faith acceptance.  In communication there is place to review and find solution to find honey that in language offers sweetness, not sting, for faith and truth.