In AD20s Nazareth there was only one make of shoe worth wearing – ‘Stags’.
Your Stag was a lightweight shoe with a hardened camel skin soul and thin linen upper, not dissimilar to the modern slipper. They were always tan in colour, making the wearer appear shoeless from a distance. Despite their thinness, a pair of Stags were rugged and durable, and in conjunction with being the only make of shoe on the market, became the automatic choice of the consumer. Stags sold like hot cakes. (When hot cakes were finally invented some 80 years later the phrase ‘selling like Stags' was coined. When hot cakes started to outsell Stags in terms of sales per minute the phrase was updated.) Their only drawback was a tendency to become clammy and sweaty, but this was to be expected in the scorching heat of the Nazareth sun. Every man and his donkey wore them. You wore either Stags or nothing. And the only people who wore nothing were the poor and the very lame.
Then in AD22 a young man named Solomon Sandal developed his own design of shoe to rival the Stag's monopoly. His shoe was an altogether classier affair than a pair of Stags. They had a thick cork sole and were held to the foot by three leather straps, two across the top of the foot and one across the heel. Your Sandal was slightly less snug than your Stag but its wearer’s feet were spared the discomfort of sweatiness by the constant ventilation permitted by the open design. Such was the stylish simplicity of the shoe that it was hailed as an instant classic. Word of mouth spread quickly about this superior brand of footwear and the before long the fashionable hordes were laying siege to Sandal’s stall, demanding a pair. With the fashionable hordes came the landed gentry and noblemen. Solomon Sandal was the toast of high society.
Sandal had been raised as an only child in the poor back streets of Nazareth and this newfound wealth and privilege had an intoxicating effect on him. He revelled in his position of shoemaker to the high and mighty and hoped that the name ‘Sandal’ would always conjure images of class, quality and style. Every man of note owned and wore with pride a pair of Sandals. Except one. That man was Jesus Christ. Although neither wealthy nor high class, Jesus’ reputation as the Son of God had marked him out as a bit of a celebrity. He should wear Sandals, decided Solomon.
Sandal set about gaining Jesus’ patronage by following him on a walk to Judea. He approached Jesus and said unto Him, “My Lord, I bring you a gift.” Jesus stopped.
“Really, young man? What do you bring?”
“I have brung unto you a pair of the finest Sandals, to facilitate your heavy walking schedule.”
“But I already have a pair of Stags,” replied Christ.
“But they are worn and frayed whereas these Sandals are box fresh and have a ventilation system that will allow your holy feet to remain free of clamminess at all times.”
“You are very kind,” said Christ, “but my Stags still have some life in them yet and to discard them for a cooler and less clammy shoe would be utterly decadent. I’m afraid I cannot accept your very generous gift. Go out, young man, and give these shoes to the poor and slovenly.”
“But the poor and slovenly aren’t the sort of clientèle I want to attract. These are high quality shoes for high quality people. If the poor and slovenly were to be seen in them it would damage the reputation of the shoe and its inventor irreparably,” protested Sandal.
Jesus laid His hand on Sandal’s head and said unto him, “Young man, what is your name?”
“Solomon Sandal, my Lord.”
“Solomon, that’s a nice name,” mused Jesus. “Solomon Sandal, you are a man of drive, ambition and intelligence. Your footwear is excellent and you are good of heart. I want you to go and sell your Sandals to the rich and use the profits to manufacture free shoes for the poor. Some people can’t even afford Stags and if you were to clothe the feet of these people you would be bound for the kingdom of God. The Lord be with you”. With that, Jesus and His followers walked on.
This was a setback to Sandal; he had wanted a celebrity endorsement, not some religious guff. He decided not to follow Jesus’ teachings. Instead he built himself a palatial mansion in the hills and in keeping with the other aristocrats he socialised with, he commissioned a number of temples and public buildings. It was whilst the construction of these buildings was under way that Sandal came across a brilliant marketing ploy. He should commission statues and paintings of the man of the moment: Jesus Christ. However in his depictions he would take the artistic liberty of portraying Him wearing the famous and celebrated Sandal. Jesus himself wasn’t that bothered by the misrepresentation – He had bigger fish to fry.
Sandal was an extremely happy man. He had worked out that only a few thousand people would ever see Jesus in the flesh and even then they probably wouldn’t note his choice of footwear. A few months later even fewer people would have the chance to see Him because He’d been stiffed by His mate and sentenced to death. Even though Sandal grieved for the harshly treated saviour of humanity he was loath to pass up an opportunity to completely flood the marketplace with images of Jesus in Sandals. He commissioned pictures of Stag-sporting Roman soldiers doing the Sandal-clad Jesus terrible and degrading discourtesies. The Christians took note.
As generations passed the number of people who had met or seen Jesus in the flesh dwindled. Most of the images that remained were the ones commissioned by Sandal. These images were often replicated for new audiences further afield and in almost every instance they showed Jesus wearing a pair of pristine Sandals. From that day to this, the common perception is that Jesus Christ, Son of God, is without doubt the world’s most famous Sandal-wearer. Indeed, He is so synonymous with the item that they are often referred to as ‘Jesus Creepers’. The truth is he never wore them. He always wore Stags. It is only the marketing genius of Solomon Sandal that fooled us into such a belief.
Let us not make the same mistakes with less trivial inaccuracies. Amen.
© Iain Laurie, 2008
Stag vs Sandal by Iain Laurie was read by Silas Hawkins at the Liars' League Winners & Losers event on Tuesday 12 August 2008
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