“The Night of the Seven Suppers” | “Oidhche nan Seachd Suipearan” (Scottish Gaelic)
We come to the Longest Night on December 21, the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere. I recently learned a phrase describing this night. It comes from the highlands of Scotland, “The night of the seven suppers.”
The longest night is dark for so long that it feels like there is time to eat seven suppers!
This saying is balanced with another proverb I find fascinating and also features the number seven.
“Seven herrings, a full meal for a salmon;
Seven salmon, a full meal for a seal;
Seven seals, a full meal for a small whale;
Seven small whales, a full meal for a large whale;
Seven large whales, a full meal for a bull whale;
Seven bull whales, a full meal for the leviathan of the ocean.”
The leviathan is featured in Psalm 74:14, a sea creature, it seems, of considerable size!
The saying raises the question of how much is enough.
All need to eat.
All who ate had “a full meal.”
All had enough.
Salmon doesn’t need seven seals, seven herring is enough.
The seal is satisfied with seven salmon, not eight plus a snack.
Enough.
Maybe seven suppers is too much even for a long, dark night.
A dark night, however, invites time enough for gratitude and pause for reckoning how much is enough.
May all have enough.
May we eat and drink what we need.
May we be grateful.
May we not share too little.
May we share enough.
Enough.
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