Let’s Ask Ourselves Hard Questions On The Governor’s Jugular

By Olalere Fagbola

WHEN I was a child, I spoke like a child. But now, having drunk from the cup of maturity, I am daily escaping from blabbering words on their surface for I now understand that right inside the bone of words which a child throws away as inconsequential, lies the sweetest marrow. Talk of the Governor’s Cup,  and the sense of the child hovers around sports in which athletes or footballers slug it out on the field over who is qualified to pick the trophy.

But here in the elderly conference we are not just talking of the Governor’s Jug as the mere journey between the cup and the lips, but we are talking about the Governor’s Jugular.

For instance when we talk of the Cup which Jesus at the last supper gave to His disciples even from an eye-opening insights, one comes to the realisation of the fact that Jesus Christ’s injunction to Christians to do so in remembrance of Him, is not just for jamboree or as mere Hollywood parody in which the embrace of the Cross of calvary is a drama fit only for the stage.

At this juncture, it is pertinent to go down memory lane on what the King’s Cup or the Governor’s Cup symbolises in ancient times, and from which today has wisely borrowed. Noting that the Cup is as good as its content,the talk of the King’s or the Governor’s Cup is the talk of their Cupbearers ; the equivalent of today’s Chief of Staff to the King or to the Governor. Take it straight, it is the Chief Cupbearer to the king ,being the chief officer who serves him wine that holds the King’s jugular.

Hence in China, the king and his chief cupbearer must have unity of spirit and which is why another name for jugular is :”Yoga”. This is because the words jugular, Yoke and Yoga belong to same cognate family as they all share similar roots.The Latin word for jugular is “iugularis”, diminutive of “iugum”(Yoke) while this crossbar fitting over the necks of two oxen of equal strength derives from Germanic and anti-European stem corresponding to Latin:”iugum”from the base of Sanskrit:”Yuga” or call it :”Yoga.”

The implication is this: it is the man, the Chief Cupbearer who serves the wine directly to the king that holds the king by the jugular. In Israel ,or in ancient Egypt, the king and the chief Cupbearer must be equally yoked, for on matters of policiess, governance and judgement, they swim and sink together, sharing victories or defeat as occasions demand. This is why the chief qualification or virtue needed to be appointed as the chief Cupbearer is Trustworthiness ,and it is the appointment to the office of the chief Cupbearer that is considered as the most important appointment that the king or the Governor could ever make .In view of the fact that it is also the most honourable and most prestigious position in the king’s cabinet or kingdom, the chief Cupbearer wields the most considerable influence on the king either privately or publicly.

Just as good policies are the lifeblood of governance which gladdens the hearts of governors,  It is the wine that makes and gladdens the heart of kings and he,the chief Cupbearer is fully in charge of it.

“The historian Xenophon describes the procedure of the wine service of the Persian and Median kings thus : “Cupbearers would bring the wine to the chief cup bearer,who washed the cup in the king’s presence ,poured a little of the wine into his left hand and drank it.Then ,lightly holding the cup between thumb and fingers, he handed it to the king.
The fact that possibility always existed that attempts might be made In the king’s life through poisoning his wine, testing wine by tasting it before serving the king guaranteed that the chief Cupbearer remained the king’s jugular and the “jar to the king’s heart.”

In ancient days the Chief Cupbearer were regarded as :”Pure of Hands” and the words of sages often advised kings and governors to think doubly twice before appointing the chief Cupbearer, for it is always too difficult and detrimental to the life of the king to reverse such sensitive appointments.

“If you don’t trust him, don’t engage him; but if you engage him, don’t doubt him .” said Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

When King Pharaoh sometime fired his Chief Cupbearer and his Baker and confined both of them to prison for gross offence ,it was his chief Cupbearer that he later restored to his position.Also noting the strategic place a chief Cupbearer occupied in the heart of a king,it was not for fun that Joseph, the prisoner and dream interpreter had to beg the chief Cupbearer: “Think of me when it shall be well with you and mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this (prison) house.”

Of course, human memory is always short as the chief Cupbearer who benefited from Joseph’s goodwill soon sat in the middle of eminence only to forget . At God’s own appointed time however he cried:” I remember my sin today and it was this remembrance that paved the way for Joseph becoming the Governor in Egypt.

In view of their prominence and pre eminence in the king’s court,the chief Cupbearer ( pronounce the chief of staff ) had about a dozen critical functions in their role as chief operating officer, manager,chief strategist and coordinator as well as personal confidants of the king or governor.
In the management of the king’s wine ,the chief Cupbearer is equally managing the king’s time,policy,agenda,messages and crises that are envisaged or unexpected. Thinking along this same path of ancient wisdom in the administration of the office of the chief Cupbearer, a veteran chief of staff who described those occupying same office today ,regardless of differences in roles ,as all powerful,remarked:” it does not make a difference, if it is your assignment,or not,as the Chief ,you are responsible for everything.”

It should be noted here that in ancient times, paper qualification or intellectualism was not a sufficient prerequisite for appointing a chief Cupbearer, as the wise in the land often explored the cosmological or the spiritual factor to it . When Governor joseph was playing fast intelligence on his brothers who sold him off to Egyptian merchants, he hid his silver cup in the sack of the biblical Benjamin and while his steward waylaid his brothers for stealing the silver cup, the government charged them with the theft of an equivalent of the governor’s eye and vision.
“Is it not my master’s drinking cup with which he divines the future ?”

Upon being dragged before Governor Joseph, he also charged his brothers:”What is this that you have done ? Do you not realise that such a man as I am can certainly ( with the aid of the silver cup )detect and know by divination everything you do without other knowledge of it ? ”
One is tempted to stop here for fear of being misinterpreted but I must hazard this hard question to most of us as stewards in the king’s court ,including the media :Why are we so much engrossed in our own self opinion that we have tended to fail to reflect deeply more on those things that bind the king and his chief Cupbearer than the things that separate them ?
With the scripture advising against being partakers in the drinking from the cup of double-dealing at same time ,isn’t it high time we focused on the aspects of the relationship which enhance capacity for reuniting the king and the chief Cupbearer towards making saner conclusions possible for governance?

Jesus in praying at Gethsemane Garden at His trying moments that the CUP may pass away from him was not doing so much out of fears as of His concern for the reproach his death (as one wrongly charged with blasphemy and sedition) would bring to God.

Nevertheless, He was willing to submit to Jehovah’s will and drink from the cup of suffering.

Conversely, our symbolic cup sometimes may come in form of unmeritted tribulations ,it is to test our will; for if we patiently endure it ,taking joy in our good intentions, the baptism of fire being experienced may after all climax us into a more glorious future for us.