There used to be a popular abandoned railroad bridge in New Jersey. It was 50 feet above the Delaware River near Portland and teenagers would jump off it. An otherwise-reasonable woman in Ledgewood Baptist Church did it. A definitely unreasonable pastor’s son from this congregation [Josiah Holwick] climbed up to the upper arch of the bridge and dropped 80 feet to the river. He was filmed doing it, of course. In 2009 a young man jumped off and his body wasn’t found for seven months. Authorities altered the bridge so no one could ever jump off it again.
That bridge attracted amateurs. A higher level of thrill comes from BASE jumping. BASE jumpers find extremely tall buildings, cliffs or bridges – and jump off them. They carry special parachutes on their backs and release them at the last possible moment. It is supposed to be very thrilling.
The movie “Sunshine Superman” is about the man who invented BASE jumping. Carl Boenish was a nerdy guy who loved to parachute and especially to video himself and others while parachuting. He got the idea to do it without an airplane by going to Yosemite National Park and jumping off El Capitan, one of tallest cliffs in the world. * It made a great video.
It wasn’t legal, of course, but he felt the laws of nature trumped the laws of man. I am not sure which law of nature says it is a good idea to throw yourself off a cliff or skyscraper but the idea soon caught on and thousands were doing it. This week a British guy jumped off a bridge attached to a bungee cord, dropped hundreds of feet, and dunked a biscuit in a cup of tea.
One of the tallest cliffs in the world was in Norway. Carl flew there with his wife and crew and made a world-record jump from the top of it. Soon after this he went back up the mountain with some locals. At the top, he asked them if they knew the Bible. He then proceeded to tell the story of the temptation of Jesus. The devil took Jesus to a high point of the temple and challenged him to jump off. Satan even quoted a Bible passage that promised that God would send his angels to deliver his devoted follower from danger.
Carl Boenish pointed to his parachute and said, “This is my angel.” He jumped.
The locals filmed him as he fell, but then they froze. Carl’s body had turned into the cliff face and tumbled down until he lay motionless on the rocks below. About one out of every 700 BASE jumps ends this way. Over 300 have died in the sport, averaging 25 a year.
Carl omitted a critical part of the temptation story. Jesus had said to Satan, “The Bible also says, don’t put God to the test.” Jesus never jumped.
* Carl Boenish was not the first to jump off El Capitan – Brian Schubert and Mike Pelkey had done it in 1966. Carl and his friends took it beyond being a stunt to the full-fledged sport of BASE jumping.
________
Sources for this illustration:
Wikipedia, “Carl Boenish,” < https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Boenish >.
“Trollwall 1984,” by Stein Erik, February 8, 2010 (last modified December 12, 2014); < http://www.basejumper.com/Articles/Stories/Trollwall_1984_873.html >.
“Film Review: ‘Sunshine Superman’,” by Dennis Harvey, January 16, 2015; < http://variety.com/2015/film/reviews/film-review-sunshine-superman-1201406409/ >.
“‘Sunshine Superman’ Review: Leap of Faith,” by Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal , May 21, 2015; < http://www.wsj.com/articles/sunshine-superman-review-leap-of-faith-1432232903 >.