Yesterday
(literally!) I thought I had nothing new to give you, but then I realized I did
have something old to offer, the wisdom of the poet Kahlil Gibran. My mother
loved reading his books in the sixties and I’ve been reading her copy of Mirrors
of the Soul, translated with biographical notes by Joseph Sheban and
published by the Philosophical Library of New York in 1965. It’s amazing to me
how relevant it is today.
In
seminary I had a friend from Lebanon who could not understand why Gibran was so
popular in the United States. “There are better poets in Lebanon,” he said frankly.
But reading this particular book explains it to me. He immigrated to the U.S. with
his family when he was a teenager, though he returned to Lebanon for his higher
education. No doubt being “bicontinental” as well as located in New York City gave
him the exposure needed in the publishing world.
This
book begins with a quote of Gibran that speaks to our need to listen to our own
hearts and the heart of the universe:
My soul is my counsel and has taught me to give
ear to the voices which are created neither by tongues nor uttered by throats.
Before my soul became my counsel, I was dull, and
weak of hearing, reflecting only upon the tumult and the cry. But, now, I can
listen to silence with serenity and can hear in the silence the hymns of ages
chanting exaltation to the sky and revealing the secrets of eternity.
How
often we only attend to “the tumult and the cry” rather than “the hymns of [the]
ages”!
Sheban
contends that Gibran was “a rebel, but only against ceremonial practices,” while
familiarizing himself with a wide range of spiritual teachers, Christian,
Muslim, Buddhist, Confucian, non-religious philosophers, and more. In one of
his stories in Arabic, “Kahlil the Heretic,” a novice urges his monastic
community to go out and serve the people, saying,
“The hardships we shall encounter among the people
shall be more sanctifying and more exalting than the ease and serenity we
accept in this place. The sympathy that touches a neighbor’s heart is greater
than virtue practiced unseen in this convent. A word of compassion for the
weak, the criminal and the sinner is more magnificent than long, empty prayers
droned in the temple.”
Of
course, the novice in the story is driven from the monastery!
Another
character from another story, “John the Madman,” prays, “Come again, O Jesus,
to drive the vendors of thy faith from thy sacred temple.”
Finally,
these excerpts from Kahlil Gibran’s essay entitled “The New Frontier” written a
hundred years ago may have a familiar ring and relevant reverberations for our
time:
Are you a politician asking what your country can
do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are
the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in a
desert.
Are you a merchant utilizing the need of society
for the necessities of life for monopoly and exorbitant profit? Or a sincere,
hard-working and diligent person facilitating the exchange between the weaver
and the farmer, charging a reasonable profit as a middleman between supply and
demand? If you are the first, then you are a criminal whether you live in a palace
or a prison. If you are the second, then you are a charitable person whether
you are thanked or denounced by the people.
Are you a religious leader, weaving for your body
a gown out of the ignorance of the people, fashioning a crown out of the
simplicity of their hearts and pretending to hate the devil merely to live upon
his income? Or are you a devout and a pious person who sees in the piety of the
individual the foundation for a progressive nation, and who can see through a profound
search in the depth of one’s own soul a ladder to the eternal soul that directs
the world?
If you are the first, then you are a heretic, a
disbeliever in God even if you fast at day and pray by night. If you are the second,
then you are a violet in the garden of truth even though its fragrance is lost
upon the nostrils of humanity or whether its aroma rises into that rare air
where the fragrance of flowers is preserved. …
Are you a governor who denigrates himself before
those who appoint him and denigrates those whom he is to govern, who never
raises a hand unless it is to reach into pockets and who does not take a step
unless it is for greed? Or are you the faithful servant who serves only the
welfare of the people?
If you are the first, then, then you are as a tare
in the threshing floor of the nation; and if the second, then you are a
blessing upon its granaries.
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Copyright © 2019 by Chris
R. Glaser. Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution of author and
blogsite. Other rights reserved. Photo from California desert by Chris.
