WAWA Blog January 20, 2009: In Honor of King and with Hope for Change: Part II
Part One: Read more...
Khaled
erupted. “I wonder if Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol ever read
Micah. I read that when he was told by his generals that the IDF was
the greatest army since King David, he became ecstatic! I cannot
understand why the American government is ignoring the situation in my
homeland, when, in 1956, the US demanded Israel withdraw from the Sinai
Desert back to the international border after only three months. The
Six Day War was a year ago, and no such demands were made.
"They
have turned a blind eye to the destruction of Palestinian towns, and I
cannot believe America has not stood up to the Israelis. Not a word of
condemnation about the massive building projects in the West Bank,
Sinai, Eastern Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights! Not a word that
Palestinians are still living in refugee camps, and their homes and
olive groves have been plowed over!
"Why doesn’t America
demand equally just treatment for Palestinians, too? Yes, yes, yes,
America is focused on Vietnam. Now we mourn Martin Luther King in
America, and I mourn the lack of justice in my homeland.”
Art violently snuffed
out his cigarette and boomed, “Look, the situation is untenable. We got
nowhere discussing this last night, and you cannot forget what my
people, my very family, suffered beyond belief from the Nazis! You
cannot compare the two! Then, we must endure the inflammatory rhetoric
to ‘push the Jews into the sea!’ Why, of course we believed another
Holocaust was about to happen. How can you blame us after all we have
suffered while the world remained mute? Nobody spoke out to protect us
when the Nazis were exterminating us in ovens. My God! How can you
blame us for attacking first? Anyone would have, if they had suffered
as my people have. How can you blame us for attacking first?” Khaled
kindly replied, “Of course, we all deeply regret the atrocities that
were inflicted upon the Jewish people. But that pain should not be used
as a reason to inflict pain on others.” Riad
shook his head, removed his thick-lens, thin wire-rimmed spectacles and
rubbed his myopic eyes. “Yes, we all agree and we must be sensitive to
the suffering the Jewish people have endured throughout history. I was
in Egypt when the UN forces stationed on the Egyptian-Israeli border
left, and what happened next? The Egyptians blockaded the Straits of
Tiran and cut off Israeli shipping access to the Port of Eliat. Such
infantile behavior from world leaders! It’s always about control and
keeping power. If I were Irish, it would certainly get my Irish up!” Jack
and Riad shared a smile as Art erupted. “Yes, Khaled, it is true that
just a few weeks after that blockade, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq
signed a mutual defense agreement designed to facilitate a combined
attack on Israel. They want to obliterate Israel! You see, Khaled,
Israel had no choice but to attack first!” Khaled
was miserable. “I read that President Johnson was asked to intervene,
but I am sad. Vietnam preoccupies this country. I am sad about many
things. It was only seven years ago in his farewell address that
President Eisenhower warned the American people to beware of the
military-industrial complex. He warned us of the danger of becoming
dependent on the manufacturing of weapons to stimulate our economy. It
was a year ago that Martin Luther King warned us that ‘any nation, who,
year after year, spends more money on military defense than on programs
of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.’10 What
I see going on in the world is that everyone seems to believe that
stockpiling weapons will ensure peace and provide many jobs. This is
false security, and sows the seeds that war is the way to peace.” Riad
rubbed his gleaming dome and looked directly at Art. “The Jewish people
have been threatened throughout their entire history. It is
understandable they are paranoid. It is justified! But, that does not
justify them treating others unjustly. The Israeli nation is surrounded
by refugee camps--refugee camps filled with indigenous Palestinians who
were forced off their land by threat of their own holocaust. Poor
leadership on all sides brings us to this place in time. The horrors
and injustice of the Holocaust are still fresh in Jewish minds. It
should remain fresh within all our minds. We should never forget the
injustice of the Holocaust. We should never forget that man’s
inhumanity to man was able to proliferate because good people did
nothing. The nations of the world turned a blind eye to the pain and
injustice the Jewish people suffered until too many had died. Now, the
Palestinians are being ignored by the world and are fighting back in
ways that will not help their cause. Injustice must always be
confronted and be withstood by peaceful means. When will this be
understood?” “Get
real, Riad. The PLO wants to wipe us out! But God is on our side. After
all, we won the war in only six days! The Arab nations received a
left to the liver by Israeli’s pre-emptive strike, and now we control
the Sinai, Gaza Strip, Suez Canal in Egypt, West Bank, and East
Jerusalem. The entire city of Jerusalem is under Israeli control!
Surely you see the hand of God in this?” Khaled
was steaming, while Riad gently spoke. “I know you do, Art, but I see a
different side. Superior military force, and the fact that Israel was
supplied with American intelligence and knew exactly where to strike,
won it. Eighteen thousand Arab soldiers died, and Palestinian refugees
continue to be ignored. By her silence, America has legitimized the
Israeli victory, and I fear ahead of us will be more injustice, death,
and destruction. Last December, George Habash founded the Popular Front
for the Liberation of Palestine. It is a terrorist organization
inspired by communism. Each side ups the ante with more death and
destruction. When will it ever be enough?” Art
sighed deeply and offered, “You are right, Riad; when will it be
enough? The Torah teaches that everyone is a part of God and created in
the divine image. We can even agree with Jesus that the greatest
command is that we love God with our whole hearts, souls, minds, and
strength. I suppose, if everyone did that, it would be a perfect world.
You know I love you, man, but I have got to hit the road. Sylvia and I
are flying back home to Iowa City tonight, but we will definitely see
you soon in sunny Florida.” While Khaled and Mary escorted Art to his car, Jack turned to Riad and enquired, “What religion are you?” Riad
smiled cryptically as he sighed, “Child, I am a student of all; my mind
is open to the wisdom of every tradition, and I am still exploring. May
I ask you, Jack, if you agree that we are all flawed, imperfect beings?
Do you believe we all come from the same source, and we will return to
that source when this journey is through? Can you entertain the thought
that this life just might, in fact, be a dress rehearsal for the next?
Do you agree that we all hear the message of the good news, limited by
our own spiritual, intellectual, and psychological capacities?” Jack’s
eyes had become more dazzling than emeralds, and Riad laughed from his
gut. “Jack, I must be careful with you. It is with patience we are to
run the race set before us. Hmmm, I sense you would like to hear about
the stages of the soul, no?” “Riad, you are some kind of strange, but please, go on.” Riad
sweetly intoned, “Ah, Jack, I will not argue with you, and I joyfully
share with you that the spiritual journey is fluid, not static. One may
pass back and forth through any of the four, and maybe more, stages of
the soul in one’s journey.11 Stage one is
essentially our infancy in the spiritual life. Like a wild child, a
person in this stage reflects the inner chaotic and anti-social,
unregenerate soul that is interested only in its own self-satisfaction
and ego. Stage one people may claim to love others, but their behavior
proves that they love their own pleasure, money, power, prestige, and
security above any other. For stage one people, it really is all about
them. “The
good news is that God is already within us, so the vast majority of
humanity responds to that inner tug and seeks God, entering stage two.
These folks live virtuous lives and do many good works. They also can
be rigid, fundamental, and legalistic. They adhere to a higher human
authority than themselves for guidance. They submit to institutions,
scripture, dogma, ritual, ministers, or gurus. This is the most
appropriate stage for older children and most adults. A difference
between stages one and two is that a stage one person wouldn’t even
notice a neighbor in need, while a stage two person has awoken to the
fact that we are to be our neighbors’ keepers. “Now,
stage three souls have awakened to the realization that one’s neighbor
is everyone on the planet, and not just those who think and look alike.
Stages threes are seekers, doubters, skeptics, and may even become
atheists or agnostics. They will study philosophy and other religions,
and often become activists for social justice and reform. “Then
there is stage four, which is the way of the mystic. A mystic can be
understood as one in love with the divine mystery, and one who is aware
of the unity of all creation. They have gone beyond their concepts of
God to an intuitive comprehension of the divine in all creation. They
are awake to the action of God within themselves and others. Saint
Francis, the leper kisser of Assisi, was a mystic--head over heels in
love with God, in everyone and all creation. Many thought him nuts, or
at least, eccentric. The mystic realizes the connections and unity of
all beings, places, situations, past, present, and future. This person
has traveled beyond their concept of God, not by personal effort, but
in response to the invitation of the Mystery we call God, for lack of a
better word. “Now,
Jack, you have a very wild look in your eyes; I hope I have not
disturbed you too much. Please, understand that it would be violence
upon a soul to rush the work of God. A stage one or two should remain
that way until God beckons them on.” Mary
and Khaled had returned to the kitchen just as Jack’s eyes bored into
Raid's, and his voice cracked, “You know, Mr. Riad, I’d like to tell
you why I tuned out the institutional church. Up until I was about
eight years old, every Sunday morning was spent standing in a
glass-encased room that was called, and literally was, the cry room. I
would stand at the soundproof glass and watch this show on the other
side. My brother Mike was an altar boy. I’d make faces at him, hoping
to crack him up, but he never looked my way. Every so often, I’d hear
the priest’s voice filter through the loudspeaker above my head. But it
was all Latin to me: and back then, it really was! I see myself now,
just as I was: surrounded by squirming kids and uptight adults,
engulfed by the sounds of crying and whining, and I truly believed that
was church. Once my younger siblings had grown, we got to be in the
main room. It was ok.
“But when I turned fifteen in 1963,
three things occurred. By Thanksgiving that year, I was overfilled with
images of JFK being shot and John-John during that motorcade. I still
can’t get that little guy in his short coat with his knees exposed out
of my head. He saluted as the casket rode by, but nobody knew why it
had to be that way. And life as I had known it all changed. But God is
good, and three months later, the gloom had gone. For the Beatles
appeared on a Sunday night in my living room, and the world as I had
known it was never the same. Recently, John Lennon made a comment to a
reporter that the Beatles were more popular with my generation than
Jesus, and he was right on. My friends and I know every lyric to every
Beatles song, but nobody ever quotes Jesus. “Lennon
made me think about my own hypocrisy, and that led me to drop the
church. It happened at weekly confession; there I was at the altar, on
my knees and mindlessly repeating the same old prayers as the week
before. But on that day, it was for the last time. In the middle of the
three Our Fathers and ten Hail Mary's, it hit me like a light. These
words that I uttered never changed anything, and I got up and walked
out for the very last time. But now, I understand; I’m just a stage
one! The thing is, you have given me a lot to think about. Maybe I was
just born into the wrong faith?” Ahmad
smiled even wider and exclaimed, “Jack, a Hindu would advise you to
follow the path you have been born into. Seek God in your family
tradition. Seek where you have been placed. If, after you truly seek
God there, you do not find him, then go seek him wherever he leads.
Now, have you heard what Gandhi said about Christianity, Jack? He said
that it was a most excellent religion; they should all try it.” “Too
bad Gandhi wasn’t there during the Crusades! Those barbarians tortured
and burned people at the stake! What kind of Christian could
rationalize that? So much hypocrisy! I will not give my soul over to
another. No institution is going to control me!” Jack announced
triumphantly, and then continued, “My best bud Al is a Jew, and we both
have tuned out what our elders have offered—too many rules! Besides, I
think Christians can be real cowards, or else they were sleeping while
Hitler was gaining power. I hate to think it, but maybe it was because
they are anti-Semitic?” Riad
interrupted, “I won’t comment on that, but in 1965, the Second Vatican
Council issued a declaration on the relationship of the church to
non-Christian religions, condemning anti-Semitism, and recognizing ‘the
bond that spiritually ties the people of the New Covenant to Abraham’s
stock.’12 Now, I realize nineteen centuries of
anti-Semitism and some very unholy behavior will not erase the sins of
the fathers, but with this new revelation begins the healing. Hope
emerges every time a wrong has been admitted and corrected.” Art
had returned unnoticed and had silently stood in the doorway until Riad
finished and then softly spoke. “Excuse me. The book Sylvia had been
reading to me while we traveled--it’s a collection of Einstein’s
essays. I was driving down your street when a white cat darted in front
of me, and I hit the brakes. The book fell on the floor, and that cat
flew up a tree and sat, and just stared down at me with his icy blue
eyes. The book fell open to ‘The Calling of The Jews.’ "I
quote: ‘This is a time when there seems to be a particular need for men
of philosophical persuasion—that is to say, friends of wisdom and
truth—to join together…We Jews should be, and remain, the carriers and
patrons of spiritual values. But we should also always be aware of the
fact that these spiritual values are and always have been the common
goal of mankind.’13 Einstein’s advice should be
heeded by all men of good will. But it seems to me that we all can
claim to do God’s will, and yet we all can too easily justify unjust
behavior.” The
Muslim and the Jew locked eyes, and tears welled up from within them
both, and then overflowed at the same time. After a time of
timelessness, Riad softly spoke. “I offer you Thomas saying
forty-eight, and I quote: ‘Jesus said, “If two make peace with each
other in a single house, they will say to the mountain, ‘move from
here’, and it will be done.’”14 Art
exhaled smoke as he spoke directly to Khaled. “I just flashed onto
another memory about how you came to be the owner of a ’41 Pontiac with
a dent in the side door that--” ”Oh,
no, Art, you can’t tell that one without me first laying the
foundation. I remember it well. Jack, did I tell you that my friend
here, Art Pearlman, hired me while I was still in college? Right on the
spot and he never regretted it. Art was the director of the
assistant-engineer-in-training program at the John Deere Company, and
supervised with an iron hand and warm heart. While still a sophomore at
State University of Iowa, I was promoted after four months on the job
to be Art’s right-hand man. We had become like brothers! Jack, remember
when I told you about Gloria breaking my heart? Yes, well, Art watched
me brood the entire week after we broke up, and he refused to allow me
to keep my broken heart to myself!” Art
grinned and continued, “It was unbearable. I said, ‘enough with the
stony silence; you look like you are ready to explode. It’s been a
long, hard week. Let’s knock off early and grab a beer. You haven’t
said a word all week—no jokes, no smiles. Who died? What happened with
you?’ Oh, how you sighed and moaned as you related your tale of woe. I
can still hear you whine, ‘I have decided I will never get married
unless I marry a girl from my own culture. And here in Iowa, I have not
met any!’ You cried in your beer, and then I suggested you forget about
marriage, have some fun, and date some of those beautiful college girls
I watched all over town.” “Yes,
you made a good point, Art. But college girls only dated college men
who owned a car. Not only did I not own a car, I did not even know how
to drive. But, I began imagining myself behind the wheel of an
automobile and having many dates! So, the next thing I knew, we were on
Mallard Avenue, at Jim’s Used Car Lot. We were immediately pounced upon
by Jim, who demanded, ‘What are you looking to spend?’ I immediately
remembered a traumatic experience with a Syrian rug merchant when I
first fled Majd Al Krum in 1948, and I shivered and said, ‘Speak with
my advisor, Art.’ Jim placed his hands upon our backs and led us
through the lot, telling us every car was a bargain. We stopped in
front of a shiny black sedan with a dent in the passenger-side door,
and then Art took over like the master he is.” “Right,
I negotiated a sweet deal for that pony, just two hundred dollars,
cash! But, Khaled still didn’t know how to drive. So I chauffeured him
to the public parking lot a few blocks from his boarding house, and had
to catch the bus back to the dealership to retrieve my car. That
weekend was a nephew’s bar mitzvah, but I promised, come Monday after
work, I would give Khaled his first driving lesson.” “Ah,
but I couldn’t wait. I could already taste all those dates! I buoyantly
walked to the campus library, humming Arabic tunes, and located every
book about clutches and cars that I could find. Not until the librarian
flicked the lights at eleven at night, did I leave. I carried home a
dozen books about cars and spent the rest of the night reading. “As
soon as the dawn broke, I headed to the public parking lot and admired
my acquisition. I carried the car keys in my pocket and thought, I
don’t have to wait for Art; I know what to do. So, I climbed behind the
wheel, located the ignition, and inserted the key. The car jumped, and
I panicked, until I located the brake, and sat gripping the wheel and
praying, ‘Please God, don’t let me hurt anyone or anything.’ For hours,
I practiced, until I mastered the clutch and was grateful I only
scratched up an old relic that someone had abandoned in the lot. By
noon, I was confidently circling the lot and tempted to venture out
into the street. I reluctantly paralleled parked, waited until Monday
morning, and arrived at work, beaming. ‘Art, I have great news. I
taught myself to drive; I am skipping lunch today. I am ready to take
my driver’s license test.’ “Well,
we skipped lunch, and sure enough, Khaled scored a hundred percent on
the written exam and drove back to work like a pro!” “Yes,
and when I got back to my rooming house, I beeped the horn just once
with sheer delight, and the old woman who lived next door stuck her
head out the window and began cursing at me. I had feigned ignorance of
English at each encounter with her, and by maintaining a stony silence
in her presence, I was able to learn every American curse word! __________________________________________________________________________________ 10. King, Testament, pg. 241 11. Peck, Different Drum, pg. 186-208 12. Columbia Encyclopedia, 5th Edition, sv. "Vatican Council, Second." 13. Einstein, Later Years, pg. 268 14. Meyer, Gospel of Thomas, pg. 43
Related Link: 16 Days in Palestine |