The truth behind the Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

St. Francis, probably the most loved of all Christian saints, was born as Francis Bernadone, in Assisi, Italy, in 1181 or 1182. A remarkable prayer has been commonly attributed to him, called simply the Prayer of St. Francis. As one might expect, there are a few variations of it, and this is one:

Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.

This version was taught to me by my meditation teacher, Eknath Easwaran. Sri Easwaran had a deep love for St. Francis. I suspect it was Sri Easwaran who added the words "to self" in the last line—no doubt to emphasize the idea that eternal life means mystical union with the divine, as opposed to the idea of spending eternity in heaven.

The NY Times today reported that this prayer is not believed to have come directly from St. Francis, a fact widely understood within certain circles of the Catholic Church. In fact, no one knows for sure who exactly wrote it. It was very likely inspired by St. Francis's life, and some of his phrases might be reflected in it, but he didn't write it.

When I first heard this news from Fr. Michael McGarry, when staying at Tantur in 2006, I was initially somewhat shocked. On Sri Easwaran's recommendations, it was my first meditation passage. I imagined that St. Francis himself had composed it based on his own experiences living the best life he possibly could.

In time, I concluded it didn't matter who wrote it. It remains one of the most stunningly inspiring religious passages we have available to us in the modern world. It's direct and to the point, from the first line to the last. It's an especially powerful passage to turn to when struggling to be good among difficult people who in their ignorance are behaving badly. And it is faithful to St. Francis's life. The real truth behind this prayer is that it speaks of the truth of humanity's highest ideals.

Shortly before my mother died, she and I watched the marvelous film on St. Francis's life, "Brother Sun, Sister Moon". She was moved by it. I read out the prayer at her funeral. I very much hope it will be a part of my life till the day I die.

A southern wedding

Before last Saturday, the previous three weddings I'd attended were in Pakistan and India. You know the setup. Weddings that go on for days. Dancing that goes on late into the night. Gold jewelery and glittering precious stones practically lighting up the room. Women wearing more makeup than a corpse. Hordes of cousins and aunts and uncles and family friends and children dressed up in little suits. The bride and groom sitting patiently on a stage having their photo taken with never ending waves of relatives.


A tiny fraction of the diamond and gold jewelery worn at an Indian wedding earlier this year

I'd never been to a wedding in the Southern U.S. before. When I found out that my peace studies classmates Jonathan and Diana were having a part of their wedding celebration in Atlanta, Georgia, I welcomed the chance to attend. Since Jonathan is from Atlanta, and Diana is from England, their marriage is a mixed marriage -- one of those where people think a little differently from each other beyond what color to paint the bedroom. The weddings in South Asia had been among identical couples -- the same religion, ethnicity, nationality, and socioeconomic class. Only the gender was different. Di and Jonathan are both Christians, and their education is naturally as close to the same as you're ever going to find, but here Di was marrying someone in whose church people speak in tongues. That's just not done in England.


Di and Jonathan exchanging vows in Jonathan's church

The service was held in Jonathan's church. Near the church entry, scenes from their wedding proper in Oxford played on a couple of monitors. The back wall was dominated by a large sign that said "SEEING THE UNSEEN" and an American flag. People sang songs about Jesus their savior. The atmosphere was relaxed, caring and inclusive. Anyone who wanted to could participate during the prayers for the couple. Jesus's name was proclaimed loudly and regularly. The very high esteem felt by Jonathan's community for him marked every prayer. None of this was surprising. What was surprising -- shocking almost -- was when one of Di's family friends, a tall silver bearded Englishman in his fifties, spoke of Jesus and the couple so enthusiastically that he ended up shouting loudly into the microphone. He out evangelized the evangelicals on their own patch. I never thought I'd live to see that.


A light hearted moment during prayers

Another peace studies classmate of ours, Elizabeth, had already married her sweetheart, Dylan. Dylan is from rural Kentucky. Elizabeth is Mexican, and proud of her indigenous heritage. They both attended the wedding. Dylan was wearing a sweater from the University of Notre Dame. On it the coat of arms of Sorin College was proudly displayed. A local asked him if he was one of the English guests.


Elizabeth and Dylan. Their marriage was in Mexico City. Elizabeth is Mexican and Dylan is from Kentucky.

Dylan and I had a chat about mules. Mules are what happens when a male donkey and a female horse have a good time together. They're prized for having the best characteristics of both animals. The Wikipedia entry for a mule observes it "possesses the sobriety, patience, endurance and sure-footedness of the donkey, and the vigour, strength and courage of the horse." They make wonderful working animals. I confess that I might be one of the few people on Earth ever to have contemplated the mule as a metaphor for the benefits of mixed marriages. But it's true. I did for a while.

There's only one problem with mules: unlike a horse, who mostly kicks backwards and occasionally forwards, a mule can kick in all directions. Another characteristic of mules is that they're almost always sterile. That's not so much a problem for the farmer -- they can always breed some more. But it can be problem for the mule. They can feel the desire to get laid but lack the reproductive equipment needed to act on it. Dylan told me a story from rural Kentucky some forty years ago. A female horse was in a field beside a male mule. The horse was in heat. The owner of the mule didn't stand a chance. This mule did more than just kick. By the time his body was found, the mule had taken out his rampant sexual frustration by using his powerful jaws to almost sever both of the unfortunate farmer's arms from his body.

I know what tragedy is. That's when you get a kick in the guts, get up after a while, only to get another one before you've had a chance to fully recover, and so on. Repeat until death. But I've never seen anything try to chew a person's arms off. That's a new one.

So much for the mule as a metaphor for countless the blessings of mixed marriages. Still, there must be a metaphor in there somewhere, right? After all, there is the "elephant in the room". Everyone knows that. Perhaps there could also be "the frisky mule in the field". Hmm. That probably won't work either.


Performing a religious song in front of an American flag

It often seems to me like a good mixed marriage is a miracle of sorts. The miracle is not that they work. Cultural differences pose no insurmountable barrier when the love is true. The miracle is that they work in spite of the skeptics and naysayers who sometimes make it their eternal mission to sow the seeds of doubt and division. In these two peace studies marriages, even if such thinking did exist somewhere, it wouldn't have stood a chance, given the loving support the couples received.

Interview with Rabbi David Rosen

Rabbi David Rosen is one of the world's leading figures in inter-religious relations.

This interview was conducted in his office in Jerusalem on January 8, 2006. Nothing has been left out.


Rabbi David Rosen giving a speech at an Arab university on January 4, 2006

Damon Lynch: Very briefly, I am interested in something called the spiritual imagination. I see my interest in this as being related to character, conduct and consciousness in people, and how they connect their inner life—their spiritual life—to the action they take in the world. I am particularly interested in how they see the use of love, power and knowledge. My feeling is that a lot of religious people talk about love without incorporating necessarily the component of power. There is the Quaker phrase, “speak the truth to power.” I think we can have power as well, and use it responsibly. I am very interested in developing a counterpart to C. Wright Mills’ sociological imagination, but with a more inner dimension. And I am interested in how people understand the development of their inner selves, their inner life, with the action that they take, particularly peacebuilding. So I wanted to know what kind of ideas you might have in this area.

Rabbi David Rosen: Well I do not know I have any particular significant ideas. What you say sounds extremely right—that these individuals do have what you call a spiritual imagination and are integrated in their approach towards both the more moral and ethical-spiritual dimensions. Then their ability to be able to contribute to reconciliation and mutual respect is all the more powerful. I agree with you that the ideal would be where these elements are of both one’s relationship to the institutional structures that determine people’s life—political structures, the structures of authority—should be the goal of those who are animated and motivated by the moral, emotional and spiritual aspects of their own conviction. But the reality, certainly in this part of the world, is that that tends to happen too rarely, that those who are related to the structures of the power are anyway here very much subject to political authority. Also the vast majority here, because we are in a context of conflict living in degrees of greater or lesser fear and suspicion, which therefore limit the full expression of their spiritual imagination. Those who are more spiritually developed tend therefore not to be part of the institutional structures and tend to be more involved in grassroots activities, and there tends to be a dislocation between the two. And therefore, if I may be so immodest, those few of us who do seek that kind of integration have a responsibility to try to be able to egg on those in institutional positions in order to be more responsive to the challenges. I think we need to be modest as to what extent we can actually open up their minds and hearts.

Lynch: It strikes me that most people when it comes down to it would rather be a blessing instead of a curse on the rest of life.

Rosen: Well it is absolutely true, but nevertheless it is like the famous—this is an over exaggeration—it is like the Mel Brooks takeoff of Hitler where he says “all I want is peace, I want a little piece of Poland, and a little piece of this.” So everybody here wants peace and everyone here wants to be a blessing, but they always wanted peace on their own terms. Generally speaking, because of their own insularity, and because of their fears, they see the responsibility with the Other and see themselves as virtuous and self-righteous.

Lynch: I have noticed that when I have asked people how they connect their inner life to their outer actions, people struggle to articulate this. Maybe I am asking the wrong questions.

Rosen: No, I think it is very true because most people do not think of their inner life. I suppose it depends where. I think in the Western world, that is not so true. In the Western world we have had to look more critically at what our what our religious and spiritual convictions and therefore can talk of them in terms of our inner life. But I would say that is relatively new. Well, it has always been of course the language of the mystics. But, in terms of institutional authority, maybe there are two things. Maybe in a way, power and authority tend to stifle the degree to which people devote themselves more to their own inner life. If you look through history, I suppose, generally speaking, those of the more mystical orientation have been those who have eschewed power and authority. And those who have been in authority, therefore have been by almost definition rather one-dimensional types. In our part of the world to the large degree that is still the case. Then there is another factor, and that is to be able to answer your question properly requires a degree of self-critique. It requires a capacity of introspection, which tends to come with a capacity of self-critique. That requires a degree of confidence and I would say that the vast majority of people here do not have that self-confidence to be able to look critically at themselves or at their tradition. So there are a number of different factors that need to be there to facilitate that integration. Of course there have always been remarkable individuals who have risen above such limitations, but they have been exceptions and therefore almost by definition not impacted enormously upon the overall context. So I think if you going to say to what extent does your prayer and your meditation and of course you religious study impact upon your life, all leaders would say “of course it impacts upon my life, it directs my life.” But nevertheless, they have not really looked at themselves within a more self-critical perspective to enquire more profoundly as to what relationships are between the inner and the external. The difficulty that people have comes to some extent from the circumstances in which they live, and of course it could come from the fact that maybe they do not have a significantly developed inner spiritual life!

Lynch: One example I am intrigued by is the example of Abdul Ghaffar Khan in the North West Frontier Province of what is today Pakistan. With his Servants of God, they took on British imperialism with nonviolence. His people were, to put it bluntly, a smashed, divided, very weak people. One of the arguments he put to his people was that “if we Pukhtuns fight the British violence with nonviolence and we are patient, we will show the whole world who are the civilized people here”, obviously putting the challenge to the British to critique their own concepts of civilization. He used a number of religious and nonreligious arguments to convince his followers to stick steadfastly to nonviolence. But I very much like one in particular: the idea of taking the culture’s strengths and using them to overcome its weaknesses. A particular strength of the Pukhtuns was their honor. Khan used it to get his followers to overcome a serious weakness, which was the idea that they were brutes, uncivilized and uncouth (which had some truth to it as well). Sheikh Aziz Bukhari mentioned to me yesterday this idea that if you are standing at a checkpoint and the soldiers are not being nice, he does not want to give them the satisfaction of seeing him respond with anger—sometimes they provoke people to do that. He said he instead smiles. I see that as a similar kind of a concept, but in a smaller way, of taking a bad situation and turning it into a good one. I am beginning to think that this seems to be a core idea of being able to imagine something very different from what it is now—of taking what you have now, and transforming it into something good.

Rosen: I would say two things. First of all, what you are describing with regards to the Pukhtun ways of course was Gandhi’s own approach towards the British as well. A number of scholars have observed that he was very lucky that he was preaching this idea of nonviolence, a culture of nonviolent resistance, to the British. Had he been advocating that let’s say to Nazi Germany, then that would have been the end of India, and it would have been wiped out entirely. In order to be able to have preached that kind of approach, you have to have an antagonist on the other side who can be responsive to it. Otherwise, as a principal I think it is a fallacy with regards to those who cannot appreciate the value of what you are standing for. Therefore I think we have to be very cautious about generalisations in that regard. With regards to Sheikh Abdul Aziz I think it is very important in any situation, if we are able to, to be compassionate. I remember reading a story of somebody during the period of the Holocaust. He was a rabbi, and he was being beaten by the Nazis. He was being tortured, and he was feeling a great deal of pain. He was filled with an initial sense of great hatred towards the people who were torturing him. He said, “I had to remind myself that these are also creatures created in the image of God. Once I remembered that, I could bear all the torture that they had to throw at me.” So obviously the power of both affirming the dignity of the Other and compassion towards the Other is an enormous resource and reservoir that enables us to withstand enormous adversity. However in certain situations, smiling at somebody can actually do the reverse. I remember another Hasidic story of a rabbi who had a shrewish wife and he was very henpecked. She used to say all sorts of nasty things to him, even in the presence of his Hasidim, his followers. He never answered them back. He always kept his quiet, because he was a very saintly man. On one occasion he replied to her sharply and she was quiet and went back to wherever she had come from. The people said to him “Well rabbi, you have never ever replied to your wife. Why did you do that like this? ” He said “because I could see that being quiet and not responding to her was causing more anguish than if I responded.”

Lynch: I remember Sri Ramakrishna used to say to his followers that some people should be saluted from a distance. I very much like that image. As an aside, what you make of the arguments of some that the challenge of the German women to get the Jewish husbands back outside the Reichstag in Berlin—I forget which year it was, 1941, 42, 43—paralysed Hitler’s so-called iron will? What do you make of this account that the German women undertook nonviolent direct action? [Editor’s note: read a detailed account of the event here. The location was Rosenstrasse, not the Reichstag]

Rosen: I do not know. I do not know the story, but I would be very surprised. I cannot see any reason why Hitler would have behaved like that.

Lynch: I wish I had memorised it better, but in short, the German women with their Jewish husband’s, perhaps numbering in the hundreds, were taken and imprisoned. Some were already on the way to the gas chambers. The German women for two or three days conducted nonviolent resistance, right outside the headquarters of something important like the SS, a very symbolic place anyway. Hitler knew what was going on. He could not just shoot them.

Rosen: Why?

Lynch: Perhaps because they were German.

Rosen: He shot plenty of other Germans. He did not have any problem with homosexuals. In fact, I would say the vast majority of those who continued to be married were publicly humiliated. If anybody was caught walking with a Jewish partner they were generally publicly humiliated in the streets. It is very difficult to believe that Hitler felt a little more compassion than his SS guards who were behaving like that the streets.

Lynch: Well apparently in this case not only did the men come back—not only were they saved that day—but they were not picked off one by one as the war progressed, as we might have assumed. Apparently they lived.

Rosen: This is totally inconsistent with almost everything else that happened under Nazi Germany—there must be some other factor at play.

Lynch: I share your concern about the smile and be happy approach all the time. I think it has its time in its place. Sometimes, a word said sharply can be very useful.

Rosen: I think actually what is much more effective is the model that Marshall Rosenberg has developed, which basically comes out of Carl Rogers, and that is the language of empathy—being able to understand somebody’s needs and wants and their feelings at any given moment. Therefore, if you are able to say to somebody something along the lines of “I realise that this is really tough for you and it is really dangerous and there are some really nasty people around who want to do harm, and you had to protect it, etc”. You show compassion to them. Then you say, “I would like you also to understand how I am feeling in this regard” than express your own particular feelings, values and needs. As long as you have shown compassion from the beginning, you are likely to get a lot through. But you have got to be able to connect to the person’s feelings and needs.

Lynch: In your own tradition, what are some ways that you teach others to develop empathy for those who they truly believe are inferior to themselves?

Rosen: In my own tradition, from my point of view, the most important principle is to teach them that there is nobody who is inferior to them, because everybody is created in the divine image, and therefore everybody is of inestimable worth, and every life in all their dignity is therefore of inalienable value. That is not taught well enough. The problem is that when you get to the situation of conflict there is a need to demonise. Therefore you look to sources that therefore can reinforce the dehumanisation of the other. But in my opinion they all fundamentally contradict the most central principle that everybody is created in the divine image. Of course we all have problems with our texts because in every text, whether it is the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, or the Koran, we find areas of where clearly there violent things that are endorsed in one way or another under certain circumstances. Therefore if you are dealing with a person of a more liberal orientation, you can look at them and you can say what are the more central principles for the more contextual issues, and therefore what we have to be guided for. But when you are dealing with people who are basically fundamentalists—this word fundamentalist of course, Scott Appleby in particular would understand is a rather dangerous word because it can have so many different meanings. But if we said let us use the term to say we are dealing with people who are uncritical with regards to their text in their tradition, then it is very much easier for them to be able to draw on more problematic texts as much as to be able to draw on the more positive texts. I would therefore obviously seek to reinforce as much as possible additional texts. The most famous rabbinic text is a discussion between Rabbi Akiba and Ben Azzai on what the most important principle is in the Bible. I would say to them “look, there is no way it says the most important principle is a question of protection of property or protection of land. The most important principle that they discuss is that Akiba says ‘love your neighbour as yourself.’ And Ben Azzai says the more important principle is that every human being is created in the divine image, so you do not say because I was despised so let my neighbour be despised, because I was cursed, so let my neighbour be cursed. In other words his concern is that Akiba will make ‘love your neighbour as yourself’ to mean ‘love your neighbour as you yourself were loved or not loved’, and therefore his emphasis is that it does not matter how you have been treated, you have to be able to always remember that you have to treat an individual as a child of God and a person created in the divine image. And then comes the punchline of Rabbi Tanchuma who says that if you do so (in other words if you say because I was cursed so let my neighbour be cursed, or because I was despised so let my neighbour be despised) know who it is who you despise, because in the image of God he made man.” In other words, any act of disrespect to another human being is an act of disrespect to God. So if you could communicate that effectively to people that in fact behaving badly towards other people is behaving badly towards God, then even in your more uncritical—or using the term unscientifically, fundamentalist elements—you may succeed better in getting it across. However I get back to what I said before. All these arguments utilising Jewish sources are only going to be feasible if people do not feel threatened and if they do not feel fearful. Therefore to overcome their sense of threat and fear, you have to be able to give them empathy. To give them empathy means that you need to be able to show them that you are connecting to their needs and their feelings.

Lynch: In a moment, I want to come back to this disconnect between the power structures and the religious life. I share your caution about being arrogant about this kind of thing, but let us suppose for a moment the more highly developed spirituality of some people. But as an aside, in Hinduism of course one of the ancient discoveries was that the Atman is the same as Brahman, or the inner infinite Self is the Godhead. Is this compatible with the idea that we are all created in the image of God?

Rosen: I would say yes obviously, and it would be more within the mystical tradition that would see us meaning “all created in the image of God” as all part of God and that we die we are as it were returned to the Godhead. Therefore it is all part of the mystical idea especially developed by the Hasidic movement, that God is in everywhere and everything. This was not always the perception, in which often the sacred was divorced from the non-sacred. There is within the mystical tradition a view that there is sanctity in everything everywhere. And that idea I would certainly identify with, even though I would not buy into all necessarily the cosmology that comes with certain parts of Jewish mystical tradition, specifically within Kabbalah. That is part of the reason also why I am a vegetarian, because I believe that in different degrees there is sanctity in everything. One can never be absolutely reverential of all sanctity to every single degree—one has to find a balance somewhere. But the more one is conscious of the divine in everything, the more one is able to both ennoble oneself and one’s society. Again, there is a danger of course, especially with regard to vegetarians—there are plenty of people who care more about animals than they do about human beings. It has always got to be done with a certain telos, a certain teleology in mind. Those who accuse people of speciesism are actually being immoral. If you put all sentient beings on the same level then you are going to be at some stage inadequately sensitive to the needs of human beings. This is not a new idea. This is in the writing of one of the great Jewish philosophers, Joseph Albo, a mediaeval philosopher. Therefore for me ethical vegetarianism actually is in its most potent and valuable when it takes place with an understanding of a hierarchy of life in which human life is more sacred than animal life. In my opinion that is where vegetarianism is its most ethical. Where it is seen that all sentient life is of the same order, then it is dangerous, because then you can lose the necessary sensitivity towards human life.

Lynch: Yes I think I agree. I am also a vegetarian. Coming back to this disconnect between the power structures and the spiritual life of people, you must have given some thought about how to make that disconnect a little less disconnected, and to build some bridges between these two worlds.

Rosen: It is not a matter of just thought—it is a matter of what I do in my life. It is really what I do. In order to do that, I have to be able to speak many languages. Even as I am speaking English or Hebrew in the course of the day, I have to speak many languages because I have to connect to people where they are at. Very central to my work is a belief in the power of the human encounter. I agree with you that most people want to be a blessing. From this point of view, this is a big difference between Judaism and Christianity, of not seeing the human being as essentially flawed. From a Jewish perspective, if anything, we are born with original virtue. It is only social factors that can corrupt us and lead us astray, or these fears that I spoke about before. The more that we can therefore bring people to overcome those fears and those suspicions and overcome those stereotypes and prejudicial preconceived perceptions, the more we can enable their inner spiritual life to be expressed in the way they relate to others and in the issues and initiatives that they able to contribute to and come to. I see myself very much as a mediator in that. Certain things for example, like bringing the Chief Rabbinate of Israel out of its cocoon, have been facilitated by external factors, not least of all the visit of Pope John Paul II to Israel in the year 2000, which developed the opening for the Committee of the Chief Rabbinate for Dialogue with the Vatican. For those involved it is significant, and even for those not involved it begins to lead them to start questioning as to whether their narrow perceptions are fair. We had another moment at a discussion on interfaith relations at - a conference of Orthodox Jewish leadership that has just concluded. Most Orthodox rabbis unfortunately, and I say this as an Orthodox rabbi, tend to be rather insular. This once again reflects their fear and lack of comfort with the world outside. On discussion of interfaith, of course I was very passionate about its importance. One of the reservations expressed by one of the rabbis, is the fear that this would therefore lead to intermarriage and undermine the integrity and therefore the continuity of Jewish identity and of the Jewish peoplehood. I give that as an example of the kinds of fears that one has to be able to contend with. You need to be able to argue with them constructively, both by giving them empathy for what their fears are, of being able to suggest to them that there is actually more to gain than to lose, and to be able to introduce them to the opportunity. You cannot always do it. In many cases it is not possible. One just has to keep on trying as much as one can.

Lynch: The initiative that you are involved with, with rabbis and imams, this world council, is this involving rabbis who represent a broad spectrum of rabbinic thought in Israel?

Rosen: In Israel, yes. There are all kinds of internecine problems, similar to the problems that you will not be able to get major Sunnis if you have Shi’ites there, or if you have Sufis there, and certainly not if you have Baha’is there. Unfortunately most of my Orthodox colleagues, unfortunately—while they are certainly open to meeting Muslims and to a lesser degree meeting Christians—the ones they fear most are other kinds of rabbis from the liberal strands of Judaism. Basically in their eyes they see those as heresies. They see them as more threatening heresies because they threaten to undermine their own power base. One of the things we have to decide with regards to the imams and rabbis is who are our target groups. If your group encompasses the total spectrum, then you will not get the spectrum, because by having the presence of one you cannot have the presence of the other. Our need was to get to the most intensely rooted—and in a way you might even say insular elements, within both communities. In Brussels at the first conference the spectrum of Israeli Jewish orthodoxy was amazing. We had an amazing spectrum of rabbinic representation. Many of those had never met a member of another religion ever before, let alone a religious leader. It was a very important opening for them. I would say it was the same in many senses for Muslims as well. In order to be able to get that spectrum of Orthodoxy it meant we had to have only a sprinkling of non-Orthodox rabbis, and then almost under wraps in order to get the more fervently Orthodox elements to participate.

If you are involved in trying to take spiritual values which are animated by one’s own personal inner spirituality and moral convictions—and to bring these to an area where people, because of their fears, misunderstandings and insecurities are less able to give full expression to this inner life—then you have to work out all kinds of stratagems and tactics that are seeking certain creative options, but are always making certain sacrifices at the same time. Inevitably this involves some form of moral sacrifice in the process. Just not to invite people who represent other communities is in a way a moral sacrifice.

Lynch: That is where the importance of having a trusting relationship becomes paramount, does it not?

Rosen: Yes it is very important but it is important that that trusting relationship—and this is very germane to your central thesis—comes from your own inner spirituality in relation to the Other because intellectually and strategically, because in a way you are being dishonest. When I meet with colleagues from the most fervent Orthodox segments of society, and yet I know I want to bring some of my Liberal colleagues to be able to be there, I have to some extent to deceive them. Now I will try to do it in a way that is as tolerable for them as possible, and obviously be conscious not to put them in an embarrassing position. While I am to some extent deceiving them on a strategic level, what I must never do is deceive them in terms of the inner spiritual content. In other words the sincerity of what I am doing and what I am saying must come across to the other individual. As long as the other individual feels I am sincere, he or she might discover that things were not exactly as they had fully planned—or there might have been things that were even a little uncomfortable—but within certain bounds they will be able to tolerate that if they feel that the motive is totally sincere. But it is a delicate balance.

Lynch: I am trying to put myself in their shoes, imagining what it would be like. It is difficult, because I was not raised in that strand of thought. I am trying to imagine what it would be like from their perspective to be with people they have never met before, and to be an authentic, Orthodox Jew and to meet with an imam.

Rosen: That is much easier for them than to meet with a reform rabbi, especially with an imam. As far as Orthodoxy is concerned, Islam is pure monotheism. Christians are a little more of a problem, because there their perception of Trinity and incarnation poses certain questions. They have to be able to hopefully get into position where they can understand that maybe the way Christians understand these concepts is not exactly the way they think Christians understand them. Of course that is one of the most important guidelines of interreligious dialogue—to be able to understand the way the other understands herself or himself, and not the way you have necessarily conceived of the Other’s beliefs. But for their perception, a Jew has to observe a Jewish way of life the way they understand it. Therefore a Jew who seeks to understand a Jewish way of life in a different way, or even propound it in a different way, is far more problematic than a Muslim leader, who is a pure monotheist. You also have to remember that from a Jewish perspective, however this has developed, there is not a universal imperialism—you do not have to be Jewish in order to be loved by God. God loves you as a good Muslim, and I would say also as a good Christian, and I would say also as a good Hindu. From their perspective, certainly God loves you as a good Muslim because their perspective is that Islam is pure monotheism. Their dialogue with the Muslim is actually theologically the easiest thing for them to do. The problem for them is because of the political reality, in the conviction—which unfortunately is on both sides, both the Muslims and Jews—that the other side is out to get them, or to do them in, or to get rid of them, or to undermine them, or to deny their dignity or their attachments or one thing or another. The relationship has been vitiated in the last hundred years by politics—intensely so—but of the theological relationships, it is the easiest one for them.

Lynch: To have a Rabbi Fruman show up at a Hamas rally in Gaza, having met monthly with Sheikh Yassin in prison I understand. . .

Rosen: These things get exaggerated. He met with him I think only twice.

Lynch: Is this something that you attach some significance to?

Rosen: Actually Rabbi Fruman invited me to go along to meet him when Yassin was released, thanks to Netanyahu. Of course it was Netanyahu who brought Yassin back to Gaza, because of his botched attempt to try to assassinate Mashal, and therefore this was the price he had to pay to King Hussein. When Yassin came back to Gaza, Rabbi Fruman called me up and said “would you like to go with me? ” I said “there is a limit.” I am willing to reach out to anybody who is willing to be able to at least seek to live with me in some form of peaceful accommodation, and even if that person says there are these conditions, 1, 2, 3—but somebody who is openly advocating murdering me, my children, and my family at the same time, it seems to me to be a rather rash thing to do. It seems to me that there you are behaving irresponsibly with regards to your own community because you are undermining their well-being. Now, Hamas is not the way many Israelis think, a totally monolithic structure. There are different elements within it, like within the Islamic Brotherhood, or like the stupidities you hear in America with regards to Wahhabism and Salafism as if it is all somehow totally inimical to the very existence of anybody else, and totally destructive. I personally think that is totally counter-productive. There are within all those communities the possibilities of finding individuals who are open to dialogue, and who could become interlocutors. Looking to the possibility of finding elements within Hamas with whom you could dialogue I think is a wise thing to do. It depends who does it and how it is done, because you do have other factors to take into consideration, of the ways in which it can be exploited and misrepresented and can do more harm. In principle, I am not against it, but I think it requires a very very cautious and careful approach.

Mindfully happy - Thich Nhat Hanh in Delhi

Thich Nhat Hanh

Thich Nhat Hanh is an 83 year old Vietnamese Buddhist monk, peace activist, author, and one of the most popular Buddhist teachers in the West. On October 4, a sizable audience in Delhi treated him with great respect and dignity, attentively listening to his joyous speech on the spiritual practice of mindfulness.

The content of his talk was a mixture of Buddhist philosophy and contemporary stories from the lives of ordinary people he knew. Major themes included being present in the moment, happiness, and bringing out the goodness and compassion that already exists in people. He spoke with such joy and reverence for life, that by the time he came to tell his stories, many audience members were visibly moved.


The audience listens

One story that touched many in the audience was his description of a failing marriage that was revived by the wife rediscovering love letters her husband had written decades before. He said that people should keep their love letters, so that they can be read later in life. It stuck me that it was through sharing ideas like this that he was able to convey his deep respect for the audience's lives, reassuring them that despite he being a celibate monk, he understood them.


As Thich Nhat Hanh was on stage with his fellow monks, one of the elderly audience members felt a little hot, and placed an brochure from the event down his neck to cool down. It seemed even at the back of the room, Thich Nhat Hanh was keeping an eye on things!

Later in the day, some of his monks led further teachings on mindfulness. One young monk, a delicately built Asian woman, sang "Breathing In":

Breathing in, breathing out
Breathing in, breathing out
I am blooming as a flower
I am as fresh as the dew

Her confident, calm voice conveyed genuine love for what she was singing.

I am as solid as a mountain
I am firm as the earth
I am free.

She sang not as a performer projecting herself onto her audience, but as someone immersed in the meaning of what she was singing. She embodied it and radiated it.

Breathing in, breathing out
Breathing in, breathing out
I am water reflecting
What is real, what is true
And I feel there is space
Deep inside of me

Till this point in the song, she had sung slowly and reverently. For the last three lines of the song, she picked up the pace dramatically.

I am free
I am free
I am free

Her song rang true in the depths of the hearts of her listeners, and all were uplifted.

Soon afterward a monk led an "apple meditation", by which he meant the practice of eating an apple with complete attention to the act. He encouraged us to truly smell the apple's fragrance, to feel the juice running down one's face, to imagine who had produced the apple, and to be aware of the sunlight that had nurtured it. He told us to be completely in the moment and be happy. As he said this, we all slowly ate an apple, including him. He asked for reactions from the audience. One woman admitted she'd never smelled an apple before. Another spoke of the appreciation for the workers who transported the apples from farms near the Himalayas.

I had a different reaction. I also allowed my senses to appreciate the apple. But soon my mind was occupied by the idea that I was eating it, and that life eats other forms of life. I reflected on the supreme mystery of that simple fact: life consumes life. As I did so, I was reminded of the fact that everything is destroyed. When the sun runs out of energy, life will be extinguished on planet earth. In the fullness of time, everything as we know it will cease to exist. There will be no apples, no Buddhist teachings, and no life. I was overawed by the mystery of that, but also afraid, because I knew the answer to the question of "why" this is so will always remain elusive. In the face of the ceasing of existence, mere happiness didn't have much meaning for me.

In the question and answer session that concluded the day, I tried to share my reaction and asked for a comment. I probably didn't do a good job of communicating what I felt, because in response, a monk briefly talked about the duality of suffering and happiness. Again the focus was on being happy.

I'm not one to argue against being happy and living a life of radiant joy. The wife of Sri Ramakrishna once said "I never saw the Master sad. He was joyous in the company of everyone, whether a boy of five or an old man. I never saw him morose, my child. Ah, what happy days those were!" Thich Nhat Hanh and his fellow monks reflected the spiritual power found in living a life of joy.

But in the face of the destruction of all existence, there is a limit to how satisfying happiness will leave us. Faced with death, as we all are, the immanent prospect of the destruction of our bodies is a powerful motivating force to transcend limited notions of who we really are.

I reflected on the famous moment in time when the "father of the atomic bomb", J. Robert Oppenheimer, witnessed the first explosion of a nuclear weapon, and repeated to himself a line from the Bhagavad Gita: "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." There is clearly something very deep that can occur when we truly reflect on death and destruction, whether it be our own or someone else. That can be lost if we merely focus on the here and now of being happy, without awareness of what the full range of the Buddha's teachings were.

Although I don't have much direct experience with the particular ways in which Thich Nhat Hanh presents Buddhism, given his vast experience and his stature as a great teacher, I can imagine he has a whole variety of methods to get his devotees to reflect on life in all its dimensions. I'm interested to know what some of them are.

Sex in the ashram

"I had a lot of sex in the ashram" a Spanish friend told me today. A mischievous smile covered his face. "When the day’s yoga training finished, you had a choice. You could meditate or you could find someone to have sex with. There was an Israeli woman who twice asked me to sleep with her. She didn’t realize I am gay. I refused her, telling her I had come to India to find my spiritual path." He laughed contentedly as he said that.

What he didn’t tell her is that he was having sex with his guru, the yoga teacher. He described the ashram in Rishikesh he spent a week at learning yoga as a hothouse of sex between people who may have met only when they arrived there. "They had a lot of energy to release," he said.

Earlier this year I spent a couple of weeks at three ashrams in northern India associated with Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda. Two of these were high in the mountains, well away from main population centers. The monks living there are able to pursue meditation and other spiritual disciplines in relative solitude. Nevertheless, they are not totally isolated. Both ashrams have small communities in the vicinity. Their populations are directly served by the ashrams in some useful manner, such as through the provision of medical treatment and agricultural support. The third ashram was located in Haridwar, a thriving city nearby Rishikesh. The ashram has a major hospital attached to it, which serves the poor.

The three ashrams accept a limited number of visitors who hope to deepen their spiritual practice in the company of monks who have dedicated their lives to it. All visitors are required to seek permission before they can stay. During my visit, at least, the great majority of visitors were in their 50s or later. While each ashram had their own feel, what they all had in common was the absolute seriousness of their mission. The monks have undertaken vows of celibacy. In an age of profound cynicism toward religious men who make such vows, it’s easy to dismiss such undertakings. But when you’re in the ashram, the atmosphere is such that it would be incredible to conceive of any of them having sex with anyone. Likewise, it is unthinkable to imagine visitors having sex with other visitors they’ve just met.

I didn’t ask my Spanish friend the name of the ashram he attended. I didn’t feel the need.

A different kind of sightseeing

"Buying things and sightseeing are fun for a while", said a German art therapy student visiting Delhi. "But after a while they are not so interesting". Given we had been having a conversation about Hinduism, I suggested to him that one could find plenty of sights by looking inside, within one's self.

He smiled and suggested a name for it: "insight seeing".

"How clever", I thought to myself. I smiled back, marveling at his command of English.


Sikh prays at Golden Temple - Amritsar

Baba Kuhi and Hafez

Shiraz has long been Iran's cultural capital. It has produced poets and mystics of such renowned quality that some parents of neighboring countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan teach their children Farsi, just so they too can drink from the cup of divinely inspired verse and prose.


Baba Kuhi's tomb overlooking Shiraz

Hafez, born approximately 1320 A.D., is among the most famous of Iran's poets. Everyday masses of visitors and locals flock to his magnificent tomb, touching his grave and reciting his poetry. They know him especially for his romantic poetry, but he also composed poems on God and in protest of oppressive political rule. He has become a cultural icon. This was not always so. In fact in his lifetime he had enemies who were jealous of his prodigious talent, including among the conservative religious clergy, who accused him of not being Islamic. However his talent was too great to repress, and the common folk adored him. These days even mullahs may occasionally be seen praying beside his grave.


Hefez's tomb

Baba Kuhi, who died approximately 1050 A.D, is less well-known. Indeed many Iranians know little about him, if they have heard of him at all. Unlike Hafez's tomb, which is prominently located in the city, Baba Kuhi's tomb is found perched on the side of a small mountain ("Baba Kuhi" translates into English as "father of the mountain"). There are no sign posts pointing the way to his tomb, and it is not even located on tourist maps produced by an elegant hotel nearby.

Baba Kuhi appears to have reached the highest levels of divine union, as evidenced by his classic poem, Only God I Saw:

In the market, in the cloister -- only God I saw.
In the valley and on the mountain -- only God I saw.

Him I have seen beside me oft in tribulation;
In favor and in fortune -- only God I saw.

In prayer and fasting, in praise and contemplation,
In the religion of the Prophet -- only God I saw.

Neither soul nor body, accident nor substance,
Qualities nor causes -- only God I saw.

I oped mine eyes and by the light of his face around me
In all the eye discovered -- only God I saw.

Like a candle I was melting in his fire:
Amidst the flames outflashing -- only God I saw.

Myself with mine own eyes I saw most clearly,
But when I looked with God's eyes -- only God I saw.

I passed away into nothingness, I vanished,
And lo, I was the All-living -- only God I saw.

(The translation is from Reynold A. Nicholson, The Mystics of Islam, London: Arkana, 1989).


Baba Kuhi's modest grave

When I visited Baba Kuhi's tomb, I soon discovered it was being reconstructed, from top to bottom. The grave itself was tiny and nondescript. The site was covered in fine dust. Rickety old chairs stood to one side. I looked up and admired what I thought was the handsomely painted ceiling. Only after clambering up the scaffolding using a makeshift ladder did I realize that the ceiling work was made from countless ceramic tiles which had been patiently cut into pieces and neatly arranged, including the detailed geometric designs. The man undertaking the work, Hamid, proudly showed me his handiwork. One day his children will come, and tell their children that it was their grandfather who built the ceiling, piece by piece.


Ceiling tiles at Baba Kuhi's tomb

Hamid left me at the tomb and headed back into town. I then meditated using Baba Kuhi's poem as my passage, concluding with a different passage that Sri Ramakrishna used to enjoy singing from. I wondered who might have come to this place before me and likewise drawn on these two mystical figures.

I headed down the mountainside and stumbled across Baba Kuhi street. Soon after I saw a woman in her late forties sitting beside the road. Next to her was a battered old car. I asked her if she minded being in a photo. She looked puzzled. I tried to explain that her face would not be seen. She looked even more puzzled. I took the photo. Soon a rotund man from across the street joined us. I showed them the image and they seemed to conclude I was a little deranged. "He's a tourist" she muttered to him, and he nodded in agreement.



There is a charming story linking the lives of Hafez and Baba Kuhi that deserves to be more widely known. As a young man, Hafez had fallen in love with a beautiful woman, Shakh-e-Nabat. His love was a hopeless love, however, as she was due to marry a local prince. In desperation he remembered the legend that if he were to stay awake for forty nights at Baba Kuhi's tomb, he would be granted immortality, the gift of poetry, and whatever his heart wished for. Determined, Hafez undertook a lonely vigil at the tomb. By the end of the forty nights, his most fervent wish had changed. His longing for Shakh-e-Nabat was supplanted by a longing to achieve union with God, which he achieved forty years later.


A girl from among a group of school children singing Hafez's poetry at his tomb talks to her teacher

I thought it was rather neat that I had the good fortune to visit Baba Kuhi's tomb as it was being reconstructed. The symbolism of the two tombs is dazzling. Hafez, poet of the masses, awaits his many visitors in a manner befitting his role as a great troubadour of love. Meanwhile, his spiritual father quietly looks down from the mountain, seeing God in everyone and everything. Just like his tomb, true love is something that always needs to be worked on. Perhaps in future more visitors will come to his tomb and find what they may. Before leaving I had my own conversation of sorts with Baba Kuhi. "It is time", I told him. I hope he agrees.

Islamic Global Peace & Unity in London

The comfortable and familiar feeling of being among a sea of Muslims returned when I attended the Global Peace & Unity event held in London on November 24 and 25. There were literally tens of thousands of Muslims from South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Everyone looked the part, largely dressed in a way that set them apart from the rest of the British population. There were elegant East African women -- tall, thin, dark, and often carrying themselves with striking beauty. The South Asian women varied from those who wore an all enveloping hijab that left only the eyes visible--often thick with makeup--to those who made no attempt to hide their feminine charms. Likewise, their menfolk included men with imposing black beards and others whose visits to mens grooming saloons must have been at least once a week. Confusingly, the majority of this vast crowd spoke English with a thick working class British accent. My eyes were telling me "that man sure looks Arab" while my ears were saying "but he certainly sounds English". I was immersed in a mixed-up world of multiple identities and generational allegiances, where English was Arab and Pakistani was English, and where half the women wore cheap Chinese made Palestinian style kaffiyehs despite having almost certainly never set foot anywhere near Jerusalem.


Muslim woman

There was a large room with all kinds of small booths and stalls offering things for sale and causes to contribute. One popular stall painted small flags on women and girls' cheeks, and henna on their hands.

There was a man and woman selling Muslim T-shirts. A brown shirt said simply resistance, and had a picture of an automatic weapon. A blue shirt had a superman logo that said "Muslims do it 5 times a day". But the finest was a red shirt with ISLAM in large letters, whose 'M' was in the style of the famous McDonald's logo. Beneath it was the slogan "I'm lovin it". I looked at it intently with a no doubt perplexed look on my face. I asked the man if he thought the shirt was sacrilegious. Without a hint of irony or humour, in his British accent he told me he didn't know what sacrilegious meant. I told him it meant it was against the sacred nature of Islam. He replied that he had designed the shirt himself, and that some Muslims loved it while others hated it. He thought it was practical. Imagine, he said, a young Muslim man being confronted by drunks on an underground railway station at 11 p.m. The drunks would find the shirt amusing, giving the upstanding Muslim the perfect opening to preach the glories of Islam. His wife was standing beside him, her face covered, busy serving customers. I did not know what she thought of such practicalities.


Mr McIslam

I asked a man selling a military biography of Khalid ibn al-Walid, otherwise known as the Sword of Allah, whether this was an appropriate book for a peace and unity event. He admitted he had not read the book and could not say. Before asking him this, I had taken his photo alongside it, honouring his request to include the honey he was also selling.

There was a booth with a bearded man bellowing loudly into the ear of a young woman. Above them was a sign promising to assist those suffering from evil eye, black magic, or jinn possession. The man was effective. Soon enough, the woman broke down in tears. While all this was going on, I asked his son of I had permission to photograph the sign advertising their services. He told me to go ahead. I took the photo, his father noticing out of the corner of his eye. He stopped helping the woman and began to berate me for daring to take a photograph. I let him speak, and when he was finished, I told him I had merely photographed the sign with his son's permission. His temper flaring, he demanded to know I was a journalist. I said I was not. He was agitated and I realised it was best to listen to him quietly and calmly. He said in his booming voice that British journalists had made a mockery of his work, and a French television station had confused him with a man wanted by the police, giving him all kinds of things to worry about. A elderly man beside me became very angry and demanded to know what I was doing there with a camera. I said nothing but looked him in the eye, which he took to be a sign of aggression. The curer of evil eye, black magic and jinn possession calmed down at this point, and told the other man he could handle it. I reassured him that at no time had I photographed anything but their sign. I gave him my card and expressed my sympathy for his predicament. He smiled, apologised, and resumed his work. The elderly man also smiled apologetically.


The massive crowd

I came across a booth where a wife and husband of Pakistani origin had enterprisingly set up a small photographic studio. We struck up a long and fruitful conversation. The wife told me about their photography business, emphasising her skills as a woman photographer, which was very useful with the upsurge in gender segregated weddings. They were dull to photograph, she said, because they lacked the interaction between the groom and bride that made wedding photography so special. But it was good for business. In our discussions on Muslim marriages she told me that she believed a woman should always have the right to choose her husband, no matter what anybody else in the family says. She herself was married at age 17, without ever having met her husband till the day she was married. While she had a marvellous marriage with three children, she said as women became better educated they were demanding their right to choose their husband themselves. A skinny pimple faced young man came up to the booth, examining the beautiful bridal photographs on display. She offered him her brochure, at which point he realised that he was not at a booth offering to match potential brides and grooms. His friends laughed at him. The woman pointed out that all the brides were already married, and her husband pointed to a portrait photo of a girl who was about three years old, mentioning that she was not married. We all laughed.

I joined a crowd of many thousands enjoying musical performances taking place in a huge auditorium. On stage were a continual stream of earnest musicians emphasising their wholesome family values and commitment to Islam. It was in fact uplifting family entertainment suitable for the many young children present. The organisers wisely interspersed the more somber acts with a dash of humour, which proved to be a big hit. A Californian named Baba Ali had everyone laughing when he described how a Muslim could get thrown off a plane. One suggestion was to scream loudly in Arabic. Another was to turn to a friend mid-flight, waking him up and saying loudly "Osama, it's time, it's time." He said that wearing a hijab would not get you thrown off a plane. Neither would a large beard. But wearing a hijab while having a large beard probably would.


Baba Ali

God's villages

Once there was a man walking in a field with God. As they passed near a village, God asked the man if he knew the people living there. The man said he did. God asked him if he knew their religion. The man said “they are Jews.” The pair continued to walk and eventually they passed beside another village. God asked the man if he also knew the people in this village. The man said he did. God asked him he knew their religion. The man said “they are Muslims”. They continued walking and saw more villages. One was Christian. Another was Hindu. One was even Buddhist. God asked the man why the villages had different religions. The man thought about it for a long time. The only answer he could give was that the village children learned their religion from their elders, who were taught by their elders, going back generations, all the way to their prophets. God asked the man if he could explain why a certain child was born in one village and not another. The man said “only you know that”.

Laylat Al Qadr in Jerusalem

Upon recently arriving in Jerusalem, I was determined to go to the Haram Al Sharif and into Al Aqsa Mosque on the night of Laylat Al Qadr (you can read more about this holy night here and here). Many Muslims are unable to travel to the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock, their third holiest site. It is therefore a great privilege for me to go there, and I wanted to make the most of it.

I walked in the direction of the Haram Al Sharif from Damascus Gate, down through the streets of the Old City of Jerusalem. There were many people--mothers holding tightly onto small babies, old men wearing their "kafiyeh" (head dress), and old women walking leisurely on the way. All were making their way to or from the Haram Al Sharif. The Old City's streets are narrow in some places. Because the shop keepers like to put seemingly half of their shop's goods for sale on tables outside their shop, the streets became even narrower. Pop music sung by women from Lebanon was heard bellowing out of one shop, while another not far away had Qur'anic music sung by groups of men with deep voices. Shop keepers yelled out what they were selling and how much it cost. "Hamseen sheckels!" they yelled again and again. Even the young boys working on behalf of their father or uncle had booming voices that no one could fail to miss. Smoke from meat burning on barbecues and countless water pipes hung in the air almost everywhere.

I finally arrived at my favorite entrance to the Haram Al Sharif, not far from the Western Wall. There were many thousands of men and women praying. Most of the women were in a different area from the men, around the Dome of the Rock, but there were a few women under the covered walk ways off to the side of the men. Some of these women were looking after small children. But others were quite old, and I am unsure why they were not with the other women. No one seemed to mind. It was all quite relaxed.


Praying on the Haram Al Sharif

While the men were praying with devotion and concentration, there were other men shouting out what food they were selling from their stalls. I did not expect people to be buying and selling things on such a holy site during one of the most holy nights of the year.

I immediately found a spot to join the men praying, and I did this for some time. Since I was off to the side, it was a safe place for me to start. After discretely taking a few photos, I went to another spot to pray. This time I went down the front, very close to Al Aqsa Mosque, and much more in the open.

I was doing the prayers like the other men, and soon another man came to pray beside me. I thought to myself "ahh, now I am really in the middle of things!" Many thousands of us prayed, and this particular set of prayers went on for perhaps another 20 minutes. There was a lot of Arabic that I did not understand but for me it did not matter. The main thing was that I was praying sincerely to God, with all my heart. I gave it my best concentration, and I felt my consciousness was changing. By this I mean that when I was focused on God in such a holy place, there was a special feeling in my mind that I cannot describe. All I can really say is that it is not an emotion. Just like when we fall asleep, our consciousness changes. In this case, it was changing but I was of course very much awake! It was wonderful to be in the midst of such a huge crowd of people praying to God on such an auspicious night.

When we finished, the man beside me turned to me and he said "you made many mistakes". I said "yes you are right, it is to be expected because I am very new to this". He asked me "are you Muslim or a tourist?" I gave him my answer, and he told me he wanted to teach me about Islam. While I think all prayers offered with sincerity are as real as each other, it is of course best to show respect for what is considered correct, so I was eager to hear what he had to say about correct ways to pray. I listened to what he had to say. Instead of talking about prayer, he emphasized the elements of cleanliness and purity. He liked what he was teaching, but I could not help but think he should have talked to me a little more first to understand exactly what he needed to teach me! However it was still good to listen to him.

After we finished our discussion, I went straight inside the Al Aqsa Mosque. It was not my first time there, but it was my first time on the night of Laylat Al Qadr. There was hardly any room to pray. There was many people and many things were taking place at the same time. Someone was giving a political speech about America and Israel. Some men were praying. Some were sleeping. Others were looking at everyone who walked by them.


Inside Al Aqsa Mosque

There was little emotion from the people praying and waiting inside Al Aqsa Mosque, giving the occasion a very different temperament than might be had a Shi'ite place of prayer, for example. My initial impression is that Sunnis seem to be more reserved than Shi'ites. Personally I prefer the more emotional and passionate approach--I cannot but help think of the example of Sri Ramakrishna on the occasion of religious festivities. Perhaps it will sound strange for me to mention a Hindu man as a role model, but for those who know of the life example of Sri Ramakrishna, it is of absolutely no surprise at all!

Pervez Hoodbhoy, modern Muslim hero?

I met Pervez Hoodbhoy in 2001 at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad. We spent some hours together. We exchanged ideas on religion and science, and he shared a little of his relationship with the great Pakistani intellectual Eqbal Ahmad. From these all-to-brief discussions I formed an immense admiration for Dr. Hoodbhoy, which I still hold. For I knew at once I was in the presence of a man whose goal was to serve his people as best he knew how. He could have easily been working in a prestigious Western university, living a comfortable lifestyle. Instead he chose to work in an environment which is at times deeply hostile to his cherished ideas on science and humanity. For years now he has been publishing a range of articles carefully advancing his views on science, religion, progress, intellectual freedom, history, and more.

Consider this recent article on science and the Islamic world. These are the words of someone passionate about his subject, yet respectful of people who hold differing views. His appeal is to Muslims who think critically, regardless of their personal religious views. Whether his readers be atheist or devout Muslims, there is something in his writings to seriously reflect on and ponder, which in my mind is a sign of excellent writing. It is in this sense that I think of Dr. Hoodbhoy as a modern Muslim hero. Having placed himself at the service of his people, who are Muslim, he has engaged Islam. He has taken the time to study Islam and its history. Islam benefits from Dr. Hoodbhoy because he poses challenging, vital questions for its followers in a dignified and respectful manner.

I say these things mindful I have till now completely ignored Dr. Hoodbhoy's individual religious views, and in this sense it is certainly deeply presumptuous of me to suggest he is a "Muslim" hero. Yet when I look to his dedication to his cause, pursued not out of a desire for fame or fortune, I cannot help but be reminded of the spiritual yearning for truth and freedom from the bonds of ignorance that exist within every major religion, including Islam. In this spiritual sense he is more "Islamic" than many practicing believers are. If more religious people were to serve their people instead of their intolerant arrogance, their religion and their community would flourish!

Sikh Delegation meets Rabbi Froman

December 12, 2005

The religious peacemaker Eliyahu McLean let me know he was hosting a Sikh tour of the Holy Land, and he invited me to join them throughout their travels. I joined them when they visited Rabbi Froman in Tekoa. Sikhism is one of the world's newest religions, and Judaism one of the oldest. One is from the Punjab in India and the other Jerusalem. Both have about twenty million followers each, and both have experienced more persecution than they have the intoxicating glories of political and territorial rule. While the orthodox followers of one like to wear loose white clothes and the orthodox followers of the other like to dress in formal black suits, they both admire long flowing beards very much. It promised to be an interesting afternoon and evening.

The delegation of Sikhs numbered about twenty. They were all Orthodox: they faithfully followed their tradition of kesh (keeping their hair uncut) and wearing a kara (steel bracelet). One of them assured me they also wore the kangah (wooden comb) and the kirpan (ceremonial dagger), albeit a small version “so as not to cause problems with security.” They take this tradition very seriously, wearing their dagger even when they sleep. However they were not wearing what would strictly be considered kachha (short pants). I imagine this was a concession to modesty than for any profound religious reason.

Upon boarding a small bus to visit Tekoa I found the Sikhs sitting contentedly, their tall trim bodies filling the small seats. All but two were men. Some were already in a trancelike state, an impressive undertaking given the formal prayers had not yet started. Eliyahu later confided they had been up all night travelling and were probably just exhausted.

The Muslim peacemaker Ibrahim was there sitting at the back of the bus with his usual big smile and traditional Arab garb. Last time Ibrahim and I were on a bus he would take every opportunity to tell the young Israeli soldiers stationed at numerous checkpoints that they looked like one of his ten children and that they were beautiful. The soldiers invariably broke into a big smile themselves when he told them that, their tension spontaneously transformed into genuine joy.

The settlement of Tekoa is reputed to be the land of Prophet Amos. It is close to the Palestinian village Tekua. Mt. Herod sits silently nearby. Tekoa is in an arid part of the West Bank, beside a series of spectacular valleys heading down to the Dead Sea. What few trees survive without be watered by people are undoubtedly old and hardy.

We arrived in Tekoa to find an Israeli soldier guarding the entrance. Rabbi Froman is a man of peace but his village still relies on the military for protection.

Froman joined us on the bus with greetings of “shalom salaam”. He said in Jewish and Islamic traditions, shalom and salaam respectively mean both peace and “the very name of God.” Thus the land of peace is the land of God, according to both faiths.

We were guided to the edge of the settlement, overlooking the inspiring hills and valleys. Jordanian hills could be seen in the distance. A dry riverbed (known as a wadi) wound its way through the valley floor below.


Gulleys beside Tekoa

Off in the distance an isolated settlement sat, its distinctive red roofs signifying it was Jewish. Although it looked peaceful, the existence of settlements like this are perceived by many Palestinians, Israelis and international observers as one of the three major causes of conflict between Palestinians and Jews, along with Palestinian refugees demanding they be able to return to their villages they left during wars during the 1948 war, and the status of Jerusalem as a capital city claimed by both Israelis and Palestinians.


Jewish settlement

Amidst laughter and joy the Sikhs' leader and Froman began to swap religious insights and stories, using the geography of the land and their respective religious culture for guidance. Ibrahim looked on as the Jew and the Sikh conversed.


Swapping religious stories

But before this interreligious dialogue Rabbi Froman thanked the Sikhs for their remarkable hospitality at the 2004 World Parliament of Religions in Barcelona, where they fed the 8,000 participants free meals. Froman said Jews have strict dietary requirements, and confessed with a happy smile that the enormous Sikh tent was the only place in all of Barcelona they could eat. He apologized for not preparing a tent for the Sikhs. The Sikh leader said that on the contrary, the land itself was a big tent, where they shared the love of God. Froman said “yes, yes, the love of God.” The Sikh leader said they had come simply to pray, to love each other and seek peace. He added that we become wise by serving God and serving his people.


Swapping religious stories

When Froman tried to articulate a spiritual dimension of hospitality, his budding command of English led him to confuse the word with hostility, bringing not only more laughter but an observation from the Sikh that language is tricky and cannot satisfactorily describe God. Froman added that despite his limited command of not only English but also Arabic, he has close friends who are Arab. He said it did not matter because “the language of the heart is less tricky than the language of humans.”

A young Sikh alone surveyed the land quietly as the sun hovered behind him, a land described by Froman as currently being in a “miserable” state because of the conflict between Jews and Palestinians, one of the few political references shared between them.


Contemplation

Jewish tradition holds that the wadi that runs from Jerusalem (a point of life) to the Dead Sea (a point of death) is special, for at what Froman referred to as “the end of days” the Dead Sea will receive the water from Jerusalem and become a sea of life instead of death. Froman also outlined a story from Chronicles, near the end of the Hebrew Bible where enemies are defeated not by power and force but by love, humility, and by singing to God and praising him (God was always referred to in the masculine sense by both Froman and the Sikhs). The Sikh leader then recounted a Sikh story which had a similar perspective on the need to praise God.

These observations reminded me of the complex nature of religious thought. While praising the God present in all people as being higher than one's limited self is a fine thing—or put it in non-religious terms, to live for the good of others and not just yourself is wonderful—to live responsibly does not mean abdicating reason to a vain hope for what Karen Armstrong calls “miraculous intervention”. She points out the danger of “a form of religiosity that reduces spirituality to magic.” Religious stories will always need wise interpreters, it seems.

After the two religious leaders shared spiritual insights, emphasizing a universal spiritual identity above that of their identities as faith leaders, the Sikhs lead a session of prolonged prayerful singing.


Prayerful singing


Prayerful singing

The Sikh leader and Froman sat side by side, emphasizing their unity and perhaps even their status as leaders in their respective communities.


Prayers

Two thirds of the way through the sun began to set, and Froman excused himself to perform traditional sunset prayers while the Sikhs continued to sing. Their different voices of prayer came together, the unity in diversity clearly apparent to everyone present.


Sunset prayers


He then joined them once more, this time in a particularly enthusiastic round of singing the praises of a wonderful God, his body swaying back and forth.


Prayers

As they all sang together the religious intensity became greater and greater, the men's voices rising in volume and quickening in pace.

After the devotional singing the men and woman talked among themselves. I conversed with a Sikh born in 1941, a humble man with a sharp mind. Many of the Sikhs in the delegation appeared to have roots in Kenya. There are something close to 500,000 Sikhs living in England, according to my interlocutor Sikh, who is leader of a Gurdwara (Sikh religious temple) in England. When I asked if it made sense to ask an Orthodox Sikh if they had a favorite Guru among the thirteen who founded Sikhism, he said it did not, as they regarded all of them as one. In response to a question of mine, he said the idea of Khalistan (an independent homeland between India and Pakistan for Sikhs) was one formed by the “propaganda machine” of India, and that his party was religious and not political, having nothing to do with the Khalistan movement. However he was familiar with a political figure associated with that movement, Singh Mann. He did not know of the Indian independence leader Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, being much more familiar with figures like Jomo Kenyatta, having instead grown up in Kenya and experiencing its freedom struggle.

On the way out we visited a Yeshiva (school of religious learning) in the settlement. There were an impressive number of students and many of them were studying in small groups. They were all very enthusiastic to meet the Sikhs and talk with them.


In the Yeshiva

One thing about the beards, flowing garments and turbans of the Sikhs is that they immediately make them stand out from the crowd, even in a place rich with religious symbolism like Israel Palestine.


In the Yeshiva

When back on the bus I felt a sense of great peace and calm among these religious Sikhs. Their very presence conveyed peace in our often hurried and turbulent world. The next day I heard a well-known Israeli peacemaker who is non-religious describe an experience where Froman was in the back of his car, presumably lost in prayer, completely oblivious to the vigorous political discussion taking place around him. Whether one admires religious peacemaking efforts like this, or finds it archaic, naïve or worse, it is undeniable that the religious figures see themselves playing a valuable role in bring peace to this land. It might be that the mere fact a variety of Palestinians and Israelis witnessing such figures may be an experience that stays with them for some time to come, perhaps even influencing their thinking. Perhaps sessions of prayers and singing gives them legitimacy in the eyes of the religious. Whether it not the actual act of prayer and singing contributes to a culture of peace is a research question where gaining evidence is not easy.


In the Yeshiva

It has been said by some that “denial is not just a river in Egypt”—and this was powerfully illustrated on the bus ride to and from Tekoa. The Israeli man acting as tour-guide pointing out the sights on the way from Tantur to Tekoa began pointing out places where “Palestinian terrorists” had been shooting and murdering innocent Jews. He referred to Israeli settlements not as settlements but as towns. Just six weeks before his son's girlfriend was one four young people murdered by unidentified Palestinian gunmen not far from the road where we turned off to go to Tekoa, an tragedy that generated a lot of news coverage and led to the closure of the West Bank by Israeli authorities for some days. On the way back, the Israeli man again at some length talked about Palestinian terrorism, pointing out places where the Israeli State had placed protective barriers to minimize the effects of sniper fire from Palestinian villages neighboring the road. Not once did he talk about Israeli violence against Palestinians. In private I asked him why he believed the killings were taking place. He replied by saying the Palestinians had a culture of violence. Behind his back, Eliyahu just rolled his eyes and smiled. When I pointed out to the Israeli man that three times as many Palestinians had died compared to Israelis since the start of the second Intifada, he said that was because Palestinians were killing each other in intra-group violence. He said that Palestinians like to fire guns at weddings and funerals. In short his message was: Palestinians are violent and Israelis are innocent of any wrongdoing. Eliyahu mentioned quietly to me that the Sikhs would be visiting Bethlehem later in the week, where they will hear Palestinian perspectives.

The tour-guide when not talking about Palestinian terrorists did usefully point out that some of terraced fields we were passing by in the minibus had been dated as being between 3-4,000 years old by archaeologists, with ancient olive trees also present.

I must confess I was surprised that one of the Sikhs present was a professor at the University of London, who said he was a friend of the late Edward Said and of Noam Chomsky. He said he edits the journal Social Identity and is a specialist in post colonial theory, including sub-altern studies.


Comment from a friend on this article, January 1 2006:

“It is my view that the important thing for people like you, and even to some extent myself though I have been here so long, is to be a neutral as we can. This struggle is not a football match—and no good purpose is served by taking sides as so many outsiders of evident goodwill seem to do. The Israeli who described the attacks by Palestinians was telling the truth as he saw it, and indeed he seems to have had a personal reason for painting them all black. You will find the same absolute black and white views among Palestinians. Those who believe in peace have to slowly reduce the number of people holding these views, based on pure ignorance and inablity to see any point of view except your own, so that those who hold them are reduced to an impotent minorty. But it is slow work.“