Judas

 

Many, many lifetimes ago a Sunday school teacher taught me one of the great truths, a truth so great that it has stayed with me 1000s of years later, a truth which one has to be of the boldest disposition to be able to hear and not be completely and utterly destroyed. Now, dear friends, I feel ready to be able to utter this truth and I pray that you are able to read it without too much harm being done to yourself. And this truth is that…Judas Is A Carrot. ‘Ah,’ I hear you say, ‘that explains his orange skin and green hair, when you think about it, as all great truths, is it obvious really’.

 

Judas Iscariot, one of the 12 disciples of Jesus, is one of the most important people in the Christian bible but has it ever occurred to you how little is known of him and how did he gain such infamy?

In his book The Divine Comedy the poet Dante tried to reimagine how the Catholic Church should be and in it he had nine levels of Hell. Why nine? Well, not everyone in Hell deserves the worst punishment. In the first level, for example, there is Plato whom Dante asks (the whole book is him wandering around doing role call and is pretty tedious), ‘Plato, you wrote such wonderful books about love, why are you in Hell?’ to which Plato explains that being born before Christ meant that he could not believe in him as he did not know of him and thusly, as the way to Heaven is as ‘Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.’ (John 14:6) Plato cannot go to Heaven and even when Jesus broke out of Hell and took Moses et al with him (see the apocryphal gospels and Dante) Plato was not in the Jewish texts and therefore does not get to go to heaven. In the lowest level of Hell there is a frozen daemon with three heads. The left and right are occupied by Cassius and Brutus as they betrayed Caesar (ummm) and the middle head is occupied by Judas, who betrayed Christ. But the question never answered, which has perplexed me for years, is how did he get there?

 

1. His actions were surprising: If this is the case then the whole crucifixion cannot be the foundation of Christianity for if it was unplanned then Galatians 2:20 ‘I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.’ cannot be true for, unless God created  humans so flawed that he knew their nature would be to kill Christ, the death of Christ was unplanned and was subsequently used by early Christians for their own purposes as a form of propaganda to promote Christianity.
2. His actions were destined: If this is the case then God damned Judas to unimaginable suffering for his own ends and, if this is the case, then John 4:7-8, ‘Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.’ cannot be true for if God is love then one cannot condemn another to such suffering not even for their own ends.

 

Here we have the two possible reasons for Judas’ actions. 1) he did it of his own accord and subsequently the crucifixion is nothing more than using the circumstances to promote a cause or 2) Judas was damned by God as part of a masterplan. When you look at the two options neither fit with the Christian notion of God which means that is there possibly a third option?

 

In the Cainite Gnostic Gospel (150AD) Judas puts across his account of what happened. According to Judas he alone could see that Jesus was the son of God and he had a dream which Jesus interpreted for him as being the end of false religion, all only made possible by Judas going along with his destiny (the language may be mistranslated here as destiny cannot be changed by will or anything, even God) to betray Christ. In this we see Judas not as Fate’s lacky or the embodiment of the flaws of humans, rather we see him as one who the other disciples feel unworthy of and one  who has seen his destiny (it’s all rather dramatic, seeing into other realms etc) and goes along with it (again, the language may be mistranslated) as a collaboration, (‘I delivered him to the High Priests according to God’s Almighty Will’)  to bring about the end of the unholy and the rise of ‘a great new generation’.

 

 

What the truth of this is we can never know but often I find that people learn prejudices at the knee and then cling to them as truths. This may be all well and good, for to question what we call ‘truth’ is to question our very beings, but to leave you with the words of Bod Dylan, it is up to us to challenge and question those truths we hold dear, for

 

‘Through many a dark hour

I’ve been thinkin’ about this

That Jesus Christ was

Betrayed by a kiss

But I can’t think for you

You’ll have to decide

Whether Judas Iscariot

Had God on his side.’

 

‘till next time  

 

 

thegreaterfoolblog@hotmail.com            

One Meatball

 

A little man walked up and down

He found an eating place in town

He read the menu through and through

To see what fifteen cents could do

One meatball, one meatball

He could afford but one meatball*

 

‘There are good people on both sides’ thus spoke President Trump after neo-Nazis marched through Charlottesville and were confronted by a violent response from Anti-Fascist marchers.

 

Whilst it is not hard to know what President Trump meant, given his white supremacist leanings, one has to take into consideration the facts of the matter. Were there both people on both sides? It is clear that there were bad people on both sides, but were there also good people?

 

8.8% of non-Hispanics in the US live under the poverty line, 18% of children. This means that they cannot find work, education or, that most elusive of things, genuine hope. Thusly potentially great people are forced into a world which is the breeding ground for disquiet and frustration.

 

 

He told the waiter near at hand

The simple dinner he had planned

The guests were startled, one and all

To hear that waiter loudly call, “What

“One meatball, one meatball?

Hey, this here gent wants one meatball.”

 

At times like these one takes stock of one’s life and pulls themselves up by the bootstraps as many born affluently have done but this is not always possible, for one thing for a problem to be fixed it must first be noticed. Suburban America seems to be ashamed of white poverty as it does not fit into the American Dream. There are celebrities holding fundraisers for people across the world but are ignoring those on their doorstep in the so-called fly-over states (you fly over them on the way to somewhere). These people have recently come to the attention of the white middle class given their (misguided) support of Trump as Trump offers them hope which they were fooled into thinking was real.

 

The little man felt ill at ease

Said, “Some bread, sir, if you please.”

The waiter hollered down the hall

“You gets no bread with one meatball

“One meatball, one meatball

Well, you gets no bread with one meatball.”

 

The procurement of personal wealth is not something which should be lambasted out of hand (as by millionaires who evade/avoid paying tax, hello Bono) and if one works hard then they should be rewarded. Yes, the jobs which are affluent should be jobs that actually matter (school teacher, nurse etc) but that is for another time. The soul of a society, and its greatness, is seen in how it treats those less fortunate, how it, in the words of the Christian scriptures, feeds the hungry, heals the sick and protects the weak.

People can bleat about their rights to luxuries such as wealth, guns, holidays, second/third homes all they want and if they earn these things, then fair enough but only, if only, the basic needs of all people are tended to, not in a Marxist utopia but in a very real sense. Everyone has shelter, everyone has food, everyone has health care, everyone has hope.

 

The little man felt very bad

One meatball was all he had

And in his dreams he hears that call

“You gets no bread with one meatball “

 

Poverty is a terrible state to be in as it destroys the body, spirit and mind for generations. Maybe if such things were eradicated people would have less time and need to put on their bedsheets and find a scapegoat? Just a thought.

 

 

‘till next time

 

*the lyrics are taken from the Josh White song ‘One Meatball’ check it out, it’s great

Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee

 

Dee Brown’s book, Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, tells the tale of the American West from the perspective of the natives. From the last Chief (Sitting Bull) agreeing to reservations, then denied, to the ‘civilisation’ of the natives, bringing them Christianity etc.

 

One cannot read the book, or watch the dramatization, without feeling a deep loathing towards white people, almost boarding on hatred. Seeing a proud and peaceful (for the most part) people who had behaviours which may be seen as cruel (read the Native American ‘Bible’ Gospel of The Redman’) but were done, not out of cruelty but out of love, affection, self-sacrifice and pragmatism.

 

The lies and vagaries of the whites turned the natives into people who drink cod-liver oil for the vaguest trace of alcohol just to face the genocide of their selves, physically and metaphysically. Indeed, only 2% of the US population is native. Recently, two kids went on a seven-hour journey to see a prospective university. Upon seeing them one of the other parents called the campus security. As one person put it, that’s illegal immigrants for you, always scared when they see a native. Yet this is not an isolated event. Such genocides are part and parcel of civilisation and many seem to stem from, primarily, two races. White and Chinese. White history is one of empires and conquest. Likewise, with Chinese (by which I mean ethnicity including Mongolia, Japan etc).

 

It would be wrong to say, categorically, that all the problems stem from these races, after all the Native Americans warred with each other, the Persians and Egyptians conquered (even though Cleopatra was technically Macedonian) but much of human history and present (and probably future) involves Mongolians, Han Chinese, British, Romans etc conquering be it with hard or soft power.

 

The wolf is the natural predator in the US and recently wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone Park. Instantly things changed, the population of dear decreased and plants grew higher than they had been before, to name but two changes and likewise without the Whites and Chinese at the top of the proverbial food chain would the native not conquer the world? This is a hypothetical that we cannot answer. Yet, as Hermann Göring (a Nazi) said ‘we will go down in history either as the world’s greatest statesmen or its worst villains’, (often misattributed to Churchill as ‘history is written by the victors’, another of his being ‘isn’t the internet great? I can see all the things I never said which make me look so clever!’)  and as history is written by the Whites and Chinese George Orwell’s nightmare can be realised.

 

I’m not saying history would be better if there were not any whites or Chinese in it as we are all fundamentally human, but it would be interesting to look at the reasons why empires are built and see if it is cultural and if so can anything be done about it?

 

‘till next time

 

Afterword:

 

This piece was written a few months ago. Over the last few days I have been watching people talking about race in America, highlighted by the anniversary of the Charlottesville events last year. People on all sides talk of inequality but only for their own race. It is important to remember that a lot of whites came to America to escape religious and other forms of persecution and many blacks were brought to America as slaves, however, since then both blacks and whites have been able to, in relative terms, prosper yet I don’t see any of them speaking on the behalf of the natives whom they replaced. When Marlon Brando won the Oscar for The Godfather he sent up a native American lady, Sacheen Littlefeather, to read a statement refusing it on grounds of mistreatment of natives. The lady and Brando are still vilified to this day, in a day and age when white films starring blacks and women are seen as ground-breaking it is still deemed heinous to speak about those who were destroyed by whites and blacks and Hispanics etc. You can wrap it up any way you want but the majority of the politics are not about race or gender, they are about self-interest and as long as the true victims are crushed underfoot by indifference an apathy you cannot have a  world which is just and ethical and racially tolerant. Unfortunately there is an I in politics and herein lies the rub.

 

TGF

The Spirituality And Truth Of Leonard Cohen

 

Almost two years ago I reviewed the new, and tragically, last Leonard Cohen album, You Want It Darker, after my initial listen. Now, having listened to it, either actually or just rattling round my empty head, for the last, almost two years I feel I can discuss one aspect of the album which really intrigues me more, that is the religiosity of Mr Cohen.

 

Born into an affluent Jewish family, descended from prominent Rabbis, into the Christian city of Montreal (‘This is the first time I was ever in a city where you couldn’t throw a brick without breaking a church window.’ Mark Twain) Mr Cohen grew up with a love of spiritual matters and religions (‘My friend Brian Johnson said of me that I’d never met a religion I didn’t like.’) and studied many of them, meeting the mother of his children in a Scientology church.   Being ordained a Buddhist monk in 1996, when in Rome… (‘I’m not looking for a new religion. I’m quite happy with the old one, with Judaism’) and then leaving the monastery ‘cured’ but then going to India to study Advaita, a nondual teaching, with Ramesh Balsekar.

 

The studies he made found their way into, or were enhanced, by his poetry and songs (for example ‘Did you ever go clear?’ from Famous Blue Raincoat refers to a central tenant of Scientology) but what can his last album show of where he was spiritually? The correct answer is that it cannot and is none of my business, that being said let’s study his lyrics for clues.

 

The tone and tenor of the album, from cantor is very much Jewish, with parts of it being recorded in Congregation Shaar Hashomayim, the synagogue Cohen’s grandfather and great-grandfather were presidents of and Jewishness and Judeo-Christianity prevail on the album

 

I heard the snake was baffled by his sin

He shed his scales to find the snake within

But born again is born without a skin

The poison enters into everything

 

Presumably referring to the snake in Eden and the notion of Baptism as rebirth, ‘I do not care who takes the bloody hill’, presumably referring to Calvary, ‘I seen you change the water into wine’, Jesus at the wedding feast, ‘Hineni Hineni/I’m ready, my Lord’, God talking to Samuel as a child and the list is endless, but let’s go beyond the obvious.

 

One thing which Buddhism and non-dualism (Advaita) teach is that there is no ‘self’ (existentialism was heavily influenced by such thought) and a lyric such as

 

I guess I’m just

Somebody who

Has given up

On the me and you

 

May, on the surface seem like a boy/girl relationship but in the context of his life may mean that he has given up on the notion of a true ‘self’ and that all there is is sunyata (nothingness or emptiness) and nothing beyond such as heaven and hell

 

There’s nobody missing

There is no reward

Little by little

We’re cutting the cord

 

Cutting the cord to what? Well, the notion that there are real truths that one can find and that we are a ‘self’

 

It seemed the better way

When first I heard him speak

But now it’s much too late

To turn the other cheek

 

It sounded like the truth

It seemed the better way

It sounded like the truth

But it’s not the truth today

 

For what one must do is

 

Steer your heart past the Truth

you believed in yesterday

Such as Fundamental Goodness

and the Wisdom of the Way

 

which comes from a poem published in The New Yorker and which I think is the centre piece of the album (see below). One by one Mr Cohen lists the things that one must go beyond- ‘the wisdom of the way is from eastern philosophy’ (way= truth), ‘Steer your way through the fables of Creation and The Fall’- Judaism and Christianity, ‘Steer your way through the ruins of the Altar and the Mall’- socio political theory, ‘As he died to make men holy, let us die to make things cheap’- the abdication of personal responsibility putting it all onto Jesus to bear the burden of sin until  one can ‘say the Mea Culpa which you’ve probably/gradually forgot – say I am to blame, I am responsible.

 

But, as this is Mr Cohen, one thing resides above all others, and that is love. He once said that we all live the life of the heart, but this love cannot/may not/has not come from above

 

Magnified and sanctified

Be Thy Holy Name

Vilified and crucified

In the human frame

A million candles burning

For the love that never came

 

(Other than the sacrifice of Jesus) for us and we must find love here, on this mortal plane

 

I knew that it was wrong

I didn’t have a doubt

I was dying to get back home

And you were starting out

I said I better hurry on

You said, we have all day

You smiled at me like I was young

It took my breath away

Your crazy fragrance all around

Your secrets all in view

My lost, my lost was saying found

My don’t was saying do

 

And

 

If the sea were sand alone

And the flowers made of stone

And no one that you hurt

Could ever heal

That’s how broken I would be

What my life would mean to me

If I didn’t have your love

To make it real

 

 

And the dearest wish that he, Mr Cohen, had was a wish to reconcile the irreconcilable, that which there is nothing and that all there is that matters is love and that once one has gone beyond the myths, truths, self and lies all that one has is love, for what is life without love?

 

I wish there was a treaty we could sign

It’s over now, the water and the wine

We were broken then, but now we’re borderline

And I wish there was a treaty

I wish there was a treaty

Between your love and mine

 

 

 

 

 

 

After all, even if there is ‘nothing’ love is all that really matters

 

‘till next time

—————————————-

You Want It Darker is our now and a last book of poetry and writings The Flame is due October 2018

 

———————————————–

Steer Your Way

 

Words and Music by Leonard Cohen

 

Steer your way through the ruins

of the Altar and the Mall

Steer your way through the fables

of Creation and The Fall

Steer your way past the Palaces

that rise above the rot

Year by year

Month by month

Day by day

Thought by thought

 

Steer your heart past the Truth

you believed in yesterday

Such as Fundamental Goodness

and the Wisdom of the Way

Steer your heart, precious heart,

past the women whom you bought

Year by year

Month by month

Day by day

Thought by thought

 

Steer your path through the pain

that is far more real than you

That has smashed the Cosmic Model,

that has blinded every View

And please don’t make me go there,

tho’ there be a God or not

Year by year

Month by month

Day by day

Thought by thought

 

They whisper still, the injured stones,

the blunted mountains weep

As he died to make men holy,

let us die to make things cheap

And say the Mea Culpa which

you’ve probably forgot

Year by year

Month by month

Day by day

Thought by thought

 

Steer your way, O my heart,

tho’ I have no right to ask

To the one who was never

never equal to the task

Who knows he’s been convicted,

who knows he will be shot

Year by year

Month by month

Day by day

Thought by thought

 

Full Lyrics To The Album

 

You Want It Darker

Words by Leonard Cohen, Music by Patrick Leonard

If you are the dealer
I’m out of the game
If you are the healer
I’m broken and lame
If thine is the glory
Then mine must be the shame
You want it darker
We kill the flame

Magnified and sanctified
Be Thy Holy Name
Vilified and crucified
In the human frame
A million candles burning
For the help that never came
You want it darker
We kill the flame

Hineni Hineni
I’m ready, my Lord

There’s a lover in the story
But the story is still the same
There’s an lullaby for suffering
And a paradox to blame
But it’s written in the scriptures
And it’s not some idle claim
You want it darker
We kill the flame

They’re lining up the prisoners now
The guards are taking aim
I struggled with some demons
They were middle-class and tame
Didn’t know I had permission
To murder and to maim
You want it darker
We kill the flame

Hineni Hineni
I’m ready, my Lord

Magnified and sanctified
Be Thy Holy Name
Vilified and crucified
In the human frame
A million candles burning
For the love that never came
You want it darker
We kill the flame

If you are the dealer
I’m out of the game
If you are the healer
I’m broken and lame
If thine is the glory
Then mine must be the shame
You want it darker
We kill the flame

Hineni Hineni
I’m ready, my Lord

Treaty

Words and Music by Leonard Cohen

I seen you change the water into wine
I seen you change it back to water too
I sit at your table every night
I try but I just don’t get high with you

I wish there was a treaty we could sign
I do not care who takes the bloody hill
I’m angry and I’m tired all the time
I wish there was a treaty
I wish there was a treaty
Between your love and mine

They’re dancing in the street – it’s Jubilee
We sold ourselves for love but now we’re free
I’m sorry for the ghost I made you be
Only one of us was real – and that was me.

I haven’t said a word since you’ve been gone
That any liar couldn’t say as well
I can’t believe the static coming on
You were my ground – my safe and sound
You were my aerial

The fields are crying out – it’s Jubilee
We sold ourselves for love but now we’re free
I’m sorry for the ghost I made you be
Only one of us was real – and that was me.

I heard the snake was baffled by his sin
He shed his scales to find the snake within
But born again is born without a skin
The poison enters into everything

I wish there was a treaty we could sign
I do not care who takes the bloody hill
I’m angry and I’m tired all the time
I wish there was a treaty
I wish there was a treaty
Between your love and mine

On The Level

Words by Leonard Cohen, Music by Sharon Robinson

I knew that it was wrong
I didn’t have a doubt
I was dying to get back home
And you were starting out

I said I better hurry on
You said, we have all day
You smiled at me like I was young
It took my breath away

Your crazy fragrance all around
Your secrets all in view
My lost, my lost was saying found
My don’t was saying do

Let’s keep it on the level
When I walked away from you
I turned my back on the devil
Turned my back on the angel too

They ought to give my heart a medal
For letting go of you
When I turned my back on the devil
Turned my back on the angel too

Now I’m living in this temple
Where they tell you what to do
I’m old and I’ve had to settle
On a different point of view

I was fighting with temptation
But I didn’t want to win
A man like me don’t like to see
Temptation caving in

Your crazy fragrance all around
You secrets all in view
My lost, my lost was saying found
My don’t was saying do

Let’s keep it on the level
When I walked away from you
I turned my back on the devil
Turned my back on the angel too

They ought to give my heart a medal
For letting go of you
When I turned my back on the devil
Turned my back on the angel too

Leaving The Table

Words and Music by Leonard Cohen

I’m leaving the table
I’m out of the game
I don’t know the people
In your picture frame
If I ever loved you
It’s a crying shame
If I ever loved you
If I knew your name

You don’t need a lawyer
I’m not making a claim
You can put down your weapon
I’m not taking aim
I don’t need a lover
The wretched beast is tame
I don’t need a lover
So blow out the flame

There’s nobody missing
There is no reward
Little by little
We’re cutting the cord
We’re spending the treasure
That love cannot afford
I know you can feel it
The sweetness restored

I don’t need a reason
For what I became
I’ve got these excuses
They’re old and they’re lame
I don’t need a pardon
There’s no one left to blame
I’m leaving the table
I’m out of the game

If I Didn’t Have Your Love

Words by Leonard Cohen, Music by Patrick Leonard

If the sun would lose its light
And we lived an endless night
And there was nothing left
That you could feel
Well that’s how it would be
What the world would seem to me
If I didn’t have your love
To make it real

If the stars were all unpinned
And a cold and bitter wind
Swallowed up the world
Without a trace
Well that’s where I would be
What my life would seem to me
If I couldn’t lift the veil
And see your face

If no leaves were on the tree
And no water in the sea
And the break of day
Had nothing to reveal
That’s how broken I would be
What my life would seem to me
If I didn’t have your love
To make it real

If the sun would lose its light
And we lived an endless night
And there was nothing left
That you could feel
If the sea were sand alone
And the flowers made of stone
And no one that you hurt
Could ever heal
That’s how broken I would be
What my life would mean to me
If I didn’t have your love
To make it real

Traveling Light

Words by Leonard Cohen, Music by Patrick Leonard and Adam Cohen

I’m traveling light
It’s au revoir
My once so bright
My fallen star

I’m running late
They’ll close the bar
I used to play
One mean guitar

I guess I’m just
Somebody who
Has given up
On the me and you
I’m not alone
I’ve met a few
Traveling light like
We used to do

Goodnight goodnight
My fallen star
I guess you’re right
You always are

I know you’re right
About the blues
You live some life
You’d never choose

I’m just a fool
A dreamer who
Forgot to dream
Of the me and you
I am not alone
I’ve met a few
Traveling light like
We used to do

Traveling light
It’s au revoir
My once so bright
My fallen star

I’m running late
They’ll close the bar
I used to play
One mean guitar

I guess I’m just
Somebody who
Has given up
On the me and you
I’m not alone
I’ve met a few
Traveling light like
We used to do

But if the road
Leads back to you
Must I forget
The things I knew
When I was friends
With one or two
Traveling light like
We used to do

Seemed The Better Way

Words by Leonard Cohen, Music by Patrick Leonard

It seemed the better way
When first I heard him speak
But now it’s much too late
To turn the other cheek

It sounded like the truth
It seemed the better way
It sounded like the truth
But it’s not the truth today

I wonder what it was
I wonder what it meant
At first he touched on love
But then he touched on death

I better hold my tongue
I better take my place
Lift this glass of blood
Try to say the grace

Steer Your Way

Words and Music by Leonard Cohen

Steer your way through the ruins
of the Altar and the Mall
Steer your way through the fables
of Creation and The Fall
Steer your way past the Palaces
that rise above the rot
Year by year
Month by month
Day by day
Thought by thought

Steer your heart past the Truth
you believed in yesterday
Such as Fundamental Goodness
and the Wisdom of the Way
Steer your heart, precious heart,
past the women whom you bought
Year by year
Month by month
Day by day
Thought by thought

Steer your path through the pain
that is far more real than you
That has smashed the Cosmic Model,
that has blinded every View
And please don’t make me go there,
tho’ there be a God or not
Year by year
Month by month
Day by day
Thought by thought

They whisper still, the injured stones,
the blunted mountains weep
As he died to make men holy,
let us die to make things cheap
And say the Mea Culpa which
you’ve probably forgot
Year by year
Month by month
Day by day
Thought by thought

Steer your way, O my heart,
tho’ I have no right to ask
To the one who was never
never equal to the task
Who knows he’s been convicted,
who knows he will be shot
Year by year
Month by month
Day by day
Thought by thought

String Reprise/Treaty

Words and Music by Leonard Cohen

[Instrumental except final portion]

I wish there was a treaty we could sign
It’s over now, the water and the wine
We were broken then, but now we’re borderline
And I wish there was a treaty
I wish there was a treaty
Between your love and mine

 

All Songs Copyright 2016 by Old Ideas, LLC. All rights reserved.

 

 

 

 

Kindness And Cruelty

 

 

‘Perhaps she would not have thought of wickedness as a state so rare, so abnormal, so exotic, one which it was so refreshing to visit, had she been able to distinguish in herself, as in all her fellow-men and women, that indifference to the sufferings which they cause which, whatever names else be given it, is the one true, terrible and lasting form of cruelty.’

 

In Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust’s staggering work of genius in which he displays empirical evidence that he was one of the greatest psychologists, sociologists and philosophers, not to mention a true master of language (and I’ve only been able to read him in translation!) À la recherche du temps perdu: Du côté de chez Swann (if you can’t tell, I think he is alright) Proust travels through his life and memory (in actual fact we do not know if it is actually autobiographical, I get the impression it is part autobiographical and partly about a fictional character who happens to have a name which very easily can be misinterpreted as Proust’s) to see how one is shaped. Yes, it is important to note that the book is reflective in that the impressions each thing has formed are viewed from the wrong end of a telescope however, the underlying implications of what is written is undeniable.

 

The above quotation is a very good example of not only one’s ignorance of self but also ignorance of the effect that we have on others. By displaying an indifference to the world around us (yup, Martin Buber’s I-Thou) we cannot see how much pain and suffering stems from our not being connected to each other. You see it every day, cars running red lights meaning that people have to wait longer and then the cars behind have to wait as people are still crossing as the lights change, someone not flushing toilet and washing their hands etc. no matter how small and imperceptible these things may be there is a knock-on effect (the proverbial butterfly effect which I’ve never really deemed valid except as a tenuous abstraction). Everyone wants to feel special, maybe not personally but sometimes impersonally. One does not need to engage fully with another to be able to effect/affect their lives. Yes, Goethe said ‘we cannot be made to feel something’ as in we have to let things effect/affect us, but the world is, in reality, so small and complex and we are such emotional beings (even sociopaths and stoics are emotional, emotional to a, for them, terrifying degree) that we have to be careful.

 

Yet, it is not all doom and gloom, the smallest touch, physical or otherwise, can change the world of a person and, yes, revolution does not really exist, however, for one person in one moment of inner and outer space and time it can be everything, as Johnny Cash writes in his song The Night Hank Williams Came to Town:

 

‘The effect on all our lives was quite profound

On the night Hank Williams came to town’

 

And that all came from Mr Williams doing his job and singing some songs, impersonally but deeply personal.

 

Something to think about, eh?

 

‘till next time