Dear Theophilus, 

You, once again have expressed disillusionment with life and wonder what's going on. Maybe I could answer you by referring to what an American historian said when he was asked to summarize history. History teaches us four things. Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad with power. The mills of God grind slowly but they grind exceedingly small. The bee fertilizes the flower that it robs. And, finally, when it is dark is when you can see the stars. Let's take a look at this list and see how it illustrates history and maybe you will feel better after we have gone through it.

Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad with power. I think no century in history better epitomizes this saying. From the megalomaniac Stalin, to Hitler, power has been the aphrodisiac and it has brought with it destruction, death and suffering to countless millions. Stalin insisted that everyone treat him as if her were god and if they didn't, death and torture would surely come. There is a story, historically based, where Stalin and some of his cohort were out one evening looking at the sky and got into an argument as to whether a given bright object in the sky was Venus or the north star. To resolve the difficulty, they dispatched emissaries from the Kremlin to the house of the brightest astronomer in the Soviet Union. This person, upon seeing the dark limousine arrive at his place of residence, committed suicide because he felt that they had come to arrest him. Such was the widespread terror which reigned in Moscow of the time. But what the lesson taught us by Stalin and Hitler and others like them is that power is illusory, it does not last and does not deliver what it promises. Yet, if we look around at our society, we see that power is glorified at every turn. It seems that the most valued possession you can have is power. All the lessons of history, all that we have gone through has not been able to dissuade us from the pursuit of power. Jesus was delivered to death by those who were threatened by him and who saw in him a loss of their power. One of the last things that Jesus said was to forgive them for they know not what they are doing. Is this not a definition of madness - not knowing what you are doing? If we have seen madness in this century on an unparalleled scale yet, we still pursue that illusion of power. It is Mephistopheles who laughs that he has people in his palm as they strive for a lifeless yellow metal. They kill, they rob, they maim so as to possess this inorganic substance because, by the scales set up by the world, this metal confers power.

The mills of God grind slowly but they grind exceedingly small. The cry of the wicked throughout history has been that they will get away with it - they always see things in the short run. The people of God are asked to be patient because, in the end, God will act. If we look at the empires of the past, we see that they have crumbled and fallen. Where is Babylon today, or Persia, or the British Empire, or even the Soviet Union? In their heyday each of them looked impregnable, but today, they are gone, ground under God's judgement. We sometimes look at history and are struck by its unfairness, but often this is so because of our perspective. We must realize that history is under God's purview and He will judge and is so doing right now. But realizing this intellectually and living this truth are two very different things. It takes much faith to see God's input into history and it is a painful silent waiting, which is often a large part of our lives. There is a saying by a Carthusian monk, Guido, that Jesus is the word that comes from the silence (a word can only issue from silence because if it comes from another word, we will have noise) and this silence is the Father (there is a powerful message here concerning our prayer life). One of the imageless images of God is silence, the silence of death, the silence of separation, the silence of the darkness that is the vastness of the universe around us. That is the grand lesson of the crucifixion that if we are to come closer to God, we must enter that silence, which means we must await.

The bee fertilizes the flower that it robs. It is a strange world that we live in with few defining lines. Much of what we see is blurred in a mixture of good and evil. It is interesting how many of the major crimes of history have been committed by those who promised paradise, a return to Eden. Who will liberate us from our liberators is a cry that has been repeated many times in history. We seek the perfect, the untainted and yet we fail to find it but in our search we bring much suffering and pain. We forget the lesson of Genesis - there is an angel with a flaming sword guarding the entrance to Eden and blocking our way. We keep trying to get through that wall of fire and keep getting burned but we persist in our ways. But there is another lesson in that bee and flower. What we see is that none of us is perfect and we live in a state of sin that is far more pervasive than we allow ourselves to believe. Even the good that may result from our activities often, has with evil motivations. It is not easy to separate the good and the evil in this world and one of the places that we should definitely stop trying to do this is with our neighbor. The bee tells us to stop judging because we are in no superior position. Accept our neighbor (and ourselves, by the way) as he is and forgive. Remember, that forgiveness is injustice but it is an injustice that saves and liberates. Forgiveness is the means whereby the evil (the robbing of the flower) is transformed into the good (the fertilization of the flower). There is none that is good, says Jesus, to the rich young man, except for God and let us stop looking for the totally good person or system of government.

When it is dark is when you can see the stars. The really important things in life cannot be defined but are always irreducible when we apply words to them. When the sun is shining brightly, we could swear that there are no stars. Sometimes, that sun is like our intellect - when it is given free reign, it blocks out other aspects of reality and we see only partially although we are dazzled by the clarity of what we see. We are called on to develop other aspects of ourselves and then, we may see other things that were once hidden. We are taught not to accept reality at its face value but to try to discern other aspects to the world around us. There is also an important lesson for prayer here, but we will get to this point at another time. What we are called on is to exhibit courage. The dark represents the unknown, the frightening aspect of our lives. And yet, we are called on to accept and embrace this dark and when we do, we see things that we didn't expect.

It is strange being human, there is no doubt about this and it seems we need a life-time, and more, to realize what it means to be human. There is a taste of tragedy in humanity, but there are occasional glimmerings of glory. We seem to be caught up in a story whose ending we sometimes sense and from time to time, see. But, it is always temporary. We want clarity and lucidity and yet, our lives are filled with a tantalizing contradiction - there seem to be no final answers for us. We are truly wanderers with no place to rest - there are continual upheavals in our lives and the rest and peace that we want so much, only teases us with brief samplings. We are all in this together and yet, how we torment each other and make our lives harder. It was Byron, I think, who wrote of history being the scripture of Satan. When you look at history, you cannot but be struck by the horror of it with short, all too short, interminable stretches of peace. And yet, we sense, we know, we hope that there is more to it but even this hope is sometimes twisted and is expressed in ways contrary to what we want. I look at all the violence and war in the world and I am appalled by it but when I look at it a little bit more closely, another picture emerges. I see humanity bereft of hope and expressing itself in violence. We prayed, but God did not answer may be today's credo. We will force Him to answer through our violence, through our insolence, through our arrogance. He will surely speak, if even just to punish us and even this will be better than the silence we are experiencing. You may find this a little far-fetched, but believe me, the human mind is devious, especially when it is at the end of its tether. It is curious that it was Engels, who with Marx laid the foundation for communism, who commented that the Church needs persecution in order to be reborn and to thrive. Ironic, isn't this, in view of how the communists persecuted and martyred so many believers for their faith in the hope of eradicating this faith. But the world is indeed strange as you, Theophilus, are well aware.

But we still have, as Peguy calls, la petite esperance, the little hope who walks between her larger sisters of faith and charity. We still hope and we still go on and it is important to realize that we do this, not on our own strength, but as a gift from someone who is silent so that we may hear Him. I think that it is time for us to consider prayer, and maybe that is what we will do in our next letter. Meanwhile, Theophilus, do not lose your hope and do not give in to despair.

Yours, as always,

Bar-Abbas

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