The Master's Maiden Speech, Part II; Gabby and Bea Save a Puppy
By John Taylor; 20 September, 2005
An anonymous writer defined religion this way: "Nobody is anything
except as he joins himself to something. You cannot be a whole unless
you join the whole. This I believe is religion." I agree with this
wholeheartedly, and for that reason I almost burst when people claim
to adhere to spirituality but not organized religion. If the spirit
cannot organize, what good is it? What kind of a whole can move one
heart all alone but not build from that group structures, social good?
Such a whole would be impotent, a mere superstition, an illusion not
worth the time it takes to picture it.
The true whole is the unifying factor, One holism that is not to be
confused with "everything." When May Maxwell went on pilgrimage she
dragged along her cynical atheist husband, W. Sutherland. The Master
asked W. what God is, and he said, "God is everything, everywhere, I
suppose." Wrong, the Master told him, if you say that something is
everything, that is the same as saying it is nothing; if you say
something is everywhere, that is the same as saying that it is
nowhere. To join yourself to everything is really to join with
nothing. The One stands behind everything seen and it is One, a
unifying whole. If that is not so, then there is no God. If there is a
Singularity behind all things, then there is a God. Sutherland thought
long and hard about what he had been told and eventually saw that He
was right. He eventually converted to belief in God, the One behind
the whole, and became an exemplary Baha'i.
A couple of years later, `Abdu'l-Baha in His first public address in
London's City Temple, laid out the other two Oneness that proceed
directly from the primary oneness, the Oneness of God.
"The gift of God to this enlightened age is the knowledge of the
oneness of mankind and of the fundamental oneness of religion. War
shall cease between nations, and by the will of God the Most Great
Peace shall come; the world will be seen as a new world, and all men
will live as brothers." (`Abdul-Baha in London, pp. 19-20)
Peace then, and the principles of peace, are the result of joining One
God to the other two Onenesses, One religion, a single underlying
Divine Teaching, and one human race to learn from It. Peace cannot be
bound and confined to one heart, that would be just one more division
among the billions of divisions already conflicting our world. Only
tension and war come of everyone turning to everything. The only
reality is the One in its three expressions of wholeness, working
Itself out as a harmonious One, in other words, peace.
Peace is the thesis of our time, its antithesis ignorance, imitation,
division, conflict. They clash in apocalyptic battle. The Master
warned us to strengthen our spiritual consensus, form a common
synthesis based upon One. This only should be our focus, it is our
only way to defeat the error and wrong threatening us.
"You are loosed from ancient superstitions which have kept men
ignorant, destroying the foundation of true humanity... In the days of
old an instinct for warfare was developed in the struggle with wild
animals; this is no longer necessary; nay, rather, co-operation and
mutual understanding are seen to produce the greatest welfare of
mankind." (Id.)
This is a startlingly brilliant historical thesis, one of those simple
ideas that seems obvious as soon as you grasp it. Civilization started
with the invention of agriculture a few thousand years ago, but before
that for thousands and millions of years humans in small groups must
have been in perpetual struggle with large beasts of prey. Now we can
bring down a bear or a lion with a single bullet and we pity the poor,
helpless beasts, threatened as they are with imminent extinction. It
is easy to forget that they threatened us for so long. Killing them
easily was an impossible dream. Fighting them took all the courage,
physical prowess and usually the coordinated efforts of an entire
village to kill, dress and consume an animal like the mammoth.
Solitary travelers through the ages until very recently were in
constant danger of being killed and eaten by large predators. Even
when the threat of cruel beasts receded, savage tribes imitated their
predatory ways by raiding, conquering, and otherwise preying upon
undefended villages and towns. Aggression brought great booty, and
aggressive thoughts and words were valued above gentle ones. With such
standing threats hanging above our heads it would be surprising if
society had not come to admire and value the opponent, the militant
and the ruthless more than the gentle, the cooperative and the kind.
Next time we will consider the Master's following, perhaps even more
startling statement: "Enmity is now the result of prejudice only."
Gabby, Bea and the De-population of New Guinea
In Michael Creighton's latest novel I read that in certain parts of
the world crocodiles have learned a new way to get a free lunch. That
called for a Gabby and Bea story.
It happened during their world tour that Gabby and Bea stopped in for
a visit to the island nation of New Guinea. They swam ashore and
walked into a village smiling at the people, who were even more
overjoyed to meet the famous pair. They called them and said, "Please
help us save our puppy." The wolf and fox agreed and were shown a
little puppy in an open field, held back by a heavy chain. Gabby and
Bea touched noses with the puppy and asked what was wrong with it. The
puppy looked just fine. Nothing, they answered, only he is the last
dog left in our village. He is in great danger. The crocodiles have
learned to make a sound that sounds like the barking of a dog. When a
dog hears it he goes to investigate and is eaten. The more dogs
disappeared the more lonely our dogs became until now this puppy is
our last one. He is extremely lonely now, he longs to see one of his
own kind. And do you hear the barking down by the river? Bea said yes,
she understood what the barking meant in dog language, albeit
imitation dog language, the barks were saying,
"Help me. I have fallen in the water. I want to be your friend but
first you have to save me here."
Just then the puppy escaped from his collar and ran hell bent for
leather down towards the river. Nobody noticed. Gabby did not notice.
Gabby objected that he was a native speaker of dog language and what
business did Bea, a fox, claim that she understood dog language when
there was an expert standing right here.
It was then that my audience took the story into its own power. A
giant hand burst through the paper and as it were grabbed me by the
throat, reminding me forcefully that if I did not save that puppy
right away there would be shouts, tears and protests to Mama -- more
than enough annoyances to counterbalance the pleasure I had been
hoping to gain from a description of an ingenious croc's honest,
hard-won meal.
Suddenly a child villager noticed that the puppy was missing. Gabby
knew where the puppy must have gone and as Bea leaped on his back, he
flew after the puppy at top speed. Speaking perfect dog language,
Gabby and Bea explained the ruse to the puppy, who stopped just in
time to see the croc leap out and snap at the air where it had been
about to move.
Gabby and Bea saw that the only way for the little puppy to be
completely safe would be to leave the island completely. But it
transpired that he was the last dog in New Guinea and the people loved
their dogs; what would they do? Silvie would entertain only one
possibility, they had to leave New Guinea en masse and stay with the
puppy. I protested, "Would that not mean that the crocodiles will have
won out?" She agreed but did not care, the land had to be depopulated
and left to nature. There was nothing more to be said, so that is
where I ended it. And that was the end of the story...
--
John Taylor
badijet@gmail.com
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