Wednesday’s Twin Duties
By
On Tuesday, March 13th our monthly public meeting will take place in the Garfield Disher room of the Dunnville Branch of the Haldimand Public Library at
I have little knowledge of what Doug will be saying on Tuesday, but I would guess that these two duties are what the Ancient Greeks understood them to be, a duty to the body and an equal duty to the mind. The body is protected by medicine and sustained by gymnastic. We develop the mind by education, contemplation and dialectic. In Baha'i terms, these duties are conditioned by twin purposes of life, one, a collective physical duty to carry on an ever-advancing civilization and, two, a personal, spiritual duty to know and love God. The latter is stated in the noonday obligatory prayer where we attest that our prime reason for being is to know God and worship Him. The former social goal is set up in this, from the Writings of Baha'u'llah,
"All men have been created to carry forward an ever-advancing civilization. The Almighty beareth Me witness: To act like the beasts of the field is unworthy of man." (Gl 215)
In every age, philosophy breaks into two camps or styles of thinking based upon our two natural duties to our body and to our mind. Those who begin with physical and biological problems tend to emphasize the practical aspects of truth. Those who begin with the product of the mind, thought, orient themselves to our abstract and theoretical needs and resources.
This split between rationalist and empiricist is memorably portrayed in Raphael's painting, "The School of Athens." Plato is shown walking on the left with his right finger pointing straight up towards heaven, the consummate idealist and mathematician. On our right is Aristotle, the biologist and empiricist, his hand held out before him, flat and parallel to the ground. For him practice, observation and experience come first. In Aristotle's ethics, virtue is moderation in all things, and politics is the direct outcome of this virtue of individuals expressed in a group. For Plato, the material world is a poor reflection of the ideal world of forms. Politics at worst is a pale reflection of our attempt to project the light of an ideal sun onto an uneven, flickering cave wall.
In the study of justice with which we have been concerned for the past few months, there is a similar split between idealists and "natural law" theorists.
The idealists see justice as a fiat, an act of will, as the word of authority, an exclusive prerogative of kings. A king by divine right conjures up justice and what he says is law. If it was not right before, the very act of declaring makes it right. His is a God-given, divine right to legislate. We are like sheep without a shepherd without Him. Or like travelers in a caravan through a dangerous, inclement desert; to stray a hair's breadth from the wisdom of the leader is to risk a certain death in the wilderness. Baha'u'llah put it like this,
"Know verily that the essence of justice and the source thereof are both embodied in the ordinances prescribed by Him Who is the Manifestation of the Self of God amongst men, if ye be of them that recognize this truth." (Gleanings, 175)
This and only this constitutes the divine right of kings. Exclusive, unmediated sovereignty is reserved for the true King, God's Rep. And, as Baha'u'llah reaffirms in the Kitab-i-Ahd, His Kingdom is not of this world. All other than He are servants, and even He is the Servant Supreme; all are as nothing before the stunning power of God. Baha'u'llah addressed God: "Wert Thou to look upon them with the eye of justice, all would deserve Thy wrath and the rod of Thine anger." (P&M XXXVII, 31) This theme is repeated often in His prayers, "Everything Thou doest is pure justice, nay, the very essence of grace." (Baha'u'llah, Prayers & Meditations, 252) God's exaltation reconciles apparent contradictions by transcending them.
"...Thou Who art the King of the realms of justice and the Ruler of the cities of mercy!" (P&M, 135)
Abdu'l-Baha portrays how this idealist aspect of justice plays out as a Baha'i social principle, the fourteenth of fourteen principles mentioned in the "Tablet to
"And among the teachings of Baha'u'llah are justice and right. Until these are realized on the plane of existence, all things shall be in disorder and remain imperfect. The world of mankind is a world of oppression and cruelty, and a realm of aggression and error." (Selected Writings, 304)
Attaining to absolute Justice is a survival mechanism, salvation from utter perdition. Socially speaking, we are in the same boat and if it sinks we are all doomed. Baha'is, then, are idealists in a restricted sense. The only king with absolute authority is the divine Legislator and human kings and queens are "shadows" of His sovereignty. Without the Manifestation we would be doomed to a Hobbesian hell. His Law allows us to reach out and touch the infallible finger of God.
On the other side of the equation are the "natural law" theorists, who begin with the body and proceed to the mind. Justice is not a convention but is in some measure derived from the same laws that rule over nature independently of opinion and conventions. The font of law is "out there," eternal, unchanging, unconditioned and the best we can do is experience it and learn from it. The legitimacy of law is derived from something beyond the ken of mortal men. These laws of nature are independent of what people decide is true and right. What is right is right, no matter what anybody says, regardless of what we know or do not know, or what either individual or society thinks or says is right.
Here is how Baha'u'llah in a prayer portrays the individual's inadequacy to face this harsh inability to live up to the requirements of justice,
"I testify that every man of equity hath recognized his unfairness in the face of the revelation of the splendors of the Day-Star of Thy Justice, and the ablest of pens hath confessed its impotence before the movement of Thy most exalted Pen." (P&M, 55)
It is only by plugging in to the extreme compassion of an All-Merciful Creator that we can overcome our basic unfairness. Again, from a prayer:
"The tenderness of Thy mercy, O my Lord, surpasseth the fury of Thy wrath, and Thy loving-kindness exceedeth Thy hot displeasure, and Thy grace excelleth Thy justice." (P&M, 136)
The confirmations of God are our only hope that we will ever be truly fair and just. These come only to a humble, searching mind. Hence Baha'u'llah's definition of justice (in the second AHW) as seeing with one's own eyes and knowing with one's own knowledge. This experience of first hand investigation of truth is the empirical or natural law aspect of justice for a Baha'i.
A good time to think and pray about justice is on Wednesday, the fifth day of the Badi' week, which is named 'Idal, Justice. Let me end with some divinely revealed prayers for justice that might be nice to say on that day of the week.
"He is the Living, there is no God but He, therefore call on Him, being sincere to Him in obedience; (all) praise is due to `Allah, the Lord of the worlds." (Q40:65, Shakir)
"Whatever betide us, we beseech Thine ancient forgiveness, and seek Thine all-pervasive grace. Our hope is that Thou wilt deny no one Thy grace, and wilt deprive no soul of the ornament of fairness and justice. Thou art the King of all bounty, and the Lord of all favors, and supreme over all who are in heaven and on earth." (P&M, CLIII, 246-247)
"I testify, O my God, that Thou hast, from eternity, sent down upon Thy servants naught else except that which can cause them to soar up and be drawn near unto Thee, and to ascend into the heaven of Thy transcendent oneness. Thou hast established Thy bounds among them, and ordained them to stand among Thy creatures as evidences of Thy justice and as signs of Thy mercy, and to be the stronghold of Thy protection amongst Thy people, that no man may in Thy realm transgress against his neighbor. How great is the blessedness of him who, for love of Thy beauty and for the sake of Thy pleasure, hath curbed the desires of a corrupt inclination and observed the precepts laid down by Thy most exalted Pen! He, in truth, is to be numbered with them that have attained unto all good, and followed the way of guidance." (P&M, 298)
"Glorified, immeasurably glorified art Thou! Thou art adored in Thy truth, and Thee do we all, verily, worship; and Thou art manifest in Thy justice, and to Thee do we all, verily, bear witness. Thou art, in truth, beloved in Thy grace. No God is there but Thee, the Help in Peril, the Self-Subsisting." (P&M, CLXIX, 262)
No comments:
Post a Comment