Namo Buddhaya Namo Buddhaya Namo Buddhaya Namo'valokiteshvaraya Namo'valokiteshvaraya Namo'valokiteshvaraya La la la, la la la, la la la la [...]

[01:25]

We are going to take a minute to think about what we're going to do and how we're going to handle it. While we're thinking about it, we're also going to think about what we're going to do when we get there. La la la la la... Mrs. Sarah Small, co-director, Packard Manse, Boston, Massachusetts. I didn't know I was going to have to say anything.

[02:35]

I never know. The Lord said, be also ready. And I'm ready, because I can tell you a lot about me and building a community. And I got to tell it the way it happened to me. Because when the Lord found me, I began to see things anew. You know, some people say my hands look new and my feet look new. And I began to see black people in a society. that was made for white people, in a society that we couldn't fit in, and nobody was interested in what we're saying, and nobody's still not interested in what we're saying. Everybody's trying to do for us, and nobody listens. Everybody think that God gave all the ability to one color, and that color's supposed to take care of everybody.

[03:39]

But God has no respect of persons. And believe it or not, He touched me. And he sent me out to help my people. And when I went out to help my people, I was playing for about eight different Christian groups. And they fired me because I was talking ugly to the white folks. And my brother stopped speaking to me. And everybody was threatening my life. And they shot in my house. And they put me in jail. And they did a lot of things. And that's why I was so upset about what happened here yesterday. Because it runs so deep. And we get entertained by people who have to live in your society. And you never stop to wonder why 90% of the men in jail are black. Because the society was not set up for them.

[04:41]

The only peace that I find is in Christ Jesus. That's why I talk about him all the time. And that's why I can love you. Sarah couldn't. But Jesus in me can. And I thank God for that. I thank God for giving me courage. You know, I dealt with death. The first thing I had to deal with was death. You know, a lot of people have been meditating and doing everything. But mine had to be done fast, because God had a job for me to do, and he wanted me to do it right away. And I had to deal with death, because people died for saying things that I was saying. I won't curse him. But I was saying, if I'm dirty, I'll take a bath. If I'm dumb, I'll go to school. But don't. Don't condemn me because I'm black, because I didn't make myself this way. God made me.

[05:43]

And he said, and that's good. Not only did he say, that's good. He said, that's very good. And if I'm going to believe one thing in the Bible, then I got to believe all things. But America didn't teach me that. They cut me from my culture and they said I didn't have none. So they said to achieve, you got to become white. Although I'm never going to let you be white. You're going to be always treated black and you're going to be that second class person, but you spend all your money sending your children to school to learn, to be like me. And God said, no. So you got something, Sarah. You got ability. Be yourself. Be you. That's what I am. I'm me.

[06:45]

And I don't try to be like nobody want me to be. I'm just me. God's child. I don't pin my faith to no denomination. I'm everything. I'm Catholic, Episcopalian. Anybody that's loving Jesus, I'm right with them, 100%. And even if you don't love him, I'm still with you, 100%. But I don't stop loving him. And I don't forget the bridge that carried me over. And that's what I'm going to talk about. But in our community, I saw all the damage that sending our little black children to school that was set up by white people have done. Because just to give you an incident, when after we marched, all of a sudden everybody needed urban renewal, which I call nigger removal, because it always moved black people.

[07:47]

You never get it in the white community. I don't care how bad it is. And here was these people. that had worked very hard, and they built nice homes, trying to be like the white folks. They got $1,000, $40,000 brick homes. And these people went downtown, and they sat down and figured out a way that they could condemn those fine houses. Because they said, well, you got to have Six feet on this side, and six feet of land on that side. And if you don't, we can condemn your house. They didn't say that when they built the house. But now that's not so bad, because the Lord allowed me to hear about it. And I went around, and to be a good Christian, you had to become a foot soldier, a good worker for Christ. You don't wait, you know. You go around and knock on doors. And you say, you're getting ready to be done in. I think y'all need to come to a meeting. But I'm going to be fair about it.

[08:50]

I'm going to invite the white folks to it. And I got up and told the black people what was going to happen. And the white people got up and they made it so pretty until, you see, they had already been attuned to listen to certain people. They didn't hear me. And last week I went home. And they're getting ready to tear down those houses. And they're not going to give those people what those houses are worth. And they can't get it. And they said, can't you stay? I said, no, I've got to go to Mount Savior, because I said I was going there. The Lord didn't send me back for that. But he wanted me to see, so that I would be prepared when I came here this week, how people won't listen. He said, you know, you don't help us. when you take us and put us on exhibit, because we're not a show. We're human beings, and when all of us can sit down with our sins, because whether you want to believe it or not, evil is in the world, and the devil is very real, and he has power.

[09:56]

God got all power, but there is Satan. I still believe the whole Bible. And if he met Jesus and showed him the world and told him how pretty it was, naturally, he's going to do the same thing to me. So I came. And because society has treated us so, when we want to achieve and be just like white folks, we can't get that type job. So we got to rob and steal. And then the law catches us and puts us in jail. We tell our case in court. And since Attica, things has changed. And Father Martin decided to let some boys come over here. And they were put on exhibit yesterday. Because after hearing all of this, nobody sat down and said, now what can we do for them? We just heard it. It was a grand show. That's what always has happened to us. We've always been the people that's funny.

[11:02]

They didn't mind slavery. Why, they was laughing, and they were glad to work for old Massey. This is where the movie showed it. But it's not true. Nobody wants to be a slave. And nobody wants you to take the chain off of their ankles and off of their arms and put it on their minds. And this is what's happening. Even now. Even people that love Jesus. A lady said, but I love Jesus just like you. I said, but lady, I'm in the hole. And you throw the rope where I tell you. And I can tell you how to get me out. But please don't throw it where you think it ought to go. Because I'll never get out the hole. And she said, but I love Jesus just like you. And she can't hear me. And this is what has happened to this society. And that's why we are here. Because God said, be not deceived. God is not mocked whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

[12:05]

And the baby have sowed a lot of seeds. America, bad seeds. From the beginning, when you can write a constitution and say all men are created equal and leave men out because of a color, you start off wrong. And when you break your arm and it start going back crooked, in order to get it straight, you got to re-break it. And God got to re-break this country. And we don't have much time to sit down and argue about who's right and religions, because God wants us to get ready. Because he said, except for the elects sakes, those days will be short. But America is getting ready to go in it. They're over in Vietnam because Vietnam won't let them run their country. So they divided. And all the people that agree with them are the South Vietnamese. And all the people that disagree are the communists.

[13:08]

And the Vietnamese people told me that America was making more communists over there than anything else. Because they were dropping bombs on them. And the communists wasn't dropping bombs on them. And that made sense. And I could agree. And I could identify with them. Because I dealt with the same type people. I dealt with the same type people. And I come up and say, we want to go in the movie, and we don't want to sit upstairs. And they say, we can't let you sit downstairs. And you say, why? They never thought it through. They say, we just can't let you sit downstairs. And you say, why? We just can't let you sit downstairs. You never get an answer. And finally, they write a civil rights bill, and they put a whole lot of stuff in there for black people that they can't get. It looks good in the paper, but I dare you to try to get it. Even in the Cradle of Liberty, Boston, it's worse than the South.

[14:11]

This is really true. And God opened my eyes to all of this, and I don't know why he sent me there. But for a year, I observed. I observed the city. And the job is real big. But I see a way that we can be helped, because the Catholic Church has a lot of power in this country. And sometimes, if people that say they are lovers of Jesus Christ would just say something, would just say something, but we sit quiet. And the sin of omission is just as bad as the sin of commission because there is sin. There is sin. And I'm sure there's sin because I've been sinned against and I have sinned. So I know that there's evil because evil have come in my house. And it doesn't make any difference how much love I get and sit down and how far off in space I go.

[15:19]

I'm still in the world, in reality. You know, it's a state of mind, just like everybody's in. Everything else is a state of mind, but sometimes we got to come back home. And we got to straighten things out because there are other people that might not ever get a chance to meditate, or they might not ever get to a meeting like this. But I hope that out of this meeting, Somebody will have heart and realize that people are people no matter where. I got a call the other day to come down to the state house in Boston. And when I got down there, there were 3,000 white people saying, I don't want my children bused. And all my life, they've been busing people. So busing is not what it is. It's because they don't know about me. And they are afraid to put their children on the bus with mine.

[16:22]

But we really don't need people. My children are just little children, you know, like all the other little children. They get into mischief. I'm sure they'll fight sometimes. But they just want to learn. And they say, well, we got to put 50 blacks and 60 whites, and that'll balance it off. But that's not the way to balance the schools. To balance the schools is to put black culture in the schools. Integration is a blending of cultures. You don't balance with me if you are all on a scale. And just a number of black children in a classroom is not helping things at all. And I hope that some of y'all are in the position to say this along with me because I'm going to be saying it this winter. Because President Nixon needed votes, so he got everybody all upset again about busing. And I hope we can just stop and say, let's learn about the people.

[17:26]

They're human beings. They're people that God made. And this is what happens to me in America. Not what happened, but what's happening now. Thank you. Thank you very much, Sister Sarah. Two of the very important points that Sister Sarah mentioned, one, the institution again, and what you do if you belong to an institution who fails by commission and by omission and so forth, to what extent do you die to it, to what extent do you identify yourself, and also the question of evil. And we are going to take those two questions up in a very short time. But there was this little incident, if you want to call it little, yesterday afternoon, which you specifically mentioned. And I think that in the context of the symposium, and particularly as chairman, I should address myself just briefly to this.

[18:36]

And that's a good opportunity. Definitely, a great mistake was made. Some of us are not aware of it, but many are aware of it. I think that possibly I personally have to take a great deal of blame for it, as chairman, who after all controls this to a certain extent, who tries to serve and at a particular time did not know how to control the situation. If I had to go through the whole thing once more, I have gone through it several times mentally, I would again not know where to intervene. I just don't know. This is a shortcoming on my part. If anybody can personally instruct me and help me, it may be very helpful. But I would briefly like to show you where I think the thing went wrong and where we did the best that we could do under the circumstances.

[19:37]

I think the whole thing went wrong long before we ever started getting together. I found myself confronted with four beautiful young people who had a need to express themselves, to have a need to stand on the stage and display themselves. And the word expressionist came over and over again. They shouldn't have had this need and they shouldn't have been put in this position. But that happened before we ever got together. Once they stood on the stage, I couldn't turn it off, and I couldn't even see turning two of them off. And the reaction of the group was very favorable of giving even those two who had escaped this painful situation a chance to express themselves. And I watched their faces. They were overjoyed. They had absolutely the need to get on stage, these two, too. So I think the main mistake happened before and the reason why I let it go in this way, and it may have been wrong, was because I saw that here was the need of four human beings at stake and the injury that would have been done then by turning them off at any point at which I could have turned it off would have been graver than the injury that was done to the program and was done to the group.

[20:58]

That's my excuse and it is maybe my fault. However, I think we did under the circumstances something very beautiful. And the best and most beautiful things are always done without figuring them out. We simply started dancing. And I think that is under all circumstances the best thing that you can do. It is much better than giving somebody bread to give them a flower. Of course you must also give them bread. Of course I also expect all of us to do something about it. Most of us did not need that reminder, but maybe somebody needed that reminder. Fine. We have to do something individually about it. But certainly the more gracious thing, in the full sense of the word gracious, is to respect the other person as another person. And of course these four young people did a much greater honor to us by taking our hands and dancing with us than we did to them, given the circumstances.

[22:00]

to dance with that. But the right thing seemed to be to dance with one another. It was a very beautiful gesture and I think a deeply expressive gesture in the context of the symposium. That is all I have to say to this thing. But again, except my apologies. John David had raised his hand. Do you want to say something? It seems to me that as you've expressed it, there's a pernicious kind of liberal sentimentality. It seems to me that providing a theater for a certain kind of ego trip, which is basically debasing, because there they are performing and we're saying, oh dear, how awful, how terrible a history you have had. The dynamics never really came full circle so that we saw that we were all in jail. No, instead we danced, which was an improper resolution of the tragedy in my mind.

[23:07]

I dispute that their need was served by letting them rap as to what a terrible history they had had. We could all do that, really, if we realized we were in prison and how we got there. I thought the day was... the afternoon was an expression of naivete and sentimentality on our part. And I was... shocked. At a certain point I thought perhaps it would be possible to... Well, I'll tell you exactly what I thought. I thought it would be possible for Shlomo, and I invited him to consider the possibility, of taking a couple of words given by the speaker who was giving his history, And just by strumming the guitar to start a kind of hum, which wouldn't be an intrusion, I hoped, but rather an invitation to turn the history into a celebration which could then go on and involve us all in the story of bondage and of

[24:30]

our own debasing, which we all surely have experienced if we meditate on it a little. Shlomo appeared to be sympathetic, but he said, I'm afraid that it will be seen as an intrusion, and it will be seen as a Jew intruding on the blacks, and as we all know in ghettos, storekeepers, this is my extrapolation, Shlomo simply said it will be seen as a Jew dominating, of putting down a black. And I extrapolated from that, from my own experience, little experience in Harlem and New York, that the shopkeepers are often Jews, and that it's a rather delicate situation. And I'm sure Shlomo's sensitivity was very accurate. Having thought of that as a way of of modifying the dynamic and of bringing somehow the tragedy to some kind of a resolution, I then also gave up, which was... gave up and was simply sullen and angry, which was giving in to the demonic in myself.

[25:47]

So I'm also to blame. And let me just say this much. I agree fully with what you said, John. They had the same idea. But I didn't even go so far to suggest it. But I think if anybody was naive, I can really not imagine that anybody was that naive that they didn't see that we were the ones that were in jail. Only there is even a way of dancing in jail. And that's exactly what we did. Rabbi Joseph Gelberman. I should like, if I may, to respond to Sister Sarah. A little Hasidic story came to my mind. This happened sometime in somewhere in Russia, where the custom was to just simply pick up a very important Jew and then put him in prison

[26:48]

and then call upon the Jewish community for ransom. And this great rabbi, he was assigned the job to go around all over the countryside in the communities to collect money for ransom. When he came to this particular rabbi for money in a little town in Russia, And he heard the story, he said to his colleague, I have no money. I hardly had enough to eat. I don't even know anyone who has money. Whole community was poor. But I can dance. Let me dance for you. And he did. We danced last night, yesterday afternoon.

[27:50]

We're constantly reminded to be silent. I wonder if you can respond as I did this afternoon for the second time in my life. The first time I cried as a grown-up man It was when I visited Jerusalem a few years ago, and I saw the monument to the memory of the six million. I have a great part in that, not only because I'm Jewish, my whole family's there. That's the first time I cried, and I cried this afternoon. Perhaps, I don't know how much it will help Sister Sarah and her people, but I think it will help us if we cry.

[28:54]

Miss Aliza Mandel. May I speak as the culprit or responsible for what happened? It just happened, that's one thing, one can't change it. But I think to some people I said it and others, I think they should at least know that what I said to a few, that means that I encountered four, as you said, beautiful human beings who were here just under our noses and they were ignored. And when I read in the program that there will be an unstructured program of poetry reading and music, I had the idea, and in fact I suggested, would you play something? In fact, I thought of music, not poetry, I didn't know. And they said, well, I must be in the mood, but I can do some poetry.

[30:09]

I did not know, I didn't know what they would do, but they seemed to know, and I trusted. And then what happened, happened, and I don't know, I can't say more, but one of them, voiced exactly what I felt he wanted, people to know them, to know things as they really are. And I can say with Rabbi Gelbman, I cried too. I did it yesterday and today. I think I should also say that they weren't just here as not part of the symposium. On Monday I suggested that they get their lunch with everybody else and join the groups for the small group conversation. I probably should have gone further, but I didn't. And asked them if they wanted to simply join whatever we did during the day, but I did urge them.

[31:12]

to join the luncheon conversations in small groups, which was really the opportunity we had for person-to-person exchange within our overloaded space together. I should have done something more, and I didn't. Sorry. Miss Mary Woodward I want to say something first about what's happening here right now. We would have a panel this afternoon when we talked about how one builds revolutionary community, how one has community out in the places where we come from. And instead what we're doing is we're dealing with our own community right here, which seems to be much more to the point. I feel that there was an emotional need within this group from many of the people I talked to about yesterday, midday, to be more relevant, I suppose one might say.

[32:16]

And there were things on the program today that were going to speak to that need, but it came yesterday. We've been talking about many very, very important things. We've been talking about our spiritual lives, out of which come our action. But we'd only gotten to the place as Rashi San where we could say that when we're enlightened we will go back. When we become like Jesus we will be able to go back and to love. And the need was in us to love now. And the boys' need coincided with ours. And so up there this thing happened. And unfortunately, I'm afraid, it was a using of the boys, the young men, for our emotional needs, and it was wrong, but perhaps much good will come out of it because it'll bring us to a dialogue with ourselves. Father Richard Griffin, Catholic chaplain at Harvard University.

[33:18]

I consider the events of yesterday afternoon among the most important and revelatory happenings of the week. It seems to me that we do not serve ourselves or the community well by whitewashing ourselves about what happened. I do not intend, on the other hand, to be masochistic about it. We will do no good in flaying one another about it either. But for my part, I could not dance after what occurred. It seems to me that dancing is a beautiful thing, something I love to do. I could not do it in view of the subtle manipulation that occurred yesterday, a manipulation all too common in our society, as I think Sarah Small has made eloquently clear to all of us. The reason why I think yesterday's events which made me very angry and upset, as I guess I still am. The reason why I consider them revelatory is that I think they bring out certain themes which I found altogether too lacking in this week.

[34:30]

One of the themes I think is very important, which I have not heard people speak about nearly enough, is the power of illusion. It seems to me that in the life of the Spirit, especially, that we're all so concerned with, illusion has a very great place. And it's for us religious people, especially, to beware of that. I come from the Christian tradition and I hear the gospel saying to me constantly that this illusion is one of the greatest powers at work in our lives. And those of us who think of ourselves most spiritual and most religious are those who are most caught up with illusion. And yet I have found many traces of illusion in this week and yet I've heard very little discussion of it. The second reason why I consider the events of yesterday so revelatory is that they seem to me to pose to us very important questions about the context of our spiritual life.

[35:38]

Is our spiritual life to be a luxury, something apart from the main problems of society? Or is it going to have some vital continuity with people who are poor, who are oppressed, who are suffering? By using these latter terms, I don't intend to romanticize people and their situation, but I have been in contact with great people from all around the world who seem to me the true religious and spiritual leaders of the human family. They are not people who take upon themselves any such role, but people who rather have learned from the poor and the oppressed. And so I guess in summary, I would like very much to see some emphasis upon these particular aspects of our situation. I do not want them to... with less than... I do not want them ingeniously explained away.

[36:46]

I would like us to face as a community this power of illusion in our lives. I'd like us to face up to the context of the life of the spirit that we attempt to live. I would like to see in ourselves a greater modesty in our claims. I'd like to see a spirit of greater self-criticism. I think in those ways then we might hope to reach out with a little more authenticity toward the God whom we love. Thank you very much, Dick. I think you have drawn out some very positive aspects of this, and I agree with what you said, although you probably said it better than I tried to say it. I do not agree with you on one point, and I want to bring this out, because I think It is simply drawing out one important implication that came up in every single talk throughout the symposium.

[37:57]

But while there are ways of dancing, there is dancing and dancing, I think it is an implication of everything that has been said here that There is no situation in which the spiritual man cannot dance. Now, I don't mean externally. Dancing is the expression of the spiritual life. I think that came through in what everybody said from whatever tradition it was. And I just invite us to think about it. Maybe I'm wrong. Professor Thomas Berry has a comment. I would like to say that I've thought from the beginning that we should begin where the great traditions begin. And the great traditions begin with Dukkha. a primary word in the whole of Indian tradition or the Buddhist or Hindu. A person might say the primary word in biblical religion is the fall, the catastrophe.

[39:03]

The primary situation out of which Confucianism arose in China was out of a catastrophic situation. In the catastrophic situation that existed in China where, when it comes to killing, And people killing each other in a society, it is likely that it's never been surpassed. But out of that arose the magnificent vision that the Confucian tradition produced of a human society. And when a person reads about the sense of harmony, about the responsibility of of a leader to the people and so forth, and the interrelation of family, this wonderful network of affective relationships that have been developed in China, it all developed out of a sense of catastrophe. In one of the groups that I was with this week, I mentioned the need that if we did not go into the question of the demonic and the historical convulsion in which we live, the great danger of this group was ending up in frivolity.

[40:17]

But man, I think, never does anything very profound or very lasting or does not commit himself to anything of any great consequence except he's frightened to death. And a person wonders why people go to monasteries and something like that. Well, they're frightened to death. And we had stories, we have accounts this past week of personal mention and so forth of people that do not begin to get serious about their own existence until they're down. And to mention some of the other things that this idea, I've got to get myself together. while nobody really gets himself together in a really profound way unless he has this sense of a demonic force in some manner facing him and ready to devour him. And when I propose this sense, when I propose this need for a sense of the global human tradition,

[41:26]

I'm not doing it out of a kind of a sense that we can do it or not do it or this or that. But I'm frightened. I'm frightened with the convulsion through which the world is passing. Now the religions will not really become present to each other in any profound way until they see that in the face of what is happening to the human family, is something that is destroying us all. And if we're going to build the future, it can only be built on a global scale. And now it's not to say that there's not a place for the others, but that must be a dimension. And now one of the overarching dimensions present in any effort on the part of man and any of the humanities or anything else, People have come to an impasse and what was mentioned earlier this afternoon is an indication that people are not finding or have not somehow found in the present order of things

[42:39]

what they are looking for. In fact, it's turned into a demonic situation for them, the establishment. We represent, to some extent, a part of the establishment, a part of the demonic, and so they're fleeing, that is, as establishment, and they're fleeing into many, or giving themselves to social reform. Others are feeling they must do it in the terms of these new foundations where a person goes deeply into the contemplative life in some manner, and deep into themselves, and deep into that reality that a person begins to experience there. It gets to be a feeling that even the greatest effort is not really in this type of a technological society. Actually, the culprit in this, to a large extent, is technological society itself. We can't get rid of it today unless Jacques Edouard has given us a vision in his book on technological society.

[43:44]

He's given us a terrible vision of the irreformability and the irreversibility of the whole process that we're involved in. But now, in whether that is valid or not, and whether this whole situation can be remedied for the large numbers of people, is a problem. For one of the things that I think spiritually oriented people should be able to communicate is an interpretation of evil and suffering, and really, without copping out on the need for dedication of energies to improve the situation, to be able to give to people some way of protecting themselves from destruction by the evil. And that is the primary spirituality in our times. After we do it for ourselves or have some type of a vision, the next thing must be how to go through this suffering.

[44:53]

It's one of the things about the American Indian. One of the most amazing things about the American Indian, a person might say, that almost no people in history have gone through anything quite like this. Others have suffered enormously also. But there is a certain uniqueness. There's uniqueness in all suffering and so forth, and of peoples. But you get a kind of a wonderful sense of being able to manage it. There is a terrible destruction taking place, personality disintegration, and you only need to read some of the disintegration that has taken place in the situations to which they've been subject. But somehow, when you read the overall response in so many instances, you have a noble way of coping with it. And to read some of the talks, some of the expressions that were given,

[45:56]

It represents a people faced with a type of extinction and so forth, still able to say noble words. That is the real test, a person might say, of a spirituality, of a religion, is to cope with destruction in such a way that it becomes a creative and not personality disintegrating experience. Baba Ramdas wishes to speak. The other day I mentioned the term dharma, which has much meaning in many different ways to many people. But primarily what I'm thinking about in the story of the Ramayana. Ram, who is an incarnation, is the son of a king and as such he's the perfect prince.

[47:05]

And then he marries and he is the perfect husband. And then through a set of difficult circumstances he gets banished to the jungle and he is the perfect hermit. And then his wife is stolen away and he becomes the perfect outraged husband. And in doing battle to the enemy, Ravana, he becomes the perfect warrior. And at one point he's standing at the ocean He's gone to pray to the ocean to allow him to cross to Lanka. And the ocean doesn't answer him. And he's going to get his wife back. And after some time he gets angry. And he gets a bow and arrow and he sends an arrow of fire. Or he starts to do that and the ocean starts to quake and immediately, because it's all going to get burned up, crisped by him.

[48:13]

because it didn't answer and it comes and offers all the help it can and it says after all I am the ocean and you made me this way and I'm sort of stubborn and you know difficult and I had to be sluggish in this way and that's the way I am and you know you I'll change if you want me to but that's the way you made me okay and so I went to my guru and I said look you tell me saints shouldn't get angry but here's Ram he's picking up a bow and arrow and he's shooting the ocean how do you you know what are you going to tell me about He says, well, at that moment, as the outraged husband, that was his dharma. That his dharma was a fluid dharma. It kept changing as the circumstances, his work. At each time, he brought to it his total purity and the appropriate action for that moment. And retained his consciousness through it all. But didn't get caught in, I am a priest, or I am a king, or I am a prince, so all the time he's in the jungle, he's just an embittered prince. and so on.

[49:14]

And that had a lot to say to me about what our work is in the West, because one of the things that we need, especially my relation, which is primarily with young people who have been working with drugs and are living in all these communes that Steve and France were speaking about, is the work about finding their route through, which in the spiritual route to God, which is called the Dharma. And finding a Western Dharma, if you will. Well, now we listen to Sarah Small and she's telling us about her Dharma. She's not telling us about our Dharma necessarily. And all of her emotionalism doesn't raise one ounce of guilt in me. I can see guilt and I can see shame and I can see horror and I can see much inhumanity everywhere I look. And I can feel absolutely overwhelming compassion. But I have reflected long after I have been cuddled so long with so much emotional appeal to better the plight of mankind.

[50:27]

When I look and say, how did the plight of mankind get to be that way? We can talk about devil or sin or all. Or the fall or however we want. Or why is it the way it is? I'd say, well, it has to do with human consciousness or awareness. or who man thinks he is or who he thinks everybody else is. And I have begun to see that my work on myself, my dealing with evil, as I see them in the world, is my change in my own consciousness first, so that I don't reinforce it in a very interesting way. I was involved in the Haight-Ashbury scene out in California for a long time. And I saw the hippies create the police and the police create the hippies. All the good guys were creating the bad guys, and the other guys thought they were the good guys, and they were creating the bad guys, and everybody kept saying, there's more of them, we got to have more of us, and more of us, we got to have more of them. And I saw that attachment to any side of a polarity creates the other.

[51:29]

And that I think for many of us, we are caught in the dilemma often of the position that it is premature to act, and yet we must act. Because we'd all like to wait till we're realized beings, till we're fully conscious beings, and there is no action, so there's no new karma created by any act. But we aren't in that position to do it, and we have to serve. But whether or not I spend my time in a monastery, increasing my consciousness, or in the Boston State House, helping the blacks, is which part of Christ's body I represent. And as the Gita says, to do another's dharma is adharmic. It's against the dharma. You have to find your own place and do it. Even though your own place may not be the one out on the front of the battle line. And it seems to me that what is gathered here together is a group of beings.

[52:32]

And I would say, yes, it is an elitist thing. You're absolutely right. Consciousness, awakening in any lifetime, in the terms of total number of incarnations, actually is a very minor percentage. And there are two kinds of suffering you deal with. One is your own suffering, and the other is somebody else's suffering. My suffering I love. I'm the Christian monk who says, God, God, give me more pain. Not because I'm a masochist, because I realize suffering shows me where I'm not and that helps me get free of where I'm not and get on with my work. So if somebody gets me like, this week I've gotten very angry at many people, wow, good, you got me angry, thank you. Thank you for awakening me to where I'm not. That's my suffering, I love it. because I'm working with suffering. For someone else who is in this incarnation and thinks the goal is pleasure, my job is to relieve their suffering.

[53:34]

But I've got to relieve their suffering. This is a critical point. I must relieve their suffering in a way that does not increase the illusion. And that is the thing that if I give somebody a piece of bread and I think I am the giver, I have given them poison. And that's the predicament with America and its relations to most of the underdeveloped countries in the world. They've been giving poison. And the Gita, the Patanjali Sutras, no giving and receiving. Meaning you have to be in a place, no giving, no receiving. You need the bread, you use it. I need the bread, I use it. It's our bread. It's all God's bread. Who needs it? So it's a very delicate issue. Suffering and evil, all the impurities in yourself, great. They show you where you're not, you get on. It's the fire that burns. It's the fire we all, us as a group, we need. We need. It awakens us. For someone who says, look, I don't want to become conscious. I don't want to come to God. I just want to have a good life.

[54:36]

And it hurts because I'm a black person. I've been persecuted. Then you help relieve their suffering. But watch out how you do it. Do it as an exercise of consciousness on yourself. Because if you're doing it out of a romantic sense of doing good or being a do-gooder, watch it because the hippies are creating the police and the police is creating the hippies. And good creates evil just as sure as shooting, because polarities exist. James Forrest has a word. I agree with most of what you just said. I agree. But I have a worry. That's why I put my hand up. I see a kind of antiphonal irony. I see many people with no interest in, quote, religion, end quote, though it has treasures to offer that are rich beyond imagery, because

[55:41]

they don't perceive it as being responsive to the more gross forms of human suffering. In fact, they see it at the institutional level as being an accomplice to the causes of their suffering and sometimes even an architect of their suffering. And then I see this reaction to that, where we are bitter about that and we will not be party to that hypocrisy, quote-unquote, and so we create Haight-Ashbury or some, quote, peace movement, end quote, or some other kind of struggle movement. I won't put that in quotes because that's an accurate way of putting it. It sort of describes the problem where we become the peculiar echoes of that other thing, that evil.

[56:54]

I think I understand what you're saying. Now my problem is that besides this The very simple problem in this simple malady of religious establishments that I've described and which I think most of us recognize, there is, I think, a more subtle problem. That is, I have an insight that everybody is in prison. Everybody is poor. Everybody is suffering. And I don't search deeply enough into that truth to understand that I also am not in prison and somebody is. I also live comfortably and somebody else doesn't. I'm not able to bring together the insight that I am in prison and I'm not in prison and affirm both. This leaves me with a very I think lethal problem of spirituality.

[58:03]

By announcing to the world that I am in prison too, I am poor also, etc. I am saying often to myself and in any event very frequently to other people, You don't have to be responsive to these, to imprisonment because you're imprisoned. You don't have to be responsive to malnutrition because we're all suffering from malnutrition. I see this in the church very much and I even worry that it's here, that we have become too subtle for reality. We've become too sophisticated. to weep. I have no answers. I don't know what to do. All I, as I said before, all I keep hoping for is the whale to find me and take me to the right beach and have the energy left to crawl over the whale's tongue toward the light. But I really, really hope that we can be very deeply conscious both of the fact that we're all in prison and that very few of us are in prison here.

[59:15]

Both are true. I would just add to that one thing about the Dharma. The Dharma concept has been very liberating for me as a Christian. I rejoiced in discovering that old book, The Dharma Bums, and it led me on to read about the Dharma quite a lot. And I was very happy with the story of how one person went through so many phases of Dharma that you told. I was very interested in that. The question, it comes up, and perhaps I should leave it mostly as a question. I have some ideas about it, is how do I find out when my Dharma is changing? Or how do I find out what my Dharma is if I don't think I've found it yet? If I feel that I'm in Adharma? And here I think the answer is one of the words for it is prayer. Which is, it seems to me, confessing the appetite for direct exposure to reality. Please, help me tear down the walls. Help me

[60:17]

Scratch off the calluses, anything. That's what I think prayer is about. I want to be in communion. I want to experience reality. I'm tired of being dead. And when that happens, when that really happens, when we really are blown, how do you say, chauffeur? The horn? The horn that is heard is the one that is blown by the man who most wants to be heard. When we pray like that, we don't need anybody. We don't need Jim Forrest, or Daniel Berrigan, or Thomas Merton, or Thich Nhat Hanh, or Brother David, or anybody to say how to make peace, how to deal with Roxbury, where Sarah lives, or any of those questions. We don't need any answers. All we need to do is to pray. Then we will know what our Dharma is and how our Dharma touches that reality well. It will touch it beautifully. Professor Bruce Long of Cornell University. I can put my question in the briefest way to Baba Ramdas.

[61:23]

There's one part of the Rama story which he failed or forgot to mention that is very central to the notion of dharma in the Ramayana and that is the last major section of Rama's life when having regained his wife Sita from the demons and bringing her back to India, Bharata Varsha, he kicks her out of the house because she has not been able to prove sufficiently that she remained pure while in Ceylon in the hands of the demonic forces. Even though she argues and plaintively cries out that she did remain pure, Rama kicks her out. This, I take it, is also a dormant moment. Would you care to or dare to comment on this?

[62:33]

What can I answer in this culture about that culture in that day at that moment? Because that was a culture where the caste system was the most conscious system imaginable and where And in a way, Ram was, in some sense, representing the consciousness of everybody in that society. And the people in that community that were not happy with the test, that she had indeed passed the test, were part of his consciousness. And he was, at that point, the king. and his primary commitment, you may dispute whether a king has a more primary commitment to his kingness than to his wifeness, but in that day and age, at that time, under those conditions, that was his dharmic role, was to be king, and the king was God made manifest as king, and it had a certain responsibility to many, many people, and in that sense, his wife It wasn't that he killed his wife, he merely couldn't live with her any longer because his people were not satisfied.

[63:42]

And so, I may not agree, just like the caste system at that time was perfect, later on, when the spirit changed, it became a very inequitable system. But at that time, saying, was it dharmic that a person should have somebody be a janitor because he was a janitor, his father had been a janitor? Yeah, sure, it was just perfect. It was right on. Because when reincarnation was in the heads of everybody, and karma was in the heads of everybody, that was the optimum strategy to keep everybody cool. The minute the spirit was gone, it's the most horrible, inhuman thing possible. And now India, which is primarily an economically underdeveloped, poor country, and been raped by so many beings for so long, and so overpopulated, now it's got real physical plane problems, and now the caste system's really adharmic. But at that time, it was dharmic. And in the same way, this is a historical issue, I think. I think it's something along the history of the law here. Apparently, since a bit of the Ramayana,

[64:44]

I'm not going to let you off the hook quite that easily, Ram, because I take it that while there is an element of the historical and the relative, that since this is scripture in the broadest sense of the word, that it proclaims truths that are eternal. And what I was really after was What do you see as the eternal truth of Daharma with particular reference to evil, the creation of evil, and one way of dealing with evil as expressed in this act of kicking Sita out of the house? I hear the issue and I really don't feel prepared to answer it at this moment. Maybe they will or I will be willing to reflect on it and go back to my room and read my Ramayana and come and reflect with you, but I just don't feel qualified to answer that at this moment.

[65:55]

Brother Joe Florio. I would like to answer as a Christian and also as a contemplative. I am Brother Joe and belong to a kind of congregation, we are a community, religious community, like monks more or less, living in the city, working and praying, and usually sharing the life of the most poor people. You said that you don't feel any guilt feeling about the problem that you were mentioning. I think that one thing is guilt feelings and one thing is responsibility.

[67:00]

If we have poisoned the world with our gifts, Whose responsibility is this? And I'm talking of everybody, of the United States of America as well as the Vatican. See, when the Americans send gifts to the poor countries, it's written there, and I've seen it, gift of the people of the United States of America. And when the Vatican sends something, it's written gift of the holy city of the Vatican or something like that. In my tradition, and I only can speak on my tradition, this element of responsibility is the basic element of contemplation. The contemplative, first of all, and since there are Jewish people here, the prophet was the contemplative in the Old Testament, and I feel that I am Christian of the Old Testament.

[68:07]

The prophet was the one who was responsible of his people. The first prayer in the Bible is a silent one. When Noah came out of the ark and he offered everything, no words. The second one is one of Abraham's. When he intercedes for Sodom and Gomorrah, And he stands in front of God and he talks with him and he fights with God. Let me take another example, Elijah. Chapter 19, first book of Kings. He ran away from the city because they wanted to kill him and he went to the desert and he said, the only thing he could say was, let me die. I'm not better than my fathers. The generation gap is not new. And after there is a dialogue with God, God comes to him through the wind, the fire, and finally God tells him, why did you come here?

[69:21]

Go back through the same way you came here. Go back through the same desert. Basically, our contemplation starts from this point. I was a little bit surprised, David, and I can tell you as a brother and as a friend, when the first night you introduced, you opened the symposium and you talked about contemplation. I know that my tradition is not complete, fortunately. And that many things can be brought into my tradition from other traditions, the Eastern, which I don't know unfortunately. But if as a monk I would have to present what my contemplation is, I would say only this, that my contemplation is what Heschel calls the sharing of the divine pathos for man.

[70:30]

I could not say anything else, not more than that. All what my contemplation can do is to share God's love, God's concern for man. Swami Venkatesananda wishes to speak. I remember the very wise saying of the Jewish masters that God gave you two ears and one mouth, so that you listen twice as much as you speak. But then there is another Indian tradition which says that whereas the ears are always kept open, God provided 32 teeth and a couple of lips to lock the tongue in. So be careful there. That's all I know. I'm not guilty of any virtue. I don't know about evil.

[71:44]

And first of all I must make it quite clear that this has no reference at all to what is supposed to have happened yesterday because I was not there. That's the only thing I missed. So I'm not, I'm completely ignorant of what happened. And I'm not involved in that. I am also a very humble admirer of Rabbi Gelberman. And if he's asked a question, does Satan exist? He is in his American accent, you cannot possibly imitate. Possibly. Does evil walk around in some kind of, you know, hideous form? Possibly. Does God have 16 faces? Possibly. So it's possible. There again, I'm totally ignorant. Not that I'm ignorant of evil. I am ignorant of those possibilities. But let us look at this.

[72:49]

Again, you have some paper in your hands. I wish I had a blackboard here. This much I know that I cannot live unless I turn away from evil. Will you write the words, please? I cannot live unless I turn away from evil. Evil, the word is at the exact opposite of the reversal of the word, live. Juggling with words? Possibly, but please, it may help us remember the truths that these words can convey to us. And then I look at this word, evil. Evil, what is this evil? so that I can run away from it. And you know these plastic letters sometimes get dislodged and they fall down and if I'm an illiterate man and I stick them back again, I may put them back and forth, the spelling is jumbled.

[73:55]

Jumbled the spelling you get the word veil. Possibly Satan is walking around somewhere, possibly this evil exists in some form, hideous form. But whatever be the form, it is a veil. Veil, veil, darkness, veil, shadow. And any attempt at establishing myself in a position and shooting this veil or the shadow will only damage the walls. because it's more expensive. I don't get rid of the evil but I've got rid of my walls. I have to put them up again. This is what has happened in history. People who have wrestled with evil after establishing themselves, I am the destroyer of evil or they have shot

[75:05]

The shadow on the wall destroyed the wall and then found, oh I need a wall, put them up again. I look at this word again, wordplay. I look at this word. I don't want this evil. How can I destroy this evil, the word evil? Take its life out. In Tamil, the vowel is called the life. of a word. If you take the vowel away, you cannot pronounce it. So what is this living vowel in this word evil, which will make it unpronounceable? I. Naturally, all evil springs from I. So long as this I is there and even in the prayer, Lord, make me.

[76:10]

No, no, no, no, not me. Because so long as the me is there, the I is there, the evil is not going to disappear from the face of this earth. Nothing in the world is going to change it. Right? That is the essential vowel in the word. I pull it down. Plastic letters, pull it down. Easy. It's very difficult to pull this I out. It's very easy to pull that plastic letter out. But then I cannot. There's no life in that word. And I go looking for another vowel which is the exact opposite of this. E, no. A, no. It stands on two legs. The other fellow stood attention. The A stands, you know. Stanities, it's no use. None of these things is of any use. There is only one other letter of the alphabet, one other vowel, which is the exact opposite of I, which doesn't stand but bends down.

[77:26]

Doesn't. Complete, complete bending down. I has a beginning and an end. The other vowel has no beginning, no end. The I dharma might change. Sometimes it stands there like this and sometimes if you knock it down, it's flat. But so that it seems to change. But this thing doesn't change. From whichever angle you look, it is the same. Perfect, total. And if you will forgive again, playing with words, This O is the heart and center of God. Simple. I'm not a theologian here. I'm a metaphysician. G-O-D is the center. If God is G-O-D, the O is the center.

[78:29]

Because that seems to be the perfect thing. I pull it out, stick it there. Love. And sure all of you have been in love and all sorts of things, but this love it is impossible to experience so long as the I is there. I cannot, cannot, cannot love the other. I cannot love the other. When the I goes I melt into you or you melt into me, love happens. That's why they say this God is love. Love is God. If there is evil, it is this I. And if there is a redemption from evil, it is not the opposite of evil. The opposite of evil is good, the opposite of good is again evil.

[79:32]

But if there is to be redemption from evil, it is total, complete, total negation or the doubling up of desire so that it turns into awe and love. This may be the last time I may face you. So on your behalf and on ours, I would like to express the gratitude of all of us to King David, and Saint John the David. All Johns have been very good. And Father Martin and the holy community here, all of you. God bless you. Up my soul in the bosom of Abraham.

[80:37]

Rock my soul in the bosom of Abraham. Rock my soul in the bosom of Abraham. Oh, rock my soul. Rock-a-bye Storm Queen, with boogers in my baby's right hand. Over on the rock and stone, before he saw my eye. I can't get close to him, it's so hard. I can't get under him, it's so hard. I can't get around him, I'm looking through the door. God, my soul, in the bosom of a king I am God, my soul, in the kingdom of heaven I am God, my soul, in the kingdom of heaven I am God, my soul, in the bosom of a king I am God, my soul, in the bosom of a king

[82:00]

We can get on this pretty small boat ride. We can get right out of here on a small boat ride. On a small boat ride. We can get right out of here on a small boat ride. We can get right out of here on a small boat ride. Can't get it by me no more, can't get it by me no more, can't get it by me no more. ♪ It is time to come together ♪ ♪ It is time to come together ♪ ♪ It is time to come together ♪

[83:43]

All the way to the land of the living. There's a place to come and play. [...] I just want to get inside and talk about the history.

[84:58]

Get inside and talk about the history. Get inside and talk about the history. I'm gonna let it shine. I'm gonna let it shine. I'm gonna let it shine. You can't stop me, I can't stop you. I can't stop you, I can't stop you. I can't stop you, I can't stop you. I'm

[86:13]

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