Dear Sir,
Many thanks to Fintan O’Toole for his
comments on the effects of terror and the redeeming force of compassion quoting
Aristotle on the emotions of terror and pity as our response to tragedy, both
on the stage and in life.
We can only address the ‘below
thought’, dysfunctional level of consciousness which precipitates violence with
the ‘above thought’ consciousness of unconditional love - even for the killers.
Many readers will initially baulk at the very notion of this, or even the
advice that you should ‘love your enemy’ or ‘love your neighbour as yourself’,
which evidently means not necessarily because you love yourself – and so you
should! - but because you are your neighbour, you are your enemy.
Allow me to take the liberty to coin
the word (orthographically, at least; it’s a noun and a verb!) lOve. In ancient
Greek, the word for spiritual love was agape; they had other words for
the other kinds of love.
But all love is spiritual, otherwise
it is not love. (Falling in and out of love makes no sense.) This is the lOve
which is all-embracing, without the sentiment or even the need that is attached
to the ordinary word love, as in romantic love or love within a family or love
for a friend or one’s pet or one’s country. This lOve, this ‘unity
consciousness’, embraces compassion and joy.
When we experience the terror and pity
the victims, we express ourselves as evolved human beings, as Fintan suggests.
And so, mercifully, we do. But our feelings do not necessarily preclude
judgment or a sense of moral superiority. Our pity is still one step removed if
we do not experience lOve.
The terror the killers perpetrate and
the terror in our response that they crave, is the experience of separation.
Why do they do this? Because they experience separation, the absence of
lOve, and want us, in turn, to experience the bitter taste of separation. We
deny them this by responding with lOve and not with terror.
When we experience lOve, we are not
alone and separate.
We are the terrorists. We are the
victims.
Sincerely,
Gregory Rosenstock
Thalassa
Seapoint Rd
Bray
Co Wicklow
012829723
You
can be a leaf in the wind or
The
leaf and the wind – it’s your call…
