RING OUT 2020

 

RING OUT 2020

The year 2020 was not the one which deserves to be thanked for having come, but it does deserve a quick farewell with the REQUEST not to cast its ugly shadows on any future year of our beautiful  planet.

The Covid-19 pandemic which emerged in almost the very beginning of the year and continued to prevail throughout the year,  disturbed almost every area of human life all over the world. It became a deadly curse, day in and day out, affecting the health and happiness of millions of people.  There was no immediate remedy to curb it except to bring a change   in the human behaviour, like masking the face, keeping  social distance, and washing hands frequently, remaining indoors and avoiding all sorts of physical gatherings.

The hope of getting rid of this harrowing affliction or even putting a strong check on  it, rested on the most intelligent medical fraternity.  Thank God they rose to the occasion and  through their fast and intensive research succeeding in producing best possible results in the form of vaccines.

Each one of us should earnestly pray to the invisible forces above  that the vaccine which comes into being turns out to be safe and effective and becomes accessible to every eligible person at a modest price.

What follows are some stanzas  of a poem written by English poet Lord Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892).  Though very old, the core message of the poem is as relevant today as it ever was. 

The title of the poem is “Ring Out, Wild Bells.”

“Ring out the old, ring in the new,/Ring happy bells, across the snow;/The year is going, let it go;/ Ring out the false, ring in the true

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,/For those that here we see no more;/Ring out the feud of rich and poor,/Ring in redress of all mankind.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,/ The faithless coldness of the times;/ Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes, /But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease,/Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;/Ring out the thousand wars of old,/ Ring in the thousand years of peace.”

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Wishing all the readers a perfectly healthy and happy New Year 2021.

                                                                                    G.R.KANWAL: 31.12.2020

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YOU ARE IMMORTAL

 

YOU ARE IMMORTAL

‘You Are Immortal’ is the assurance which we get from the  reading of the  second chapter of The Bhagavadgita, which itself is derived from the sacred Indian epic “The Mahabharata”. Originally written in Sanskrit, The Gita, known as the Divine Song, has been translated into many languages, and has been interpreted  by innumerable scholars and philosophers.  Quite aptly its text has also been named as ‘Science of Human Development”.

            The second chapter of The Gita is entitled as ‘The Book of Doctrines.” As a great Indologist Sir Edwin Arnold puts it,  the book is a discourse between Arjuna, Prince of India, and the Supreme Being under the form of Krishna.

            The discourse pertains to the battle between the armies of the Pandavas and Kauravas. The former is much smaller than the latter which consists of Arjuna’s kinsmen. Arjuna is reluctant to fight because of these kinsmen. Extremely fear-stricken, he has a dry mouth, trembling body, shaking hands, whirling mind and inauspicious omens before his eyes.

He tells Lord Krishna that he would not fight. Killing his kinsmen will be a terrible sin.

            But then he immediately seeks enlightenment from the Lord, as he is his disciple. The Lord starts by telling  him there is nothing like death.  All beings are immortal.

Translators put this part of the Lord’s speech as follows:

            The wise grieve not for those who live; and they grieve not for those who die – for life and death shall pass away.

We all have been for all time: I, and thou, and those kings of men. We all shall be for all time, we all are for ever and ever.

The spirit of our mortal body wanders on in childhood, and youth and old age. It wanders on to a new body.  Heat  and  cold, pleasure and pain, come from the world of senses. The man whose soul is one is not moved by these, because they are transient. He is worthy of life in Eternity.

The soul is imperishable, eternal and free from birth and decay. “As a man discarding worn-out clothes, takes other new ones, likewise the embodied soul, casting off worn-out bodies, enters into others which are new. 

The soul cannot be cut, nor burnt, nor wetted, nor dried. Changeless, all-pervading, unmoving, the Soul is eternal.

A verse in Katha Upanishad  gives a similar message:

When the knots of the heat are untied, and man is freed from worldly attachments, he becomes immortal.

The Antaratman (The Spirit) is lodged in the secret recesses of our hearts. It is sheathed as the reed-plant is sheathed in its blades. We should abstract it with understanding, tearing ourselves from attachments and desires and separating the pure from the gross.

The Spirit within is pure and is immortal.      

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26^th December 2020                                                                     G.R. Kanwal

REMEMBERING LORD JESUS CHRIST

 

REMEMBERING LORD JESUS CHRIST

On the eve of Christmas Day, let us see what Lord Jesus Christ said in his Sermon on the Mount:

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the poor in heart: for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

            And this is what the American clergy Francis Wayland (1796-1865) said about the Holy Bible:

            “That the truths of the Bible have the power of awakening an intense moral feeling in every human being ; that they make bad men good, and send a pulse of healthful feeling through all the domestic, civil, and social relations; that they teach men to love right, and hate wrong, and seek each other’s welfare as children of a common parent; that they teach man to aspire after conformity to a being infinite holiness, and fill him with hopes more purifying, exalted, and suited to his nature than any other book the world has ever known --- these are facts as incontrovertible as the laws of philosophy, or the demonstrations of mathematics.” 

            It is rightly claimed by many a scholar that the Holy Bible is not only great but high explosive literature.  Here are half a dozen examples  from here and there”

(i)Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. (ii) Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you. (iii) Let us crown ourselves with rosebuds before they be withered. (iv) Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth. (v) Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise. (vi) Man shall not live by bread alone.

                            MERRY CHRISTMAS 

24^TH December 2020                                                        G. R. Kanwal  

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A BISHOP’S CONCEPT OF ENTHUSIASM

 

                                                                                                                                                                A BISHOP’S CONCEPT OF ENTHUSIASM

An OUP dictionary defines enthusiasm as a strong feeling of excitement and interest in something and a desire to become involved in it. The word is, however, also used to convey  eagerness, keenness, passion, zeal, zest, whole-heartedness, devotedness, commitment, earnestness and even fanaticism.

It  is undeniable  that nothing great can be achieved in any field of life without a good deal of enthusiasm. English statesman and author Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)  thinks that every production of genius must be  the production of enthusiasm. American author and editor Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) speaking  in the same vein says   great designs are not accomplished without enthusiasm of some sort. It is the inspiration of everything great. Without it no man is to be feared, and with it none to be despised.

What follows is a short sermon by Gilbert White9 1859-1933)   a poet and Anglican Bishop of Carpentaria ). He served two Australian dioceses for 25 years. He is best known for his two immortal books ‘FIFTY-SIX SHORT SERMONS and FIFTY-TWO SHORT SRMONS:  For the Use of Lay Readers, published in London in 1922 and 1926 respectively.

What follows is an extract from his sermon on “Enthusiasm”:

The word  means literally, “in God,” that is, God-possessed. Practically it means a man so ruled and possessed by a great idea that difficulties are taken little count of, disappointment survived and hope ever renewed. It means that when a man is so possessed he finds pleasure in all that pertains to the mater in hand, he bends all to it, he is never tired of dwelling upon it, and laying it before others, and seeking out those who delight in it as he does himself.

It is this enthusiasm that we need, to counteract and cast  out that indifference which is so fatal to any  faith. Enthusiasm does not mean noise and shouting or necessarily any outward demonstration.  It is quality of the man, not an outward demeanour; a fire burning steadily in the heart, not  crackling of thorns before the eyes of men.           

There is often a dread of enthusiasm, an inclination to adopt Talleyrand’s motto, “Above all, no zeal,’ a tendency to be or ashamed of being in earnest about anything, a tendency to dabble in many but to give the whole mind to nothing. There is nothing to be proud of in this. It is as sure a sign of national decay of vitality as languor and listlessness are of bodily disease. It has been prevalent during the worst times, when, as in the final days of the Roman Empire, there were many Gallios who cared for none of these things. 

Most enthusiasms are good whether they be for Art or Science of Invention or National Reform.

Enthusiasm at least does this, it raises a man out of himself, out of the petty round of selfish interests into a higher and more unselfish atmosphere; and of all enthusiasms that for Truth and Righteousness is the highest and noblest. It alone can fully satisfy every aspiration, and fulfil the highest interest of the human heart.

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22^nd DECEMBER 2020                                                                         G. R. Kanwal

  

GOETHE’S VIEWS ON POETRY AND POLITICS

 

GOETHE’S  VIEWS ON POETRY AND POLITICS

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was born in Frankfurt, Germany, on 28^th August 1749 and passed  away in Weimar, Germany, on 22 March 1832. He was a versatile writer and his authorship extended to poetry, plays, novels, art, science, religion, philosophy and  statesmanship. He is best known for his novel The Sorrows of Young Werther and the play Faust. He occupies a prominent place in world literature.  His interest in India was quite vast and admirable. Urdu and Persian poet Dr .Sir Mohammad Iqbal considered  him and  India’s greatest Urdu poet Mirza Asad Ullah Khan Ghalib as kindred souls. Interestingly enough, Goethe called his bunch of poems as ‘Divan’ a Persian word, which instantly reminds Indian readers of Mirza Ghalib’s Urdu poetry entitled as ‘Divan-e-Ghalib’.

What follows are Goethe’s views about the unpalatable role of a poet in politics.  In a short statement on Poetry and Truth, he says “The word liberty has such a splendid sound, we could not do without it, even if it named an error.” It is a remarkable statement because poetry is enjoyed not only for its thoughts and feelings but also for the enchanting sound of its words.

The views that are reproduced  below are found in To Eckermann (1832).  They express Goethe’s outlook about a poet’s unadmirable interest in politics.

“If a poet would influence politics, he must join a party, and then he is lost as a poet: goo-bye to his free spirit and his open mind! He must pull over his eye the cap of bigotry and hatred.

The poet as a man and a citizen will love his native land, but the native land of his genius lies in the world of goodness, greatness and beauty, a country without frontiers and boundaries, ready for him to seize and shape wherever he finds it. His gaze is like the eagle’s poised far above the lands, pouncing on the hare whether it cowers in Saxony or in Prussia.

Then, what does it really mean “to love one’s country, to be a patriot”? What better could a poet do all his life than try to combat pernicious prejudice, open the narrow heart, and enlighten the spirit of his people, purifying their taste and ennobling their thought? What work for him could be more patriotic? To set him those unfitting and thankless tasks would be as bad as expecting the colonel of a regiment to entangle himself in politics and neglect his own profession.” (Courtesy: The Wisdom of Goethe by Emil Ludwig).

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16^th December 2020                                                                                       G. R. Kanwal