Hayden reports here on translations from the Aramaic, where “unripeness” was rendered, supposedly, as “evil”.
On Sunday morning the radio (BBC Radio 4) told the story, with interviews, of a woman who runs a retirement home for chickens. They’ve worked at laying eggs in battery or free-range farms, and their residual value is too low to be worth feeding any more. She offers their first-ever chance to scratch the ground for worms and beetles, and to flap their wings freely. In their new-found contentment, many start egg-laying again, but in any event they discover what life as a chicken should be, and die happy of natural causes. A sick bay nurses the wounded and diseased birds back to health. She’s the Mother Theresa and Florence Nightingale of the hen world.
One morning last week, I went early to the communal rubbish bins at the back of the flats and heard a noise. Looking inside, I saw two cute young rats checking me out with intelligent beady eyes. I went to get my camera, not so much for their cuteness but to try and persuade the Council to change the bin as I have been asking for the last three months, as it’s broken and lidless and a threat to hygiene. When I returned ready to take the picture (which, placed in the local paper, could have shamed the Council), the rats were in a more nervous mood, desperately trying to jump out of the bin. So I leaned a plank against the open bin (what Americans would call a dumpster) to provide them with a ramp. Their comfort was more important than my cunning scheme.
Though we are programmed by evolution to survive at all costs, there’s a place inside for compassion to all living things. We’re close relatives, and our species are interdependent. Setting post hoc rationalisations aside, there is something instinctive about caring for others as well as oneself.
Contrast this with the fundamentalist versions of three religions: Christian, Muslim, Jew. Their Gods help them smite their enemies. How so? They themselves are merely the mouthpiece and the agents of their Gods’ agendas, disclaiming conscience and responsibility.
So am I an atheist? No, that is another form of fundamentalism. To be an atheist is like denying the existence of pain or drunkenness. “I don’t understand, therefore the phenomenon cannot exist.” No. As a human being, I understand God as well as anyone. God is like seeing a footprint in the mud, and imagining the whole creature which made it. I clothe my imagination with the attributes I want to see in a God. Some clothe their God in less compassion than I have in my elbow.
Governments all want to look virtuous. Rama reports here on the real reasons why Calcutta wants to abolish leg-powered rickshaws, and my newspaper had a feature on Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi in Bombay, and the motivations for trying to pull it down.
Is there any justification for smiting our enemies, or letting them rot when their interests don’t coincide with ours? I don’t know. When I’m linked to every creature as one family, there is no enemy.
a wayfarer’s notes 
Hullo! Thanks immensely for your visits to Cuckoo’s Call and your comments. Thanks for the link to your article “Poetry Discovered” at http://www.ian.mulder.clara.net/discover.htm This was inspiring indeed – for me especially, since I also have a close relation to my city and its spaces, history, culture etc.bestrama
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Atheism is another kind of fundamentalism – Yes!!I hope I can meet you on my next visit to London – expected late November. Thanks for sharing your experience of that city in http://www.ian.mulder.clara.net/discover.htm. I’d like to share with you something from Lewis Mumford autobiographical writing that I put up last year on his birthday (19 October), about his seeing his city New York in a new light for the first time, at:http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/2005-October/006379.html best, rama
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Hullo! Thanks immensely for your visits to Cuckoo’s Call and your comments. Thanks for the link to your article “Poetry Discovered” at http://www.ianmulder.clara.net/discover.htm This was inspiring indeed – for me especially, since I also have a close relation to my city and its spaces, history, culture etc.bestrama
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Your discussion of ripening reminded me some years ago I had written about the concept of “paradise” in Islam – coming to fullness. The term “Falah” signifies this. Thanks for this wonderful post! best, rama
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“When I’m linked to every creature as one family, there is no enemy.” Yes, yes, yes! There is no enemy! I’d like to invite you to read my posts sharing the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh on this matter, put up in my blog on 15 July 2006. best, rama
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Atheism is another kind of fundamentalism – Yes!!I hope I can meet you on my next visit to London – expected late November. Thanks for sharing your experience of that city in http://www.ianmulder.clara.net/discover.htm. I’d like to share with you something from Lewis Mumford autobiographical writing that I put up last year on his birthday (19 October), about his seeing his city New York in a new light for the first time, at:http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/2005-October/006379.html best, rama
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Hi, thanks for your comment on “Gurus”, which I agree with entirely! By and large, gurus pander to some lowly instincts and motivations of their followers, the whole “groupie-ism” is revolting! But people are entitled to do as they please, and learn from it. The quote you have put on your mast-head, about forgetting about truth but ceasing to express opinions – is also something I have learnt to follow! Lord Buddha found his enlightenment by himself. Our gurus can also be those now absent from earth. But there are also anonymous, humble teachers and preceptors. rama
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Thanks for all these comments, Rama! I’ve just followed up your link on Lewis Mumford. Don’t know him at all though the name is so familiar. Now I’ll be looking out for him!
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ah, to be in london. i am so far away in the colonies and missing my birthplace in reading a lifetime ago…….ripening. the developers are bulldozing the corn fields here to build houses, but yesterday while riding my bike i heard a familiar sound from the past. the sound of the wind in whispering through the tall corn. there are still small areas within our suburban sprawl that have corn fields and the sound transported me. yves, thanks for dropping by at hypgnosys and challenging my thoughts.cheers, alistair.
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ah, to be in london. i am so far away in the colonies and missing my birthplace in reading a lifetime ago…….ripening. the developers are bulldozing the corn fields here to build houses, but yesterday while riding my bike i heard a familiar sound from the past. the sound of the wind in whispering through the tall corn. there are still small areas within our suburban sprawl that have corn fields and the sound transported me. yves, thanks for dropping by at hypgnosys and challenging my thoughts.cheers, alistair.
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I’m trying to drop by again and challenge more thoughts but this pesky Blogger is on some kind of go-slow.