Perhaps there has never been any time in history when terror, horror, cruelty and brutal suffering, much of it inflicted by men themselves, have set their curse upon so many lands. The unimaginable crimes unleashed during the second great World War probably exceeded in depth and extent of horror anything before or since in human history. That was a time of universally declared war when peace and compassion and the common decencies of humanity were not expected to exist.
Now there is no declared war in the world. Yet the cruel civil wars, the religious conflicts, the deadly internecine rivalries seem to be multiplying without end. Parts of the world are sinking into undying enmity, never-ending agonies and merciless hatreds. The ferocity of the Islamic State captures the headlines but, in terms of numbers brutalized, raped, tortured, slaughtered or sent fleeing in despair, the deeds of those black-flagged, blood-soaked fanatics are minor compared with what is accumulating in a score of other scenes of horror. What more can the devil find to do when all that is diabolical is already being done. An incredible half of the population of Syria has been displaced and one hides from the thought of what that means in daily human suffering – especially the innocent suffering of children. They, the children, are the greatest victims of these horrors. Which of us can bear to watch without flinching as their haunting images of hurt and misery flash on our TV screens? There was an image of a little Syrian boy smiling uncomprehendingly before he died just before his father was united with him in a makeshift hospital… words fail.
There is a poem by the Polish poet Aleksander Wat which I cannot get out of my head. The title is ‘From Persian Parables.’
By great, swift waters
on a stony bank
a human skull lay shouting
Allah la ilah
And in that shout such horror
and such supplication
so great was its despair
that I asked the helmsman:
What is there left to cry for?
Why is it still afraid?
What divine judgement could
strike it again?
Suddenly a rising wave
took hold of the skull
and tossing it about
smashed it against the bank.
Nothing is ever over
– the helmsman’s voice was
hollow –
and there is no bottom to evil.
I cannot get the lines out of my head since I read it. The simple fact of what is happening in the world is contained in that last despairing line. Within that reality let us somehow cling
to each other as far as we can as brothers and sisters.
