A planetary moment of reckoning

When I was asked this morning if I could work on creating a dialogue space around the Israel-Palestine situation at the moment, my mind harked back to a dialogue a few years ago. Needless to say, the last few days have been filled with prayer, for friends on both sides, and for life in all its forms. In the dialogue a few years ago, when things heated up and some participants were on the verge of physical violence, an Israeli teacher quietly began sharing her story. She was widowed a few years ago, when her husband died of a sudden stroke. They decided to donate his organs, and several of them were received by different people. She did not want to know who the recipients were; she was simply grateful that even in death, her husband gave lives to others. Only, she was curious about who received his heart, a heart that had loved her for 20 years. She was told, it went to a Palestinian man. She went on to say, that in that moment, they were no longer the ‘other’. How could she despise a community where her husband’s heart lived?

For all the notions of division that our minds create, our bodies do not know. Much as our minds try to weaponise our bodies to play identity politics — the body only recognises our unified identity as a species. It leads the way out of divisiveness.

We seem to hold a rather fantastic archetype (collective belief or idea, in simple terms) of peace in our collective consciousness, that causes us to lash out in anger when the reality does not match up. This fantasy of peace seems to be of having no conflicting opinions or choices, of idyllic lands, of ease and predictability, of serene meditative faces, of linear growth on all fronts. While this is a great aspiration to have and strive towards, it is important to note that we have never had such a period in history. We have had times of relative prosperity, but conflict has always existed in one form or another, either with other human beings, or with other species on the planet.

A war-torn world such as it is right now, offers us an opportunity to shift this archetype, and re-form our relationship with both peace, and conflict. Historically, archetypes have shifted in one of two ways: violently, or through massive cultural reform through arts, public discourse, etc. For example, the archetype of war itself shifted after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki: the collective idea of war we had till then was no more, and therefore, after World War II, we attempted to exercise restraint because the newer idea of war was rather nerve-racking. On the other hand, the Renaissance is an example of a shift of the civilisational archetype, but through means including art, political systems, science, literature, etc.

Even as we have much to cope with, being alive at this time makes us responsible to work to shift the archetypes that no longer serve us. What would it be like, to relate to peace differently? Could peace be about accepting conflict as an essential and enabling process of life? What would it be like, to relate to conflict differently? Could we befriend it and sublimate it into nurturing forms of expression, as they did in the Renaissance?

We are war-ravaged because we choose to hold on to a certain relationship with conflict and its expression. We have an opportunity to participate differently. Here are some requests:

• If you feel an urge to form an opinion or take sides, please ask yourself, who/what does that opinion truly serve? Sometimes we form opinions by force of habit, and we do not need to berate ourselves for it. We are, however, responsible for the choice of sharing it.
• If your idea of justice involves the death or loss of dignity of another, please ask yourself, what are you setting in motion? What cyclical consequences will your future generations have to face?
• If your concerns at this time revolve around human beings and human systems, please ask yourself, what kind of lives will we be left with, if we destroy other species and planetary resources in the process?

The next few months are pivotal for life on this planet. How we participate will determine the outcomes. What kind of an ancestor are you willing to be, for those that are to come?

#RukminiIyer #peacebuilding #Israel #Palestine