One of the most alarming things about the present US-Israel versus Iran war is that
there is absolutely no authoritative moral voice in our world that can persuade the
powerful war mongers to end this totally unnecessary battle. It has unveiled the utter
moral and spiritual emptiness of our world in the face of terrible human suffering and
threat to all life on earth.
In the Second World War when Allied Powers including USA, Soviet Union, China,
Britain and others fought the Axis powers, mainly the expansionist Nazi regime of Adolf
Hitler, there was among other things a strong moral concern about the rise of Nazi
ideology and the demonic way in which the Nazis destroyed six million human lives
mostly of Jewish stock. The western powers learned a great moral lesson from two
world wars and genuinely aspired for global peace. They inscribed at the newly formed
UN headquarters in New York the celebrated biblical verse from the book of prophet
Isaiah: “They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning
hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war
anymore” (2:4).
What is happening now with the strange mixing up of aggressively confrontational and
deceptively peace-fostering rhetoric of the leaders is something that no human observer
with even a modicum of wisdom and knowledge of history can understand. If a
militarily powerful “democratic” nation’s policy is simply what its supreme leader feels
when he wakes up every morning, then there is no more international law and no more
hope for a just and peaceful world order. This style of policy making may become trendy
and a role model for other power lusty leaders. Where are the people who elected and
enthroned them? The common people simply suffer without voice and without any
trustworthy resort to turn to. The United Nations Organization created by peace loving
leaders of the nations to rescue the world from a chaotic and death-dealing situation has
been rendered totally impotent. All sober voices about the moral fabric of a just world
order are being ridiculed or brutally crushed by those who want to make their own
country, rather themselves, great again, whatever happens to humanity at large.
Hannah Arendt, the political philosopher, introduced the phrase “banality of evil” in her
1963 book on the trial of Eichmann, the notorious Nazi criminal. She argued that very
ordinary human beings could become deadly instruments of evil when they do not
question the moral ground of what they blindly do in the name of obedience to higher
authority, devotion to duty and ideological insensitivity to real human agony. Something
of this sort of criminal insensitivity is pervading the contemporary political culture.
In English and other languages, we have the expression ‘to give one’s word’. It implies
that the word of a responsible human being is a firm and hopeful promise to be kept
against all odds. But now it is rendered totally meaningless. When presidents and prime
ministers, religious supremos and spiritual leaders unabashedly break that ancient
human moral principle nothing is left in our world for people to trust and hope for an
order of peace and justice. These leaders without any prick of conscience implement the
massacre of innocent children, the bombing of refugee camps, hospices and hospitals
and the eliminating of all that human beings painfully built up in the name of
civilisation.
Some of us remember participating in anti-nuclear campaigns and gatherings in the
1970s and 80s with the projected goal of achieving world peace. Our wise mentors in
such events used to say that a major risk of nuclear weapons was that they could be
mishandled by unscrupulous and insane political rulers with terrible consequences for
humanity at a global level.
We have now begun to experience that tragedy even with our sophisticated non-nuclear
weapons. We should suspect by all means that some of these decision makers who
unleashed the devilish war on humanity are to a very serious degree mentally deranged.
What do we then do with such power-wielding leaders who are not only unable to
function and govern with sobriety and good sense, but also indulge in crazy acts of
decision making that spell disaster on large chunks of humanity?
Incidentally one may remember that in the Christian canonical tradition, there are rules
regarding the possible removal of patriarchs and other high-ranking clerics if they fall
into a condition of insanity, or as they put it in Latin canons “Non compos mentis “, not of
sound mind. In the Eastern Christian tradition when they are elected and ordained to
high offices the believers have to approve it by publicly shouting Axios, he is worthy. It
implies that in case those elected misbehave and misuse their office and violate the
People’s trust in future, the same people can shout Anaxios, he is unworthy and remove
them from office. Such is the People’s power.
In the present war situation and in similar circumstances the suffering people who had
elected and enthroned their political leaders should be able to declare them insane and
so unworthy of governing. The question is whether the present democratic system has
any effective mechanism to remove them from office once they are elected with a
considerable parliamentary majority.
We may also raise the question if vengeance is a virtue. Looking at the Hebrew
Scriptures, we see that under certain conditions the following instruction is given by the
Torah or the Law of Moses: “But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye
for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound,
bruise for bruise” (Book of Exodus 21:23–25). This is sometimes called the Law of
Talion, the law of retaliatory and reciprocal justice. Some religious-cultural traditions in
our contemporary world literally follow this ancient notion of justice. What many in the
Western world, and following them in other places, label as terrorism could be a
phenomenon that probably assumes this law of vengeance as a foothold to restore
justice. In that case, no counter terrorist initiative is likely to succeed eventually, but can
simply sow the seeds of further violence and vendetta for many generations to come.
Jesus, a Jew, corrected and radically reinterpreted his own legacy of Torah, the Law of
Moses, and replaced it for a completely new order of human life and society: “You have
heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an
evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also”
(Matthew 5: 38-39).
We should be very clear that in our modern situation of advanced technology,
sophisticated weaponry and digital environment there is no winning or losing a battle in
the literal sense. That belongs to an old paradigm. Now, the vengeance that is created
between nations and between religions and ideologies can erupt in innumerable ways
of massive violence. This century and the previous one have witnessed this fact. We call
it terrorism, and governments are spending enormous money and energy to set up
counter terrorist strategy and structures. But given the subtle nature of advanced cyber
technology and the understanding of vengeance as retaliatory justice, no government
will be able to counter act effectively calculated massive violence in unsuspecting spots
in the air, land and sea at a global level.
Our vision, therefore, of a peaceful human society devoid of idealised vengeance and
furious vendetta turns out to be an impossible dream. Governments may consider it a
great technological advancement that some stealth planes, drones, and ballistic missiles
are not piloted by human beings. But the irony is that they fall on real human beings,
calculated to annihilate life, and all fruits of human civilisation so far.
Jesus radically challenged the Jewish scriptural concept of retaliatory justice, and asked
us to turn the other cheek, and forgive one’s enemies. Some western Christian
theologians would consider it an impossible ideal of the kingdom of God. But in our
times, Mahatma Gandhi a Sanatan Hindu brought it alive in actual effective practice in
India’s independence struggle for freedom from the British colonial power. He
combined it with the ancient Indian Jain and Buddhist tradition of Ahimsa, non-violence.
It is, therefore, good to remember that violence of any kind breeds violence of all kinds,
now and for ages to come. Aware of the chain reaction of violence that could be
engendered by his own religion’s imperative on retaliation, Jesus gave such staggering
dimensions to the principle of forgiveness. It’s not simply seven times but seven into
seventy times and more that we need to forgive. He literally practised it on the cross
while being crucified by his enemies. Only forgiveness restores the world order created
by God and as gifted to us.
As a species we call ourselves Homo Sapiens, that is, wise humans. (Sapientia in Latin is
wisdom, discernment and right judgment). If we do not pay heed to this principle of
forgiveness and reconciliation as the decisive key to the survival of life on earth, we will
end up annihilating all life on this planet. If we stubbornly insist on a deliberate policy of
bringing about such a tragic eventuality, we better call our race Homo Insipiens, that is,
unwise or foolish human!
Still there may be some good news for people who wish to be more sanguine. Our
present species is only one of the innumerably possible Homo species existing in one of
the innumerably possible universes. The Creator can wisely deal with it if it is needed to
create a much wiser Homo species than our own foolish species.
