1 10 351 https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/279504a2a9a4a76294916fcdd033c661.pdf cf9e25466b1a4ece963c5b2c5224b4d8 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-001_A.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] [CHORUS SINGING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University In the quietness of our period of meditation, we turn our minds and focus, our thoughts to and upon the house of Israel. These are the holy days, the days which will be climaxed in the day of atonement. The moment when, at long last, all of the story of the private life and the collective activity, all of the living texture of all the days that have passed during the year are spread before the King of the universe for judgment, for inspection, for renewing, for benediction. We are mindful of the faithful and dramatic story of the Jewish community and the history of life on this planet. In ways that the mind cannot quite grasp nor the emotions fathom, there has moved in the midst and the heart of these people an awareness of a holy presence brooding over their days, urging them to feel themselves to be peculiar witnesses to his love, and his wisdom, and his omnipotence. Strange house of Israel, bearer in its body of so much anguish. Its sons and daughters through all the leaden-footed centuries having been victimized and broken by the hostility and cruelty of man. In the silence of this morning, we can hear the screams in the ghetto and smell the burning flesh in the ovens. We can hear also the voices speaking in tongues that draw forth a response from the hearts of all men. The voices of the prophets, the voice of Jesus of Nazareth. We remember Israel as we sit together in the presence of God. Be a fire in our conscience, a softness in our hearts, a courage in our actions, oh, God, that through us there shall be no hatred, no hostility passed on. But somehow, our Father, may we be so full of thy love, that the bruised reed we will not cry crush, nor the smoking flask quench. And for us, merciful God, this is enough. [MUSIC PLAYING] What is man that thou art mindful of him and the son of man that thou visiteth him? For thou has made him a little lower than the angels and has crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands. Thou has put all things under his feet. All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field, the foul of air, and the fish of the sea. And whatsoever passes through the paths of the seas, oh, Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu I like to feel that strange life beating in upon me. I like to realize forms of life utterly unlike my own. When my own life feels small and I'm oppressed with it, I like to crush together and see it in a picture in an instant, a multitude of disconnected, unlike faces of human like. Pitts Theology Library Emory University A medieval knot with its string of beads pacing the quiet orchard and looking up from the grass at his feet to the heavy fruit trees. Little Malay boys playing naked on a shining sea beach. A Hindu philosopher alone under his banyan tree thinking, thinking, thinking so that in the thought of God, he may lose himself. A troop of bacchanalians dressed in white with crowns of vine leaves dancing along the Roman streets. A martyr, on the night of his death, looking through the narrow window to the sky and feeling that already he has the wings that shall bear him up. An Epicurian discussing at a Roman bath to the nod of his disciples on the nature of happiness. A Kaffir witch doctor seeking for herbs by moonlight, while from the huts on the hillside come the sounds of dogs barking and the voices of women and children. A mother giving bread and milk to her children in little wooden basins and singing the evening song. I like to see it all. I feel it run through me. That life belongs to me. It makes my little life larger. It breaks down the walls that shut me in. I want to begin this morning by laying the foundation and taking perhaps a half a step in the direction that we shall be going for the next four or five Sundays. Disciplines of the spirit. Discipline means training. It means the reaction of an organism or the organism to the impact of the environment upon it, including the adjustment that the organism makes to this impact, including the way in which, as a result of the impact upon the living thing, certain qualities that are inherent in the life of the living thing are brought into fruition. Discipline means training. It means development. It means response to. And often, it means responsibility for something. Well, so much for discipline, which is not a particularly good word. Now, spirit. This is a good word, but more difficult. What do we mean by the spirit? The human spirit? I'm sure when I get through talking about it, you will not know if you don't know already. But I'm under obligation to lay it before you so that you at least will know what I mean when I'm saying it. Now, the body, the human body takes its energy from matter. From bread, meat, water, these things that you can touch, and feel, and handle. Now, the human body works over this stuff and extracts from it the energy that it needs to keep it going. And as it does this, the body grows and develops in accordance with something that is written in the constitution of the organism. Now, the mind takes its energy neat. It doesn't get its energy through matter. But energy in the form of motion moves across things that we call nerves to certain centers in the brain, I suppose. And these motions on these nerves make impressions. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu These impressions linger, tarry after the energy shoots over it. And as these pile up, they begin to fit, to be organized into systems of memory, and they make up for the individual, his personal history from the inside. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now, the moment that the mind, now, begins to take all of these memories that are a part of the living organism and the part that it inherited and begins to deal with them in some kind of order so that they become unique, and private, and personal, and they begin to guide the life of the organism in terms of behavior, in terms of action, in terms of responses and responsibilities. When the mind begins to act in a manner that is independent of its body boundenness, if I may put it that way, then the mind begins to take on the characteristics of spirit. Now, spirit then may be thought of, not defined as, mark my words-- spirit may be thought of as that quality of personality that causes the individual to act with authority over his environment, and to take responsibility for that action. Now, the spirit, in the sense in which I'm using it, is disciplined, is trained, is cultivated, is fashioned by many things. The first to which I will call your attention this morning is by the experience of growth. Growth. Now, growth means development. It means unfolding. It is characteristic of life. A little child's spirit develops as-- tends to develop-- as the body grows and as the mind grows. But a baby who's first in the family, as you know very well from your experience and observation, the baby is the master of the household. Everything that has been moving in an orderly manner now begins to reverse itself. You cannot behave as you did before because somebody is always sitting in judgment upon you if you don't do certain things. Now, for the baby then, you see, to desire something is to get it. Wish and fulfillment like this with no time interval between. And the baby discovers this very early. And he has ways of making himself articulate, and he does it. He knows that when he cries then-- or when she cries, rather-- that somebody is coming. Somebody is going to do something about it. Now, after a while, however, the newness begins to wear off and other responsibilities come in. The telephone rings at the wrong time, or something happens to the stove, and then the baby discovers that no thing happens when he expresses his wish. And then he tries all the little tricks. He doesn't know that they're tricks, but he tries. He experiments with what must we do now in order to keep the time interval-- this is the only point that I'm making this morning. To keep the time interval between wish and fulfillment at zero. But the time interval begins to expand due to forces over which the baby cannot exercise apparently any control. And whether the baby goes into a healthy-- and I use the word "adjusted" in quotes-- a healthy, adjusted human being depends on the degree to which the child is able to respond to the demands that he must to learn how to negotiate an expanding time interval between wish and fulfillment. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now, if the baby does not like this, then the child will not know it. If the child does not know it, the youth will not know it. If the youth does not know it, the adult will not know it. And we see them around us, don't we? Those individuals are psychologically and spiritually unprepared to deal with the expanding time interval between their private wishes and the fulfillment of those wishes. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And how do they live? How do they behave? In their [INAUDIBLE] and in the inner tortures of their spirits? Have you ever heard yourself say when you were a grade school student-- of course, you do not say it, those of you who are in college, that this teacher, for some curious reason, the teacher just doesn't like me. Now, she likes everybody else. She doesn't like me. And when you try to talk this out, then you are reminded that you do not understand. Now, very often, this is a thing that is at work. How can I keep the time interval at zero? How can I remain a baby? Now, this is an awkward way to put it, isn't it? But this is what it adds up to. Now, sometimes a man uses all the powers of his mind and creativity to make friends on a highly selective basis. Friends, which by cold calculation because of the position which they occupy in the world, all the possessions which they have, all power which is theirs. Friends that are able to become living instruments in his hands keeping the time interval close to zero between what he wants and being able to get it. This becomes a very, very searching fire that's built at the heart of a man. That makes him sometimes ambitious and courageous. Long suffering in order to get power. And what is there that is so deadly about power? It is this. That power enables a man more and more to be able to reduce the time interval between his will and the fulfillment of the thing that he wills. This is why war is so difficult to uproot in human life. Because what is the heart of the war notion? It is that the will of a nation may be brought to bear convincingly and effectively upon another nation in order that what the powerful nation wishes and the fulfillment of that wish will be close to zero in time. This is it. Now, as we learn how to negotiate the time interval, we develop something that is called patience. Patience. And I will just have time to touch it now. We learn how to wait. Sometimes, I think-- and I speak with great reverence here. Sometimes I think that perhaps the most distinguishing thing, one of the most distinguishing things between God and the human spirit is that God knows how to wait. How to sit it out and watch the slow crawling manifestation of the potential of the organism. And man does not know this. So one of the things, one of the results of the discipline of growth is to learn patience. Now, patience may be merely an escape into inactivity. It may be the result of fear, laziness, all kinds of things. Well, I'm not talking about that kind of patience. I'm talking about the patience that represents the time interval after the desire has manifested itself and the way in which the individual must assess and reassess his environment in order that he may know what the chances are for the fulfillment of his desire or his wish. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now, let me illustrate it from the baby again. I was visiting with a friend of mine and the baby began crying just a little. And we were talking and my friend and I just unconsciously began whispering. The baby stopped crying not quite, but the crying went down about like this. And it was sort of trembling there. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Because you see, the baby was sure that she had heard voices. Then we stopped and she couldn't hear them any more, so she stopped crying so much so that she could-- she was assessing the environment. And then she started up again. And she cried and cried, and it just became one of those-- you know, the horrendous cries. It was awful. And it makes you feel guilty if you don't run in and do something because you know that the baby is dying. But we didn't do anything. We just sat there. And then the baby stopped and waited. And we were sure that she was listening to see whether or not there was any movement in that room. And when she was convinced that there wasn't any sounds around, there wasn't anybody, rather, around, then she just went on doing her little baby things in contentment. Now, what the baby did, you see, was to take time to assess and reassess the environment. To see how to proceed in order to negotiate the expanding time interval. And this is the content of a certain kind of patience that is a discipline of growth. And then there is just one other kind of patience, and it is the kind that makes you sensitive to the relationship between the thing that you wish and the practical elements in the environment which must be in line with your wish if that wish is to be fulfilled. This idea of having a great desire, wish, or ambition, if you please, that requires of you a certain kind of fulfillment if you are to grow into its likeness. And as you look at the present situation, you do not see any possibility for this sort of thing. It may take 5 years, 6 years, 8 years, 10 years, and you don't know whether you can wait that long. A lot of other things must be done. It takes a certain many number of hours of work every day and you aren't sure whether you are so disposed to do this. Now, the temptation is to scale down. And please, those of you who are under 25, please listen to this carefully. The temptation is to scale down the heights of your dream or your desire. To put it down to a level that will make it fit the dimensions of your cramped little world. And if you do that, you see, then it means that wish and fulfillment now can be close to zero. And after you have it, if you pay that price, as long as you live you will despise yourself. And the very springs of your spirit will begin to decay. Thou hast made him a little lower than God and given him dominion over the things of the earth, including himself. Leave us not alone, oh, God, in the weakness of our thoughts and the dullness of our spirits. But take the broken words, the inarticulate musing of the spirit, and so fill it with thy light and thy life that its perfect work will be done. Oh, God, God, God, our Father, leave us not alone. [MUSIC PLAYING] 5 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-001_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit I, 1960 Sep 25 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-001_A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 1, 1960 September 25 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-09-25 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource This initial lecture in the Disciplines of the Spirit series is a discussion about the development of patience through the discipline of growth. Thurman describes discipline as the training, development, response to, and often responsibility for something. The spirit is disciplined, trained, cultivated, and fashioned by many things. One of these things is the experience of growth. Growth is characteristic of life and as our body continues to develop, so does our mind and spirit. In our initial stages of growth our desire to keep the interval between what we wish for and the fulfillment of that wish at zero. As we learn to negotiate the expanding time interval between wish and fulfillment, we develop patience. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard discipline growth patience spirit https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/d6de3743f21a5d77d12e9d61f647076f.pdf 87be9f7391465d64e6f6d87292c57749 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-001_B.mp3 [MUSIC - "DEAR LORD AND FATHER OF MANKIND"] Pitts Theology Library Emory University (SINGING) Dear Lord and Father of mankind, Forgive our foolish ways. Reclothe us in our rightful mind, in purer lives Thy service find, in deeper reverence, praise. Oh Sabbath rest by Galilee, oh, calm of hills above, where Jesus knelt to share with Thee the silence of eternity interpreted by love. Drop thy still dews of quietness till all our strivings cease. Take from our souls the strain and stress and let our ordered lives confess the beauty of Thy peace. And the moving of Thy Spirit in our hearts, sometimes, our Father, is more than we can take. The absence of a sense of Thy Spirit in our heart, our Father, is sometimes more than we can bear. Gather us together. Gather us together in this waiting moment, that our spirits and our minds may be so stilled that there may begin to move from the depths of us to the surface those things which Thou wouldst scrutinize and assess, but things of which in the business of the daily rounds we are scarcely aware. Make us whole, our Father, that the great struggle of conflict in our spirits may be quieted, and once more we may know, each for himself, that we are Thy children. Thou art the God of our spirit and our heart. We do not want to drift, to wander aimlessly up and down the streets of the world. We need so desperately, oh God, our Father, a sense of home in our mind, in our hearts, in our dreams, in our ambitions, in our work and our play. And we wait, we wait for Thy benediction now, our Father. [MUSIC - "GREAT GOD, THE GIVER OF ALL GIFTS"] We continue our discussion of the disciplines of the spirit, dealing further with the whole experience of growth. "It little profits that an idle king by this still hearth, among these barren crags, matched with an aged wife, I mete and dole unequal laws unto a savage race that hoard and sleep and feed and know not me. I cannot rest from travel. I will drink life to the lees. All times I have enjoyed greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those that loved me and alone, on shore and when, through scudding drifts, the rainy Hyades vext the dim sea. I am become a name for always roaming with a hungry heart, much have I seen and known-cities of men and manners, climates, councils, governments, myself not least, but honored of them all and drunk delight of battle with my peers far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met yet all experience is an arch wherethrough gleams that untravelled world whose margin fades forever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, to rust unburnished, not to shine in use as though to breathe were life! 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Life piled on life were all too little and of one to me little remains-- this is an old man talking, I forgot to say. But every hour is saved from that eternal silence, something more, a bringer of new things. And vile it were, for some three sons to store and hoard myself and this gray spirit yearning in desire to follow knowledge like a sinking star, beyond the utmost bounds of human thought. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Old age hath yet his honor and his toil. Death closes all, but something ere the end, some work of noble note may yet be done, not unbecoming men that strove with gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks. The long day wanes. The slow moon climbs. The deep moans round with many voices. Come, my friends. 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order, smite the sounding furrows. For my purpose holds to sail beyond the sunset and the baths of all the western stars until I die. It may be that the gulfs will wash us down. It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles and see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Though much is taken, much abides. And though we are not now that strength which in old days moved Earth and heaven, that which we are, we are one equal temper of heroic hearts, made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." Thus speaks Ulysses through the mind of Tennyson. It was said of the Master that he increased in wisdom and in stature. It was suggested last week that growth means change, development, it means learning how to negotiate the expanding time interval between wish and fulfillment. Today I want to pick up the threads of that aspect of our discussion and take it a little further. Growth of the body is a very demanding process, far more demanding than the tools and techniques which we have developed are able to ascertain and determine. I think one of the reasons why little children sleep so much longer than adults, and sleep with such utter enthusiasm is the fact that they are tired. They are tired, but they aren't weary, as they will be later. So much energy has gone into growing, so many subtle processes are taking place-- as a matter of fact, the little organism is laying a track on which it will run for the rest of its days. And this is a time, therefore, of innocence. [CHILD CRYING] We hear it. [LAUGHTER] This is a time, this is a time of innocence because the mind, you see, which is so new, so recent in the experience of man-- as a matter of fact, we just got our minds about 30 seconds ago in the long time span. That is the moment when the mind was able, somehow, to separate itself from all of the involvements and the complexity of the body, and look at the body and look at the world. Now this means that while the little child is growing and the mind is still wandering around 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu through all of the avenues of its organism, trying to locate everything against the future, the mind have no time to deal externally with the world. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And this is what we mean by innocence. A time when the child-- applying it at this point-- a time when the child is involved in the experience of an utter absence of any aware responsibility. And that is why our times are so terrifying, because all over the world this morning there are little children-- one year old, two years old, three years old, five years old, who are forced to grapple with the external world as if the work of their bodies had been essentially completed, and they were now released with their minds and spirits to deal externally with the world. What a future are we piling up for ourselves in the mass denial of the privilege of children to be children? Think of it. To be born, to live with this whole segment of life cut out. No chance to experience innocence. What would have happened to you if you'd never experienced innocence? Now growing in stature mean going through the period of innocence. It means that the individual should have the chance to pass while somebody else takes the responsibility. Now, when this doesn't happen, the whole timetable for the individual is thrown out of line, and the individual develops what may be regarded as an angry nervous system that expresses itself in a wide variety of detailed, anti-social attitude for which we have these strong and interesting words. Like delinquency of one kind or another. But this isn't all. Growth means the acceptance-- how to say this-- it means the acceptance of one's fact Now let me illustrate it. One of the things that always fascinates me about life as I observe it and as I experience is that its limitations seem to be built into life itself. For instance, there comes a time when your feet stopping growing. Now there's no notice about it. But it grow, your feet grow and grow and grow, and then suddenly-- or it seems suddenly, at any rate-- they stop growing. But suppose your foot didn't stop growing, wouldn't that be something? [LAUGHTER] You know, just moving around. But you see, your foot may stop growing or your body may stop growing, but in your mind you want it to keep on growing. So all the time, as you watch the fact that you have stopped, the people who are most prestige-bearing around you have kept on. And one of the disciplines through which you pass in this growing experience is to be able to deal with your physical fact, which seems somehow to be built in to the creative energy and process which is in you, but which may not be binding on the person for whom you have the greatest regard and the greatest respect. So part of the discipline of your spirit is to accept the fact that you are five feet three, and the most acceptable height in your mind is five feet eleven, and you're stuck with it. So that somewhere along the way, you see, you must learn how to accept your fact and to use this as one of the elements of the structure of meaning and dependability in your world. And you can take this and apply it in various other ways that I won't take the time to do. Growth means, also, being able to handle-- and this ties directly into the idealized Sunday. Growth means also to be able to handle change. Change. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now it is all right, perhaps, if the change is very slow, so slow that you aren't hardly aware of the change. But so often, growth means accepting radical change, being involved in a situation that involves radical change. Sometimes the radical change is so dramatic that the reason is unhinged, and somehow the whole equilibrium has to be stabilized while one's insides can wrap themselves around the new fact. Pitts Theology Library Emory University In the first parish that I had in [? Overland, ?] one Monday morning when I returned to the city-I'd been away for the weekend-- as I walked in the door my telephone was ringing. And I answered it and it was the husband of the lady in my little church who was the superintendent of the Sunday school. And he said, will you please come over to the house right away? I said, is it urgent? I've just come in. He said yes, it's more than urgent. So I walked right back out of the house and went over to their home, and he met me at the door. And he said, my wife went to bed last night in her customary health, and when she awoke this morning her whole right side was paralyzed and her mind seems to be gone. And I went upstairs, and I sat by her bed and talked. I read. It was in the days, the period in my own life when one of my constant companions was Thomas a Kempis. And I reached into my hip pocket where I carried my little Thomas a Kempis, and pulled it out and began fingering through, reading, talking, having a prayer now and then, being quiet for long stretches, reading some more, talking. The doctor came back at 1:00. I was still there doing this. He did his work and left. And then I remained for more than seven and a half hours. I sat at her bedside, holding her hand, talking, reading, praying, being quiet, reading, talking, praying, until-- it was so graphic that words cannot quite put it. It seems as if finally, her mind settled back in its socket, to use the phrase. And after that, she was able to manage this sudden rupture of her world. Now, that's very dramatic. But in one way or another, the principle is very sound and applicable to all aspects of our development. When change is mandatory, it means that there is a period, a moment or an interval when we are without moorings, when we are without the things in our world to which we are so related that we have a sense of inner stability. And we struggle to keep change from taking place because we do not want to run the risk of being without structure. How hard it is for children to become independent of their parents in the way in which I'm thinking. How hard it is for parents to release their hold on children. A friend of mine wrote a poem about this in another collection. And he described it as, back many years ago, when the great battle was the battle of evolution. Those of you who are very young do not remember any such thing, but there was a time when that was true. So he wrote a poem about it. And this is the form that the poem took. He described a prison, and in that prison there was a large cell. And in that cell were many people who had been in jail so long that they had made their peace with the fact. It was-- they had their meals, such as they were, but they came, they had no responsibility. And then he came along with a key and unlocked the door so they could get out and be free. They could not keep him from unlocking the door, but they could keep him from opening it, so all of the strong man in jail came over to the door to hold it tight so they could not get out. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now, growing in wisdom means to be able to accept the zone of treacherous quiet through which you pass as you leave one structure of dependability in quest of a new structure of dependability. The journey between these two is a journey, often, of insulation, of panic, of fear, of anxiety, because the things that have stabilized you in the past and upon which you have grown dependent are no longer present. And as you reach to find at-home-ness in a new structure, walking beside you all the way is the enemy, who constantly whispers in your ear. Suppose you are mistaken. Suppose you don't find it, then what? Discipline of the spirit means, then, that in moving from where you are to where you feel you are destined to go, you must accustom yourself to loneliness, to solitary-ness, to a sense of being deserted, until at last you're able to build or to find a new structure, a new basis of integration, a new level of awareness and significance. And if you don't do that, then you will perish. Perish. Not die, I didn't say that, but perish. And by perish, I mean simply this, that you will be unable to function as one who, in your story, your experience, your opportunity, unable to function as one who has those things should be able to function. "I'm tired of sailing my little boat far inside the harbor bar." This is what I'm talking about. "I want to go out where the big ships float, out on the deep where the great ones are. And should my frail craft prove too slight for storms that sweep those billows o'er, I'd rather go down in the stirring fight that drowse to death by the sheltered shore." Growing in [INAUDIBLE] and in stature, this is what God requires. Then what shall we do about it? Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, oh Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. [CHORAL MUSIC] (SINGING) Amen, Amen, Amen. 5 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-001_B.html" ></iframe> Internal Notes Notes for project team Edited transcript - SR, 190508 Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit II: Growth, 1960 Oct 2 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-001_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 2: Growth, 1960 October 2 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-10-02 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this second installment of Disciplines of the Spirit, Thurman builds upon the concept of growth introduced in part 1 of the series. Here Thurman describes growth as the ability to accept what is fact and to handle change, whether the change is gradual or radical. Our desire to resist change for fear of being without a familiar structure requires us to grow in wisdom as we navigate the anxiety associated with the search for stability having lost all that is familiar to us. Our ability to properly function depends on our ability to grow accustomed to the solitary nature of life as we transition from where we are to where we feel we are destined to be. This brings about a new level of awareness, significance, and ultimately wisdom. The wisdom that God requires. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard awareness change growth wisdom https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/d0904d3ba82b22bf2548571ad85e4b59.pdf 3e4c7ecd6c37b49d6a208c17551a8255 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-002_A.mp3 [CHOIR SINGING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into Heaven, Thou art there. If I make my bed in Hell, behold Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and fly to the uppermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand hold me, and Thy right hand shall steady me. If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me, the darkness hideth not from Thee, but the night shineth as the day. The darkness and the light are both alike to Thee. For Thou hast possessed my reins. Thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. How precious also are Thy thoughts unto me, O God. How great is the sum of them. If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand. When I awake, I am still with Thee. Search me, O God. And to know my heart, try me and to know my thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. [ORGAN MUSIC] We are continuing our discussion of disciplines of the spirit. And today we are considering the discipline that is involved in achieving some measure of personal stability. As preparation for our thinking, will you listen to these two selections, paying very careful attention to the last part of each one of them. The first is Matthew Arnold. "Only but this is rare. When a beloved hand is laid in ours, when jaded with rush and glare of the interminable hours, our eyes can in another's eye read clear, when our world-deafened ear is by the tones of a loved voice caressed, a bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast, and a lost pulse of feeling stirs again. The eye sinks inward and the heart lies plain. And what we mean, we say, and what we would, we know. A man becomes aware of his life's flow and hears its winding murmur. And he sees the meadows where it glides, the sun, the breeze. And there arrives a lull in the hot race, wherein he doth forever chase that flying and elusive shadow, rest. An air of coolness plays upon his face, and an unwanted calm pervades his breast, and then he thinks he knows the hills where his life rose and the sea where it goes." And then this. "The great hunger today is for a conception of human destiny, which has significance for individuals, which will give them something to work on with a sense of individual meaning that is not continually being invaded and frustrated by the fundamentally irrelevant purposes of states and armies and navies and other historical or Manifest Destiny tasks. The men we most admire and revere have and have had this sense of meaning in their lives. It was so strong for them that they created an environment in which it could be realized or effectively pursued. Their lives are not shaped by the accidents of history, although circumstances may have given what they did is outperform. In any external environment, they would have made their mark. In any external environment, they would have made their mark. Of men of the sort, we can only say that they tapped intuitive resources that do not seem available to the ordinary run of mankind. But if we say this, we ought to say something about how those resources can be made available to mere individuals. What can a man do to get such inward moral convictions and sense of destiny for himself?" 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu This is the question that I will ask you-- on which I will ask you to ponder after you leave the service. Personal stability may be defined as the experience through which an individual passes. When he thinks he has that which is of most importance to him. Pitts Theology Library Emory University But I think I have in my possession that which is most important to me. I have personal stability. Now, another definition may be personal stability is morale, private morale. And by private morale I mean belief in your own cause, whatever that cause may be. A man may be said to have personal morale when he believes in his own private enterprise. Now, personal stability is an achievement of the spirit. It rests, sometimes, upon the possession of things that are important to the individual, but the very existence of those things may be destructive to someone else. My personal stability may rest upon the degree to which I am able to render you unstable. That's what I mean. Alice Shriner has a very interesting allegory about this, an allegory about Hell. I've read it to you sometime in these years that I've been reading. She noticed when she went to Hell in this allegory that in the distance, men were digging holes, but in the holes they didn't seem to put anything. They just dug the holes and then made a little breastwork of some sort over the holes and then covered that with dirt so that the hole wouldn't be there, except in fact. And she said to God, what are they doing? And God said, they're digging holes. Why do they do this? They're digging these holes into which they think and hope that their fellows may sink. But why do they want their fellows to do this? Because God said her, these men think that they cannot rise unless their brother falls. And then she said, but God, are these men sane? And God said, oh no, they're not sane. There's no sane man in Hell. Personal stability that rests on someone else's instability. And this means, you see, something that is very searching and it is not easy to arrive at a satisfactory working solution to the problem. For instance, your personal stability as an American may rest upon the stability is dramatized in some of our utterances as the American way of life, for instance. But the American way of life in one place may be held secure in its place because its very presence guarantees the insecurity of everybody else, except those that are included in the stability itself. This is the problem with which the south is wrestling right now. To guarantee stability with stability at the same time will be so extensive in character that it includes a wider and wider area of human beings. This is why personal stability ultimately rests upon something that is more than that which is private and intimate and personal. Sometimes personal stability rests upon something that's very trivial, like money. Of course that money, money's important, but it's trivial, isn't it? I can hear someone saying if you have it, its trivial. [LAUGHTER] So I say it for you so as to bring your minds back into focus. Now if your private morale rests upon something that is trivial or something that the existence of which is in the hands of the ebb and flow of the order of things to guarantee, then the initiative over your own personal stability cannot conceivably be in your own hands, even in a limited way. I remember during the Depression, it must have been about 1932 or 1933, I was invited to Buffalo, New York. Oh, I didn't mean to say where it was. It's all right. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu [LAUGHTER] Pitts Theology Library Emory University I was invited to Buffalo, New York, by the YWCA and they asked me to spend a day holding an all-day retreat for about 200 women. These women had requested the YWCA to provide some moment, some experience for the deepening of their own sense of personal stability that they may be able to tide their husbands over the great upheaval due to the collapse of the economic structure. During that period, men were committing suicide jumping out of windows, doing all kinds of things, and there wasn't anything that could be done. Except the wives felt that if they could get their hands on a deeper level, that they could touch some kind of resource that would start a flow in them that could float the anxieties of their husbands. This would give them some basis of stability that will hold until they themselves could catch their breath. Now, sometimes the personal stability rests upon your own self-confidence. It may be that life has been hard for you, that you have had to wrest from stubborn and recalcitrant and unyielding hands just enough to hold you steady in your place that you have developed an attitude towards life which says that no one makes any awards to me. I must grab everything and hold it against all odds. I must lift myself by my own bootstraps. I dare not depend upon any context in which I'm operating. If I lose my hold on my selfconfidence, nothing else is left. And this is very difficult, isn't it, when you see circumstances moving in your direction that undermine this. I remember reading a novel many years ago about two outlaw bands that met high up in the Pyrenees in a pass between Spain and the other country. And they couldn't-- there wasn't room enough for the two outlaw bands to fight each other, so they decided that the two leaders of the outlaw bands would fight. And the rest of the outlaws became cheering sections. Now one man was rather short in stature, wiry, elastic. The other man was big and strong and had an overweening confidence in his ability to crush this little man. And the fight was on. Then the novel described something that I wish I had the power to picture it to you as I lived it, as I read it. The strong man found suddenly, apparently, or slowly, I guess that's more accurately stated, that his strength was weakening. That his right arm did not respond to the order of his mind, that his left arm just didn't do it. And all of his life, his whole sense of private morale, was contingent upon the possession of a strong body that obeyed him. And the novelist describes the panic, the slow evolving of panic in his face as he collapsed. Because the little man had a hidden dagger rapier, I believe, or whatever it's called, and he stuck him in a vital place. And as he bled slowly to death, this was happening. But he didn't know that he'd been stuck. The only thing he knew was that his self-confidence was going because his body no longer obeyed him. Now all of this means that I must stop. That we are under obligation to achieve and maintain personal stability if we would grow meaningfully into life. We are to select those bases for our stability that will be able to transcend the vicissitudes of fortune and the accidents of life. And this means that an individual stands within the web, as it were, of his life and he broods over his 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu total behavior, watching what he does as his stability, sense of personal stability, shifts from this thing to that thing. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And all the time, if he be wise and sensitive, he is assessing the grounds of his ability. Widening these grounds, pulling it back, relenting, moving ahead, juggling with his environment, externally, as it were, to find the area which even temporarily will yield to him an increasing sense of morale. But ultimately, a man discovers that the only true basis for stability has to have in it that which is so universal in character, that it does not know any age, any classification, any creed, any particular faith, any particular altar, but that which binds and holds. For itself and for all mankind. Now in my thought, this is the function of religion. And any religion that is projected on a basis that is less than that cannot possibly abide. So the prophet says, a curse on him who relies on man, who depends upon mere human aid, for he is like something desert scrub that never thrives, set in a solitary place in the steppes. But happy is he who relies on God, who has God for his confidence. For he is like a tree planted beside a stream, sending his roots down to the water, his leaves are always green, he goes on bearing fruit, when all around him is barren. And he looks out on life with quite eyes. I must find that which is big enough to absolve me from the limited narrow basis for my stability. Big enough to hold against all the tensions of my life and my age and my generation, my period in history. And if I do, then I will be able to stand anything that life can do to me. And if I'm not, if I have not found this, well then maybe that the storm will carry me down. But if I'm searching with all of my passionate endeavor, I will go down to my grave with a shout, and this is man's destiny. Walk beside us, O God. So runs my dream, but what am I, an infant crying in the night. An infant crying for the light, with no language but a cry. [CHOIR SINGING] 4 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-002_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit III: Personal Stability, 1960 Oct 9 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-002_A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 3: Personal Stability, 1960 October 9 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-10-09 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this third installment of Disciplines of the Spirit, Thurman is lecturing about personal stability. In this lecture, personal stability is defined as the experience through which an individual passes when he thinks he has that which is of most importance to him. An additional definition of personal stability used in this lecture is private morale, which is the belief in one’s cause, whatever it may be. At times personal stability rests on the instability of others which has and continues to have far-reaching consequences that are typically problematic. At times personal stability rests upon our self-confidence which can ultimately fail us if our area of self-confidence is challenged. Thus, we must find that which is big enough to absolve us from the limited narrow basis for our stability. We must find that which is big enough to hold against all the tensions of our lives, age, and generation. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard experience stability https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/026c9ba1cce0a7c5acc55a0c73f5f910.pdf 95867f1fc2edab7d780ec640350fc1c4 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-002_B.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] (SINGING) [INAUDIBLE] Pitts Theology Library Emory University We welcome the opportunity to sit together in the congregation and to sense the presence of others whose lives move in quest of the same quality of illumination and understanding as we ourselves seek. It is so comforting to be preoccupied with ourselves, our needs, and all that those needs indicate in terms of the behavior of our lives. Our own dreams, to which, in the silence, we may give wings with the hope that their stirring flight might bring to leaden feet a lighter movement, a quicker step. It is so reassuring and comforting to be preoccupied with our little world and all the things that go to make it pulse and beat and throb. We tear ourselves away from such preoccupation as we wait in the silence before God. For there are those others, far removed from us by land and sea and air, by cultures and civilizations and faiths and religions, who must be gathered in to sit beside us in the quietness. Those people who live in countries where the fever is high, where violence walks up and down the streets and is the companion of all the retreats of the human spirit. For all those who are denied food and shelter through no merit or demerit of their own but whose lives are cast in hard and barren and arid places. For those lonely watchmen on the towers of our times. The prophets who speak, and those who dare not speak. The statesmen who agonize, seeking some answer to the riddle by which their days are surrounded and their aspirations are choked and stifled. For all of those who have a broad and deep sense of responsibility for the total life, we bring them to sit beside us in the quietness. And, O, God, as we share our spirits with their spirits, gather us in by Thy love and understanding so that we shall have a new faith in life. And the great dread that hangs over us about tomorrow will be seen, penetrated, and transcended. And if, by some little grace, so great a benediction as ours, we give the quiet, muted praise of our distracted hearts, O, God, our Father. [MUSIC PLAYING] We continue our thinking together about the disciplines of the Spirit, and today, we begin with commitment and its significance. For any persons who may be interested in pursuing the basic idea on which we shall be working in this aspect of our discussion, I suggest two books to you. One is Kierkegaard's Purity of Heart, which is a classic study of this particular aspect of the religious struggle and the religious fulfillment. And the other is a play written about 25 years ago by Charles Morgan, and he calls it The Flashing Stream. This is a study of commitment from an angle that is more spiritual than religious, but very interesting. I want to read, as a background, a poem which suggests the heart of the idea. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu "All night, the fury of contending will--" get the picture. "All night, the fury of contending will raged in my head, until my bed seemed the tormented world that devils fill. With anguish mixed and hungry violence, I waited for the day with muted sense. Too dry to weep, even my terror is dumb, as if, while body wait, spirit were numb. Pitts Theology Library Emory University At last, as though I lay upon a hill above a valley, choked by envenomed form, trackless and dark, I saw a spark strike down from heaven, whence a stream was born, which flowing from the zenith to the sea, fierce and unswerving as the zeal of saints, had yet the saints' reserved tranquility. And gave to Earth its genius unconfined-- the soundless passion of a single mind." Deep within every man, there is a profound sense with reference to the meaning of life itself. Now, this sense may say to him, in terms of the way in which this sense [INAUDIBLE] the ideas in his mind, that life is finished, that life is fixed, that life is set, that it is hard, not in a moral sense, but in a constituent sense. Now, if a man, deep within himself, is convinced that is the nature of life, then, in his attitude and in his functioning, he says that there isn't anything that he can do about anything. That life is as it is, and it cannot be altered. The slang phrase that we use is, this is the way the cookie crumbles. This is a phrase we use. Now, it is fortunate if such a man be circumstanced advantageously in society, it's a wonderful thing. If he is in a position that is secure and advantageous, it is a wonderful thing for him to know, to be convinced, that this is the way it is, and nothing will change. Nothing. Nothing can change. On the other hand, if he believes that life is dynamic, if he believes that there is what may be called a fluid characteristic in life, of life, that it is moving, it is creative, is essentially unfinished, then such a man knows-- in the things that he does and the attitudes that he takes towards the order of his life or the order in which his life is cast-- that always there is, riding to the front, a sense of alternative, a sense of option. And he knows that there is always something that can be done about life. Now, if such be his position-- and in my judgment, this is the spiritual, this is the religious, this is to the most fundamentally productive attitude-- then commitment becomes the experience through which a man passes when, deep within himself, he makes a selection of values and proceeds to lift this selection of values into the dimension of the absolute. He says that with my life, I can make the choice between that for which I am willing to stand and that against which I stand. Now, this is very fundamental. And commitment means to say yes totally to that to which you have said yes with the nerve center of your consent. Now, there are many things, external things, that may create commitment in this sense artificially. During periods of national crisis, for instance, when there is a common threat, there is a sense of commitment and a sense of dynamic that is inspired by such commitment on the part of all the people involved. Let me illustrate it simply. I talked with a man who is the patriarch of the Coptic church. He had spent some 25 years as a desert monk living in a cave in some part of the Sahara. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University And he talked about how life was so hard there. Existence was so difficult that every living thing tended to relax its self-regarding instinct and envelope the other forms of life around it so that, together, they might survive. For instance, he said, for many months, my companion was a hyena. We lived together in this little hole on the side of the hill. He knew that life was hard, and I knew life was hard. And the only way that we could survive would be to get together. I found, for instance, that even the snakes in the desert and I began to have a quiet kind of communion. Now, it may be, you see, that what, as individuals, we are unable to do, unwilling to do, the externalities of our circumstances may force us to do. But commitment of this character is very limited in quality because as soon as the pressure, the external pressure that galvanizes it into place is released, then the old behavior patterns reassert themselves, or tend to reassert themselves. Now, there are certain things which work against commitment, certain things. Sometimes we say that there is some evil something that has happened to me. You may, as a friend of mine-- when he was a baby, his father dropped him, and his left leg and thigh were injured so that as he grew into boyhood and manhood, he was permanently limited to movement by a crutch, a cripple. And for a long time, any thought in his mind which had to do with the possibility of his giving himself totally to some cause or purpose or movement, the significance of which would be more important than his own life, any time he was confronted with such a possibility, he reverted to the fact that he was a cripple. Until one day, he said he stopped resisting this evil thing. He moved into it, penetrated it, and established an independence of it. He freed his inner life from the necessity to seek refuge from any surrender to anything other than his crippledness. And when you see him today, you'll remember, after seeing him and after talking to him, that he is crippled. This is what I mean. Sometimes we use other things to keep us from being willing to yield the nerve center of our consent. We say, there's nothing much to me. I'm not really very much. What I can do isn't much. What difference will it make if I do this or I do not? No one can possibly accept me and my gift, even though my surrender is absolute and the nerve center of my consent is total, and I put at the disposal of it everything that I have. What I have is nothing. Rufus Jones tells about a farmer near his home in South China, Maine, who had a commitment, a very quiet thing. But it was to take the thing that the French represent, their kind of witness in their hostels in other countries, to take this to the Middle East. He was a so-called potato farmer. Not quite illiterate, but almost. And when the first day meeting came, he stood in the midst of the little Quaker fellowship and gave testimony that this was his concern, this was his commitment. And in the silence that followed, there was complete rejection. And everybody thought, he is just a poor, almost illiterate farmer. What on Earth can he do with something as tremendous as this? He at least should be a college man, and he should have traveled the world a little. He should know something about these people and so forth and so on. He isn't even sophisticated. So the Spirit did not say yes in the meeting. So he went to the quarterly meeting. And at the quarterly meeting, the silence was dramatic and effective. Then he went to the yearly meeting. And at the yearly meeting, the same thing happened. And then he went to the five-year meeting. And at the end of that time, the silence 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu was just as it was before-- an utter rejection. And then Rufus Jones says, the man sold his farm, went to the Near East, and established it. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now, all of this adds up to one very simple thing with which I want to lay our foundation-- that this is the kind of world in which the individual who is able to bring himself to a point of consent with reference to an end which, to him, is more significant than is his particular life, such a person moves at once on the receiving end of boundless energy which becomes, at his command, that which makes of His little desire, his little energy, his little gift, a tremendous energy, a tremendous desire, a tremendous gift. Therefore, if where you sit this morning, you are saying to yourself that the tasks of life are so big and you are so little, that if you are saying that what is required is so great and what you have to give is so insignificant, if you are saying that this is the kind of world in which only a certain select persons are instruments in the hands of the living vitality, of the living energy of the living God, may I suggest to you that where are you are-- if you are able to yield the nerve center of your consent to something which, to you, as you are, is more important even than whether you live or die, then yield to it. And let the vast creativity movement of the living spirit of the living God course through you at the point of your commitment. And your strength is magnified. Your qualities become enlarged. And what you are able to do becomes not a sacrifice but a sacrament. And this, this is the basis of the Christian doctrine, which insists that the heart and the mind of man must be surrendered to the Kingdom of God. And all else flows from the absolutism of that kind of commitment. Leave us not alone, our Father, despite our sense of weakness and inadequacy, that Thy spirit may find in us nothing that blocks and hinders but all that makes it free-flowing to the end, that we may do Thy thing as our thing. This is our prayer, our Father. [MUSIC PLAYING] [CHOIR VOCALIZING] (SINGING) Amen. 4 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-002_B.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit IV: The Single Mind, 1960 Oct 16 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-002_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 4: The Single Mind, 1960 October 16 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-10-16 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this fourth lecture of Disciplines of the Spirit, Howard Thurman discusses commitment and its significance. Deep within every man, there is a profound sense regarding the meaning of life itself. Those that believe that life is dynamic and essentially unfinished tend to also be of the mindset that there are always alternatives and options to be considered. In these instances, commitment becomes the experience through which a man passes when, deep within himself, he selects values and proceeds to lift this selection of values into the dimension of the absolute. While commitment consists of offering our yes completely, there are external forces that support and hinder our commitment. When yielding our consent to a cause that is more significant than life, the little that we have becomes a tremendous force. When our commitment involves the total surrender to the Kingdom of God, our strength and qualities are magnified. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard commitment values https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/943ea7f94a61d806706e56c053d50bbe.pdf 46c3dcf618b7db32682de81a096ddcec PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-003_A.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] [CHORAL SINGING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University [INAUDIBLE] deeply distressed because there is so much that is dependent upon us as individuals carrying specific responsibilities within a world which is small, and compact, and demanding. So overwhelming is this kind of pressure upon us that we are tempted to rely on, despite all of our inadequacies, upon our own strength. Again and again, we say to ourselves, if I do not depend upon myself, if I do not depend upon that which I am able to do for myself and those for whom I am responsible, then there is no other source upon which I may be dependent. And even as we say it and as we feel it, our minds are flooded with multitudinous instances in which strength did come to us that was not of our making. A lift to our burden did come, even though it could not be measured by anything that we ourselves were doing. All around us, there are these surprises of kindly interference manifest of the grace of life and the tenderness and the mercy of God. And thus, when we sit together in the sanctuary, waiting in the great silence for the movement of the spirit of the living God in the mist, our hearts are wooed into thanksgiving and praise for so much that has come to us, transcending our merits and our demerits, so much thoughtfulness, so much reassurance, so many little ways by which our spirits have been renewed and revived. And thus so, God, even against our disposition, we offer our thanksgiving to thee. Accept it, our father, as our sacrament and as our offering to thee, totally, wholeheartedly, that after this hour has passed, we may know, each for himself, that we are thy children. And thou art are father. [MUSIC PLAYING] We are continuing our thinking together on the general theme of disciplines of the spirit. And we are picking up this morning the threads of our discussion of two weeks ago on commitment, giving particular attention to one of the strange and puzzling aspects of commitment, and one with which my own mind and spirit have wrestled for a long time. And even now, I'm not sure what it means. For somehow, at the heart of what is at work in a man, which makes him become a worshipper of his commitment rather than of that to which he is committed continues to elude me. But as a background for our thinking about it this morning, will you listen to these words by John Neihardt? "Let me live out my years in heat of blood. Let me die drunken with the dreamer's wine. Let me not see this soul-house built of mud go toppling to the dust, a vacant shrine. Let me go quickly, like a candle light snuffed out just at the heyday of its glow. Give me high noon, and let it then be night. Thus, would I go. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And grant me when I face the gristly thing, death, one haughty cry to pierce the grave perhaps. Oh, let me be a tune swept fiddle string that feels the master melody and snaps." Pitts Theology Library Emory University There seems to be, deep within the spirit of man, a nostalgia for perfection, as if there is an echo- no, no, not that-- a rumor moving through all of the corridors of a man's life that perfection is his heritage, and perfection is his goal. This is a very extraordinary thing, this nostalgia for perfection that we all have. Socrates suggested that we have it for a very interesting reason. We don't have to accept his doctrine, but it's instructive for the groundwork that we want to lay. Socrates says that the soul of man has an existence prior to his body. Don't let yourself get all confused by this. But just listen until the point. And then get the point and forget the details. These souls spend all of their time, before they get into the body, you see, in the presence of God. Naked souls in the presence of naked knowledge, naked purity, naked wholeness. This is the picture. And then the time comes for the soul to get into a body, you see, as if you were being parachuted. And as soon as the soul hits the time-space involvement, the body is ready. And all the time that the body is alive, the soul carries with it that which it had distilled from this timeless experience in the presence of God. It knows all things. Everything is open to it. Therefore, the Socratic method, bring even the slave into the midst of the academy, and ask him a series of skillful questions. And little by little, the onion will peel. And any knowledge known to man is known to any man. If you keep asking the right questions, little by little, the mind will get its hands on the secret of the soul. This notion that perfection is the heritage and the goal of man, this nostalgia for perfection-- oh, it expresses itself in a lot of little ways. I don't want to spend too much time on this aspect of it. But you don't ever do anything the way that you are sure that you are capable of doing it, do you? You know? Always the deed is being monitored, monitored by perfection. And we even dare to dream that if we could live long enough, then there would be time enough, time sufficient to iron out all the limitations, to do the perfect thing, to be the perfect thing. Therefore, the master says, be perfect. As your heavenly father is perfect, it's a reverberation of the same refrain, this nostalgia in the human spirit for perfection. Now, when a man is committed, when he brings to bear upon a single end all of the resources of his life, given their impetus and their guidance by the yielding of the nerve center of his consent, he is apt to apply his nostalgia for abstract perfection to the quality of his commitment. Now, it happens that we are not perfect. Just incidentally, we are not perfect Because we are free, more or less. And freedom means, if it is real, means the possibility of error, so that the conflict is very present in all of us-- the nostalgia for abstract perfection, the recognition, that we are ourselves are not perfect. Now, if in my commitment, if I can make my commitment sufficiently fierce, if I can make my commitment sufficiently absolute, if I can make my commitment sufficiently binding, then the integrity of my commitment becomes the way by which I fulfill the private demands of the nostalgia for abstract perfection in my life. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu So I offer the integrity of my commitment, the almightiness of my commitment. This is my perfection. And any relationship that I have with other human beings that reveals limitations, that reveals error, the closer I get to them, the more I feel threatened by them. Pitts Theology Library Emory University So, if my commitment is fierce and is as absolute as it is within my power so to make it, then all human beings who are not caught up in that same kind of commitment threaten the emotional security of my life, as I seek to fulfill the demands of my commitment. This is a terrifying thing. It makes me hard. It makes me unyielding. For if I admit the error which is characteristic of human beings, then this error involves me, for I am a human being. And if I let myself become involved in this error, then it follows that I can not be bound, then, by the intensity of my commitment. Are there many illustrations of this? Have you ever seen anyone who was so fierce in his commitment, so absolute in his commitment, who found no flaws in the integrity of his commitment, and who was an impossible human being? Just impossible. For all the time, the judgement that he passed upon others was a judgment that was derived from his sense of meeting an abstract demand for perfection. And when he applied his life to the deeds in which he was functioning, all of the reasons why he was unable to do his perfect thing was not because he was a human being, but because other human beings were not committed. And if I can get all the human beings committed, then we will all be together. It isn't my fault that the thing to which I'm committed breaks down. It's these others, these others. So if I can make them committed, then the perfection will fulfill itself. For whatever it takes to bring them under, I will do it, for the good of their souls. Hence, the inquisition not by bad men, no, but by consecrated men, men deeply convinced interiorly. But they had a moral demand placed upon them. And that was to bring you in, so that your existence would no longer be a threat to the integrity of their response to the nostalgia of abstract perfection. This throws some light on one of the most exciting human beings in our political history. And what I'm about to say now has no political overtones. Any political overtones that you get from this are irrelevant. I've often been puzzled by Woodrow Wilson, a man of fierce, fierce intensity, a man who by the sheer illumination of his whole-hearted commitment was able to stand for one staggering moment at the pivotal center of all life on the planet. He had given himself wholeheartedly to response to the nostalgia of abstract perfection. Hence became his commitment. But being a man of deep piety, from within the context in which he moved, and I speak with great-- what's the word?-- great reverence for his personality. From within the context in which he moved, he was doing this for God. It was out of his piety, this deep piety, this baptism in the insights, certain of the insights, of the Bible, the fierce kind of consecration of his life, it is out of this that he felt that he was moving. And with what result? You remember. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University In the book by McCombs, How I Made Woodrow Wilson President-- you may recall reading it when you were younger-- after McCombs, according to McCombs' story, had made it possible for Wilson to get the nomination to become governor of the state of New Jersey, which sort of eased him, sort of made the transition from Princeton, a rather awkward transition, more comfortable, and McCombs took the machinery provided by the Princeton connection, and as it were, moved it over and over and over again until it became a nationwide thing, the result was the landslide. This wasn't the only reason. There are a lot of other reasons. But the fact is that there was the landslide. And when the landslide was over, McCombs and Wilson met. And McCombs said to Wilson, I've come to talk and congratulate you. But before McCombs could get his words out, Wilson said, now, let it be understood, I was not made president by any act of man. No man could have defeated the will of God in this regard. I owe you nothing. God made me president. And then a little later, after the First World War, and there was a man in the Atlanta federal prison, Eugene Debs, who'd been there a long time. And many forces of goodwill in the country were concerned about this. We need not involve ourselves at the moment in the merits or the demerits of the case, but the issue is clear. When they appealed to Wilson, they were sure that the man who had spoken on behalf of all of the downtrodden and the people who had been under the foot of the tyrant would, out of what does God require thee but to do justly, to love mercy, give this man Debs his freedom. And Woodrow Wilson, on the grounds of the integrity of his moral commitment, could not do this. And then I came into the White House after that. A man with whom moral commitments had had no association scarcely, and whose whole life, in that most responsible office which we have, was not a very happy one, for the health of the land, Warren Harding opened the doors for Debs to walk out. Now, what does this mean? What does it mean, whatever may be your thoughts about these issues around the situation? When a man feels that the integrity of his commitment satisfies the demands of perfection, which haunts all of us, then an important eclipse takes place in his spirit. He is cut off by the very nature of such intensity from open and free access to that to which he is committed. Men do over and over, on behalf of God for God's sake, out of great moral intensity and fervor, that which violates even what they themselves experience as the living God. I make of my commitment an idol when the commitment itself becomes more important than that to which I am committed. This is all I'm trying to say. When I close the circuits then I can no longer be influenced by the vitality and the power and the dynamism of that to which I am committed. Thus, the man prayed, I thank thee, oh, God that I'm not like the rest. I am committed to thy law. I pray five times a day. I pay my tithes. I do all the things which are demanded of me out of the integrity of my commitment. I'm not even like the man with whom I must share the temple now, the tax collector. And the tax collector, oh God, God, God, Be merciful unto me, a sinner. A sinner. A sinner. The words are so weak, the wisdom so circumscribed by inadequacy, the life so full of blemishes, oh 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu god. Take the weak words, the imperfect wisdom, the sinful life, fill them with thy glory, that thy truths may not die. And for us, our father, this is enough. [MUSIC PLAYING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University (SINGING) Amen. 5 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-003_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit V: When Commitment Becomes Idolatrous, 1960 Oct 30 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-003_A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 5: When Commitment Becomes Idolatrous, 1960 October 30 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-10-30 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this fifth lecture in the Disciplines of the Spirit series, Howard Thurman discusses the propensity to idolize perfection in our commitments. When we worship our commitment rather than that which we are committed, we give up the ability to be influenced by the vitality, power, and dynamism of that to which we are committed. This is especially true of our moral commitments which, when idolized, violates our experience of the living God. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard commitment idolatry https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/f44de59b6395fd45e39492c3694cdf0a.pdf 0e310d0887929ed94a31d7debe02947c PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-003_B.mp3 [CHOIR SINGING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University Our spirits-- yea, the spirits of all men of good will are deeply troubled this day as we sit together in the quietness before God. The quietness that surrounds us is broken by the angry noises of the violent, the hard sounds from the bitter and agitated hearts that have ascended during this week that has passed in New Orleans. Our silence is broken by the mute, inarticulate bewilderment of three little girls who have no way by which in their little lives to handle so gross an expression of life. It is broken by the anguish of their mothers and their fathers. And in the quietness, we bring them here with us, sitting by our sides. And we bring the angry criers of violence with us, sit them by our side as we wait in Thy presence, oh God. We have no words to say. Even our thoughts are paralyzed. Our hope shimmers and sometimes fades in the darkness. But Thou has taught us that Thou art the God of the darkness and the light. And in the darkness, we reach for Thy sustaining hand. That strength and wisdom and hardness of mind can somehow be coupled with tenderness of heart. That Thy Spirit may walk again in the midst of Thy children. Oh God, God, God, leave us not. Leave us not, our Father. [CHOIR MUSIC PLAYING] Be not afraid because the sun goes down. It brings the sunset and the plover's cry. Before the colors of the evening drown, the stars will make new colors in the sky. Night is no enemy. She passes by and shows us silence for our own heart's good. For while we sleep, the roses multiply. The little tree grows taller in the wood. Fear not the night. The morning follows soon. Each has his task to make the earth more fair. It is by these, by midnight and by noon, that she grows riper and her orchards bare. Her fields would wither in a sun too bright. They need the darkness too. Fear not the night. The topic may be misleading for it is not quite the time and the journey that we are undertaking to examine for our enrichment together the suffering and evil as disciplines of the spirit. But I didn't know how else to find a peg to hang what I wanted to say on, so I use the subject that's indicated here, the evil and the good. I am continuing our thinking together about certain aspects of commitment. The mind and the spirit too, I suppose, are very peculiar things. There comes a moment when you're sure that the insight that has broken, and you see very clearly what it is that you must say. And even as you find yourself saying it, you know that this isn't it. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu So those of you who may have a sufficiently extensive recall and who were here when we began working on commitment-- if you think that everything that I'm saying this morning I said four weeks ago, now you may be right. But I don't think so. Something eluded me, and it has worried my spirit and my mind. So we will try again to get at this. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Commitment is a dedication. It is the offering of whatever it is that one has to something which seems to the offeror to be so supremely [? wistful ?] that all that one has to give is not enough. Now, this sort of experience for the human spirit is possible, I think, because of the nature of life and the kind of vitality that life itself represents. As I have said over and over again, that life is alive. That this is a living, breathing, pulsing existence which is ours. And that the mind and the spirit of man can brood with concentration over the stubborn and unyielding and recalcitrant stuff of life. Until at last, this stubborn, unyielding, recalcitrant stuff begins to shape itself as the objective manifestation of the thing that is held at dead center in the mind. This is the kind of world that guarantees that kind of experience. And there seems to be a mechanism or that's not-- a principle, I guess is a better word-- and that that operates almost automatically. When I meet the conditions, the energy flows. When I am able to bring myself into focus, around a single end, I find my life energized. And this seems to operate automatically. And I will hold that in mind as we pursue it, because I'll come back to it at the end. Now, commitment does certain very important things for the life. It gives structure to the life. It gives order, not order in general. You see, there is in all life-- in your life, in my life-- a certain organic order, a certain behavior pattern that our organs follow, certain organic patterns that go to make up our individual lives. I don't mean order of this kind, but order that becomes capable of putting the inherent order in the life at the disposal of a new demand. This gives structure to the life. It gives meaning. It provides the individual with a writhing sense of judgment with reference to anything that he does. The simplest thing now is defined in terms of where his life is headed. Even his ethical values, his idea of right and-- his experience, rather, of right and wrong becomes meaningful to him in the light of the bearing that the deed has on what for him is the meaning that his life has. So to state it in another way, commitment provides a basis of integrated action for the life. So that one does not have to refer externally to find out whether or not this is the bearing that I should take, or that is the bearing. But the thing that determines which way you go is the hard core of purpose around which your particular life is organized. This defines your goal. This even determines what you mean by right and wrong. This sits in judgment on how you spend your time, what is wasted time and what is not wasted time. Now, the second thing that commitment does is to inspire or to encourage-- well, inspire is a better word. It inspires a willingness to give up anything that comes between you and this central devotion. Anything that blocks the way, more and more I am under the necessity to remove it. Now, the thing that blocks the way may be a good thing in itself. It may be very useful, very wonderful. But in terms of what my life means, this thing is a deterrent. So that all the time, you 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu see, I pass a judgment upon the things in my life in times not merely of what they are in and of themselves. But what do they do to me in terms of making it possible more and more or less and less for me to make a complete and fundamental and utter surrender of all of my life to that to which I am committed. Pitts Theology Library Emory University So the master says, if your arm does this thing, cut it off. If your eye does it, pluck it out. That's very extreme language. So let us not say, well, since I know he doesn't mean that literally, so let's not waste any time on that detail. But what he does say, you see, is precisely this. That only I can tell whether or not this very precious thing that I have is slowly, quietly pulling me away. So that more and more, the meaning of my life becomes less, and less, and less, and less. It inspires a willingness to surrender, to sacrifice anything, and even under certain circumstances to sacrifice one's life. And this is the thing that finally the master faces. It is better to say yes to that imperious pull that holds in its hands the creative synthesis of all the meaning that I can garner out of living. It is better to say yes to that than to go on living, because I'm afraid to die. And there isn't anything dramatic about this. It is just the quivering response of the life of a man. Simply this and nothing more. But there's a third thing. And this is the part that may not still be clear. Commitment insists that all life, all people must be divided into two groups, the committed and the uncommitted, with nothing in between. The committed, the uncommitted. And the functional significance of the committeds is to see that more and more, the number of the uncommitted will be less and less. So an attack is made by the committed upon all whose minds have not been made up or all who are not already in the way. This is the genius of the missionary impulse. This is why you want to get as many people to think as you think about things. And if they don't think as you think, there's something that may be just a little off about what they think. Not terribly off but they'll see the light is the phrase we use. And when they see the light, what does that mean? They will see the light that I see. Now, why is this necessary for the committed? This is the thing that I think I see. Because one of the problems that the committed individual faces-- suppose I'm wrong. What if after all the discipline of my life, I have placed everything upon this altar and find that the God of the alter is dead, dead, dead, dead? How can I protect myself from self-deception? This is the heart of the problem. So a part of the meaning of trying to enlist other people in your commitment is the almost unconscious activity of the human spirit to try to guarantee itself against error in its own commitment. Now, one more little step. The commitment may be to something that is evil. It may be to something that is against life. And the searching problem is this. Does the same principle hold to the man who is committed to an undertaking that is diabolical in its fulfillment and significance that holds for the man who is dedicated and committed to 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu something that is good, and creative, and constructive? Is there any difference in the dynamics of the experience of commitment? This is the heart of the problem. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I have two suggestions to make, and I'm not-- and I'll mix the [INAUDIBLE] many minutes, if I can. The first is that in one sense the fact that that to which a person is dedicated or committed is good or evil is beside the point. Now, you may not think so. The simple, crude illustration is that if I planted healthy strawberry seeds and the soil is right, the conditions are met, growth will follow automatically. And that's wonderful, because strawberries are good to eat, and they do wonderful things to the palate. Now, if I planted poison ivy seeds that are healthy and the conditions for growth are met, the poison ivy seeds will grow. Now, the fact that poison ivy gives me a rash, and a temperature, and under certain circumstances, may even short circuit my life is beside the point. Now, there's this element at work here. But as a religious man, I am convinced, you see, that ultimately, this is the kind of universe that cannot-- that does not sustain the evil enterprise. But there was a time interval, a considerable time interval, when the evil enterprise and the good enterprise-- as far as the dynamics of the experience of commitment are concerned-- you cannot tell the difference between them. But there's something very subtle about goodness, and this I do not understand. And it is that there's something about goodness that seems to lull people into less strenuous activity. I don't quite know how to say this. But for instance, a person who is dedicated to something that's against life-- organizes, puts all of his energy at it, will not permit any defects, deflections-- if you sign up, you have it. And if you don't carry through, then you are liquidated or something like that. But there's something about goodness-- and I don't understand this. There's something about goodness that seems to give you a feeling that goodness will somehow good its way through the world-- just good its way. You don't have to have any brains. You don't have to have any resources. All you have to do is to have a good heart, and you can rent out everything else that you have. Now, the man who has been [? unevil ?] knows that he can-- he must lay a mortgage on everything that he has. There are two great majorities, those who are dead, and the great host that remains yet to be born. We are a thin minority who live. And we must carry the torch of God unanimously, because we are a thin minority. Our words are even more feeble than our thoughts. Our thoughts are weaker than our striving. You give to all of us the great, redemptive benediction of Thy Spirit as we separate one from another, our Father. [CHOIR SINGING] [CHOIR MUSIC PLAYING] 4 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-003_B.html" ></iframe> Internal Notes Notes for project team Edited transcript - GL 5/14/19 - [? wistful ?] -> wasteful in "to the offeror to be so supremely wasteful" - "I'll mix the [INAUDIBLE]" -> "I'll make them in as" - [? unevil ?] -> unevil Edited "wasteful" to "worthful" - GL 8/3 Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit VI: The Good and the Evil, 1960 Nov 20 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-003_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 6: The Good and the Evil, 1960 November 20 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-11-20 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this sixth installment of Disciplines of the Spirit, Howard Thurman talks about commitment in the framework of good and evil. Commitment is a level of dedication that gives us structure, order, and provides a basis for integrated action in life. Commitment rises against whatever comes seeks to come between self and that which self is committed to. In this lecture, Thurman poses the question of whether there is any difference in the dynamics of the experience of commitment when the commitment is to evil as well as good. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard commitment Good and Evil https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/cdfdfe96529244d072a96e0b4d0db55b.pdf a0c8395c2e08b8fcea025178a88e5330 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-004_A.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] [SINGING] [INAUDIBLE] Pitts Theology Library Emory University Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou annointest my head with oil. My cup runneth over. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou leadest me beside still waters. Thou restoreth my soul. It is very good to celebrate the goodness of God-- the obvious expressions of his goodness that sustain our lives in ways that our strength could not quite do; in ways that our minds and imaginations, even, cannot quite either comprehend or assess. It is good to celebrate the goodness of God for the obvious manifestations of sustaining grace. It is good to celebrate the goodness of God for those miraculous manifestations of an intent that is more than anything that we can quite understand. The ways by which, when we have given up hope, hope refuses to die. The times when we have exhausted all of our own efforts, and the thing which we seek has not been found, and then in ways that dazzle the mind, the thing is found. The wonderful sense that sins are forgiven, when we know there is, within the grasp of our understanding, no merit that is worthy of such a sense of relief that we have because a burden has been lifted, and the guilt that bore us down and hounded us has lost our scent. And we have escaped from its necessities. It is very good to celebrate the goodness of God, even at times when we are apt to be overcome by our own sense of evil visited upon us, even when we are most overcome by the oppressive mismanagement of the organized life around us. It is so very good to sit together in the quietness of the congregation, feeling the touch of each other's shoulder side by side, and know that each of us is surrounded by the goodness, and the tenderness, and the love of God. Oh, Sabbath rest by Galilee, oh calm of hills above, where Jesus knelt to share with thee the silence of eternity interpreted by love, drop thy still dues of quietness till all our striving cease. Take from our souls the strains and stress, and let our ordered lives confess the beauty of thy peace. [MUSIC PLAYING] [SINGING] [INAUDIBLE] When I polish the brazen pan, I hear a creature laugh afar in the gardens of a star. And from his burning presence run flaming wheels of many a sun. Whoever makes a thing more bright, he is an angel of all light. When I cleanse this earthen floor, my spirit leaps to see bright garments trailing over it, a cleanness made by me. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Purger of all men's thoughts and ways, with labor do I sound thy praise. My work is done for thee. Whoever makes a thing more bright, he is an angel of the light. Therefore, let me spread abroad the beautiful cleanness of my God. Pitts Theology Library Emory University As a background text, which I will not bring into the foreground, I don't think, let us listen to the words taken from the scripture lesson. If a man slaps you on your cheek, do take it. Do something. Turn the other one. Now, an act is an expression of the personality. It is a deed of some sort. And if I may be forgiven for using a word like this, there are psychosomatic acts. That is, in the presence, for instance, of some monstrous evil, and as I contemplate the death-defying character of this iniquity, my reaction may be in terms of protest. Not protest-- in terms of protestation, I might say, how awful. What a terrible thing. Somebody ought to do something about it. I let all of my energy be spent in outcry-- in protest of that kind, which gives me, quite certainly, a feeling that now that I have done this, I have acted. I have done something. Now, an act on my part is even a response to an action. My act is clued, as it were, by the kind of deed to which I'm responding. Or my act moves out of the center out of which I am living without regard to the kind of response that is demanded of me. This is very crucial, and I will come back to it after another preliminary statement. There is an element in all action that is irrational. That is to say, when a person acts, it means that he has finally waited as long as he can. He has exhausted all of the possibilities of pro and con. He has looked at, but on the other hand, and if I do this or the other. He has weighed and balanced the thing. He has waited until all the evidence that he can possibly wait for has come in. And then when he decides to act, he pulls down the shades and takes the leap. Now, this is why intellectuals find it so difficult to act. We are disciplined in weighing things. And when you talk with an intellectual-- and I cast no aspersions on anyone when I use a remark like that-- it's a good word. But you see, with the trained mind, we are so disciplined in weighing evidence and then weighting-- W-E-I-G-H-T-I-N-G-- evidence because we do not want to act irrationally. We do not want to act out of some sort of emotion. We want to be deliberate. Now, this is good. But you see, there is something in the mechanics of the intellectual's approach to life that tends to make him inactive and therefore ineffective because you see, if he takes a side, he may be prejudiced, you see. And if he's an intellectual, he cannot be prejudiced. He has to be open-minded, even though some minds that are open perhaps have should be closed awhile for repairs. But nevertheless, as long as we insist that the mind must be open all the time, before there's any action, then this paralyzes action because when I act, it means that in that moment, I have made a decision. I have taken a side. Have taken a stand in the light of all the data that I could wait for. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And I hope, you see, that in the light of my act, that each subsequent day will validate the action. But it may not. Here again, I made thee in error. Every act, then, has as its companion error, misjudgment a certain element that even may be false. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now all of this, I take into account when I act. And I hope, you'll see, that all of the new experience will confirm the validity of the action that I have taken in the light of my accessing of all of my experience up to date. Now, if I'm lazy as to my mind, or if I am so full of anxiety, or fear, or [INAUDIBLE], that I refrain from taking into account all of the available data in the light of which I want to make up my mind, then the chances of my error are greatly multiplied. My responsibility, therefore, is to act not only out of the best judgment that I have, but my responsibility is to act out of the center out of which I live so that with my act will go the commitment of my life. My life backs my act if my act springs out of the center out of which I live. But if my act springs out of how I react to your act, if you-- and I think this is the insight that the Master's working on here, much of which I do not understand, so I will not pretend anything. If a man is angry with you, and you react to him out of his anger exercised towards you, then it means that you may be reacting to him out of something other than your center. And the initiative over your own act is now given up into the hands of someone else. If, for instance, you and I are competitors, and the competition as we move down to the line is pretty close, as was the last election, for instance-- just so that you would know what I mean-- if I knew what I could say to you-- now, listen very carefully. If I knew what I could say to you that would make you react not out of your center but out of your anger, out of your temper, then I would know that if my center was in competition with your center, and I could make you react out of something other than your center, I could defeat you. Any person who is able to determine how you feel on the inside has in his hands your thermostat. And all he needs to do is to manipulate it and give you a temperature. And when he does, you are at his mercy. This is what the old saying means that, those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad because then they start reacting to life out of something other than the core out of which they live. Now, the discipline of act is to brood over all of the manifestations of my deeds, bringing them more and more in line with the central center and commitment of my life so that there will be, in the act, the integrity of the self. Now, when you do this-- when you do it-- it means then that you take the responsibility for your reactions to all the things that happen to you-- not only your responsibility for your actions, which you initiate, but your responsibility for your reaction to the things that are initiated in other people. And these things move towards you. And when they do, you must deal with them. And you may deal with them on their own terms, or you may deal with them in terms of the center out of which you live and move and think. Now, if I may illustrate it very simply, in the conversation that I had some 25 years ago, when I was in India-- a conversation with Mr. Gandhi-- and I asked him a very simple question at the 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu end of our talks. How did it happen that all of your activities-- on behalf of nonparticipation, so forth, on behalf of ahimsa-- why did all of these activities fail of their objective? Pitts Theology Library Emory University And his answer, briefly, was this-- that a creative idea such as ahimsa-- or non-cooperation, or nonviolence, or whatever that would we wish to use-- is dependent, as far as masses of people are concerned, upon the way in which each individual is able to react to this ethical demand. And I've found that it is getting out of hand, and so I had to demonstrate what I meant by acting out of your center. And he said, the first thing I did was to adopt into my family an untouchable. I'm a caste Hindu, he said, but I adopted into my family an untouchable girl. And I said to all caste Hindus, this is what I mean by the act that I've been talking about. And the second thing I did-- I changed the name. I redefined the character, in terms of the name, you see, of the untouchables. This is what we do during war. This is what he did. During war, we give the country against which we are fighting a different name. We give them a name that reads them out of the human race. Now once we give them such a name, then we can do anything to them we wish to without any moral violence to ourselves. This is convenient. That's why some people cannot tell you what they think of you until they lose their temper. Then, you see, they do not have moral responsibility for the act. Now, so he said, I will do just the opposite. I will call the untouchables not untouchables not sutras, but I will call them harijens. Now, harijens is a combination Hindi word which means child of God. Now he said, if I call them a child of God, then every time a caste Hindu refers to an untouchable as a child of God, if he keep this up, finally, there will be created within him the kind of moral crisis that cannot be altered until he changes his attitude towards them in keeping with this new shift, even in terminology. Now, he said, if this happens, then the first step on the road to peace in our land will be that the untouchable, in the light of the thing that he just described, would become a member of good standing in Hinduism so that no longer will the shadow of an untouchable that falls across the road on which a temple resides will contaminate it, and so forth and so on. Now, all of this is to say that the discipline of the act comes in the degree to which the individual is able to bring the judgment of his innermost center to bear upon the deed which he performed. Are you deeds out of character as far as the core out of which you live? Or are they in character? If a man slaps you on one cheek, don't take it lying down and acquiescent like some craven thing. No. Keep the initiative in your own spirit. Turn the other cheek. Do something. And in so doing, you force him to compete with your intent because you refuse to compete with his deeds. And this is the difference. It is no easy way, and I do not pretend to understand all that it means or its ramifications. But this is the commitment of the human being of good will in this year our Lord 1960. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Forgive us, our Father, for then sins which we muster and accumulate like a great shadow obscuring thy vision from our spirits. Walk beside us as we journey and as we separate one from the other. And grant unto us thy peace, for this, above all else, oh God, we need, or we perish. Pitts Theology Library Emory University [MUSIC PLAYING] 5 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-004_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit VII: The Discipline of the Act, 1960 Nov 27 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-004_A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 7: The Discipline of the Act, 1960 November 27 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-11-27 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this seventh lecture in the Discipline of the Spirit series, Thurman uses Matthew 5:39 as a framework for discipline as it relates to our decision to act. Thurman reminds listeners of the responsibility to act or react in integrity centered around core values as we are responsible for the actions we initiate as well as the reactions we initiate in other people. One must always be careful when deciding to act lest our deeds are out of character with our core beliefs. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard action choice dilemma discipline forgiveness Ghandi https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/fee4ceb17ff4a21472e529defad9b956.pdf 05a3be6f7e2f3cd2dfe248debc8fbec8 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-004_B.mp3 [ORGAN MUSIC] Pitts Theology Library Emory University [CHOIR SINGING] (SINGING) [INAUDIBLE] It is one of the very special graces of life that each of us can rely upon his own strength to do so many things for ourselves and for others. The quiet sense of assurance and independence is so strengthening to the heart and to the spirit. Sometimes our experience of self-confidence is so overwhelming that we forget the limitations by which our lives are surrounded. There are so many things of which we are heirs that are not the result of any act of our own, any wisdom which we have distilled, any kind of knowledge which has been vouchsafed to our minds. Always we are surrounded by so much more than what we are, so much more wisdom, so much more understanding, so much more knowledge, so much more caring, so much more love, so much more mercy, that as we remember this, in the quietness of this place, in the midst of the worshippers of God, we find new tongues of praise to give to thee, oh God, for thy brooding care, beyond which, despite arrogance and pride and independence and self-confidence, we cannot drift. Gather then unto thyself, oh God, these spirits of ours, that they may come to themselves in thee. And this, this will suffice. This will suffice even us, oh God, God of our spirit. [ORGAN MUSIC] I'm reading a contemporary poem as a picture of feeling tone that I would like to have you sense, as we think together about two implications from this, the what is perhaps the greatest poem of the 19th century, Goethe's Faust. A sparrow who lived in the eaves of a church, and whose ideas were somewhat erratic, met a pigeon one day from a church o'er the way whose opinions were very dogmatic. They stopped in their search for a mid-day repast, and in hunting they both were astute. And I hate to relate they engaged in debate that led to a frightful dispute. Quoth the pigeon, I hold the theological views considered both learned and wise, so without more delay, I will show you today the only straight road to the skies. Said the sparrow, your effort will be unrepaid, for I follow a different road. And it causes me grief to hear your belief in such a ridiculous code. Then without more ado, I am sorry to say, they are engaged in a battle most gory till each was bereft of his sense and his breath. And the curtain here falls on their story. Now, a strange little bird from a blossoming tree had witnessed the scene with surprise. Then with unfettered wing and a heart that could sing, he took the straight road to the skies. We have 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu been thinking for some days now about the meaning and the significance of commitment as a discipline of the spirit. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Today, we are thinking about the bearing of certain of the insights that we have explored together on this very moving and significant expression of the creative genius of man's mind. Faust, Goethe's Faust. The scene is somewhat like the scene at the beginning of the Book of Job. There is the conclave, which is called by the creator of the universe, by God, and in Faust, the heavenly chorus, the angels are singing their praises to God because He is God, and the world is good, and life is good and whole and complete. But there is one person present, and this is very interesting to me. This person, the prince of darkness, Mephistopheles-- it's an interesting-sounding name, isn't it? Well, anyway, Mephistopheles is the prince of darkness, but he is a part of the conclave. Now, this is very interesting. He is a member of the conclave in good standing. Thus says, in the prologue to Job, Satan is one of the members of the family. The principle of dualism that perhaps has done so much damage in some of its aspects to the religious thought and the religious experience structured by the religious thought of mankind is not present here. So Mephisto, or Mephistopheles, says, I won't join in this chorus because I'm too honest. I'm a realist. I know that this flight isn't quite like these angels are saying. They are out of touch with reality. So then he has a conversation with God. God says, is what you're saying really true? Do you think that creation is bad, that life is out of joint in some of those aspects? Have you thought about Faust? Have you reviewed him? Have you encountered him? Have you taken him into account? And so they strike a bargain. The tendency to bargain is so universal, and in this instance, it seems cosmic. At any rate, they strike a bargain. You can do anything to Faust if you wish, but you cannot take his life. And that's all Mephistopheles wants. He's sure he can handle the rest. Then the scene changes, and Faust is seated in his library. And he's come to the end of his rope. He has exhausted all knowledge. As it seems to him, he has explored everything. He is universally admired, because through his alchemy or through his medicine and through his insights, he's been able to administer to human need and the response of the healed body is so overwhelming that the mind bows before the man who is able to bring such healing and to be and experience. So this does not satisfy him. He says that he has tried all of these things. Let me read what he says. He's tried all of these things, but everything fails me. Everything. These instruments, do they not all mock me? Lathe, cylinder, ring, and cog and wheel? In vain I call on you for aid, you keys of science. I stand before the guarded door of nature, but it bids defiance to latch or ward. Mysterious in the blaze of day, nature pursues her tranquil way. The veil she wears, if hand profane should seek to raise, it seeks in vain. Go, wondrous creature, mount where science guides. Instruct the planets in which orbs to run. State the tides and regulate the sun. Then drop into thyself and be a fool. This is what he 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu discovered. So, he says, since I have exhausted all of the meaning of life and I come back to the starting place every time, the living of life is no good. I shall now apply my knowledge to selfdestruction. Pitts Theology Library Emory University He lifts the goblet of poison to drink. Then in the church, hard by his studio and laboratory, he hears a choir singing Easter hymns, and these hymns, one of the hymns reminds him of the early religious experiences of his childhood. And as he is carried back into that kind of experience, he is saved from self-destruction. This I cannot refrain from commenting as I go along. I don't want to do this too much, but what a wonderfully tragic thing it is, almost criminal, I think, in my judgment at any rate. If those who have children deny their children the experiences as they grow up of the distilled religious experience and wisdom of the race, whatever may be the mature judgment of the parent with reference to whether or not there is any meaning in this religion or not, no parent has the right to make that kind of choice for his child, for the child must have as his heritage the cumulative wisdom of the race. And this moment in the life of Faust underscores the meaning of what I'm saying. So he goes on. The scene changes again, and Mephistopheles enters, and he says, all the things that you want I can give you if you will enter into a little bargain with me. If you will give your soul to me so that you will be my servant and my slave when you die, after death, I will be your servant and your slave while you are alive. Well, Faust is sophisticated. The only life he knows, he says, is the life that we have now. And tomorrow, beyond the grave, that may be a fiction anyway. When a man dies, he is dead. So I will promise anything for after death, because death is something that happens to life. And if death is something that happens to life, then death ends life. So he signed up, and now the transformation takes place. He loses his old age. He loses his disillusionment. He becomes young and full of vigor and vitality, enthusiasm, good looks, money I suppose. He has everything. And he and Mephistopheles go out to experience life, to open up the bowels of sensation until they can contain all of the meaning of existence. This is what he thinks. And they go, they meet at a friend's house, Martha's house, Marguerite, who represents innocence and wholeness, the essence of Catholic piety and devotion, tender, gentle. And when she meets this ambulating essence of sophistication, she just capitulates. [LAUGHTER] Is there anything she can do? He gives her jewelry. He gives her all kinds of things that she did not dream that anybody possessed, not only that she would ever possess them. And he sweeps her off her feet and takes her into the depths of degradation and shame, always holding before her the glittering promise of a kind of fulfillment which identification with him would give to her, knowing all the time that more and more as he explores more deeply and more deeply into the experience of sensation, that this cannot meet an ultimate hunger which he has. And then he leaves her skinned and cast down like a sheep without a shepherd. And her brother, Valentine, wishes to wreak his vengeance upon a man who has destroyed his sister. So Faust 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu encounters him in a duel and kills him. Now, he adds this sense of shame, which he has, adds to that murder. And there's a stirring in him, but he still cannot recognize it fully. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And then he and Mephistopheles have a rendezvous at the place where the 1st of May every year, the prince of darkness has his magic festival. And here you can see the pristine fulfillment of all the meaning of the lesser levels of existence blown up so that they seem to be all that existence holds. And in the midst of this festivity, Faust sees the face of Marguerite, and then he is thrown into the arms of a wrestle with what remains of his conscience. And he begs Mephisto to take him back to see Marguerite. And they go to visit her in her cell, she is so deranged that she hardly recognizes him. She is now condemned to death because she has taken the life of her baby. And Faust begs her to go with him, but go where? She's been with him everywhere. And just at that moment, the face of Mephistopheles appears, and then Marguerite dies asking forgiveness of heaven. And the chorus says she's shamed. 30 years separate part one from part two. And in part two, Faust also finds his redemption. Now, that's the story in bold, audacious outlines. Now, let's look a little. The fundamental question that has bearing on my concern is are the contradictions of life final? This is the heart of the issue in my mind. That is to say, if the contradictions of life are final, are ultimate, if there is an ultimate division that marks the boundary of goodness and the boundary of evil, then it is possible for an individual to make as his absolute commitment, his life, his thought, his everything, to evil. And it will follow as a series of creative or less creative derivatives from this central commitment to evil, all of the developments of significance and meaning that this kind of commitment can give. In other words, a man once committed to evil, if the ultimate contradiction holds, you see, mark what I'm saying, if the ultimate contradiction holds that a man who thus commits himself to evil will do the evil with the kind of utter abandonment and abiding enthusiasm with decreasing sense of any awareness of the fact that the evil is evil, it represents a final choice that the individual makes. But the contradictions in life are not final, are not ultimate, then it would follow that a man cannot make a total and fundamental and complete commitment to evil. It seems in the development of this point that Faust made his fundamental commitment to the power of darkness. And then in the 30-year interval between the writing of part one and part two, Goethe comes to a new insight, that this cannot be so, because Faust has to be redeemed. And why must Faust be redeemed? Because the Creator of life, the Creator of existence, the Creator of Faust is Himself righteous. And whatever there is in all the annals of existence that can hold out finally against God must be regarded as being equal to God. Never yielding, surrendering more and more, exploring all possibilities of wandering may be done in human experience. Not of necessity, but may be done. But at long last, at long last, nothing can hold out against God. I wonder if you believe that. I wonder. Now, it suggests one other little footnote, because I've said the heart of what I wanted to say. One little footnote, and that is that we must not be deceived by the fact that what we experience in time and space is limited, is limited to time and space. Now what do I mean by this? 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University That life as we live it, life as we experience it, as sentient creatures, cannot quite be measured in terms of the time interval that extends from the date of our birth to the time of our dying, that there is a dimension of life that transcends the time interval of a person's living so that every experience of man, even the experiences of the mind or the experiences of the senses or the experiences of the spirit to make these fictitious divisions of personality, is contained in that which transcends the experience. Now, this has very important bearing on death, as I think of it. One of the reasons why all religions, all religions that are good religions, whatever may be the content of the creed, all religion that are good religions ultimately know that they cannot address themselves to the ultimate demands of the human spirit unless they deal in some way with the question of death, because what death says, always, that there is no future. This is what death means, the cessation of future. Now, therefore, any religion that has to do with the meaning of life and the meaning of man's experience has to make that hurdle. It has to answer the question for man. Is there any way by which the future may be guaranteed to me? So all the doctrines which have to do with eternal life and salvation ultimately speak to this point and to this issue. Now, what do they say essentially? That death is episodic, that death is an event in the experience of a living person. But the life is not measured by the time interval that death marks. So in the imagery in which they give about heaven, about hell, all these, these images, these insights have to do with the continuation of a man's life. And death is just one of the incidents in connection with this. Now, if that is true, then it says, you see, that there is a dimension of the human spirit that stands outside of all of the events through which the individual life may be passing. Now, we see this in many ways, and I'll hurry through this. We see this in many ways. There is no event which you ever perform that quite contains all that you mean or that you are. If I ask you very quickly, and I'll select one incident in your life that represents you completely, which one would you select? You select one and before the words die, you would say, oh, no, but there's some part of me that's left out. So you come with another one. Now, always, you are an observer of yourself, as a participant in what you are doing. This dual dimension always, you the observer, you the participant. Now, there is a sense in which you, the observer, is never involved in whatever may be the events of your life. And death is one of these. And I think that's why a man may be very aware of the fact that he is dying right up to the end, because some aspect, some crucial, transcending, time-binding aspect of his personality is not involved in this. And I think this is the God in him. And the degree to which a man is aware of this-- he knows that the contradictions of life, however terrifying and overwhelming, are never final. Beyond the tempest and the struggle, there is a movement of the Creator, brooding over all the stuff of man's experience, informing it more and more and more of the quality of Itself. Heir of the kingdom 'neath the skies, often he falls yet falls to rise, stumbling, bleeding, beaten back, holding still to the upward track, playing his part in creation's plan, godlike in image. This is man. This is man. This is man. 5 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And I thank God with all the heart that I can get that it is so. Take the weak word, the great inadequacy of mind. Fill them with thy glory, oh God, that the truth may live even though error may abound. Walk beside us as we separate, and lead us not alone to the strength of our own minds. Pitts Theology Library Emory University [ORGAN MUSIC] [CHOIR SINGING] (SINGING) Amen. Amen. 6 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit (1960, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource In this 8-part series, Thurman discusses a variety of topics related to the disciplines of the spirit, including growth, personal stability, commitment, dedication, actions, dualism, and redemption. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by ShaCarolyn Halyard AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-004_B.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Disciplines of the Spirit VIII, 1960 Dec 4 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-004_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Disciplines of the Spirit, Part 8: Faust, 1960 December 4 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-12-04 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Description An account of the resource In this eighth installment of the Discipline of the Spirit, Howard Thurman uses Goethe's Faust to set the tone as he discusses the principles of dualism and redemption. Thurman goes on to discuss whether our contradictions in life are final considering the righteousness of God. The movement of the creator through the experience of man is also discussed. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard contradiction dualism experience Goethe redemption https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/afb9bb6b83c50a82aba05df10bb65d5b.pdf 6c8f7c3f3b4fae8a3736cd918052a569 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-013_A.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University We have turned aside from the tasks and the duties and the responsibilities which involve us day after day to present ourselves with as much confidence and faith as we can muster-- hoping that in Thy presence and in the great quietness of this waiting moment, we might find the measure of deepened inner peace, without which the enterprise of our private lives cannot be fulfilled. We share with Thy all of the meaning that we have been able to garner out of the days of our living. We see as if by a flash of blinding light, the meaning of some things which we have done since last we were here together-- the hasty word the careless utterance, the deliberate act by which another was injured or confused, the decision to do what, even at the time of the decision, we felt was not either the right thing or the thing which we were willing to back with our lives. All of these things crowding upon us our Father to be sure that what we say in Thy presence and what we feel and in Thy presence will be honest and clear and sincere. As we look at this aspect of our lives, there is only one moving request which we make. And that is for forgiveness, forgiveness for the sin, for the wrong act, for the bad deed, forgiveness our Father. We do not know all together what it is that we want beyond this. We see our lives, the goals which we have set for ourselves, and as we wait now in the quietness, and these goals are weighted and held in tender balance before Thy scrutiny and Thy caring, we see them in a new light. And we trust that somehow as we move into the tasks that await us, the radiance which we sense now will cast a long glow to guide us in tomorrow's darkness. We're mindful also of all kinds need in the world, those needs which are close at hand and about which we have had some superficial concern. We have met them casually out of the richness of our own sense of surplus. There are those other needs at which we have not dared to look, our Father, because we fear what our response to such needs might make us do or become. We might find all of the careful plans of our lives upset and the goals which we have put in focus thrown out of line or discarded. Because as we look into the depths of certain needs, we cannot ever be ourselves in happiness and peace again. And this is too costly for us. And yet, our Father, as we wait here, these needs move before us. We hear the cry anguish of the destitute, of the hungry, of the hopeless, of the despairing. And we cannot be deaf. But we don't know what to do. We don't know how to give and not destroy ourselves. Oh God, deal with our disorder with redemptive tenderness so that we as we live tomorrow and tomorrow may not be ashamed of Thy grace that has made our lives move in such tranquil places These are all the words we have. Take them, and let them say to Thy the words of our heart and our spirit. Oh God, merciful God, merciful God. [MUSIC PLAYING] 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Quests of the human spirit as background for laying foundation for our thinking together for the next few weeks. Will you listen to these words? "A ceaseless search like the ebb and flow of oceans marks all man's days. For him, no rest, no rest. The fever in the blood is answer to the temper of the mind. When time was young, just learning how to walk, it placed its stamp on a single cell, which gave a slant to all that lives today or yesterday, no matter when. Pitts Theology Library Emory University A ceaseless search like the ebb and flow of oceans marks all man's day. Is there some point, some place of rest to bring an end to all man's quest? Something that does not feel? Something that lasts beyond all things that pass when the shadows thicken and the lights grow dim? Some worldly hope that gives retreat from all the winds that beat upon the world? Some sured attachment to another's life that stands secure against all change of mind or heart? Some private dream where only dwells the purest secrets of desire? All these must fade. All these must pass away. There is a sense of wholeness at the core of man that must abound in all he does, that marks with reverences his every step, that has its sway when all else fails, that wearies out all evil things, that warms the depths of frozen fears, making friends of foe, making love of hate, and last beyond the living and the dead, beyond the goals of peace and the ends of war. This man seeks through all these years to be complete and of one piece within, without." And then this from Robert Bridges. "Man born of desire cometh out of the night, a wondering spark of fire. He's striveth to know, to unravel the mind. He wills to adore. He dreameth of beauty. He seek to create fair and fair to vanquish his fate, such is man." I begin this morning by undertaking to lay the foundation for our thinking about the quests of the human spirit. To quest is to seek out, to try, to find. It is to search. It is to bring into focus a goal or a purpose and to put at the disposal of such a goal or purpose, the cumulative resources of one's life. It is in the very nature then of the case that a quest is a creative act. It began there. It is creative because when it is initiated, the individual has to adjudicate between possible alternatives. He has to make up his mind by a series of efforts, which result in the elimination of those things which present themselves as worthy of the questing. But for reasons that may be personal and private and intimate, they are rejected. And the one thing is lifted out above all the rest. It is a creative act then in the first place because it involves a decision of the mind and the will. It is creative act in the second place because once the choice is made, once the object of the quest is selected, then the resources of the individual, slowly sometimes and sometimes dramatically, are organized and made available to the individual as the raw materials of the energy which he needs in order to pursue the quest. And this particular act on the part of the mind, of the personality is important because of what it suggests about how man is put together in the first place. He has memories. And these memories at some far off time in the history of man were not memories as we know them. They were impulses shooting over the nerves, registering their impact as the individual encountered various aspects of his environment, reacting to various situations. And as these became cumulative, the mind then began to how a sense of the history of man's experience with 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu life so that at any particular moment, at levels of which he is aware and at levels of which he is not aware, all the past is present, present. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And this means, you see, that what we are saying when we say that a man is conscious is that he is aware of the past as a part of the living stuff of the present so that when he brings to bear the resources of his personality in an effort to make it possible for him to realize his quest, what he is really doing is actualizing his potential. What he is really doing is putting at the disposal of a specific act or a specific goal, the cumulative resources of all of his life. Now the goals, the objects of our quest very often are not on our own. How can I say this? Sometimes, they are a reflection of what we think we ought to want. Sometimes, they are reflection not of what we really want to see. But there are reflections on our love for someone whose desire for us we embrace and act upon it as if it were our own. We see this very often vocationally. Sometimes you talk with a man who is in the last stages of his personal equipment for the realization of a quest which will be for him an enduring one vocationally. And he says, I don't think I've ever really wanted to be a doctor. I come from a family of doctors. My father is a doctor, my grandfather is a doctor, my great uncle is a doctor. And ever since I was born, I have heard my parents talk about the fact that I would carry on where my father left off. Or I would some day be so equipped that I will be able to join my father in this quest. So that out of love, I react. And I still find that at the end that much of the resources of my life are not at the disposal of that which I have selected as the object of my quest. So I may go on and become, let us say, a very good doctor, a very worthy doctor, an excellent healer of diseases if that is how the vocation is defined. And yet, something deep within me remains untouched. And my mind is in it. But my heart refuses. Now the quest of the human spirit about which I shall be thinking the quests of the human spirit, about which I shall be thinking during these days has to do with those experiences, those goals in which there is the meeting of the mind and the heart so that the total resourcefulness and the total resources of the personality may be available to the quest that has been chosen. Now there's a second aspect of this that belongs in the foundation. And that is that sometimes and individual is so fortunate-- and I think this is the right word-- that he does not have to go through the experience of making up his mind, of making the choice. It is as if something-- I don't quite know how to put this-- but outside of him seems to lay hold on him. And he doesn't know when he knew. The only thing he does know is that he knows that through success and failure, through trial and error, this is the thing that he must do. If I may be personal about this, I remember when I was a high school boy. At the end of my first year in high school, I went to a conference in North Carolina. It was a conference of the student conference of the YMCA. The first night I was there, there was a vesper service. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu I sat on the side of a hill. It was an outdoor service. Everybody was sitting on one side of the hill. I said over by myself. I was a stranger, didn't know anyone. So I sat alone in the twilight, the long twilight. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And I listened to a man make a speech. I don't know what he talked about now. I don't know what he said. But as I listened to him, I knew what would be the area and the meaning of my life quest. I did not know in terms of a bill of particulars. I could not spell it out in terms of precise goals. But I knew more deeply than I understood. The three or four months after that I wrote the man a letter telling him about my experience that night. And he answered-- I shall always remember this-- two pages single spaced. It was the first type-written letter that I had ever received. And I carried this letter in my pocket. And you will be embarrassed-- I mean, I should be embarrassed, I suppose, to say it. But I carried it in my pocket to the rest of my school and for four years in college. I changed envelopes I don't know how many times- but the letter was there. It served as a gentle reminder of what I had felt. But it was years after before the feeling that I sensed that night worked itself up into the region of my deliberations and my choosings. And sometimes that happens. All of this is to say that the quest is a creative thing. And sometimes, it is the response of the individual. Sometimes, it is the response of the mind based upon selections. And then there something of the personality are organized and put at the disposal of the thing that is held at dead center in the mind. Now there is something else that needs to be said. This possibility, the possibility of quest, the miracle of being able to seek is writted, it seems to me, in the very nature of life. For you see, if life is fixed, if life is finished, if life is complete, if life is contained in a continuum that is essentially static, then the possibility of seeking, the possibility of bringing to bear upon a goal the resources of the personality so that as the individual begins to actualize his potential and becomes himself more and more, the living embodiment of that for which he is questing, all of this is an impossibility if life itself is not fluid, creative, dynamic. Now if it is true that life is fluid and creative and dynamic, then it becomes a reasonable thing to say that the time and the place of a man's life is time and the place of his body. But the meaning of a man's life is as eternal and as significant. As with all of him, he wills to make it. Now let me repeat this. If life is dynamic, fluid, then it is a reasonable thing to say that the time and the place of a man's life is the time and place of his body. But the significance, the meaning of his life can be as eternal and as creative. As with all of him, he wills choose to make it. Therefore, when a man quests and in his quest he honors a deep and insatiable hunger of his spirit and in response to that hunger, he more and more begins to feed it with all the raw materials of his stuff, then the hunger has to be honored by life, and I think by God. So the Master says if you hunger, hunger, hunger, if you thirst, thirst for righteousness. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu This is the nature of life that you will be filled, that this is the kind of world in which the riding possibility is always present if a man is able to bring to bear upon, even the stubborn and unyielding and recalcitrance stuff and contradictory stuff of life that which will not be denied, he will find. I wonder if you believe this. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I do not mean some casual whim, some impulse that grows out of something that does not reach down deep in me. For you know it may be that I cannot seek for something that I do not have already. This may be it. So a man said to the Master, "will please help my son? There are times when he seems to be possessed. And he throws himself on the floor and he writhes as a madman." And the Master said, do you believe this? Do you mean that anything can happen as a result of what you are asking me to do? Is this the kind of world in which it is possible for a quest like that fundamentally to be honored? If you believe this, then it will be. And the man said, oh yes. I believe. Help Thou, my unbelief. Oh yes, I have faith. And it is the faith in me that keeps pushing me for more of itself. So it may be that seeking and finding, questing and finding are one in the same thing, that what I hunger for grows out of what I am aware of as the most real thing in me already. And it is that multiplies itself, multiplies itself until I am consumed by it, and it is consumed by me. The time and the place of a man's life is the time and place of his body. But the meaning of a man's life is as the eternal and as significant. As with all of him, he wills to make it. And we shall see in the days that follow what this means. Walk beside us, our Father. And leave us not alone either to strength or our weaknesses. But yield to us what we need in order that we may be that which is Thy dream for us. [MUSIC PLAYING] (SINGING) Amen Amen, Amen, Amen. 5 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Quests of the Human Spirit (1962, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource ”Quests for the Human Spirit” is an eleven-part lecture series focused on the creative process of self-actualization. Thurman shows how this process centers and affirms a person’s purpose in life. Discussing pursuits like freedom, stability, values, identity, and integrity, he illuminates the importance of questing in identity formation. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1962 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dr. Tim Rainey AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-013_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Quests of the Human Spirit (I), 1962 Feb 4 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-013_A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1962-02-04 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Description An account of the resource In his introductory lecture to “Quests for the Human Spirit,” Thurman describes the quest as an act of bringing to focus the purpose of one’s life. Thurman notes that this is a creative work wherein one’s mental resources are organized into the raw materials needed to energize and pursue growth within the human spirit. Choosing between alternatives on the life journey is a matter of mind and heart – resources that drive the quest. Thurman argues that questing is essential to life because it is the quest that actualizes the person who becomes the embodiment of one's striving. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Title A name given to the resource Quests of the Human Spirit, Part 1, 1962 February 4 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Dr. Tim Rainey actualize choice creative act heart mind quest https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/77279978e050e1ea4c8bf4792623a4de.pdf b243dcc147d67ae95dc8baa6799299d6 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-013_B.mp3 (SINGING) [INAUDIBLE] Pitts Theology Library Emory University It is of enormous reassurance to us, our Father, the sense that Thou art the sustainer and the holder of life. That despite all of our own limitations and finitudes, despite all of our weaknesses and failures, despite all of the soarings of our minds and imaginations and our spirit, that always we come back to the deeply lying assurance that Thou art the sustainer of life, the holder of all of creation, and the guarantor of all our values. And this is of such overwhelming reassurance to us that we celebrate in simple words of praise this almighty grace. We offer on our part not merely the good deeds of which we are aware at times, not merely the concerns for our fellows, which sometimes lead us to simple deeds or glorious acts of heroic self-sacrifice. But we offer to Thee the things that we might become. All of the possibilities of our lives, the potentials not yet realized. We offer to Thee our failures also, those times when something breaks down and we do not know what, or when something breaks down and we do know what. All that we might have been at a particular time and were not. All of the sense of conscience that disturbs and whips and tortures because we have not been in quality and in kind what we knew at the time we could have been in quality and kind. And beyond all of these expressions of ourselves, our Father, we offer to Thee ourselves. This is what we want to do. And sometimes, sometimes we are able to do it, just to say to Thee, Father, here am I, my life as it is at its depth. I give it to Thee, and I want Thee to hold it so that it is no longer my life to do with it in accordance with my whims, my impulses, my desires, or even my needs. But to take my life and to hold it until it takes on Thy character, Thy mind, Thy purposes. If Thou wilt do this and if Thou wilt help me to do this, then I can be in myself what is truest and surest in me. And this, this oh God, is all, all, all. [MUSIC PLAYING] As background for our consideration of the second in our series, the quest for freedom, it is a strange freedom to be adrift in the world of man without a sense of anchor anywhere. Always there is the need of mooring, the need for the firm grip on something that is rooted and will not give. The urge to be accountable to someone, to know that beyond the individual himself there is an answer that must be given cannot be denied. The deed a man performs must be weighed on a balance held by another's hand. The very spirit of a man tends to panic from the desolation of going nameless, up and down the streets of other minds where no salutation greets and no friendly recognition makes secure. Always a way must be found for bringing into one solitary place the sudden look from another's face, for getting the quiet sanction of another's grace to undergird the meaning of the self. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu To be ignored, to be passed over as of no account and of no meaning is to be made into a faceless thing, not a man. It is better to be the complete victim of an anger unrestrained and a wrath which knows no bounds. To be torn asunder without mercy or battered to a pulp by angry violence than to be passed over as if one were not. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Here at least, one is dealt with, encountered, vanquished or overwhelmed, but not ignored. It is a strange freedom to go nameless up and down the streets of another's mind, where no salutation greets and no sign is given to mark the place to call one's own. To be known, to be called by one's name is to find one's place and hold it against all the hordes of hell. This is to know one's value for oneself alone. It is to honor and act as one's very own. It is to live a life that is one's very own. It is to bow before an altar that is one's very own. It is to worship a God who is one's very own. It is a strange freedom to be adrift in the world of man, to act with no accounting, to go nameless up and down the streets of other minds where no salutation greets and no sign is given to mark the place one calls one's own. The quest for freedom is fundamental to the human enterprise, for freedom is the gift of life. And yet paradoxically enough, freedom must always be realized, achieved. It is given, and yet it must always be actualized. Freedom then is the capacity that is inherent in personality to determine the future by action. Let us weigh this. It is the capacity to determine the future by action. It operates at the simplest and most elemental and elementary level of life while the organism may accept or reject substances which it can and may use to guarantee its own physical existence. It may be the movement of the organism or the staying put of the organism. It may be the exercise of choice to do or not to do. It is to interpret the act available to the individual in terms of the meaning of the act and its bearing upon the future of the life. Therefore, arriving at the very center or at least on the crest of all activity which may be defined as activity of freedom is the possibility of failure. For if the individual could not fail in his act, then freedom of the act has no meaning. So that always in the background of whatever man means by freedom is the threat-- yes. The threat of absolute failure as far as his life is concerned. In other words, the fact of death, which represents absolute failure for the organism. The fact of death then is the guarantor of the experience of freedom. Suppose you couldn't die? Then this would mean that there is not available to you at any particular point any other possibility than the possibility that you are then or that you are now experiencing. But because I can always die, this means that one possibility other than the possibility that I'm now experiencing is always open to me. So that men decide as they begin to think about the meaning of freedom in their own lives, they may decide that the situation with which I am faced now or by which I am faced now is for me a situation intolerable in character. And if this is the decision, then I do not have to accept that. I always have this other possibility. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now that does not mean that I will go around wanting to exercise this possibility. But it does mean that in the background of my mind and in my experience, there is this other option. So Ibsen in The Wild Duck says that-- has the wild duck say that if he's wounded, he will sink himself to the bottom of the lake and give his life up to the waters flowing there rather than to accept life on any terms that life may offer. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now to go back to the working definition, the first part of it, freedom is the capacity of the individual to determine the future by action. This means then that the individual can, standing where he is, project himself imaginatively into another possibility of action and deal with that possibility in his imagination, and decide to accept it or reject it. And if he decides that in order to fulfill what seems to him to be an inner necessity for acting in a way that will determine a future which to him is mandatory for his life, then-- and he knows that if he acts in this way, the result of his action will be his death, then he can choose deliberately to accept this possibility rather than to remain in the condition which he finds himself. So the slave said that he would-- that before he'd be a slave, he'd be buried in his grave and go home to his Lord and be free. The essence then of freedom in the first place turns on how the individual which is given this, how the individual is able to negotiate the frontiers of his freedom, the limitations of his freedom. Now we are always working on the frontiers of our freedom. Next Wednesday morning or afternoon or Thursday, we will be trying to negotiate a frontier of freedom of movement in space in every aspect of our life, because we are rooted in nature. We are always trying to push back the frontiers of our freedom of movement. And we may fail again and again and again. But if the sense of my own possibility to determine or influence the future by my action remains active, I will try again and again and again, and I will not accept the frontier as being final. Now if I'm dealing with a situation in which the frontier must be accepted as final, then I exercise my freedom by the way in which I deal with the fact of the finality. Now this is comparatively simple when it comes to the frontiers that I established by nature. But there are other frontiers that I established by the conventions of society. There are frontiers that are set up by which individuals are surrounded. And when they meet these frontiers of their freedom, they may acquiesce, because necessity fronts them with a kind of an invincible gesture, and there's not a thing that they can do about it. Now, now this is where the essence of freedom moves now. If I decide that there isn't anything that I can do about it period, then the frontier of freedom that is external to me shifts from outside of me to inside of me. But if I decide that there is something that can be done about the frontier so as to make it more possible for me to actualize the potential which is a part of the gift of life, the potential of freedom, then I keep working at the frontier, working at myself. I keep trying to find ways within my environment that can influence the frontier, getting the frontier to move. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu We see this going on in the kind of social revolution that is taking place in various parts of the world. In particular at the moment, that's taking place in our own country. The frontier of freedom set by convention. And the individual decides that he will not accept this frontier. And if he decides that he will not accept the frontier, then he brings to bear upon the movement or the possibility of the movement of the frontier. Pitts Theology Library Emory University First, all of his own resources. And then all of the resources that are within the convention that establishes the frontier. Until at last, the frontier begins to move. Or if the frontier does not move, he may decide that it is better for him to give up his life rather than to accept the frontier as the fact of his life. Now freedom then means first the capacity of the individual to determine the future by action. Now the corollary to that is that freedom means also the sense of alternative, the sense of option. It may not mean the implementation of the option. It may be, for instance, that I decide that I can be what I want to be, but I don't want to want to be what I want to be. So that before I can deal with the possibility of my realizing in the future by action that which I want to be, I must operate on myself so that I will want to want to be what I want to be. Now I remember many years ago when I was a freshman college student in Atlanta, Georgia. One Thanksgiving night, I was going up the hill from town, going back to the college. It was a cold night, and I noticed a fire burning on the side of the street, and there were some men sitting around it, warming themselves. And I decided I would join them to get a little warm before making the last pull up the hill where the college was. And they were discussing the fact that at the Candler Warehouse, which was one of the large cotton warehouses in Atlanta, that most of the men working there had been laid off until the first of the year. And they were discussing all that this involved, not only in terms of Thanksgiving celebrations and so forth, but no toys for their children at Christmas time. And you know, what men under such circumstances would be saying. And then presently a man began strumming a guitar and humming first some melody that sort of insinuated itself into your mind without your permission. And then he began putting words to it, and these are the words. He said, I've been down so long, down don't worry me. And I said to one of the men, this means that for this man, all of the possibilities of his life are canceled out. Canceled out, because the sense of alternative had died. And it is not important, you see, as far as freedom is concerned, it is not ultimately important whether or not the individual is able at any particular point in time and space to realize the option. For again and again, the realization of any particular option is merely one of the external conditions of freedom. But freedom is a quality of the spirit. It is a quality of the mind and the heart. And as long as the individual keeps alive within him the sense of option, then whatever he may be doing at any particular time, there is inherent in that act the threat that this act at last will be 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu an act that can determine his future. But if this dies, then before there can be any movement towards freedom, the personality has to be reborn, and then move. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now this whole idea was illustrated for me in something I heard and about which I've told you before, but it was the most dramatic sermon that I heard during the years of my boyhood. It was a traveling minister who preached a sermon about Hell, and his experience when he was on a personally conducted tour of Hell. He said that here in the sermon he dealt, of course, with the two cardinal sins of that period. And you can date me now, because the two cardinal sins of that period were dancing and card play. And so the first place to which he went in Hell was a huge dance hall, and there were millions of people dancing. And they had to dance forever, and with the same partner. He took them next to a place where they were all playing cards, and the game that they played at that time was a card game called Five Up. And they were playing Five Up, four people at a table. And here they had to sit throughout eternity, playing Five Up. Now the thing that made the situation Hell was not any of the things that we think of ordinarily due to certain imagery that has come down to us. Burning lake, a certain kind of devil with a pitchfork. None of this. But the thing that made it Hell was the fact that they had left to themselves no option. They had no freedom, and freedom is the gift of life. And where there is no freedom, it is death. Freedom then is the capacity of the individual to determine the future by his action. It means, therefore, that in its essence, it is a quality of the spirit. For if a man's sense of option with reference to his ability to influence the future by his action is lost, then freedom perishes. And there is no external force or power that can destroy freedom in this dimension. For even though all external conditions are negative, even though there is nothing that is operable or maneuverable or movable at the frontier, at the moment as far as that which keeps the individual from being able to determine his future by his actions in the present, nevertheless it is one of the fundamental dimensions of personality to keep alive the sense of option, the possibility of being able at some time, somewhere, some when to determine the future by action in the now. And if this is true, then it means that freedom is essential to what a man means when he says that he is a man. A man. It is rooted, then, in a sense of essential human dignity and human life. And he puts this positive, creative quality of the self as a relentless binding pressure against everything within him and without him that would establish without his assent the boundaries, the frontiers of his freedom. And therefore, the quest for human freedom is as old as is the existence of personality. And perhaps this is what it means to be a child of God and not a carrot or a turnip or a tomato. But a man, a man, a man, a man. 5 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Strong son of God, immortal love, who we either have not seen Thy face by faith and faith alone embrace, believing what we cannot prove. Our little systems have their day. They have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee. But Thou, oh Lord, art more than they. And in this, oh God, our Father, is our hope and our redemption. Pitts Theology Library Emory University [MUSIC PLAYING] [SINGING] 6 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Quests of the Human Spirit (1962, Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, MA) Description An account of the resource ”Quests for the Human Spirit” is an eleven-part lecture series focused on the creative process of self-actualization. Thurman shows how this process centers and affirms a person’s purpose in life. Discussing pursuits like freedom, stability, values, identity, and integrity, he illuminates the importance of questing in identity formation. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1962 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dr. Tim Rainey AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-013_B.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Marsh Chapel, Boston University, Boston, Massachussetts Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Quests of the Human Spirit (II): The Quest for Freedom, 1962 Feb 11 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-013_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1962-02-11 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Description An account of the resource Thurman explains that freedom is the “capacity to determine the future by action.” He sees the possibility of death as the guarantor of the experience of freedom because that possibility is always open to the person. The fact that this option is available rather than accepting any present conditions is only to suggest that this means one can imaginatively project oneself into another possibility. For Thurman, grappling with one’s final option opens the door for pushing back the frontier of freedom wherever unacceptable limitations persist. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"><img style="border-width:0;" src="https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/4.0/80x15.png" alt="80x15.png" /></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License</a>. 2019. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-7915565.7490374 5213612.6443988)) Title A name given to the resource Quests of the Human Spirit, Part 2: The Quest for Freedom, 1962 February 11 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Dr. Tim Rainey death failure finality freedom frontier of freedom hell option