1 10 351 https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/d5c03551707c2d66457a18350f13c14a.pdf 180ca104deaa4aa027beb293eadedc9e PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-285_A.mp3 I am still searching for God, hand over heart, trying hand over heart, and see if there be any real way in. And [INAUDIBLE] voice everlasting, everlasting. Amen. Pitts Theology Library Emory University There is, in every person, an endless sea. And in that sea, there is an island. And on that island, there is an altar. Standing guard before that altar is the angel with the flaming sword. Nothing can get by that angel to be placed upon that altar unless it has the mark of your inner authority. Nothing passes the angel with the flaming sword to be placed upon your altar unless it is a part of the fluid area of your consent. This is your crucial event with the [INAUDIBLE]. Through Jesus God breathes through all that is. The sparrow overcome by sudden death at the end of his life-- the lily blossoming on the rocky hillside. The grass, and the field, and the garden path. The clouds, light and burdenless, or weighted down with unshed waters. The madman in chains or wandering among the barren rocks in the wasteland. The little baby in his mother's arms. The strutting arrogance of the Roman legion, the brazen [INAUDIBLE] of the craven tax collector. The children that play and the old man quibbling in the marketplace. The august Sanhedrin fighting for his life amidst the impudencies of empire. The futile whisper of those who have forgotten Jerusalem. The clear voice, utterance of the prophets who remember. Through Jesus, God breathes through all that is. To Him, God was creator of life and substance, the living stream upon which all things move. The mind containing time and space, and all their multitudinous offsprings. And beyond all these, God's friend and Father. The time most precious for Him was at close of day. This was the time for the long breath from all the fragments left by the commonplace, for all the little hurts and the big aches to be absorbed, and the mind to be freed of the immediate demand. And voices that had been quieted by the long day's work could once more be heard, and there could be the deep sharing of the innermost secrets and the laying bare of the heart and the mind. Yes, the time most precious for Him was that close of day. And there were other times He treasured. A great while before day, says the Book. The night had been long and wearisome because the day had been full of needles and annoyances. The high resolve of some winged [INAUDIBLE] had [INAUDIBLE] panics, no longer shielder of free, had been embarrassed as it had never been. There was need and utter urgency, for some fresh assurance, the healing touch of a healing wave. A great while before day, He found his way to a quiet place on the hill and prayed. I had a very strange experience of getting here. Not about getting here, but getting here. [LAUGHTER] 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now, I had prayed rather hard on the theories that I was-- to you I have announced it, but. And then I felt that I didn't want to do it. And I was embarrassed, because at my age, you don't have a lot of hours left to do something and then don't do it. But I just couldn't do it. So I started out in another direction. I want to think first of all tonight about the meaning of religious experience. Pitts Theology Library Emory University And perhaps, perhaps finally in the last few minutes about meaning of the religious experience to Jesus. There is something so very private, and personal, and intimate about the religious experience. It is-- and a paradoxical way, it seems to me-- a time when it is, I think, the individuals who are alone in all the universe, and yet at the center of the experience he seems to be a part of everything there is. It's a strange paradox. It's private, it's personal, it's intimate. It is the experience of stripping, laying bare, of revealing whatever there is that is intimate and literal, and elemental, primary-- all the words. Time and mind. It's a naked-- when pretensions disintegrate, when one runs the risk of being himself or herself in the presence of God, there is something very-- there's something very terrifying about it, because to feel oneself be as one is looking upon oneself from the other side where there is no activity, no functioning, no pretension, completely exposed, completely vulnerable, and completely secure. Now then at the center, at the core of religious experience, one comes upon what, in my language, is the awareness of the givenness of God. Let's save that. The givenness of God. It is not merely an act of will for those who may be involved. It is not merely a dimension of reflective thinking, because reflective thinking is in God. It is where one becomes aware of God as a part of one's own deep inner landscape. For it seems to me-- and I do not wish to speak, seem to speak, even, irreverently. But I have felt for long time that God is very shy. Put aside all the vast rumblings of creating a universe. All of these things we are seeing and hearing, the whole structure of existence, the anatomy of existence, but the God. God seeps into the awareness. [? Did ?] any of you with my innermost [INAUDIBLE], you see. And suddenly I realized that always He has been there, always. The awareness of the givenness of God. Now, it is the nature of the mind-- and pardon me. I know this has been a long day, and it's the end of the day. And I know there are other things that may be going on in your mind that you don't-- you can't begin to be as tired as I am, so. Just do the best you can, because that's what I'm doing anyway. But if you really get weary, it's all right if you just put it back. Just do it quietly. One of the things that seems to be always in attendance to any feeling, tone, about the quality of what I am thinking and feeling is the mind-- the mind is a very wonderful thing, but it's-- it's a trickster. It's very, very funny. We get our minds about 30 seconds ago. It's all new [INAUDIBLE]. Looking for proof. That's human insecurity. You ever try to prove a thing of which you are sure? 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu But the mind, you see, that religious experience must validate itself-- must-- It must-- it must become an object of thought. Now, in order for religious experience to become an object of thought, it has to be imprisoned. Now, follow me carefully. Pitts Theology Library Emory University It has to be imprisoned. It has to-- religious experience is fluid. It's moving. It's dynamic. There at the heart of it, the pulse beat of creative urges. It's alive, like the liveness of light. But it moves so rapidly that the mind can't draw a bead on it, so it has to be trapped. Then the mind can draw a bead on it and extract what? Doctrine. Dogma. Theology. Principles of rationalization. For all dogmas, all theologies, all creeds, however crucial they are for the enrichment of the common life, even for the redemption of the human spirit, all doctrines, all dogmas, all creeds are inventions of the mind. They are what the mind does with the fluid creativity of religious experience. Therefore, all dogma, all creeds, all theologies are just a little out of date. They describe-- they depict what was when the moving rhythmic pattern of dynamic religious experience was trapped temporarily. Meanwhile, the religious experience goes on experiencing. So you are always going through the difficult job of making religious experience an object of thought so much to yourself you can seem to be rational as you try to feel it with your mind, if I may be contradictory here. But it always escapes. So what do we do? We set up a whole series of little laboratories so that we can make dry runs. Check it out. And always, always we see that the test, the test of the religious experience can never be found in that which is pragmatic and empirical, which is not to say that, as long as there is mind function, there will be the effort to reduce it to that which is empirical and pragmatic. But the test of it is not there. But I am never relieved from the necessity for trying to prove it that way. So even in the Book it says by their fruits ye shall know them. This is what the Book says, dealing with this whole question of a pragmatic checking out of the validity of the religious experience. For the more, you see, that the religious experience becomes an object of thought so that I can talk to you about it as I am talking about it now. You know and I know that I'm talking around it. Now, one-- one or two more things. It is for this reason that in prayer, meditation, that I-- there was a time when I would use the word meditation without self-consciousness. But I can't use it now because, well, because I know what I'm talking about, but nobody else does, because everybody's talking about what it has come to mean. And this is good. But as in prayer and meditation, what we are always trying to accomplish, to experience, to-- what we are always trying to become aware of is-- is the presence of God. And therefore, all of the disciplines that we use are meant to ready us so that there will be a climate within us in which God may assert Himself without embarrassment. But the curious thing is that there is no necessitous-- mark my words, please. There is no necessitous relationship between all the discipline, all the preparation, and the coming of the awareness of God. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now, if you hear this, don't-- don't disagree with it or agree with it. Just hear it, and leave it alone. It'll take care of itself. Now, all of the disciplines, all of the preparation, all of the spiritual exercises, all of these things are part of the readying, the sensitizing of the spirit so that we may become aware of God's presence. But there is no necessitous relationship between the preparation and the awareness. Pitts Theology Library Emory University If you don't get anything else, help me, please, by getting that. I tell you that there is no necessitous relationship between all of the disciplines, all of the spiritual exercises, all of the meditation, all of this-- however you phrase it-- and the awareness of the presence of God. Only one of the mystics with who I am familiar in one place seemed to suggest something to the contrary. And you'd never know. There was one passage in [? Descartes ?] in which he says that, if a man rids himself of preacherliness, God automatically fills him up, so that God is put in a situation in which He has the can't-help-its. But consistently it is the description of the statement of the journey in the inward region that I have only one responsibility, and that is to ready myself. There is a vast creative mystery about the spirit, for around any road, anywhere, any time a man may come upon a burning bush and hear a voice say take off your shoes, because the place where you are now standing, doing what you're now doing is a holy place. At late night, He comes after the pattern of his own inner disposition. [INAUDIBLE] like that. I can't chart His course. The only thing I can do is to be there at the pass, waiting. He may not come, and I prayed my heart out. I've got everything. Or He may come but He's the last person in the world I'm thinking on. There's something eerie, and mischievous, and marvelous about the freedom of the creator of existence, for He [INAUDIBLE] existence, and then move according to His principle. And He will within the throbbing context of His creation. Now, the Master saw this. Do you remember? He tells a story. The Master tells a story about a man who decided that he got on a trip. And he knew he was going to spend quite a bit of money, so he called three, I believe, the Gospel says, of his prime movers to him. And he said, I'm going away. And I'm going to do some high spending. So when I come back, I'll need to recoup. So here's $100. Here's $75. Here's $25. Report when I get back. So finally he came back. Do you remember? But he came back. The first man said you gave me $100. Here's $125.90. The man to whom he gave $75 said here's $80.50. The man to whom he gave $25 was the only man who made a speech. [LAUGHTER] Now, he said, you may not know it, but you have a bad reputation. You reap where you haven't planted. You print coupons where you haven't been tested. And I knew this, so I hid it so I could watch it every day. And when the word came that you'd come back, I brung it, and here it is. And 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu the master said that he'd put him off of his place, cast it into outer darkness where there was wailing and gnashing of teeth. Why? Why? Why? Not because he did not show any increase. No. But because he didn't work at it. Pitts Theology Library Emory University The only responsibility he has is to work at it. God moves as God moves. And He will not jump where I pull the strings. He will hear me cry. He will find ointment for my bruises then. For He's God. He's God. All of my life I've tried to [INAUDIBLE] so that in my own moments of weariness and desperation I would know which way to use and it would the [INAUDIBLE] way. But I never found out. I never found out. I have never found out. Where did it come? There's a little village where Jesus lived. There was a man, John the baptizer, preaching. That's a job. And Jesus joined the group with the others. Why? Oh, I don't know. I wonder what was going through His mind that He journeyed to [INAUDIBLE]. I wish I knew. And He presented Himself to John to be baptized. And when He did, it is written in the Book that, as He came up out of the water, the heavens opened, and the Spirit of God descended upon Him like the dove. And gee, nothing's certain. Not John. He heard the Lord in the language of His own heart. You have made me very happy, my Son. Prying into, personal, intimate, primary, naked-- as if He and His Father alone existed in that moment of time. A curse on him who relies on man, who depends upon mere human aid, for he is like some desert scrub that never thrives except in a salt solitary place in the steppes. But happy is he who relies on God-- God, who has God for his confidence, for he is like a tree planted beside a stream, sending his roots down to the water. He has no fear of scorching heat, his leaves always green. He goes on bearing fruit when all around him is barren. And he looks out on life with quiet eyes. With quiet eyes. With quiet eyes. 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 The Meaning of the Religious Experience (1976, [Disciples of Christ Retreat], Santa Barbara, CA) Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1976 Description An account of the resource In this sermon series, Howard Thurman illustrates the all-encompassing nature of religious experience. The encounter with God is a renewing experience in which one's very center is changed, rippling out into all of one's life. It is in this whole-bodied commitment that one comes into the creativity and responsibility of ethical life. This sermon series contains a number of Thurman's most familiar images, i.e. the inward sea, the sound of the genuine, etc. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Erik Mattson & Rodell Jefferson III. AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette The Meaning of the Religious Experience, Part 1 (Santa Barbara), 1976 Jul 23 Audio with Transcription <iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-285_A.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Santa Barbara, CA Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1970s 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 The Meaning of the Religious Experience, Part 1, 1976 July 23 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1976-07-23 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. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-285_A Description An account of the resource In this first sermon, Thurman sets out to explore the meaning of religious experience, and the religious experience of Jesus specifically. For Thurman, religious experience is a private and intimate experience, and yet it also seems to involve everything that is. Religious experience is not static, but rather a dynamic experiencing that our minds cannot capture totally. Nevertheless, the mind tries to freeze it into doctrine, dogma, and theology – the language of rationality. But Thurman says religious experience cannot be reduced to the practical and empirical. Ultimately, religious experience is our awareness of the presence of God, and nothing we do gives us control over that presence. For it is God that gives of Godself freely and lovingly. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Rodell Jefferson III. https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/7d7505e29c8ef5896baf66e5b23feb1d.mp3 ca5fdb8011eeb6a22689153324a5f610 https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/fb770c52a65c50819572ff1c4aeea9bf.pdf 5a45c0c0c4681e125de9e41e0754b4d9 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Interview with Sue Bailey Thurman on "Presenting Albert Schweitzer" with host Miriam Rogers, Side B (394-337_B) Pitts Theology Library Emory University Miriam Rogers: Uh Mrs. Thurman, do you think that he [Mahatma Gandhi], he would feel it [struggle for African-American equality] has progressed fast enough or is good enough? SBT: Well, I think he would uh be very happy about the way it is being done. He would-would council um a fidelity to the dream, even by those people who-who work under cover of night, and there are many in the South who are a little afraid to have their sincere interest and concern for the working out of uh of these uh tensions brought to light of day. But Gandhi felt that the only way that people can be constrained to deeper expressions of humanity, that they share with each other in this great trial of bringing man to a um higher ground in their relationship, each to the other. That is the only way. I think he would say that we pay a-a terrible price, uh we pay a very great price, but then we learn, we grow, through suffering and we develop and we become very great as a nation and uh as a group of people forming a one world uh compact, one world citizenship in doing so. MR: [Clears throat] We can’t bring this hour to a close Mrs. Thurman, without bringing into focus this lovely little book, which you gave me about a year ago. It is called “Meditations for Women,” with an introduction by Dorothy Canfield Fischer and edited by Jean Abernathy. Twelve different authors have chapters about each month in the year, yours being April. [Clears throat] I was impressed by the beauty of your prose and the selections of poetry and reference. I wish you would please tell us something about this elegant and helpful little volume, and how it came into being. I notice that you have quoted Tagore, and I hope we’ll have time for you to read a little from it and a little of Tagore’s poetry, which I love uh so very deeply. There, the authors, there are twelve different authors as I said and they come from a great variety of sources. Edith Lovejoy Pierce on January, for instance; Josephine W. Johnson, August; Banaro W. Overstreet October, and I-I wonder if you could tell us whose idea the book was and what purpose you think it uh was collected for and um how much time you spent on it because as I say, it is rather a profound [pauses] April which you have for us, a different little page, a different page for every day in the month. SBT: Well, it was considered necessary to bring out a book of this sort that might be read by women, um particularly those who would like something of refreshment of spiritual and-and intellectual refreshment for each day. And the women were supposed to write from various backgrounds, several approaches that we make to-to this sort of meditation uh to the um reading of uh the things that um inspire and in-induce us to-to deeper thought and to um the greater dreams to which we aspire. I took April because I had the temerity to want to write something about three people who were born in the spring. I selected Juliette Derricotte, um who was the Dean of Women of Fisk University and before that uh um a Y, a national YWCA secretary who traveled greatly uh in the um fulfillment of uh in-in the service of this dream I shall say. It was Juliette Derricotte who-who was killed in an automobile accident that rocked this country, some years ago. Uh returning home from around the world um where she had spoken to thousands of student groups in behalf of uh the friendship that American students would like to offer around the world, she met with an automobile accident and died because she couldn’t get service- 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu medical service- that was needed. She was not accepted in this little hospital in Dalton, Georgia. I wanted to write about her as a wonderful child of April. MR: What is a veena, Mrs. Thurman? Pitts Theology Library Emory University And then it happens that Thomas Jefferson was born in April, and how I put the two together of course is um a thing of- took some daring. And Tagore, that you speak about, um is in this chapter because he uh is the poet of spring. He was born in May, but there was something about Tagore that made him the spring’s poet for all people, and he is the- these are the three that could inspire and enliven any April or May or any spring, and I brought Tagore and Juliette Derricotte and Thomas Jefferson together. Uh back to Tagore, we spent some time on his campus and there I learned to play, or tried to learn to play, the instrument which is called the veena. I brought the instrument home, um soon it became a thing of beauty- beauty of sight [MR laughs], but a silent beauty, not a beauty of sound. SBT: Well, it is supposed to be the second oldest instrument known to man. It is the daughter of the oldest instrument. It is a string, it is made of string uh, it is a string instrument that is played sitting down, stretches across the knees. It’s a very elegant thing to look at and to hear it is to be taken back um into many centuries of the past and to be brought forward into the future that is far far away in the distance. MR: Um [clears throat], would you tell us a little bit about the name of the school, which Tagore founded and a little bit about the campus there in India? It had always seemed so intriguing to me that you have gone to this school and several of-other of our friends have attended it also. SBT: Well, the name is um Shantiniketan, which means abode of peace. It’s a beautiful campus with um spreading banyan trees and out of doors one will find uh the broad vistas and you wander around an-an aura of beauty. Uh the school has captured the arts of India and brought them back to the Indian people. Uh this after they had been forgotten and laid aside in favor of the English language and English poetry and English music. It is now I think a uh a school operated by the government and uh it has taken the place of those missionaries or ambassadors of Indian culture who have traveled around from place to place, from community to community, all through India from north to south, east to west, teaching their people to love their own arts and culture. The school is doing this. Um the Chakravarties live there when they are not in residence at Boston University. MR: Oh, yes; that’s where they met I believe. Did Mr. Tagore read his own poetry while you were there? SBT: Yes, he did. He read to us one night. Um, we-he gave us a long reading of poetry. MR: Well, Mrs. Thurman, in your little um book, you have two poems of Tagore’s and I believe we have time for you to read both of them. Would you start with the one I think Tagore’s “Maiden” and then close with “Where the Mind is Without fear?” 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu SBT: Well he writes in “Gitanjali,” uh about the Indian maiden who takes her lamp down to the river: “Maiden where do you go shadowing your lamp with your mantle? My house is all dark and lonesome. Lend me your light. I have come to the river, to float my lamp on the stream when the daylight wanes in the west. I have come to dedicate my lamp to the sky. Pitts Theology Library Emory University In the silence of gathering night I asked her, Maiden your lights are all lit, then where do you go with your lamp? In the moonless gloom of midnight I asked, Maiden, what is your quest holding the lamp near your heart? I have brought my lamp to join the carnival of lamps.” And then the other one uh that you want, I think, is “Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action; Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake.” And I think he would say all countries awake. MR: That’s a most appropriate close to a very fascinating and unusual hour. I want to thank you, Mrs. Thurman, for being a guest on this program. Thank you in the name of Albert Schweitzer, and the friends of Albert Schweitzer. For me, it has been a great pleasure to be joined with you and listening to you and hearing the things that we wouldn’t have heard otherwise, and I feel sure that our listening audience will say the same. Thank you again, Mrs. Howard Thurman. Norbert Ellerin: You have been listening to another program in the series entitled “Presenting Albert Schweitzer.” This program is conducted by Mrs. Miriam Rogers of Brookline. Mrs. Roger’s guest this afternoon has been Mrs. Howard Thurman. Your announcer has been Norbert Ellerin. This afternoon’s program came to you by tape recording. This is Boston University Radio. 3 � 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 Sue Bailey Thurman Recordings Description An account of the resource This collection contains a two-part interview between Miriam Rogers and Sue Bailey Thurman. In this interview, Thurman explores the lives of Phyllis Wheatley and Amos Fortune, two black people brought to Boston on slave ships, presenting their lives of thought and action as exemplary of democracy and freedom in America. Thurman also talks briefly about the life of Harriet Tubman, and other current events, including: the growing influence of Gandhi's philosophy of non-violence, and readings from a book of "Meditations for Women," to which Thurman contributed. All in all, this interview offers a small window into the work and thinking of Sue Bailey Thurman. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Rodell Jefferson III. AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1950s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WBUR, Boston, Massachusetts Audio with Transcription <div style="text-align:center;"> <audio controls style="width:90%"> <source src="http://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/pittsthurman%2Foriginal%2F7d7505e29c8ef5896baf66e5b23feb1d.mp3?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAI4CD764Y635IGLNA&Expires=1645649174&Signature=Byfwjnl%2BaSUWFIeD4UqbkVIKGTQ%3D" type="audio/mpeg"> Your browser does not support the audio element. </audio> </div> 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 Interview with Sue Bailey Thurman on "Presenting Albert Schweitzer" with host Miriam Rogers, Side B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Miriam Rogers Sue Bailey Thurman Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1959-03-10 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. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-337_B Description An account of the resource This is Part 2 to "Presenting Albert Schweitzer," a radio program aired on WBUR Boston University Radio, hosted by Miriam Rogers. This episode was an interview with Sue Bailey Thurman. The introduction to the episode is provided by Norbert Ellerin. In this second half, Miriam Rogers and Sue Bailey Thurman closes out the interview. Rogers asks Thurman about Gandhi and his perspective on social progress. Rogers also tasks Thurman about a book in which she is included, entitled "Meditations for Women." Finally, Thurman ends the interview by reading two poems from Rabindranath Tagore which were included in the book. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Transcription by Kayleigh M. Whitman. Description by Rodell Jefferson III. https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/1ea7391ebeffc3fc0a65baa1c806758e.mp3 12e081f028979f1194827e6486c95fcf https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/e5efa5f320debfac3eb56816ff8c914e.pdf 7d6d9c11fc4386460cb4713a0562083a PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Interview with Sue Bailey Thurman on "Presenting Albert Schweitzer" with host Miriam Rogers, Side A (394-337_A) Pitts Theology Library Emory University Norbert Ellerin: Welcome to another program in the series entitled: “Presenting Albert Schweitzer.” This program is conducted by Mrs. Miriam Rogers of Brookline; and now, here is Mrs. Rogers. Miriam Rogers: Thank you Mr. Ellerin. Our guest this afternoon is Mrs. Howard Thurman. It is needless to say that Mrs. Thurman would be expected to shine by the reflecting glory of her husband, Dr. Howard Thurman, Dean of Boston University’s Marsh Chapel. But Mrs. Thurman shines in her very own right also, in many different ways. We are delighted to have Mrs. Thurman with us today and have been looking forward to this pleasure for a long time. Mrs. Thurman has chosen a unique and oblique angle to tie in what she has in mind with a program dedicated to Dr. Albert Schweitzer. But before we can properly start the program, I must give you some background and bibliography of our guest, so you will understand how well prepared is her education and activity for this subject. Sue Bailey Thur-Thurman born in Arkansas, received two degrees from Oberlin College before her marriage to Dr. Howard Thurman. Before coming to Boston, she was extremely busy in San Francisco initiating and developing the Intercultural Workshop of the distinguished Fellowship Church in that city. She was busy also [pause] with the YWCA. She founded and edited the Aframerican Women’s Journal and traveled and lectured extensively in India, to mention just a few things. Here in Boston, Mrs. Thurman continues her interest in the YWCA as chairman of the [coughing in background] World Fellowship Committee. At Boston University, Mrs. Thurman is chairman of the Hostess Committee for the international students, which incudes much entertaining of these students at the home of Dean and Mrs. Howard Thurman. Their residence is always unlocked and ready to welcome the students and their friends. [pause] Mrs. Thurman is also a member of the board of the International Student Center in Cambridge. She is Chairman of the International Student Program for the United Church Women of Boston. These are just a few of the activities which show the broad scope and interest, which our distinguished guest, and of the feminine gender for a change, will bring to you on our talk with her this afternoon. Mrs. Thurman it is a pleasure to have you on this program. Sue Bailey Thurman: Thank you Mrs. Rogers. It is a very great pleasure for me to be on this program, a program which I consider a-a very important one making a distinctive contribution to international understanding of all peoples, and particularly of the work that is being done by Dr. Schweitzer at Lambaréné in French Equatorial Africa. MR: Thank you, Mrs. Thurman. Because Dr. Schweitzer’s hospital is in Africa, we have had many programs on African themes and interests. It is especially appropriate therefore, today, that Mrs. Thurman has chosen to speak in part about two very fine people who came to these shores as slaves. Mrs. Thurman I am happy to turn the microphone over to you. [pause] 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University SBT: Thank you Mrs. Rogers. It seems to me, um always um, to-to be an inspiring moment when we can think about two such people, especially when we are considering countries being new born today; and particularly the one that has just achieved its freedom, independence, and privilege: Ghana formerly the Gold Coast of Africa. During the past week we have had occasion to recall the beginnings of our own country, the United States, and remember with new appreciation the several contributions that have been offered to this land from a variety of sources, contributions that have come to be a part of our own developing life and thought. The opening lines of our national drama, we should always remember, the opening lines of our superb dream of democracy in America, were recited by many people. And we are very proud that in America they represent people who come from many nationality, racial, and creedal cultules [sp probably cultures]. Among the many are some whose contributions are not well known, because they were made many years ago perhaps, made quietly inobstrusively [sic] in remote sections, even before we thought of them as being a part of American life and thought and action. The two that we will be considering vitally today lived in our own eighteenth-century Boston; and they are Phillis Wheatley and Amos Fortune. Both of them came to Boston in slave ships; they won their own freedom here and remained to become citizens of this country, members of their community who spoke significantly in their respective ways to all America in their century, as they speak to us in our century. And whose contributions may be said to have given vast illumination to their time, in the-in the community of the world in which they lived and had their being. Who was Phillis Wheatley, and what are the fascinating facts about her that are stranger than any fiction? Phillis Wheatley was a little African girl who at aged eight or nine was taken from her native land and [sic] which according to some historians was located near Senegal. She was brought to this country over the dreadful Middle Passage across the seas, arriving in Boston to be sold at the slave market here. [nine-second pause with rustling papers] It is difficult for us to think of a slave market in Boston, but um such was the case and-and for Phillis Wheatley, she was fortunate to be met at the steamer and to be purchased by a Mrs. John Wheatley. Uh Mrs. Wheatley seems to have been a very remarkable Boston woman who wanted Phillis Wheatley for a personal servant, but more than that as a companion. Uh Mrs. uh Wheatley thus had uh some idea of Phyllis Wheatley’s innate abilities when she glimpsed her um coming off the boat. Soon Phyllis, who had latent talents of a remarkable variety, had become a member of one of the most cultured literary families in Boston. In a short year and a half she had mastered the English language completely, and could read the most difficult portions of Holy Writ. She would be about aged eleven at this time. And by age of fourteen she was able to translate Ovid and she was studying Pope’s Homer. She had become an ardent uh student of Pope and his poetry; and along with this she was delving into astronomy, ancient and modern geography, and history, which speaks very well for this little girl in the year 1758 or 9. About this time she had definitely established herself as a little poet in the finest circles of Boston. The earliest attempts which have been preserved to us being her uh acknowledgement of loyalty in a poem, which was felt, by many of the Colony at that time, a poem addressed to George III because he had repealed the Stamp Act. Of course this was some years before the revolutionary struggle had begun. This poetry of hers was eighteenth-century poetry and therefore it carried the patterns of the day. It was repressed and formal, but it represented the mind of a very young girl that recently come to these shores. That’s an interesting thing about her and about the other young people of her day, 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu that they responded readily to what was going on in the social and civic life; and that she would have the temerity to write a letter to George III in England is remarkable indeed. Sewell is dead. Swift–pinioned fame thus cried. Sewell is dead. Is Sewell dead, my trembling tongue replied, Oh what a blessing in his flight denied How oft for us the holy prophet prayed. How oft to us the Word of Life conveyed. By duty urged my mournful verse to close, I for his tomb this epitaph compose. MR: That’s lovely. Mrs. Thurman, how old would you think she was at this time? Pitts Theology Library Emory University So it was, that the freedom in which she lived and moved and had her being, in the family of the Wheatleys made it possible for her to extend her kind and thoughtful spirit in many directions. In 1769 she became a member of the Old South Meeting House, pastored at that time by Dr. Sewell. It was upon the late uh latters death, a year after Phillis Wheatley had joined this church, that she wrote the poem for his tombstone, which is again astounding for a little servant girl in the fellowship of Old South Meeting House. This is a bit of the poem: SBT: I think perhaps uh fifteen, [MR can be heard in agreeing in background] fourteen or fifteen. MR: Yes. SBT: She wrote um epitaphs for other friends at this age, um prominent people who were in this Wheatley circle. They were formal and serious, but they were written in appreciation of people, who could create a Phillis Wheatley in this new free land. I think that should be said here in commendation of the society in which she moved at the time. MR: [beginning while SBT is finishing sentence] That they could appreciate her, it-its hard to believe when you read the, when you say the date, 1769, these people who had slaves could give one s-so much freedom and could appreciate the quality of her mind and spirit. SBT: Well the insight perhaps of early New Englanders, and they and only they I would think could-could create and-and br-bring to life here, um the Phillis Wheatley whom we have come to honor uh on this occasion. She was very fortunate coming to Boston, I think, instead of to Charleston or Atlanta. She addressed herself to the important events of her day always preparing unconsciously for more remarkable opportunities, which were to come to her later. In 1773 she was given a trip to England by this gracious mistress Mrs. Wheatley, who was now her patron. In England, she was presented by the Countess Huntington to the drawing rooms of London, and here again it is well to note the year, 1773. The little African girl who had become the little American girl, the Bostonian Phillis Wheatley, is taken back across the Atlantic and-and uh back across a very different-different passage it must have been this time, to be presented in the drawing rooms of London. It was early in the next year upon her return to Boston that her collection, while imposing one it was for that time [sic], was published and called “Poems of 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Various Subjects, Religious and Moral” by [MR clears throat] Phillis Wheatley. In the Boston Gazette for January 24th, 1774 appeared an advertisement: “This day published, adorned with elegant engraving of the author, poems by Phillis Wheatley sold by Cox and Perry at their store on Kings Street.” Pitts Theology Library Emory University MR: Very sweet; very old-fashioned and formal, yes? SBT: Before coming back to America- and incidentally she did rush home suddenly because Mrs. Wheatley, gravely ill, wanted to see her before she passed on- Phillis was presented a gift from the Lord Mirror of London: a leather-bound copy of Milton’s Paradise Lost, uh which was a very high tribute to her as she returned to literary, a literary future of very great promise in her own land. Because her moment of highest honor was yet to come. In 1775, du-during the Siege of Boston, George Washington had his Revolutionary army headquarters stationed in Cambridge, Phillis wrote a letter to the distinguished soldier enclosing a poem of high tribute and was thus the first to refer to him as first in peace. Her poem was printed in the American monthly museum periodical at the time and the words “first in peace” appear in the opening lines. The poem begins: Thee, first in peace and honor We demand the grace and glory of thy martial hand. Famed for thy valor, for thy virtues more, Hear every tongue thy guardian and implore [Brief Pause] MR: This is very lovely. Uh I read it before-fore we went on the air and I also read uh George Washington’s reply to this poem, which I think is lovely. Could you read that for us please, Mrs. Thurman? SBT: It’s a much longer poem, but um I-I have just read the first four lines where she speaks of him as first in peace and honor. Um this poem, and the uh accompanying letter, uh George Washington re-received and uh sent a reply on the date of February the 2nd, 1776 and he begins his letter, “Miss Phillis, your favor of the 26th of October did not reach my hand til the middle of December. Time enough, you say, to have given an answer ere this. Granted, but a variety of important occurrences, continually interposing to distract the mind and to withdraw the attention, I hope, will apologize for the delay, and plead my excuse for the seeming, but not real, neglect. I thank you most sincerely for your polite notice of me, in the elegant lines you enclosed; and however un-undeserving I may be of such encomium, the style and manner exhibit a striking proof of your poetical talents. In honor of which, and as a tribute justly due you, I would have published the poem, had I not been apprehensive that while I only meant to give the world this new instance of your genius, I might have incurred the imputation of vanity. This and nothing else determined me not to give it place in the public prints. If you should ever come to Cambridge, or near headquarters, I shall be happy to see a person so favored by the Muses, and to whom nature has been so liberal and beneficent in her dispensations.” It is signed “I am with great respect, your obedient humbled servant, George Washington” 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu MR: Very impressive and he wrote beautiful prose himself, didn’t-don’t you think so Mrs. Thurman or do you suppose a secretary wrote that? I don’t think so, no. MR: Were you going to read the names of these people? Pitts Theology Library Emory University SBT: [Starting at the end of MR’s sentence] Well. I-I think he wrote it himself. Its very much like-like [MR laughing in background] the letters that uh we find that he has addressed to other people. That he took time uh-uh during those-those crowded hours to [MR says “imagine” in background and clears throat] respond to Phillis Wheatley is an amazing insight into the character of George Washington. [Pause] It is um, a rather formal and stilted uh prose, however, but it is the eighteenth century, which we must remember even when we think of Phillis Wheatley and all of the poems that she wrote at that time, against the background of the eighteenth century and the style and pattern of that day. Sometime after this, Phillis accepted the invitation that had been extended her by George Washington to visit his headquarters in Cambridge, and she was received with great courtesy by General Washington and his officers. It was to be expected I suppose, that um many skeptics of that day would doubt if the young Boston Negro girl were really the author of many of her poems and communications. Of the many that were signed by her, and uh th-there were those who considered uh, they may have been written by someone else because it was very difficult for them to accept her genius. Because of this, her collection of poems had to carry m-after a time the following voucher, which is very interesting indeed. SBT: Yes. “We whose names,” uh this is the voucher “We whose names are underwritten do assure the world, that the poems specified in the following page, as we verily believe were written by Phyllis, a young Negro girl. She has been examined by some of the best judges and thought qualified to write them.” The signatures here are, they begin with, His Excellency Governor Thomas Hutchinson; Honorable Harrison Gray; Honorable James Pitts; Honorable John Hancock; Reverend Samuel Cooper; Reverend Samuel Mather. MR: Well, very fine names indeed in American history. SBT: After this she was to write a poem to [clears throat] the men of Harvard, which said in closing “improve your privileges while ye stay, ye pupils, and each hour redeems that hears a good or bad report of you to Heaven. Let sin that baneful evil to the soul by you be shunned nor once remit your guard. Suppress the deadly serpent in its egg. Ye bleeming[sp]-blooming plants of human race divine, an Ethiop tells you ‘tis your greatest foe its transient sweetness turns to endless pain and in immense perdition sinks the soul.” I don’t know how many Harvard men saw that poem [MR laughs] or knew that it had been written to them. Incidentally, Phillis Wheatley was a very pious girl and she would dare to take a subject like this and address such a poem to men of Harvard. I suppose she heard a lot about them and the other students around New England at the time. If she were living today, she would write the poem many times over again perhaps. MR: I think it would be very useful indeed. 5 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu SBT: I think it would, even for our students today. This edition of her poetry is located on Harvard’s campus in the library there, one of the few places where it can be found. There may be another copy at Vassar College, but it’s very hard to find them anywhere. They have become collector’s items of course. Many people are looking around in old bookstores to find this first edition of Phillis Wheatley’s poems. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Now, it is a sadder story to tell of her closing days. The story of Phillis Wheatly is the story of a sensitive woman who could not make the journey all the way through life with se-sensitive friends surrounding her. The Wheatleys had passed on and aft-after the Revolutionary War, conditions were serious in and around Boston. It was not easy to find work to do; food and rations were scarce. It was a Boston that would follow any war, and particularly this one. With the death of the Wheatleys, uh Phillis was without support and of course she could not earn her board and keep by writing poems, and at this time she considered it would be um the proper thing to be married. So in the year 1778, she married a man, a ne’er-do-well who made many promises it seems. He was impressive to look at; he carried along pretensions of being qualified for many things. He was a baker, storekeeper, lawyer, doctor, and Phillis was unfortunate in herin her selection of this man, but it is one of the things which go to make this interesting and eventful life of hers. The marriage was not successful. In broken health, she spent her last days in a part of the city, um where she was trying to carry on some work in an atmosphere of a boarding house. Here she took in people to room and board, but um her health was broken very soon from having lost two children and dying the day the third was born. She comes to the end of her days here, destitute, deserted by a man who sold her treasured gifts of books and valuables in payment of his debts. Mr. Peters was his name, um he it was who sold the copy of Paradise Lost which the Lord Mirror of London had given her, and so we won’t find that copy again as Mr. Peters has done away with that. MR: Well, um, seems that such a delicate person of mind and spirit would not be realistic enough or strong enough to cope with a Mr. Peters- seems to happen that way, don’t you think so? SBT: I’m afraid it does. A few days after her death in 177-84, there appeared this notice in the Boston Independent Chronicle: “Last Lord’s day died Mrs. Phillis Peters, formerly Phillis Wheatley age 31, known to the literary world by her celebrated miscellaneous poems. Her funeral is to be this afternoon at four o’clock from the house lately improved by Mr. Todd nearly opposite Dr. Bullfinch’s at West Boston, where her friends and acquaintances are desired to attend.” The house thus referred to was situated on or near the present site of the Revere House in Bolton Square, formerly known as a portion of Cambridge Street and sometimes as the Western-Westerly end of Court Street. [pause] It is uh interesting to me, Mrs. Rogers, that the um two hundredth anniversary of uh Phillis Wheatley, Phillis Wheatley’s coming to the United States would have gone unnoticed if the city of Cleveland, having a Phillis Wheatley House, had not called the nation’s attention to Phillis Wheatley and the fact that she was the very first Negro woman to a-achieve distinction in America. We do know that she is honored in many ways by having many branches and uh 6 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu YWCA centers named for her in this country. But she should be remembered, and here in Boston, for having made a distinctive contribution to our life and to our growing attitude of friendliness and understanding, and to a feeling of all-inclusiveness that was germane to New England life during the days of her brief time in the city. Pitts Theology Library Emory University MR: Mrs. Thurman, I’m very grateful to you for exposing us to this lovely lady and I’m certain that not very many people, like myself, knew much about her until you brought her to our attention. Thank you very much indeed and I hope in the future we can find out a little more about her than our time allows this afternoon. I know you have uh another person that you are very anxious to tell us something about and I believe you said his name was Amos Fortune. SBT: Yes, Amos Fortune, um comes next, and uh before going on to him, I would like to tell you that it was a reading of that fascinating book [stutters] Amos Fortune, Free Man written by Elizabeth Yates, who in private life is Mrs. William McGreal of Peterborough, New Hampshire. I was particularly happy in coming to Boston after I read the book, that I might uh get more facts on him and be near the place where Amos Fortune lived and died. Such was the impression that the book had made upon me and thousands of others as far away as California. It was due to Mrs. McGreal, Elizabeth Yates, that so many people knew of Amos Fortune. She literally brought him forth from the grave and gave him to us at the time when we need to interpret his life and his influence so very much. A-About him, uh much can be said that would present new [sic] fact to many people. He reached Boston on a little ship, which was called the White Falcon as early as July of 1725, uh fully twenty-five years before Phillis Wheatley arrived. He too had been brought over on a slave ship from the Gold Coast, which is now Ghana, when he was about fifteen years of age. He was bought by good Quakers, um who went down to meet his ship. Many of them at the time purchased these bondsmen when they were not financially in a position to have servants, to say nothing of slaves, but they purchased them at the shipside that they uh might uh have an opportunity to work for their own freedom and become citizens, free citizens, of this commonwealth. It was a very old and gracious tradition of the Quakers of Boston in the eighteenth century. Now the Quakers who purchased Amos Fortune were Caleb and Celia Copeland. They lived very near Boston and it was with them that Amos Fortune had his first years here, and very good and profitable years indeed were they. He lived with them until 1740, and during this time he attended the Quaker meetings and each first Sunday uh aft-after which he attended Mrs. Copeland’s School for Children which she conducted in her own home. Other Africans who had and come and who were in various houses and forums around New England considered him a very great friend, for he remembered his native land and could tell the others heroic stories of his own father who was the chief of a tribe of At-mun-shi. He could recall the philosophers of the older men and the long talks at night, women children together, the festivals, the songs of young voices. It was said that Phillis Wheatley could keep only one haunting memory of her home and people, being so young when she was snatched away to the hole of the slave ship that brought her here, but that memory was a very interesting one: a memory of her mother making a gracious gesture, bowing very low and pouring out water in salutation to the rising sun. It was as though she performed some act of choreography as the sun came up in the morning. 7 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University [Tape makes a cut – SBT resumes talking in the middle of phrase]… very different um with Amos Fortune, uh for he remembered many things and he gave the quality of his being to the dream of New England in 1725 and until 18-1 [1801] —the year of his death. He served this New England with a magnificent heart. In 1740 he was given over to the Richardsons of Woburn, sold to them where he learned a trade and became an excellent tanner. He had earned enough to pay for his freedom, his own freedom, in 1769, and then he became a purchaser of freedom for other people. There is a sidelight on him here that is remarkable indeed. He paid for the freedom of one person whom he wanted to marry. By 1769 he himself is an old man, or getting to be an old man for his time, and this person whom he wanted to marry was fastbecoming an elderly woman, but Amos Fortune wanted her to die free, so he paid for her freedom and married her. She died in a short year. After that, he paid for the freedom of another woman who was along in years and who was ill at the time of this act, and she too died very soon afterward. And the third wife he paid for uh the freedom of, Violet, who lived a very long life with him, dying a year after his death. This wife lies beside him in the cemetery at East Jaffrey today. He moved to Jaffrey, built his house in the shadow of the Monadnock mountain in New Hampshire; “the mountain that stands alone,” he said. He proceeded to become one of East Jaffrey’s finest citizens. In time one of the doctors of this community indentured his own son, that the boy might learn the tanner’s trade. Uh, the indentured paper read that the doctor had of his own free will and accord, bound his son Charles as apprentice to Amos Fortune, tanner, to learn his art, trade, or mystery after the manner of an apprentice. To serve him from the date hereof for and during the term until he shall arrive at age twenty-one years. During said time, said apprentice his master shall faithfully serve his secrets keep his lawful commands gladly obeyed. [MR laughs] SBT: I think this is a marvelous statement of an apprenticeship paper. And what makes Amos Fortune so [pause- can hear faint music in background] wonderful, viewed in the light of the highest values of his day, is the evidence of a great public spirit, which consumed him. He can teach us many of the fine and skillful arts of integration in all ways. He made his will, leaving one hundred dollars to his church in Jaffrey with which to purchase a silver communion service for all of its communit-communicants, and he left about two hundred and fifty dollars- uh both of these considerable sums at that time- the latter sum for the public schools to be used in any way for the benefit of its students. The school money was deposited with interest and today has become a sum of several thousand dollars. A forum is named in his honor today and a special time is set aside to remember him, and to do him honor in the community where he lived and died. The silver service was sent to a church in the South where it is now felt lost. Well-meaning people thought that this silver service might inspire some people in the churches of the South to think and feel as Amos Fortune did. The only thing that really happened was that it went south and was lost, and now we search for it today as those who seek for the Holy Grail; but we cannot find it. We know that uh we can find uh the spirit of the silver service only as we make gifts of the spirit to our community wherever we live, just as he did. High tribute is due these two. Representing in Phillis Wheatley a woman of thought, a reflection of intuition, and in Amos Fortune, who lived ninety years of the eighteenth century, a man of noble action. Their stories should hearten many of us here in America, in all parts of America, 8 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu coming from racial and creedal and national backgrounds, those who have kept the dream of democracy and freedom in America and who look forward to this dream and those freedoms becoming the heritage of all of her people. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I would like to tell you Mrs. Rogers that I was invited to this high school in East Jaffrey last fall to speak uh on that special day somewhat as a friend of Amos Fortune. The fact that I came for this particular purpose and with uh my own background would make me a friend of Amos Fortune, as the high school students are, and we have uh um to have a man remembered because of his gift over a hundred fifty years in this little New Hampshire town is something that does gladden the hearts, and I speak for all the friends of Amos Fortune. MR: Both of these stories are very inspiring, Mrs. Thurman, and thank you for bringing them to us this afternoon. You mentioned in our discussion, some time ago, that this month was the anniversary of the death of Harriet Tubman, another wonderful Negro woman. The other um day in discussing Harriet Tubman with a friend of mine, he said that he’d figured out that Harriet Tubman must have walked something like six-sixty thousand miles over this country in her underground journeys. This is something of course I didn’t know, he said she made about four hundred trips back and forth, and the distance from the South to Canada being what it is was really unbelievable. I wonder if you would um have time to tell us a few words about this wonderful woman, Harriet Tubman, who lived such a long and profitable life? SBT: Yes, it is fine of you to mention her right here. I have been thinking about her in connection with Phillis Wheatley. I would like to connect her with Phillis Wheatley. For, uh Phillis Wheatley was a Negro woman of the eighteenth century and I would consider Harriet Tubman the outstanding contributor to the nineteenth and indeed to the twentieth centuries because her life stretches across the nineteenth century, as you’ve said, having been born in 1820 and having died in 1913. [35:11] Now she was not fortunate, as was Phillis Wheatley, to um be brought to Boston, or perhaps I should say that because of her deeds, her brave deeds, and her leadership, she was fortunate not to have been born in Africa and brought to Boston. Uh she was born in Maryland and lived there as a slave until she ran away, which is the history of many of the very active and progressive ones who had to run away and take things in their own hands and speed them up. She ran away and established herself in this section in Boston and-and New Bedford, and she became uh very interested in life here, but often sad and having a feeling of guilt that she had come away and had the freedom that the others were denied, so she went back again and again into Maryland, deep into Virginia, pressing into the South, until she had brought out more than four hundred of her fellow bondsmen. They traveled by night. She carrying a sawed-off shotgun—uh it being necessary to have at that time—she following the North Star. [sic] And they would come to this section and on into Canada [whistling can be heard in the background] uh she to establish uh whom for her bondsmen, her freedmen, which was the northern terminal of her underground uh railroad. This was established in Auburn, New York. Because of that, she was called the Moses of her day and she made a contribution as a scout and spy during the Civil War and actually led a raid in South Carolina. She knew the Abolitionists here, one and all, particular-particularly uh did she know as a friend Robert Gould Shaw, whose statue is in the Boston Gardens. Uh this young man was a great inspiration to her, and she was to him. They were in South Carolina at the same time during the war and uh um in the battle in which he felled. You are interested in Harriet Tubman I think because you have seen this very 9 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University beautiful tapestry quilt, which [talking in the background] was done by a group, executed by a group in California. [Faint music in background] It has Harriet Tubman’s figure on it and uh these people whom she will bring across the border from darkness into light, uh freedom and opportunity, are sketched in in a fascinating fashion. When we think that it-the quilt was made by a group of men and women, um an interracial group of men and women, who made their distinctive contributions- the men uh doing research and the women the stitching I think- um it is uh it attests to-to the appreciation which many Americans feel for her as one if it’s very great heroes. They were artists and craftsmen, an interracial group as I have said, and as a matter of fact there were a few Orientals who worked on that quilt I understand. MR: Well it-it’s very beautiful indeed. It was on display at the chapel several times and you said that it has been on display in Washington in several of the government buildings. Also, I’ve seen a lovely mosaic uh of Harriet Tubman that David Holleman did and if I’m not mistaken, it-he gave it to your husband, Dean Howard Thurman. Is that correct? SBT: Yes. Yes, uh with um Harriet Tubman leading um a little um boy by the hand as though [MR clears throat] she is giving him a benediction and following um the path of the North Star and leading him into its light and fulfillment. David Holleman has another um mosaic of Harriet Tubman, which many of us here in Boston hope one day may be placed at Harriet Tubman House, which is a community center about which you know located here- a center which is rendering very great service to um children in the community where it is located in Roxbury. MR: Well, I certainly hope so. I’m a great admirer, as you are Mrs. Thurman, of Mr. Holleman’s work and also his spirit. Now we come to a very exciting event that we can’t let pass without some mention, although we’re very far away: this is the new African Republic of Ghana. We are both very thrilled about this event and in this the prospect, the hope of a truly free Africa. [40:01] The newspapers have stressed that the prime minister of Ghana emphasized his sympathy for the peaceful theories of Gandhi. I would like to quote uh what one man says here about uh Nkumah’s [Nkrumah] idea, and I’m reading from the Christian Science Monitor an article by Edward M. Waken [sp?], and he says, “After months of studying Gandhi’s policy and watching the effect it had,” quoting Nkumah [Nkrumah] I should have said, “I began to say-to see that when backed by a strong political organization, it could be the solution to the colonial problem. In Nehru’s rise to power, I recognized the success of one, who pledged to Socialism, was able to interpret Gandhi’s philosophy in practical terms.” That’s the end of the quote. I just want to say on thing [clears throat], talking about historically thoughtful people, uh the Africans really can assume responsibility if it is given to them. The trouble has been that they haven’t been given any responsibility in Africa, or very little until now. From my own very brief and superficial experience, I noticed there that every-any African that had any responsibility toward me, or towards his job at the time, did a fine one if given the freedom and liberty to do it. This is why Ghana is so exciting for me. I certainly hope that one day all of Africa will be free. It is hard to imagine in the light of events today and in the light of what is going on in South Africa is almost too dreadful to think about. But if Ghana can be free, then, it seems, there is hope for the rest of Africa. It occurred to me in mentioning the influence of Nehru and Gandhi, on uh the prime minister of Ghana, that you, Mrs. Thurman, because of your having traveled extensively in India, because 10 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu you have known the great Gandhi, that perhaps you could say something in the light of your experience on this subject and in the light of your traveling and lectures in India. Pitts Theology Library Emory University SBT: Well yes, I would like to. I think, however, that uh Amos Fortune must be very happy in his grave in East Jaffrey knowing that uh Ghana has come into being uh formally um the Gold Coast from whence he comes, Ghana of today. He was um one of the great uh forerunners of the potentiality of men of the Gold Coast, and it is because of him, I think, one reason uh would be uh that the Gold Coast has proved its capacity for all of Africa for leading the way for all of Africa’s nations. And the men who have come to this country and who lie in our soil, would be happy to turn their eyes and their hopes toward Ghana. And if indeed, uh Nkrumah is inspired by Gandhian theories, I would say that Ghana is in very good fortune. We had very early hours with Gandhi that extended into noon. He wanted uh to meet us, and we wanted to meet him, because he thought we could answer some questions about American life. He was particularly interested uh to know about the life of Negroes and other minority racial groups in America, about our own country and how we are meeting the um fascinating challenge and privilege of making one people and one country um from a variety of strains [could be strands?] and sources here. He wanted to know how we worked toward this expression, which has a remarkable practical-it is having a remarkable practical demonstration right before our very eyes in the South today. The thing that is being done in many sections, that is being brought to completion and fulfillment by ministers who are trying to carry out the Gandhi tradition, wouldhe would consider um the-a fulfillment of his dream many thousand mile-uh-miles from India. MR: There’s a very fine minister, about whom you know, Reverend King, uh is in Ghana with his wife, and I’m sure this is going to be a very profitable visit for him and for Ghana. One of our own very good friends, friend of Dr. Schweitzer Revered Homer Jack, a unitarian minster from Chicago, is in Ghana and we hope we can entice him to this microphone when he comes back. Do you think Gandhi, if he were alive today, would be happy with the progress that has been made in America, as far as the American Negro is concerned? Uh Mrs. Thurman, do you think that he would feel it has… [end of tape]. 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/. Title A name given to the resource Sue Bailey Thurman Recordings Description An account of the resource This collection contains a two-part interview between Miriam Rogers and Sue Bailey Thurman. In this interview, Thurman explores the lives of Phyllis Wheatley and Amos Fortune, two black people brought to Boston on slave ships, presenting their lives of thought and action as exemplary of democracy and freedom in America. Thurman also talks briefly about the life of Harriet Tubman, and other current events, including: the growing influence of Gandhi's philosophy of non-violence, and readings from a book of "Meditations for Women," to which Thurman contributed. All in all, this interview offers a small window into the work and thinking of Sue Bailey Thurman. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Rodell Jefferson III. AudioWithTranscription Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1950s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WBUR, Boston, Massachusetts Audio with Transcription <div style="text-align:center;"><audio controls style="width:90%;"> <source src="http://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/pittsthurman%2Foriginal%2F1ea7391ebeffc3fc0a65baa1c806758e.mp3?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAI4CD764Y635IGLNA&Expires=1648053168&Signature=Ig9lxQeOwWUCIcsLwzv2%2BBjfvbQ%3D" type="audio/mpeg"> Your browser does not support the audio element. </audio> </div> 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 Interview with Sue Bailey Thurman on "Presenting Albert Schweitzer" with host Miriam Rogers, Side A Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Miriam Rogers Sue Bailey Thurman Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1959-03-10 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. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 394-337_A Description An account of the resource "Presenting Albert Schweitzer" was a radio program aired on WBUR Boston University Radio, hosted by Miriam Rogers. This episode was an interview with Sue Bailey Thurman. The introduction to the episode is provided by Norbert Ellerin. In this interview, Sue Bailey Thurman presents the lives of Phyllis Wheatley and Amos Fortune, two black people who had arrived to America at Boston on slave ships. Thurman says that the stories of their lives should hearten all Americans, as they embody the dream of democracy and freedom in America. In addition to Wheatley and Fortune, Sue Bailey Thurman also explores the life of Harriet Tubman, and speaks to Gandhi's increasing influence on the freedom movements in both the American South and in Ghana. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Transcription by Kayleigh M. Whitman Description by Rodell Jefferson. https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/5176d27c664d2128e507e4103f7de1ec.pdf 15486d14a8cd5c4318e174309890e9fd PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-755_B.mp3 And I think that's arrogance-- to think that we can kill anything. Well, I know this-Because life is life. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Is it possible-- you have just said-- life is life and can have no part of death. Life cannot die. How then can we kill? Do we kill the law of electricity by breaking that bulb so that it can no longer support the force of electricity? How great are we if what we do, in the interest of what we have to do for the nourishment of a vehicle in which we may express some things between ourselves that among [INAUDIBLE]-- how can that be killing? But I think that in any-- I think what you're saying is valid-- and in any ultimate terms-- but I am one of these manifestations of life dealing with another manifestation of life-- and that has responsibilities right there in that tight circle. And that's what I'm talking about. But it seems to me that if there is an omniscience that caused all this to be-- you, me, and all that is-- and through our empirical or whatever kinds of observations, we see that that operates with some order which must be out of that omniscience-- and some of that order seems to be that some species live off of the material manifestations through which life or energy gets expressed-that it's sheer arrogance on our part to think that what we do in that lawful process that omniscience has ordained us to do-Says who? Says your mind and mine and every other mind in the world that worries that subject in the name of philosophy, theology, science-- whatever. There are models somewhere for this, and somebody much smarter than I have said if men can think of it, it exists. You may be right-- that may be a solution. For me, it is not. Because I cannot escape my personal sense of responsibility for the life that is in me-- [INAUDIBLE] I was grounded in existence and all that. But in one sense, what is happening in my context has never happened before. Nobody like me has ever lived before. Absolutely right. And gives me a-- oh, is it-- [INAUDIBLE]? No I'm turning it-Is it-Well, it's 3 o' clock, if you want to break. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Oh, my. Let's coffee. I'm putting [INAUDIBLE]. [INAUDIBLE] coffee break. [CLEARS THROAT] Yes? Well, I was just clearing my throat. But you know [INAUDIBLE]-[LAUGHTER] Oh, I thought you were [INAUDIBLE]. Yeah, [INAUDIBLE] go ahead. Pitts Theology Library Emory University [LAUGHTER] No, no. I-- I'm-- The question you raise, I think, is a very good question-- if you look at life in ultimate terms. But you see I am a time binder, as well as a space binder. And it is in the space binding dimension of my reality that I hurt-- that I hunger-- that I do this and this and this and this. And it is that aspect of any other manifestation of life's reality that I feel I am under obligation to deal with. And this is where the thing-- But as a time binder-- then I'm in another dimension. As a time binder, I sit here, and I go back 20 years. I'm still here. For a hot second, I saw the coffee in my hand, but I was still here. I mean, there is a non-space, non-time-- a non-spatial, non-temporal dimension of my personality, which is I think rooted in what I am calling the aliveness of life. And that part cannot die. But the space binding dimension of my personality is also a reality, and I have a responsibility there. And the question is, for me-- and I do not speak for the world-- the question is-- how can I negotiate my time-space interval, honoring what seems to me to be the responsibility of my being a space binder, despite the fact that all the time I am transcending it as a time binder? Now this is what I'm getting at. Because, you see, I feel the same way about death-- about living and dying. And it belongs in this dimension, it seems to me. In terms of being a time binder, there's no reality in something called death. What do you mean when you say you're a time binder? What precisely does that-Well, when I say that I am a time binder, that means that I function freely outside of any particular time interval in which I may be living at that moment. That's all I'm saying. You see, and then I can go back 20 years. I can go back to yesterday. I can leap 30 years into the future. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu How can you-Guessing a lot when I get over there, but-- [LAUGHS] --but it is that. And of course, this is-- we better stop, because when I get into that, we'll be here for 45 minutes, going. Because-- and I-I'm glad you asked that question, because I thought it was theological language. [RUSTLING WITH MICROPHONE] Pitts Theology Library Emory University [LAUGHTER] It has been suggested that I say what I'm reading when I read it, and so I'm saying what I'm reading-[INAUDIBLE] --what I've been-- [LAUGHS] --reading. This is a quotation from Olive Schreiner's From Man to Man. "The new mother, when she looks down at the little head upon her breast, whispers in her heart-'Oh, may you seek after truth. If anything I teach you be false, may you throw it from you, and pass on to higher and deeper knowledge than I ever had. If you are an artist, may no love of wealth or fame or admiration and no fear of blame or misunderstanding make you ever paint, with pen or brush, an ideal or a picture of external life otherwise than as you see it; if you become a politician, may no success for your party or yourself or the seeming good of even your nation ever lead you to tamper with reality and play a diplomatic part. In all the difficulties which will arise in life, fling yourself down on the truth and cling to that as a drowning man in a stormy sea flings himself onto a plank and clings to it, knowing that, whether he sink or swim with it, it is the best that he has. If you become a man of thought and learning, never with your left hand be afraid to pull down what your right hand has painfully built up through the years of thought and study, if you see it at last not to be founded on that which is; die poor, unloved, unknown, a failure, perhaps-- but shut your eyes to nothing that seems to them the reality." [CLOSES AND SETS DOWN BOOK] Now I'll drop back to the time binder and the space binder for a minute. One of the tricks of the mind-- my mind, forgive me-- is that when I get an insight, I think that I thought of it myself. And there's a moment-- a breathless moment-- when I am full of felicitation and congratulations that going along, attending to my own business, I was visited by this tremendous thing. [LAUGHTER] 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And then the disillusionment-- I didn't think of it at all. But at a moment when I was not aware of it, it insinuated itself into my awareness-- and my consciousness-- and then I began to work-- and then finally begin to bear fruit. And I thought I planted it, but I didn't do it at all. Pitts Theology Library Emory University So the struggle with humility is a lifelong struggle. This is what I'm really saying. So back now to the time binder and the space binder-- that is a derivative in my mind-- a sort of residue to that I found in the bottom of my mind. But I had spent a year working, with great intensity, in an effort to discover the timeless religious insights of Negro spirituals, getting ready for the Ingersoll Lecture. And it said itself. And I remember when the whole thing was over, Dr. Brightman-- the name may be familiar to some of you-- who was the philosopher that Boston University generated-- he was dead before I went there-- but he was present when I gave the Ingersoll Lecture. And he came up to me, and he said, now where did you get that concept about the time binder and the space binder? And I had forgotten until now that I told him the truth-- that I told him that it had popped up-- just blossomed-- out of all of the brooding and feeling and thinking I'd been doing about the word of Negro spirituals to the people who themselves had no outlet-- no door-- no way-- no opening. And I straightway forgot about it, and since that time I've been using it again. And today is the first time that-- it occurred to me while we were fooling around with this coffee and so forth, in the break-- that that's where it came from. And I'm glad to acknowledge it. I wasn't on some lonely height, contemplating the nature of existence-[LAUGHTER] --when up, out of the bowels of the earth, came this tremendous insight that my mind seized upon and reduced to a manageable unit to pass on. No, no, no, no, no, no. [LAUGHTER] Not a chance-- not a chance. Now to break it down, therefore, it has been seminal in my thought and my whole approach to what I call reality-- and more seminal, because it was planted out of sight and just bearing this fruit. Now as I-- well, I'm sorry-- you answer your business-- I think you see that if the mind can get handles-- you know, if you can get handles of a way of thinking about things, then you have a-- how to say this-- there's a decoding process of intellection that against which the conglomerates of experience-- beat, beat, beat-- in this decoding reduces the essence, in terms of insights and concepts and so forth and so on. And the pitfall is that when that happens, the temptation is to think that you thought it. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University But the most amazing and startling insight of my whole life is that I am being thought. I am being thought-- not that I think-- but I am being thought. And it gives me-- it's-- I don't know how to put this to you. It is very precarious to me, because on the one hand, there are times that I don't want to take the responsibility for what I'm thinking. And on the other hand, there are times when I want to grab all the responsibility for what I'm thinking. And neither one of these is true. Neither one is sound. Neither one is valid. So to get back now-- as a time binder, my whole feeling about death-- that I want to take the rest of the time now to talk about death a little. Can you hold it now and let me turn this tape over? And then I won't have to lose anything in the middle of it. All right, now-- oh, about death. [INAUDIBLE] Well, that's it. That's it. Oh. Yeah, you are-[LAUGHTER] [INTERPOSING VOICES] And you know, can you imagine what some part of me goes through when I eat a piece of chicken? Yes. But I still eat it. You see, then I repent, and sometimes I don't repent. [LAUGHTER] You see. It depends how tired I am-- how upset some other aspect of my life is-- and I read all of that into this. So we don't know where we are, but we certainly are in it. All right, now. As I grew up, death was no st-- well, no, I started to say no stranger, but death is a stranger to anybody all together. But in our community, every summer, a certain number of people died from typhoid fever. It was the days before you knew anything about-- there weren't any cures for typhoid fever. There was a plant that grew in certain yards-- we had one in the back part of our yard-- I know how to spell this, but we called it a "palma Christian" leaf. It was a big leaf, like that. And the 5 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu only thing that we ever used to break the fever was to bathe the body and try to cool it off a little and then wrap the body in these leaves. And sometimes it would break the fever-- sometimes it wouldn't. Pitts Theology Library Emory University So in the beginning of the summer, without any sordidness-- no, that's not the word-- without any sense of the melodramatic or any sense of-- well, I can't think of the word, but any sense of whatever it is-- my buddies and I would talk about who is going to die this summer. There wasn't anything gruesome about it, but we knew that every summer a certain number of fellows were going to die-- or people in our community. And they would die from typhoid fever. And if you got it, you may live. If you lived, it was a miracle. From rattlesnake bite in the huckleberries season-- being drowned in the quarry, where none of the kids were permitted to go to swim-- but you did go. [LAUGHTER] And you died, because it had no bottom. Or the 3 o'clock train-- now the 3 o'clock train came through the section of our community which was about a mile and a half before it got to the station. So it came down full speed-- it didn't begin to brake until about a mile of the station. And there was no rail guard there-- I mean, nothing to protect you, so that at least twice a year-sometimes three times a year-- somebody would be run over by the 3 o'clock train. Now there wasn't anything depressing about our talking, but this is on our way for the first day's fishing or the first day's huckleberry picking. We talked about death and who was going to die, and there was no nightmarish quality. And if a person had typhoid fever, as the person moved towards the crisis, we could always tell it. Because the children stopped playing in the yard and sat on the front steps. And you knew now that the mother or the father-- whoever the sick person-- or the child-- had now moved into the crisis. And no one knew how the crisis would end except God. And perhaps he had to guess, I don't know. And you knew that the crisis was passed by one or two things. The kids started playing again in the yard, or you heard the women screaming. So that death was a non-oppressive part of my ordinary growing up experience. And as I grew older and had to deal with it it-- had to think about it, one of the things I discovered was the fact that because I am a time binder-- and death is an aspect of the space binding dimensions of my personality-- as a time binder, I can be aware of my dying right up to zero. Now for me, this was a great growing discovery-- that as a time binder, I could be aware of Howard Thurman, the space binder, as he is being delivered from his time-space frame of reference. In other words, I can be conscious, I think, of my dying all the way. Because a part of me is not involved in that. A part of me is the observer, watching the space binding aspect of me participate in the passing of this time interval. This is what I'm saying. 6 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Now the problem, in my mind-- and it's been a part of my thought-- and I suppose I should apologize to you, because I am talking to you in the areas that are still full of confusion to my own mind. So it's all right to cheer up. [LAUGHTER] Pitts Theology Library Emory University You are on your way, so don't be smug. [LAUGHS] The closest that I can come to thinking-- and I feel every aspect of my experience, I've got to deal with it reflectively and just worry it as long as I live, trying to get whatever insight that will make me lay claim to it as my own. And I've thought a great deal about this. I've felt a great deal. And I've walked with so many people during these last moments. And there was a moment when the time binder dimension of personality lays claim to the space binder. Well, to put a window there-- when I was my first year in seminary, I worked in the summer as an assistant to a minister at First Baptist Church in Roanoke, Virginia. It's a big church-- 15, 1600 members, you know? And it is wonderful because the minister had known my family, and as a part of that sort of past, you called him cousin. I called him Cousin Arthur. We weren't kin, but it was closer than kin-- for some cousins, you can't stand. [LAUGHTER] At any rate, I was his assistant, and I was learning. I wasn't ordained or anything. My first job was to direct this daily Vacation Bible School. Do people still have those things? Oh, yes, in the summer. Is that so? Well, there were 330 or 40 youngsters in this daily Vacation Bible School and 15 or 20 teachers. And I was the bouncer. [LAUGHS] [INAUDIBLE] [INAUDIBLE] The boys were up to 12, you know? And I had two jobs. I was the bouncer for the unruly boys, and I had the closing worship upstairs in the sanctuary. Oh, that was something. I tell you. There wasn't any girls? Oh, no, no. They were nice and civilized. Their mothers that taught them a lot of things that they forgot subsequently, but they-[LAUGHTER] 7 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Anyway, once one Friday, I was having devotions upstairs. And I read a story-- I had made up a story-- about a cat. And it had a tremendous point. And there's a blackboard that I had brought, and I drew what I called a cat on the board. And everybody had mild hysterics. They'd never seen any-- Pitts Theology Library Emory University [LAUGHTER] --anything like that to be called a cat. And they couldn't get quiet enough for me to tell the story. So I just erased it and told them, let us stand and repeat the 23rd Psalm. [LAUGHTER] And we went home. But the next day, I did it. I said, now this is a good story. And-[LAUGHTER] And this is what I did. I took a piece of crayon-- vrrooo-- that's all I did. I said, now, that's a cat. [LAUGHTER] And every youngster did what-- put his image of a cat into this. That's good preaching, too-- just in passing. [LAUGHTER] You know? So the minister went away after about a month and left me in charge. Now I had gotten a driver's license. Nobody thinks that I've ever had one, but I had a driver's license. Nobody would ride with me, but-[LAUGHTER] Oh, I'm sorry. I'm just fooling around, reminiscing about this, but it was so fantastic. I had this Hupmobile. Have you ever heard of a Hupmobile? [INAUDIBLE] Anybody? Oh. Yeah. [INAUDIBLE] 8 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Were you old enough to know? Yeah? Wow. And my problem was I couldn't keep my mind on driving. I'd drive all over town in first gear-- and in those days, there's an exhaust, you know-and everybody knew when I was c-[LAUGHTER] [LAUGHTER] In the middle of the street. And it registered and went in and out. And the next-[LAUGHTER] --thing I knew, I saw this figure leaping. [LAUGHTER] Then I heard the whistle. [LAUGHTER] And that's when he came over to me and said, oh, it's you. [LAUGHTER] Pitts Theology Library Emory University --when I was coming. I couldn't do anything with this thing. And in those days, you didn't have traffic lights. You had, set in strategic places, you had a policeman who directed the traffic. And one of the places was just a block down the hill from the church. And I was going along. And somewhere, vaguely in my mind, I saw some-- [LAUGHS] --somebody [INAUDIBLE]. I'm going up the road to Dr. James, and I'm telling him he's got to take you off the street. [LAUGHTER] That ended my driving career. [LAUGHTER] But before that happened, the first day that Cousin Arthur was away-- and his family telephone rang. And I answered, and it was the local hospital. And the head nurse said I'd like to speak to Dr. James, and I said, well he isn't here-- he's on vacation. She said, well, he's the chaplain of the hospital, and there's this man who is dying up here. And he wants a minister to come. Are you a minister? Well, now, I am-- there's 1,000 years between that question and that feeble yes that I gave. 9 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University She said, well, will you please come up here right away. Well I got in the car. I went up. And she took me into this ward. In those days-- I guess they still do-- there was a curtain around it. And she beckoned me to come in one side, and she stood on the other side of this man. And here he was. His eyes had practically disappeared-- there was just a little white rim up here-- heavy breathing-- and she leaned over and whispered in his ear, the minister is here. She repeated it two or three times, as I took his hand. And slowly, his eyes dropped down into focus, and our eyes met. And he said, you-- with broken breathing-- he said, you are suppose to have something to say to someone who is dying. Please say it, and please hurry. I put one hand over the other hand. I had one hand on one of his hands. I put there-[CLAP] --and I bowed my head. And I prayed. I prayed in feeling tones that had no use for words and syllables. I sighed my spirit, hunting God down until I had found Him. And that's all I remember. And then, finally, I said, Amen-- opened my eyes, as he opened his eyes-- focused his eyes-- and the loose hand that was not in mine put-[CLAP] --on top of mind. And he said, I understand, thank you-- and died. And that was all of this. Now for a moment, the time binder and the space binder flowed together, and the time binder took off and left the space binder in my hands. Now I think-- to back up with another kind of category or generalization-- I think because a human being is so-- oh, I can't think of the words. A human being is so integrated, as to timespace construct, which is the human being's reality. And any human being who lives in touch with its reality-- nothing ever comes to him or her as a surprise. This is what I'm saying-nothing. You ought to know it's 4 o'clock. Oh, is it? Well, I'll quit now. I'll round this business out, and then-- thank you. Because your life is one thing. It is not a series of events. It's one breath. It is one beat. It is one pulsation. And the time binding, space binding dimensions of life are caught up in that expression of total creativity. And that's why, I don't think, that when you're in touch with your own reality in this sense, nothing ever surprises you, really. 10 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University Those of you who visit the sick and the dying-- that's an extreme illustration of it, but I could document it in many other ways-- but the time's out. But I'm sure you've had the experience that you go to talk to someone in the hospital or home who is very ill-- and if you know the person, and they know you, there's this flow-- and they wait until everybody in the family, or whoever it is, is out of the room-- and they say to you, you know-- whatever they call you-- I know I'm not going to get well. I know it, but I don't want the family to know it. I don't want this one to know it, I don't want-- and then when you go out they tell you, now we know that he is not going to make it, but we don't want him to know. There is no reality that can be hidden from reality-- no reality that can be hidden from reality. And that's why I feel that the real discipline of human life is to try to keep in touch with your own reality, however you define it. Don't quibble over what I mean. Find your own-- you know what it is. When you hit it, it's like the smell of ammonia. [SNAPS] It goes though you. And nothing catches you by surprise. You may hear yourself saying, oh, that's what it meant-- or that. But you know, you all look as if you are at a funeral. [LAUGHTER] Oh, thank you very much. We'll quit now. [LAUGHTER] Great-- 11 � 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/394-755_B.html" ></iframe> Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon Star King College, Berkeley, California Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1970s 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 394-755_B Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1978-06-28 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(-13610179.891766 4562064.9082981)) Title A name given to the resource Soundless Passion of a Single Mind, Lecture 3 (Starr King College), 1978 Jun 28 Description An account of the resource Thurman continues this lecture by discussing the fact that we cannot kill life, and it is arrogant to think that we can kill anything. Thurman tells how he is a time binder and a space binder which means that he can function freely outside of any time interval he might be in, and that death is an aspect of his space binding personality. Thurman describes how there is dimension to his personality that is rooted in the aliveness of life and cannot die. Then he tells how the struggle with humility is a life long struggle. Thurman then spends the majority of the lecture discussing death and reality. There is no reality in death. Death is a stranger to everyone, but growing up death was normalized to him, and he knows that he will be conscious of his dying. Thurman then tells an anecdote of when he was an assistant to a minister at First Baptist Church, and went to visit a dying man in the hospital. When this man died Thurman describes how his time binder and space binder aspects flowed together. Thurman concludes by stating that any human that lives in touch with reality can never be surprised, and that there is no reality that can be hidden from reality. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Mary Sellers Conley death humility omniscience reality space binder time binder https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/76bf3c4c3da2a0ec521ae20a93730bdd.pdf 05e8e15621047e2c4478caa5a05a648f PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-819.mp3 Endureth all things. Endureth all things. Endureth all things. Endureth all things. Endureth all things. Endureth all things. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Love hopeth all things, Endureth all things. The contradictions of experience confuse, confound. Tides of beauty caught in an undertow of slime goodness luminous, refined, manacled by evil-no hand can stay. Love, ripe and full, stalked by hate that binds and chokes. Hope, leaping clear from peak to peak haunted by echoes of despair. The contradictions of experience confuse, confound. Which is the true, the sure, the real? The final vote of man's spirit-- for what is it cast? Is there eternal drama here endless in intervals-whole in itself? Is the tension on the shadow a trick of mind, a whimper in the heart and nothing more? The closing vote-- what does it say? The contradictions are final, never. The growing edge of hope remains when all the voices of despair are stilled. Love persists when hate no longer holds. Goodness triumphs though evil struggles to the end. All this man's spirit says. The dogmas of the mind are afterthoughts. So let the winds blow. Let the torrents fume. Let the night wax in darkness. Let death be death. Life will not die. Life holds and grows. Knowledge shall vanish away. Whither there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. 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 the single cell which gave a slant to all that lives today or yesterday-no matter when. A ceaseless search like the ebb and flow of oceans marks all man's days. 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 shadows thicken and the lights grow dim? Some worldly hope that gives retreat from all the winds that beat upon the world? Some sure attachment to another's life that stands secure against all change of mind or heart? Some private dream where only dwells the purest secret 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 reverence 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 friend of foe, making love of hate, and lasts beyond the living and the dead-- beyond the goals of peace, the ends of war. This man seeks through all his years to be complete and of one piece within, without. For we know in part-- for we know in part, and we prophesy in part. The sense of self is fully known when a man can say, I did it. Such triumph, who can claim? In every deed are many streams whose sources lie beyond all dreams or sleep within the womb of ancient myths. The words in his tongue, wanderers all, finding in man a short span of space. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu They are never his alone. What a way they've come through countless years in every land, through crucibles of every mood-- words now familiar in their place have made their own the mark of many minds. How dare a man say, I-- I speak. Free flowing thoughts from living minds are big with residues of other times, forced from their place by inner law compelled to rest in little spells. Pitts Theology Library Emory University A man may never say, this thought is mine. And equity in thoughts, if his, the rest belongs to every man. Fierce, private, intimate, unique-- feelings spring from deep within. A boundless inner world as old as life-- they come without command. The feeling tone, the pointed shape carries the image of the man. To this, he gives his own life plan-- no more than this is his to claim. All knowledge in whatever form maintains its place secure. It knows no lord, no single mind. Its harvest ripens as it wilts. Its secret is its own to give, in part to share with other minds. To say, I know, is always false, however sure the words may seem. Before the echo fades, the lights go out. The man is held by fear, by doubt, to seek, to find, to seek again-- this is man's journey, this his way. Come to that which is perfect, but when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. Of all the stories Jesus told, there is none more deadly where it strikes than what he said about the man who came to feast with wedding guests without the proper dress. One precious moment all his own to bring to life his only gift. Nameless, unclaimed-- the moments come and go. The smooth unfolding of each passing day weans the life from earlier dreams, dulls the sharp edges of the mind. Days are but days and the night but interludes before the sound begins again. And then, one moment unlike all the rest descends upon his world. It comes unheralded, but it bears his name. The one desire which all his years have sought stands ripe for plucking before his startled eyes. The one great vision from the heights that launched him on his way when life was young-- the perfect love to make his life complete, but always the fatal flaw. The refrain's the same-- the wedding feast is on. Down the long banquet hall, the King appears. He sees the careless dresser with half-brushed hair. In the weary eyes, that slow chagrin-excuses, fears, or alibis can find no voice-- an awful stillness freezes everything. The moment burns itself away then passes, even as it came. And what is left? Stark despair where nothing lives-- the dream has died. When I was a child, I spake as a child. This man is innocent. The words I heard on many tongues where deeds can find no resting place, they lift the load that guilt would yield. Hidden behind their empty shield, the wounds the years can't heal remain. A name is ruined. The delicate fabric is ripped, is torn. Innocence may be more than this. Something that has never been tested, never tried-- no ordeal has caught its brow. Pure of conscious wrong or filled mistake, There is no wisdom it is learned to know. Such is the beauty of the road. But the beauty of an oak is something more. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Pitts Theology Library Emory University The child is innocent. A man is not. He is never pure. He has chronicled too many days. Tasted, in fact, or mined forbidden fruit, then caught and held by many drives, immune to ends of virtue in a single mind-- to be innocent, to be pure. If he has needed ugliness until beauty stands revealed, if he has wrestled with the open independence of the sea until he holds the secrets of storm and calm-- if he has walked through flames, felt their searing until the dross of all mistakes has been consumed. If he has fought with inward foes until every weakness of his life has shown its face, this is to triumph. This is to know. This is to be the good he seeks. This is to know the God he knew. But then, face to face-- for now, we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face. It is the judgment scene-- the climax of man's life has come at last. The oriental despot sits enthroned. Before him come the peoples of the earth. Here are no men, no women, boys, or girls, struggling for rank, wealth, class, or power. No race or climb has standing here-- all walls that separate, divide by the moving drama are pushed aside. Each life is freed of all pretense. Each shadowy seeming swept away by the mighty spread of ceaseless life. I was sick, comfortless. I was hungry and desperate. I was lonely, wretched. I was in prison, forsaken. Strange, awful words from him-- words more searching followed after. I know your tasks were manifold-- unyielding claims consumed your thoughts. There was no time to be at ease with deeds, to give yourself beyond your creed. All I know about your temperament, your health-- somehow you could not manage all your chores, excuses came to reinforce the empty feelings of your heart. I know how hard it was for you. You did not want to be an easy touch. Beyond all else, your ties of blood, charity must begin at home. Besides, you did not know, but are you sure? Do you recall the flashes of concern that held you in your place that day? I see-- you do remember well. Again, they came and then again until at last they came no more-only the hollow darkness of the fence-- cut off from all the pain and pathos of the world. No word of mine can alter what your days have done. The story of your life is what the judge reveals. From the relentless judgement, is there no appeal? The greatest of these-- now abideth faith, hope, love-- these three, but the greatest of these is love. While there is a law class, I am in it. While there is a criminal element, I am of it. While there is a man in jail, I am not free. Thus spoke a man whose life, whose deeds these words fulfill. Contacts across all barriers abound of how the world is narrowed in fact and dream. If there is found no will to love, to make an act of grace towards fellow man, contact degrades-- outrage destroy the tender shoots of simple trust. Love abides where all else dies from sheer revulsion and disgust. The fruit it bears sustains the nerves, strengthens the weak, the insecure, breaks the chains of fear that hold the minds of men in hate's embrace-- condemns the things that shrink the soul. 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu It is the precious bane for those who seek to know the way of God among the sons of men. It meets men where they are-- cruel, lustful, greedy, callous, of low design. It treats them there as if they were full grown and crowned with all that God would have them be. For love's own sake and that alone, men do with joyous hope and quiet calm what no command of life or death could force of them if love were not. Pitts Theology Library Emory University To be God's child, to love with steady minds, with fervent heart-- this is to know the truth that makes men free. Answer me when I call. We are now ready to begin our word, and I don't-- displays. I don't see why it shouldn't, unless there's something wrong with it. Now, I'll see if it'll work now. Perhaps it will, I'm not sure, but let me see. 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 Featured Thurman Recordings Description An account of the resource This collection highlights individual lectures, sermons, interviews, prayers, and meditations given by Howard Thurman throughout his professional career. 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/394-819.html" ></iframe> Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1970s 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 394-819 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Readings from the Inward Journey - 1 Corinthians 13, 1970 Jan 10 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1970-01-10 https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/a4528b49a41012a63e3362bd2ac54819.pdf 7aa2a8b98625c3ea5cd4559cf36b1c61 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-818.mp3 Testing. Testing. Testing. Testing. Testing. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I am reading from the section called "For the Quiet Time," from my book Deep is the Hunger. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the poor in spirit. What does it mean to be poor in spirit? Does it mean having a sense of inferiority? Does it mean discounting one's true worth and value? Does it mean pretending to think lowly of one's self in the presence of others so as not to seem to be conceited or proud or arrogant? What does it mean to be poor in spirit? Perhaps it means to have a present sense of inadequacy in one's own spiritual life. The gulf between what we recognize as the high spiritual possibilities of life and what we are able to achieve at any particular moment is the measure of one's paucity of spirit. To be aware of this is to be blessed. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Theirs is the rule of God. The rule of God in one's life is the priceless possession. It does not mean that one is holy. It does not mean that one is perfect. It does not mean that one is sinless. It does mean that one has a sense of holiness, a sense of perfection, a sense of sinlessness. It is this sense that is the open channel through which the spirit of God invades the life. To keep the channel open and clear is to be in possession of the rule of God. When I know that I have not experienced in all my parts the rule of God and yet the rule of God in my life is the center around which my life moves, then I am poor in spirit. Our Father, for the truth which Jesus channeled to us concerning Thy kingdom, we express our moving thanks. Be in us increasingly, that Thy kingdom, Thy rule, may guide our decisions, inspire our wills, and determine our actions. Amen. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the merciful. What is it to be merciful? Does it mean to be kind? Perhaps not. Kindness has a quality all its own. There is ever, in kindness, the quality of gratuity, of surplus, of extra. It may well be that no man ever quite deserves kindness. Kindness rests upon that which is without merit, the basically undeserving, the great overflow by which one life crowns another with glory. Of course, it does not mean justice or even righteousness. There is always the element of balance or establishing equilibrium of squaring off in justice and righteousness. There is a certain core of fairness, of accuracy, hovering over the just treatment, the righteous act toward another. Blessed are the merciful. In dealing mercifully with another, I enrich my attitude with a diffusion of sensitiveness that mellows it, softens it. The merciful act is the muted act. There is no particular interest in fairness and measured dealing. It is like the difference between raw or pasteurized milk and milk that is homogenized. The richness is nowhere but everywhere. Am I merciful or just decent? Are you? They shall obtain mercy. Curious paradox. Does it mean that if I am merciful, I shall be dealt with in a merciful manner by others? That I shall receive at 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu the hands of others, in kind, the thing I have passed on to them? This may not follow at all, or it may. But that is beside the point. Pitts Theology Library Emory University The merciful shall obtain mercy because they have mercy already. They are what they share with others. Often, the net result is that my act of mercy does call forth action of the same quality from others. I become so involved in the richness of the quality of my dealing that I am immunized against the absence of mercy in the dealings of others with me. My life places upon others an imperative that broods over their own deeds, revealing their true quality to them, pervading their deeds with the richness of my own deeds. It is a great risk. But in the last analysis, it is unbeatable. Blessed are the merciful, for they have mercy already. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the humble, the low in heart, the generous in attitude toward others, the unafraid, the courageous. Meekness is often confused with false modesty, with a certain lack of courage, with selfdegrading and ingratiating humility. To be meek is to have a clear understanding of one's strength and one's weakness. It is to have a normal self estimate, not to overrate nor to underrate one's ability, one's powers, one's functioning. Meekness is sometimes used as a device for getting one's way, for taking advantage of others, for exploiting other people. It arises out of a sure knowledge that the attitude of pride and arrogance will be resisted, but that meekness will unarm the opposition and win the victory. Meekness, used in this way, is a form of radical deception and is not to be confused with humility. Am I guilty do I take low in order to gain my end? Search me, O God. Search me. They shall inherit the earth. They shall possess the earth. Is true that humility can never be humiliated. It cannot be finally resisted or overcome, for it is an attitude of direct honesty in relationships, growing out of a knowledge that the sure responsibility is to God and not to the estimate of nor the impression of one's fellows. It is an attitude of openness toward life, ever learning, ever growing in a perfection, which is God. There is no room in it for fear, for cringing, for cowardice. It breathes confidence because it is the soul's answer to the scrutiny of God. To such, life and the earth belong. Search me. Search me, O God. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are they that mourn. What does it mean to mourn? Does it mean to weep, to exhibit grief? This is the most obvious meaning. What is grief? Is it merely an emotional reaction to a situation which causes one to be sad and, in a sense, unhappy? Or is it an expression of sorrow growing out of a profound sympathy for-- or identification with-- someone in distress? What are the things that are capable of making you mourn? 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu What things, however terrible they may be, are incapable of affecting you? You are blessed if you mourn over situations that are worthy of the outpouring of your spirit. This is a hard test. Pitts Theology Library Emory University They shall be comforted. They shall be reassured. They shall be consoled. They shall be confirmed. They shall be validated. To be comforted does not necessarily mean that the occasion for mourning will be removed. But it does mean that in the presence of a situation in which there is a spontaneous outpouring of the self in healing and redemption to others whose need grips and holds, the spirit is somehow cleansed, washed, reassured. It is a paradox. The comfort is in the thing that happens to you, in the process of the self-giving. That it will do much for the other person may be assumed. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Our Father, let me not spare my self in the outpouring of my spirit in sympathy and in total selfgiving where the need of another makes demand. Teach me the fearlessness that comes from such encounters. The results I trust to Thee. Amen. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are the peacemakers. Am I a peacemaker? Do I make peace in my home? This is my desire. I have a will to peace. Or do I? I must see that no man gives all nor takes all. But rather, that by yielding and affirming, wholeness of living in community becomes the way of life. Of course, I do not wish war in myself, in my private circle, in the wide world of men. Yet, the seeds of war are in me. Deep is the conflict within. When I would do good, evil is present. Or-- I want to do what is right, but wrong is all that I can manage. One slight injury to my pride, to my feelings, and I let it ferment until it sends a temperature all through my spirit. A false sense of honor. Sometimes, I like to nurse my wounds. Whole nations do this. Blessed are the peacemakers. This means that I must possess and create a will that is good toward myself, toward my fellows, toward life and living. This good will must constantly be fed by facts and a careful understanding of them. Facts concerning myself, concerning my fellows, concerning life. There must be an energized imagination. In my mind, I must play with all manner of creative possibilities in my relations with others, familiarizing myself with the flavor of people and their potentiality. This I must do until there is revealed in them the very essence of what I know of myself. Then I will understand their understanding, feel their feeling, sit where they sit. My judgment will be tenderized. My hardness will be softened. My justice will be merciful. I will be a peacemaker. Or-- "I" will be a peacemaker. Or-- I will be a "peace" maker. They shall be called the children of God. The peacemaker is so like what men are seen to be at their best that they remind men of what God must be like. They recall two men's minds the thought of the best and the highest. They warm men with the thought of God. They breath his promise to the spirit of men. They 3 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu bring to mind the assurance that all stand in immediate candidacy to achieve in fact what they are in essence-- children of God. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you falsely for my sake. Can this be possibly true? To be reviled? To be persecuted? To be reviled and persecuted is to be turned down by one's fellows. No one ever thinks that he quite deserves it. It causes a man to feel that he is no good, that he has no worthy place in the regard and respect of his fellows, because, in some way, he has betrayed them. The most natural thing is to feel that they have betrayed him. But if it has not been my intent to betray them, or even to attack them, then what? Suppose I have only done what I had no other choice but to do. There was nothing personal or vindictive either in my attitude or in my intention. I was only speaking out against injustice, for instance. I could not stand silent in the presence of cruelty, exploitation, violence. I had to speak out, to do what I could, to arouse the conscience of my fellows. This I had to do. It was not in my mind to stir up trouble, because enough trouble was already stirred up. Why don't they face the evil they are doing? Why do they take it out on me, I ask, perhaps. I have no power. I have no organization. I represent no interests. I am just a man who could not be silent. And now they turn their backs upon me. Now they pour their wrath upon me. Rejoice and be exceeding glad. Rejoice and be exceeding glad. What does this mean? Should I take delight in my suffering? Is that healthy? Is not that morbid? Is that not thinking of myself more highly than I ought to think? I mistrust the mood. Over and over I go in my mind. The question will not down. Can I trust my own feelings when I take delight in what men are doing to me? Perhaps I am looking at this in a wrong manner. Rejoice and be exceeding glad. Because I am being persecuted? No. Rejoice and be exceeding glad because I did not miss my one opportunity to recognize and count myself on the side of justice, truth, right. What a chance I almost missed. Oh to know, for once, that I had sheer courage, that I declared myself on the side of decency. That is why I am glad. That is why I rejoice. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven. I'm doing, now, three short meditations based upon three phrases from the Lord's Prayer. Thy kingdom come. Thy kingdom come in my life, with myself. Often, I forget to remember that always I must live with myself. What of me that is unpleasant, ugly, negative, what of me that is pleasant, beautiful, positive is still of me. I cannot escape from myself. Often, I try by a wide variety of means. 4 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu These escape devices are many. Sometimes it is attempted through excessive work. Sometimes through heightened excitement. Sometimes through worry and anxiety. But always it is the same. I come back to myself at last. I must let the rule of God invade my relations with myself. What in me makes for disorder, for tempest, for destruction I must release to the purging, the cleansing of the rule of God. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Thy kingdom come in my life with others. Often, I forget to remember that always I must live with others. I am not alone as if I were the only person on an uninhabited island. There are those with whom I am in daily contact. Am I helpful or am I unhelpful in what I do in my relations with my fellows? Do I make life easier or do I make it harder for them? Am I an irritant, always managing to be the center of some kind of disturbance? Do I exploit others in my relationships with them? Do I use them as means to my private ends, sacrificing them to goals in which they do not share? I must let the rule of God invade my relations with my fellows. I must put at the disposal of the divine invasion the rugged or brittle fabric of my other-than-self relations. Holy Father, turn Thy holy light upon my relations with myself and with others, that these things that defeat thy kingdom in me may be destroyed or rooted out. Thy light seers, O God. Thy light seers. Amen. Thy will be done. Thy will be done in me. The will of God is often thought of as something that comes into a man from the outside. It is regarded as something against which the individual has to struggle as an antagonist. It may well be that the will of God does not come from without, as a grand invasion of the spirit, but rather, it is welling up from within the deeps of the mind and spirit, taking the shape of the life as water from a spring takes the shape of the banks between which the water flows. Thy will be done in me. The will of God is native to my spirit. It is the fundamental character of me. It is the foundation of my mental, physical, and spiritual structure. It is what I find when I am most myself. It is what I find when I get down to the deepest things in me. It is what is revealed when all the superficial things are sloughed off and I am essentially laid bare. Thy will be done in me. When I come to myself, I am aware of the will of God as part and parcel of what it is that I seek above all else. To know this, to see this clearly, is to understand what sin is, what the evil of evil is, what rightness is. Close, present Father, flow through me in all the ways native to me and all my parts, that as a whole person I may do Thy will with such completeness that perhaps I may become Thy will. Amen. Deliver me from evil. Deliver me from evil in the thoughts that linger in my mind. Evil thoughts come into my mind sometimes on invitation, sometimes dressed in garments of innocence. My temptation is to deny that they are there, or worse-- to think I have gotten rid of them by pushing them down, out of sight in some hidden corner of my mind. Once there, they settle down to reproduce their kind. 5 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Deliver me from evil by strengthening me in honesty, that I may give no quarter to the negative thoughts and their residue in my mind. Deliver me from evil in desires that are destructive to the vision of the good that illumines my pathway. Pitts Theology Library Emory University It may be that my desires are not evil or good in themselves. Perhaps it is what they become when clothed in the deed that gives them their character. On the other hand, certain desires are geared to accomplish and call it by its true name. In so doing, I would hold it up before the scrutiny of God, that I may see it through his eyes. Deliver me from evil in the things that I refrain from doing. Sometimes I see very clearly what I ought to do, but I reject it deliberately and blatantly. Sometimes I refrain by default, not intending to, really. But by negligence or a variety of other alibis, I do not do what I know I ought to do. Deliver me from evil by stirring my will to action in accordance with what is right, as Thou dost give me to see the right. Holy Father, deliver me from evil in all the ways by which I shield myself from the wholeness of Thy spirit as it works its perfect work in me. Amen. There follows, now, a series of short meditations on the theme-- there is in God strength sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. One, either God is the creator of life or He is not the creator of life. If He is the creator of life, then there is inherent in life all that is necessary to sustain life in accordance with the demands of any particular life span. This means that there must be laws of growth, re-creation, and maintenance that operate as long as they are not blocked. I start, then, with that simple fact. Two, it is my moral responsibility to understand how life operates in me so that I shall not consciously or unknowingly interfere with its free creative movement in me. I begin, then, with my own body. I assume that when life is operating freely in me, I shall be full of health and physical well-being. When this is not the case, the life-giving force that sustains me has been blocked. It may be blocked by a faulty diet, for instance. It is a matter of spiritual responsibility for me to use my intelligence and the knowledge that the race has acquired about foods to keep the life force unhampered in my body. I must search to find the things that are most useful in this particular and to understand the things that slow me down, making my days demand increasingly greater effort to do the same amount of work. To eat properly then, is a part of my religious vocation, for by so doing, I draw on the strength which God makes constantly available to me. There is in God strength sufficient for my needs at this point. I consider my mind with reference to my fears. I'm conscious of what fear does to the way my body-mind behaves. It slows down my digestion and speeds up the beating of my heart where there is no corresponding demand made upon my productive energy output. The result is a curious kind of congestion, affecting my efficiency and filling me generally with fatigue. 6 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu I shall track down the source of my fears, destroy their hiding place so that the vital energies of God will not be blocked by them. I may need expert help in doing this, but I recognize that help is also a part of the strength of God. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I consider the tendency toward anxiety. Anxiety arises because I am unable to resolve some difficulty or to solve some personal problem. I must take a positive attitude toward the thing that is the source of my disturbance. I recognize that I'm never alone, that I'm never left completely at the mercy of the things which would undermine my peace of spirit. God is with me. He is present in the midst of my anxiety, as insight, as courage, as confidence. This I must never forget. God is with me in the midst of my anxiety. Anxiety blocks the free flowing of the creative life of God, so that I become undernourished in my spirit and often in my body. I consider the tendency toward worry. Worry is bad for my digestion. It creates the kind of toxic condition in my system that aids the development of those protests in my stomach called ulcers. Something happens in my organism that blocks the free flowing creative power of God in my body, making for health, strength, and vigor. Worry is against life. It is anti-vitality and antiGod. I must remember that God is more concerned about my well-being than I can possibly be. I shall discipline myself in trust-- trust in life, trust in my mind and its understanding, trust in God. This does not mean that I shall ignore the things that worry me. But it does mean that I shall seek always to understand them. I shall not give them a place in my thoughts that will make me their slave. I know that my life, the life of the world, and life itself all belong to God. I consider my feeling of inadequacy. There are times when I give out completely. There are times when I raise the question, what is the use of continuing to put forth effort in trying to do well what I have been able to achieve only poorly? Sometimes I am faced with demands from others which with all my heart I would like to meet, but I fail them. My failure has nothing to do with my intention, my desires, or even my understanding. It is due to a lack of power of dynamics, perhaps. I discover at such times that I am depending too utterly on my own strength. I act as if my knowledge were complete and my own power sufficient. I forget to remember that God is my strength and the source of the power without which no thing is possible. Over and over I must know this. There is strange in God, sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. I consider the meaning of failure. One thing that an awareness of the strength of God makes possible in me is the understanding that there is often a clear cut distinction between failure on the one hand and being mistaken in the things I am undertaking to do on the other. Failure may be due to the operation of forces over which I have no control, and therefore, the responsibility for failure may not be mine. When I am too deeply involved in a sense of failure, I am apt to think that always my failure is due to my being mistaken or wrong in the thing I am undertaking. The strength of God enables me to turn even the spear of frustration into a shaft of light. 7 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu I consider my desires. I recognize the place in my life of simple elemental desires which, through the years, have aided in guaranteeing the continuation of my own life. They are not bad in themselves. This I know. They are part of the creative process of life at work in me, a human being. Pitts Theology Library Emory University When my desires get out of hand and lead me in two paths that do violence to my health, my integrity, my ethical values, or when they cause me to lead another to do violence to his health, his integrity, his ethical values, then that which is an aide to life becomes a corruption. The free flowing of the spirit of the living God becomes blocked and I am temporarily cut off from his spirit. I must remember to keep my desires under the divine scrutiny. And this I can do if I let myself down into his strength. I consider my desires further. It has come upon me with some measure of shock that many of the things that I desire to do I do-- that I am no better than I am because deep within me I do not really desire to be better. It is deeply disturbing to realize that again and again my desires are fulfilled. I must get the strength to want to desire to be better. I must desire to desire to be better. Here and now, I lay my situation before God and seek his strength, that I may desire to desire to be whole. This I do with confidence, because there is, in God, strength sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. I consider my sins. There are times when I have gone against the right as I have understood it. This means that my wrongdoing in such instances has been deliberate and objective. There are times that I have obeyed a sudden impulse without thinking about it. At such times, I have been completely reckless of consequences, without fear, and without an immediate sense of guilt. There are times that I have gone against the ride without knowing it until they appeared before me the fearful consequences of my actions. And I am stricken with shame or grief or humiliation. It is when these awareness are upon me that I reach out for the strength of God to course through me, to cleanse my mind, to purify my heart and abide with me as I work out the conditions of my forgiveness. I consider my sins further. There are subtle ways by which I have blocked the clean feeling, fouled the upright thought, stifled the good impulse without doing the deliberate act of transgression. I have surrounded my thoughts with fog so that my vision become blurred. I have indulged in half measures, because the clear full measure required more patience or more effort than I cared at the moment to exercise, thus causing the right thing, even as I saw it, to be lost by default. Pride has entered into the quality of self giving, thus devaluating my motives in service. Then some spoken word, some fleeting memory of a bygone grace, something throws a flood of blinding light into the remote corners of my life, making me aware of my need. I reach out for the strength of God, which is sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. 8 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu I consider my relations with people. There are some people who irritate me. Sometimes I can put my finger on the reason. Sometimes I cannot. There are times when I show my irritation by the sharp retort, the sudden frown, the sense of tension in my body. Pitts Theology Library Emory University When I am irritated, I create around me a negative atmosphere in which it is very difficult for other people to be at ease. In addition, I have a sense of shame because of my behavior, then perhaps a feeling of guilt. And with the feeling of guilt, the creative life giving spirit of God encounters grave difficulty in affecting a release in me. In my effort to overcome this, I must remember that there is in God's strength sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. I consider my relations with people further. I want to love people with understanding and sureness of touch. Often, I fumble. My zeal runs ahead of my understanding. I do not take the time to inform my good will. I am become too anxious to be effective in my relation. Hence, I hurt easily. And instead of having happy relations, satisfying relations with people, often I am confused. In my confusion, I am apt to say, they do not like me. I must quit my anxiety, be still within, until my sense of life makes it simple for me to work out informed relations with my fellows. Hence, there will be blunders I do not make. I will have an eagerness for facts, and I will cushion them with understanding. In my effort, I shall rely on the strength of God, which is sufficient for my needs, whatever they may be. I let go of my accumulations. My ego is like a fortress. I have built its walls stone by stone to hold out the invasion of the love of God. But I have stayed here long enough. There is light over the barriers. O my God, the darkness of my house forgive and overtake my soul. I relax the barriers. I abandon all that I think I am, all that I hope to be, all that I believe I possess. I let go of the past. I withdraw my grasping hand from the future. And in the great silence of this moment, I alertly rest my soul. As the seagull lays in the wind current, so I lay myself into the spirit of God. My dearest human relationships, my most precious dreams I surrender to his care. All that I have called my own I give back. All my favorite things which I would withhold in my storehouse from his fearful tyranny I let go. I give myself unto thee, O my God. Amen. I accept the good in myself. There have been times when things of beauty have stirred me deeply-- sunlight pouring into a city alleyway, moonlight upon the water of a still lake. That in me which responds to beauty I recognize. This I love. For the beauty which unites us, I am thankful. There have been times when something in me has stopped my telling of an untruth or the exaggerating of the facts. That in myself and in my fellows which desires truth, I reverence and love. I love myself. I stop to reflect upon the finest acts ever performed by any other persons I have known. That in them which caused these acts, I reverence. I remember at once when something in me has caused such a creative and wholehearted act that I was amazed at my own goodness. This I love. For the total of all the good acts performed throughout history, I give thanks. 9 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu O God, I need thee. I need Thy sense of time. Always I have an underlying anxiety about things. Sometimes I am in a hurry to achieve my ends and am completely without patience. Pitts Theology Library Emory University It is hard for me to realize that some growth is slow, that all processes are not swift. I cannot always discriminate between what takes time to develop and what can be rushed, because my sense of time is dulled. I measure things in terms of happenings. Oh, to understand the meaning of perspective, that I may do all things with a profound sense of leisure, of time. I need Thy sense of order. The confusion of the details of living is sometimes overwhelming. The little things keep getting in my way, providing ready-made excuses for failure to do and be what I know I ought to do and be. Much time is spent on things that are not very important, while significant things are put into an insignificant place in my scheme of order. I must unscramble my affairs so that my life will become order. O God, I need Thy sense of order. I need Thy sense of the future. Teach me to know that life is ever on the side of the future. Keep alive in me the forward look, the high hope, the onward surge. Let me not be frozen either by the past or the present. Grant me, O patient Father, Thy sense of the future, without which all life would sicken and die. Let go. Everything but God I must let go. For so long I have held to the habit of holding on, even my muscles are tense. Deeply fearful are they of relaxing, lest they fall away from their place. I cling clutchingly to my friends, lest I lose them. I live under the shadow of being supplanted by another. I cling to my money, not so much by a wise economy and a thoughtful spending, but by a sense of possession that makes me depend upon it for strength. I must let go. Deep at the core of me, I must have a sense of freedom, a sure awareness of detachment, of relaxation. I must let go of everything. I must let go of pride, for instance. But what am I saying? Is there not a sense of pride that supports and sustains all achievement, even the essential dignity of my own personality? It may be that I must let go my dependence upon triumphing over my fellows, which seems to give to me a sense of security in their midst. I cringe from my pain. I do not relish the struggle of life. But I do not want to let go, because the hurt and the tension of contest feed the springs of my pride. They make me deeply aware, but I must let go of everything. I must let go of everything but God. But God. May it not be that God is in all the things to which I cling? That may be the hidden reason for my clinging? It is all very puzzling, indeed. When I say I must let go of everything but God, what is my meaning? What am I talking about? I must relax my hold on everything that dulls my sense of him, that comes between me and the inner awareness of his presence, pervading my life and glorifying all the common ways with wonderful wonder. 10 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu Teach me, O God, how to free myself of dearest possessions, so that in my trust I shall find restored to me all I need to walk in Thy path and to fulfill Thy will. Let me know Thee for myself, that I may not be satisfied with aught that is less. Amen. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I give thanks unto God with my whole heart. I give thanks unto God with my mind. I count one by one much that has come to me to make me glad. I remember the simple delights-- the taste of food, the tasteless refreshment of cool water, the feeling of fatigue followed by restful sleep, the friendly greeting of many who pass me in the daily round and whose smiles deepen my faith in ordinary kindness. I remember. Yes, I remember. And in my mind I give thanks to God. I give thanks unto God with my feelings. There are dangers which are now passed. I escaped. How, I do not know. Vast is my relief that my hunch was wise to hold my tongue when to have spoken would have hurt far beyond my powers ever to amend or heal. The mood that settled was of despair, unrelieved and stark. And then a change came out of nowhere. All I know is the cloud was lifted, and once again I was free. With sheer feeling, I give thanks to God. I give thanks unto God with my life. The will to do more than the situation requires, the desire to be better than I am and to work at it, the urge to be thorough even in simple things, the delight in my friends' good fortune, the sympathetic outgoing of myself in times of another's need, the thoughtful telephone call, the urgent letter sustaining the hand of a public servant who serves the common conscience-- all these and more are my thanks to God, with my life. The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall guard my heart and thoughts. The peace of God. There is a peace that comes when lowering clouds burst and the whole landscape is drenched in rain, refreshing and cool. There is the peace that comes when knowing hunger finds intimate fulfillment in food, nourishing and life-giving. There is the peace that comes when hours of sleeplessness are finally swallowed up in sleep, deeply relaxing and calm. There is a peace that comes when what has lurked so long in the shadow of my mind stands out at last in the light. I face it, call it by its name, for better or for worse. There is the peace that comes when sorrow is not relieved, when pain is not quieted, when tragedy remains tragedy, stark and literal, when failure continues through all the days to be failure. Is all this the peace of God, or is it the intimation of the peace of God? The peace of God shall guard my heart and thoughts. There are feelings untamed and unmanageable in my heart. The bitterness of a great hatred not yet absorbed. The moving light of love unrequited and unfulfilled, casting its shafts down all the corridors of my days. The unnamed anxiety brought on by nothing in particular, some strange foreboding of coming disaster that does not yet appear. The overwhelming hunger for God that underscores all the ambitions, dreams, and restlessness of my churning spirit. Hold them, O peace of God, until Thy perfect work is in them fulfilled. The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall guard my heart and my thoughts. Into God's keeping do I yield my heart and thoughts and yes, my life-- with its strength and weakness, 11 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu its failure and success, its shame and its purity. O peace of God, settle over me and within me, so that I cannot tell mine from Thine and Thine from mine. Amen. Pitts Theology Library Emory University The Lord is the strength of my life. The Lord is. Is God an idea in my mind? A rumor planted by old tales born of fear, when life was young and death lurked behind every waiting bush? Is God the desire in my heart, a longing that goes always unfulfilled? Is God the restlessness I feel after dreams have come to pass and all my hopes have built themselves in facts? Is God the indescribable tenderness that creeps in the voice unawares, that steals into the fingers as they linger momentarily in the hand of a friend? Is God the endless churning of the turbulent sea or the steady shining of the stars against the blackness of the sky? Is God the quenchless aching of the consciences over sins committed, and the vast cleansing in the soul riding on the wave of forgiveness that sweeps all before it? The Lord is. He is more than tongue can tell, than mind can think, than heart can feel. The Lord is my strength. When day is done and in weariness I lay me down to sleep, when fear becomes a lump in my throat and an illness in my stomach, when the waters of temptation engulf me and I strangle beneath the wave, when I have thought myself empty and the solution to my problem hides, lurking in the shadows of my mind, when the disease of my body tightens its grip and my doctor picks up the broken lances of his skill and knowledge and takes his leave, when the tidings are of brooding clouds of war and of marching feet and humming plains moving in the awful rhythm of the dirge of death-- when all of this happens, the Lord is the strength of my life. Of whom and of what shall I be afraid? Quietness and confidence. In quietness and confidence shall be your strength. Long before I was born, God was at work, creating life, nature, and the world of men and things. The worlds were ideas in the mind of God that have been realizing themselves through the ages. God is not through with creation. God is not through with me. In quietness and confidence shall be my strength. Acquaint now thyself with Him and be at peace. In many ways I'm getting acquainted with myself. Always I seek a deeper understanding of my true self, the very core of me. What I would be and am not yet reassures me. Through my innermost self I find my way to God. I shall acquaint myself with Him and be at peace. I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh-hen flies, filling all the space twixt the marsh and the skies. What I seek beyond is what I am finding within. The beyond is within. The signature of God is all around me-- in the rocks, in the trees, in the minds of men. I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh-hen flies. I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. I can never be overcome by evil until the evil that threatens moves from without within. This does not mean that I shall not be hurt by evil, shall not be frustrated by evil, that I shall say that evil is not evil. I shall see the travel of my own life with evil and be unafraid, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff, they shall comfort me. 12 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And their follows, now, two or three meditations from Deep is the Hunger, from the section "A Sense of Presence." Pitts Theology Library Emory University It is a simple story, simply told. One day, a man walked into an antique shop and asked permission to look around. It was a rather exclusive shop, frequented only by those who could afford to purchase articles made rare by their scarcity and age. The visitor seemed strange that out of place, because he was poorly dressed, though clean. Indeed, it was clear from his appearance that he was a laborer whose face had been etched by sun and rain and whose hands were rough and worn. After more than a half hour, he left. In about 10 days, he returned. This time, he found a very beautiful piece of old glass and asked if he could make a deposit on it. Each week, he made a payment until, at last, the article was his. With much curiosity, the owner of the shop engaged him in conversation to determine, if he could, the use to which such a man would put his new purchase. "I bought it for my little room," he said. And continuing, "it isn't much. But I bring to it from time to time, through the years, only the very best and most beautiful things. You see, that is where I live." End quotation. To bring to the place where you live only the best and the most beautiful-- what a plan for one's life. This is well within the reach of everyone. Think of using one's memory in that way. As one lives from day to day, there are all sorts of experiences-- good, bad, beautiful, ugly-- that become a part of one's past. To develop the ability to screen one's memory so that only the excellent is retained for one's own room. All kinds of ideas pass through one's mind-- about one's self, about the world, about people. What do you keep for your own room? Think it over now. Which ideas do you keep for the place where you live? It is well within the mark to say that the oft-quoted words of Jesus about laying up for yourself treasures in heaven deal with this same basic idea. The place where you live is where your treasures are. Where your treasures are is where your heart is. And where your heart is is where your God is. Francis De Sales, in his Introduction to the Devout Life, says that bees, when they are surprised by the wind, lay hold of little stones so as to keep their balance and not be swept away in the storm. No one is able to predict when-- and, indeed, how often-- the strong winds will come to threaten the very core of one's balance and security. Indeed, there are some people whose lives seem to create vacuums that pull into them tempests-storms, tornadoes-- which keep them constantly in a state of siege. For such, there does not ever seem to be the lull, the quiet period when nothing is happening. It may be that such persons regard the quiet time merely as that which is the immediate forerunner of the storm, and hence cannot be separated from the storm. Often, as a mere technique of equilibrium, an attitude or mood is developed that makes the individual hold his course, despite the fact that his way ever moves along the storm path. There may be an element of fun and good fortune in the fact, even. 13 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu The rest of us, however, live very tame lives. We are not often caught up in blowings that would uproot and make havoc with our balance. But soon or late, we are visited by the storms. Sometimes they come unannounced-- bright sunshine one moment and the next, dark clouds and the winds. Sometimes they are a long time in the making. We may ignore the signs or we may be too busy to be able to do anything to prepare for meeting them. Pitts Theology Library Emory University At any rate, there comes a day when all fury breaks forth and we are without shelter, without protection. At such a time, we are reminded by Francis, the bee fastens himself onto a stone which is nearly always at hand and clings to this, thereby enabling him to keep his balance and not be swept away by the storm. Do you have anything to which you cling at such times that enables you to keep your balance and not be swept away by the storm? Think about it. Whenever the mind of man has been uplifted; whenever I have frustrated the temptation to deny the truth within me or to betray a value which to me is significant; whenever I have found the despair of my own heart and life groundless; whenever my resolutions to be a better man have stiffened in a real resistance against some form of disintegration; whenever I have been able to bring my life under some high and holy purpose that gives to it a greater wholeness and a greater unity; whenever I have stood in the presence of innocence, purity, love, and beauty and found my own mind chastened and my whole self somehow challenged and cleansed; whenever for one swirling moment I have glimpsed the distinction between good and evil courses of conduct, caught sight of something better as I turn to embrace something worse; whenever these experiences or others like them have been mine, I have seen God and felt his presence winging near. Prayer grows out of an imperative urgency-- sometimes pointed, sometimes diffused. It enables one to keep fresh and focused in spirit the dedication to which one's life is given. Again and again, prayer creates a profound sense of power deep within the mind, expressing itself in strange new courage and purposefulness. The first manifestations of this courage is the attack that it makes on the basis of one's external fears of people and of circumstance. Prayer often yields a buoyancy and joyousness of spirit as the overtone of a relaxed confidence in God. It helps to clarify the conflicting issues that naturally arise out of any form of action so that against the darkness of age I can see the illumined finger of God guiding me in the way that I should go, so that high above the clash of arms, in the conflict for position, for rights, for status, for security, I can hear speaking distinctly and clearly to my own spirit the still, small voice of God. Without this, nothing quite has meaning. With this, all the rest of the journey-- however difficult, however painful, however devastating-- will be filled with a music all its own. And even the stars in their courses and all the wooded world of nature will participate in the triumphant music of my heart. When our minds are sick with frustration and division, when fear eats away the foundations of our peace, be present, O our Father, to heal, to bless, and make whole. When our hearts are 14 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu heavy with sorrow and misery, when only heaviness is our daily portion, be present, O our Father, to heal, to bless, and relieve. Pitts Theology Library Emory University When our friends are difficult because of misunderstanding and loss, when the beauty of comradeship has wasted life the noonday, be present, O our Father, to restore, to bless, and renew. When the thread of our years unwinds near the end of the spool, when the failing powers of mind and body accent the passing days, be present, O our Father, to reassure, to make steady, and confirm. When our well-ordered plans fall apart in our hands and hopes give up having run their course, be present, O our Father, to replenish, to create, and redeem. When faith in our fellows wallows in the mud, when through disappointment, through fear, and through flattery, all seems lost, be present, O our Father, to revise, to renew, and reassure. I close these reading of sections of Deep is the Hunger with this prayer that appears on page 104. God, I need Thee. When morning crowds the night away and tasks of waking seize my mind, I need thy poise. God, I need Thee. When love is hard to see amid the ugliness and slime, I need Thy eyes. God, I need Thee. When clashes come with those who walk the way with me, I need Thy smile. God, I need Thee. When the path to take before me lies, I see it, courage flees, I need Thy faith. God, I need Thee. When the day's work is done, tired, discouraged, wasted, I need Thy rest. Amen. 15 � 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 Readings from <em>Deep is the Hunger</em> (1951)<em><br /></em> 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/394-818.html" ></iframe> Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1970s 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 394-818 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource For the Quiet Time, 1974 July 18 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1974-07-18 Description An account of the resource In this first installment of Readings From Deep is the Hunger, Howard Thurman uses Matthew 5 as a framework to discuss the sufficiency of God as we wrestle with the concepts of kindness, mercy, and humility. Thurman goes on to discuss the need for God as we navigate challenges internally and externally with the world around us. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by ShaCarolyn Halyard humility Matthew 5 Mercy https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/e3524a16138e0e4e7d932509a1bf7254.pdf 2f8483c1637496c088317c638922823a PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-814.mp3 [BELLS RINGING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University [MUSIC PLAYING] Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh Lord, my strength, and my Redeemer. [MUSIC PLAYING] I'd like to begin today by reading the last two pages of a novel called The Choir Invisible written by James Lane Allen, published about 1898. It is the last part of a letter. I have succeeded, perhaps reached now what men call the highest point of their worldly prosperity, made good my resolve that no human power should defeat me. All that Macbeth had not, I have. A quiet throne of my own, children, wife, troops of friends, duties, honors, ease. There have been times when with a natural misgiving, lest I had wandered too far these many summers on a sea of glory, I have prepared for myself the lament of Wolsey on his fall. Yet ill fortune has not overwhelmed me or mine. All this prosperity as a mere fruit of my toil has been less easy than for many. I may not boast with the apostle that I have fought a good fight, but I can say that I fought a hard fight. The fight will always be hard for any man who undertakes to conquer life with the few and simple weapons I have used and who will accept victory only upon such terms as I have demanded. For be my success small or great, it has been one without willful wrong to a single human being and without inner compromise or other form of self abasement. No man can look me in the eyes and say I ever wronged him for my own profit. None may charge that I have smiled on him in order to use him or called him my friend that I might make him do for me the work of a servant. Do not imagine I fail to realize that I have added my full share to the general evil of the world, in part unconsciously, in part against my conscious will. It is the knowledge of this influence of imperfection forever flowing from myself to others that has taught me charity with all the wrongs that flow from others towards me. As I have clung to myself despite the evil, so I have clung to the world despite all the evil that there is in the world. To lose faith in men, not in humanity. To see justice go down and not believe in the triumph of injustice. For every wrong that you weakly deal another or another deals you to love more and more the fairness and the beauty of what is right. And so to turn with ever increasing love from the imperfection that is in us all to the perfection that is above us all, the perfection that is God. This is one of the ideals of actual duty that you once said were to be as candles in my hand. Many a time, this candle has gone out, but as quickly as I could snatch any torch with your sacred name on my lips, it has been relighted. My candles are all beginning to burn low now. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu For as we advance far on into life, one by one, our duties end. One by one, the lights go out. Not much ahead of me now must lurk the great mortal changes coming always nearer, always faster. As they approach, I look less to my candles and more towards my lighthouses. Those distant, unfailing beacons that cast their rays over the stormy sea of this life from the calm ocean of the infinite. Pitts Theology Library Emory University I know this, that if I should live to be an old man, my duties ended and my candles gone, it is these that will shine in upon me in that vacant darkness. And I have this belief that if we did but recognize them aright, these ideals at the close of life would become one with the ideals of our youth. We lost them as we left mortal youth behind. We regain them as we enter upon youth immortal. If I have kept unbroken faith with any of mine, thank you and thank God. The idea that there is a very definite difference between the ideals that are on the horizon that stand as points of referral and the immediate goal or the immediate ideal, if you will, that structures the first simple steps along the way. We have before us always goals that we can reach, goals that are the projection of what seems to us to be the working possibility of our lives. And as we achieve these goals, we discover that what seemed to us at an earlier time was a goal was merely a gate leading to a larger goal. And life seems to be this way, that we operate in a state of possible achievement with reference to what is next on our horizon. But always when we achieve it, we find that it leads to something else. I said, says Oppenheimer in one of his poems, when I get there, the fight will be over. But when I got there, I found that the fight was not over, that the fight would never be over, not even in death. That always our lives are being informed by distant goals, by ideals that, in some sense, are above the struggles of our lives, above the tensions and above the contradictions, but are always informing the struggle and resolving the contradictions. I go to prove my soul. I see my way as birds, their trackless way, I shall arrive. What time, what circuit first I ask not. But unless God send his hail, his sleet, his fireballs, I shall arrive. What time, what place, I know not. He guides me and the birds in His good time. Therefore, I shall never settle them for the immediate goal. For any goal that I can achieve really, in essence, is not worth achieving. It is the sense of deep inner tension at the very core of a man that keeps him striving. Not in anxiety, no, but keeps him truing all of the details of his life, all of the whole spectrum of his life by something that transcends his life at every point. And I think this is the way God reveals himself over and over in human life. He speaks to us in terms that we can hear. But when we respond, we find that there is so much more to the utterance than we thought when we gave our initial response. I go to prove my soul. I see my way as birds, their trackless way. He guides me and the bird in His good time. [MUSIC PLAYING] Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh Lord, my rock and my redeemer. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu [MUSIC PLAYING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University This program was prerecorded. 3 � 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 We Believe (Television Series, 1958-1965) Description An account of the resource <em>We Believe</em> was a color television program that aired on WHDH-TV, Channel 5, in Boston on weekday mornings at 11:15. From 1958 to 1965, while Howard Thurman was Dean of the Chapel at Boston University, he was the host of the Friday morning show. Each message has a brief introductory section with bells and music before Thurman delivers his short meditation. Some recordings have been edited to remove the intro. In some cases, the Howard Thurman Educational Trust produced tapes with two messages on one recording.<br /><br />"These meditations are no longer than 15 minutes, but highly representative of his style, influence, and search for common ground." - <a href="http://archives.bu.edu/web/howard-thurman">the Howard Thurman and Sue Bailey Thurman Collections at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University.</a><br /><br /> <p style="text-align: right;"><em>We Believe</em> program listing in the TV Guide, March 29, 1958</p> <img src="http://pittsviva.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/webelieve-whdh-boston.png" style="float: right;" alt="webelieve-whdh-boston.png" /> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dustin Mailman 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/394-814.html" ></iframe> Internal Notes Notes for project team Original Title: In His Good Time (WB-19B) Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WHDH-TV, Boston, Massachusetts 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 394-814 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Ideals and Goals (1964-02-14) 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1964-02-14 Description An account of the resource In this recording within the We Believe series, Thurman draws upon the novel "The Choir Invisible" by James Lane Allen, to reflect upon God's relationship to humanity. Thurman deeply leans into the mystery that is associated with humanity's actualized potential. He notes that our arrival to our actualized potential is inevitable; however, we shall not know the time or place of this arrival. Rather than giving quick answers, Thurman encourages us to look to the horizon for the next goal, trusting that the same God who cares for the birds of the air is the same God that cares for humanity, and is moving humanity towards a shared goal. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Dustin Mailman actualized potential gate goal horizon love tension youth https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/33ed6cd120f54c272607406839df6a36.pdf a34e101111a25546f6d7bc6fc890b33d PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-813.mp3 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh, Lord, my Strength and my Redeemer. Pitts Theology Library Emory University A friend of mine from England sent me something that I want to share. It is a poem, and it is written in the first person as if it came from the mind of Philip in the New Testament. And it is based upon an incident in the sixth chapter of Mark. When we returned and told him all we had done, I, for one, was emptied out like a husk that has scattered its seed upon hard ground. We had not had time even to eat-- always the open hand, always the blind eyes, always the deaf ears, always the wound to be healed. My thoughts were like wild birds beating the bars of the cage for empty skies. Even now, the smell of the people clung to my hair and clothes-- oil and musk and sandalwood, it hung in my hair. Their voices went on and on in my head-- monotonous wails wearing my mind away. Rock is worn by the waves to sand. I wanted to shut my mind that my thoughts close on my peace. I wanted to close the peace of my love in my heart like dew on a dark rose. But he told us to rest. We went in a small ship-- the wind and water moving in her. She lives in their sweetness of life-a bride, her sail a white wing, unmoving, moves with the tide. She lay to the wind, and we gave our hearts with a sigh to the breath of the spirit of love. But, when we came to the shore, the people were there. They had found us out-- always the open hand, always the blind eyes, always the deaf ears, always the wounds to be healed. They were there everywhere-- insects there in the sun when someone has lifted a stone. I knew they would drain him and ring him out-- ring him out to the last drop of the fountain water of life. I was sick of it all with a dry husk for a heart. But, he saw the flocks wanting shepherd and fold. Pity in him rose a clear spring for the world's thirst, and love was a pasture land. So, it went all day-- always the open hand, always the dull mind, always the slow heart, always the nameless fears, and self-pity-- self-pity and tears until the sun went up in the blaze of the day's heat. And with red wine burning through thin gold, it was lowered slowly onto the altar stone of a darkening world, where the sheep were in fold. We thought, now it is night, he will send them away. They are always late, we said, this is a desert please. Send them away, Lord, to buy food and be fed. But he, you give them to eat. The grass in that place shown exceedingly green-- I remember, because when the brain is dust, the cool greenness of grass is absurdly sweet. Then, let us go with what money we have and buy them bread. Bid them sit down on the grass and give them to eat, the Lord said. Matthew, and Mark, and Luke have written these things. They tell of the boy who brought us two little fish and some loaves of bread. The boy was one of the crowd. He went as he came. As long as a world lasts, the world will remember him, but no one will know his name. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu They sat down on the grass. My heart contracted. My mind was withered up. But Christ poured out his tenderness like wine poured out into a lifted cup-- always the open hands, always the blind eyes, always the mouth to be fed. And I, for one, was emptied out like a husk that had scattered its seed upon hard ground. Pitts Theology Library Emory University But, he saw the flocks wanting shepherd and fold. Pity in him a rose and a clear spring, for the world's thirst and love was a pasture land. The Lord blessed the bread. He put it into our hands, and it multiplied-- not in his hands but in mine. Even now remembering this, my thoughts shocked like a folding wing. My mind is a blank sheet of light in the mystery of the thing. I gave and my hands were full again and again and again. Pity in him fell on my dried dust. It was summer rain, and the husk of my heart expanded and filled again-- and was large with grain. For me, the miracle was this-that a clear stream of large love-- not mine-- flowed out of my soul-- a shining wave over my fellow man. These things I have told you happened a long while since. Our cherished Lord is dead-- he was crucified. Now, as then, we go about in the crowd telling his love and how he rose from the dead. And, risen in us, he lives in the least of men. But, I think nobody understands until I touch their wounds and they know the healing of his hands. On the night of the pass, before he died, he blessed the bread and put in to our hands to increase and be multiplied to the end of time. Now, if I turned my face away from the marketplace, I should be haunted-- hearing the rustle of heat in the darkness, striving, pushing up to the light. I should hear his words falling like slow tears in the supper room when he prayed that all may be one-- the father and son, even as they are one-- falling like slow tears over the sown fields. And I should see the world like a young field of wheat growing up for the grain, watered by his tears-- always the open hands, always the blind eyes, always the slow mind, always the deaf ears, and always Christ our Lord crowned with the following thorn and ring the spears. I know now that I never see the predator's feet in the dust where the son of man trod-- that in every man forever, I meet the Son of God. It is a slow truth-- a forbearing truth-- that human need is infinite. And, if a man devotes all of his time, all of the distilled essence of his wisdom and all of the manifold complex of his resources to the meeting of human need and devotes himself exclusively to it, every hour of every day of every year for 1,000 years without eating or sleeping or resting-- at the end of the 1,000 years, human need would still be infinite. Therefore, the wise man learns that since he cannot make a quantitative impression on infinity, he can make a qualitative impression on infinity. So, he puts at the disposal of human need the best that he can give, knowing that when he does this, the great god of life pours through this opening and multiplies his energies and his gifts. Always the open hand, always a teary eye. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. 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/. Title A name given to the resource We Believe (Television Series, 1958-1965) Description An account of the resource <em>We Believe</em> was a color television program that aired on WHDH-TV, Channel 5, in Boston on weekday mornings at 11:15. From 1958 to 1965, while Howard Thurman was Dean of the Chapel at Boston University, he was the host of the Friday morning show. Each message has a brief introductory section with bells and music before Thurman delivers his short meditation. Some recordings have been edited to remove the intro. In some cases, the Howard Thurman Educational Trust produced tapes with two messages on one recording.<br /><br />"These meditations are no longer than 15 minutes, but highly representative of his style, influence, and search for common ground." - <a href="http://archives.bu.edu/web/howard-thurman">the Howard Thurman and Sue Bailey Thurman Collections at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University.</a><br /><br /> <p style="text-align: right;"><em>We Believe</em> program listing in the TV Guide, March 29, 1958</p> <img src="http://pittsviva.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/webelieve-whdh-boston.png" style="float: right;" alt="webelieve-whdh-boston.png" /> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dustin Mailman 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/394-813.html" ></iframe> Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WHDH-TV, Boston, Massachusetts 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 394-813 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Always the Open Hand (1964-02-21) 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1964-02-21 Description An account of the resource In this recording within the We Believe Series, Thurman reads a poem sent to him from a friend. This poem speaks from the perspective of Phillip, one of Jesus' disciples. The content of this poem wrestles with the demands of the people upon Jesus, and Jesus' willingness to pour himself out to benefit those who are in need. In the author's engagement with Jesus' life, work, death, and resurrection, we are asked to ponder the human quest of making sense of God's open, relational, and creative nature. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Dustin Mailman christology communion disciples Feeding of the Five Thousand healing Incarnation Jesus kenosis Last Supper miracles Phillip poem Spirit of Love https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/43fba1cdc87a8a7de7378b60d8b1f110.pdf e986a0ed30674284c5bf3baf163dfec5 PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-812.mp3 [CHURCH BELLS] Pitts Theology Library Emory University [MUSIC PLAYING] Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh, Lord, my strength and my Redeemer. [MUSIC PLAYING] Last summer, it was my privilege to spend five or six days at the five years meeting of Friends of Quakers. And while there, I discovered a little pamphlet-- one of the Pendle Hill pamphlets, which has to do with the writing of poetry among Quakers. I must confess that in my own thought, the Quaker poets hardly existed. I thought of Whittier, always, and the tremendous influence which his words, and his poetry, and his images had not only on the Society of Friends, but in the great creative push of the abolitionist movement. But I was overwhelmed by some of the things that I found in this pamphlet-- some of the things that I want to share with you. It is all the more impressive to me, because the poets talk a great deal about the place of silence and the place of quiet in the meeting. I don't know whether you have had the experience of ever attending a Friends meeting. But there is a different dimension present in these meetings, and particularly in the meetings that are called the un-programmed meetings. That is the meetings that do not follow any pattern or scheme, in which there is no leader. And no one takes the initiative. But the whole group comes together in the meeting house. And they sit in the silence and do what the friends call centering down. And as they do, the noise in the mind, the kind of confusion that is going on in the spirit, begins to subside. And more and more, one is pulled into a vortex of creative, pulsing quiet, like the stillness of absolute motion. Now, one of the poets describes the silent meeting. "Enter the meeting and sink down in quiet. Grow deaf to hear. Repeat the wordless litany of silence. Silence invisible and necessary as air. Our bodies dwelling before birth and after death. Think of the soundless whirling of the earth, the silent worship of trees that sway and bow and praise. Unspoken love and a simple hand class, saying what lips would disavow. Walk the still jungle of remembered sin with love alone for a guide. Close out all sound. Enter the perfect silence, where is God." And then another, Ann Ruth Shawbaker describes the meeting house. "The old meeting house, where there is no symbolism, where there is no alter, where the people simply gather. And in some of them, there is a fireplace. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu And in the fireplace, there are logs burning. And as one sits and is gathered up in the creative silence, one's mind is stretched and one's spirit is, in a sense, hollowed out to make room for the movement of the mind, and the life of God, and the spirit of the worshippers. Now, this is how she describes it. "The sound of silence lies within this place. Pitts Theology Library Emory University Cool to the fevered heart as a fan in the heat of the day. And to the mind's chill uncertainties, warm as a fire in the lonely watches of the night. Before and after. Before the silence and after ride the furies. Here is the eye of calm within our storm. Here, the long, timeless tides of all men's consciousness break at our feet." And then this is another dimension of the same thing. The kind of prayer that this sort of silence inspires, but it's slightly different from the rather placid, smooth movement of the lines that describe the silence of the meeting house or the silence in the meeting, itself. "Deliver me, oh Lord, from subtle sin that creeps upon me. Here, I am aware. Like pride in humbleness or anxious care that righteous deeds I do be known to man. Forgive me if my plainness I display. All consciousness of self, let me forget. Teach lowliness to me, oh Lord. And let my inmost self be clad in Quaker gray. Defeat was sure before the race began. If for the prize of praise, the race I ran. My finest deeds are seen. If they are done through love of being thought a godly man, unbind my eyes, dear Lord. And let me see. Inverted pride is not humility." And then a Quaker economist at the University of Michigan has written some amazing sonnets. His name is Kenneth Bolding. And the sonnets are on those famous words of James Naylor, written in 1660. I think there should be time to read one of these. "My Lord, Thou art in every breath I take. And every bite and sup taste firm of Thee. With buoyant mercy, Thou enfoldest me and holdest up my foot, each step I make. Thy touch is all around me when I wake. Thy sound, I hear. And by Thy might, I see. The world is fresh with Thy divinity. And all thy creatures flourish for Thy sake. For I have looked upon a little child and seen forgiveness and have seen the day with Easton fire cleanse the foul night away. So cleanses thou this house I have defiled. And if I should be merciful, I know it is thy mercy, Lord, in overflow." And then, in these lines-"on forgetfulness and vain, I bind my finger with a thread. Playing mute remembrances instead of rings. I frayed my diary with the dates of things to hide them in my pocket, seldom read." And then I would bring all of this Quaker emphasis on poetry to a close with these lines of Whittier's. "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." [MUSIC PLAYING] Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, oh Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. 2 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu [MUSIC PLAYING] This program was prerecorded. Pitts Theology Library Emory University [MUSIC PLAYING] 3 � 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 We Believe (Television Series, 1958-1965) Description An account of the resource <em>We Believe</em> was a color television program that aired on WHDH-TV, Channel 5, in Boston on weekday mornings at 11:15. From 1958 to 1965, while Howard Thurman was Dean of the Chapel at Boston University, he was the host of the Friday morning show. Each message has a brief introductory section with bells and music before Thurman delivers his short meditation. Some recordings have been edited to remove the intro. In some cases, the Howard Thurman Educational Trust produced tapes with two messages on one recording.<br /><br />"These meditations are no longer than 15 minutes, but highly representative of his style, influence, and search for common ground." - <a href="http://archives.bu.edu/web/howard-thurman">the Howard Thurman and Sue Bailey Thurman Collections at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University.</a><br /><br /> <p style="text-align: right;"><em>We Believe</em> program listing in the TV Guide, March 29, 1958</p> <img src="http://pittsviva.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/webelieve-whdh-boston.png" style="float: right;" alt="webelieve-whdh-boston.png" /> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dustin Mailman 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/394-812.html" ></iframe> Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WHDH-TV, Boston, Massachusetts 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 394-812 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Readings from Quaker Poetry (1963-11-29) 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1963-11-29 Description An account of the resource In a message reflecting on his visit to Quaker meetings, Thurman reads from Quaker poetry about the emphasis on silence, inner reflection, meditation, and seeing God's presence in the world around us. He also reads an excerpt about practicing faith for oneself instead of as a demonstration to others. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Spencer Roberts meditation quiet silence https://thurman.pitts.emory.edu/files/original/0c8834938a0d069c845061021b62f763.pdf d3e14ccb3b004caefeae9531a0acfe7d PDF Text Text Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu 394-811.mp3 [MUSIC PLAYING] Pitts Theology Library Emory University Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, oh, lord, my strength and my redeemer. [MUSIC PLAYING] This is my final broadcast until next September. I wish to express my personal appreciation to all of you who have taken the time to write letters or postal cards, or make telephone calls expressing appreciation for the weekly broadcasts. I wish for each of you a full, and restful, and creative summer. Because tomorrow is Memorial Day, I have chosen to read several poems having to do with some aspect of this particular celebration. As the overall phrase covering what I shall read, I'm using two lines from Hermann Hagedorn's poem about the unknown soldier. And these lines are, we died, but you who live must do a harder thing than dying is. For you must think, and ghosts shall drive you on. The first thing that I'm reading is from John Drinkwater's "Abraham Lincoln", and Lincoln is speaking. I beg you not to harass yourself, ma'am. I too believe war to be wrong. It's the weakness, and the jealousy, and folly of men that make a thing so wrong possible. But we are all weak, and jealous, and foolish. That's how the world is and we cannot outstrip the world. Some of the worst of us are sullen, aggressive, but clumsy and greedy pirates. Some of us have grown out of that, but the best of us have an instinct to resist aggression if it won't listen to persuasion. You may say it's a wrong instinct. I don't know. But it's there, and it's there in millions of good men. I don't believe it's the wrong instinct I believe that the world must come to wisdom slowly. It is for us who hate aggression to persuade men always against it and hope that, little by little, they will hear us. But in the meantime, there will come moments when the aggressors will force the instinct to resistance to act. Then we must act earnestly, praying always in our courage that never again will this thing happen. And then we must turn again and again to persuasion. This appeal to force is the misdeed of an imperfect world. But we are imperfect. We must strive to purify the world, but we must not think ourselves pure, above the world. And the next that I shall read is from the Arizona poet of the desert, Badger Clark. This is about the Civil War. My father prayed as he drew a bead on the gray coats. Back in those blazing years when the house was divided. Bless his old heart. There never was truer or kinder, yet he prayed while hoping the ball from his clumsy old musket might thud to the body of some hot eyed young southerner and tumble him limp in the mud of the Vicksburg trenches. 1 �Pitts Theology Library The Howard Thurman Digital Archive Transcription thurman.pitts.emory.edu That was my father, serving the Lord and his country, praying and shooting whole heartedly, never a doubt. But now, what about me in my own day of battle? Could I put my prayers behind a slim Springfield bullet? Hardly, except to mutter, Jesus, we part here. My country calls for my body and takes my soul also. Do you see those humans herded and driven against me? Pitts Theology Library Emory University Turn away, Jesus, for I've got to kill them. Why? Oh, well, it's the way of my fathers. And such evils bring some vast, vague good to my country. I don't know why. But today, my business is killing. And my gods must be luck and the devil till this thing is over. Leave me now, Lord. Your eye makes me slack in my duty. My father could mix his prayers with his shooting, and he was a rare, true man in his generation. Now, I'm fairly decent in mine, I reckon. Yet if I should pray like him, I'd spoil it by laughing. What is the matter? And then this by Edna St. Vincent Millay, written when she was a young woman. And as I understand from an article which I read concerning her many, many months ago, she herself is alleged to have repented the mood of this poem. Of this fact, I'm not sure, but I state it because I feel that it should be said. And the poem is called "The Conscientious Objector". I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for death. I hear him leading his horse out of the stall. I hear the clatter on the barn floor. He is in haste. He has business in Cuba, business in the Balkans. Many calls to make this morning, but I will not hold the bridle while he cinches the girth. And he may mount by himself. I will not give him a leg up. Though he flicks my shoulders with his whip, I will not tell him which way the fox ran. With his hoof on my breast, I will not tell him where the black boy hides in the swamp. I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for death. I am not on his payroll. I will not tell him the whereabouts of my friends, nor of my enemies either. Though he promise me much, I will not map him the route to any man's door. Am I a spy in the land of the living that I should deliver men to death? Brother, the past word, and the plans of our city are safe with me. Never through me shall you be overcome. I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for death. And finally, this from John Bunyan, "Mr. Valiant for Truth". After this, it was noised about that Mr. Valiant for Truth was taken with a summons, and he had this for a token that the summons was true, that his picture was broken at the fountain. And then he said, by my sword, I give to him that shall succeed me in my pilgrimage. And my courage and skill to him that can get them, my marks and scars I carry with me to be a witness for me that I have fought his battles. Who will be my rewarder? I shall die, but this is all that I shall do for death. I am not on death's payroll. [MUSIC PLAYING] Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, oh, Lord, my rock and my redeemer. [MUSIC PLAYING] 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/. Title A name given to the resource We Believe (Television Series, 1958-1965) Description An account of the resource <em>We Believe</em> was a color television program that aired on WHDH-TV, Channel 5, in Boston on weekday mornings at 11:15. From 1958 to 1965, while Howard Thurman was Dean of the Chapel at Boston University, he was the host of the Friday morning show. Each message has a brief introductory section with bells and music before Thurman delivers his short meditation. Some recordings have been edited to remove the intro. In some cases, the Howard Thurman Educational Trust produced tapes with two messages on one recording.<br /><br />"These meditations are no longer than 15 minutes, but highly representative of his style, influence, and search for common ground." - <a href="http://archives.bu.edu/web/howard-thurman">the Howard Thurman and Sue Bailey Thurman Collections at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University.</a><br /><br /> <p style="text-align: right;"><em>We Believe</em> program listing in the TV Guide, March 29, 1958</p> <img src="http://pittsviva.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/webelieve-whdh-boston.png" style="float: right;" alt="webelieve-whdh-boston.png" /> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Descriptions by Dustin Mailman 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/394-811.html" ></iframe> Original Title Title as transcribed from tape cassette Selections for Memorial Day (WB-7B), 1964 May 29 Time Period The decade in which the recording was produced. 1960s Location The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon WHDH-TV, Boston, Massachusetts 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 394-811 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Thurman, Howard Title A name given to the resource Selections for Memorial Day (1964-05-29) 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> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1964-05-29 Description An account of the resource In this recording within the We Believe Series, Thurman reads three poems written by various authors speaking to subjects of war, conscientious objection, aggression, and violence. Each of these poems are read as a reflection upon the Memorial Day holiday. The first poem, by John Drinkwater, deals with aggression as it is related to war. The second poem, by Badget Clark, deals with a young man's decision to fight in the Civil War. The third, and final poem, by Edna St. Vincent Millay, speaks to conscientious objection while hiding a black child from people of power. Each of these poems emphasize Thurman's commitment to an anti-war ethic, pacifism, and the religion of Jesus. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Description by Dustin Mailman Abraham Lincoln aggression America anti-violence anti-war Badger Clark citizenship civil war consciousness death Edna St. Vincent Millay evil Herman Hagedorn holidays John Drinkwater poem prayer soul war