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--of a certain power that he had, that in little ways of relatedness, the vision was always breaking
trough. We will call it an insight that was a derivative from this experience.
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And he seemed [INAUDIBLE] something else that, in the moment of vision, one of the things
that happens is the man becomes aware of his gifts, of his particular, peculiar gifts. And one of
the gifts of which Jesus became aware was the gift of healing. And I'd like to pause now to
comment a little about this.
I think that there is a gift of healing, just as any other gift. I think a man who studies medicine
becomes a doctor. And who has the gift becomes an extraordinary person. But he can be a doctor
without the gift of healing. And he does something. But there's a magic that the git of healing has
that addresses, stimulates, calls forth a quality in the sick person of which the sick person was
not aware until it was called for by this healer.
Now, I realize that there are all kinds of focusing that turn up at the moment I mentioned this.
About 10 years ago, Margaret [INAUDIBLE] wrote a book about a woman who lived in
Minneapolis, Mrs. Somebody, who was a healer. And I live on the edge of curiosity all the time.
And I'm always sniffing things that seem to be out of my life that will throw light on my life.
After reading her biography and I found that she'd lived down in Minneapolis-- I was going there
for a weekend. And I wrote her ahead of time asking if she could give me a half hour on a
Saturday evening. I wanted to visit.
So when I got to the hotel, there was a note from her saying that the appointment was at 7:30 that
evening. And I went out to her apartment. I was met at the door by her sister, who was dressed in
a nurse's white [INAUDIBLE]. She took me into a small room, which apparently was a treatment
room.
There was [INAUDIBLE]. There was a table. And on the table was an old bible. On the wall
above the table was a print of Hofman's Head of Christ. To the left against the wall was an oldfashioned doctor's treatment-- what do you call it? Well, a table. That's the word. And then a
bright kind of [INAUDIBLE] and then a little stool.
And I was told to be seated at a chair. And presently, Mrs. Rhodes-- that's her name. Mrs.
Rhodes came in. And when she a face of [INAUDIBLE] that she had a goya that hung way down
her dress. She was a healer.
And I said to myself, even under the most overwhelming kind of insistent commitment and
passion diluted, oh, you are one of the most [? brazen ?] human beings I've ever seen.
[INAUDIBLE] healing people. So we introduced ourselves. And we began to talk.
And I said, you know, I have never met a live healer before. I said, that's why I'm here. I'm
curious. Tell me a little bit about you.
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And she said, I'm a simple farmwoman. I think she said maybe in second or third grade-- her age
at that time was probably seven or eight-- she had been a healer maybe two or three years. And I
said, tell me what happened? How did you--
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And she said that one morning, she felt a hand on her shoulder. But there wasn't anybody there.
Nothing. And she was told that from that time on, until such time as there was a change, her life
was under the direct direction or control of a spiritual person [INAUDIBLE].
Well, I settled back into my chair. I said, well, how does it work? She says, when someone
comes to see me, they see him. "He" refers to this person. He tells me what to say. He tells me
what the disease is, where it is located, where to place my hand, and at the same time, he tells me
whether or not healing can come through me to heal the disease.
And I obey. So then some people could come, as soon as I've touched them, I'm told that no
creative energy can flow through me to touch [INAUDIBLE]. And then he won't come back.
Other times, yes.
When I got through that with my mind, Then she said, last night, a very extraordinary happened.
She said, [INAUDIBLE]. And I was shaken. And I was told to get up and go to my desk, take
my pencil and paper, and write. And I was told that I was to write a symposium on the soul. And
I said, you will have to spell "symposium" because I've never heard of the word.
And I was told that my job was to write, and not to ask. So I wrote. I wrote 10 pages. And I
looked at my watch. And my half hour was up. And knowing how I wish people who came and
talked to me would observe the time, I said, my half hour is up. And I don't want to stay a minute
longer, because this is all I asked for. And then she said, oh, stay another half hour.
So I settled back in. And we talked more about this strange energy that flowed through her, that
she could not control, but that came at a moment in her life that she was nothing but powerful.
And thus, before the half hour was up, she said, may we pray. Would you be embarrassed? I
said, oh, no. I a prayer kind of [INAUDIBLE]. So there was a silent prayer where she said-- I
don't remember anything relevant. The words aren't [INAUDIBLE]. And I realized that she had
stopped talking.
She had stopped verbalizing for some time. And when I opened my eyes, her eyes were riveted
on my hands. And she said, when I looked at your hands, all the insides of your hands are worn.
But he tells me to tell you to pay no attention to that, but to keep your hands holding firmly the
thing that they're holding. Now, I don't know what that means. Does it make any sense to you,
she said tome. I said, well, I don't know. I'll have to put it in my hopper and see what comes out
of it.
As I was leaving, I said, I'm going back to Boston tomorrow afternoon. But do you have the
things that you wrote the other night? I would like to read them. Let me keep them overnight.
And I'll return them by messenger or bring them to you by 10 o'clock in the morning.
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Now, I digress to tell you this. Because we live surrounded by the mysteries of life.
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She let me have them. My kind of strength would not let me copy them for myself. Since that
time, I think I regret that I didn't. But when I read it-- this still seems amazing to me-- here was a
detailed discussion of the platonic theory of the soul, which we'll be talking about when we get
to [INAUDIBLE]. Just a detailed, careful statement of the platonic doctrine of the origin of the
soul.
And now and then, there comes a moment in a man's life, or a person's life-- as was in the-- we
talked about the life of Jesus-- when the primary private wall, shell, skin-- whatever the word is-that marks the individual life, part from the whole, is transcended, is pulled, is wrenched, and
there flows into the light something that the individual is aware of as having always been there,
and then the wall rises again, and your private individual life becomes yours, but never the same,
quite never [INAUDIBLE].
And how it manifests itself subsequently depends upon how the person defines his location. So
that we see in the life of Jesus stripped of all of the theology, and the Christology, and all of that,
what we see in the light of Jesus is-- the thing that happens when the implications of the vision,
the experience of illumination casts shafts of light on the path that the individual will follow for
the rest of his days.
And therefore, there is a very striking innate relationship between the inner experience, the
energy, and the most radical kinds of change in social order. And the mystic experience, instead
of its being life denied, does in that way become life affirmed. And the rhythmic beat maintains
itself in what a man like Hawking called the principle of automation. [INAUDIBLE].
"And understood what it is that we are trying to work out. He was very old. And from the secret
swaying of planets to the secret decencies in human hearts, he understood. I used to watch him
watering his lawn, and scattering the food for the woodpecker, sweeping the crossing before his
house.
It was not that there was light about him visible to the eye as in the old paintings, rather an
influence tamed from you him in little breaths. When we were with him, we became other. He
saw us all as if we were that which we dreamed ourselves. He saw the town already clothed for
its tomorrow. He saw the world beating like a heart. Beating like a heart.
How may I too know, I wanted to cry to him. Instead, I only said, and how is it with you today.
But he answered both questions by the look in his eyes, for he had come to quietness. He had
come to the place where sun and moon meet, and where the spaces of the heavens opened their
doors.
He was understanding, and love, and the silence. He was the voice of leaves as he fed the
woodpecker." And then this.
"When my own life feels small and I am oppressed with it, I like to crush together and see, in an
instant, a multitude of disconnected, unliked phases of human life. A medieval monk with his
string of beads pacing the quiet orchard, and looking up from the grass at his feet to the heavy
fruit trees.
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Little Malay boys play naked on the shining sea beach. A Hindu philosopher, alone under his
banyon tree, thinking, thinking, thinking, so that in the thought of God he may lose himself. A
troupe of [INAUDIBLE] dressed in white with crowns of vine leaves dancing along the Roman
streets.
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An Epicurean discussing at a Roman bath to a [INAUDIBLE] of his disciples on the nature of
happiness. A martyr on the night of his death looking through the narrow window to the sky and
feeling that already, he has the wings that shall bear him up. A [INAUDIBLE] witch doctor
seeking for herbs by moonlight, while from the huts on the hillside come the sound of dogs
barking, and the voices of women and children.
A mother giving bread and milk to her children in little wooden basins, and singing the evening
song. I like to see it all. I feel it run through me, that life belongs to me. It makes my little life
larger. It breaks down the narrow walls that shut me in."
To capitulate for a minute and start moving along, you will remember that the great primal
discovery, disclosure that Jesus made in the climactic experience of the baptism was a radical
disclosure of who he was.
And you'll remember the imagery, the symbolism that he used for the heavens up there. And the
spirit of God descended upon him like a dove. Symbolism. And he heard the voice say to him,
"you are My son, My beloved. This day, have I begotten thee. Are in thee am I well pleased."
Having this experience of heightened and acute awareness of himself, of his essence, his
substance, his core, having been penetrated at what may be called in psychological terms the
nerve center of his concept-- that this experience created a radical demand upon his life.
And the question that he had to answer now as a derivative from the vision-- it was, what is the
bearing of this disclosure on my life, my journey, my function, my work, my mission. And in
order to separate settle the thing, shake it down, so that he could derive from the experience what
may be called, for lack of a better term, a working paper for his life.
A working paper that was a derivative from this experience of illumination. And the first step
taken in the carrying out of this sense of trying to discover how this awareness of himself as an
essential part of God, of the eternal-- what difference does that make in how I relate to the other
kinds of identity by which I had found my meaning? And this is very important.
Now, I've skipped the wilderness and moved to the [INAUDIBLE] for that's the journey that I
want to finish if indeed I can this afternoon. Because [INAUDIBLE] is blowing down my neck.
And I want to get rid of him. The first identity which Jesus had to heal was the identity of
belonging. And this, of course, is your first identity [INAUDIBLE]-- mine, anyway. What
bearing does the vision have on the particular meanings of mine own sources identity?
Can I hold clear and distinctly this new awareness of myself in relation to the eternal, and at the
same time, work out some sort of construct with reference to the identity belongings by which I
have defined myself by? And with him, it was very tricky, because his identity of belonging was
Jewish. He was a Jew. A Jew.
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[INAUDIBLE]. How can I work out this awareness that has come to me, my self awareness
which I've discovered to be rooted and grounded in God so intimately that I am conscious of the
fact that I am his immediate offspring? What does that do with the identity by which I have
found my significant [INAUDIBLE]?
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For instance, when as a young man and Judas of Galilee was going around the community trying
to get young Jewish men to join him in insurrection against Rome, why didn't Jesus join?
It is reasonable that he weren't in the rebuilding of the city Sepphoris, which was destroyed as a
hostile city by Rome because of his insurrection-- that young Jewish men, who were his
contemporaries, who were part of his life and with he'd participated. But he didn't go.
How could he continue living the life of a Jew in Palestine without locating his identity in his
Jewishness?
This meant at once, for instance, are the enemies of the Jewish community, with which I have
my identity-- are the enemies of the Jewish community my enemies? So then much of what we
find him doing with reference to the attitude towards enemies-- which has become a part of the
lip service doctrine of the youth in our religion-- is located in this critical problem.
How must I deal with the enemies of the Jewish community that I remain a Jew who has had this
moment that gives to him an awareness that transcends the group [INAUDIBLE]? And it's
interesting what he does.
For instance, the enemies in the Jewish community were three. One, the regular man that
everybody has-- people that you don't like, sometimes for good and sufficient reasons,
sometimes [INAUDIBLE]. But whatever your private reason-- And he says about Jesus that-[INAUDIBLE].
[INAUDIBLE]? I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
[INAUDIBLE].
Yeah?
I didn't hear what you said.
Oh. Well, I don't know what I said. But I'll start. The private enemy that everybody has-- there's
nothing unique about that, people who, for one reason or another, there's a ruptured relationship.
But he begins there. And what did he say?
That if I discover, on my way to affirm, my awareness absolves-- and the language he uses is
symbolic-- "I'm taking my gift to the [INAUDIBLE]." And then I remember that there is a
ruptured relationship between me and someone else, the person [INAUDIBLE]. Then at the
point of my remembrance, I pick it up. I go back and I find the person [INAUDIBLE] the other
day.
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Now, the second category was the member of the Jewish community who had rented his mind
and his know-how to the Roman government, the tax collector. For the tax collector would say to
the Romans that, I know Jewish psychology. And I can get the tribute in a way that a gentile or a
Roman can't do.
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I will rent my know-how, my idiom. You can borrow it for a price. And so that the tax collector
was despised because he was a great betrayer. Now, how does Jesus, aware now of himself, who
also is a Jew-- how does he deal with this? Because these two things must not be in permanent
conflict.
He uses a very quaint way. He says that Matthew, or whoever [INAUDIBLE], is a son of
Abraham. And he tested it by inviting himself to be a guest in the tax collector's house.
And he soon realizes-- he said something of very great psychological significance in terms of
what he was working out in the light of his vision-- this is what I'm talking about all the time-that the ultimate intimacy between human beings is to break bread together. [INAUDIBLE].
And as systems and social systems in the world, where there is a desert and a gulf between
peoples, we will do everything together-- play together, sleep together, work together,
[INAUDIBLE]. Because when-- and why-- Oh, I'm getting far too [INAUDIBLE], and then I'll
come back.
Because when you eat, when you stop to eat, a lot of things that have been trying to catch up
with you all day and you haven't had a chance to pay any attention to-- you've been too busy-when you sit down to eat, then they come around.
And that's why I have never been [? inclusive ?] of where I am now. I've never happened on any
college or university campus in my life where people who eat in dining rooms or what have you
were satisfied with the food-- not because the food's bad, but because it is the one time that all
the things that have been bugging you all day and you haven't had a chance to pay any attention
to-- when you sit down, and you say, well, here you are now, and they come, and [INAUDIBLE]
regret and-[LAUGHTER]
I made you sandwiches, and huh? And so Jesus-- now, this is the clue. If I eat with the tax
collector-- I can do it-- and then the Roman who was the great enemy-- and I just have to take a
moment to throw it into context for you.
The Jewish community at the time that Jesus lived in Palestine had lost its political freedom. It
was a vassal of Rome. They were permitted-- "they" being the Jewish people-- were permitted to
have their own private religion, but they did not have-- now, the Jewish state-- they did not have
power of veto and certification over the life of a citizen.
That's why, for instance, when Jesus was tried and condemned, the Jewish community could not
put him to death. The Romans had to do that. Because the autonomy of a state at last seems to
rest on whether or not it has power of life and death over its citizens.
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How can I handle this without destroying the integrity of this awareness that came
[INAUDIBLE]?
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And you know what, how did he do it? He rejected one by one--
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University of Redlands, Redlands, California
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Edits: brazen human; Bacchanalians; never been inclusive - GL 5/20/19
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1970s
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394-098_B
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Thurman, Howard
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On Mysticism, Part 12 (University of Redlands Course), 1973
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<a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a>
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audio
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<a href="http://pitts.emory.edu/">Pitts Theology Library, Emory University</a>
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<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.
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GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-13042600.321303 4037296.9410534))
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1973-02
Description
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This recording is the eighth lecture in our collection of ten that Howard Thurman gave at the University of Redlands in 1973 on the topic of mysticism. Thurman indicates that this lecture functions as a means to point the listener towards practical approaches to mysticism through lenses of psychology, philosophy, and religious experience. In this recording, Thurman reflects upon the life of Jesus, and an encounter he had with the author Margaret Rhodes, in order to make sense of what it means to heal. Here, Thurman indicates that the primary function of healing rests in the healing of one's "identity of belonging." In other words, Thurman is arguing that to heal, and be healed, is to be fully integrated into a life of community.
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Description by Dustin Mailman
baptism
calling
christology
contemplation
creative energy
gifts
goya
Head of Christ
healer
healing
Henrich Hofmann
historical Jesus
imago dei
inner experience
interelatedness
Jesus
magic
Margaret Rhodes
Minneapolis
mystic experience
Palestine
Platonic doctrine
power
principle of automation
self-awareness
social change
Stephen Hawking
symbolism
symposium of the soul
wilderness
woodpecker
working paper
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And the self, the sense of self, that the personality has. So I began to look around to see. And
when he said loss of self-respect, I smiled. And he said, oh, no. It's not what you're thinking. I
said, how do you know what I'm thinking? Oh, he said, you're thinking that we suffered the loss
of self-respect because of the presence of the conqueror in our own land. I said, yes.
He said, oh, no. That maybe there, but that's minimal. He said, the loss of self-respect is due to
untouchability and Hinduism, a part of the Hindu family saying to another part of the Hindu
family that it is of no account, and no meaning, and no meaning. This rejection undermine the
sense of self respect, both for the caste Hindu, and for the outcast Hindu.
So I began attacking that. And the first thing I did was to adopt, in my own family-- as I'm a
caste Hindu-- to adopt in my own family an outcast girl. And this announced to all of the caste
Hindus, this is the road back. And the second thing I did was to change their name from Sudras,
or outcasts, to harijan. And harijan is a combination Hindi word that means child of God. Boy,
he said, if I can make every caste Hindu, any time he refers to an outcast, call him a child of
God, I will create in that caste Hindu the kind of moral congestion that cannot be believed until
he changes his attitude towards them. This is very interesting.
Now the significance of his contribution to the modern feeling and interpretation of nonviolence
is at one point, he give, he rested the dogma, the ethic of nonviolence, into the hands of the
masses, the least privileged of the Indians. And this said to them that even though we are this, or
that, or the other in terms of no meaning and significance, Gandhiji feels that we are worthy to be
the custodians of this ethical insight, the implementation of which will bring about a different
kind of social climate for us and for all of India.
And he thinks we can do it. And he placed a crown over our heads that we are trying to grow tall
enough to wear. And I have an idea about what that means. When I was a little boy-- to give you
a little rest-- but when I was a little boy, my older sister had a boyfriend. Oh, it is natural. And he
was a big boy in comparison to me. And they were playing what we call hard ball up on one end
of the playground and the little boys were playing another kind of ball made out of tightly bound
rags and tied that we call a softball.
So I said to my chum, I will bet you a cartwheel, a cartwheel is a big ginger cookie that sold for a
penny, six for a nickel, I said I'll bet you a cartwheel that when Willy Thomas's turn comes to
bat, he will let me bat in his place. So the bet was on. We stopped playing, ran up there. And I
went to Willy, I said, Willy, when your turn comes, will you let me bat in your place? Oh, sure,
Harlan. Of course, you know why he wanted me on his side. So I wouldn't talk.
And then his turn came, I went to the bat. And the bat was so heavy that I could hardly handle it.
And I stood at the bat and the miracle happened. The big boy threw the ball as hard to me as he
threw to the big boys. I was this little boy, could hardly hold the bat, scared to death. But what he
did for me in that moment created a new dimension of my own persona.
Now this is what happened to the masses of Indians when Gandhi assumed that the one thing that
was available to them was also the most creative, and dynamic, and redemptive thing that could
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be done, not only to change the society and make life uncomfortable for the British, but to put at
their disposal a new, and fresh, and significant way of living. Now the thing that followed from
that is that-- oh, boy, well, I can't stop it, the watch I mean-- the thing that follows from that is
this, that the effect on the life of the people, namely giving them a new sense of self, now given
this fact, they are much more conscious of all of the injustices that were placed upon them than
they ever were before.
And this is the dilemma of nonviolence. For when you become the custodian of that kind of
created increment, it enlarges the sense of the dignity of the individual who is the receptacle of
this credential. And with this new sense of self, you become aware of things that have been
happening to you all your life, but you had absorbed them and paid very little attention to them.
Now the whole area of your being becomes sensitized.
And this is the danger moment for the dogma of nonviolence. For when I become aware of my
predicament in a way of which I have not been aware before, now I see the anatomy of injustice
in a brand new way. And my first response to that is to renounce the thing that made it possible
for me to become aware of it in the first place.
And this is why men like Gandhi, and then another entirely different dimension in King, Martin
King on the American scene-- I have time to go into that just a little-- when these men began to
work in somewhat the fashion as I have hastily outlined, so that as a result of what was
transpiring in them, they became aware of pain, of misery, of injustice, of discrimination. And
the awareness has a sense of immediacy about it.
And the nature of their hate and their hostility now becomes articulate in them. Now this is a
very important, very subtle point, because it is happening all around us now. Now hate becomes
active in the lives of people who are developing flattery a sense of self. Hate becomes activated
[INAUDIBLE]. But hate is not created by a fresh, a new awareness of the self. It merely
becomes activated.
Now, if I may illustrate it. Whether in the life of the masses of one country or another, the
masses are the people who have been systematically outside of this meaningful stream of the
contemporary society, and hate in them, very often, is unactivated, if I may make a word I guess
is such a word. It is hate that is hydrated. It's like a sludge. Do you know what a sludge is? Well,
I'll have to use the words, it's a sludge. All the liquid is out of it and it's a sort of gooey stuff
down in the bottom of the psyche, sealed off by the encrustation of the ancient iniquity in the
environment.
Now the thing that happens is sometimes, as a result of the kind of change that has taken place in
the life of the people precipitated by the sort of thing that Gandhi or Martin did here, and
sometimes, as a result of changes in the society that may not be related to them as themselves,
but whatever happens, however it happens, once these shifts take place, a little air gets down into
the psyche. And the air activates the sludge.
We are the custodian of an instrument of social change that we can use and no one can prevent
us. In that moment of awareness, ancient fears disintegrated and a whole new people emerged.
Now in that emergence, was a new sense of self, new awareness of the extent of their misery
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became articulate. This is the point that I'm making. And with this articulation violence,
remember, quick, tends to be efficient, became the immediate handle.
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And I will stop because I've got get a train. But so let me put it together, you can't ever quit this
because your minds-- now what I've said is this, that given the necessity for social change,
violence is the most obvious, the most available instrument, not only because of what it is, but
because it is the instrument for social change that's a part of national policy. It's a part of the
etiquette of the state of government.
It is quick, it is all these things. It does not touch the will. Why always, it is always possible for
the individual under the attack of violence to establish psychological distance between himself
and the violence and thereby, work out private and personal immunity from its effect.
Nonviolence insinuates itself into the will.
It often is slow. Its most creative dimension is the way in which it activates the imagination of
the individual, or individuals, so that it becomes possible for them to project themselves into the
other man's situation, place and thereby, open a way for him to do the same thing to them. There
is no guarantee that nonviolent direct action or nonviolent indirect action, will make for social
change.
The possibilities are that social change that is instrumented-- if I may make a verb there-- social
change that is instrumented by nonviolence has the chance of involving protectedness into a
single commitment, whereas violence guarantees that no such involvement will take place. For in
the last analysis-- and this really is the last sentence-- there is but one place of refuge for any
man on this planet and that is in another man's heart. And what the nonviolent man does, he
makes of his heart a swinging door. And the violent man seals his door against intrusion and
thereby, becomes a prisoner in his own house.
[APPLAUSE]
3
�
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Man and Social Change Series (1969, California State College, Long Beach, CA)
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In the three lectures comprising this series, Thurman discusses the effects of personal experience on social change. He illuminates points regarding individual freedom, the expression of togetherness in community, and nonviolence as the individual’s attempt to broaden one’s circle of concern.
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1969
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Descriptions by Dr. Tim Rainey
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1960s
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Man and Social Change (III): Violence and Non- [Side B], 1969 Mar 21
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394-048_B
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Thurman, Howard
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1969-03-21
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<a href="http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rp8k9">MSS 394</a>
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GEOMETRYCOLLECTION(POINT(-13148225.246838 3999563.3243138))
Description
An account of the resource
Throughout history, physical violence has been used to bring about immediate social change. However, it is unable to rob a person of the “final vote” – the option to give up one’s life. Non-physical violence is a more devastating reality for Thurman because when it is effective, the person surrenders the will and is robbed of the option. Willingness to die, to escape the forced option, is “the organic basis for freedom in human life.” The force of violence does not enter the will but “Nonviolence insinuates itself into the will,” creates a new sense of self and freedom, and enables the person to become an unbounded instrument of social change.
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<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.
Title
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Man and Social Change, Part 3: Violence and Nonviolence (continued), 1969 March 21
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Description by Dr. Tim Rainey
Ghandi
non-physical violence
nonviolence
option
physical violence
social change
violence
will
World War I
World War II
-
http://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/pittsthurman/original/4c7b2f8958c2c1430cc45371d7afd319.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAI4CD764Y635IGLNA&Expires=1711648800&Signature=ZNXbY2K1GhDQ50YaZ3sWQ57BSl8%3D
bcf73b76c66fba92b69337756bc13a9e
PDF Text
Text
Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
394-048_A.mp3
I have two things that I want to read as a background for our discussion. The first is from the
introduction-- the prologue, really-- to Bernard Shaw's Androcles and the Lion.
Pitts Theology Library
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The captain says to Lavinia, what you are facing is certain death. You have nothing left now but
your faith and this craze of yours-- this Christianity. Are your Christian fairy stories any truer
than our stories about Jupiter and Diana?
Lavinia, a man cannot die for a story and a dream. None believe the dreams and stories more
devoutly than Spintho. But he could not face the great reality of the pain. What he would have
called my faith has been oozing away minute by minute whilst I have been sitting here with
reality becoming more and more real with stories and dreams fading away into nothing.
Captain, are you then going to die for nothing?
Lavinia, yes. That is the wonderful thing. It is since all the stories and dreams have gone that I
have now no doubt at all, no doubt that all that I must die for is something greater than dreams
and greater than stories.
But for what? I don't know. If it were for anything small enough to know, it would be too small
to die for. I think I'm going to die for God. Nothing else is really enough to die for.
What is God, said the captain. When we know that, Captain, we shall be gods ourselves.
And then this from an earlier period in the creative unfolding of Edna St. Vincent Millay. 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
clutter on the barn floor.
Death 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 death's 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 password 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.
1
�Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
Social change, violence and nonviolence-- it is a matter of very great significance to me that we
are at a moment in human history in which great shifts in the meaning of society and the
meaning of the individual seem to be in balance.
Pitts Theology Library
Emory University
As a man who has devoted most of his maturity-- that is, most of what he calls his maturity-- to
questions which have to do with the meaning of religion and, particularly, the meaning of the
religion which is a part of my own history and culture, I have been profoundly puzzled by two
tremendous events. The first is that-- there are really three. Two we have here, and then one
along here.
The first is that in 1917, when there was the great upheaval in the empire of the Tsar, when the
stage was set for the turning of the tide, and those persons who were most responsible as the
living instruments for social change-- those hard-nosed individuals who were the spearhead of
the revolution-- when they were casting about for the kind of dynamic way of viewing the world
that would bring about social change, which from their point of view would be redemptive and
full of health and will for the common life, the great ethical religion, Christianity, was rejected-rejected.
That, for which it seemed to have come into the world, was denied. And the Russian Revolution
went its way using another kind of ground for its meaning, for its motivation, for its dynamic.
When, many years after, there was a complete break down in another society, and a whole nation
was wrestling with the question of moral guilt precipitated by a responsibility that was placed
upon it for bringing about a World War-- namely the German people-- and what was needed was
something that would give a sense of worth, and significance, and health to the guilt-ridden
populace, and the man arose who became the redeemer of the society, and once again, a whole
nation under the aegis of a very, very charismatic leader rejected this great religion and found by
an appeal to another aspect of life the energy, the strength, the dynamism to purge the German
soul of guilt of one kind and send it on its way with the dream in the mind and the heart to create
the new order and give to that order a new and radical definition.
Now this is interesting. Twice now, this great ethical religion, which is my own, was rejected.
Back in the '30s, by 19-- I will get to the point by and by. Just don't worry. I've zeroed in on the
point, but I have to do it this way.
About 1934, '35, the new act of India was developed by the British government and passed on to
the Indian people to establish some order of life for the Indians that would not disturb the
balance of their colonial status. And one of the political provisions in this act was to give
political representation in the Indian parliament or whatever the body was called on the basis of
religious population. So that since the Hindus about 60% of the total population, it meant that
they would have a larger representation in the assembly. And the Muslims were next, and then
on down to the almost microscopic percentage of Christians.
There were 25 million untouchables in Hinduism. And they became a choice prize because, for
instance, if the Muslims could get this bulk of 25 million, it would at once increase their
numerical representation in the parliament and give them more of a concrete and definitive
bargaining power. If the Christians that were less than 5% could get the 25 million untouchables,
2
�Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
this then would at least give them a position of some sort of political prestige that would make it
possible for them to exercise and influence that was far greater than anything they had ever
dreamed of.
Pitts Theology Library
Emory University
So the Dr. Ambedkar, who was the head of the untouchables in India, became the centerpiece. If
you can get Ambedkar, then the 25 million untouchables will follow him. So it was quite a time.
So all of the groups made their pitch. E. Stanley Jones spent many, many hours wrestling and
agonizing with Ambedkar, hoping to win him to Christianity, and through him, 25 million
untouchables. And he made all the claims how Christianity really is addressed to the underprivileged, that it gives a sense of persona and meaning to those people who are anonymous in
the society and so forth. You know all of the things that would be said, as only he could say
them.
And once again, a great world figure, in the sense that he represented a vast, vast-- millions of
human beings, turned Christianity down. And the simple answer was I lived five years in the
United States. That's all he had to say. Now with this in the background, let us go to work then
on the issue.
Violence, as an instrument of social change. We are familiar with this because it is a part of
national policy. Violence is the act by which one man or one nation seeks to impose its will upon
another man or another nation.
It is very appealing as an instrument of social change because it tends, up to a very significant
point, to be efficient. It's efficient. It's quick. It saves a lot of time proing and coning. You simply
bash the heads together, and by the time they recover, they are committed.
When our younger daughter was five and we were on sabbatical living on a campus, I was
working away in my room with a big book I was reading. And she came in. And she said,
Daddy, I want you to help me do something in my room.
I said, Anne, don't you see that I'm busy? I'm trying to read this book. And I must finish reading
it before the taxi comes because the book is too heavy for me to carry in my bag. Well, that just
went over, making no contact at any point.
Then she said, but Daddy, this is important. And I want you to help me now because later will be
too late. And I said, I can't do it.
And she stood there. And I didn't use any violence. But I put a new depth in my voice and
surrounded her with an atmosphere of violence. And she bristled. But being her mother's
daughter, she stood her ground.
[LAUGHTER]
And finally, she went out, slamming the door behind her. Now, I went on with my work. But
something was always nagging at my mind.
3
�Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
Pitts Theology Library
Emory University
Now, I could taken her by the hand, figuratively, led her gently into my meaning, my necessity,
my urgency. And then I could have let her take me by the hand and do the same thing for her. So
in this kind of interchange of projection, she would have looked out on my problem through my
eyes. And I would have looked out on her problem through her eyes. And it is conceivable that
not only would she not have disturbed me, but she would have stood guard at the door to keep
her mother from disturbing me so that I could finish reading the book and be ready when the taxi
came.
But that would have taken about two hours. And I had only about 25 minutes. There is
something about violence as an instrument of social change that gets-- within a limited time
interval-- gets the job done so that the next move may be made.
Gasset-- Ortega Gasset, in his book The Revolt of the Masses, discusses the meaning of violence
in a very interesting way. And I suggest to you to read it sometimes if you're interested in
pursuing this, at least his kind of argument, because it's an interesting one. He says that violence
does not ever disappear from the horizon of the human adventure or the human enterprise. But it
operates on what he calls an ascending and descending scale in human life.
The barbarian, according to Gasset, is a man who, when his will is frustrated so that it is
impossible, for he is blocked in his effort to impose his will upon another, as soon as that
happens, says Gasset, the barbarian resorts to violence. Now, Gasset says, the civilized man
postpones the use of violence until he has exhausted all other measures. But that violence, as an
aspect-- a functioning aspect of personality, is always present.
Now, violence may be physical force. And usually, the definition of violence is the use of
physical force. That's the definition that the dictionaries give is the use of physical force as an
extension of an individual's will as it seeks to impose itself on another without the other's consent
or assent.
But perhaps, perhaps physical violence or violence as a physical force does not exhaust the
possibilities of the meaning of violence in human experience. For non-physical violence is far
more devastating than physical violence.
A man can accommodate himself to the fact that in this adventure through which he is going, he
may lose his life. He may make an immediate and radical accommodation to the fact of his
death. So that in one creative sweep of his mind, he can accept the acceptance of death, which is
far more important than merely accepting death. He can accept the acceptance of death.
For every thoughtful man, some time in his life, arrives at a decision. And that decision has to do
with how crucial to him is the continuity of his physical existence. This is what Jesus means, I
suppose, when he says, what would a man give in exchange for his life?
Now, dictators, in a society that has become totalitarian, understand this subtle thing in
personality. So that they surround the atmosphere in which their subjects live with a subtle
rumor. The result of which causes the individual citizen to over-emphasize the significance of his
physical existence.
4
�Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
Now, how do they do this? You go to bed at night and everybody is at home. You wake up in the
morning, the father is missing. The mysterious knock during the night, and the father disappears.
A neighbor that you saw this morning working in his yard, this afternoon he's gone.
Pitts Theology Library
Emory University
And after a while, to continue to live and not be pulled away unannounced and unnoticed causes
the priority of physical existence to mount and mount until it becomes a top priority. Now, once
the dictator guarantees-- sees that in the populace the average man places a maximum premium
upon his physical existence, then the society is ready for any kind of change that the dictator
determines. For all he need to do is to threaten to kill you. And you will do whatever he says to
so that sooner or later, every man-- and by man, I mean man the generic-- every man has to
decide for himself how important is his own physical continuity and under what circumstances
will he gladly give up his life. Give up his life.
Now, violence, then, is maybe the least reflective way by which social change may take place.
Or it may be the most cunning, the most subtle means for bringing about social change.
It is comparatively easy to say that one option, one alternative in this picture a man always has-and that is that he can always die, you see? And of course, I think this is the organic basis for
freedom in human life. But that's another story. There's one option that nobody can take from
me. I can always die so that whatever the other thing is that I'm being required to do, I don't have
to do that. I can die.
But one of the things that we've learned from the terror and the madness of the Third Reich was
the fact that there are refinements in physical violence that may systematically rob a man from
exercising his final vote to give up his life. I was talking with an ophthalmologist down in
Stanford, who had come through one of the camps. I preached a sermon talking about this. And
the idea seemed sound and solid and worthy. So he asked after the meeting-- he asked if he could
come by to see me that night.
When he's through with his rounds at the hospital, he came by about 10 o'clock. And we talked
from 10 o'clock at night to 5 o'clock in the morning-- all night long. And nobody got sleepy.
And what were we talking about? He was saying that it is possible-- the thing that happened to
me was I was taken right up to the point of death, right, and then snatched back. Until finally, he
said, my very self was splintered and shattered. And I had no will left and no sense of my own
personal private autonomy.
Now, violence does this. Let me put that aspect up together and talk about nonviolence and be
through. Violence tends to be efficient. It tends to be quick. It's a time saver.
It inspires a certain kind of panic in the human spirit so that it makes capitulation possible
without moral compromise. This is very interesting. But it does not change the will. It tends to
drive the will underground and let it lurk there until a more propitious and promising moment for
its emergence to come to pass.
But it is simple. And it can be exercised without discipline because the history of violence in the
life of the human animal is a very long one. Now, I will leave violence. I'm not through, but I'll
leave it and move to non-violence [INAUDIBLE].
5
�Pitts Theology Library
The Howard Thurman Digital Archive
Transcription
thurman.pitts.emory.edu
Now, non-violence in our time has been associated, of course, as an instrument of social change
and associated with Mahatma Gandhi. When I was in India, I did have a wonderful five hours
with Mr. Gandhi. And a part of the time, we were discussing this question of the dynamics of
non-violent direct action. And one aspect of our conversation I want to use as the
[INAUDIBLE], and I know what I want to say.
Pitts Theology Library
Emory University
I asked him near the end, why was it that his campaign of non-violent direct action expressing
itself and non-cooperation with the British, why did it fail of its objective? And the objective
being, of course, to get rid of the British. But they were still there. And the campaign had bogged
down apparently from the march to the sea and the making of the salt, and so forth, and so on.
And he said that non-violent direct action is an ethical activity that is derived from the Hindu
doctrine of Ahimsa, no killing. It is, what he called, not only immoral idea or ideal, but it is a
spiritual one.
And he said that it involves complete involvement on the part of all of the masses of the people
who are caught up in the process of social change. It cannot be, said he, the activity of a leader
separated from an activity in which the masses of the people participate. This is the first point.
So, he said, at first, based upon our tradition, it was possible for the masses of the Indians to
respond to this doctrine. But under the pressure of the organized political power of the country in
the hands of the British, the non-violent non-cooperation ideal bogged down and degenerated
into violence. These were his words.
And he said, this at first raised the question in my mind about the validity of the non-violent
ethic as an instrument in social change. And once I was satisfied that the concept itself was valid
based upon my experience, my interpretation of my own devotion to truth, I began to look
somewhere else for the cause of the breakdown.
And this is very astute. He said, I found, based upon my own experience, something I'd
forgotten, said he. That it takes an enormous amount of energy, physical energy, to sustain an
ethical ideal such as non-violence over a time interval of sufficient duration to make it effective.
And the masses of the Indians were unable to do this because they didn't have enough food to
eat.
So he said I withdrew from the political campaign and began working on the question of
rebuilding the-- well, whatever you do when you feed people-- to do this. So that's why I reactivated the old spinning wheel and the cottage and village industries, so as to put at the
disposal of the masses of Indians that which at one time was a part of their technique of survival
but had been taken away from them when the conqueror came. And by reactivating this, they
could get more food and build up their vitality to the point that, in terms of physical energy, it
would be possible to sustain this ethical ideal over the time interval that would make it effective.
And the second thing I observed was that they lack vitality because they had lost their selfrespect. And he said, we don't begin to understand the relationship between our energy and
dynamism in the personality.
6
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Man and Social Change Series (1969, California State College, Long Beach, CA)
Description
An account of the resource
In the three lectures comprising this series, Thurman discusses the effects of personal experience on social change. He illuminates points regarding individual freedom, the expression of togetherness in community, and nonviolence as the individual’s attempt to broaden one’s circle of concern.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1969
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Descriptions by Dr. Tim Rainey
AudioWithTranscription
Audio that is shown through the 3Play Media embedded interactive transcript
Audio with Transcription
<iframe width="100%" height="820" frameborder="0" src="/files/players/394-048_A.html" ></iframe>
Location
The location of the interview, speech, lecture, or sermon
California State College, Long Beach, California
Time Period
The decade in which the recording was produced.
1960s
Original Title
Title as transcribed from tape cassette
Man and Social Change (III): Violence and Nonviolence [Side A], 1969 Mar 21
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
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394-048_A
Creator
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Thurman, Howard
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1969-03-21
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>
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(-13148225.246838 3999563.3243138))
Description
An account of the resource
Throughout history, physical violence has been used to bring about immediate social change. However, it is unable to rob a person of the “final vote” – the option to give up one’s life. Non-physical violence is a more devastating reality for Thurman because when it is effective, the person surrenders the will and is robbed of the option. Willingness to die, to escape the forced option, is “the organic basis for freedom in human life.” The force of violence does not enter the will but “Nonviolence insinuates itself into the will,” creates a new sense of self and freedom, and enables the person to become an unbounded instrument of social change.
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.
Title
A name given to the resource
Man and Social Change, Part 3: Violence and Nonviolence, 1969 March 21
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Description by Dr. Tim Rainey
Ghandi
non-physical violence
nonviolence
option
physical violence
social change
violence
will
World War I
World War II