THE WAY AT THE RIVER IDYAI
A Sermon
Preached in the Duke thiversi ty Chapel
by
The Reverend Professor James T. Cleland
Dean of the Chapel
31 January 1965
There are many aspects of our academic corporate life which receive merciless
criticism in the editorial columns of "The Chronicle" and in the Letters to the
Editor. But one institution seems to be doing a good job, judging from the way
it is left alone: the Quadrangle Pictures. There we are .eiven the chance to
see t Le movies we may have missed downtown or at home or overseas. We are given
t he opportunity to see for a second time those films which impressed or delighted
or b~ f fled us. Recently the Quadran~ le Pictures brou~Lt back to a large and awed
audience "The Bridge Over The River Kwai," a prize winnin::; picture based on a
novel of the same name, written ten years ago (1954 ) by Pierre Boulle, a Frenchman. It is the story of the building of a wooden bridge, by British prisoners
of war on the Siam-Burma border, to carry the railroad which would enable the
Japanese to invade India. Do you remember the triangular contest involving the
sadistic Japanese Colonel who must Lave the bridge, the militarily ritualistic
Britislt Colonel who supervises its building, and the cloak-and-dagger boys from
Calcutta who want to blow it up? Sir Alec Guinness was t he British Colonel. Your
feet are J right now, probably tappinc; out the rhythm of its theme song: "Colonel
Bogey •
II
A second book was .written about the River Kwai , in 1S62 . The author was
Ernest Gordon; the title was, Through the Valley of the Kwai. It became a best
seller and was translated into at least two foreign laneuages. It may now be
purchased as a paper-back, and you should buy it. It is a biographical narrative
of three and a half years in the prison camp whose intabitants actually built the
brid~e.
It was written by a pro f essional soldier, an officer in the Argyll and
SutLerland Highlanders. Let me give you a resume o l' what happened in that faraway place. For Through the Valley of the Kwai is the text of this sermon.
'lbe background can be sensed in two or three paragraphs of Gordon's. "During
the four years they were in control, the Japanese military violated every civilized code. They murdered prisoners overtly by bayonetine , shooting, drowning,
or decapitation; they murdered them covertly by working them beyond human endurance, starving them, torturing them, and denying them medical care" (52). The
survivors built the bridge "unwillingly," says the author, " ••• at bayonet point
and under the bamboo lash, taking any risk to sabotage the operation whenever the
opportunity arose" (70). Lying in t he Death House--the prisoner' name for the
TEE \'JAY AT TliE RIVER KWAI
2
camp hospital--Gordon overheard the medical officers discussing his own case:
"Ee's had the works •••• Malaria, dysentery, beriberi, plus some kind of blood
infection we can't identify. Oh, yes, he's also had an appendectomy. And on
top of that a bad case of 'dip'/(liphtherii/ which left him without the use of
his legs" (86). That is the background. The first reaction to this kind of existence on the part of the prisoners
was an upsurge of religion: church services, Bible readin~, private prayer(58).
It didn't last, for it didn't work. God declined to be used as a personal expedient (78). Tbe counter-reaction was a widespread self-centeredness which revealed itself in selfishness, hatred and fear. Gordon calls it "the law of the
jun:;le" (75 ). lf.en stole from one another. They cursed so creatively that they
constructed whole sentences in whici. every word was a curse. Yet the stron~st
still died. The wiliest and the cleverest perished with the weak. Gordon wrote
a letter to his parents saying "Good-bye" (88).
TI1en things began to happen which are told us in a cl~apter entitled "Miracle
by tl:e River Kwai" (V). SOme of Gordon's friends built him a hut where he could
sweat out his illnesses in quiet and, if necessary, die in peace (90). An
Englishman by the name of Dusty Aftller--remember his name: Dusty Miller--came
voluntarily and daily to bathe Gordon's putrid ulcers (94). With the help of
another soldier, the officer was nursed back to life. TI1en stories of voluntary martyrdom began to be whispered. There was the soldier who died from
starvation because he gave his rations to a sick friend (103). There was the
soldier who "confessed" that he had "stolen" a missine shovel because he saw that
the guard was angry enough at the theft to shoot every man in the squad. That
soldier was beaten to death where I.e stood. "When the tools were counted again
at the guardhouse no shovel was missing" (105). Listen to the ending of that
story: " admiration for the Argyll transcended hatred for tbe Japanese guard • "
An Australian was decapitated because he was caught outside the prison fence
trying to obtain medicine from the natives for his sick friends. His last words
to the agitated chaplain were: "Cbeer up, Padre. It isn't as bad as all that.
I' 11 be all right" (106).
Thus the law of the jungle was denied. The law of the jungle is not the law
for men. Man cannot become a beast; he may become less than a beast.
COrdon thought about this. f~ puzzled to find a common denominator. Tbe
two soldiers who had cared for him were Christian; but o e was a llethodist, the
other a Roman Catholic. Was there any word which linked them and the others who
had given up the law of the jungle? Could it be "love"? Does love of neighbor
have any relation to love of God, love from God?
A new kind of life began in the camp. A discussion group was started by
Australians to find out what Christianity was about. Gordon was asked to lead it,
since he was a Lbiversity man, but on one understanding: "The lads won't stand
for aay SUnday School stuff. What they want is the real 'dingo'" (117). They
got it, That class grew into tbe Jungle t"niversi ty, with a curriculum which
TI-::E WAY AT THE RIVER KWAI
3
offered courses in history, economics, philosophy, mathematics, several of the
sciences, and at least nine languages, including Latin, Greek, Russian and
Sanskrit (148). An orchestra was f ormed, and a t heater was established. Artificial le ~ s were made for the le ~ less, who in turn made legs for the other legless
(1 ·~·; ).
~n painted, carved, pen-sl:etched, and gave exhibitions.
1bey invented
dru ~ s and anaesthetics; they manuf ac tured surgical implements.
They recovered
respect even for the dead. Instead of being chucked into a common pit, each
corpse received a personal burial, with a lettered cross to mark tbe grave.
Casually, quietly, a church was built, an open-air church, a church which was all
doo1·s. It was named "The Church of the Capt1 vi ty. " Here are Gordon's words about
it: "The cnurch was a fellowship of those who came in freedom and love, to acknowled;:e their weakness, to seek a presence, and to pray for t heir fellows. The Confession of Jesus Christ as Lord was the one requirement f or membership. The
church was made up of Methodists, Baptists, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and former agnostics" (173). It al«oat sounds like the Duke Chapel.
When the end of the war came--well, let me quote Gordon again: "1be incomine
liberators were so infuriated by what they saw that t l ey wanted to shoot the Japanese cua r ds on the spot. Only t he intervention o i t 1.e victims prevented them.
Captors were spared by their captive s. 'Not an eye f or an eye, a limb for a
limb tllis time,' said these exhausted but forgiving men" (230).
And all this happened at a P.O. W. camp near the bridge over the River Kwai.
As I read this book, two passaGes from the New Testament surfaced from my
subconscious memory, the two which formed our mornin~ Lesson. Let me quote a
verse from each of them, hoping you will spot the noun whicl. is common to both
verses. First:
"Teacher, we know that you are true, and teach t he way of God
truthfully, .•• " (Matt. 22 :16).
That was said to Jesus, probably in sarcasm.
Second:
"and L~auy asked him ;i.e., t Le high priest7 f or letters to the
syna~o~ues at Damascus, so t Lat i f he found any belons ing to the
Way, men or women, he mi ght br ing them bound t o Jerusalem" (Acts 9 :2).
The noun, common to these two passages, is "way": one of t he many New Testament
names for the Christian manner of life, for the walk and conversation of those
who sought to understand and implement the will of God t hrough the teaching of
Jesus. "The Way" (with a capital VI) becomes a desienation for the Church. Why
not? Jesus had called himself t he ··lay (John 14:6), and t >:e church is supposed
to be l:is ''body".
SUch a way has always two complementary and interactiltG aspects. One is
theological: its view of God, who is conceived of, analoe ically, as father,
THE WAY AT THE RIVER KWAI
4
rather than as king or judge. n 1e other is ethical: the day by day living,
here on earth, which is worthy of, and satisfactory to, such a Father-God.
Which comes first? For some people, the theological; for others, the ethical.
But both groups would agree that both aspects are needed for a proper explication and application of The Way. Some believe first, and act second. For
others, action leads back to belief. Faith and works; works and faith--never
independent, always interdependent.
-Do you recall that one of the men who helped Gordon was a Vethodist? Have
you ever thought of John Wesley's :Lollowers as "the people of The Way"? Isn't
that what "N.ethodist" means? , The Greek word for the way is hodos. "U.ethodist"
i s proper 1y me t a ..J.hd
.
o os, i.e., . "nf ter the way " , or " according
to the way " .
The name was originally one of several applied derisively by fellow students to
the members of the religious association formed at Oxford University by John
and CI.arles Wesley and others. It is no longer a term of derision.
Christians are people of The Way--in Jerusalem, in Damascus, at Oxford) on
the banks of the River Kwai.
I can almost hear your puzzled reaction to all this: "Such a way of life
may be possible--infect, it is possible--in a closed societ], especially one
whic~ . is small: in the early church; in Wesley's holy club; in a prison camp,
from which death seemed to be the only escape. It is possible in the orders
of tile Roman Church, in the cell ~l·oups within Protestantism. But it is impossible, unfeasible, for the Christian who has to live in contact with the
world, as most of us have to exist."
The critic among us has a case. The average church-member is too tame, or
to reluctant, or too compromised to think of Uvin3 in so thoroughly Christian
a way as those prisoners in The c~_urch of the Captivity. That fact hit Gordon
when he came back to Scotland. Lere is his post-war description of the church
in his native land: "After my return I had gone to churcL every SUnday, but
what I saw and heard depressed me. The sermons belon ~ed to a different age.
They suggested Victorian parlors, elderly people dressed in black, horsehair
chairs and antimacassars. We had seen a vision of far horizons and caught a
glimpse of the City of God in all its beauty" (251). There is so little that
is extraordinary about much church membership. It is just the religious gloss
or luster on our normal secular livinff. That is why the Church of England has
been defined, not untruthfully, as, "The Conservative party at prayer."
Yes, the critic has an argument. Qlt there is another argument. The Way
was adopted in the first century, and by Wesley, and at the River Kwai as the
only method of transforming existence into life, of metamorphosing ugliness into
beauty, of creating harmony out of discord. Are we really living in a much
heal tl ier situation today? What can l8cf~ef There is 11 ttle any one of us can
do about world problems or impersonal,$onflicts. nere is much we can do within them. The al~n1 of the Kwai and other hell camps knew that. Some entered
the ministry to share with the church the vision they bad seen in Thailand.
.
TI::E WAY AT THE RIVER KWAI
5
Others became lay members of their local churches for the same reason. Others
are,by intention, teachers, welfare officers, doctors. In worship or in work
they wanted to be in contact with people, to share the good life they had discovered in prison. It takes only a cup of cold water, a sick-visit, a piece of
cloti.1ing to get one into the Kingdom--if they are given in love. That is "the
Way".
Yet, lest we leave this house of God with either a rosy glow or a cynical
smile, there is one other thing to be said. You recall Dusty baller who voluntarily bathed Gordon's wounds. What happened to him? Go1•don asked that question,
too, vLen Le was finally released. Listen to this dialogue; Gordon speaks first:
''But what about Miller?"
"Ee got the Nip warrant officer in charge of his party down on him. "
"What had he done wrong?"
"That was it. He hadn't done anything wrong. The Nip hated him because
he couldn't break him. You know how he was--a good man if ever there was
one. That's why be hated him."
"What did the Nip do to him?"
"He strung him up to a tree. "
"You mean--"
"Yes. 1-;e crucified him. " (235)
The Way is not walked in a rosy glow and there is little about it for the cynic
to smile at. It is a Way which leads to the New Jerusalem, but a Cross may be
a way-station on it. It is not a Way for idealists. It is a Way for realists.
A Christian had better be a realist, about God and about his fellows.
There is a footnote to be added to this sermon. Do you know what Gordon,
the nuthor, is now doing? He is no longer a professional soldier. He is now the
Dean of the Chapel at Princeton Lniversity.
PRAYER f.FTER THE SERMON
0 God,
Who hast set us in the midst of strenuous
days;
Teach us that we are always Thy soldiers,
Expected to serve under the banner of love,
and to walk Ue Way of Love;
As did Thy Son, even Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen.