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\ LIBRARY
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A few years ago there appeared a book by an American rabbi
entitled "Peace of Mind".
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It begins with a personal reminiscence.-Saah
Once, as a young man, he drew up a list of what he considered to
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be the most.des;rable things in life: health, love, beauty, talent,
power, riches anq fame.
He showed this invpntory to a teacher who
commented: "An excellent list...But it appears, my young friend,
that you have omitted the most important element of all.
You have
forgotten the one ingrédiént lacking which each possession becomes
a hideous torment, and your list as a whole an intolerable
burden.”~
Theh, with a pencil, he grossed out the entire list and wrote down
in its stead the three words: peace of mind.
The book continues to givé the author's own prescription for
the attainment of peace of mind; and this prescription, very roughly
summed up, amounts to two things: self—knowledge and religious fgifh.
Before examihing this prescuption we may, fiést of all, agree
that peace of mind is a most precious possession, precious both in
the sense-that it is highly to be desired and in the sense that it
is rare and hard to attain.
than it is todéy.
Probably it has never been more rare
Mast of us labk it or possess it only imperfectly.
We suffer from anxiety and restlessness, and there is probably no
more common disease in this twentieth century than neurosis.
And if we wbnder as'to the cause, we are apt tp point to
the world in which we live: the sooiél instability, the eoonbmio
"1n39°ur1tY» the indurial-unrest, fine political exglos¢¥eaeee,~
the aftermath of war, the memory of horror and the dangér of
global catastrophe.
These, we say, are the causes of our-anxiety,
and if we retaih a semblance of sanity in spite of,them, that is
a
compliment to our mental toughness.
It follows that if only we
could banish these external factors from our consciousness, we
should have perfect peace of mind.
The recipe is escape: escape‘
to some South Sea Island remote from civilisation, where these
is no rédia and no newspaper; or better still, since even here
there is no complete protection from the danger of war or fh)m
the radioactive fall-out of atomic tests, better still it would
be to escape to some other planet where we could forget éntirely
about the crazy world which wé had left behind.
Unfortunately,
we say to ourselves, these channels of escafie are impracticable.
So we resom to another kind of escapism.
We see escapist films.
We read escapist literature.
We watch escapist television programmes.
We skip over the front page of our newspaper and ignore the
unpleasant realities of the world in which we live.
If it is possible to obtain pehce of mind in this way,
it is a peace which religion, which Judaism in particular, cannot
countehanoe.
Hillel.
"Do not separate thyself fnwm the éommunity," said
The task allotted to us by God_is to live and work in_
the world as we find it and to try to make it a better‘place.
,
We must identify ourselves with mankind, and this means that we
must share its sorrows and sufferings.
Where there is distress
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we hust relieve it.
right.
Where there is inJustioe we must put it
Where there is misery we must bring cheer, and where
there is hatred, love.
To turn our backron the troubles of the
world, for the sake of our own peace of mind, that is the height
of selfishness. ‘And because it is so, it cannot really bring
peace of mind.
We should be doing violence to our human nature,
and we should be torpented by the knowlgdge that we had deserted
those who needud our sympathy and our help.
m
If peace of mind is to be attained at all, it cannot be
attained in this way.
We must attain it, not by escaping from
the troflbleé of the world, but in spite of the fact of sharing
them, and sharing them fully.
It must be the kind of peace which
is not destroyed by, but endures through anfi triumphs over the
deepest pain at the suffering of others and the most indignant
anger at oppression and injustice.
There must-be room in it
for sympathetic sorrow and healthy discontent.
Such a peace of mind does hot depend upon the conditions
of the World without but upon thé condition of the soul within.
Naturally the perplexities and pgrils of the wbrld in which we
live makefi such peace harder to attain.
Naturally it imposes
Nafiurally it gg a cause of our anxiety and restlessness.
But the deeper cause lies in ourselves. There is something wrong
a strain.
with the inner self.
it.
In our moré honest moments fig are aware of
But it is a reality as unpleasant as that of the external
world, and therefore, like the latter, we prefer to ignore it.
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We indulge in another form of escapism.
that all is well.
We pretend to ourselves
We persuade ourselves that, though we are not
perfect, we are fundamentally very decent.
When things go wrong
in our relationships with othar people, we put the blame on them,
or on circumstances, or oh some misunderstanding, but never on
ourselves.'
Ifor
Preferably we do not look too closely into ourselvesL
fear lesf such scrutity should reveal a picture disappointingly
empty or unfiatteringly ugly,
That is anbthef reason for our
addiction to escapist entertainment.
That is why we must have
company and cannot bear to be alone.
That is why we find silence
oppressive and prefer the noise of a blazing radio switched on
indiscrimihately.
We waht to escape not only from the world, but
also from ourselves.
It is here that'psychology has refidered a geaat service.
It has given us a techniqué tor sélf-knowledge, a technique for
piercing through the wall of deceit and flonoeit which we all erect
around our ago, a technique for detecting the real motives which
govern our behaviour, disillusioning though the discovery must be.
We do not need to be psychologbsts to avai; ourselves of these
techniques.: To a large eitent they are common sense.
extent they have become common
knowlne
diffusion of psychological discoveries.
popular books, such as the one
I
To some
as a result of the
And there are simple,
have mentioned
—
théugh they must
be chosen with cafe from a good deal of charlatan literature -
which can give us quite easily the necessary insights.~
.
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The experience is an unpleasant one; but it is necessary as
a
first step towards the attainannh of peace of mind, which cannot
be secured without self-knowledge.
The next step is acceptance.
Just as we must face and accept the facts about the world; so we
must face and accept the facts about burselves.
It must lead, once again, to a healthy
mfist not bé a complacent one.
disconfent.
But the acceptance
It must generate the desire to build up our innér life
And this means, above all, that we must
in a new and better way.
choose a purpose which shall direct and guide all our aspirations
and activities.
It must be a single purpose.
Otherwmse the
conflict of desires which :5 the basic cause of gur restlessness
will continue to rob us of our peéoe of mind.
It must be a purpose
which bverridgs all other purposes, and which is worthy of so
overriding £fiem.
these conditions.
t_
There'is one purpose and one only which satisfies
And that
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the service of God,
saying
or, what is only another way of XXIIIKE the same thing, the
sérvioe of all those ideals which we believe to be commanded by
God and perfectly exemplified 19 him: truth and Justice, ERNIE!!!
love and compassion, holiness and beauty.
The kind of person
I
have described, the kind of person
we must try to become if we want to achieve inward peace, does not
ignore the realities of the world.
He looks them in the faze,
though they cause distress and pain, he does not depair.
that he can and must do something to impréve the world;
And
He knows
He does
V
-6not overestimate this something.
_ach1eve very little.
He knows that he can ohly
But the little is important; and the knowledge
that he is attempting it, that he is exert¢ng his influence, however
feebly, 1n the right direction, that knowledge givefl him peace of
mind because it gives him the assurance that he is fulfilling or
trying to fulfil the role which has been allotted to him.
"It is
not youfs to complete thelwork; but neither are you free todesist
from ity"
This thought is to him at once a comfort and a spur.
Similarly he faces the facts about himself.‘ They too are
a cause of pain, the pain of dissatisfaction and contrition.
he does not Shirk the pain.
self-imprévement.
But
Rather he lets it stimulate him to
He does not KI§XKKIZHKIKXKIXXEKXXI despair of
himself, but neither does he overéstimate his ability to improve
himself.
He knows that he cannot become a saint overnight.
Just knows that he can be'better.
He
A Chasidio Rabbi, Zusya by name,
once HXKHH remarked: "In the world/to come they will not ask ge:'
'Why weré you not Moses?‘ They will ask me: {Why were you not
Zusya?'".
The knowledge that he is trying to be true to the best
in himself giveg him peace of mind because, once again, it gives
him the feeling that he is making the best use of his potentialities
and opportunities.
There is, then, only one source of true and abiding peace of
mind: the knowledge, the humble and unconoeited knowledge, that in
our small way, which can always become a bigger way, We are trying
to do the will of God.
There will gtili be sqrnww and evil and
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pain; but they will not distupb our peace of mind as long as
we can feel'in the'depth of ourselves that we are doing our best,
Such peace of mind is not quiescence, but a quitfiude, a tranquilliy,
a serenity which not only is compatible with, but dependent upon,
the most strenuous activity on behalf of rightéouSness and tnxth.
It involves n9 escapism, either from ourselves or from the world,
but the elevation of the world and of ourselves By the vision of
God.
God alone, as the Psalmist says, can deIiber gs from all
our fears.
Or rather, we should say, faith 1h God: the faith
that He is the unchallenged Ruler of the universe, that He has
a righteous design which must ultimately become reality, and that
b§ trusting in Him and co¢operat1ng with Him we can make our
contribution and Justify our existence.
Such peace of mind,
such freedom from anxiety, cannot be bought cheaply.
is effort and activity.
The price
We must seek peace and pursue it.
That
is the only peace of mind worth having, and the only kind which
can withstand the‘strains and stressgs of an insecure existence.
"Greet peace have they that love thy law; and there is no stumpling
for them." (Psalm 119:165)
It is the peace which comes ffom God,
the peace which he makes in his high places and which is also
available to us on earth if we will attempt to lead the life which
he haseagggifiéd.
That is the meaning of the priéstly benddiotion.
Like all prayers it is not only a petition; but also an act of
self-dedicatioq, an injunction addressed to ourselves.
Lord lift up his countenance upon us
up our countenance towards him
-
— yes,
Mayh the
but may we also lift
and he will give us peacé.