When Laurens van der Post one night
In the Kalihari Desert told the Bushmen
He couldn’t hear the stars
Singing, they didn’t believe him. They looked at him,
Half-smiling. They examined his face
To see whether he was joking
Or deceiving them. Then two of those small men
Who plant nothing, who have almost
Nothing to hunt, who live
On almost nothing, and with no one
But themselves, led him away
From the crackling thorn-scrub fire
And stood with him under the night sky
And listened. One of them whispered,
Do you not hear them now?
And van der Post listened, not wanting
To disbelieve, but had to answer,
No. They walked him slowly
Like a sick man to the small dim
Circle of firelight and told him
They were terribly sorry,
And he felt even sorrier
For himself and blamed his ancestors
For their strange loss of hearing,
Which was his loss now. On some clear nights
When nearby houses have turned off their televisions,
When the traffic dwindles, when through streets
Are between sirens and the jets overhead
Are between crossings, when the wind
Is hanging fire in the fir trees,
And the long-eared owl in the neighboring grove
Between calls is regarding his own darkness,
I look at the stars again as I first did
To school myself in the names of constellations
And remember my first sense of their terrible distance,
I can still hear what I thought
At the edge of silence were the inside jokes
Of my heartbeat, my arterial traffic,
The C above high C of my inner ear, myself
Tunelessly humming, but now I know what they are:
My fair share of the music of the spheres
And clusters of ripening stars,
Of the songs from the throats of the old gods
Still tending even tone-deaf creatures
Through their exiles in the desert.
(“The Silence of the Stars” by David Wagoner, from Traveling Light: Collected and New Poems)
Question: Everything is the other way around in this world. Whoever hears the stars is sent to the doctors. Tell me, please, who is sick after all—the one who hears the stars or the one who does not?
Answer: I cannot say about the stars.
Comment: We probably mean nature by this.
My Response: Yes. Anyone who does not hear nature is, of course, ill. He is cut off from nature, and I feel sorry for him.
Question: What does “hearing nature” mean?
Answer: To hear nature is to be close to it. A person close to nature is a person who perceives everything around him as the attitude of the Creator toward him. And that is why he does not see anything wrong with it. Right up to his death, which he also sees nothing wrong with, it comes, it goes, and I go too.
Question: Is it possible to live like it: warm, calm?
Answer: Of course. It is an inner voice in you that just needs to be revealed.
Comment: But we were deprived of this quality of hearing nature.
My Response: It is our egoism that locks us within and does not allow us to turn anywhere.
Question: So, it is better for it that we do not hear nature?
Answer: It is an evil force that acts in parallel with a good force, but we give advantage to this evil force.
Question: And how can we feel that we miss nature, this hearing?
Answer: Trying to get inside nature means connecting with the Creator. We must try to get closer to Him. And then we will succeed.
Question: But this needs clarification. What is the Creator for an ordinary person, what is it?
Answer: Everything around us.
Question: All this is the Creator?
Answer: Yes. And even everything that is inside us is all the Creator.
To come closer to Him means to reveal your feelings so that there would be no boundaries or barriers between you and the Creator. And then you will feel that the whole world is filled with delicate singing. I would say it like this.
Comment: Beautiful! Tell me, is this necessary for our survival?
My Response: It is not about surviving in this world. The point is to be in harmony with it. And that is how it comes.
Question: Now a lot of people leave cities, go to some forgotten villages, abandoned houses, rebuild, and even go into forests and live there. Mainly, what is it? Is this an escape from suffering or is it a search?
Answer: It is a search for harmony when I feel good about what I have. I am content with it, I am satisfied with it. I do not need anything, I do not have any complaints about anyone. That is how I live. This is a good attitude toward the world.
Question: At one time you said that once the real Hasidim, Kabbalists, left everything behind and went away for almost a year. Without anything. Without bread, without money, they went into the world. What kind of move was that? Was it a search for that harmony, as you say?
Answer: Yes. This is called “going into exile.” But in fact, it was an exile from oneself. And a lot of people did that. It was not only in Russia. This was also the case in Central Asia.
Question: So, it is not just Judaism? Other religions also do this?
Answer: Many nations, yes.
Question: They were leaving to hear this gentle sound that you were talking about? Is that what drove them?
Answer: Yes. They were not hermits, they were surrounded by people, but they strove to be as independent as possible. In this way they strove to feel the Creator.
[322143]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 11/20/23
Related Material:
Superhumans or People Who Feel Nature?
Returning To Harmony With Nature
Distortion Of Nature
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Question: In the amplitude of the race of our ten and the Creator, He is constantly ahead. Even if we descend, He is still ahead of us down there. How can we outrun Him or at least stick to Him?
