(Editor’s Note: This piece won first place in the Angel C. Palanca Peace Program Essay Writing Contest, professional Category, in October 2004; published in Tambuli, Vol. IV No. 4, December 2004.)
Months after the 9-11 attacks, I chance upon a poem by Yehuda Amichai entitled The Diameter of a Bomb. It goes:
The diameter of the bomb was thirty centimeters
and the diameter of its effective range about seven meters,
with four dead and eleven wounded.
And around these, in a larger circle
of pain and time, two hospitals are scattered
and one graveyard. But the one young woman
who was buried in the city, she came from
at a distance of more than a hundred kilometers,
enlarges the circle considerably,
and the solitary man mourning her death
at the distant shores of a country far across the sea
includes the entire world in the circle.
And I won’t even mention the crying of orphans
that reaches up to the throne of God
and beyond, making
a circle with no end and no God.
(translated by Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell)
This is a striking and poignant description of a bomb explosion. Here, the poet attempts to measure the diameter of a bomb from its physical dimension to its effective range, only to realize that the diameter increases infinitely to include those affected: four dead and eleven wounded, two hospitals and a graveyard, the solitary man, the crying orphans, and God. It is incredible how a small explosion can reach a man in a country across the sea, and God in the heavens.
How odd it is to consider why oftentimes it requires a tragedy before man can be aware that each one is inextricably connected to and responsible for each other and to the entire universe. What an individual does or fails to do, no matter how small, has repercussions to the same universe beyond what one consciously know. A similar tragedy lead Cain to think and ask, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
This concept of interrelatedness explains why I cried and was angry as I watched on TV the live telecast of the collapse of the twin towers of World Trade Center being rolled repeatedly that fateful September 11. I just arrived home from school at 9 P.M. and had yet to take dinner, when the graphic clips took my eyes glued on the screen. I did not have any relative who worked at the World Trade Center, nor did I know any person there in particular. But my shock and sorrow was more awful than the loss of grandpa who passed away earlier that month. I knew it wasn’t just sympathy. John Donne reminds us in his Meditation XVII, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main… any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.” This made me understand that I was part of the growing circle of humanity that was hit by the bomb—I was a victim myself. Without doubt, those two planes were bombs exponentially bigger than thirty centimeters, and the explosion reached me instantaneously although I was at a distance halfway around the globe. Max Scheller would definitely agree.
Prospects of peace
The current world scenery—the 9-11 attacks and its aftermath, the bombings in Afghanistan, the U.S. led take-over of Iraq and the pockets of violence, the suicide bombings in Israel and Palestine, and the terrorism here and abroad—forces us to look seriously at the prospects of peace and the responsibility of a university in promoting peace. The peace affair has gone beyond the fleeting concerns of politics, power, and penny. Peace has become a personal enterprise. Dwight D. Eisenhower believed “that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days, governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.”
It is interesting to note that limited beings as we are, our demands for order, unity, and peace are godlike. We require nothing less than a perfect harmony with the entire range of creation. It is encouraging that there remains a small spark in each one that yearns to be united with that divine fire. The order and peace that we experience occasionally in nature and the outer universe give us insight of what could be a genuine peace.
The university’s privileged position
Among institutions, a university occupies a privileged position inasmuch as it performs a unique dual role: it reflects the larger outside world while at the same time influences back that same world.
A university is a fascinating microcosm of the larger cosmos where we find ourselves in. Far Eastern University is a universe as it is full of dynamism and diversity: from ideologies to creeds, from culture to color of skin, from economics to study habits, from management styles to sexual preferences. In another sense, it is a universe because it has a complex interrelations within itself like the bigger universe. FEU mirrors the same outside world and the same conflicts.
On the other hand, a university supplies the society at large with its students and graduates who are presumably not just “well-informed,” but also “well-formed.” Even as students, they already extend the perimeters of FEU to Araneta Coliseum, to Silang, Cavite, and to their individual homes as far as Ilocos and Iligan. After their graduation, the school boundaries are enlarged significantly to include their places of work in Manila or Makati, Milan or Massachusettes, and to the scope of their businesses which is the Philippines and the world. Depending on their status or positions in governments or businesses, their actions and decisions affect communities, countries, and continents. A “tamaraw’s” kind word, an honest work, an act of justice, a consideration for others, or a helping hand, will not fail to reach up to the heavens, and God. As a birthplace and cradle of future leaders and citizens, managers and workers, entrepreneurs and consumers, a university takes pride in the conviction that “he who rocks the cradle, rules the world.” Hence, FEU’s circle of responsibility stretches far and wide, beyond the confines and constraints of Nicanor Reyes and Lerma Streets; of Recto and Quezon Avenues.
Knowledge is one
A university is also a universe of great minds and ideas. It is here that students are initiated to diverse philosophies from Plato to Aquinas, from Descartes to Sartre, and from Camus to Derrida. It is here that students are exposed to great literatures from Sophocles to Shakespeare to Shelley; from Arcellana to Joaquin to Zafra. It is here that students toy with the prospects of “teletransport” across continents, planets and stars as inspired by the breakthroughs in Space Programs and in Information and Communications Technology (ICT). It is here that students are thrilled at the possibility of creating a better version of themselves by altering their DNA codes while at the same time enjoying a genetically engineered French fries which can be bought from Jollibee across the street. Students go on to tinker endlessly with what is great, what is possible, and what universes still to conquer.
Sadly, with too much to know and too varied, knowledge tends to be seen as fragmented and compartmentalized, and consequently, everyone is likely to believe in the pre-eminence of each field of interest. The dispute as to who is the better thinker, the better thought-system, the better methodology, or the better college course to take, never ends. As if the confusion is not enough, certain camps proceed to pontificate that theirs alone is the true body of knowledge, or the correct creed.
There is naïveté, if not arrogance of bigotry, in the belief that one discipline is superior to another. No structure is immune to critique. Any camp that claims dominance has to reevaluate its positions and conclusions if it were to “avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannonshots” (Napoleon Bonaparte). Knowledge is one even with all its ramifications.
The over-fascination on the different ramifications of knowledge has lured us to espouse various “isms” which in turn lead us to lay aside some basic lessons on being and becoming human. Ella Wheeler Wilcox retorts, “So many gods, so many creeds, / So many paths that wind and wind, / While just the art of being kind, / Is all the sad world needs.”
“What is needed in the effort to reinvent an effective program of study for our college students is the realization that knowledge is one and its subsequent specializations should not blind us to their essential interrelatedness. No less imperative, if not more so, is the awareness that thought, which is the instrument of knowledge, is itself limited. Only then can we move ahead in our academic journey. (Lucio F. Teoxon, Jr., Editorial, The knowledge of “what is,” FEU Newsletter, Vol. VII, First Quarter, 1996. p. 2)
We are more alike than different
The increasing complexities of living and the demands of the job market inevitably force educational systems to fashion each student as a “specialist.” As a “specialist” is prized by the society, he is differentiated from the rest. And those who are not bow down to his word.
A “specialist,” however, is prone to the dangers of intellectual egotism. Unfortunately, this hubris is born and nurtured in fertile grounds such as a university. Strangely enough, what is esteemed as a “specialist” is actually one who knows more and more about less and less because nobody can conceivably be “know-all” or “be-all.” Hence, a physician is different from a general surgeon, a gynecologist is different from a pediatrician, a cardiologist is different from an anesthesiologist, and so on. Comic, if it were not so tragic, that one day a left kidney doctor will refuse to operate on a patient with a right kidney problem for reason that the right kidney is not his field of expertise. The more one specializes, the more he is likely to regard himself and be regarded by others as different from them.
The key is to realize that even as “specialists,” we are the same human beings. Degrees or fields of expertise do not make anyone first class citizen, neither give a license for scorn. Specialization is premised on the full actualization of the unique interests and talents of the individual for the efficient performance of the duties and functions in his work, in his family and in the society.
Contemporary researches like Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligence (MI) Theories, and Daniel Goleman’s “Emotional Quotient” (EQ) are meant to understand individual different capacities and develop these to the fullest measure possible without undue prejudice. Joseph Campbell speaks of “Man with a thousand faces.” The opportunities for development of the self must be provided by the university, if it is to avoid bias.
The programs of study in a university must be so designed to reflect not only the development of skills that will enable the student to earn a living afterwards, but also a holistic education that will enable him to actualize the full range of his potentials and appreciate the full extent of being human. The role of education then, is to carry man into the next evolutionary stage in order to transcend the ignorance, intolerance, and apathy which are endlessly ripping humanity apart. We are more alike than different, that is why it makes sense to communicate, or even to compromise.
It is pointless to underscore the growing differences among individuals due to scholastic standing as it is the source of pride and prejudice. Ken Wilber purports to view man integrally as one, although multifaceted, as each is a “holon” of larger “holons.” Each man is a whole, and at the same time, a part. Man is a whole—a universe in himself, but composed of parts which are smaller wholes that go all the way down. Man is also a part of larger wholes that extends all the way up. A “specialist” is an essential part of a larger whole.
The deeper self as the locus of peace
Each student, teacher, or administrator is a microcosmos, too. The external chaos around us is but a manifestation of the conflicts within ourselves. Within each small universe of the self, conflicts can arise. The discrepancy between what we know is right and what we want to do, is proof. Hence, any individual can be divided within himself.
But time and again, we take the wrong route by looking for resolutions of our inner conflicts outside. The truth is, the real journey goes into the deeper universe of the self. Peace, by its very essence, is not external. “It is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice… it is not just the absence of war,” according to Baruch Spinoza. Jawaharlal Nehru could not agree more, saying, “Peace is not a relationship of nations. It is a condition of mind brought about by a serenity of soul.” The deeper self is the locus of peace. And if we do not find it there, we will not find it anywhere.
As peace is essentially internal, it cannot be caused from the outside, nor can it be compelled like a rule or a school policy. It can only be voluntary, as it requires the full assent of the will. With the presence of coercion, peace takes its flight at once. Hence, it is only the individual self, whose inner conflicts had been resolved, can truly initiate and effect a process of genuine peace.
The necessity of the journey back to the self was already pointed out by Socrates since the dawn of civilization. “The unexamined life is not worth living.” It is only in the sense of going back home, as it were and if at all completed, that one will finally find serenity like the great wanderer Ulysses reaching the shores of Ithaca.
Christ, Buddha, Lao-Tzu, Ghandhi, Khrisnamurti, Luther King Jr., Mandela, Havel and many gurus have shown the way to peace. Paradoxically, peace is also the way. It is an arduous but not an impossible task, for according to Johann von Schiller, “Peace is rarely denied to the peaceful.”
FEU’s contribution to peace
Our efforts to peace, no matter how small, bear consequence to the larger universe. Regretting how little he had done to save the Jews from the holocaust because he was still keeping a gold ring on his finger and another gold swastika pin on his chest which could have bought-out some more Jews, the shrewd Nazi businessman, Oscar wept in the celebrated Steven Spielberg film, Schindler’s List. However, he was relieved while he listened to the grateful remark of the rabbi, “He who saves a Jew, saves the world entire.”
There is yet a universe to conquer—that is, the universe within us. There is yet something more fundamental to learn—that is becoming human. As Martin Luther King, Jr. sharply puts it, “We have learned to fly the air like birds, to swim the seas like fish; but we have yet to learn the simple art of walking the earth as brothers and sisters.” If someone in Far Eastern University will start to walk as a brother or a sister, then perhaps, we can begin to measure the diameter of peace. ©
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