Wysheid en Waarheid wat betekenis gee II
Skets deur Kahlil Gibran
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“I love you when you bow in your mosque, kneel in your temple, pray in your church. For you and I are sons of one religion, and it is the spirit.”― Kahlil Gibran ―
Ons sit ons reis voort oor die waarheid en wysheid van Mistici. Laas week is begin met Rumi en vandag gaan oor Kahlil Gibran.
Kahlil Jubran, soos hy gedoop is, is op 6 Januarie 1883 gebore in Bsharri in vandag se Libanon. Sy familie was Maroniet Christene, alhoewel sy geloof en lewensuitkyk nooit beperk was deur religieuse grense nie en het sy werk ʼn wye gehoor bereik en geïnspireer.
As ʼn jong seun immigreer sy moeder na Boston waar hy vroeg reeds raakgesien is vir sy skryfkuns. Op 15 stuur sy moeder hom terug Beirut toe om sy skool daar te voltooi. Na sy suster se dood in 1902 het sy moeder hom huis toe laat kom waar sy kort daarna sterf.
In 1904 sou hy die eerste keer vir homself ʼn naam maak toe sy sketse en tekeninge uitgestal is in Boston.
Met die finansiële hulp van ʼn weldoener (Mary Haskell) het hy in Parys gaan studeer. Met sy terugkeer, publiseer hy sy eerste boek, ‘The Madman’ (1918).
Volgens Goodreads het hy meer as 1,000 boeke geskryf en word steeds beskou as ‘one of the most influential authors of all time’.
Op my rak staan ʼn hele paar van sy boeke waarby ‘The Broken Wings’ (1912) en ‘Jesus, the Son of Man’ (1928) ʼn groot invloed op my eie siening van geloof, liefde, en spiritualiteit gehad het.
Ons kan vandag stilstaan by ʼn paar temas uit sy bekendste boek, ‘The Prophet’ (1923) wat gaan oor 'n profeet genaamd Almustafa wat 'n fiktiewe stad met die naam Orphalese besoek.
- “Speak to us of love.”
“Love gives nothing but itself and takes nothing but from itself.Love possesses not nor would it be possessed; for love is sufficient unto love. When you love you should not say, “God is in my heart,” but rather, “I am in the heart of God.”
- “And what of Marriage, master?”
“Love one another, but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.”
- “Speak to us of Children.”
“You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them but seek not to make them like you.”
- “Speak to us of Giving.”
“It is when you give of yourself that you truly give …There are those who give little of the much which they have — and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome. And there are those who have little and give it all.These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.”
- “Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.”
“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?And is not the lute that soothes your spirit the very wood that was hollowed with knives?”
Saam met hierdie vyf gaan ons eerskomende Sondag ook kyk na sy gesprekke oor, ‘Joy and Sorrow’, ‘Reason, Passion, and Pain’, ‘Beauty’, ‘Prayer’, en ‘Religion’.
Nieteenstaande sy wortels wat vierkantig in sy Christen-geloof gelê het, was hy sterk beïnvloed deur die Sufism (Islam Mistiek), asook die Theosophy van Rudolf Steiner en Jungian sielkunde.
Alhoewel hy nooit getroud was nie is dit duidelik uit die briewe wat ontdek is tussen hom en Mary Haskell dat hulle twee in ʼn liefdesverhouding was.
Hy sterf op 10 April 1931 in ʼn hospitaal in Manhattan. Hy was 48 jaar oud. Dit was sy wens om begrawe te word in Bsharri waar hy gebore is. Vandag is dit die Gibran Museum.
Alle kopiereg van sy boeke asook die opbrengs van sy sketse en skilderye is bemaak aan Bsharri met die wens dat dit tot die opheffing en verbetering van die dorp sal gaan.
Intussen kan jy gerus jou kopie van “The Prophet” gaan soek en afstof om dit nog ʼn keer te lees.
Mag die res van die week in sy mooiste vir jou ontvou.
Soos altyd
Terblanche is sedert September 2011 die geestelike leier van Neo-Spektrum.
