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You see, I had agreed to do the filmmaker article for this month’s Herald, but I didn’t know what I’d write about. Absolutely nothing came to mind. So I intended that something would pop into my life to give me something to write about. It’s like creating a vacuum, and holding that empty space and watching for the Universe to slip something in.
But it was getting late. This was supposed to be written and turned in to our editor last night and there was still nothing. Literally nothing. The vacuum held!
And then today I pulled into the grocery store parking lot just as another story came on NPR. It was Walter Cronkite (one of my heroes), so I didn’t jump out of the car and go about my business, but sat there for an extra 30 seconds. He started talking about what turned out to be one of the most important moments of journalism in the 20 th century. I turned the car off. And sat.
It was 1977 and during a routine interview with the President of Egypt, Anwar Sadat, President Sadat said he would accept an invitation (not yet given) to come to Israel to talk. In a moment he had swept aside 30 years of hostilities and political and diplomatic roadblocks. A shocked Walter asked what the preconditions for the visit would be. Anwar said, “There are none.” Walter asked, “How soon?” Anwar said, “Within a week.” (During this segment on NPR they played the original interview, which was really great.)
CBS scrambled over the next few hours to get Menachim Begin, Prime Minister of Israel, on the phone. Walter informed Menachim of Anwar’s acceptance of any invitation that might be forthcoming. So, would the Prime Minister invite him?
Now a meeting of this sort would usually take months and months of high level negotiations and haggling, and then still might never come about. But Mr. Begin thought for a moment, and then invited Mr. Sadat. The meeting happened within days, not months, and ultimately, according to Walter, resulted in “That famous handshake on Camp David which led to a peace treaty.”
As I listened, I had tears in my eyes. I still do writing this. Why???
Because sworn adversaries rising above themselves and seeing everyone as equals and family, and making decisions from that space is remarkable and beautiful. In the Tantric teachings it’s “the reconciliation of opposites.” In those teachings, such reconciliation leads to enlightenment. In the world, it leads to peace.
Peace. What is it? How do we get there? Do we want to? If we do, why are bombs still falling? I was asked over and over during our BLEEP tours what could individuals do about creating peace in the world. The quick answer, standing on stage or in a hotel lobby, was “find peace inside, then it will change outside.” But it’s more complex then that. Or is it?
Our good friends at IONS recently held a conference on The Science of Peace with some filmmakers working on a series of the same name (scienceofpeace.com). And they discussed that, just like some of the advances in science have implications about our inner life, so they imply something about Peace. If we are all one (quantum entanglement), does that mean bombing Iraq is the same as bombing Beverly Hills? If mind creates matter, does that mean flipping someone off on the highway creates a bullet in a gun in Indonesia?
It’s interesting how something that is so universally accepted as important and “good,” is so little understood. Despite the universal value of Peace, humans seem to grow most by conflict, crisis, and their resolution. Does that mean that Peace is overrated? Is it ultimately stagnation? What is the “Peace that passeth all understanding?”
And yet, when Anwar Sadat and Menachim Begin let go of decades of violence and moved towards an understanding, they sent ripples down the corridors of time that rocked my world in Ralph’s supermarket parking lot decades later.
“And that’s the way it was, January 15 th, 2007.”
Click here to listen to the NPR show
