Quest of the Spirit: From Suffering to Acceptance

3.2 Reborn in Courage and Faith:Rilke,Spengler,Toynbee, Lerner, Dostoyevsky

  1.   Of the many ways God manifests His glory, the most striking feature is the miracle of rebirth. The Raising of Lazarus depicts the human need for transformation from death and loss to life, on both a psychological and spiritual level. The same process occurs in our lives if we accept it.  Spiritual rebirth is common in all major religions. The divine power to change our lives from a state of loss, despair and alienation, to transform our lives to one which enables us to claim a commonality with all faiths.  In a time of turmoil, displacement, and isolation, Christ teaches His apostles to be reborn with a new inner strength, to stand against the the evil in man, as did Judas Maccabeus during Herod's persecution of the Jews. Jesus tells Nicodemus that except a man is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God. Being born of the spirit means being transformed into a  prophet and a warrior. The miracle of the Resurrection itself fulfills God's promise concerning loss and redemption. The Parables of the Prodigal Son, the Lost Coin, and the Lost Sheep all embody this concept of death and rebirth. The Scripture says that man's corruptible body shall put on incorruptibility and that the man in Christ shall become a new creature, as old things shall pass away. The Apostle Paul warns man not be to be conformed to this world but to be transformed by the renewing of his spirit. In essence, the phase of separation and transformation must occur for the individual to discover spiritual or emotional fulfillment. As Carl Jung observes in his chapter entitled "Concerning Rebirth" : "Real increase of personality means consciousness of an enlargement that flows from inner sources. Without psychic depth we can never be adequately related to the magnitude of our object. It has therefore been said quite truly that a man grows with the greatness of his task. But he must have within himself the capacity to grow; otherwise even the most difficult task is of no benefit to him" (Jung 55).  The transformation always begins within you. As Michael A. Singer noted in The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself, "Only you can take inner freedom away from yourself, or give it to yourself. Nobody else can." As Rainer Maria Rilke said in Letters to a Young Poet, "How should we be able to forget those ancient myths that are at the beginning of all peoples, the myths about dragons that at the last moment turn into princesses; perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us. So you must not be frightened if a sadness rises up before you larger than any you have ever seen; if a restiveness, like light and cloud shadows, passes over your hands and over all you do. You must think that something is happening with you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand; it will not let you fall. Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness . . . any depression? For after all, you do not know what work these conditions are doing inside you."  In essence, the trying of your character is what determines your inner worth. Henry Fielding expressed this sentiment with wit  and understanding: "Adversity is the trial of principle. Without it a man hardly knows whether he is honest or not." Louisa May Alcott expressed a similar idea when she said, "I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship."   As Shannon L. Adler observed, "There is no perfection, only beautiful versions of brokenness."  John Geddes, in A Familiar Rain, expressed a similar sentiment when he said, "I don't just wish you rain, Beloved--I wish you the beauty of storms." Writing in Wealth for All: Living a Life of Success on the Edge of Your Ability, Idowu Koyenikan avers, "Success comes from the inside out. In order to change what is on the outside, you must first change what is on the inside."  In essence, man is commanded to "forget the things that are behind and press on toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God."  Only faith enables man to transcend the vicissitudes of life, faith in self, those whom he loves and love him, and God. We must live by the Golden Rule if we are to transcend the mundane. As Henrik Ibsen said, "The worst that a man can do to himself is to do injustice to others." As Albert Camus said in The Rebel, "Damocles never danced better than beneath the sword " (Camus 72). And not in the past century have nations and people been challenged by the tragic events associated with the coronavirus and Russian aggression. Faith must prevail.