In
these times of unusual awakening, when we are witnessing the greatest
experiment in social and economic adjustment of all time in India and Russia,
it is well that we pause to consider whether we ourselves must come to the
parting with old institutions and come to the collectiveness of property. We
must realize that private ownership is not so much a matter of legal title,
recorded deeds, and certificates as it is a state of consciousness, recorded so
deep within the minds of people that it cannot be shaken by anything short of
cataclysm in the world, or death of the physical being. It is no wonder that,
when the first lessons of childhood are concerned primarily with ownership, and
are carried on through the public school system to maturity, it is evident that
the idea of ownership and its desirability have become a part of the very
nature of the people.
In
this discussion we are not concerned primarily with any change of the outward
material manifestations of ownership, for we realized that as long as people
think about it as they do now, it would be far easier to drain the oceans than
to take away these institutions. Indeed, it is very questionable if taking away
the individual right to certain private ownership would effect any commendable
results, but certainly there are some subjective treatments of the
consciousness of ownership which will bear careful scrutiny.
Have
you not noticed how friends and neighbors on every hand have given their very
lives to the sacrifice of the Idol of Ownership of something—a home, a
business, a farm, bonds, stocks, certificates, insurance, and even jewels,
clothes, automobiles, and all the endless list of luxuries or partial necessities?
Many years of their lives have been passed out on the platter of the
installment plan for the acquiring and owning of things.
In
the case of homes and other properties, we are driven into ownership through
the fear of poverty and old age, or through the desire for the esteem of our
neighbors, but even to these apparently legitimate manifestations of ownership,
what a terrible price we pay in putting off spiritual understanding and growth
until we are suddenly brought face to face with the Fallacy through death or
have sold the Slave-Master of Ownership so many of our years, that we have only
a few fleeting moments in which to snatch up some dwarfed and struggling
flowers of spirituality. Even then we often would not recognize the Fallacy
were it not for the cycle of economic depressions which come like a tidal wave
and sweep away the fruits of our lives in one moment of anguish and heartbreak.
No
matter how solidly upon the rocks of human knowledge and understanding our
institutions of ownership may be built, these cycles come and no man, great or
small, can stay them. So overpowering are they that the great men of this world
attempt to destroy their lives in order to hide their eyes from the desolation,
and the weak who follow, grumble and starve and pray for a savior, but still
covet the Governor’s mansion and blame Fate.
How
narrow and pitiful are the lives of those who sell their lives and souls for
the small petty luxuries they cannot afford except by buying on the installment
plan and living from hand to mouth on the superficial thrills of owning the
baubles of the moment.
Ah,
but in all these things there is nothing new, for it is only the very-repeated
story of mankind. You will find it on the ancient papyrus records of Egypt. It
is written on the burned clay tablets of Babylon and the mouldering old scripts
of Greece and Rome. Man has always sought to find life by individual ownership
of external, material things, rather than by the individualizing of the Cosmic
wealth within.
Yet,
while this has been the story of mankind as a whole, sages and saints of all
people have stated in different ways the deathless truth: "Seek ye first
the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you."
Man
all through the ages has been striving to satisfy an inner craving with an
outward offering. It is an impossibility, for it is an inner lack that drives
us to seek peace and security in the acquisition of material things, and this
lack can only be satisfied by an inner experience of the harmony, safety, and
eternally sanguine disposition of the Cosmos.
When
we seek wealth within the storehouse of all Riches, we find that not only is it
safe from "moth and rust", nor do "thieves break in and
steal", but depressions are not in the cycle and riches once gained,
compound themselves beyond our dreams.
The
Fallacy of Ownership of things is not in the outward manifestation of property,
but in the seeking for it before first finding the true source of wealth which
is within, for to be conscious of anything is to be the owner of it. Surely the
gardener who is conscious of the beauty and welfare of the flowers and grounds
is more their owner than is the title holder of the estate who gets up in the
morning with indigestion and walks to the curb through his beautiful
surroundings with his mind upon the ticker-tape.
If
we can only become conscious of the true meaning of ownership, we shall become
heirs of God and joint heirs with all the wise men and sages of all times. Let
those who will, waste away through the vain Fallacy of Ownership, until they
have drunk so deep of that cup that they will turn at last to become true
owners with those who now realize their vast heritage.
by: Yaphet Kotto
0 comments:
Post a Comment