Silence
Silence
A nuclear bomb exploded this week without anyone hearing a sound. North Korea’s nuclear test was conducted underground, but the silence of the explosion was in stark contrast to the noisy reaction around the world. Paradoxically, many of the noisy protests came from other nuclear powers with weapons stationed on North Korea’s doorstep.
In a world of noise, silence is a rare commodity, and a precious one. I try to go for an early morning bicycle ride each day, and if I leave early enough, the still silence of the early morning is broken only by the swishing of the tyres - and this is in Hong Kong, not famous for its quietness! One does not hear silence often, especially in Hong Kong. If the noise of cars and buses is not heard, then it is people shouting into mobile phones or noises from the helicopters or aircraft overhead - or maybe not, because frighteningly, we are often no longer aware of them.
Some seek escape from noise by plugging in iPods; these are often the folk who walk with total oblivion in front of me even when I ride on designated bicycle tracks. I can tell they are enjoying the music because of their erratic body twitches.
The idea I want to advance here is that noise needs to be reduced in order to hear the sounds - as one of my colleagues describes it - the sound of the heart pumping, a mind thinking, a soul praying. We can choose to hear noise or filter it out of our lives. We can choose to hear the anguish of the poor, the weak and the marginalised (like the lepers of south-west China), or we can fill our ears with the noises associated with serving our own needs.
Silence is not always golden, though; it can also be yellow, the yellow of cowardice that causes us not to speak when we should. When we see a bully causing physical, social or emotional harm and remain silent, we are cowards. When we hear a cry for help and remain deaf with indifference, we are heartless.
There is a time to speak, particularly when our voice can bring justice and take away pain, when our voice can right a wrong - provided of course we have the discernment to be convinced that we speaking to correct an injustice and not perpetrate another. In such cases we have an obligation to speak, without shouting and empty rhetoric, but with gentle wisdom.
During China’s turbulent Cultural Revolution, there was lots of shouting and sloganeering in the name of giving a voice to the masses. Of course, the opposite was the result as the so-called free speech, in reality a statement of the orthodoxy that MUST be adhered to, or else, served only to intimidate those with an alternative viewpoint from exercising their freedom of speech. The number of voices shouting in unison bears no relationship with the legitimacy of the argument.
Stalin made the mistake of believing the adulation showered upon him by the masses was real, even though the adulation was his own creation, born of fear and manipulation. We hear the sound, or is it noise, of the same adulation in North Korea today. Could it be that all that noise of adulation in North Korea today is actually the sound of silence?
Is there ever a time for silence? Most certainly yes, as the American writer Robert Benchley wrote “Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing”.
I work in a school with young people whose immense talents never cease to amaze me. They do have one shortcoming, however, and that is they have had fewer birthdays than their teachers, and thus the wisdom and knowledge they have acquired over time may be limited. This may mean that an adult is better equipped to deal with some issues.
My school is an extraordinarily supportive community, a community that closes ranks around its own when they are in pain or need. I sincerely hope that this remains an important part of our culture. It is also my hope that students know how to be silent, when to speak out and how to be supportive, and to have the wisdom to know the difference.
I hope we will always discern when to be silent and when not to be silent.
I hope that my school will remain a community that can hear the sounds that enrich through the noise that diminishes.
FOOTNOTE:
This week’s image is taken from one of the three galleries of images of North Korea on my website. All three galleries can be accessed from HERE.
Sunday, 15 October 2006