Video: Religion and Nonviolence: Past and Present with Cornel West and Sasha Dehghani

Religion and Nonviolence: Past and Present with Cornel West and Sasha Dehghani
[MUSIC PLAYING]

Thank you. My name is Sejal Patel, and I am also on the Alumni/Alumnae Council. And I've counted about 200 smiles that I've put in my pocket over the last two days. I hope you guys have a similar tally. We have two very, very exciting presentations to end the intellectual nourishment of these wonderful last few days. I have the great privilege of introducing Professor Cornel West and Sasha Dehghani. 

Professor West is a Professor of the practice of public philosophy here at HDS. He has taught at Yale, Harvard, the University of Paris, Princeton, and most recently, the Union Theological Seminary. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in three years, and obtained his master's in PhD in philosophy at Princeton. He has authored 20 books, and is best known for his classics, Race Matters and Democracy Matters, and his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud. 

He appears frequently on the Bill Maher Show, CNN, C-SPAN, and Tavis Smiley's PBS show. He is the creator of three spoken word albums, including Never Forget, collaborating with Prince, Jill Scott, Andre 3000, Talib Kweli, KRS-One, and Gerald Levert. His spoken word interludes were featured on Terence Blanchard's Choices, which won the 2009 Grand Prix in France for the best jazz album of the year. 

Cornel West's Theory's Second Rome, Raheem Devaughn's Grammy-nominated Love & War MasterPeace, and most recently, Bootsy Collins' as Funk Capital of the World. Passionate about keeping alive the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr in his writing, in his public discourse, and through the arts-- the legacy of truth-telling, bearing witness to love and justice. We are so proud to have Professor West here at HDS and with us today. 
[APPLAUSE]

In conversation with Professor West is Sasha Dehghani, a visiting scholar at the CSWR. He has his master's in Islamic studies, political science, and Protestant theology and religious studies from the Fredrich-Schiller-University Jena, and a PhD from the Freie University Berlin. He has been a research associate at the Center for Literary and Cultural Research in Berlin, and has taught courses on Shiite Islam, Islamic intellectual history, and the Bahá'í faith at the Free University of Berlin, and the Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, where he was a visiting assistant professor. 

He currently works at the research department of the Bahá'í world center in Haifa. His research at the CSWR this year focuses on the classification of the Bahá'í faith as a world religion, comparing the classification in the German academy with that of Anglo-American and the Islamic world. Please, again, let's give a warm welcome to our two wonderful speakers. 
[APPLAUSE]

Yeah, you go and do your thing. 

Dear friends, dear Harvard alumni, Harvard Divinity School, it's a pleasure and a privilege to be here today. Just a few minutes before I came on stage, I spoke with Professor Cornel West and I suggested I should start before everyone came to see him. 

[LAUGHING] 

So I was afraid if he starts, once he's done, everyone will leave the tent. So it's much better to do it that way. In addition, I have-- of course it's unnecessary to say-- the question in your mind is, who is Sasha Dehghani? So to some extent I will try to answer this question. 

And of course, when we want to achieve things in life, you know there's a famous statement that we should sit on the shoulders of the giants. Now today, I will sit next to such a giant. I might look very small. That's fine. I don't think actually, that my research as such is that important. But I hope that by the end of the few minutes that I will present to you today, it will get clear why I think the topic that I want to speak to you has some significance. And thank you for coming and listening to that. 

Just yesterday we had Professor Danielle Allen, who was speaking about the question of violence. And some of you who were here, you might remember that she was telling a story of her cousin-- and she's writing a book about this cousin-- and the violence that he had endured in his life, that is her cousin. A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure to see professor Danielle Allen in the Harvard conference on inclusion and belonging. And in that conference she had organized and gathered a number of different academics from Harvard University, who spoke very privately. 

They shared their life stories, very truthful, some of it, at times, tragic. But certainly always enriching. And the Harvard President Faust, she was there, and they all encouraged us to tell stories. So I thought-- I have read a lot for today-- but at the end, with so many theories and names in my mind, I gave up and I thought, actually, what I will do, I will start with a story that is related to my life. And hopefully this story will help us to understand what the question of religion and nonviolence, and also what the topic of the Bahá'í faith and Bahá'u'lláh is that I'm going to present today. 

Sometimes in life, there's a synchronicity and parallels that come like a mystery, and it's difficult to explain. Karl Jaspers spoke about the Axial Age, people are appearing at the same time, things happening at the same time. The development of the Bahá'í religion, which is by now considered as the youngest world religion as such, has many parallels to the important steps of the history of the United States, which I can not go very deep today because of the time. But I just want to mention to you three of the parallel things. 

Bahá'u'lláh, the prophet founder of the Bahá'í faith, was born in 1817. That is, this year is the bicentenary of Bahá'u'lláh, which overlaps-- fortunately for me-- with the Harvard Divinity School Bicentenary. I think that explains why I'm standing here today. In 1848-- and we have Professor [INAUDIBLE] here, who is an expert on-- and many others friends of course as well-- on the question of women and Iran. 

In 1848, Bahá'u'lláh himself gathered the number of Bábis at the conference of Badasht, and helped and assisted a young Iranian woman by the name Táhirih Qurratu l-'Ayn to remove the veil publicly as a sign not only for the advent of a new religion, but also as a sign for the equality of men and women. And Bahá'u'lláh was a major force. Now, we know 1848 was Seneca Falls, a group of women which gathered in the United States-- albeit collectively-- whereas in Iran, it was one courageous woman who tried to do the same. 

And in 1863, Bahá'u'lláh, then banished from Tehran to Baghdad-- and I might have a few minutes later on to talk to you about that. And here, where Lincoln, in this important country of the United States, abolished slavery. And this year actually, Bahá'u'lláh proclaimed his message to humanity. So now I will come to this story, which I wanted to tell you. 

In 1981, I was in the age of around six years. You can now start to count how old I am. I have now reached the age of 40. And 40 is a dangerous age for you who are familiar with religious history. Muhammad claimed to get revelation on the mountain of Hira, Moses wandered through the wilderness for 40 years. And Bahá'u'lláh himself was 40 years old also in banishment. So the age of 40 is quite dangerous, but I promise I have no revelation for you today, except the fact that I will share some story that is related to my childhood. 

In the age of six years-- I was born in Tehran in Iran and left later on, and went to Germany. Now I live in Israel, and you can imagine I'm kind of the horror for any security out there in the world when I have to get through. And my name is Sasha-- some think my parents might have been Communists. Anyways, when I was in the age of six, one family member of ours, one year after the revolution, by the name [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] was imprisoned. Not in Tehran, but in the city of Shiraz. 

He was imprisoned with another friend, Medhi Anvari. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] from my family, the uncle of my mother, was a pretty successful businessman. Medhi Anvari was a medical doctor, as far as I can remember, I was in the age of six. So you know that after the revolution in Iran, many things changed. 

One of the things that happened is that the Islamic government quickly adopted a constitution. And this Constitution of Iran, the article 13 says very explicitly that Jewish, Zoroastrian, and Christian people are accepted as religious minorities, and only these. Which means the Bahá'ís, the biggest religious minority in Iran, with 300,000 people, are-- even by constitution, right from the beginning of the revolution-- excluded from any rights. 

In very practical terms, this meant, step-by-step, that Bahá'ís and the leaders of Bahá'í institutions were not only brought to prison, but also the Bahá'ís didn't have the right to higher education, which is still till nowadays it hasn't changed. In a way, they go through strangulation in economy, in professional life, and many things. But the story I have today is just like a glimpse of what happened to the Bahá'ís, representative to a much bigger community that we have in Iran. 

When [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] and Medhi Anvari were in prison, the hope at that time and still nowadays is the same when the Bahá'ís are imprisoned. The leading institution of the Bahá'ís, seven members of the Bahá'ís are at the moment, since eight or nine years in prison in Iran as well. When the Bahá'ís are in prison, one of the hopes of the government in Iran is that they would recant their faith. That they would say they are not Bahá'ís anymore. 

And when they figure out after a while that regardless of torture or what happens to them, that is not going to happen. Then after giving the chance generously, one has to say, that they can convert to Islam. When they keep believing in their faith, and they stay steadfast, then usually the death penalty is what happens to them. So Medhi Anvari and [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] were both killed in 1980, after it got clear to the soldiers and to the prison in Shiraz that they will not recant their faith. 

What happened is at first, they staged a mocked execution. So they pretended as if they were going to soldiers-- as if they are going to shoot them, but they didn't. They just shoot in the air. And of course, you know, that might have been the hope that that will trigger such a terror in their heart that now they will come to reason, and they will accept to convert to Islam, which didn't take place. 
Then, of course, the second attempt, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] and Medhi Anvari, they were both killed. And from Bahá'í perspective, they are seen as martyrs. Now, why do I tell this story today, and why did I want us to start with this story? 

William Sears, an American Bahá'í, and a very famous journalist in the United States, was in contact with many Bahá'ís in Iran. And he wrote a book, The Cry of the Heart, which was written a few years after the Islamic Revolution. In this book-- in chapter nine, for those of you who are interested in that-- he speaks about what happened to [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] and Medhi Anvari. 
The interesting thing, which I learned through that book-- I had not heard from my family, and at the age of six, I was in Iran still-- is that he says that Medhi Anvari had written a testament, a last will. And he asked, in his last will, his children to go to the soldiers in prison and to give them sweets and flowers. Now, you can imagine that was not that easy for the children to do. That wasn't something that came very easy to the family as such, but this was his last will. 

And I thought, starting with this story, it's a good introduction to the question of religion and nonviolence. And there are several lessons that I, at least, always found in what happened at that time. First of all, it shows us that Bahá'ís, if they follow the teachings and principles of Bahá'u'lláh, are not willing to hate. Indeed, there is actually not a second to hate for us friends in this life, but we should struggle for justice and social change. But in a way of constructive resilience. 

We shouldn't dehumanize those who think we are their enemies. Because by reacting with violence to violence, we close the door. We are not able to create enough space for the other side-- who has decided to become the other-- to have this change in their life. And I think here is a huge parallel in what I, in my very limited knowledge-- but I'm happy that Professor West is here today-- to some extent this overlaps with some of the principles of Martin Luther King. So very clearly, nonviolence is the response that the Bahá'ís choose. 

This story, however, tells us also something in addition. It shows us that the Bahá'ís, who are usually asked to be loyal and obedient to any government in the world, regardless of the oppression that they witness-- which is a principle of the Bahá'í faith. But when it comes to the principle of faith, and the principle of conscience, no temporal power and force in the world has permission to decide for any individual in this world what he or she believes in. 

So I would say here we have some aspect of disobedience, which is justified from the Bahá'í perspective. But in many other matters, the Bahá'í in Iran, the dissolvement of their institutions, that Bahá'í literature cannot be published, that only literature that exists in Iran-- more than 30 years by now-- is constantly written against the Bahá'í, that the Bahá'í accepted. But when it came to principles of faith, they were not able to give up what they thought, regardless of what happened. 

The third point of course, what the story shows, and I mentioned it briefly. And because of the limited time, I will also just not to go too deep into this question is-- of course, the Islamic government as such see the Bahá'ís as a threat. Otherwise they wouldn't do what they did. Now I have a few minutes, but I thank you, I need just a bit longer. 

So to be clear, is that the Islamic government as such-- and I'm not trying to present Islamic civilization or religion in any ways as a dangerous religion. I'm just speaking about the experience of the Bahá'ís. As a matter of fact, at the funeral of [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH], hundreds of people were gathered, and many of them were Muslims, because this uncle in my family was married to a Muslim. It was not a big question to Bahá'ís. So I'm far away from that. 

But in the Islamic religion, as I said in the Constitution number 13, the article, what Islamic theology permits is the existence of three Islamic monotheistic religions. That's why Judaism, Christianity, or Zoroastrianism are respected. But when it comes to a monotheistic religion with a prophetic claim after Muhammad, there is no such space for such a religion in Islamic theology. And Islamic theologians and jurisprudence is struggling with this question. And fortunately, step-by-step, more people are coming to this direction to accept that space has to be created for the existence of a prophetic religion after Muhammad. 

Because from the perspective of the Bahá'ís, Muhammad, Jesus, Moses, or Buddha are all inspired divine messengers sent to humanity at different times. So Bahá'ís believe that for nowadays, Bahá'u'lláh has come, and what he's bringing to humanity is as well inspired. But there is the idea of progressivity. Prophecy can not stop from Bahá'í perspective. The prophetic voice is needed, and this created kind of a clash. 

So with your permission, I will just speak-- if that's OK-- I will add a few sentences about the background to 1981, and what it has to do with Bahá'u'lláh, and the bicentenary of Bahá'u'lláh, which six, seven million Bahá'ís in the world this year are, and will be celebrating. In the year 1863, Bahá'u'lláh, when he was banished from Tehran to Baghdad-- shortly before again he was banished from Baghdad to the Ottoman Period-- he gathered a number of believers in a garden in Baghdad. 

And in this garden, he actually pronounced the main principles of the Bahá'í faith. That is, that prophecy continues, and with him, the promised one of the Bábi religion has come in of the past. And then to other principles which he announced, which I think is important to understand 1981. These two other principles is that Bahá'u'lláh says that the principle of the sword, and militant jihad is annulled and abrogated. It is abolished. 

So Bahá'ís are not permitted to spread or defend religion by the means of the sword. The second thing that Bahá'u'lláh announced is a very theological principle, but I think at the Harvard Divinity School I might be permitted to speak a bit about the existence of God. So from the Bahá'í perspective, as in all other monotheistic religions, God shows and manifests himself to his divine names and attributes. Love, generosity, knowledge, kindness-- they have positive existence. 

Actually, from Bahá'í perspective, the negative things and sin is an absence of the development of the good side. So Bahá'u'lláh says if there is one source for humanity, if all human beings come from just one source, the conclusion should be there is one religion. All religions, at least in their core teachings, are one. But in addition, because of that spiritual connection to the one source, everything is merged into the sea and ocean of purity, says Bahá'u'lláh. 

So the concept of being impure that so many religions in the past have abused, doesn't exist. And if there's a chosen people, all humanity, regardless of race, of religion and gender, all are chosen people. There is no such thing as us and them. And Bahá'u'lláh explicitly writes about the idea of a unification of mankind. But a unity that is not uniformity, but diversity. 

Alain Locke, a very famous PhD in philosophy, an African-American Bahá'í, wrote about the principle of unity and diversity. And he was a close friend of WEB Du Bois, who-- both were very close to Abdu'l-Bahá, the son of Bahá'u'lláh. And Du Bois actually met Abdu'l-Bahá while Abdu'l-Bahá was traveling in the United States. And then Du Bois chose to publish the picture, the photo of Abdu'l-Bahá in his journal The Crisis. 

The reason why he did that was that Abdu'l-Bahá had given a talk at the NAACP, and the major content of that talk is regardless of the color, God looks at the heart. He does not look at our outer appearance of black, or white, if we are yellow or green. When we are created in the image of God, says Abdu'l-Bahá, it's the character that counts. And all the characters in this world, according to Abdu'l-Bahá, deserve equal rights and equal opportunities in this life. 

As you can see, when I get started, it is difficult to stop me. But I know we have a beautiful, wonderful soul next to me, who I really, I don't know how to thank him. Because I wouldn't stand here today without his generous offer. So with your permission-- although I really have much more to say-- I will stop, and I will hand over. And I know you will not run away now. Thank you so much. 
[APPLAUSE]

That was wonderful, brother. That was wonderful. That was wonderful. What a blessing to be here to celebrate 200 years of a rich legacy that goes back to 1816/17. With memories, of course, of the great Ralph Waldo Emerson giving that July 15th 1838 address to the six graduating seniors. There was seven, but only six showed up. 
[LAUGHING]

And after that address, Ralph Waldo Emerson was banned from Harvard for 30 years. 
[LAUGHING] 
That's part of the great prophetic legacy of the Harvard Divinity School. 
[APPLAUSE]

I want to thank my dear brother Sasha. He is a magnificent human being. His soul, his heart, his mind has moved me in our discussions dealing with the wonderful overlap of the black freedom movement and our precious Bahá'í, who to this day, continue to be persecuted in countries all around the world. Let us never forget. 

I want to thank brother Mike, who has been just magnificent in facilitating this event, and all of those who are working with him. Thank you so much my sister Patel, the distinguished esquire and lawyer. I don't want to take too much of your time, but I do want to say something about the fact that we're living in one of the most terrifying moments in the history of this nation. 
[LAUGHTER] 
[APPLAUSE]

And we've got to return to the source. Existential sources, who are we? Institutional sources. Who are those who constitute our synagogues, and our mosques, and our temples, and our churches, and our civic institutions in this Trump moment? And the Trump moment can be characterized roughly as an escalating spiritual blackout. 

The relatively quick eclipse of integrity, honesty, decency, and courage, and the prevalence of big business, big money, big corporations, greed, envy, resentment, scapegoating the most vulnerable, and not enough people confronting the most powerful. And our challenge is, how do we constitute prophetic coalitions, prophetic religious coalitions? Thank God for our secular Brooklyn-based Jewish brother who lives in Vermont named Bernie Sanders. 

[CHEERING] 

It's true. He's keeping alive the best of a prophetic tradition, and it comes a variety of different forms. But for each and every one of us concerned about justice, nonviolence, concerned about equality, concerned about the preservation of democracy, small d, in all of its various forms-- our first question is, who are we? Who am I? 

And I stand here as not a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, but one-- as a student at Harvard College-- was so deeply, deeply shaped by students like James Melvin Washington, and Fred Lucas, and Boykin Sanders. And of course, Professor Preston Williams, the godfather of so many of us, and especially we chocolate ones. Because he was the only one in a vanilla sea, who was chocolate enough. Not because of his skin pigmentation, but because of his acknowledgment of being part of a tradition. 

And his tradition is my tradition. And that tradition, of course, has the variety of different streams and strands. But it's the tradition of people who have been so chronically and systemically hated, and yet still taught the world so much about how to love. I could just turn on John Coltrane's A Love Supreme right now, and sit down. 
[APPLAUSE] 

Just sit down. Or read James Baldwin's loved-soaked essays, keep track of the love. Witness of Martin Luther King Jr, and Fannie Lou Hamer-- this is not just a matter of isolated individuals. They've been shaped by certain prophetic, religious soul craft, to use the old language of the medieval thinkers. 

And a soul craft is a shaping of a self, a formation of attention that attends to the important things, not the superficial things. It's the maturation of a soul that allows you to preserve your capacity to love, and your capacity to fight for justice. In that wonderful formulation of Joseph Temple of 1636, one of the grand pilgrims who arrived and said, we need more charitable Christian hatred. 
[LAUGHING] 

And I love that formulation. And a hatred of the sin, and a love of the sinner. A hatred of injustice and unfairness, but keeping track with the humanity of the other. And so here we are in the most commodified, marketized, commercialized culture in the history of the world, buying and selling. Obsession with getting over by any means, focused on the 11th commandment, "Thou shalt not get caught." 
[LAUGHING] 
Just turn to any business page, scandal after scandal after scandal. Many churches, mosques, synagogues, and temples, scandal after scandal after scandal. The market model has become so ubiquitous and hegemonic that it's hard for us to conceive with our imaginations an empathy, an alternative world that is not dictated by oligarchs and plutocrats who disproportionately shape just-- not only of the political lethargy of our government-- but in the culture. 

And especially the culture of our precious young people of all colors. And we're living in a moment of moral and spiritual awakening. The movement for Black Lives, the ecological movement, the intensification of the anti-homophobic movement. Lo and behold, the awakening of slices of the trade union movement. 

And most importantly, the need for, and the increase day-by-day of an anti-war movement. Because when you talk about nonviolence, you're talking about a critique of militarism. You're talking about a critique of the military industrial complex, you're talking about a critique. Every dollar, $0.54 goes to the military industrial complex. We don't have a language that permeates the culture to understand that. 

26,172 bombs dropped last year by the Nobel Peace Prize winner president. Oh, we don't like to talk about that. Trump commits his own war crimes, and we go ballistic. 12,000 bombs dropped on Syria last year before Trump got into office. Where's our moral consistency? Where is what Jane Austen called constancy? 

We've got to be willing to tell the truth, and the condition of truth is always to allow suffering to speak. And we've got to have an unapologetic love, and we know we religious folk have no monopoly on unapologetic love, let alone courage. And I don't even like to talk about courage these days. 

I like to talk about fortitude, because fortitude is a creative fusion of courage and magnanimity, of greatness of character. A Nazi soldier can be courageous, and still be a thug and a gangster, because they got a thuggish cause. But fortitude is when you have your courage with spiritual and moral dimensions to it. And that's the tradition that I'm talking about, that Preston Williams and the others exemplified when I first arrived. 

I want to take you back to 1919, the war committee before the US Senate as Archibald Stevenson steps to the seat and gives a report. He says I've got 16 people who are dangerous American citizens. But the most destructive, the most dangerous American citizen alive is Jane Addams. Oh, we forget that don't we? 

Why? Because she was committed to nonviolence. Why? Because she was a pacifist. Why? Because she opposed World War I. And Ed Bemis, her colleague at University of Chicago, was released immediately when he marched against World War I. Professors were pushed out of their job at Columbia University. 

Charles Beard, the grand American historian left, they founded the New School, in part because they wanted some relative autonomy. Because they thought, my God, these universities are so obsessed with objectivity and value-free inquiry, but as soon as the country goes to war, that drops out. And it's all mobilization across the board. 

How come? Because of catastrophe. We say, oh, wait a minute. What do you think indigenous peoples been dealing with since 1492? That's catastrophe. What do you think slavery and Jim Crow and Jane Crow's about? That's catastrophe. What do you think a working class rule by robber barons unable to engage in collective bargaining until the 1930s were dealing with? That's catastrophe too. 
But only when it's catastrophe in its nationalistic form do the universities all of a sudden mobilize all of their resources and go on a crusade. Thank god for William James. Didn't graduate from Harvard Divinity School but he learned a lot-- 

[LAUGHING] 

From Harvard Divinity School professors. You all know William James had no AB, he had no MA, he had no PhD. All he had was an MD, and a whole lot of wisdom and courage. And he wrote an essay in 1910 called "The Moral Equivalent of War." How do you find spiritual analogues, moral analogues so people are on fire fighting against poverty, fighting for justice, and motivated by something deeper than justice. 

That's all right, to quote Reinhold Niebuhr at Harvard Divinity School, even though he's Union Theological Seminary's Darling. 

[LAUGHING] 

He said, "Any justice that's only justice soon degenerates into something less than justice. Justice must be rescued by something deeper than justice." And that's love, that's empathy, that's a willingness to sacrifice. It's a self-emptying, it's kenosis. And that's what we need these days to connect with the best of the exemplars. 

I'm not talking about market-driven celebrities. I'm talking about spiritually-laden exemplars. Never confuse exemplarity with celebrity. And if you are a celebrity, or find yourself a celebrity, you better be a spiritually-informed exemplar or you will betraying the best of the tradition that's gone into you. 

And for me, the greatest honor I've ever received in my life, trying to be a love warrior. And that's very different than being a polished professional. Too many polished professionals are shot through with conformity. They're shot through with complacency, and sometimes just downright cowardice, in order to preserve their careers and opportunities. Rather than bear witness, and bear the costs, and come to terms with the consequences. 

But for me, to return to the source before I sit down, it has everything to do with being the second son of Irene and Clifton West. Mom and dad and not just ordinary folk. They're very much like that black cafeteria worker that Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel met when he went to Cincinnati, leaving Jew-hating Europe. 

And he made close friends with that black man in Cincinnati. He went to the black Baptist Church, he was also a deacon in the black church in Cincinnati. And Heschel would say in his journals, he would say in his autobiography, what? I never met a man with such unbelievable integrity and honesty as that black brother David. That's one of the reasons why it opened my eyes to white supremacy, so I can march with Martin Luther King Jr and others. 

It's just not a matter of the iconic figures at the top, it's the concrete encounter of people who have integrity and honesty that change your life, and force you to contest and call into question your own prejudices and pre-suppositions. And we need context, multi-racial context, multi-religious context, where that kind of interaction can affect us at the existential level. Well you see, if brother Heschel had met mom and dad, it would have had the same effect. 

[LAUGHTER] 

Same effect. If he had spent some time on the chocolate side of town at Shiloh Baptist Church in Sacramento, California, where I come from with the legendary Willie P Cook and my deacon, Deacon Henton, they would have had the same effect. These are persons of unbelievable integrity. Not pure, they're flawed. But they represent the best of a prophetic legacy on the ground. 

You won't read about them in a text book. But the figures in that text book do not exist without them. It reminds me in some ways of that black preacher in Philadelphia who knocked on the door of the Coltrane family when John Coltrane came up from North Carolina, and the young brother who was blowing his horn. 

He had lost his grandfather, his grandmother, and his father all within a matter of months. He was living all by himself. His mother and cousin Mary had gone to Philadelphia, and all he did was blow his horn trying to bring back his parents. When he finally got to Philadelphia, he kept on blowing and kept on blowing, all day, all night. 

And the folks in the projects on the chocolate side of Philadelphia said, we got to get rid of his Negro, he's making too much noise. And they voted to vote the Coltrane family out. And the day before they gonna move out, he got a knock on the door. 

[KNOCKING] 

And there was a black preacher. He was a Baptist preacher, John Coltrane was AME Zion-- nice ecumenical connection. 
[LAUGHTER] 

But he knocked on that door. He said, son, I don't know what your name is, but these are the keys to my church, you can come to my church and blow any time you want, all day, or all night. And Coltrane would say as he played A Love Supreme in his own mind and soul, I'm thinking about that concrete love. I don't exist without that black preacher who gave me that key so I could practice in that church, 'cause I was being booted out with my mother, working as a domestic maid. 

That's the kind of soul warriorship that we need in the age of Trump. So that we can generate the kinds of coming together, with vision, and with witness. And we'll see whether we can do it. Thank you all so very much. 

[APPLAUSE]

And we'll open it up, we'll open up to questions. We'll open it up to questions. We've got sister Ann Marie back here. 
We're ready for some questions. 

With her microphone. Our dear brother on the right here, too. 
Anybody have questions? 

This question is-- my name is Pierre Berastain, I'm a graduate of the Divinity School from 2014. And this is a question for both of you. There's been tremendous fear in the immigrant community. I myself am an immigrant, I was undocumented, I'm am now under DACA. 

And there there's been a lot of criticism of Harvard University for not declaring itself a so-called sanctuary campus. What is your opinion of Harvard, Harvard Divinity School, as institutions that can provide safety for the students who go here? 

Yes, you want to jump in first. 

No, that's for you. 

Well, no, I think-- I mean, first you got principal, then you've got practice. And the question becomes, what are the ways in which we can ensure that there's legal defense, moral defense of the students on the ground. It's not going to be just a matter of posing and posturing about how good we are. 

When they are in crisis, are you going to come to the rescue? Now, that for me is the fundamental measure, crucial measure. Now, generally speaking, yes, in principle indeed, it's very important that we make public declarations and so forth. But the crucial thing would be, the test will be, when our precious students are being charged, being targeted, will the university then come to the defense? 
If the university comes to the defense of 99 out of 100, and would still defendant that one-- with whatever the declaration is-- that's a positive thing. Because that's what you want. That's what you want. You want to make sure you as a student, and so many others are defended. And make sure that you don't have to worry about being insecure, anxiety-ridden, targeted, and so forth and so on. 
The ideal situation would be of course, for Harvard University to declare itself a sanctuary. But Harvard University as a sanctuary for the vulnerable-- 
[LAUGHING]

That's a stretch. That's a stretch, it really is. And the reason why I say that is because we live in a community, we live in a society, where there's a lot of centrists, there's a lot of right wing folks, there's a lot of xenophobes, we're not the only ones in the country. And we push, and we bring pressure to bear, but we recognize that Harvard is not the exemplification of the prophetic. Has never been. 

[APPLAUSE] 

There's been prophetic figures, prophetic individuals, prophetic professors, prophetic janitors, prophetic all those others-- at Harvard. But Harvard in general, if they ban Ralph Emerson-- 
[LAUGHING] 

In 1838, and he hadn't even got out his abolitionist lectures yet. You see what I'm-- so I'm not putting-- I in no way want to give a pass to Harvard. But most importantly, we want to keep the focus where it belongs, which is on the suffering of the students, and the need to protect the students. But you, jump right in. 

Yeah, I mean, thank you so much. I appreciate what you said, because I'm a fellow at Harvard, so I'm not part of the faculty. I'm certainly not as prominent as the gentleman next to my left. But some of the thoughts that I had related to Harvard, actually, they came to me in the last month, is maybe less about the question of sanctuary, but our responsibility as an institution of higher academic institution. That Harvard is a leading institution of the world. 

And the question of responsibility of the academics and intellectuals. We all know the famous case of Samuel Huntington, who is a Harvard professor who passed away some years ago, who wrote The Clash of Civilizations, as we know. And I was very astonished when I read this book how-- and now coming from the perspective of Harvard and leading professors, and the responsibilities that we have also as intellectuals not to create division in this world, you see? 

Huntington to me is a very fascinating exemplar-- for whatever you want to take him as an exemplar-- he combines, to me, truths, and some things that are not true really. So the things that really astonished me is-- because you spoke about the question, who are we-- you know, he has the second book after The Clash of Civilization. He wrote Who Are We? 

And in both books, actually, his main approach-- not only to Harvard, but the question of the West-- is the question of identity. And what he does, he literally says in The Clash of Civilizations, we know who we are when we know who we are not, and against whom we are. So is that really necessary for a professor in such a leading position at Harvard, or any other professor at such a university-- Harvard, Yale, Princeton, wherever you want to go-- to think about the identity of human beings in light of us and them. 

And so, no wonder that after he says, well, it's a sad truth, but it is a truth, so we need the enemy. And then he comes with the West against the rest, which, I don't think he meant Cornel West, he meant really, the West against the rest. 

[LAUGHING] 
But it could also have been you again, I don't know. And then he speaks about all of these strange principles. And the enemy that he finds is Islam and China. And this, of course, then has impact on students, and the life of the students, and how we educate people around us, and our colleagues and our relationship to them. 

Now, I wouldn't be naive and would say, oh, there is no danger in Islamic terrorism. I think there is a huge problem, and it has to be addressed. But I don't think we can do it in this way. And so, once he has identified as a Harvard professor-- that's why I speak about it-- the external enemy, who is the internal enemy, and who are we? It's the Mexicans. 

For those of you who have read the book, he says that the progress of the United States is pretty much white nativism, and the decline of the country is based off Catholic Hispanics. And then he again talks about the problem of enemies, and the necessity to have an enemy. And at one point, he even quotes Goebbels. 

Now, for those of you who are familiar with German history, I haven't seen anyone in the last years, if I'm not wrong, please-- as intelligent audience, you will go and read yourself, if that's true what I'm was saying. But I really remember how he would find all of these quotes about the necessity of having enemies. So I think, in a wider sense, right, this is related to what we are presenting today. 
And it is, as I said, less the question of sanctuary, and practical things. I leave all of these questions to our wonderful Professor West, because I'm a visiting fellow. I'm here for a few months, I learn about the United States. And in less than a few weeks, I'm gone. Which is not that bad for you, because then someone else can come and give another presentation.

But as such I think it is very, very important to come out of the problem, the irresponsibility of the academics around us. And language that we use, you know? And even in philosophy, when you look at Marxism, and we look at Nietzsche. And I come from the German tradition, I love Germany. I am really proud of my country that has accepted one million refugees, personally. I'm speaking as Sasha, not as a representative. 

[APPLAUSE] 
I'm not speaking as a representative of the Bahá'í world today, it's just my humble personal thoughts. And although I love the Germans, one thing that is very interesting in the German tradition is the radical spirit that exists. Whatever someone starts, like Nietzsche, or Marx, or Freud, they take it to such an extreme that there is space for nothing else. 

Now that is great, because they're really convinced about what they're doing, and the passion and love. Although Nietzsche wouldn't accept that the Holy Spirit went through them. But that's there. But at the same time there is some danger in intellectual totalitarianism. And we have to think much deeper about these questions out there. Now, I stop at this point. There's my two cents on Harvard. 

[LAUGHING] 

Question. I was going to ask, are we in a bubble, but I'm not going to ask that. I will ask, what do you feel in your heart, in your head, when people say, you're in a bubble. You're thinking in a bubble. I don't mean, just you, I mean us. And I know you, Professor West, you're often in a venue where sometimes you're butting heads with people who would think that you're in a bubble. And when I say bubble, I think you know what I mean, the political thing. 

Oh yeah. No, I think we have to proceed on the notion that all of us have our own version of learned ignorance. We all have a certain parochialism and provincialism, and our end and aim is to shatter it. But it's endless, it's always incomplete, it's always unfinished. 

So in that sense, somebody says, well, you're in a bubble. You say, well, tell me exactly the ways in which the bubble operates in my thinking. Because I know it's true I've got some limitation and blind spots, point it out to me, because I am deeply committed to seeing in order to do, and bear witness, and live, and love, and laugh. So in that sense, that's what piety is all about, right? 
We learn how to die in order to learn how to live by shattering our parochialism, letting go certain assumptions, and end up more compassionate, more critical, and we hope, more courageous with more fortitude. But all of us have a certain kind of bubble. But it's one thing to be in a very narrow bubble-- you only talk to people who look like you, you only talk to people who agree with you, you only read certain things that are an echo chamber of what you think. 

That's a bubble in which is hard to grow and mature. No doubt about that. But on the other hand, it's not as if there's anybody who is bubble-less. 
[LAUGHING]

They're in space and time. We all got contexts and horizons in which we get to locked in. And we need to be unsettled, we need to be contested in that way. But it's very important too that there be movements, and organizing, and with the people who are willing to fight and sacrifice. And I wouldn't call it a bubble, I would call that a choice of trying to change the world in such a way that more love and justice is manifest. 

But there's other parts of your life. You're gonna end up reading poetry of a reactionary called TS Eliot, who you love, who I love. You see what I mean? I'm going to be listening to Bruckner, Catholic reactionary, but I like his music. 
[LAUGHTER] 

You see what I mean? And at the same time, I'm gonna read some anarchists, who I love too. 
[LAUGHING]

So there's a sign that we have a few more minutes. My thoughts related to that, if I may, just the question of the bubble. And we were asked what we think about that when we were asked the question. I mean to try to take it, as the highest point possible for me, it's somehow-- to live in a bubble-- I mean if it's a bubble and it takes us upwards, from a theological perspective, spiritually, that's nice. We're going upwards. 

But to live in a bubble means to have a very closed understanding of reality, right? And I think one of the dangers, and coming from the prophetic voice of Bahá'u'lláh, one of the dangers that we have in the world nowadays is certainly this deep, entrenched problem of we against the other. And the question of partisan politics, to see everything-- and the question of, you know, forced to see is from the left or from the right. But my feeling is we have to get out of this in order to achieve unity. 

And I think the United States will need that a lot in the coming years, these voices. You know, a house that is divided will not stand. This is what your president in the 19th century said very clearly. And the question of how to achieve unity, not uniformity-- 

That's right. 

Is a very, very deep and important question. 

That's right. 

I know that Cornel West, in his theories about democracy, has a very interesting point. He says democracy is less about election or due process. It is about giving other people a voice. Isn't that what he did today by inviting me to come on stage? 

And what does the voice do? It creates a conversation. Bahá'ís all around the world, from children age, to junior youth age, to adults, are engaged in different activities. It is about spiritual capacity building. To learn a language that unites people, and does not separate us. 

And I think that is very important to start to teach that from a very early age, and in a nonsectarian way. To be open to invite everyone to join this idea, to have a conversation as part of democracy. A meaningful conversation. 

Absolutely. 

And not to speak about the money, and the fame, and now I'm at Harvard, and now I have that. You know, violence can have many forms. It's not just Islamic or Christian fundamentalism. It can have many forms, believe me. And for us to move out of the question of violence, it needs much more education, ethical, moral virtues. 

And one thing which I couldn't go into it, and I know they want to stop us, which is fine-- which I couldn't, but I just want to mention it. This is the question of religion and nonviolence is not just a phenomenon in the Bahá'í faith. In my field of theology I learned that one huge similarity to the Bahá'í community is early Christianity. 

The example of Jesus, although he only had 12 disciples, as Martin Luther King said. But how he was able to change reality around him. He didn't bring just a new theology, he came to bring a new civilization. And I don't think that civilization was inviting people to live in a bubble what Jesus brought. And for 300 years, the Christians were willing to suffer. And isn't suffering in itself, something that is part of our humanity? And we should embrace it. 

But whereas in the materialistic, capitalistic society, we are running away from suffering. We are afraid of talking about death. Let's talk about sex, we have these songs. But no one wants to talk about the things in life that are difficult. But if we take a look at early Christianity, or at Buddhism, and other traditions. Even early Islam, Muhammad in the Mecca period, there are beautiful principles for humanity to be embraced, and step-by-step to create a new and higher organism. 

And Adam and Eve, if we want to take it serious, was a family. In the time of Jesus, the philosophers like Plato and Aristotle would write about the polis. The politeia is centered on the polis-- it's a city-state. And with Muhammad, and after Muhammad, we had the idea of Oman, some people translate it as a nation. But nowadays we need an interdependent global existence-- an interdependent global existence that brings us all together. 

And I see our dear friend Michael Goetz is pointing at the time. So I will stop at this point. Thank you so much. Also thank you again, Professor West. 
Thank you all very much. Thank you very much. 

[APPLAUSE] 
We've got the great Harvey Cox. Harvey Cox is on the way. Harvey Cox is on the way. 
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