Peace through the spectrum of beauty, creativeness and art

Satyam, Shivam, Sundaram Natalia Kravtchenko, Vladimir Zaitsev
From ancient, miraculous stones build the steps of the future. Nicholas Roerich

CULTURE OF PEACE Edited by BAIDYANATH SARASWATI 1999, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts

When one considers the problem of peace, immediately we think of its opposites, aggression and war. It is a cornerstone dilemma of many generations:

• What are the roots of violence?
• What are the reasons for human impatience and cruelty?
• What is the way to protect ourselves from violence and preserve peace?
• Is peace an unfulfilled dream of humanity?

In the ancient texts of Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Christianity and other world teachings we find very profound considerations and real concern about peace. Presently we would like to suggest that we take a look at the problem of peace through the spectrum of beauty, creativeness and art. We regard beauty and art as the most powerful mediums in the process of mutual understanding of different nations and their peaceful coexistence.

In the recent past noble and lofty ideas of art and beauty were considered idealistic, superficial and abstract conceptions. Human consciousness, narrowed by modern technocratic civilization, moved back the achievements of culture maintaining an idea of its material impracticality. In spite of this in human history we observe another process — everything striving towards cultural constructiveness and unselfish knowledge created brilliant epochs of renaissance, and on the contrary every departure from the foundations of beauty, from culture has always brought destruction and decay. It is also a fact that old, forcible methods do not solve present conflicts and contradictions, they only increase tensions and the threat of war.

It seems to us that the present scientific and technological development took the form of a desert mirage: when it is far it gives the impression of prosperity, stability and development, but when we reach it this disappears and in front of us is the whole range of modern problems. The most serious and crucial amongst them is the threat of the use of nuclear weapons. In this reality all our present achievements, innovations and progress look meaningless unless we approach the real understanding of peace.

One would be able to reach it when the difference between mechanical civilization and the coming culture of the spirit is realized. ‘For man intellectually developed,’ writes Sri Aurobindo, ‘mighty in scientific knowledge and the mastery of gross and subtle nature, using the elements as his servants and the world as his footstool, but undeveloped in heart and spirit, becomes only an inferior kind of asura (demon), using the power of a demigod to satisfy animal nature.’ Observing the historical panorama one may find that civilization is created during a few decades, while culture is based upon achievements of thousands years.

At present we have what painters call mistake in perspective. Instead of going on the vertical level, in other words the change from within, spiritual development and growth, the modern way of progress turns towards the horizontal plane, change from outside, the way of material prosperity and widening of technocratic might. The last does not fulfil the qualitative role in the change of human society. It does not reach the depths of consciousness and spirit of man. It was never said, ‘the hand kills not, but the thought’. It is true that the idea of killing another living being is already its potential realization. As a matter of fact a war is not outward disaster, it is an expression of ignorance and of the absolute absence of the culture of the heart.

The continuous process of man’s isolation from nature, increasing of emotional, personal gaps between people, the loss of cultural and spiritual values of past generations, have reduced the capacity of man in sensitiveness and receptivity. He misses the sense of beauty of being (existence), no more does he consider himself a part of infinite creation. Hermit Zosima in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov contemplates: ‘What is hell? It is inability to love, to feel unity with the world in all its forms.’ Thus the link between different worlds is distorted.

From childhood the sense of unity is a natural feeling for man, there is need, thirst in a child for communication and friendship with the outer world. Slowly his mind impresses on its screen all prejudices, conventional divisions: political, social, religious, national, domestic, all the atavisms of society; he becomes a certain screw in a grandiose machine. In hierarchy, where people are separated between one’s people and strangers, rich and poor, etc., a man completely loses feelings of community and identity with his environment. The serene world of his childhood is revealed to him as strange and hostile.