Sunday, April 09, 2006
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THE WISDOM OF NASREDIN HOJA
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Nasredin Hoja was fixing his roof when a passerby asks him to come down. When Nasredin Hoja climbs down, the man identifies himself as a beggar and says, “Give me some money.” “Come on up to the roof with me,” Nasredin tells the man; and when they both go up to the roof the beggar says, “Where is my money?” To which the Hoja replies: “I have no money for you.”
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I am afraid something similar may happen to us on the day the Turks admit the reality of the Genocide: they may ask us to climb to the roof with them. As for allowing us to annex historic Armenia: I doubt if the regime in Yerevan will want to assume the additional responsibility of depopulating it.
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To those who disagree with me, let me recount another Hoja story. When a dying man asks Nasredin to teach him a prayer that will ease his passage to the next world, the Hoja says, “Say, God help me and Devil help me.” “That’s crazy!” the dying man says. “Not so, my dear fellow,” replies the Hoja. “You are in no position to reject anyone’s help.” Translated into idiomatic English: “Beggars can’t be choosers.” And when it comes to wisdom, who among us will dare to say he is not a beggar?
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Monday, April 10, 2006
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We speak of books only when they are written and published. What about books that are never written because the author is convinced they will be rejected by editors, or suppressed by censors, or ignored by an intolerant, hidebound, brainwashed, or philistine public?
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In an environment where even written books are ignored, why should anyone bother to mention unwritten ones?
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We may not have a contemporary literature but we do have publishers whose function appears to be to see that only politically correct trash gets into print. We also have well-paid editors by the dozen whose number one priority is to be on good terms with bosses, bishops, and benefactors not because they know better but because they have God and capital (make it Capital and god) on their side.
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Unlike Hitler and Stalin we don’t build concentration camps, but we have become experts on how to alienate, isolate, and silence. I speak as an inmate.
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We tend to confuse our spirit of contradiction with intelligence or erudition. As a child I had an overdeveloped spirit of contradiction and an underdeveloped brain. Any moron can contradict, that doesn’t make him a genius, only a nuisance.
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Tuesday, April 11, 2006
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Very often in life that which is most obvious is ignored. Or, in Cocteau’s own words: “Nothing is more easily ignored than the essential.” The following Nasredin Hoja story illustrates this brilliantly.
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In his youth the Hoja amassed a vast fortune by dealing in contraband. Everyone knew this but no one could figure out what he was smuggling, not even the border guards who would search him and his mule thoroughly. Years later when one of the guards met the Hoja and wanted to know what was it that he used to smuggle, the Hoja replied: “Mules.”
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When it comes to the Genocide, the question that gets ignored is this: Why is it that after 600 years of coexistence the Turks suddenly decided to exterminate their most loyal subjects? The answer I was brought up to believe is, “Because they are bloodthirsty Asiatic barbarians.” Why did these barbarians, after managing an empire that lasted much longer than most empires (including our own under Dikran the Great) suddenly decide to act against their own interests? If we say “mass hysteria,” we give the Turks an out by allowing them to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.
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Speaking of insanity: what could be more insane than to surrender our destiny into the hands of barbarians and to serve them loyally for 600 years?
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Why did the Turks try to exterminate us? The short answer is, we don’t know. Not even the Turks know. That’s because none of us is equipped to understand and explain the incomprehensible, and a great deal about human conduct remains incomprehensible.
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Speaking for myself, I can’t even explain the crimes committed in my own neighborhood by people I know. Also, I can’t always explain why I behaved as I did. I can only repeat Toynbee’s explanation in reference to the Genocide: given the right (or wrong) combination of circumstances we are all capable of committing unspeakable acts.
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I may not be sure about many things, but I am sure of this: there will come a time, and the sooner the better, when both Turks and Armenians will do what’s best for themselves by deciding to coexist in peace, and this time not as masters and subjects but as equals. However, this time may never come if we think of them as bloodthirsty Asiatic barbarians.
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Allow me to conclude with another Nasredin Hoja story. A man once found a mirror. He picked it up, took a close look at it, didn’t like what he saw, and reasoning that if it was discarded by its original owner it must be useless, he threw it away. Isn’t that what we do too whenever we don’t like what we read about ourselves?
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Wednesday, April 12, 2006
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TOPICS FOR FUTURE SERMONS
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Faith becomes a liability when, instead of enhancing our understanding, tolerance, and compassion, it legitimizes our need to judge, condemn, and assert moral superiority.
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Stress the negative in yourself and you may succeed in enhancing your credibility. Speak well of yourself and run the risk of projecting the image of a self-satisfied jackass.
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We either advance towards the truth even if it means a fraction of an inch in our lifetime or we sink deeper into lies.
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When it comes to politicians, vote for the lesser of two evils, adopt a wait-and-see attitude, and prepare yourself to be disappointed.
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If you want to understand a country, read its dissidents and critics, not its propaganda. Read its propaganda only if you want to gauge the magnitude of its illusions.
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I may not be a candidate for literary immortality but I think I have a chance of getting there someday because even those who hate me read me (judging by the number of nasty e-mails I get) and I’d rather be read and hated than loved and ignored.
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