I was eating lunch yesterday and sitting a few tables away were five folks who were speaking quite loudly; as they seemed to be about my age I assumed that some of them were hard of hearing and thus the need for the increased volume. The wait person, whom I know, asked me as I began to read the book I had brought with me, ‘Won’t their loud talking disturb you?’ I responded that it would not and thanked her for her concern. Then I began to noodle about ‘disturbing’ and then ‘disturbers.’
There are ‘disturbers’ and then there are ‘DISTURBERS.’ The latter are those that disturb in powerful ways, ways that challenge, ways that invite, if not demand, transformation (transformation = a fundamental change in character or structure). These folks are not embraced by the comfortable, the rigid, the dogmatists, and the entrenched. Most of us, it seems, fall into one or more of these categories and so most of us will not easily embrace these folks. Who were some of these great DISTURBERS?
Gandhi comes to mind. He disturbed an empire. He disturbed the establishment. He was killed by a person who thought Gandhi was destroying his world (which he was).
Socrates comes to mind. He disturbed a nation; true it was a small city-state but. . . His disturbance came in the form of questions to consider. The leaders were so threatened by his questions that he was invited over for a drink – of hemlock. Lincoln comes to mind. His very election was the impetus for a split in our nation. His desire to help heal the nation via compassion and forgiveness and his vision for a ‘more perfect union’ contributed to his not being embraced by many in the North and many in the South. One man fired the shot that took his life but to this day there are stories of their being a wider conspiracy encompassing those from both the North and the South. Martin Luther King, Jr. comes to mind. Talk about being a great disturber. He was even more non-violent than Gandhi (is that possible?) and, like Gandhi, he was struck down by the assassin’s bullet. Buddha, Confucius, Abraham, Jesus and Mohammed were great universe-disturbers and in many ways they continue to be so – for good and for ill [I write ‘ill’ because of the fanatics or zealots who believe that violence done in their name is not only good but is sacred].
What does it take to become a DISTURBER? I am not sure. What does it take to follow one who is actively causing disturbance? Courage – heart, faith, hope, love and learning to live with fear; these come to mind, there are others I am sure. When any of these great disturbers were alive would I have chosen to follow them; would I have been invited to follow them? I am not so sure that I would have had the courage – heart, or faith or hope or love or be willing to live with the fear. I find it challenging enough to embrace and live into and out of their message today and I find myself resisting when I become uncomfortable. I don’t think I am out of the norm (perhaps I am deluding myself). Why aren’t there great disturbers today? Do we not need one for our times?
Searcher-Seeker 