Read an Excerpt
A long, long time ago in a faraway place, there was a small village. On one side of the village was a great ocean, and on the other side were high mountains.
A few of the people in the village made their living by fishing, but most of the men and women and children worked in the rice fields that were high on top of one of the mountains.
Every morning, the villagers climbed the mountain path to work in the fields. Every evening, they trekked down the mountains to sleep in the village huts.
Only a grandmother and her granddaughter—whose name was Hanako—lived on top of the mountain, where it was their job to keep the fires lit at night to scare off the wild animals who might eat the rice.
Early one morning, during the season when the rice fields turned golden dry, ready for the harvest, Grandmother tended the fire for one last time. Down below, the villagers began their morning chores before climbing the mountain to begin the day’s work.
As she did every morning after first stirring the fire, Grandmother went to the mountain’s edge to watch the sun rise. But, on this day, she did not see the sun coming up. Instead, what she saw brought terrible fear.
As quickly as she could, she ran to the hut where her granddaughter was sleeping. “Hanako,” she called, “Get up. Get up!”
“Oh, Grandmother,” said Hanako, “I am tired. Please let me sleep.”
“No, my child. Get up right now, and do as I say. Get a burning stick from the fire.”
Hanako knew that she must do as she was told, for she had never heard her grandmother so upset. Hanako went to get a burning stick from the fire, and, soon, she joined her grandmother who was standing out in the field.
Grandmother cried out a command: “Burn the rice fields!”
“But, Grandmother,” Hanako cried, “we cannot burn the rice field. This is our village’s food. Without this rice, we will all starve.”
“Do as I say,” commanded Grandmother.
With tears streaming down her face, Hanako did as she was told. She touched the burning stick to the fields and set the precious rice on fire. Soon, large clouds of smoke rose up from the rice fields on the top of the mountain.
Down below, the villagers saw the smoke, and in moments, every man, woman, and child in the village came running up the mountain.
When they reached the top, they could all see the flames destroying their precious rice. Their whole crop was ruined.
“What happened here?” they all cried out. “How did this horrible fire begin?”
“I set the fire,” Grandmother told all the villagers.
“What? You set the fire? You stupid old woman! You have ruined our rice crop. We will all starve. How could you do such a horrible thing?”
“Come with me,” said Grandmother, as she walked toward the edge of the mountain. “Look,” she said, as she pointed out toward the sea. “Look at that great storm that is bringing enormous waves coming toward the shore. In less than an hour, a wall of water will hit our little village, and everything will be destroyed.”
The people stood quietly watching, and before long, they saw that Grandmother was absolutely right. The heaving ocean brought huge waves onto the shore, and every hut in the village was crushed under a deluge of water.
The villagers looked down at their little village, which lay in waste, and they looked at the rice fields that were burned down, and one man cried out, “We have nothing left. Everything is gone. We are ruined.”
And every villager mourned and wept.
But one woman said, “All is not lost. We are here up on the mountain. We have our lives. Every one of us has survived the great flood.”
“That is right, my children,” said a village Elder. “We have our lives. So, this afternoon, we will start all over again. We will build new huts and plant new fields.”
And for the rest of her days, Grandmother was honored and revered for her wisdom and her courage.
Now.
It seems to many that our world is being overtaken by great storms, and that we are all about to drown.
The heaviness of hatred, and division, and violence, and terror, and war, and greed, and political folly of the present moment burdens our spirits and threatens the soul of all humanity.
Nations are “lift[ing] up sword[s] against nations.”
Human and civil rights and liberties are being trampled; the powerless and the poor are being exploited while the elite and the wealthy become more powerful; diversity and equality are squashed; uninformed biases rage.
Refugees still wander; the hungry go unfed; addictions are rampant; the voices of minorities are being muted; the free press is being intimidated; danger lurks around every corner; fear grips.
In our bewilderment and our angst, we wonder—we cry out—“How long?” How long must the world suffer in strife before brave hearts and determined hands pull us back from the non-sense of this madness?
In this highly technological age—where the vast world has become a tiny village— there will be no “losers” or “winners.”
We need to learn to live together lest we perish together.
Temporal “solutions” and the political expediencies of the moment offer little.
Not then. Not now.
There is but one pathway.
It is a pathway that requires great and resolute courage.
We’ve known about it, we’ve lived with it, since the moment of creation.
Sometimes we forget. Sometimes we choose to ignore.
But the stakes are too high; the time is too fleeting.
We must Re-Member.
“Who are we? And what are our lives?”
How shall we be? How shall we live?
The answer is right before us.
The answer will gladden and ennoble us.
The answer will save us.
This simple little book can be our guide.
Its teachings come to us from the Highest of the High and the Deepest of the Deep— from the eternal wisdom and the universal truths that are within each of us.
The village and the fields can rise up again.
And the villagers can forever tell the tale.
