“Do you want to know how the building of the Tower of Babel began, and
do you want to know how it ended? I see a man who comes from the Dawn
of the World. He is as beautiful as the world, and has a burning heart.
He loves to walk upon the mountains and to offer his breast unto the
wind and to speak with the stars. He is strong and rules all creatures.
He dreams of God and feels himself closely tied to him. His nights are
filled with faces.
“One hallowed hour bursts his heart. The firmament is above him and his
friends. ‘Oh friends! Friends!’ he cries, pointing to the stars. ‘Great
is the world and its Creator! Great is man! Come, let us build a tower,
the top of which reaches the sky! And when we stand on its top, and
hear the stars ringing above us, then let us write our creed in golden
symbols on the top of the tower! Great is the world and its creator!
And great is man!’
“And they set to, a handful of men, full of confidence, and they made
bricks and dug up to the earth. Never have men worked more rapidly, for
they all had one thought, one aim and one dream. When they rested from
work in the evening each knew of what the other was thinking. They did
not need speech to make themselves understood. But after some time they
knew: The work was greater than their working hands. Then they enlisted
new friends to their work. Then their work grew. It grew overwhelming.
Then the builders sent their messengers to all four winds of the world
and enlisted Hands, working Hands for their mighty work.
“The Hands came. The Hands worked for wages. The Hands did not even
know what they were making. None of those building Southwards knew
one of those digging toward the North. The Brain which conceived the
construction of the Tower of Babel was unknown to those who built it.
Brain and Hands were far apart and strangers. Brain and Hands became
enemies. The pleasure of one became the other’s burden. The hymn of
praise of one became the other’s curse.
“‘Babel!’ shouted one, meaning: Divinity, Coronation, Eternal, Triumph!
“‘Babel!’ shouted the other, meaning: Hell, Slavery, Eternal, Damnation!
“The same word was prayer and blasphemy. Speaking the same words, the
men did not understand each other.
“That men no longer understood each other, that Brain and Hands no
longer understood each other, was to blame that the Tower of Babel was
given up to destruction, that never were the words of those who had
conceived it written on its top in golden symbols: Great is the world
and its Creator! And great is man!
“That Brain and Hands no longer understand each other will one day
destroy the New Tower of Babel.
“_Brain and Hands need a mediator. The Mediator between Brain and Hands
must be the Heart._...”
She was silent. A breath like a sigh came up from the silent lips of
the listeners.
Then one stood up slowly, resting his fists upon the shoulders of the
man who crouched before him, and asked, raising his thin face with its
fanatical eyes to the girl:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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