On Religion by Khalil Gibran

Music:
Guy Farley-Modigliani Suite

Image by H.Koppdelaney

On Religion
Kahlil Gibran

And an old priest said,"Speak to us of Religion."
And he said:

Have I spoken this day of aught else?
Is not religion all deeds and all reflection,
And that which is neither deed nor reflection,
but a wonder and a surprise ever springing in
the soul,even while the hands hew the stone
or tend the loom?

Who can separate his faith from his actions,
or his belief from his occupations?
Who can spread his hours before him,saying,
"This for God and this for myself;
This for my soul,and this other for my body?"

All your hours are wings that beat through space
from self to self.
He who wears his morality but as his best garment
were better naked.
The wind and the sun will tear no holes in his skin.

And he who defines his conduct by ethics imprisons
his song-bird in a cage.
The freest song comes not through bars and wires.
And he to whom worshipping is a window,to open but
also to shut,has not yet visited the house of his
soul whose windows are from dawn to dawn.

Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
Whenever you enter into it take with you your all.
Take the plough and the forge and the mallet and the lute,
The things you have fashioned in necessity or for delight.
For in revery you cannot rise above your achievements
nor fall lower than your failures.

And take with you all men:
For in adoration you cannot fly higher than their
hopes nor humble yourself lower than their despair.

And if you would know God be not therefore
a solver of riddles.
Rather look about you and you shall see Him
playing with your children.
And look into space; you shall see Him walking in
the cloud,outstretching His arms in the lightning
and descending in rain.
You shall see Him smiling in flowers,then rising
and waving His hands in trees.