Thus, the Eman has become a symbol, a symbol of the man trampled upon and kicked about by his counterpart, the rational scientific man and his enterprise. The emotional man is the irreducible being or its immediately self-evident form residing in all men and who is perennially yearning to evolve beyond the what his counterpart defines his territory to be. The emotional man is the most familiar abstract thing that we know. Abstract indeed, for the relativity of abstract and concrete belongs to the realm of the rational man. But he is also the most fearless companion!
Listen to one of his tunes:
I long to open the window to your freedom!
But, alas! my limbs are tied in knots,
I am locked up in a little black box like a genie;
But, I am ready to swallow your fear, Sir!
For, I am the slave of this Spirit of Quest.
Thus goes the humble song of the emotional man, facing the perennial aggression of the rational scientific man. Beyond the present context, the Eman is visible as the prehistoric man, primitive man, village man, religious man, eastern man, and ... mad man, singing other songs in other places.
Eman is at the village fair, at the marriage of his friend's daughter, at the funeral of the
headman, the pundit and at the tearful naming ceremony of the first daughter in a hundred years. He is particular in attending all the rituals and listening to all the murmurs and chants in the courtyard as well as the inner dark cellars. He is listening to the silent tears, bewilderment and pathos on that fateful night when all the newborn fell to the plague one after the other. He was at the riverside after the body of the last boy of the village went up in flames.
He had shared the deep depression from utter poverty and desolation and faced the wind of helplessness that was blowing during that summer or during that whole month of Aashad when not a hearth was burning for days together and no one was willing to speak.
Which country, whose country, ... who are we? By now he had witnessed the profound mystery on these faces, the mystery of being alive as human beings. And he found that he could not speak!
Listen and Understand!
What goes into a man's mouth,
does not make him unclean;
It's what comes out of his mouth,
that makes him unclean.
And, when he spoke of the tragedy, Eman was in the company of the deaf and mute, the turmoil on their faces expressed it all. They told him : you can speak and listen to your own words, look at me! Eman was in the city zoo, and he saw the far away look in the eyes of the animals kept in the cages, piercing the treetops in the far away forest. He had just witnessed the same gaze in the eyes of the outsiders sitting huddled in pouring rain in the tents by the side of the filthy nala. He saw the cruel fate and unsurpassed tragedy of the native men being plundered by the aggressive man. He saw them aimlessly wandering, aimlessly? saw them returning to their shanties at sundown - not unlike the birds flying in file to make it before it gets dark. It is a long way winding round and round. His enemy has filled his fertile land with an awesome junk : power plants, playgrounds, cities and factories and airports.
Eman was at the theater. He had met his friends from innumerable tribes and natives telling the stories of being wiped out, their endless travails under conquests of the owners of the timber marts and factories. He found them speaking a line or two which meant : Is it worth the salt to live like this, unable to fulfill for certain even one of the promises I gave my mother? Eman met countless friends who repeated the same lines : "I have to pull on somehow ... for the sake of the children, for the sake of my sick parents, live somehow until, until,... we disappear!
Listen to one of his tunes:
I long to open the window to your freedom!
But, alas! my limbs are tied in knots,
I am locked up in a little black box like a genie;
But, I am ready to swallow your fear, Sir!
For, I am the slave of this Spirit of Quest.
Thus goes the humble song of the emotional man, facing the perennial aggression of the rational scientific man. Beyond the present context, the Eman is visible as the prehistoric man, primitive man, village man, religious man, eastern man, and ... mad man, singing other songs in other places.
Eman is at the village fair, at the marriage of his friend's daughter, at the funeral of the
headman, the pundit and at the tearful naming ceremony of the first daughter in a hundred years. He is particular in attending all the rituals and listening to all the murmurs and chants in the courtyard as well as the inner dark cellars. He is listening to the silent tears, bewilderment and pathos on that fateful night when all the newborn fell to the plague one after the other. He was at the riverside after the body of the last boy of the village went up in flames.
He had shared the deep depression from utter poverty and desolation and faced the wind of helplessness that was blowing during that summer or during that whole month of Aashad when not a hearth was burning for days together and no one was willing to speak.
Which country, whose country, ... who are we? By now he had witnessed the profound mystery on these faces, the mystery of being alive as human beings. And he found that he could not speak!
Listen and Understand!
What goes into a man's mouth,
does not make him unclean;
It's what comes out of his mouth,
that makes him unclean.
And, when he spoke of the tragedy, Eman was in the company of the deaf and mute, the turmoil on their faces expressed it all. They told him : you can speak and listen to your own words, look at me! Eman was in the city zoo, and he saw the far away look in the eyes of the animals kept in the cages, piercing the treetops in the far away forest. He had just witnessed the same gaze in the eyes of the outsiders sitting huddled in pouring rain in the tents by the side of the filthy nala. He saw the cruel fate and unsurpassed tragedy of the native men being plundered by the aggressive man. He saw them aimlessly wandering, aimlessly? saw them returning to their shanties at sundown - not unlike the birds flying in file to make it before it gets dark. It is a long way winding round and round. His enemy has filled his fertile land with an awesome junk : power plants, playgrounds, cities and factories and airports.
Eman was at the theater. He had met his friends from innumerable tribes and natives telling the stories of being wiped out, their endless travails under conquests of the owners of the timber marts and factories. He found them speaking a line or two which meant : Is it worth the salt to live like this, unable to fulfill for certain even one of the promises I gave my mother? Eman met countless friends who repeated the same lines : "I have to pull on somehow ... for the sake of the children, for the sake of my sick parents, live somehow until, until,... we disappear!
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