...and he sounded like Shakespeare's character, the Prince of Denmark, in Hamlet. So many things have gone wrong in our time, and any one of them could ruin the world as we've known it. And they are today.
One more thing we desperately need now is a poet-playwright of epic talent to give us insight and comfort in these epic times. Words can be excellent armor and weapons for sustaining us in this spiritual war. When Hamlet says, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy" he could be talking to us about our present age.
Hamlet goes on, "Though this be madness, yet there is method in it... Our wills and fates do so contrary run... Above all to thine own self be true... When sorrows come, they come not single spies. But in battalions... So full of artless jealousy is guilt; it spills itself in fearing to be spilt... To be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten-thousand..."
Though the centuries pass and the costumes and scenery change, the same agonies, struggles, problems, successes and passions play out. If it were not so, the words of Charles Dickens, Henry James, Poe, Fielding, Voltaire, Moliere, Shakespeare, Cervantes, St. Paul, Jesus, Virgil, Isaiah, and Homer would have no meaning for us. Nor would the Bible, which is still the best-selling book in the world. More than five billion copies have been printed and distributed, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. What we call "progress" has little changed our sick hearts in 5,800 years. But each of us - as individuals - can find salvation and eternal life if we stand up to the mobs. Violence is often not required. But a close relationship with the Lord of All Creation is. Honesty is vital; lies are poison.
The only essential difference between the revolution of Exodus (Moses vs. Pharaoh Ramses, c. 1446 B.C.) and modern Israel vs. the Arab world, is the sophistication of the weapons. Ordinary and healthy people yearn for freedom and liberty so they can build a life of their own that has meaning for them. Freedom of religion is vital. Slavery is anathema. But the Ruling Classes of today believe they're gods, or like gods, and they're jealous of the True God. They don't care about anything except their own power, status, and wealth. From time immemorial it has been thus:
Here is Al Pacino as Shylock, in The Merchant of Venice by Shakespeare:
