Today I have a sense in my own body of what moved Tolstoy in his time in a highly armed Europe. On a continent where people were at the mercy of their „governments“ and carelessly sent to war and death. For motives that were completely mysterious to the people. Which they could never understand. Yes, which had nothing to do with them and certainly nothing to do with a purpose that served them.
Who is NATO? Who are these people? Who is it that decides that European countries (whose sovereigns are the millions of unquestioned, unconsidered citizens, with whose money unquestioned) are to be armed? Who is it that decides on the supply of weapons? Who decides to prolong this war, who decides that many, many people still have to die, have to lose their homes? Who was it that, in the years before, secretly pursued goals unknown to the citizens that have now led to a war? Who armed Ukraine? Who prevented Ukraine from having a neutral status? Who thought they could ignore the Russian government with all their might? Who thinks that they can play with the lives and peace of hundreds of millions of people (the sovereigns) for years? Who are these people who presume to do this? Who think they have a right to shape the world for us like this? Who believe they can impose their power at the expense of the sovereign? Who believe they can bring us to the brink of thermonuclear war?
Tolstoy was clear: with violence against violence as a principle, as a principle of fear and ignorance, humanity is going to hell.
Either you go to war or you don’t. Thus he says. Whoever goes, supports these machinations that serve only a few sick minds. Whoever participates in their institutions also. So does anyone who pays taxes. Whoever sees the government as the representative of the citizens also… Tolstoy would have let Ukraine be neutral. The government would have abdicated and several thousand people who disliked the Russian government would have had to sacrifice themselves and leave the country. Thus suffering would have been spared, thus death prevented, thus lives saved. But no. Out of a calculation of power – yes, out of sheer arrogance and the inability to give in – there is agitation, firing, armament, the war is prolonged, the deaths of innocent people are continued, millions of people are made homeless. If the destruction of the world by a nuclear strike is accepted. People all over the world will be sent into fear and despair. – Who are these people who are allowed to decide this? Who are these people who have been allowed to work towards this escalation for years and do it every day in other places all over the world? Who are these soulless cold computers that know nothing of the warm, the pulsating blood? Of the warmth with which a living body gives security? Who know nothing of eternity and infinity? Who know only the fear of their death and in their naked fear, in insane rabies, can only separate, can only tear apart everything and everyone?
100,000,000,000 euros of „special funds“ for armaments… That does not create one second more of peace in this world. It serves as a blanket for the fearful when they lie in bed at night and try, with narrowed eyes, to block out the nightly shadows in the corners of their bedrooms.
But they don’t need a blanket. They need light. 100,000,000 euros for light! Then people realise that the shadows are not real. That with light they all disappear. That the illusion dissolves. 100,000,000,000 euros, so that man becomes man again. So that he can once again recognise his destiny and go his way free of fear in the knowledge of his soulfulness. Brotherly and sisterly, hand in hand with his neighbour.
That is what Tolstoy meant. When every human being stands in the light, our life together changes all by itself. A society without fear no longer needs much… It no longer needs anything to insure itself, to repress death. It doesn’t need to grasp. For it, giving is the highest pleasure, love is the most uplifting feeling.