Torture

I was talking with an old friend about other old friends like I do every time I talk to him. This old friend was experiencing a great deal of pain because of those other old friends. Through his pain his view of them, I soon realized, was greatly diminished. His capability to recognize in those old friends a worth as human beings was obstructed by his badly wounded heart. When I tried to reason with him and build a case for them I argued that despite the veil obscuring his ability to see good in them, because of his pain, there still was good in them, it only made him grow defiant.

 

The longer I listened to him voice his deep contempt for them in how they unfairly treated him the harder it became for me to imagine these people had good qualities. Were they anything other then a cliquish, judgmental, self-superior minded bunch of backstabbers. I don’t believe this about them now but temporarily he lulled me into a hypnotic like momentary trance by his ranting. With him doing all the speaking he didn’t allow me to reflect and respond to any of his words. For a moment I had trouble seeing their good myself.

 

Such problems exist in all of us at different times in this world. In a play by Shakespeare, that I heard talked about in a recent opinion article, the malicious character Iago was discussed. He was an ultimate betrayer of his friend Othello and caused the doom of the sweet Desdemona. The opinion piece suggested that for Shakespeare's audience he may be the villain of all villains who deserves the most the liquid fires of limitless unending punishment. Shakespeare had been talking to an audience in 1604 and the audience of that time understood that he meant torture unto death. “If there be any cunning cruelty / that can torment him much and hold him long, / it shall be his.”

 

Would my old friend, along with those other old friends, have been at Tyburn for the actual torture and death of Robert Southwell if it happened now here? When he was strung up, after being sentenced, disemboweled while still being alive, his corpse ending up quartered before his head was cut off, would they have been part of a large ogling crowd?

 

Our humanity lost sight of Robert Southwells humanity. Did he still have humanity or did he deserve such a gruesome grizzly fate? Others being tormented in the middle ages for perhaps being Catholic or Protestant, one or the other, hung in dungeon cells by their hands eight to nine hours until not only their wits but entire senses failed them. Other horrors included genital mutilation and starvation so severe prisoners would lick the moisture from the walls.

 

If Robert Southwell were on trial here and all my old friends were in attendance would they lose sight of his dignity and worth like they seem to have lost regard for one another's? Queen Elizabeth I said the act was justified in order “to evoke the terror of others.” Shakespeare's audience certainly took satisfaction watching the wicked being tortured without remission.

 

Some have rightfully argued that this behavior degrades us all, I believe God wills us to banish this kind of cruelty from the earth. My friend is trapped in a desire for reckoning and revenge. He misses the most difficult truth about all of the other old friends and that is that they are all still human. Being human means they have inalienable rights. They are a member of a brotherhood of mankind. They are lovable in spite of their coldness to him.

 

What does it do to our humanity when we have such hatred? When we judge others worthless, unredeemable, while no longer deeming them to posses fairness or loving qualities,where has our mind drifted to? When violence in the imagination becomes our source of restitution. When our only path to dignity falsely is believed to be found in the violent fantasy of making the dignity robbers sorry for the pain they cause. How many of us fall into similar demonic traps that lulls people like my old friend to dream about committing the violence that comes from his pain.

 

The worlds biggest ally to the pain and indignity we feel from others is awareness of our Heavenly Father. Forgiveness for our injurers and a self understanding we all matter is paramount in importance. God has numbered every hair of our head and we are more valuable then many sparrows.