REVERENCE FOR LIFE

In the attempt to pursue a universal idea of ethics for our time, it came to Albert Schweitzer's intuition, the concept of “Reverence for Life,” while travelling by boat on the Ogooué River in the former French Equatorial Africa, nowadays Gabon; making from this concept the basic principle of an ethical philosophy developed by him and put into practice during his life, work and conviviality with the needy population in Lambaréné and other living beings who approached that poor community. For him, this journey was the most profitable of all in his life, because it was undertaken in the search for the revelation of the truth.

According to Schweitzer, the responsibility of the notion of ethics is nothing more than Reverence for Life, which is the fundamental principle of morality; that the good deed consists in maintaining, assisting, assuring and improving the lives of all the inhabitants of this planet, for the only thing we are sure of, is that all who live want to continue living.

On Earth, all living beings are entities that are part of a universal symbiosis, where each one depends on the other to maintain the harmonic balance of life. Therefore, we are brothers and sisters of all living beings, and we owe to all the same care and respect we desire for ourselves.

As far as man and his distinctive cultures are concerned, at every moment in history, there are two classifications: first, of those who classify, the so-called civilized, the powerful, those who command and govern, those who hold the economic, financial and industrial power, the oligarchies, the media tycoons, in short, all those with the advantage of the decision, therefore, unilateral and not universalist, causing the democratic principle to be circumvented, false, non-existent... those who speak piously of dignity and human rights, but at the same time ignore and disregard the dignity and rights of the second group, i.e., those who are not in the same condition, the vast majority who also have the human form, but who are destitute and who suffer by the whip of the “civilized”; these are the ones who struggle the most and least have the right to decide their destiny.

To consider man as the crown of creation is to disdain the importance other living beings have in the set of that same creation. The human being who does not love, consider, respect and reverence the lives of non-humans, cannot be considered a human being in full reason, rather, possessing fragmented ethics and morals, for so little is known about non-humans, and humans ignore how much they offer. It is to despise that in the eyes of a non-human who cannot express itself in words, there is a whole discourse that only the wise spirit can comprehend.

This principle of equality and reverence for life, including that of vegetables, was also particularly demonstrated, by Ramana Maharshi, one of the best-known seers of humanity. His love and affinity for non-humans could only be compared to Francis of Assisi. All animals approached him, and their silent languages were known to him. When he spoke, they understood and obeyed him; he arbitrated fights between monkeys, and was also known for talking to tigers and wild snakes; the whole kingdom of nature accepted him as its guardian and defender.

All the animals in Maharshi's spiritual hermitage felt his grace and acted intelligently in his presence. He considered each and every form of life to be his equal, and all the animals that approached deserved their spaces and resources. He said that they were the owners of the land, all the time and men came to occupy what belongs to them; they could also speak and demand their rights. Despite this, he maintained the idea that from man to the smallest of animals, they were the same manifestation of the Supreme Self, the Imperishable One, that even they can progress spiritually and on rare occasions achieve liberation.

And this was demonstrated through the life of a cow who had accompanied him for more than 20 years, his pet named Lakshmi, who displayed a rare devotion to Maharshi and intelligence in all matters and reciprocated that kind devotion. He said that true teaching takes place in perfect silence, through the deeply introverted mind, however, that does not mean that verbal teaching cannot be given and although he authorized the practice of different spiritual exercises, he nevertheless emphasized the practice of the self-inquiry path.

Recent scientific studies show that many nonhuman beings can show individual consciousness - for the soul of the Universe is present in all beings of creation - and a reason that is conditioned to its stage of existential evolution. Thus, they also present mental states, feelings, emotions, intentional actions, intelligence, personality, spirit, free will, love, intuition, compassion, guilt, loss, possession, territory.

According to experts in quantum science, some can communicate with us through visual messages of different characters, including claiming their rights. They are our equals, dividing our same Universe, but scattered in different aspects.

To mention just one example, the brain functions of a Labrador dog undergoing MRI, presented the exact same functions that part of the human brain presents. As mammals, in general, evolve in the same way as humans, only presenting different physical characteristics is to suppose that from the behavioural point of view, they have the same attributes.

People who love and cultivate the conviviality with animals, in particular with dogs - with which we have almost 15 thousand years of relationship - if they observe closely, will verify that the various species carry qualities that we consider almost human, such as prudence, patience, discipline, obedience, sensitivity, intelligence, improvisation, the spirit of service, vigilance and thirst for affection, infusing us with the idea that the closer they are to humans, the more similar they are; gradually perfecting their instincts in the pursuit of intelligence, the same way humans aspire to achieve someday by preparing for the next stage of a greater evolution.

And dogs are just one example... Many other nonhumans, among all forms of life, have shown surprising particularities of the universal intelligence dwelling in them.

Reverence for Life is the basic principle of love, for nothing was created without a given function. The Cosmic Intelligence did not establish coincidences at the level of creation, for the Universe is a great thought, and nothing by chance happened. Man, with the sharp free will of his analytical mind, thinks he possesses the power of life and death and thereby manages to show that the only dystonia in universal attunement is the man himself.