The Come Teach Me and The Go Away Tribes

I’m going to begin with a telling of a tale I came across from Mark Nepo. It is called “The Two Tribes”. It is a kind of modern creation mythos.

“In the beginning, when the first humans came across each other, it went two ways. Upon seeing someone different, the more fearful one said, "You're different. Go away." The other, upon seeing someone not like him, said, "You're different. Come, teach me what I don't know." While our reasoning has grown more complicated throughout the centuries, it's essentially the same. "Go away" or "Come, teach me."

Since the beginning, the two tribes have had their philosophies. The "Go away" tribe has always believed that human beings, by their nature, are self-serving and untrustworthy, in need of control. The "Go away" tribe believes in stringent laws and constraints, both moral and legal, to ensure that people don't run amuck. The "Come, teach me" tribe believes that human beings, by their nature, are kind and trustworthy. The "Come, teach me" tribe believes in empowering laws that cultivate freedom, to ensure that people actualize their web of gifts through relationship.

The truth is that we are born into both tribes and can move from one to the other, depending on the level of our fear. The times of genocide throughout history mark the extreme, malignant manifestation of the "Go away" tribe. Distorted by fear, it's not enough just to say, "Go away." For unbridled fear turns to anger, which normalized turns into prejudice and hate. Such deep, embedded fear dictates that we need to make sure that those who are different can't return. And so, we exile them, jail them, hurt them, and in extremely ugly cases, persecute and kill them.

However, the times of enlightenment throughout history mark the extreme manifestation of the "Come, teach me" tribe, which through learning and wonder leads to eras of compassion and cooperation. Empowered by trust, curiosity turns into interdependence and a belief that we are more together than alone. When allowed to blossom, we realize that we need each other and our diversity of gifts to make life whole.”

...It matters from which we tribe we are living our little and yet no less significant lives...

Fear in any form can be a deeply corrosive emotion. In its worse aspects it can lead to deep distrust and paranoia. If it grips our psyche it can destroy us from within and lead to destruction without. We live in fearful times. Whether that be of environmental destruction, economic turmoil, the Corona virus. It would appear that the tribe that distrust the becomes the dominant one. Now I am not in denial of the very real dangers present in life, my head is not buried in the ground. No, proper precautions re the current virus need to be followed and remedies to the environmental crises need to be found. These troubles are real. There is though an equally corrosive disease eating its way through life. This is the one of division, the one that sees the other as different, nay dangerous. This at its extreme paranoid level leads to the worst kind of destruction. Not just on a material external level either, but also within our own individual human souls. Fear can be the most dangerous, destructive infectious disease that consumes and destroys life; fear can be deeply addictive and all consuming.

Perhaps there is a better way, the open way, the courageous way, the path of love that sees the other as a part of the self and not separate and something to fear. Love, it is said, is the opposite of fear.

It is said that we humans are not as complicated as we often think that we are, that we are basically motivated by two forces, the same two forces that motivated the two tribes, fear and love. When fear takes hold we close in, we shut down, we pull away from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance.

If you would like to understand the current state of your own humanity ask yourself these questions: What have I noticed this last week? Have I noticed insanity, hate and sorrow or have I noticed love, compassion and understanding? Have I accepted insanity, hate and sorrow? Or have I accepted love, compassion and understanding? Have I given out insanity, hate and sorrow? Or have I given out love and compassion and understanding?

If you are like me it has probably been a mixture. We all belong to both tribes, the one that is most dominant will control our lives.

Love of self, love of neighbors, and love of God are the foundational stones of the great religious traditions, the Golden Rule of Compassion is there at the core of them all. A classic example of this comes from the following story from the Jewish tradition:

"Standing on One Foot"

A man came to talk with Rabbi Shamai, one of the most famous of all the rabbis, nearly as famous as Rabbi Hillel.

"I would like to convert to Judaism and become a Jew," said the man. "But I don't have much time. I know I have to learn the entire book you call the Torah, but you must teach it to me while I stand on one foot."

The Torah is the most important Jewish book there is, and this crazy man wanted to learn it while standing on one foot? Why, people spent years learning the Torah; it was not something you can learn in five minutes! Rabbi Shamai grew angry with this man, and he pushed the man away using a builder's yardstick he happened to be holding in his hand.

The man hurried away, and found Rabbi Hillel. "I would like to convert to Judaism and become a Jew," said the man. "But I don't have much time. I know I have to learn the entire book you call the Torah, but you must teach it to me while I stand on one foot."

"Certainly," said Rabbi Hillel. "Stand on one foot."

The man balanced on one foot.

"Repeat after me," said Rabbi Hillel. "What is hateful to you, don't do that to someone else."

The man repeated after Rabbi Hillel, "What is hateful to me, I won't do that to someone else."

"That is the whole law," said Rabbi Hillel. "All the rest of the Torah, all the rest of the oral teaching, is there to help explain this simple law. Now, go and learn it so it is a part of you."

...The Golden rule and living by it is simple, but it is not necessarily easy...

Fear can eat away at the very foundations of our humanity. Fear can block us from the love at the core of all being, the love present in life. We can become afraid to risk ourselves in love; we can become afraid of what love can teach us and turn it away.

Love is a universal principle, in fact Universalism preaches the Gospel of Love for all, there is no partiality in such love. It offers an ever widening, deepening love, it preaches what Russell Miller has titled “the larger hope”. It is a love that embraces all life, engages in every aspect of existence, a universal love. It is born in the come teach me tribe. It holds out its loving arms and says come as you are, exactly as you are but remain open to loving transformation.

I am by instinct a universalist, I am at home in the “Come, teach me” tribe, but I have not always made camp there. Fear has at times taken over me, I am as human as any of us. I have taken residence with the “Go away” tribe. I have at times mistaken which tribe I was in too. I have thought I was in the “Come teach me” tribe, when In truth I have taken up residence in the “Go away” tribe. This has usually been when I have not wanted to spend time with the fearful and negative, that I have somehow believed I was above these things. I have rejected the call for love, because I was afraid of becoming vulnerable because of it. I have been like the priest and Levite in the classic parable of the “Good Samaritan”, I have walked by on the other side because I was afraid of getting caught up in the suffering of others. I have averted my eyes, I have been unable to see what is in front of me. This is very human. I attempt each day to begin again in love, I return to love. This begins by humbly accepting my finite humanity.

I find Nepo’s two tribes metaphor helpful, but like all mythos it needs to held lightly and not literally. There are not two types of people in this world. There is only one humanity. We all belong to both tribes. The key to living in love and not to be consumed by fear is to recognize this and not to condemn our fellows when they fall short and become consumed by fear.

To live in and by love is the solution to fear that consume our lives. Love though requires effort and it requires practise. To live by love is universalism, it is to recognise that we are all parts of one indivisible whole. Yes we all pull this apart at times, we all reject or push away the other in fear, but eventually we have to come back together in love or human society would completely destroy itself. How do we do this? Well through love, trust, courage, and the ability to listen are the agencies of heart, these are the qualities that allow us to “rejoin” as Nepo describes it. As he puts it “These are the qualities that each soul has waiting within it like golden seeds to be watered by the strength of our kindness. This is the purpose of community: to water these seeds and to join and rejoin.”

So which tribe are you going to live from today. “The come teach me tribe” or “The go away tribe”. It matter you know, it really does. How are going to live today in fear, or in love. It is up to us.

I’m going to end this "blogspot" with a recasting of the 23rd Psalm. It is titled “Psalm 23 for This Moment”

“Psalm 23 for This Moment” by Kevin Tarsa

May I remember
in this tender moment
that Love is my guide,
always,
shepherding me toward ways of openness and compassion.

I have what I need, really,
with Love at my side,
above me, below me, in front of me, behind me,
inside every cell of me,
Love infused everywhere!

Just when the weight of the world I inhabit
threatens to drop me in place
and press my hope down into the ground beneath me
Love invites me to rest for a gentle while,
and leads the center of my soul to the quiet, still,
restoring waters nearby that,
somehow,
I had not noticed.

And so, Love,
quietly,
sets me once again on its tender and demanding path.

Even when the walls close around me
and the cries of death echo through untold corners,
gripping my heart with fear and sadness,
I know...
I know
that all will be well,
that I will be well,
when Love whispers
near to me,
glints at the corner of my eye,
rests with gentle and persistent invitation upon my shoulders.

Yes, Love blesses me,
Even as the sources and symbols of my pain look on.
Love blesses me from its infinite well,
And I turn
and notice...
that goodness and kindness and grace,
follow me everywhere,
everywhere I go.

I live in a house of Love,
Love that will not let me go.

I live in a house of love,
And always will.