Tao Te Ching 46

When a country is in harmony with the Tao, the factories make trucks and tractors. When a country goes counter to the Tao, warheads are stockpiled outside the cities.

There is no greater illusion than fear, no greater wrong than preparing to defend yourself; no greater misfortune than having an enemy.

Whoever can see through all fear will always be safe.
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The gold is in the last line. Everything said before it is a preface. We perceive enemies and we prepare to defend ourselves from those enemies because we are gripped by the illusion of fear. FDR said it well in 1932 as we reeled from the frightening impacts of the Great Depression: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”

We strive for safety and security in our homeland. To obtain that worthy goal we must see through all the fear in and around us. We’re trapped in an illusion of our own making. The planes hitting the Twin Towers were not an illusion by any means – but much of what has reverberated from their impact is coming from an illusion. In the white-knuckled grip of fear we perceive that a great misfortune has descended upon us – we see enemies to the left and the right and so we prepare to defend ourselves from those who we believe are intent upon raining terror from the sky.

When a country’s leaders sow fear, they will reap enemies. Enemies are made viable in the womb of fear and they cannot remain viable unless they are sustained by fear. “Fear not,” said an itinerant Jewish shepherd from the city of Nazareth. Maybe FDR had read that advice. Maybe we should read that advice.

On another day I would write about the possibility that we may not want to be safe as we profess; that we are thriving on our steady diet of fear; that we are projecting our fear around the world; that we have now fashioned an identity from our victimization; that we have found a purpose in that identity. We are the savior of the world. With us on the prowl, there is no need for the quaint but naïve musings of an itinerant Jewish shepherd. But, that’s for another day.