With the recent attacks on Iran nuclear facilities, the USA has lost any residual credibility on the world scene. Meanwhile, as the world’s eyes are on Iran, the people in Gaza are still being slaughtered every single day, as Pope Leo reminded everybody in his Sunday address. There is enough suffering, wantonness, and sheer display of power in the world to feel disempowered and lost.
My mind then goes to Etty Hillesum, the Dutch Jewish author murdered in Auschwitz in 1943, who should be considered a mystic in her own right. What is absolutely amazing about her is that she was able to “stay human” in the midst of the most unspeakable suffering. She penned these words in her diary while she was already interned at Westerbork transit camp:
The sky is full of birds, the purple lupins stand up so regally and peacefully, two little old women have sat down for a chat, the sun is shining on my face – and right before our eyes, mass murder… The whole thing is simply beyond comprehension.
She was indeed able to hold together in her consciousness the opposites of human experience, recognizing their simple “happening.” The absolute beauty of nature and the dignity of human friendliness, on one side, and the “creative” works of “immoral imagination” — as Matthew called it in yesterday’s DM — on the other side.
The fact that today a government claiming to be the heir of the victims of the Nazi Holocaust is executing very similar crimes on other people, adds layers of horror in our minds, for sure, and makes us question deeply our belief in humanity’s progress as a whole. However, Etty’s voice breaks through even these new horrors, if we listen to her.
Living and dying, sorrow and joy, the blisters on my feet and the jasmine behind the house, the persecution, the unspeakable horrors: it is all as one in me, and I accept it all as one mighty whole and begin to grasp it better if only for myself, without being able to explain to anyone else how it all hangs together.
There is not a single line in her diaries giving the impression that she was lost or that she felt disempowered. How is that possible?She did not have any dogma or hope in the afterlife to stick to. She was Jewish, but did not attend any synagogue; she read Christian literature of the highest level, but she did not belong to any church. She was entirely a creature of the earth, by which I mean that she reflected in her soul the beauty and the horror of life in its entirety without seeking consolation or redress as her first reaction.
Of course she did all she could to oppose evil, and she did not disdain the embrace of human love, but first she “accepted it all as one mighty whole” experiencing the “onenness” that marks true mysticism.
She prioritized her experience of the oneness to her desire for comprehension. Which does not mean that she did not care to understand, as she was no enemy to the intellect at all. But focusing on understanding alone perhaps would have broken her. She choose instead to feel it all.
I think there might be a lesson here for us, a hard lesson for our hard times.
Quotes from: An Interrupted Life: The Diaries of Etty Hillesum 1941-1943, p. 161, p. 332.
See Matthew Fox, Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society
See also Fox, A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice
Also Fox, Trump and the MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election
Banner image: “The Disturbed Life,” a sculpture in Deventer, Netherlands, by sculptor Arno Kramer. Name of sculpture taken from the title of the diary of Etty Hillesum, also translated as “An Interrupted Life.” Wikimedia Commons.
Queries for Contemplation
What lesson do you find in Etty Hillesum’s approach to unspeakable horrors?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society
Visionary theologian and best-selling author Matthew Fox offers a new theology of evil that fundamentally changes the traditional perception of good and evil and points the way to a more enlightened treatment of ourselves, one another, and all of nature. In comparing the Eastern tradition of the 7 chakras to the Western tradition of the 7 capital sins, Fox allows us to think creatively about our capacity for personal and institutional evil and what we can do about them.
“A scholarly masterpiece embodying a better vision and depth of perception far beyond the grasp of any one single science. A breath-taking analysis.” — Diarmuid O’Murchu, author of Quantum Theology: Spiritual Implications of the New Physics
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice
In A Spirituality Named Compassion, Matthew Fox delivers a profound exploration of the meaning and practice of compassion. Establishing a spirituality for the future that promises personal, social, and global healing, Fox marries mysticism with social justice, leading the way toward a gentler and more ecological spirituality and an acceptance of our interdependence which is the substratum of all compassionate activity.
“Well worth our deepest consideration…Puts compassion into its proper focus after centuries of neglect.” –The Catholic Register
Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election
Matthew Fox tells us that he had always shied away from using the term “Anti-Christ” because it was so often used to spread control and fear. However, given today’s rise of authoritarianism and forces of democracide, ecocide, and christofascism, he turns the tables in this book employing the archetype for the cause of justice, democracy, and a renewed Earth and humanity.
From the Foreword: If there was ever a time, a moment, for examining the archetype of the Antichrist, it is now…Read this book with an open mind. Good and evil are real forces in our world. ~~ Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Conversations with the Divine.
For immediate access to Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election, order the e-book with 10 full-color prints from Amazon HERE.
To get a print-on-demand paperback copy with black & white images, order from Amazon HERE or IUniverse HERE.
To receive a limited-edition, full-color paperback copy, order from MatthewFox.org HERE.
Order the audiobook HERE for immediate download.
8 thoughts on “Etty Hillesum on Oneness in Hard Times”
“I accept it all as one mighty whole and begin to grasp it better if only for myself, without being able to explain to anyone else how it all hangs together.” Etty Hillesum
Reading yesterday’s DM I felt a similar urge to give-up any attempt to comprehend how the ingenuity on display in the Faroe Islands Space Program “hangs together” with the unbearable cruelty of the dolphin slaughter in the very same Faroe Islands. [https://seashepherd.org/faroeislands/ (not for the faint of heart)]
“Of course she did all she could to oppose evil, and she did not disdain the embrace of human love, but first she “accepted it all as one mighty whole””
The murder of that great spiritual master in Auschwitz is another proof that “The whole thing is simply beyond comprehension.” Thank you for sharing Etty’s serenity, courage and wisdom in today’s DM.
John Philip Newell on Etty Hillesum: She “invites us to live and breath through our souls to access the meaning of life in both its glory and its agony. She inspires us to defend the dwelling place of the divine deep within us and in all life.”
Like Jesus, Etty went to her ‘crucifixion’ defending the ultimate transcendence of truth and love. Her spirit continues to in/spire others not to hide their light under a bushel. [Matthew 5:15]
You, Matthew, and Richard Rohr are my life lines that start off my days and keep me grounded. Thank you for your encouraging words and shared stories that help me continue through the day feeling supported and inspired and truly blessed.
Etty Hillesum experienced directly “unspeakable horrors” of man’s cruelty towards the suffering and death of humanity. Most of us experience this cruelty, suffering, and death of fellow humans from afar, yet it still breaks our hearts that these horrors and suffering are still happening daily in many parts of the world. Just as she able to maintain her faith and humanity on a daily basis until her own martyrdom, we have to maintain our own Faith and compassionate responsiveness to others and Life on a daily and moment to Sacred moment until the end of our own life… Compassionate Cosmic Christ Consciousness of Our Eternal Souls in Loving Diverse ONENESS in All physical/nonphysical spiritual dimensions….
I identify with Etty Hillesum; she speaks the language of Mysticism, the language of the soul as words fall asunder. Her words are the touch of my soul, in sorrow and despair as well as delight.
Beautiful. Thank you.❤️
It is sensible to accept the inevitable. But until faced with an inevitable evil, many free people choose resistance.
Saint Thomas More may have sensed his inevitable execution for treason against King Henry VIII, but he resisted according to the law of his time (as shown in *A Man for All Seasons*). In America today, non-violent resistance to growing authoritarianism takes many forms. Where there’s life there’s hope. Thoughts of despair must be shed, as history shows much good has come about through popular resistance and charismatic leaders. As attributed to Margaret Mead–Never doubt that a small group of committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
She is interesting to compare and contrast with Edith Stein, (aka Theresa Benedicta of the Cross), also Jewish ethnicity, but converted to Catholicism, and almost the same time murdered at Auschwitz.