A Vegetarian Journal for Quakers and Other People of Faith
The Peaceable Table is intended for the mutual support, education, and inspiration of people of faith in the practice of love for our fellow animals and observance of a Peace-full diet
Editor’s Corner Essay: The Living and the Deceased
Part I: A Cloud of Witnesses
In the June, 2010 PT Editor’s Corner essay, “The Animals are Waiting” (See Waiting ), I sketched the idea that all the living, especially humans and “higher” animals, are linked in a process of spiritual evolution. Accordingly, as human beings in larger numbers increase their spiritual awareness via meditation and/or contemplative prayer, one expected effect will be a decrease in violence among both humans and animals. This effect has been repeatedly demonstrated (among humans) when large numbers of Transcendental Meditation practitioners gathered in particular cities for daily meditation; crime rates went down in those areas in measurable, sometimes impressive ways. After the groups dispersed, rates rose to their usual levels. In regard to animals, G. I. Gurdjieff and (later) Katherine Hulme proposed that animals, trapped in ignorance and predation, are waiting for us humans to “climb Jacob’s ladder,” i.e., open our souls to the divine Oneness, so that they, the animals, can be increasingly freed from violence [beginning, perhaps, with omnivores becoming increasingly herbivorous] and follow us into the Divine Peace.
Healing the Deceased
Here I will discuss a related way in which we who seek this Peace may promote it both among our fellow humans and our fellow animals. It is based on a very old idea, usually (and erroneously) considered to be discredited among educated people in our culture: the healing of the deceased. It is practiced (for deceased humans) by Spiritualists, Latter-Day Saints (Mormons), occasionally Theosophists, and no doubt many people in Latino cultures; it is analogous to the prayers for the dead in traditional Catholic Christianity. It arises out of the idea that the living and the souls of the dead who seek God and goodness are bound together in a great web of exchange, and can support one another in prayer. I suggest this healing activity, not on the basis of any religious precept (I am a Quaker, and most of my fellow Friends have no interest in or knowledge of this field), but chiefly from documented evidence from my doctoral studies in Near-Death Experiences and other altered states of consciousness.
One misconception about interest in life after death, especially widespread among social-change, environmental, and animal activists, needs to be cleared away first: it’s the view that persons with such interests have given up on earth and are investing everything in the life hereafter. Certainly there are people who, like the narrator of the hymn “Abide With Me,” consider the world hopeless--“Change and decay in all around I see “--and pin all their hopes on the day when “Heaven’s glory breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee . . . .” In fact, however, interest in life after death and concern to mend our own world often go together. Some examples: in the nineteenth century, people involved in the new spiritualist movement tended to be involved in Abolition as well; the movement made little headway in white Southern society because the spirits often spoke up against slavery. Likewise, when enslaved people sang “Deep River, / My home is over Jordan,” or “Steal away to Jesus . . . I ain’t got long to stay here,” they were in many cases referring both to their hope of heaven, and their hope to cross the Ohio safely and make it to freedom. In the twentieth century, Latin American liberation activists spoke ardently of feeling the presence of the spirits of their slain companions present supporting them. Returned Near-Death experiencers, unshakably convinced that there is more beyond death, in many cases get involved for the first time in work on behalf of humans or animals or the planet. A conviction of survival is advantageous, providing a cosmic dimension to such work, and helping prevent burnout.
The idea that living beings survive death is a meta-theory, supported by several different categories of evidence; I will emphasize Near-Death Experiences (NDEs). As I showed in my book The Uttermost Deep: The Challenge of Near-Death Experiences, reports of these events have remarkably similar patterns (as well as significant differences), both within a culture and across cultures. Many accounts describe a sense of one’s consciousness being released from the body, and able to move about freely in the place of one’s (near) death; in some cases their reported observations are later verified. In this state the released consciousness is often sharply aware of the thoughts and intentions of living persons on the scene, or of anyone elsewhere to whom s/he may turn her attention. There are many accounts from very sick or injured hospital patients entering this out-of-body state and perceiving the frantic feelings and sharp words of hospital personnel as they apply emergency measures, while the patient calmly looks on, thinking “Why all the fuss? I’m just fine.”
But the situation may sometimes be reversed; out-of-body personalities may report that they benefitted from the prayers of the living. Researcher P.M.H. Atwater collected a number of supportive NDE cases, principally of child experiencers, who while out-of-body perceived prayers offered for them by living persons to be something like a beautiful golden or rainbow stream from the person praying arching over to themselves.. They reported that prayers made them feel intensely warm and good.
A Negative Impact?
If the discarnate can feel our compassionate energies and benefit, it seems likely that the opposite may also be true: that a hostile, violent out-of-body or deceased personality can react to the angry feelings of the living by becoming even more hostile. There are a good many cases of out-of-body or Near-Death Experiencers encountering hostile human figures, but I know of at least one case, in which the out-of-body personality, Sylvan Muldoon (1903-1969), perceived the figure’s hostility as a reaction to something he (Muldoon) had just done.. He reports that at 7:30 one evening in 1923 he was listening to a newly widowed acquaintance of his mother’s tell her about the terrible abuse she had suffered at the hands of her late unlamented husband, F.D.; as he heard her story, Muldoon felt a righteous rage against the batterer: “my blood boiled.”. Soon, however, the whole matter went out of his head. But when he went out of body (something he had learned to do at will after his 1916 NDE) at 9:00 that evening, he found himself confronted by the furious batterer, who evidently had felt Muldoon’s hostility and taken it as a challenge to fight. The batterer attacked, cursing and beating with a strength that greatly surpassed Muldoon’s. Since Muldoon experienced both F.D. and himself as quasi-physical, he was terrified, and escaped only when he felt himself being drawn back into his body.
The stories of children near death benefitting from prayers offered for them are potentially evidential (there should really be dated accounts signed by each party), whereas the angry batterer Muldoon encountered might have been a projection of his emotions; or the hostile figure he sawmay have been formed from energy both from the surviving batterer and from Muldoon. In any case, we cannot take the childrens’ or Muldoon’s stories as providing proof, either of life after death or of the nature of the relationship between the living and the (apparently surviving) deceased. One must study many of the thousands of cases on record and the scholarship that has developed around them. But in doing so, one increasingly feels the likelihood that they do derive from some kind of consciousness that transcends death.
In any case, these stories are strongly suggestive, and we may benefit from being sensitive to the possibilities they, as parables, offer us. They say that our prayers, wishes, feelings and thoughts in regard to the deceased (humans) are much more powerful than we think, and that they have a strong effect on their objects. Our culture encourages us to assume that all our thoughts, including our prayers, are strictly private affairs, and have no direct impact outside ourselves. But “it ain’t necessarily so.” The living may not feel their impact, at least consciously, but the deceased may be much more keenly attuned.
How About Animals?
The question of whether animals survive death is usually either denied with a conventional, dogmatic assertion that they don’t have souls, or relegated to the realm of sentimental self-deception. Seldom does the question of evidence enter into the discussion. It is true that animals returned from a brush with death cannot tell us any NDEs they may have had, but there are other kinds of evidence that they do survive, and it is linked to the evidence for the survival of humans. As mentioned above and as presented in “The Animals and the Angels,” Part II (see Angels ), the evidence that human consciousness persists after death is of several kinds besides NDEs. Another kind is experiences of apparitions, voices, footsteps, scents, or other physical effects a body would have (such as a depression in a bed) characteristic of the deceased person. The best evidence provides information about the deceased unknown to the perceiver, or occurs to a perceiver unacquainted with the deceased or with no emotional investment in him/her, or is perceived jointly by two or more persons, or by a person who took action on the basis of what s/he experienced, A comparison of the major features of cases of animal apparitions (including sounds, scents, etc.) and those of deceased humans shows general similarities, suggesting that with the so-called “higher” animals, at least, consciousness survives death much as it does with humans.
Most accounts of perceiving an animal’s presence after her or his death are comforting stories experienced and told by the animal’s grieving person. Occasionally an animal apparition will be seen by a person unattached to the animal. Readers may remember the story of the “ghost cat” included in Barbara Booth’s Pilgrimage narrative in PT 50 . For those who missed it: Barbara’s eight-year-old granddaughter Cassie noticed a picture of a very distinctively marked calico cat in her living room, and asked why she hardly ever saw that cat. Barbara explained that “Pandora” had died six years earlier, when Cassie was two. But the girl protested that couldn’t be true, as she had seen Pandora in the house just a day or two ago, twice, and tried (unsuccessfully) to pick her up. In other words, Cassie took action as a result of what she saw. A similar case, given in “The Animals and the Angels,” is that of the apparition of the deceased dog Skila seen by his chiropractor, who, far from welcoming the vision, was afraid he was going crazy.
Gabriel
A less pleasant account of an apparent encounter with a ghost animal is the story of Gabriel the pig in Joshua P. Warren’s book Pet Ghosts, derived from conversations with the family in question, at least with the father, whom Warren calls “Roy Shelton.” Roy (like the author) was raised in a rural area of North Carolina that had suffered greatly during the Depression; he had developed a view that a family was safest from hunger when they produced their own food, and was proud of being able to kill efficiently for the table. But when he married, his wife Becca talked him out of the practice; she disliked the animal smells and the violence. He reluctantly agreed, until the events of 9/11 aroused his fears that hungry times were coming back. He insisted on getting a little pig early in the spring to raise for the family’s Christmas feast. The intended victim was given a name associated with Christmas, without much thought to the detail that in the story, Gabriel is a messenger from God.
The family, including a teenage son Ruben and (two?) girls, grew fond of Gabriel, who would wag his tail, an almost-smile on his face, whenever anyone came to feed him or give him attention; Ruben liked to pet him, Becca liked him too. But as Christmas approached Roy reiterated that he would be killed, and taught Ruben how to help. Inconveniently, the day before Gabriel’s planned execution, Roy’s job took him out on the road, and his return was delayed by a threatened snowstorm. He telephoned Becca to give Ruben the .38 pistol and get started with the butchering; he would take over when he returned. Becca protested, knowing of Ruben’s affection for Gabriel, but Roy insisted. Thus pressured, Ruben took the gun and went out to Gabriel’s stall, in painful conflict between the promptings of his heart and the machismo his father had instilled. The latter won out, and he shot Gabriel twice in the head.
Gabriel didn’t die; he didn’t even go down. But he was stunned, in pain, and and clearly enraged at this betrayal. Confused and upset, Ruben walked away. All evening the family had to listen to Gabriel’s cries, groans, and growls, and the noise of his trotters pawing at his stall. When Roy returned the next day, he was angry that Ruben had botched the job, declaring that now the meat would taste “like fear.” He got out his .375 and fired at the panicky Gabriel, then attacked with a long sharp knife to the pig’s spine. Gabriel died quickly and bloodily.
There was plenty of pig flesh on the family’s plates at the Christmas feast, but the mood was not merry, nor were appetites robust. As the meal neared its end, they all began to hear from outside a high-pitched whining that grew to grunts and moans and squeals such as the family had heard the previous night from Gabriel. They knew there was no other pig anywhere near, and they grew more and more upset. Finally Ruben disappeared into the bathroom and vomited; not long afterwards, his mother and his sisters followed suit. Roy went outside to investigate, and suddenly fell screaming with pain, his leg broken, apparently having slipped in the snow.
After recovering, Roy joked that he had been attacked by the jaws of an invisible animal; but, says the author, he didn’t seem to find the joke very funny. Thereafter, Roy agreed to stop raising animals, and the rest of the family stopped eating meat. The sounds were never heard again.
What is the explanation for the sounds? Even Roy, who would have been most ready to find a conventional explanation, apparently didn’t have one. Was it a collective hallucination, sparked by distress and guilt? Some kind of mysterious psychic recording of the cries of the previous night? Was the death-event somehow still existing, ”frozen” in time, “outside” of time? Was it the surviving spirit of Gabriel, venting his grief and rage at being betrayed?
An investigator and gifted storyteller, Warren tells the story--and he claims there are others in this part of the world--with a wealth of vivid detail that makes me suspect a certain amount of artistic license. He does not present signed and dated accounts by the witnesses, unfortunately. But if the narrative in its essentials is true it makes for a strong case, having at least five persons hearing the inexplicable sounds, and life-changing actions taken as a result of the event. Those who judge it to be a tall tale can take it as a parable, richly significant.
Standing in the Need of Prayer
At first blush, the story of Gabriel suggests that things are even worse for farmed animals than it appears--that they may continue to suffer even after their dreadful deaths. But on the other hand, when taken together with the many stories about humans who are extremely attuned to the thoughts and feelings of the living while out-of-body and/or near death, what it also does is empower us to help those we have thought completely beyond the reach of rescue, for they continue to be, with us, part of the great web of conscious beings. There is something powerful we can do no matter who or where we are.
This narrative highlights especially the state of the animal who is kindly raised in decent conditions, and then betrayed. But probably most farmed animals, raised in wretched conditions and killed in hellish ones, have much the same needs. Taken together with Muldoon’s experience, it give us a take-home message that those of us who share the suffering of victims do well to discipline our feelings of helpless rage, which may well have a worsening impact on the victimizers, and perhaps also on surviving victims. They need compassion and peace, not more anger, in the spiritual atmosphere.
Prayer for animals and their exploiters and killers might be seen as the inner side of our this-worldly work toward dismantling the evil systems, freeing (as well as reducing the breeding of) living animals trapped in them, and awakening the humans who operate them or patronize them. One person directing compassionate thoughts toward the sufferers and the unawakened may be--or at least feel--relatively ineffectual. But many joining together are powerful, perhaps taking us all a few steps upward on Jacob’s ladder.
--Gracia Fay Ellwood
Sources: P.M.H. Atwater, The Big Book of Near-Death Experiences; Katherine Hulme, Look a Lion in the Eye; Sylvan Muldoon and Hereward Carrington, The Projection of the Astral Body; Joshua P. Warren, Pet Ghosts: Animal Encounters from Beyond the Grave.
Next month’s essay, entitled “The Living and the Deceased, Part II; Lay Aside Every Weight,” will sketch out things we as individuals can do to increase the power of the prayers and Light we send to both living and deceased.
A Glimpse of the Peaceable Kingdom
--Contributed by Marjorie Emerson
NewsNotes
New Clinic in Farm Sanctuary
Farm Sanctuary has constructed Melrose Small Animal Hospital on its Watkins Glen grounds, an ER for farmed animals who otherwise would surely die painfully from the abuse and/or neglect they suffered. Here veterinarians nurse them to health and welcome them to the farm, to become ambassadors for their victimized companions. To read the full article and to watch a slideshow of rescued farmed animals before and after their medical care, see Emergency Room .
Circus Animal Bans in S. America
Since Animal Defenders International (ADI) launched a major undercover investigation of animals in South American circuses in 2007, a series of government bans have swept across the continent. There are bans in place in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and now Paraguay. Ban legislation passed its second reading in Colombia this year, and legislation is well advanced in Brazil. ADI dramatically enforced the Bolivian ban last year, raiding eight circuses that had defied the law, and rescuing and relocating every animal. There are over twenty countries with similar bans already in place.
--contributed by Marian Hussenbux
Kindness Footprints
An inspiring five-part documentary film of this title, with script by PT subscriber Shuhobroto Ghosh, describes work being done on behalf of animals in India and other countries in Asia. It is now available online. It contains both scenes of natural beauty and disturbing footage of violence against animals. The link to Part I is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0yU3pfqqV0&feature=relmfu
Unset Gems
“Every good thing you do, . . . say, . . . [or] think, vibrates on and on and never ceases. The evil remains only until it is overcome by the good . . . .”
--Peace Pilgrim (Mildred Norman Ryder)
But man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he's most assured--
His glassy essence--like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven
As make the angels weep.
-- "Isabella," Wm. Shakespeare, Measure for Measure
Letters: David Pfaltzgraff-Carlson, John Gilheany
Dear Peaceable Friends,
Elias Hicks (1748-1830) was a Quaker minister from Long Island, New York. A Quietist and early opponent of slavery who was later praised as a prophet by Walt Whitman, Hicks was famously associated with theological controversy and schism within the Religious Society of Friends. Because of that schism and its aftermath, his posthumously published Journal was heavily redacted and has only recently (2009) been published in more complete form. Earlier this year, a review of the new edition appeared in Ohio Valley Yearly Meeting's newsletter, mentioning briefly that one of the restored passages suggested Friends ought to be vegetarian. Intrigued, I decided to read the Journal and have noted several entries in which Hicks reflects on the relationship between humans and animals, the most significant of which is the entry for Saturday, December 31, 1813:
“Sixth Day: Spent part of this day and the evening in assisting my
workmen in slaying a fat beef and laying it away for part of our winter's provision. After which, my mind was seriously impressed with the subject and led to take a view of the whole process and the extraordinary change that had taken place in so short a space with a strong, well-favored, living animal, that in the morning was in a state of health, vigor, and comely proportion, and at the close of the evening, all its parts were decomposed [dismantled], and its flesh and bones cut into pieces and packed away in a cask with salt to be devoured by the animal-man -- its entrails already devoured by the swine, and its skin deposited with the tanner to be converted into leather for man's use.
“What a wonderful [amazing] wreck in nature, affected in so short a period by two or three individuals, but which cannot be restored to its former state by all the combined power and wisdom of all the men in the universe, through all the ages and generations of men.
“My meditation hereon produced this query: Is it right, and consistent with divine wisdom, that such cruel force should be employed and such a mighty sacrifice be made necessary for the nourishment and support of these bodies of clay? Or is there not a more innocent and more consistent medium to be found, amply to effect the same end of man's support? And if so, will it not become a duty? If not for the present generation, for those in future to seek and employ it?”
From Paul Buckley, Ed., The Journal of Elias HIcks. San Francisco: Inner Light, 2009. 169-70. Used with permission of the editor.
Friend David Pfaltzgraff-Carlson attends Community Friends Meeting in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Dear Peaceable Friends,
Thank you for bringing the lost humanitarian work The Recovery of Culture by Henry Bailey Stevens (New York, Harper & Brothers, 1949) to our knowledge and appreciation. It is certainly important for the 'non-secular' sphere of the animal protection movement to harness its own scholarly heritage, frequently forgotten at an academic level for whatever reason(s). Otherwise, we may often waste time 'reinventing the wheel' at the expense of great insights already given to us (albeit by the same guiding Spirit, perhaps).
In some cases, humane authors of the past may have retreated from support for vegetarianism but otherwise provided seminal, in-depth and illuminating works which rarely appear in contemporary bibliographical acknowledgments. Other worthy titles remain all but entirely absent from the internet regardless of their author's vegetarian advocacy. Here are several, with year of publication:
These Animals of Ours by Aloysius Roche, 1939*
The Mind Changers by Ethel Douglas Hume, 1939
The Status of Animals in the Christian Religion by C.W. Hume, 1957
The Animal Kingdom: Why? Whence? Whither? by Basil Viney, 1965*
God's Animals by Ambrose Agius, 1970*
Kingdom of Neighbours by H.J. Hammerton, 1970*
Compassion is the Bugler: the Struggle for Animal Rights by Clive Hollands, 1980
Reason, Religion and the Animals by Rev Basil Wrighton, 1988*
(*Those with an asterisk were written by clergymen.)
John M. Gilheany is the author of Familiar Strangers: The Church and the Vegetarian Movement in Britain, 1809-2009. For a letter and photo, see PT 73 .
Book Review: Love, Life, and Elephants
Dame Daphne Sheldrick, Love, Life, and Elephants: An African Love Story. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012. 334 pages, $27.00 hardcover.
This is the heart-warming story of a life devoted to saving and nurturing the little ones who are among the most endangered orphans of all, baby animals in the wilds of Africa whose mothers have been killed, often by poachers or other agents of human ignorance and greed. For her tireless labors on their behalf Daphne Sheldrick has gradually attained recognition, including being made a Dame Commander of the British Empire by the Queen. Here is her story in her own words.
Daphne came from one of those industrious and adventurous English families who peopled the far-flung reaches of the British Empire for many generations, not as soldiers or rulers, but as hard-working farmers and traders. Her ancestors settled in South Africa to farm as early as 1820, and her great-grandfather was persuaded to move from there to try his hand at agriculture in Kenya around 1900. Daphne was born in rural Kenya in 1934, growing up close to the African heartland's innumerable animals large and small, wild and domestic; as a child she loved caring for them.
After a failed first marriage, and while living through Kenya's time of troubles with the Mau-Mau insurgency and transition to independence, in 1960 she married David Sheldrick, Warden of Kenya's vast Tsavo National Park. At 8,000 square miles, this park is larger than Connecticut and affords a refuge -- when secure -- for Africa's great herds of antelope, elephants, and giraffes, its many rhinos and hippos, as well as the lions, leopards, and hyenas who prey on them, and countless other beasts. The marriage was a tremendous success; Daphne regarded David as her soulmate. She participated profoundly in his deep commitment to Africa's fabulous wildlife and in his work, including titanic battles against poachers. Soon they were co-wardens of the gigantic Park, sharing each other's innermost thoughts about life and the living environment.
David, though an activist and capable administrator with an army background, was no less a philosopher of nature. Daphne tells us he believed that “wild animals were, in many ways, more sophisticated than us humans,” more perfectly adapted than us to the particular ecological slot each inhabited. He was “intolerant of those who viewed animal 'intelligence' as inferior to that of the human animal,” for each has evolved in the way best for its purpose, and “there were bound to be things that we humans would never fully understand about animal 'intelligence.'” David was also of “the firm belief that all animals possessed powers of communication, mysterious and hidden to human ears -- for example, telepathy and the infrasound of the elephants and also probably the language of giraffes,” though they were believed to be mute -- and through subtle body language and the use of chemical traces. In all this he was, needless to say, “openly contemptuous of those who viewed animals as a mere commodity placed on earth for the benefit of mankind.” (pp. 138-39)
To express her and David's attitude toward animals, Daphne quotes another writer, Henry Beston, whose words in The Outermost House are so forceful I would like to reproduce them here:
We need another wiser and perhaps more mystical concept of animals. In a world older and more complete than ours, they moved finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings, they are other Nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of earth.” (Love, Life p. 315)
Sadly, this wonderful companionate marriage lasted only seventeen years, ending with David's premature death in 1977. From then on Daphne has continued in her dedicated work of raising and rehabilitating back into the wild community the animal orphans of many species, aided by her profound knowledge of animal psychology. She also manages the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust which, with donations from around the world, supports her busy orphanage. Her special love has been infant elephants. She believes, no doubt rightly, that the emotional life of elephants is closer to that of humans than is that of any other species; they feel loss, separation, bonding within family and herd as deeply and for as long as we. The callousness with which the giant beasts have been killed or abducted is therefore particularly abhorrent, as she makes clear through many tales from life.
It does not appear that David and Daphne were vegetarian, but apart from one or two casual references to foodstuffs the issue is not discussed. Probably there was little vegetarian awareness in the Africa of their time and place, though Daphne and David certainly rejected the evils of the big-game hunting and culling (even when controlled) that was so much a part of the white man's Africa of an earlier day. (However, in 1989 when Gracia Fay and I lived in South Africa for six weeks, we were favorably impressed by the extent of informed vegetarianism, at least in our university-related circle.)
Many will find Daphne Sheldrick's Love, Life, and Elephants a delightful read. It is not all about animals; like any involved, spirited woman Daphne has much to say about her family, loves, children, careers, all presented with verve and insight. It is in an exotic setting--how many mothers will hear a toddler daughter ask her to make the lions keep quiet so she can sleep?--but it is still very human. Yet her story always comes back to the animals. We owe much to her knowledge and love of their many Nations.
--Robert Ellwood
Film Review: Chimpanzee
Chimpanzee. A 2012 Disneynature film for children. Directed by Alastair Fothergill and Mark Linfield; narrated by Mark Linfield..
This is the story of a very young chimpanzee named Oscar and his tribe, who live somewhere in Africa; the film seems to be something between a documentary and a drama. Where, exactly, in that vast continent does it take place? We are not told, but the credits at the end of the film mention Cote D'Ivoire (The Ivory Coast), Uganda, and Gabon. Therefore the landscapes we are shown are probably composites of these nations across the central waistline of Africa. The two tribes of chimps depicted in the story may be composites too. They are shown as being often in competition for food resources, but this situation seems to be contradicted by the many scenes showing Oscar's tribe enjoying a rich variety of foods. These include figs and other fruits, ants, leaves, nuts, honey, and, distressingly, Colobus monkeys. One inevitably asks: Why do these tribes have to compete so fiercely for food, when nutritional resources are so varied and abundant?
The first part of the film shows little Oscar enjoying a peaceful and happy life with his loving mother, Isha (which is Hebrew for "woman," by the way). She is always kind and patient with him, and teaches him useful skills, such as how to crack nuts. This is done using a block of wood - or (better!) a heavy rock. Such nut-cracking is done by all chimpanzees across Africa, but different tribes display cultural differences from each other as to the exact techniques used. Human researchers soon discover that nut-cracking is nowhere near being as easy as the most skilled chimps make it look. Oscar makes the same discovery, to be sure. He also learns how to "fish" for ants using a stripped twig (this skill was the very first tool-using behavior of animals observed by a Westerner--namely, Jane Goodall--and quite revolutionized primate studies).
Oscar's happy childhood comes to a sad end when an attack by the unfriendly neighboring tribe separates his mother from him, and from the rest of the tribe. Wounded and alone, Isha, we are told, falls prey to a leopard. However, we do not see either the wounding or the killing; we cannot be sure what the historical facts were. But there is no doubt that Oscar is now an orphan.
All alone in the world, the chimpanzee tot looks for a new mother. All the mothers in the tribe already have their hands full, however, and refuse to adopt Oscar. He finally turns to the most unlikely candidate: Freddy, the alpha male and Patriarch of the Tribe. This seems doomed to failure, since adult male chimpanzees are not very parental, and Freddy is the toughest, most macho male of the group. But Oscar tries a gradual approach, getting closer every day to Freddy, "taming" him the way the Little Prince tamed the desert fox, and Owen the baby hippo tamed Mzee the tortoise. Big Freddy is won over, and becomes a loving parent.
At the end of the film, the human film-makers bear witness that this part of the story, incredible as it may seem, is quite true, and that the big tough male did in truth become a loving and gentle adoptive parent. This love story is at the heart of the movie, and the most important part of it. We are glad it is for real. We are also grateful that we are not shown closeups of the killing or butchering of the poor Colobus monkeys. The film-makers made some wise choices, and we quite forgive them for some not so wise ones.--Benjamin Urrutia
Recipes
Ginger Walnut Pasta
serves 4
3 T. extra virgin olive oil
2 medium cloves garlic, minced
2 T. fresh ginger, peeled and minced
3/4 cup panko (Japanese style bread crumbs)
3/4 cup chopped walnuts
2 T. chopped fresh parsley
1/2 tsp. sea salt, or to taste
freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 lb. pasta (spaghetti, linguine or fettuccine) - cooked al dente, drained
While pasta is cooking:
In medium-large skillet, warm 3 T. olive oil; add garlic and ginger, stir and cook over medium-high heat for one (1) minute. Add panko, walnuts, parsley, sea salt and black pepper. Stir to coat well with olive oil and mix panko with ginger and walnuts. Remove from heat. Toss with cooked pasta. Serve immediately. Delicious served with roasted mixed vegetables. Drizzle with additional olive oil, if desired.
“Just Peachy” Cake for Your Canine Friend
makes one 5 inch round cake
1 cup organic whole wheat flour
1 T. nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
3/4 cup soy milk
1/4 cup fresh or frozen peaches or nectarines, puréed
2 T. safflower oil
2 tsp. molasses
Preheat oven 350° F. Prepare 5 inch round baking dish by spraying with nonstick cooking spray.
In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine dry ingredients with a wire whisk. Whisk in liquid ingredients and mix well. Pour into prepared baking dish. Bake 20 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool a few minutes in baking dish, then turn out onto cooling cake rack. Cool completely then frost with desired chickpea-base frosting.
Sunny Chickpea-Carrot Frosting (for cake recipe above)
makes about 2 -2 1/2 cups frosting; enough to frost 3 or 4 5-inch round cakes.
1 1/2 cups dry organic chickpeas, cooked tender
1/2 cup chunked carrot, cooked soft (start with 1 large carrot)
1/2 tsp. organic sugar (evaporated cane juice)
1/4 tsp. sea salt
2 T. safflower oil
Place all ingredients in the bowl of a food processor. Process until very smooth and spreadable. Stop the motor and using a rubber spatula, clean the sides of the bowl; continue processing until smooth and spreadable consistency. A little more safflower oil may be added if necessary to achieve a good spreadable consistency. Place the baked cake on a lazy susan, apply frosting with a plastic spatula or wide blade flat knife. Frost top and sides of cake. cover and refrigerate until ready to serve. Use of birthday candles is not recommended. Instead decorate the cake with a favorite toy or treat.
This frosting is a gorgeous sunshine color and will brighten any occasion for your best friend.
-- Angela Suarez
Poetry: Alfred Tennyson, 1809-1892
--From Morte d’Arthur
. . . . If thou shouldst never see my face again,
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice
Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
For what are men more than sheep or goats
. . .
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
For so the whole round earth is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. . . .
The Peaceable Table is a project of Quaker Animal Kinship, a non-profit, also known as the Animal Kinship Committee of Orange Grove Friends Meeting, Pasadena, California. It is intended to resume the witness of that excellent vehicle of the Friends Vegetarian Society of North America, The Friendly Vegetarian, which appeared quarterly between 1982 and 1995. Following its example, and sometimes borrowing from its treasures, we publish articles for toe-in-the-water vegetarians as well as long-term ones.
The journal is intended to be interactive; contributions, including illustrations, are invited for the next issue. Deadline for the June issue will be June 27. Send to graciafay@gmail.com or 14 Krotona Hill, Ojai, CA 93023. We operate primarily online in order to conserve trees and labor, but hard copy is available for interested persons who are not online. The latter are asked, if their funds permit, to donate $12 (USD) per year. Other donations to offset the cost of the domain name and server are welcome.
Website: www.vegetarianfriends.net
Editor: Gracia Fay Ellwood
Book and Film Reviewers: Benjamin Urrutia and Robert Ellwood
Recipe Editor: Angela Suarez
NewsNotes Contributor: Lorena Mucke
Technical Architect: Richard Scott Lancelot Ellwood
Copyright © 2012 Vegetarian Friends
