“Not until we extend the circle of compassion to include all living things shall we ourselves know peace.”–Albert Schweitzer

     The great humanitarian Dr. Albert Schweitzer was born on this date, January 14, 134 years ago.  It feels like a good time to honor this Nobel Peace Prize winner, who contributed so much as a physician, and especially as one who reveres all life.  

     I remember hearing, as a child, that Albert Schweitzer had such a great respect for life that he always tried to walk on the sidewalk, rather than on the grass, so as to avoid killing insects or other tiny creatures.  I was impressed that he so greatly valued the life of even the tiniest ant!  

     As a young man living in Alsace (on the Germany-France border, part of Germany during Schweitzer’s youth, now part of France), Schweitzer had a great love of music, and he was very talented.  He decided to spend his youth pursuing music and his other interests.  But when he reached 30, his responsibility as a Christian, he felt, would require him to devote himself to humanitarian service. 

     Turning 30 in 1905, Schweitzer embarked on a grueling, seven-year medical training.  In 1912, with his medical degree in hand, he proposed to go, at his own expense, to what is now Gabon, in west Africa, to serve as a doctor there with the Paris Missionary Society.  But because he was a Lutheran, not a Catholic, his offer was rejected.  He finally managed to persuade the Society’s board to accept his proposal.

     For many years, Schweitzer worked tirelessly in Gabon, treating ill people and developing the mission hospital.  He spent periods of time in Europe, recovering from his own illnesses, writing, and raising funds for his work in Africa.

     Schweitzer is perhaps best remembered for his philosophy of “reverence for life.”  He believed deeply that all life has a strong will to live, that the will to live should be respected, whether it’s another human being or even a blade of grass. 

     In explaining his philosophy, Schweitzer wrote, “If I am a thinking being, I must regard life other than my own with equal reverence, for I shall know that it longs for fulness and development as deeply as I do myself.” 

     What promotes or nourishes life, Schweitzer regarded as good.  Likewise, what hinders or annihilates life is evil. The ethical man, according to Schweitzer, is one who assists life to fluorish wherever possible and who shrinks from injuring anything that lives. 

     Schweitzer admitted that his philosophy poses ethical dilemmas.  It is not always easy to decide how far to go in avoiding injury to and destruction of life.   But each person, in each situation, he said, must be guided by the highest sense of responsibility toward other life.   And the more deeply we experience conflict when an action we wish to take will harm a life, said Schweitzer, the more we are living in truth. 

     I find Schweitzer’s following words deeply inspiring:  

     “Whenever I injure life of any sort, I must be quite clear whether it is necessary. Beyond the unavoidable, I must never go, not even with what seems insignificant. The farmer, who has mown down a thousand flowers in his meadow as fodder for his cows, must be careful on his way home not to strike off in wanton pastime the head of a single flower by the roadside, for he thereby commits a wrong against life without being under the pressure of necessity. ” –April Moore

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 14th, 2009 at 6:06 pm and is filed under Celebrating our beautiful Earth. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.