The Pillars of the Earth is a historical novel by Ken Follett about the building of a cathedral. Follett’s book educates us with a realistic view of life in the Middle Ages, and a look into the deep centuries old search of man’s collective soul. The reader is drawn into a fast moving and griping story starting with the first Henry of England in the Dark Ages. But we are left wondering why the human race has a history of killing the cathedral builders, and condemning the great artists and thinkers. It is disheartening to think of the way that so many great visionaries have been fought, so many hands and fingers of talented artists have been cut off, and so many repressive steps backward have been taken in our history.
Now we can only hope to raise the pillars of the human spirit in the same way we once triumphed in the physical world by the construction of the marble and glass masterpieces of the cathedrals. The lifting of the spirit takes a different kind of strength than the building of the chiseled and carved rock spires and windows of light in the Dark Ages.
It takes strength of character to build new pillars for the earth. It takes self-discipline to look within, search our souls, raise our awareness, and look beyond the physical into the world of the eternal spirit. It takes reconsideration of the transitory indulgences of the senses that waste our own energy and the earth’s natural resources, it takes an attitude of abundance through oneness with nature, and it takes a certain love of life and respect for future generations. When we learn to live less materialistically and to give more than we take, the world will be put back in balance with no one suffering to appease the over-indulgence of others. Who cannot feel it’s time to move forward and solve some of our deep-rooted problems? The evil of greed, hate, and violence has gone on long enough. The cauldron of the universe has steeped our alchemy into the next phase of transformation. May we look deep within our souls to find the treasure that awakens our true selves to develop a society based on humanitarianism and spirituality as the new pillars of the earth.
Ariadne