'De zin van het leven' is geen examenvraag om op te lossen! Wat is de zin van het water voor de vis die erin zwemt? Het bestaan is zinvol op zich. Je bent waardevol in jezelf en je hoeft je bestaan niet te rechtvaardigen.' Mijn vijfde gast in de Estafette-reeks is de Spaans-Indische theoloog Raimon Panikkar die ik ontmoette in een klein dorpje, Tavertet, dicht bij Barcelona. Hij zal mij altijd bijblijven door zijn sprankelende inzichten. 'Wist je dat het woord 'religie' niet voorkomt in het Nieuwe Testament? Men heeft het over 'aanbidding', 'respect', 'vroomheid'. Tot in de Middeleeuwen behoorde het tot de deugden. Fascinerend interview dat ik graag met u deel.
One of my favourites, after all these years! Meeting this man in person was a one-of-a-kind experience. Of course, his fame had preceded him: he was a well kown philosopher and theologian who had also earned a doctorate in chemistry. But he was chosen for this interview in the KRO-series ‘Estafette’ on interreligious dialogue because of his authority in this matter.
When I encountered him in his small but attractive house in the peaceful village that he had retired to, Tavertet, in the hills north of Barcelona, he surprised me with his humbleness and open-heartedness, not to mention his erudition ! In private, he talked to me about his Hindu father, who had been asked by Pandit Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India, to be part of the very first government of India. But Panikkar senior refused, went to Spain and married a well-educated Catalan woman.
Their son, Raimon Panikkar, who is sitting before me now on the floor in a typical Hindu way and dressed as such, speaks about his parents in a loving way, pointing towards their portrets on the wall. We decide to do the interview outside at a circular wooden table in his garden. The sight of the mountains surrounding us, is really breath-taking. I notice the Pre-Pyrenees in the far distance and am stunned by the beautiful views of this land, located above some cliffs, some nine hundred meters above sea level.
The old Roman small church on one side of us reminds me of a stern but benign onlooker to the two of us while we talk. As I was slightly nervous for the interview, I even bought some new clothes in the village below and was kindly informed that Raimon Panikkar was admired far and near.
The interview doesn’t disappoint. Panikkar is a man of subtle speech. ‘Wisdom consists in accepting things and transforming them by loving them.’ He tackles various themes: philosophy and religion, ethics, freedom, the obsession of the western mind, obedience, lost awareness of the dignity of a human person, time as a linear or circular phenomenon. He sharply indicates he dangers of democracy and western fundamentalism. What went wrong with the Church, I ask him. His answer is telling. But his final words are for the ‘Risen Man’.
This Catholic priest who founded the Raimon Panikkar Vivarium Foundation, a center for intercultural studies. is ‘his own man’.
In his typical way, he wrote a goodbye letter to all of us, of which I quote a few lines: "Dear Friends ... I would like to communicate with you that I believe the moment has come (put off time and again), to withdraw from all public activity, both the direct and the intellectual participation, to which I have dedicated all my life as a way of sharing my reflections. I will continue to be close to you in a deeper way, through silence and prayer, and in the same way I would ask you to be close to me in this last period of my existence. (…)Thankful for the gift of life which is only such if lived in communion with others: it is with this spirit that I have lived out my ministry."
Raimon Panikkar died on August 26, 2010. (November 2, 1918 – August 26, 2010)
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