Going Against One’s Conscience

Going Against One’s Conscience

1992 5 May 17 Going Against One’s Conscience (400) Arnold Toynbee, the renowned British historian (1889-1975) once said during the last days of his life that the staking of the claim by the Jews to Palestine as their historical homeland was like the Red Indian tribes asking for the return of Canada. The Jews have written innumerable books against the atrocities perpetuated by the Nazis, but the barbarous treatment meted out by the Jews to the Palestine Arabs is of the same nature as that meted out by the Nazis to the Jews.

This statement was made by Toynbee in Canada when Herzog was the Israeli ambassador to that country. Herzog invited Toynbee to a discussion with him on this subject after which a function was held at the Mc Gill University in which both took part. On this occasion, Herzog stated that the German Nazis had killed 600,000 Jews, whereas the number of Arabs made homeless in Palestine was negligible in comparison. He asked bow both of these events could be treated on a par.

In his answer, Arnold Toynbee said that what he had meant to highlight by comparing the atrocities committed by the Nazis on the one hand and the Jews on the other was not the actual death toll, but the nature of the crime. One does not have to commit hundreds of murders to be branded a murderer. A single murder is enough. “I wonder why my words so offend you? I have said just what your own consciences are saying.”

The voice of one’s heart is unfailing in speaking the truth, so that when one rejects the truth one, in reality, rejects one’s own self. What causes an individual to do so? It is mainly stubbornness and partiality, and the desire always to appear right, even when in the wrong. Whenever a man utters such false words, his own heart bears witness to their hollowness.

The greatest wrong that a man can do is turn a deaf ear to his Own conscience. This is like making oneself a witness to one’s own criminality. How strange is this moral deprivation? But when a man’s insensitivity becomes so extreme, he considers the outcome of this deprivation to be his victories. While morally, he is killing himself, he imagines that he is giving himself a new lease of life. Consider that when the voice of conscience is finally silenced, the soul, too, utters its last gasp.