The Ghosts of Our Fathers

As a young man, I thought that the idea that our actions out-lived us and were capable of potentially impacting the people and society that we left behind was uniquely African.  Then I read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar at age 14 and knew instantly that the words of Mark Antony's speech at Caeser’s funeral might never leave me.  To this day, I see images of Mark Antony standing before the audience and expressing as follows:

Friends, Romans, countrymen

Lend me your ears

I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. 

The evil that men do lives after them; 

The good is oft interred with their bones;  

So let it be with Caesar.

Certainly, the meaning of these words continue to play out daily in the lives of men and women, as good deeds are often forgotten in man's insatiable appetite to glorify self and praise his/her benefactor for today's gifts while wasting no time to verbally assault the name of the same benefactor for tomorrow's inability to provide.  To me. however, Mark Antony's words on that fateful day were, and remain a lesson that the idea of life's continuation beyond death is not uniquely African.  Had I not learned this lesson at that age, I would have had to learn it at my father's funeral service many years later when the preacher declared: "Venerable Archdeacon Jonathan Oni Eseleh lived a life of righteousness and will forever be an example for all of us.  He lived his life helping others and serving His maker with humility and grace".  Then, echoing Ezekiel 18 verse 2, the preacher continued; "Therefore, it will never be said of his children that "...The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge".  Here in a religion older than Julius Caeser was an acknowledgment of the potential impact of our actions on our children even long after we are gone. Well, I was not expecting any more of this lesson when I chose to become a psychotherapist.  So, needless to say that I was pleasantly surprised to learn as a graduate student, that solidly grounded in research and practice knowledge was a very sound articulation of the position of multi-generational processes in human development, behavior, treatment and wellness.

If we take the time to look very closely around the world, we can see the impact of the works of our fathers on the societies that they left behind.  Leaders and citizens of successful societies always maintain a consciousness of history and do their best to stay close to the foundations and guiding principles laid by their founding fathers.  They are grateful for the sacrifices of those who came before them and lead as if they are guided by the ghosts of those fathers to maintain a sense of responsibility and diligence to the paths paved by history.  In such societies, individuals and groups anchor their sense of pride on an identity carved and projected by their understanding and belief in a living history that was built and preserved by selfless visionaries who understood that they were called to a purpose greater than themselves.  An immoral and distasteful leader may arise at some point in the life course of such a society but then another leader soon comes who rights the course toward history's trajectory as envisioned by the fathers long gone

In unsuccessful and struggling societies, on the other hand, history is destroyed rather than preserved, shunned rather than embraced, and relegated rather than elevated.  Also, the role of culture and tradition is in some cases disregarded in favor of what is thought to be modern, however alien.  In such societies, the young have no knowledge of the depth of their society's history because those who should teach them have abandoned their roles.  In their quest either for survival or fame, those who ought to protect and pass along the memories of service and respectability that their societies' fathers represented embark on the dangerous course of ignoring the ghosts of their fathers.  Yet, the evidence is all around us that individuals and societies that ignore history wander aimlessly, often blind to the fact that others can see through the hollowness of their momentary trappings of success.  

As individuals, most of us know the circumstances of our societies and are aware of how far we have veered from or stayed close to the lessons of history as crafted and delivered to us by our fathers. When we succeed in suppressing our consciences, ignore the ghosts of our fathers and act as if we gained no knowledge from the lessons of history, we fail in our responsibility to make the world a better place for our own descendants.  This is a very bad thing.