In 1954 Thomas More was eulogized by Robert Bolt in a play, A Man for All Seasons – The Guardian
Profiles in Courage
By Dr Asif Javed
Williamsport, PA
Sir Thomas More walked up to the chopping block in the Tower of London, looked at his would-be executioner, and calmly said, “I forgive you, right readily… be not afraid of your office; you send me to God…I die loyal subject of his majesty, but God’s first.” Minutes later, More was beheaded. Thus ended the life of a remarkable man--one who was patient in adversity and showed little fear of death.
Henry VIII, the king of England, had decided to split from the Catholic Church, having failed to get his divorce approved by the Pope. Desperate for an heir, he wanted to remarry. But the Roman Catholic Church wouldn’t allow divorce. Thomas More, Henry’s Lord Chancellor, a devout Catholic, was right in the middle of it, torn between his conscience, and his duty to the crown. Henry expected More to support his divorce and breakup from Catholic Church. Thomas More, a man of principle, refused to go along and resigned. Furious Henry, an unscrupulous ruler, had him arrested.
The trial, held in a kangaroo court, an intimidated jury found More guilty of high treason and condemned him to death, based on the false testimony of Richard (read Masood Mahmood)—a confirmed liar and opportunist who, for his perjury, was rewarded with a post in Wales. With death staring More in the face, the English statesman delivered a heart-wrenching statement:
Death comes for us all, my lords. Yes, even for kings he comes. In good faith, Richard, I am sorrier for your perjury than my peril…Why Richard? It profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world. But for Wales? ... I am a dead man…I am the King’s true subject. I do none harm. I say none harm. I think none harm. And if this be not enough to keep a man alive, then in good faith, I long not to live.
Before the trial, when asked to bend the rule in order to facilitate the King’s re-marriage, More said, “When the statesmen forsake their own private conscience for the sake of their public duties, they lead their country by a short route to chaos.” When reminded that most of English nobility were supporting the king, he said, “The nobility of England would have snored through the Sermon on the Mount.”
Finding her beloved father’s life in danger, More’s daughter pleaded with him not to defy the king. In response, More told her:
If we lived in a state where virtue was profitable, common sense would make us saintly. But since we see that avarice, anger, pride and stupidity commonly profit far beyond charity, modesty, justice, and thought, perhaps we must stand fast a little, even at the risk of being heroes.
In 1954 Thomas More was eulogized by Robert Bolt in a play, A Man for All Seasons. More was not the first, or the last person, to have made the ultimate sacrifice. There have been others. But not many who could have easily saved themselves. Thomas More, a scholar par-excellence, the author of Utopia, a world classic, and twenty other books, chose not to, and immortalized himself in the annals of humanity.
Back home, there was Bhagat Singh: twenty-three at the time, he courageously walked up to the gallows and remained calm to the last second. A statement, published posthumously, reveals what was going through the mind of the firebrand revolutionary:
The only consolation for me is that I am sacrificing my life for a noble cause. A Hindu believer can expect to be rewarded in next life; Muslims and Christians can expect the reward in heaven. But what is in there for me? All I expect is a last moment when the noose will tighten around my neck and the board will move from under my feet. For me, that will be the very end of a life of struggle; that by itself is a reward enough for me.
Che Guevara had been Fidel Castro’s right hand man in Cuba. He decided to move on and was trying to duplicate the success of Cuban Revolution in Bolivia. Captured by CIA - assisted local army, he was summarily executed. His last words to his would-be killer: “I know, you have to kill me. Shoot, coward! You are only going to kill a man!” Che would have been pleased to know that the foremost statesman of the twentieth century, Nelson Mandela, languishing in prison at the time, called him “an inspiration” while Jean-Paul Sartre described Che to be the “the most complete human being of our age.”
Marshal Ney of France was captured after defeat at Waterloo. He was court-martialed and sentenced to death. As he faced the firing squad, he asked to be allowed to order his own execution. His wish was granted. He ordered the firing squad to shoot at himself. In so doing, he proved Napoleon right who had called him the bravest of the brave.
Hadji Murad, the folk-hero of Dagestan, had fallen out with his mentor Imam Shamail and had defected to Russians. Having realized that he had almost become a prisoner of Russians, Hadji Murad attempted a daring escape, with two of his associates. Pursued, and then cornered in a field, they refused to surrender and fought to the very end. Their uncanny bravery and battle cries were narrated by Leo Tolstoy in a novelette. Tolstoy had met the daredevil freedom fighter.
As ZA Bhutto’s fate hung in the balance in late 70’s, his supporters started a campaign of self-immolation. Raja Anwar, a onetime advisor to Bhutto, who had organized that gruesome spectacle, on behalf of Nusrat Bhutto, has given some details:
On Oct 1st 1978, Wahid Qureshi got ready in Lahore to set out for Rawalpindi. Qureshi’s wife had died some time earlier, leaving four daughters behind. He alone was now responsible for their care. The youngest was no more than four: she was the one most attached to him. Qureshi worried about her, and instructed Lala Fazil in Gujranwala: “Lala, please tell Apa (Qureshi’s sister) that she must have the youngest sleep with her at night because she is not used to sleeping by herself. I don’t want her to be crying all night.” He must have repeated this message several times before leaving for Rawalpindi … before he was driven off, everyone said to him that self-immolation bid was to be symbolic rather than real…, “don’t any of you worry,” he replies, laughing. We believed him…the same evening, the two men set themselves on fire in Rawalpindi…when those gathered there saw them burning, they began to dance around them raising excited slogans…Qureshi was lost in ecstasy, caught in a kind of transcendental state. He was so carried away by the slogans all around him that he went on dousing himself with petrol. He was terribly burnt, and died after fifteen days, never again to have his little, motherless daughter fall asleep with her head on his chest.”
Raja Anwar recounts another incident of self-immolation at Lahore:
Parvez Masih left a young wife and a daughter just eighteen months old, plus his old parents. Before the fire brought him to the ground, he was heard intoning Christ’s moving words on the cross: “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabach thani” (My God, my God, why hast Thou)
Only twenty years old Chaudhry Azam, another devotee of Bhutto, had joined Al-Zulfiqar. Murtaza Bhutto had assigned to him the perilous mission of firing a missile at Zia’s aircraft. This is precisely what Azam did, in broad daylight, from busy Murree Road, Rawalpindi. How he managed to escape from a city that was teeming with intelligence is another story. He was later to lose his life in Amsterdam. The Fascist, who shot him, did not know that his victim had no fear of death.
There are two kinds of men, it seems. The first kind are personified by Thomas More; they are endowed with extraordinary courage, perhaps because they have sincerity of purpose, and a supreme conviction to their cause. And then, there are the rest of us. It is for the former that Faiz wrote:
Jis dhaj say koee maktal mein geya, woh shaan salamat rehtee hay
Yeh jaan to aanee jaanee hay, is jaan kee koee baat naheen
Books/Play cited: The Terrorist Prince by Raja Anwar; A Man for All Seasons by Robert Bolt; The Sabers of Paradise by Lesley Blanch; Hadji Murad by Leo Tolstoy; Street Fighting Years by Tariq Ali.
( The writer is a physician in Williamsport, PA and may be reached at asifjaved@comcast.net )
