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The Bible is a fascinating book. It contains answers to every
question and solutions to every controversy under the sun. Issues on
politics, intrigue, war, science, creation, human relations, life, sickness
and death can all be sorted out using this one book. You can tell if you
are wise or foolish; whether you will end up in heaven or hell and if you
are doing the right thing, by simply flipping through the pages of the
greatest and best-selling book ever.
It is amazing that every time you read the Bible you find
something new - even if you have been reading it since you started
speaking. You can have a thousand preachers speaking on the same verse and
coming up with different sermons on the very same verse. That is why the
Great Book has been in use for millennia and there has been no one to
declare it exhausted in terms of content. It is the only Constitution that
needs no review or amendment because its laws and solutions are timeless.
It is the only code of criminal law where ignorance can be a
defence and where mercy and forgiveness take priority over retribution and
punishment.
People always ask me where I find time to write yet my job keeps
me very busy. My answer is always the same, simple one: I take off at least
half an hour every night to read and meditate on a portion of the Bible.
That effectively recharges my batteries.
Why am I bringing in the Bible?
Of course as usual, I get hundreds of e-mails responding to this
column; some giving me the thumbs up sign and others bashing me black and
blue.
There is one consistent fellow from Australia
who, to put it mildly, has got a rabid hatred of President Museveni. The
other day he sent me an e-mail saying, 'Maria, keep on irrigating the
mustard seed, because it is about to die'.
For our foreign readers, the mustard seed refers to President
Yoweri Museveni who used the same _expression_ as the title of his
autobiography. It is borrowed from the Biblical mustard seed that is one of
the smallest seeds on earth, but when planted, grows into one of the
biggest trees. President Museveni used the _expression_ more broadly, to
describe the metamorphosis of Uganda
from the mire of dictatorship and economic decline to (after 1986) a
progressive affair and a widely acclaimed example of political and economic
success.
I replied the e-mail saying,
"my brother; you think it is still a seed? Oh no! It is now a
big tree. And you do not irrigate trees, do you? At least not in Uganda;
where the climate is so conducive, trees do not just dry up like that, even
if they so badly wanted to".
Why did I bring the Bible in this column today?
It is because this week, my friend from Australia
pens me another acerbic e-mail: "In any case Maria," he chirped.
"Who asked Museveni to liberate us? We were better off the way we were
before he came in to spoil the show".
For starters, I know why this fellow is against the President.
It is a personal vendetta he is pursuing; too long a story though
to tell in these pages.
But like I have always said, I do not mind opposition - you cannot
all believe in one thing. The only problem with sections of the opposition
is that they want to turn personal disagreements into national crises.
So when this fellow asks me to tell him who asked Museveni to
liberate Uganda, I
recalled the story of the children of Israel.
They spent 430 years in Egypt,
the huge majority of this period as slaves. Hard labour, tough punishment
and a starvation diet on top of the bondage were all they knew. In their
distress they cried out to the Lord to save them.
The Lord, as usual, hearkened to their cry and sent Moses to lead
them out of bondage and into the Promised Land.
They enjoyed the flight from Egypt and
witnessed the miraculous interventions as God delivered them from Pharoah
and provided for them.
But to God's dismay, the ungrateful Israelites kept staging one
strike after another over what they called the big issues.
One of the very big and important issues was that they had run out
of cucumber and onions. They rioted, cursing Moses for bringing them out of
Egypt.
"Who told you to bring us out of Egypt?"
they asked. "At least in Egypt we
had all the cucumber and onions we wanted."
Another one was that Moses spent a whole 40 days on Mount
Sinai in conference with God. They
passed an overwhelming vote of no confidence in God, took Aaron by the
throat and forced him to make them a god out of their jewellery.
The story of the children of Israel is
a classic expose about human nature: how unfathomable it really is and how
unreasonable humans can be.
If we cannot take a lesson from such tales then ours is a lost
cause.
The writer is the Presidential Press Secretary.
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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