Approaches to Inner Life, Part One

Lanza del Vasto

Translated from
LANZA DEL VASTO, APPROCHES DE LA VIE INTÉRIEURE
ÉDITIONS DENOËL, 1962

Lanza del Vasto (1901-1981), born Giuseppe Giovanni Luigi Enrico Lanza di Trabia-Branciforte, was an Italian philosopher, poet, artist, and nonviolent activist. After earning his doctorate in philosophy from the University of Pisa, he embarked on a pivotal journey to India in 1936 (from Europe on foot and by ship) where he became a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, who gave him the name Shantidas (Servant of Peace). This experience profoundly shaped his life’s work, as he sought to bring Gandhi’s principles of nonviolence and social justice to the western world. Upon returning to Europe, he began writing and lecturing extensively about Gandhian philosophy, penning influential works including Return to the Source and Principles and Precepts of the Return to the Obvious.

In 1948, del Vasto founded the Community of the Ark (Communauté de l'Arche) in France, an intentional community based on Gandhian principles of nonviolence, self-sufficiency, and spiritual practice. The community, formed in an abandoned village high in the mountains of Languedoc, combined manual labor, meditation, and social activism, emphasizing a simple lifestyle that rejected industrialization and promoted environmental consciousness. The Ark became a significant center for nonviolent activism in Europe, particularly during the protests against nuclear weapons and the Algerian War. Members practiced organic farming, traditional crafts, and followed a disciplined daily routine that included prayer, work, and study. The community’s influence spread, leading to the establishment of several other Ark communities across France and other countries.

Warning

One does not learn to dance from a book.

Nor to meditate.

This is why it is honest to caution, as far as possible, against illusions, disappointments, and misunderstandings; reading this book will not be enough to receive the life teaching to which it relates.

What is also required is presence, guidance, encouragement or gentle restraint, the choice of the right moment, respectful attentiveness to each person’s uniqueness, and the warmth of friendship.

These things cannot be spoken, even less written; they can only be passed on by showing them, or by encouraging the seeker of truth to discover them on his own, within himself.

And then, the true subject of all this discourse is silence.

These words were addressed to the Companions of a Community, bound by vows and a rule of life, or to Groups of Friends living in the city among everyone else, or to both, mixed together in the Gatherings of great feasts or in summer camps, finally to troubled visitors, coming there to ask what to do with their life.

They were noted down and kept for years, circulating within closed groups through a bulletin titled News from the Ark.

It is not without hesitation that we present them to the uncertainties of publication. Nevertheless, we hold the hope that even an unprepared reader will find something true, good, and strong here, and that it will awaken in him the desire to know more, and especially to move into practice, to know better, to love better, to serve truth, justice, and peace more fully.

If he feels the call, he can always join our city groups, participate in our Gatherings, our feasts and camps, and perhaps engage in our non-violent campaigns and service projects.

This collection of notes is far from a systematic, methodical, and complete exposition of the teaching. Of the two main exercises, Fasting and Vigil, there is hardly any mention, only allusion.

Also part of this discipline are the Principles and Precepts of the Return to the Obvious, the Commentary on the Gospel (a collection of notes like these), and The Four Plagues, a study on the nature and destiny of civilizations, and on the civic duties of the inner person.

This teaching is not strictly religious. It does not oppose or replace any religious teaching.

We do not place ourselves above, nor against, nor beside, but below.

Our task is “to prepare a well-disposed people.” Revealed truths cannot sprout on the asphalt of common morals and philosophies. We are asphalt breakers.

A far humbler task, but essential, universal, and often overlooked.

This doctrine is not personal. Its value is out of proportion to the merits or demerits of the one who carries it. It is not something he gives from himself to his fellows; rather, he has given himself to it and lives from it, and he calls others to give themselves to it and to live.

What have we done? Planted and watered. “Neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who gives the growth” (I Cor., 3:7).

You will notice the Gospel quotations, the biblical allusions that fill these discourses. They could be even more plentiful. If one were to compile the scriptural references that confirm each point of the teaching, especially the most paradoxical ones, one could easily produce a volume equal to this one.

You will find quotes from sages who are not from our tradition. This should not lead you to conclude that it is a syncretic anthology of maxims, recipes, advice taken here and there. There exists a common ground in all traditions, of which each person can rediscover the evidences within himself, provided he submits to appropriate preparation. The dominant theme of the doctrine is the unity of life, and its fundamental nature is to form a living unity.

It is a living whole that holds to all aspects of life. It finds its fullest expression in the life of a living community rather than in a book. This is why one cannot take and leave from it without dismembering it and taking away its life.

By what sign will you recognize that you are called to this teaching rather than to another?

If, upon reading these pages, you think: “Bah! I already know all this!” you are correct, for these are simple, clear, self-evident things, and each should rightly believe he knows them. You would also be right to think that you should search elsewhere.

If, on the contrary, you say: “This is odd, it’s strange, I’ve never heard anything like this,” you aren’t saying enough. Instead, say: “This is scandalous, it throws everything to the ground!” In any case, this is not for you.

But if, in reading these pages, it feels as though you are following your own thoughts, if it is through your inner voice that this book speaks to you, if you not only understand these things but recognize them as good for you, and yet you are struck by them as something entirely new, if they not only give you a sense of novelty but also the feeling of being renewed yourself, then the sign is there, and it is a calling. Come, take, give, and act!

The Single Eye

You have noticed that we have a head. I hope you have noticed that, and a chest and a belly.

And you might say, yes, indeed, you have noticed that, and that you regret coming from so far just to hear things that everyone already knows. Encouraged by this approval, we shall continue with the course of our astonishing discoveries.

We will also note the position occupied by these three things: the head is at the top, the chest halfway, the belly below. From this, we shall draw a conclusion of great importance: that the head should be at the top, the heart in the middle, and the belly below.

You may say that everyone knows this, yet you still encounter many people who haven’t noticed it at all:

For example, those who place their belly above. Those who use their intelligence merely to fill their stomach. Those who reason with their belly and whose intelligence exists only to serve the belly. Hey! They are not exceptions, monsters, or fools, nor necessarily brutes. They are the great mass of people.

They are even very good people who love good things, who do good business, and, on occasion, perform good deeds. They simply have the misfortune of finding themselves with their belly in the air and their head down.

You might think that this position is uncomfortable, but to compensate for their misfortune, they have another one, which is not to notice it.

If you show them that it is a position of downfall, they feel offended; if you try to pull them upright, they get angry.

“Come now!” they cry, “What about common sense? Don’t you have a sense of Reality! A sense of History! Don’t you know that it’s the Economy that governs everything!”

Let’s also look at spiders. They, too, hang with their belly up and head down, and what beautiful webs they weave, and how the flies get caught in them!

Spiders and civilizations both create beautiful upside-down works! Admire the towers, the skyscrapers, the cosmic rockets, dizzying heights!

Dizziness, yes; height, no! They think they are building and rising, but in truth, they are disintegrating and sinking, and if you do not see it, beware! It’s because you, too, are looking at them with your head upside down!

But let’s return to the obvious from our first remarks: let’s put the head on top and start with it. Everything, says the Buddha, begins with thought. When thought is false, affliction follows, just as the wheel of the cart follows the steps of the ox.

“The eye is the lamp of the body,” says the Gospel. “If your eye is single, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is darkened, how great will be your darkness?”

The eye is made for light, and intelligence is made for truth. If it receives and expresses it, it fulfills its function and that’s all. But if it is in darkness and error, it is because it blinds itself or allows itself to be dazzled by false lights.

“Truth is inaccessible,” people say. I find rather that it is unavoidable.

You may lie, wander, rave, but you cannot prevent each element of your lie, error, or reverie from being true to some degree.

To be or not to be is not the question. Above, below, within, without — that is the question.

“But if your eye is single, your whole body will be full of light.” Be attentive to the translation of “single.” This teaches us that truth is a simple thing. For just as the eye is made for light, so is intelligence made for truth.

You seek the truth, do you say? How? By accumulating notions, by calculating, combining, by wielding complex arguments?

Lift your head and open your eye to the evidence of the light.

Do you see the light? Or only things and people?

If your gaze is constantly fixed on prey or obstacle, then you see things and people, but you do not see the light by which you see them.

Do not forget the shadow either, do not lose your shadow, the hidden one, the most hidden of all, the one who hides behind your eyes: yourself.

How?

How will you see yourself? Not, certainly, with your eyes, in the clarity of day; but if you see yourself, it is with the single eye, your simple eye.

Who?

The one who cannot be perceived by any other, the unique one, who, with a simple gaze, knows the inner eye fixed at the exact center, equidistant from all.

Where hidden?

Inside,
Behind,
Beneath.

The only thing you know from within.

The only introduction to the inside, to the mystery, to the substance.

The only thing that lets you know the inside of all things outside.

Yourself: the evidence of being, the witness of truth.

This truth cannot escape you if you seek it.

You have it, you are it. This is where the word of the Gospel shows its fullness: seek, and you will find; ask, and it will be given to you; knock, and it will be opened to you.

If you know nothing of yourself, you know nothing of anything or anyone, for it is through you, through you alone, that you know anything else.

If you know nothing of yourself, nothing has any meaning for you; your life has no meaning, your intelligence has no meaning; you are a fool.

If you are a fool, it is your own fault.

When your single eye has discovered the Self, it will show you the reality of the Other, of the Neighbor: you will see this other self.

Yes, both an Other and a Self.

Seeing it as other, your single eye will teach you the mathematical certainty of respect and justice.

Seeing it as a self, for it is a self as you are a self, as God is a Self who contains us all, you will have the certainty of love.

But others, tell me, do you see clearly that they are others, or do you believe that they are only there for your use, your advantage, or your pleasure?

Do you see clearly that they exist for themselves and for God?

Even your spouse is not there for you, O husband!
Nor your son for you, O father!
Nor your mother for you, O son!
Nor your friend, O friend!

“Why did I make the crocodile and the wild donkey?” God asks Job.

If you see in all beings only your use, your advantage, or your pleasure, others will remain hidden from you, and you will always ignore respect and justice.

If you see them as goods to be possessed or obstacles to be removed, you will never see them as a self, and you will always ignore love.

These three truths — the truth of Light, the truth of the Self, the truth of the Other — are but one truth with three dimensions: “So that you may comprehend the length, the breadth, the height, the depth...” says Saint Paul. The single eye grasps this in one gaze.

All else is false, vain, and bad. Every other kind of knowledge — concepts, definitions, calculations, abstractions, formulas, combinations, discoveries, systems, doctrines — are either ways of descending into the details of this truth, or they are false, vain, and bad.

Bad, because they are ways of distracting from the truth and losing it.

This truth must constantly be recalled as the first, as the condition of all truth. The other truths must be understood and ordered by this simple gaze, which in itself is truth. With this gaze established, all will have their place, even the most humble.

But if this gaze is lacking, even the greatest and most precise will lack purpose, substance, and direction.

Light or Truth or God,
The Self or Inner Life,
The Other or respect, justice, charity, non-violence, and active expectation of the Kingdom of Heaven:

In these three points lies all our teaching. First, our religious teaching, or rather, pre-religious, our introduction to all religious teaching.

In the second, our method of inner life.

In the third, our moral and social doctrine. But we are wrong to say our because it is not ours.

What are we, if not useless teachers who teach things known to everyone since always?