Spencer Heath Archive

Item 222

Taping by Spencer MacCallum from conversation with Heath.

No date

     Once upon a time a traveler on a business trip from afar to the town of Jericho depended too much upon the government of the land through which the road lay to make their country safe for him to travel in. It so fell out that, in addition to the customary exactions from foreigners by the government itself, he was beset by unofficial persons who robbed him of his goods and abused him sorely in his person.

     It came to pass as he lay prone by the way, his goods spoiled and his person abused, some of the leading bureaucracy of the land passed by. These official persons, however, felt no obligation to give him any relief. Then came some high churchmen, who likewise felt no sympathy for the abused and bereft, and they likewise walked on the far side of the road. And then there came to pass a much inferior man, a man of dark: skin and of low estate, much shunned and neglected by the high and worthy of the land. But this person of poor favor and low condition had no delicate sensibilities impelling him to travel on the other side. He descended from his donkey, bent down over the prostrate form, administering first aid, then lifted it upon his beast and took the injured person to an inn, where he gave him further comforts at his own expense and left instructions with the landlord to give him further care and send the bill to him.

     Now when this story got abroad, a great question arose. Who was neighbor to him that fell among thieves? Remember, now, that the only permanent resident in the neighborhood was the landlord. Almost all that was done for the injured person was done by the landlord; all the others were passers by. We strongly suggest that the function of being a neighbor could not have been performed by anyone else. The kind benefactor was himself a traveler. And the high official persons of course had Important duties — far away. So the landlord was the only one left in the neighborhood of either the honest travelers or the unauthorized thieves.

     The holy writ from which this tale springs gives no answer to the question, “Who think ye was neighbor to him who fell among thieves?”

     Now the landlord was the only one who was prepared on a permanent basis to give the needed comfort to the bereft and abused. The high officials, of course, had no lack of means, and the means at hand of the good Samaritan were limited; they could extend no further than the bottom of his purse. As a philanthropist, he had none of the enduring reality that the innkeeper had. But he, poor man, desiring to be of true and permanent use and goodness to his fellow man, did not see how he could join up with the landlord and other owners of the land to provide a safe and proper road on the way to Jericho. He had a social conscience, but it had not evolved to the point of cooperation with the landlord, who exercised none but social power and had no political or coercive power for doing either good or ill. So our good Samaritan could find no way of becoming useful to his fellow men but to go to the great university and there take a highly stylized course in social science and social service. This of course was costly to him, but it made him eligible to become an official benefactor and establish himself with his muniments of official office to give government relief to such travelers as might again be abused by thieves whom the political rulers of the land left at large upon the way.

     And so it came to pass that many travelers were so sore beset, first by the official agencies and powers and then by those who were in theory but not in practice outlawed that by the time future travelers arrived at the official relief station they were indeed sore depleted of their liberties and goods.

     (Now here’s where you could tell about the headaches the traveler had in getting public relief, and then when others observed him getting relief they, too, pretended to be injured travelers when they were not. The good Samaritan at his official desk had many problems to solve — making many of them liars and cheats. Now the higher-ups who kept him in office had to have votes to keep themselves in office, so they had to make terms with the cheaters — many of whom were organized in great unions — to keep them voting right.)

                                      /Breaks off/