Equal to Death

“Evil is whatever distracts.” – Franz Kafka

Perhaps war is not the devil's greatest invention after all.

Perhaps it is not war, for more prayers have been whispered on battlefields than in churches, and men have found more loyal brothers in the trenches than in their own homes.

And when a man stares death in the face, he becomes truly alive, even if only for a moment.

He thinks of life and regret, love and compassion, hatred and fear.

He wonders if God is real, and he repents just in case He is.

Perhaps war is not the devil’s greatest invention because it is war’s chaos that ultimately proves man’s darkness and his desperate need for God. And after his last breath is drawn, a tear is shed, a cross planted. And scripture is read in honor of the fallen, even if it is only mumbled.

No man denies the horrors of war.

For, when the thick stench of death fills the air, life seems fragile, and love becomes important.

When wails of the dying echo in his ear, man grows restless, searching for meaning, searching for purpose, and searching for God.

Perhaps the devil found war too dramatic, too shocking. He despised man’s ability to lose everything and yet still gain faith. And so instead of killing man, he decided to lull him to sleep.

Sleep is not atrocious. It demands no blood, no crosses, no prayers.

So instead of breathing the fires of hell upon man, the devil watches his eyes. He watches them closely as they dart from left to right and reveal man’s every desire. Then the devil fulfills man’s wishes.

The devil does not kill man; he coddles him. He removes from him the burden of wondering and questioning. He robs him of his spiritedness, life’s fire. He allows man to gorge on worldly pleasures, distracting him from all that has ever mattered.

He lulls man to sleep.

And now, while our forefathers lie buried in the ground with headstones ensuring their names live on, we lie buried in complacency and distraction. We lie buried while we yet breathe, chasing phantoms of status, pleasure, comfort, and distraction.

Is distraction not equal to death?

But no headstones are raised for the complacent, so names are forgotten.

No handcrafted wooden crosses are erected for those who have been lulled to sleep by the devil’s soothing song; no funeral is held; no scripture is read.

No faith is found; no brotherhood forged.

Is a life lived by accident not equal to death?

But no one smells the stench of it; no one sees the corpses pile high.

And those who succumb to distraction do not fight for one more breath, for they do not know that they are breathing their last.

Perhaps the devil’s greatest invention is not the war which rages on battlefields and in trenches, but the one that goes unrecognized within man. It is the war that sedates his mind, fulfills his desires, and renders him utterly useless and without direction.

And the devil unfurls his flag when we are distracted.

He plants it in our hearts when we grow complacent.

He claims victory when we drift off to sleep, allowing our lives to become void of all intentionality.

And everything we do becomes an accident.