The Quiet Haven: An anthology of readings on death and heaven, compiled by Ian Bradley

Author: Ian Bradley. Review by Rosalind Smith

I am often influenced by the cover of a book. This was so with this lovely publication: the calm stretch of water, the single rowing boat beached on the shoreline, oars at the ready. It evinces a deep calmness and conveys a feeling of continuity and peace. It seems that this was the intention of the compiler, and is just what we need in these times of uncertainty.

Contributions are drawn from an eclectic body of thought, including some of the greatest minds of the last three thousand years, devout believers included. Those searching for a meaning within the mystery are encouraged to use our ‘God-given brains and imaginations to [explore] the possibilities of the afterlife’.

On the undisputed fact of death, and beyond, there are many different outlooks to draw upon and to ponder. Excerpts are taken from the Psalms, the Upanishads, Plato, the Old and New Testaments, and Marcus Aurelius, that wise old Roman emperor who advises us: ‘Don’t despise death; but receive it well-pleased, as it is one of the things which nature wills… Depart, therefore, contented, and in good humour.’ Wise words indeed! The Venerable Bede’s analogy of a sparrow flying through a house is no less powerful now than it was in 731, likewise with beautiful passages by Rumi 500 years later.

In all there are sixty pieces to delve into, including two by well-known Quakers. One such contains William Penn’s comforting words often used in funerals: ‘Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still… In this divine glass, they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure’. John Greenleaf Whittier, the US Quaker poet, best known as the author of the poem that was adapted into the hymn ‘Dear Lord and Father of Mankind’, is here represented by his poem ‘The Eternal Goodness’. His description of waiting on the shore beside the silent sea for the ‘muffled oar’ that signals death conjures up an image that has been employed since the ancient Greeks, and is still on the cover of this book.

Zhuang Zhou (c369-286 BCE) wrote that ‘We are born from a quiet sleep and we die to a calm awakening’. Much later, William Wordsworth says ‘Heaven lies about us in our infancy’ and ‘our noisy years’ of life on earth seem but ‘moments in the being of the Eternal Silence’.

The book abounds with messages of hope, many from times when death was a more present companion than it is now. There is a page entitled ‘Suggested extracts which may help in particular circumstances’. It addresses most of the questions and reflections we will encounter in later life, or in moments of doubt. This book would be a wonderful gift of hope and peace for the coming year. Lovely and uplifting thoughts from Kahlil Gibran serve as an ending: ‘And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered? Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.’

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