Cry, the Beloved Country

I just completed Alan Paton’s classic, “Cry, the Beloved Country,” one of the most beautifully written and poignant pieces of historical fiction ever been written. I highly recommend it, both as a novel of faith and as a factual description of the urban-rural ramifications of South Africa’s racial divide. I’ve decided to include some extended passages from it, for Paton’s fictional description of apartheid is incredibly insightful. I hope this encourages you to go out and read it for yourself.

Stephen Kumalo, a native pastor and the narrator of the story, offers several prayers throughout his struggles: “And now for all the people of Africa, the beloved country. Nkosi Sikielel’ iAfrica, God save Africa. But he would not see that salvation. It lay afar off, because men were afraid of it. Because, to tell the truth, they were afraid of him… Yet men were afraid, with a fear that was deep, deep in the heart, a fear so deep that they hid their kindness, fierce and frowning eyes. They were afraid because they were so few.” “Cry, the beloved country, these things are not yet at an end. The sun pours down on the earth, on the lovely land that man cannot enjoy. He knows only the fear of his heart.”

Kumalo gives insight into the oppression of apartheid, but his witness is also a faith-filled invitation to salvation, a beacon of hope for those affected by racial injustice: “Who indeed knows the secret of the earthly pilgrimage? Who indeed knows why there can be comfort in a world of desolation? Now God be thanked that there is a beloved one who can lift up the heart in suffering, that one can play with a child in the face of such misery. Now God be thanked that the name of a hill is such music, that the name of a river can heal. Aye, even the name of a river that runs no more. Who indeed knows the secret of the earthly pilgrimage? Who knows for what we live, and struggle, and die? Who knows what keeps us living and struggling, while all the things break about us? Who knows why the warm flesh of a child is such comfort, when one’s own child is lost and cannot be recovered? Wise men write many books, in words too hard to understand. But this, the purpose of our lives, the end of all our struggle, is beyond all human wisdom. Oh God, my God, do not Thou forsake me. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, if Thou art with me.”

An interaction between Kumalo and a friend:
“-This world is full of trouble, umfundisi (Reverend, in Zulu)
-Who knows it better?
-Yet you believe?
Kumalo looked at him under the light of the lamp.
-I believe, he said, but I have learned that it is a secret. Pain and suffering, they are a secret. Kindness and love, they are a secret. But I have learned that kindness and love, can pay for pain and suffering… so in my suffering, I can believe.
-I have never thought that a Christian would be free of suffering, unfundisi. For our Lord suffered. And I come to believe that he suffered, not to save us from suffering, but to teach us how to bear suffering. For he knows that there is no life without suffering.”

A final prayer from Stephen Kumalo: “Yes, God save Africa, the beloved country. God save us from the deep depths of our sins. God save us from the fear that is afraid of justice. God save us from the fear that is afraid of men. God save us all. Call oh small boy, with the long tremulous cry that echoes over the hills. Dance oh small boy, with the first slow steps of the dance that is for yourself. Call and dance, Innocence, call and dance while you may. For this is a prelude, it is only a beginning. Strange things will be woven into it, by men you have never heard of, in places you have never seen. It is life you are going into, you are not afraid because you do not know. Call and dance, call and dance.”