Touch the devil and you can't let go!

The “Running Man” former Agriculture Undersecretary Joc-Joc Bolante is humiliating the Filipino people. He is playing a joke on all of us. True to his nature as witnessed in the past years, he has been trying to get away from it all. First he skipped the Senate hearing and ignored every warrant issued to him by leaving the country in 2006. It’s a good thing the US authorities nabbed him down. Now that he is back, we can’t even pin him down to tell the truth.

The powerful and almighty easily get away with the law, with corruption, with malpractice, with whatever you want to call it – simply put, doing the wrong things. And the irony of it is that they still believe that what they are doing is right. Our statesmen should get back on track to work for the common good and to show the world that crime and punishment is alive and kicking in this country.

Albert Einstein once said, “The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.” The secret power of evil is already working in the world today. Let us pray that our Administration, the Senate and Congress work to stop the power of evil that is harming the innocent and is thriving on human suffering.

I have chosen to print this classic piece written by my father, the late Maximo V. Soliven entitled, Touching the Devil, a caution to all that indeed the power of evil is alive and is in our midst.

“Does the devil exist? My friend Fouad Achour, Egypt Air’s charming and irrepressively bouncy Regional Manager in Manila, assures me that, indeed, he does. Many years ago in Cairo he met a fantastic old wizard named Sheikh Muhammad. There was a sort of party in the Sheikh’s house, and the host looked at Fouad shrewdly up and down and smiled: Do you want to test my power?

The young Fouad gulped and nodded. Very well, the Sheikh said. Take a deck of cards, go to the other end of the room and shuffle it. Then peep at a card and memorize it. Don’t show the card to me. Fouad did as he was told. The party progressed. Fouad was afraid Sheikh Muhammad had forgotten all about the ‘demonstration.’ Suddenly, the Sheikh confronted him and casually remarked: Oh yes, your card! He motioned at the ceiling. Look, young man – there it is! Fouad looked up. Sure enough, the card he had memorized was up there – stuck to the ceiling before his startled gaze.

Another test? Sheikh Muhammad gently challenged.

When Fouad nodded, the Sheikh instructed him: Get a piece of paper. Write down the three most important questions you have about life. Don’t show the questions to me!

Fouad complied. Whereupon the Sheikh directed him to crumple the piece of paper into a ball and set it on fire. When the small sheet of paper had burned to ashes, the Sheikh told Fouad to take the ashes into the palm of his hand, enclose them in a fist and then bring the ashes over to him. The Sheikh muttered a few words and ordered: Open your fist. Fouad looked down at what he held in his hand: it was the same piece of paper with his questions intact in his own handwriting – and underneath each line, scribbled in a strange hand, were the answers to every question.

And you know Fouad recounts today, everything that was said in the answers came true!

Fouad was awed and exclaimed to Sheikh Muhammad: Allah! It is the power of God.

No, the wizened Sheikh laughed, shaking his head. It is the power of the Devil. You see, I work for the Devil.

The Sheikh is dead now: gone to his rest to wherever Old Devils go. But Fouad has never found a rational explanation for what transpired. Can you?

The cynics in our society will, of course, have a ready quip to accompany this tale. You don’t have to go Cairo to touch the Devil. All you have to do is look at the front pages of our newspapers to know that the Devil is alive and well and living comfortably in the Philippines.

There is some truth to this. The Devil is everywhere. Lucifer he was called in our own ancient belief, the Brightest Angel until God struck him down and banished him from heaven at the point of St. Michael’s flaming sword. But, as God is eternal, the Devil – along with the other Angels who were not banished – is immortal. The struggle between Good and Evil which existed before the beginning of time continues.

The Indonesians in their village Wayangs, those shadow plays with leather or wooden puppets reflected on a white sheet screen, which start at dusk and end only at first glimmer of dawn, celebrate it. In the Wayang Kulit, Good always triumphs over Evil. The Indonesians enthusiastically applauded the happy ending, and then go off to work in their fields and in their office: back to reality.

In the real world, alas, Evil is seen more often to triumph over Good.

President Manuel L. Quezon was also much concerned with the Devil but in a roundabout way. He was the one who made the famous and furious declaration: I would rather have a government run like hell by Filipinos, than a government run like heaven by Americans!

We don’t dwell at this point on whether he got his wish. The important thing to remember is that the Americans were so harassed by his constant rages, his nagging and his side remarks, that they finally resolved to let the Philippines go, perhaps, if only to get rid of Quezon.

Quezon, on the other hand, was no less tough on his fellow Filipinos. He loved his people but fumed at any signs of weakness, backwardness or vacillation on their part. He kept on writing kilometric letters to his friend Teodoro M. Kalaw: I think I shall throw all politics out of my window as soon as I finish my present political commitment… A politician’s road is strewn with thorns and thistles. That is not the kind of life I long for.

Is the Philippines ready to go to the Devil? We’ve touched the Devil surely – but, contrary to that old proverb, we still can let go.”