Paean to Peace and Yehudi Menuhin

With AAUW at Islamic Center

"Peace may sound simple - one beautiful word - but it requires everything we have, every quality, every strength, every dream, every high ideal."-- Yehudi Menuhin

In the early days of television and my adolescence I had a crush on Yehudi Menuhin. I'd sit enraptured when he appeared with his violin. I knew he'd been a child prodigy, but what impressed me most was that.he always looked so intense, so focused, and so transported when he played his violin. I hadn't thought of him in years, but recently I read that this stellar musician saw music as a way of making peace. He lived and breathed peace. His instrument served as an extension of himself.

"The violin, through the serene clarity of its song, helps to keep our bearings in the storm, as a light in the night, a compass in the tempest, it shows us a way to a haven of sincerity and respect," he wrote.

Yehudi Menuhin

Menuhin came back into my consciousness since I began a new quest to find ways to embrace peace. I've learned recently as well that the Hebrew word for peace, shalom, means more than just a cessation of warfare. When people greet one another with "shalom," they are wishing one another a integrated, complete and healthy lifestyle.

Shalom (Hebrew: שָׁלוֹם‎ shalom; also spelled as sholom, sholem, sholoim, shulem) is a Hebrew word meaning peace, harmony, wholeness, completeness, prosperity, welfare and tranquility and can be used idiomatically to mean both hello and goodbye.

 I've also learned another Hebrew phrase: olam chesed yibnaneh. This means "we will build this world with kindness."

In an effort to understand other faiths, I've been recently to the Sikh film festival at the Frida Cinema in Santa Ana, to the Islamic Center in Fullerton with many of my AAUW branch members, and to a Latter Day Saints organ concert in Newport Beach. I've attended several synagogue Sabbaths and several Orange County Interfaith Network events. I intend to attend more.

Later this month in London I plan to see the London Museum of Jewish Life and go to a Purim service at Westminster Synagogue.

And I'm listening to Menuhin once more. Here he is, playing the Concerto for Violin No 1 in D major, Op. 6: 2nd movement, Allegro spirituoso by Niccolò Paganini

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dagrn_9V4jE

Teaching technique....