Living in the Land of Silence

Quite often I forget that I have the use of all my senses. For instance, I pay little or no attention to what it would be like not to be able to hear. My wife reminds me that I have indeed lost most of my hearing, especially when she wants to gain my attention. And it is true—I have a slight hearing loss, but nothing critical, at least from my viewpoint. Yet what would it be like, I wonder, to live all my life in "the land of silence"? What would it be like if I had never heard the birds singing in the early morning or the first words of my baby daughter or the dramatic sounds of Mozart's symphonies?

The psalmist writes, "If the LORD had not been my help, my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence" (Ps. 94:17). Without the help of the LORD he would become like a deaf person. This verse and those surrounding it seem to describe the land of the deaf, the land of silence—alone, afraid, filled with cares, surrounded by evil and wicked people. In this land no one speaks, sings, plays music, laughs, shouts with joy, yells in victory. All is silence.

In 1971 German film director Werner Herzog produced a documentary about a deaf-blind woman named Fini Straubinger. He follows her in the film as she visits numerous people in the deaf-blind community, people struggling to live with their disabilities. I commend to you clips from his film on YouTube. It is called The Land of Silence and Darkness ( Land des Schweigens und der Dunkelheit).

As you view these people, consider what it would be like for you. Learn the meaning of compassion and care for what they face. How can we assist them?

And consider again what the psalmist writes: "If the LORD had not been my help, my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence."