Collected Works of Kahlil Gibran Book Review by Ndiritu Wahome

In my entire life, never has an author communicated to me so profoundly in his works as Kahlil Gibran. In my observation, the best thing that has ever happened to the world of literature was when the Lebanese writer, Kahlil Gibran, decided to dedicate his life to being an author. An outstanding poet, a marvellous short story writer, a chaste spiritualist, a God-given mysticism, and a philosopher, Kahlil Gibran’s writings are like nothing I can compare with. In my opinion, he is among the greatest writers to have ever lived on the face of the earth. The most chaste and in touch with the human soul and spirit. I am elated to have read his works. My heart has bled oftentimes with both intense felicity and deep sadness that I have found myself wiping tears while perusing the pages of his great works, especially on cold lonely nights and breezy chilly mornings. I love him. I adore him. I pay allegiance to his wisdom, wit, ingenuity, and ideas. I am deeply honoured to write this review of his works.

The Concept of God, Christ, and Ishtar in the Collected Works of Khalil Gibran

In this collection of more than 600 pages, 12 books are covered. They are a combination of volumes of poetry and short stories. These include; The Prophet, The Wanderer, Sand and Foam, The Madman, The Forerunner, The Earth Gods, Nymphs of the Valley, A Tear and a Smile, Between Night and Morn, Secrets of the Heart, Spirit Rebellious, and The Broken Wings.

One of the most dominant themes that are carried across the works of Khalil Gibran is the supreme idea of God, which is illustrated through the teachings of Christ, Jesus of Nazareth. It seems the author was deeply influenced by the teachings of Christ and emulated His purity and goodness in his stories. He talks about the human soul and spirit, and what it means to live an upright moral life of righteousness in a world tainted by sin and driven by greed, hate, arrogance, deceit, and deception.

The theme of supreme moral uprightness as stipulated by the wisdom of Christ comes out finely in the book of Spirits Rebellion, in one of the stories, Khalil the Heretic. The author uses his name as the main character, a young monk Khalil, who is banished from a monastery in Northern Lebanon for preaching the writings of Christ. After noticing that the monastery was taking advantage of the poor peasants under the rule of Sheik Abbas, he confronts the monks with the gospel of Christ and rebukes them for their misdoings. This sees him being shown the door on a cold winter night after being prisoned for days in the dungeon.

The Sheik, who is considered a Prince, owns all the farming lands in the region and the poor villagers work all year round. They are compensated with small portions of the harvest that can barely keep them away from starvation.

In this story, the author mirrors himself acting as a martyr, only that the main character Khalil is not killed. However, after being banished from the monastery on a heavy snowing night, he is rescued from the pangs of death by Rachel and her daughter Miriam. Days after he recovers, the Sheik hears about his survival and sermons him to his palace to be prosecuted under the allegations of preaching a gospel of rebellion. He is taken into custody and presented before the Sheik and his companion Father Elis. The villagers surround the Sheik’s palace to witness the judgment.

Khalil stands proudly and addresses the crowd. They listen to his words and see not only sense in his words but the truth that the Sheik, Father Elis, and the monks, who live in abundance in the monastery, have all been benefiting from the toil and sacrifice of the villagers. The villagers do all the menial work, but the results go to these people. After Khalil’s speech, the crowd and the soldiers of the Sheik refuse to listen and obey his orders. In the end, Khalil is released. Henceforth, nobody neither listens nor obeys the Sheik. The story ends with the death of the Sheik and the end of the dark days of slavery. This story shows us that at the end of it all, in life, goodness always triumphs over evil.

The concept of Ishtar, the goddess of love and beauty is brought out divinely in the author’s testament in the last story of this collection of Kahlil Gibran works, namely; The Broken Wings. The main character Gibran falls in love with Selma Karamy, the daughter of Farris Effandi, a teenage friend of the late Gibran’s father. For the first time in his young life at the age of eighteen, he deeply falls in love with this young girl, and their days are spent in utter happiness and enchantment. This, however, does not last long.

Northern Lebanon is a region that is under the heavy patriarchal of the church, and no one dares to go contrary to the presiding Bishop. As such the fate of Selma is sealed by marrying Mansour Bey Galib, the nephew of Bishop Bulos Galib. Selma’s father accepts this reality as going against the church would make life impossible both for him and his daughter.

The motive of Bishop Bulos Galib to have his nephew marry Selma is to acquire the fortune of her wealthy father after his demise. And indeed, these two things unfold. Selma is married to the Mansour and soon enough her father dies. Gibran is heartbroken, but not more than Selma as her husband neither loves nor cares for her but spends his time indulging in pleasure with sluts and drinking alcohol. She becomes sad and forlorn. Unable to keep up with her toil, she starts a love affair with Gibran and the couple meets up once a month in a secluded temple dug out of white rock surrounded by olives, almonds, and willow trees between Beirut and Lebanon. Here both lovers seek refuge in their love under the pictures of Ishtar, the goddess of love and beauty sitting on her Phoenician throne, surrounded by seven nude virgins standing in different poses and Christ nailed on the cross, and at His side stands His sorrowful mother, and Mary Magdalen weeping.

In this temple, the two lovers indulge in their love until one day in June Selma breaks off their relationship. The reason behind this breakup, she informs her lover, Gibran, is that Bishop Bulos Galib has found out about her goings and comings out of the palace and has since started to investigate her whereabouts. She fears what Bishop Bulos Galib will do to her lover Gibran once he finds out about their love affair. For that reason, she sacrifices her love and happiness with Gibran. Her lover implores Selma to reconsider her decision and for both to run away into a distant land and start a new life, but she declines. That is the last time they see one another.

Five years later, Selma becomes pregnant but dies together with her child when giving birth. On that day Gibran is heartbroken. He sinks into utter miserly. The following day Selma is dressed in her wedding dress and put into a coffin. She is buried on top of her father’s grave.

The Idea of Love, Betrayal, Death, and Rebirth in the Collected Works of Khalil Gibran

One of the dominant themes that Kahlil Gibran has covered in his 12 books is love, betrayal, death, and the idea of rebirth, or what is known as reincarnation. These themes are vibrant in all the books. As a magnificent poet, Kahlil captures the theme of love beautifully with scripted language that vividly captures the emotions and feelings of love.

The story of The Dust of the Ages and the Eternal Fire in the book of Nymphs of the Valley, which is set in the Autumn, of 116 B. C shows the themes of love, death, and reincarnation finely. Nathan, the son of the priest loses his beloved wife to the pangs of death. He suffers greatly. He cries onto Astarte while prostrating on the floor of His temple begging Him not to take the life of his wife, but she dies all the same. Before the wife departs, she says to him, “I am going, my beloved, to the meadows of the spirits, but I shall return to this world. Astarte brings back to this life the souls of lovers who have gone to the infinite before they have tasted the delights of love and the joys of youth… We shall meet again, Nathan, and together drink of the morning dew from cups of the narcissus and rejoice in the sun with the birds of the fields… Farewell, my beloved.” She dies. Come morning when people come to console Nathan, they do not find him. Days later when a caravan from the east arrives, its leader relates how he has seen Nathan far off in the desert wandering in sadness.

Centuries later in the Spring of A.D 1890, in the plains of Baalbek in the evening, Ali l-Hussaini sits down on the ruins of a temple as he grazes his flock when he feels a strange sensation overtake him. Suddenly as if in a chimera, a memory overlaps him, and he sees the Astarte temple as it was centuries ago. He sees everything as it was back then when he was alive. Nathan’s spirit overtakes Ali l-Hussaini, and he is reincarnated in his body. An intricate emotion of love engulfs his heart, and he no longer understands himself. He rests for the night lost in alluring memories of love.

At dawn break, he walks about and drives his flock to graze on the rush meadows as he rests near a brook. Suddenly, he sees a beautiful maiden fetching water with a jug on the river. She cries in enchantment and throws the jug to the floor upon beholding him and with gusto, she stands back just the same way when one sees his beloved. Quickly Ali crosses the stream and embraces her, kissing her passionately on the lips, neck, and eyes. She welcomes his kisses and drowns in his thirst and desire for her. They walk under the willow trees flowed by the sheep until they reach the end of the valley.  She starts, “Astarte has brought back our souls to this life so that the delights of love and the glory of youth might not be forbidden us, my beloved.” The memories of how Hassan lost his wife to death capture them and once again they relive their love in absolute happiness and contentment.

Khalil Gibran has a powerful way of telling stories using rich poetic language that enchants the human heart with different elation. He brings out the theme of betrayal and death in most of his stories. For instance, in the story of The Bride’s Bed, in the book A Tear and a Smile, these two themes are brought to the light when the bride, Lyla, kills her lover, Saleem when he refuses to run away with her to a distant land from her bridegroom on her wedding night.

The genesis of this tragedy has been brought about by a lie that was propagated by Nageebee to Lyla that Salem had fallen in love with her and beguiled her to marry her cousin. Lyla falls for this lie and marries Nageebee’s cousin only to learn later that all of it was a plot between the two and a colossal lie. She becomes desperate when she sees Salem in her wedding procession and cannot wait to talk to him. Indeed, around midnight she manages to send one of the maidens, Susan, to go tell him to meet her in the garden under the willow tree, to confess her sins.

Lyla implores Salem to take her back and they ran away in the shade of the night, but he declines her offer. She is devastated as a result removes a small knife under her wedding dress and stabs Salem. As he fights for his life, she screams to draw attention to the merry-making crowd. The music stops and the crowd moves about her. In the view of everyone, she cries out, “Come, you cowards! Fear not the spectra of Death whose greatness will refuse to approach your littleness, and dread not this dagger, for it is a divine instrument that declines to touch your filthy bodies and empty hearts. Look at this handsome youth…. he is my beloved, and I killed him because I loved him…he is my bridegroom, and I am his bride.” She drives the same dagger into her body and falls next to Saleem. She raises herself and kisses his lips, and both die together.

The beauty demonstrated in this story by the author touches and moves me to tears. The act of betrayal that Lyla pulls of killing Salem and then turning to herself is the most heartbreaking deed possible on the face of the earth. How can she kill her beloved? How could she betray their love to the pangs of death? This is one way of looking at it, however, the other is that she chooses to be selfish and kill Saleem and herself rather than live a life of imprisonment in a sham marriage full of aches and pain away from Salem. She chooses to set both free in an act of pure selfless love that cannot be tainted or controlled by the hands of humanity. Her act is an embodiment of purity and chasteness. Her act is the highest form of love that has often been talked of and idealized but not many people can achieve this feat.

I think that if there is a place called heaven, I would love to meet Kahlil Gibran and talk to him in person. To let him know that his works have made a major impact on how I view life. I think very highly of him, and I would wish to master his craft in executing the art of storytelling. I thank you Khalil Gibran wherever you are, and I hope that I will meet you someday!