Some years ago, at a conference for County Ecumenical Officers, an aid agency led a session. It's a long time ago and I can't remember the name of the agency or the theme of the talk. However, they told a story and I do remember that.
Somewhere in Africa, food was scarce and a woman had no meat to feed her children. She had a large clay pot with a lid and filled it with water. She picked some herbs and placed them in the water, put the lid on and set the pot on the fire. She told her children the pot was full of meat and so they were not to touch it and that she was going to look for some herbs. She placed another pot on her head and set off. Soon she came to a clearing and found a dead buffalo. It was freshly killed and she knew that because a lion was eating it. She hid in bushes and considered what to do. She took the ring of plaited grass she wore on her head to carry the pot and threw it a long way into the bushes. The lion distracted, ran after the disturbance and the woman quickly threw dirt on the buffalo. Lions will not eat dirty meat and so after it returned the lion soon left the meat. The woman waited and then cut off the meat she needed, washed it in a nearby stream and placed it in her pot. Upon returning home she added the meat to the pot on the fire. There was more than enough meat for the meal and so she also fed all the childrenin the neighbourhood.
The aid agency asked what we thought the story was about and the usual sort of conversation followed where the lion was taken to be the West and so on.
It was only after the session that the meaning of this story dawned on me. That is why I have remembered it. The point of the story is in the very last few words. The woman finds meat after considerable adversity and then gives most of it away. Why?
The answer is self-interest, not altruism. Tomorrow, another woman might be lucky enough to find a lion. She will do the same and feed all the children. This is the mutual sharing practiced by communities that survive.
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