Between The Act Of God And Art Of War I
“If you know your enemy and know yourself you’ll not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you know yourself but not your enemy, you’ll win one and lose one; if you know neither your enemy nor yourself, you’ll be imperiled in every single battle.”
The above quote was culled from the book titled, The Art of War, authored by Sun Tzu.
World over, the art of executing war is built upon insight gained from the above quote. Interestingly, generations after generations have defeated torn in the flesh battles by simply drawing wisdom and courage from this ageless and timeless nuggets.
An instance that underscores this fact was Spartacus slavery revolts against the feared Roman Empire supremacy in the 72 BC. Several protracted wars followed thereafter in order to quell the insurgency.
After series of lost battles, the Roman general, Marcus Crassus, was able to crack down on the insurgency by infiltrating the enemy’s camp. Among other successes attributed to the quote, no one can deny or underrate the potent power of this principle.
However, a few recent ancient books recently uncovered have proved otherwise. The ancient book and the most widely read Holy Book of Christians, Holy Bible pointed to this fact.
Syria and Israel were one of the powerful nations on earth that had a bitter hatred for each other. Thus, they both drew a battle line to settle old scores. The king of Syria mustered his troops and came up with strategies to defeat the nation of Israel, by ambushing Israel’s king.
But the plot was frustrated and leaked to the King of Israel, every time.
In desperation, he set out to find out the mole. Eventually, he found out from his loyal lieutenants that there is a fifth columnist intercepting his war secret plans.
Who could this be? ‘Elisha,’ they said!
Who was Elisha by the way?
Elisha was a powerful prophet working for the king of Israel, who neither had any military skill nor informant among the Syrians army.
So, what does he have?
Simply, he was a monk that had spiritual power due to his closeness to living God. (II King 6:8–20)
