The Jerusalem Experience

(An Interview Conducted by Ian Hay-Campbell)

What was your idea behind setting up the community at Jerusalem?

It would be a matter of need primarily. There was a really gross and obvious need for some of the people who are getting, as I would say, pulled to pieces in the towns to have a sanctuary, a place they could come to.

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Why Jerusalem in particular?

It’s a fair way from the nearest town to begin with. The Wanganui River is a sort of hidden area, or seemed so to me, an area where people go to the bush in a way. There are communities along the river and they live as other people do in the country. But it’s an old Catholic mission too and I’m a Catholic myself. It’s alongside a Maori pa, a possibility of learning something from the Maori side of the fence.

You once said a pakeha can have a Maori spirit if he loves Maori people. To what extent was your commune based on Maori concepts of love and community?

In the first case the Maori spirit, te wairua Maori, can belong to a Maori and to a pakeha. I’ve heard Maori people say this – it’s not just my saying it – not necessarily to a big percentage. But supposing you’re married to a Maori woman or you’re a pakeha woman married to a Maori man or you have some close friend, then you may see life through their eyes. That’s the point I would make, and an identification with the culture. I think race is nonsense – it’s only of importance to the racist – but culture is very important.

Did you translate these Maori principles in some way into the form of action at the community?

I often spoke of these principles. The two probably that I tried to go by most would be arohanui – love of the many, to show affection to one another, to be tolerant, to help people out of their hang-ups and so on – and manuhiritanga, the relation of the host tribe to the stranger or guest, regarding the community, say, as a host tribe in this sense. That they should open the door to anybody who came, give them a warm welcome, something to eat and drink, a place to lie down. This is the open-door policy. It undoubtedly meant that a lot would come there. They would know that it was the open-door policy but I think considering the highly inhospitable nature of our public and private life in this country, particularly in the towns, there is a tremendous need for this.

The life style at the community must have been very different from what people had experienced in society outside.

Vastly warmer would be one thing. Vastly more tolerant. A sort of easier movement, not having to go by the minute hand of the clock. I think that would be a big point. Less nerve-racking. The assets of the community would be mainly interior or invisible, as the relationship of people among themselves. The external assets, much less. The houses were oldish, we did page 398 renovate them and so on. The amount of money in the community would be small; it could be shared but it was still small. Enough, say, to pay the food bills and this would upset people who are very strong on the external assets. But I think the internal assets were the important thing. People who came for half an hour would get perhaps a negative impression of the community because they would say, ‘Oh this place is dilapidated, or there’s some rubbish here’, or ‘The people are in old clothes’, or something like that. But if they were there for a day to a week they went away nearly always with a positive impression because they had time to move into the relationship pattern of the community.

Were there any sort of stresses and strains set up within the community which were peculiar to it that people might have found difficulty adjusting to?

Yes, I think the commonest thing was that people would get used to a group that were there and then those ones would shift on . . . I’ve heard them say, ‘Oh it was all right when I was here last time but it’s not now.’ What is really meant was that they’d got used to the people beforehand, but if they stayed for a day or two they’d get used to the new ones. That’s what would happen. I’d felt myself too often a nostalgia for some previous point in the history of the community – then I’d get used to the new ones.

When somebody came into the community was there anything in particular they were expected to do? Could they do their own thing completely, or what?

No, there was nothing. There was no expectation in the sense you have to do such and such. My view was that work would have to be voluntary. The experience of many people in work in this country is quite disastrous. They may be working simply for money and sometimes in great boredom. In quite a number of cases the ones who came there would be working because they preferred working to going to jail. We have this dreadful law in this country that comes down from Tudor times, the ‘I. and D.’ Act – idle and disorderly. It means that if you haven’t got a job you go to jail. I think it is a tremendous restriction on human freedom. If people choose not to go to work and it is not harming anybody else in any obvious way, they should be free to do so.

The principle of sharing was presumably a strong one at the community. Did you find that the people who had no job there would tend perhaps to be satisfied to stay in that position and thus benefit from some of the others who were providing something?

Yes, you are putting in very gentle terms what some would put more strongly. They would say you must have a lot of bludgers and parasites here. page 399 I have said sometimes, yes, the bludger or the parasite is a jewel hidden in a pool of mud. And when they come here certainly they may come to depend on people. But then you give them a month or two and you will find they are moving into relationships with other members. They may be working on behalf of the community in one way or another. People don’t tend to allow for development – once a junkie always a junkie, once a criminal always a criminal and so on; or if you are mad then you are mad forever. I think this categorising of people is stupid. The community life itself had a dynamic effect. You find a great many people who come out of their shells and change their style. It takes longer with some than others.

What about the effect afterwards on them? Did you have people who were there who would perhaps regard it as a kind of holiday camp, who would leave the community afterwards with no visible, at any rate, effect of what they have experienced when they have been there?

There was an element of that in some degree with the younger ones who came briefly. I met some of them afterwards and found in fact the effect of the community had been considerable. At the time I might have thought it was only slight. Because of the open door policy you would at times have waves, say, in holiday times. I didn’t object to this. I was glad to see them but it would put a certain strain on the community and it meant it was fairly well in flux at those times. As far as the local people are concerned, they would tend to categorise and have a fear of what they saw . . . I am thinking not so much of the people in the pa but others along the River. The ones in the pa were more used to us.

Do you feel the attitudes of the people around you are obviously conditioned by their own views of society and therefore lack understanding of what you are trying to do at Jerusalem?

I think they had a lack of any intimate knowledge of the community because the ones at hand, who saw us daily, got used to us, realised that we were in some ways fairly ordinary, but the ones who were further away would fill in the blank from their fantasy, often a negative fantasy. I think Jerusalem was rather ordinary in many ways, but this doesn’t make news. The newspaper picture would be more sensational. You can make a lot out of the fact that some houses are dilapidated or that only some people are working or some might pair off, as they will anyway. You can make a lot out of that; you get a sort of sensational feeling of fear from it.

Despite that I presume you are disappointed that the community is now closed down?

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Yes, I felt disappointed but I tended to take it in a resigned fashion. Well, it is the will of God. There were some stresses within the community. No doubt it couldn’t continue indefinitely in that form. An open door policy can probably only be kept for a year or two. Certain stresses will come either inside or outside, principally because of the number who come. You have to realise that quite a section of the population is very restless, in great pain of mind, and looking desperately for some peace of mind. A thing like this draws them like a magnet draws iron.

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