The buildup toward war with Iraq has captured the world's attention through the international press, and it has elicited a flood of comment on all sides of the issue. Many accept the inevitability of war, while others make earnest pleas for a peaceful alternative. As political, diplomatic, and military strategies are aligned, war seems increasingly likely and the world is bracing for it.

But is war ever inevitable? Must explosive forces detonate? I do not believe progress requires that people be killed. Actions impelled by imperfect motives—such as selfishness, ignorance, hatred, greed, and arrogance—lead to suffering and death. But actions impelled by progress alone do not require death as a necessary concomitant.

What is progress? One dictionary defines progress as "an advance toward perfection or to a higher or better state." It is movement toward goodness, peace, intelligence, and brotherly and sisterly love. Mary Baker Eddy spoke of progress as "the law of God, whose law demands of us only what we can certainly fulfil" (Science and Health, p. 233). She also said, "There should be painless progress, attended by life and peace instead of discord and death" (ibid., p. 224).

Progress is certainly needed now. Appropriate steps of progress would result in an improved situation characterized by forthright dealings among nations, mutual respect among world leaders, kept promises, and adherence to international law. Real progress would lead to increased safety and stability in the region and a calmer situation overall.

There are instances where explosive situations have been defused before even one life was lost. One such example is the Biblical story of Abigail, "a woman of good understanding," (see I Sam., chap. 25) who single-handedly reversed the momentum of an army mobilized for war.

Abigail was married to Nabal, a man of great wealth. His immense flocks of 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats were in the pasturelands of Carmel near their home in Maon, to the south of Jerusalem. It was sheepshearing time, and Nabal's shearers were working their way through the flock. Sheepshearing was a joyous occasion—a festival—particularly joyous for a prosperous man like Nabal, for whom it would have marked another year of abundance. The wool that came from the shearing process was considered a gift from God.

Bandits roamed the region freely at that time, so shepherds working in the open fields were in constant danger of predatory raids. But Nabal's shearers were able to go about their work unmolested, thanks to the watchful care of David (the future king of Israel) and his men. David protected Nabal's shearing process, making sure that not the slightest loss was suffered by Nabal's shearers. They said, "The men were very good unto us, and we were not hurt, neither missed we any thing, as long as we were conversant with them, when we were in the fields: They were a wall unto us both by night and day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep."

At the conclusion of the shearing process, David sent a respectful assembly of ten young men to see Nabal with a message of congratulations, hoping and expecting to receive something in gratitude for the protection and goodwill they had provided. They had every reason to expect a good reception from Nabal. The Interpreter's Bible suggests that during the shearing festival, "owners were expected to be generous and hospitable."

But Nabal refused to acknowledge David's men. Instead "he railed on them." He called them runaway slaves. "Who is David? And who is the son of Jesse? There be many servants now a days that break away every man from his master. Shall I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed for my shearers, and give it unto men, whom I know not whence they be?"

Perhaps Nabal felt he had reasons for refusing to pay David. Maybe he thought David was an extortionist, pressuring Nabal to pay tribute money for protection he had never requested. It's also possible that Nabal, who was probably loyal to King Saul, felt that paying David would be tantamount to aiding a fugitive, and therefore treasonous.

Whatever the reason, his blunt refusal insulted and enraged David, who took immediate steps to retaliate, arming 400 men and setting out to destroy Nabal's compound. His intent was annihilation of Nabal's household and possessions, and "of all that pertain to him by the morning light."

Yet, according to the Bible, "one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife." She immediately grasped the urgency of the situation and began assembling an array of gifts for David and his men. She prepared, not money, but food: "two hundred loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and five measures of parched corn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs." Then, alone except for a few servants, she set out to meet the advancing army, encountering them in a little valley "by the covert of the hill."

It must have been an incongruous sight—one lone woman traveling with a few servants and pack animals approaching an army. It seems probable that they would have simply brushed her aside, or struck her down as they passed. It seems improbable that an army, bent on vengeance, would have slowed down or stopped.

But her courage, wisdom, and humility enabled her to stop this army—and reverse the considerable momentum that opposed her. She embodied enough love and humility to absorb all the egotism, hate, misunderstanding, and hurt feelings that had built up behind this army. And her message of peace touched David so deeply that he was completely relieved of the need to prosecute this war.

One example like this gives me the encouragement to know that goodness, wholeness, love, humility, care, and wisdom, expressed earnestly, can meet and defeat any amount of hate and fear and false ego. It can pour the oil of peace over the current world tension, or any crisis, and painlessly bring about a return to normalcy and calm.