In the Beginning was the Word.
I think that here's a clue to the real meaning of religion that gets lost in the shuffle.
Two thousand years ago(a little less) the story of Jesus was a great leap forward in thinking.
As always, there are 'forces' allowing progress and 'forces' holding us back.(but from ''what " though?)
That's it though isn't it? We all live in the present and can look at 'mankind' or society through the eyes of an author of some book.
The forces keeping us back(from what?) are parental, the early mind-model that your mom and dad taught you. (Basically, 'here are our mind-models, slightly used, but servicable'.)
As you 'grow', battling through the 'hormone stage', being an organic 'model' too, with IT'S wants and needs, your streaming consciousness has to weed out the insane from the even more insane (sometimes such is 'free-will').
Think of it, if we imagine all the 'thoughts and ideas' of EVERYONE, what a stinky soup of boobs and cocks and hatred, lust and calculus and Jesus and magic and.. everything all mushed together.
In your streaming consciousness you, only you can make the decision to put all your money in an envelope and send it to me! (you have the ability!)
No, what I mean is that only you 'get to' build your mind-model as progressive, hopeful, forward-looking OR parental, harking back to mythological 'good ol' days'.
What I'm trying to say is that evolution has gone 'mental'(not insane) and 'the Word' is how we are trying to infect each other with the 'virus' of magical thinking or evolve our mind-models to embrace 'beyond religion'.
The Word, i.e. communication beyond 'mama said "be careful out there", is how we're evolving NOW.
But I think that the message from the past, the Old and New Testaments are crippling remnants of parental guidance gone wild, the path of the theist is a dead end, stuck in the duality that parents NEED to use as simple explanation to their children. A voice from the past.
If that means anything to you.
11 comments:
I think you have hit on at least part of the issue here.
Each of us goes through "evolution" from the moment of birth. We initially call it "childhood", later we call it "growing up", still later "maturation", and, it seems to me, all of it is really "becoming civilized". If one looks at this process as "civilization", that is, the acquisition of certain understandings or life skills demanded of us because we have no choice but to exist in a society, it becomes much more evident that you are correct in positing that we are all still evolving in both the macro and the micro senses of those words.
Ergo, we naturally start out accepting everything our parents, teachers, and other senior "tribe members" tell us, both directly and by observation of their behavior. It is no wonder, then, that many of us, often brought up in households with a particular religious or philosophical bent, come to "believe" as early childhood taught us to believe.
How difficult is it to later decide on one's own recognizance, to abandon or modify these learned behaviors later in life? I suggest extremely so. If we add to all of this the likelihhod that such changes in belief are usually met with negative responses from the very society we grew up in (usually including our parents, teachers and clergymen), it appears that relatively few of us will have either the desire or the intellectual curiosity to explore other ideas.
"Two thousand years ago(a little less) the story of Jesus was a great leap forward in thinking." Undoubtedly so, and, if it has any historical reality, we should not be surprised by what happened to Jesus and most of his followers. I find it very easy to understand (whether I agree with these actions or not) how and why both the Jewish establishment of the time and the Romans found Jesus' teachings either blasphemous or against the best interests of the Empire.
The messages of the Old and New Testaments only become crippling if one cannot see them as alegorical "guidelines" to help us properly respond to the demands of our (modern) society, which themselves have continued to "evolve" since scripture was written. As a result, those of us who not only "believe" in scripture, but cannot allow our understandings of it to evolve to help us respond to modern societal needs are doomed (as is so well demonstrated by MIW and Observant)
to being square pegs in round holes for our entire lives (unless, of course, we isolate ourselves as much as possible to limited societies that agree with our personal beliefs).
...crippling remnants of parental guidance gone wild,..."
I'm about to cripple my child right now!!!
grrrr... ;-)
Couldn't you say that for this cultural atheism as well? Except its duality isn't predicated upon mom and dad.
But your right about coming back down to the parents. I also agree with Harvey's opinion about the courage it takes to break free from that cycle.
Word.
*you're
Yea.
Exactly Harvey.
Stacy, I'm not recommending violence here. Just FYI.
oneblood.
What?
13 year olds are very obnoxious.
Besides - I couldn't hurt him ... he's bigger than I am. :-)
I don't remember what I was trying to say. My brain is tired, normally I'd try to recall.
I'm avoiding doing a lot of philosophy right now, I just want to have a beer and sit on a porch in a rocking chair admiring a sunset.
Since that's not going to happen, I'm posting on an atheist Scotsman's blog.
Cheers pboy.
Well, enjoy your brew oneblood.
Stacy.. beat him with a stick! LOL
"In your streaming consciousness you, only you can make the decision to put all your money in an envelope and send it to me! (you have the ability!)"
ROFLMAO!
Hold on...
What's your address? I got 63 cents in me pocket...
Ed, the Power of God commands you! (or at the very least forces heated air into a sealed container of fake blood which in turn is forced through the 'tearducts' of the God's eyes!)
63 cents!?
Look on the bright side, all you need is a slot machine and some luck! :-s
Sure ya can Stacy.
You've got to be meaner, not bigger. I tell my 14 year old son that frequently :-)
Wel, that and, " You know what your biggest problem is son? The fact that I'M your Dad !"
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