Our Story of Separation and Control
Introduction to a trilogy of the crumbling foundations of an old, old story
The Trilogy is listed at the end discussing the 10 Commandments, the Inspiration of the Bible, and the afterlife of punishment or reward.Some people think that a myth is a story that has been told for many years that is not true. That is the current vernacular usage of myth that ignores its roots. A myth can be true or false. That really does not matter. What makes a myth is the impact it has on people’s lives individually and collectively (or culturally). A myth is any micro-narrative and macro-narrative that shapes culture, forming its values and beliefs around it. Generally, it is behind the scenes, under the surface, often unconscious and submerged, part of our automatic conditioning, our confirmation bias, our echo chamber of self selected sameness; and thus takes a lot of research and reflection to get to the bottom of it.
It is important to examine the stories that we tell ourselves so that we understand what drives us and forms us. Each of us have our own unique micro-narrative or story or myth that has shaped us and those we are close to. And each culture has its own macro-narrative that is the story of a people, that forms and shapes its values, beliefs, religion, politics, fine arts, and all of its creative expression. It is important to know that underlying story. But it is even more important to understand, not only what story is beneath the surface driving and forming us, but to understand what is further down, beneath the surface of that story.
“Until you make the unconscious conscious,
it will direct your life,
and you will call it fate.”
(Carl Jung)
"I asked myself, 'What is the myth you are living?' and found that I did not know. So... I took it upon myself to get to know my myth, and I regarded this as the task of tasks... I simply had to know what unconscious or preconscious myth was forming me." (Carl Jung)
Most people understand that in our western culture, the Christian religion has been highly influential in shaping the western hemisphere for 2000 years. So that means it is sort of etched in stone. But that also means, it is never really questioned. On the surface of the story of Christianity there are many many questions and contradictions, but we have been taught to gloss over them and never really ask the hard questions. We just walk on eggshells around the established order; heaven forbid we disrupt the status quo. It can be brutal to be labeled a questioner or a doubter or a skeptic or an outcast. I wonder why that is. What are we so afraid of? It is almost as if we were afraid to get a real answer, it might explode in our face, our head may explode, or our head may implode by cultural stoning due to our unbelief or something.
But why is it that Christianity took root so strongly? What is it about our world that so desperately needed the Christian story. There were many other stories of many other gods that were considered to be more powerful than the god next door. History shows us that Christianity’s tremendous growth came on the back of the power of Empire. And what did those powers-that-be need in order to sustain itself? They needed control. And how do we control people so that the masses would be guaranteed to comply? We use fear to divide and conquer. The powerful of that time needed to create and maintain separation (divide) so that they could control (conquer) the world.
There are many theories about the origin of the Christian story. Some say it was all based on real stories and real people. Another theory says that it was made up by the rulers of that day to control the masses. Caesar’s Messiah is based on a body of research that says that the story of Jesus was invented based on the history of Caesar in order to pacify the people. The actual Roman world was occupied territory with Roman soldiers maintaining control and submission. So why is the world of Jesus so peaceful? Why is the message of Jesus also so peaceful and loving? Proof Romans Invented Jesus Christ - The Flavian Signature
This theory of religion was loosely confirmed by Karl Marx who said: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."
A very intriguing theory of the theology of the bible is that there are multiple gods that are followed throughout the bible, the "word of gods". In the beginning was Elohim, the creator god that in many places referred to himself as us. So it appears there may have been a crew of gods with their many hands that actually created the world. These gods made us in their image and also proclaimed their work to be good by looking over their creation and proclaiming it to be "very good". Biblicists say "us" was a reference to the trinity. But the trinity was not even conceived of by theologians until about the 4th century AD. There are references throughout the Old Testament of other gods warring with each other and using the military power of different countries to prove how powerful these gods are. I'm curious what constitutes one god being one nation's god and another god being another's. Was there an assignment of gods for the sake of war? Or a competition? Anyway, back on point. The gods called Elohim was the creator but was also the god that kick Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden due to them wanting to gain the knowlege of good and evil. That started a downward spiral to their management skills as we see the tower of Babel when the gods were afraid of how powerful man was becoming, so they confused their languages so that mankind could not keep getting more intelligent and hence more powerful. But apparently, this did not work for long. So Elohim took the very decisive move of flooding the whole earth killing them all... except for a small family and some animals that couldn't swim. That was a great solution until people started to populate the earth again. The gods then found out that is truly is people that are the problem with all of the competition, possessiveness, and wars. It seems to me that the gods called Elohim were fading in their power, authority, and popularity until king Jehovah stepped in.
When you read the old testament, there is clear shift of deities at the time of Moses and the 10 commandments. Notice that the first several commandments refer to all the other gods and condemn anyone that worships any of those other gods. At that point, the most powerful god (in his own eyes at least) is Jehovah. Now there is not any plural "us" in Jehovah. He is consistently the one god. Actually, this is the first time that the concept of monotheism appear on earth. Check out the extreme violent and jealous attributes of this god in Behold Thy God. As this Jehovah god began to lose his significance and power, fading slowly into the cultural background, then came the god of the new testament, the father of Jesus. Now this is a god that seemed to have grown up according to Jesus. It is at that time that the Trinity emerged, dividing one god into three giving Jesus his position as an equal to god. This threesome is peaceful, loving, forgiving, and willing to kill one of the three, his own son, for the sake of sinful man. Hmm.
Another way of looking at what I’m questioning is this: At one time, human understanding of the world and the universe was that Earth was the center and everything revolved around us. Part of that belief was that the Earth was flat. What grew out of this limited knowledge and understanding was the idea that the whole universe revolved around us as human beings, because all mankind could see is this perspective. In a universe of 400 billion galaxies that is 93 billion light years across, and this only refers to the observable universe, somehow this whole thing was created for mankind alone as some sort of entertainment of the gods. As we grew up as human beings, we realized that the Earth is not flat, the universe does not revolve around the earth, and all of universal history and the attention of the gods does not revolve around us tiny human beings. What an inflated view of ourselves and what a waste of space, literally! Did you know that there are approximately 10,000 stars in the universe for every grain of sand on earth? https://oklahoman.com/article/5622020/more-stars-than-grains-of-sand-on-earth-you-bet
As I continue to examine, day after day, year after year, the underpinnings of the old old story that I clung to for 60 years, here are more than a few thoughts about its foundations that are crumbling for me leaving me unable to continue to build my story on sand.
If the universe does not revolve around the earth then why do we continue to think that the story and history of the universe revolve around us puny humans??? Why do we continue to build our lives on this thinking and beliefs??? These are people that also thought that sickness comes from demons without any knowledge of germs and that slavery is good.
A Trilogy of Crumbling Foundations
(Based on an Old Old Story of Separation and Control)
For more:
The Underpinnings of Faith: https://livingwithopenhands2.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-underpinnings-of-faith.html
Sold Out: https://livingwithopenhands2.blogspot.com/2019/11/sold-out.html
Fragmentation or Wholeness: https://livingwithopenhands2.blogspot.com/2020/06/fragmentation-or-wholeness.html
Breaking Free From the Story of Separation:
https://upliftconnect.com/breaking-free-from-the-story-of-separation/
Check out these for more perspective:
Humans in a Vast Universe: https://youtu.be/kJ4MJ7QJ2A4
How small are we in the universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYQ3O8U6SMY
Tiny Humans, Big Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYhKblvWjKk
No comments:
Post a Comment