ORIGINS of DISSENT, DISSENSION, DIVISIVENESS, DIVISION, BELLIGERENCE, CRIME and WAR
Like it or not, it seems increasingly evident to me that God [or “The Powers-That-Be,” if you prefer to call Him that] wants all the disparate racial, ethnic and religious factions in the world to AMALGAMATE.
I believe we BEGAN [or “emerged,” if you prefer] as ONE human entity, and then after The Fall [i.e. the beginning of envy, spite, malice, murder, vengeance, theft, rape, extortion and vandalism] began to split up more and more into divisive, brutally competitive, warring factions.
I also believe in EVOLUTION, and after many tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds-of-thousands, of years the different "races" gradually took on the characteristics we see today in response to the exigencies of climate, topography and the availability of natural resources, etc.
At any rate, no matter what I believe –– or what YOU believe –– it's pretty obvious that circumstances beyond anyone's control have conspired to bring about CONFRONTATION much of it hostile, destructive –– even murderous.
NEVERTHELESS, the ultimate result is BOUND to be a UNITING of whomever is left breathing after the next worldwide conflagration.
Humanity will then have a chance to start all over again.
I imagine this vicious cycle has already been repeated many hundreds-if-not-thousands of times already in the aeons we've existed on this planet.
No. Mine is not a "biblical" view in any strict sense, but I think it's quite realistic.
After all human life existed for untold thousands of years before the Bible ever came into being.
The flowering and demise of the Hellenic Civilization alone should teach all thinking people that the Creation Fable as given in Genesis and Exodus, etc. no more tells the whole story than any of myriad other mythologies. It is but a few stones in the gigantic mosaic that is The Ultimate Truth of Being.
ALL of us –– not just Islamaniacs –– need to be more modest about our beliefs and more curious to understand, and eager to learn more about Reality.
When the Arrogance and Adamancy of the Abrahamic faiths –– the parent of which is JUDAISM –– are finally replaced with Modesty, Humility, Curiosity and more gracious, accommodating Spirit, we might start at last to bring in The Millennium.
I believe we BEGAN [or “emerged,” if you prefer] as ONE human entity, and then after The Fall [i.e. the beginning of envy, spite, malice, murder, vengeance, theft, rape, extortion and vandalism] began to split up more and more into divisive, brutally competitive, warring factions.
I also believe in EVOLUTION, and after many tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds-of-thousands, of years the different "races" gradually took on the characteristics we see today in response to the exigencies of climate, topography and the availability of natural resources, etc.
At any rate, no matter what I believe –– or what YOU believe –– it's pretty obvious that circumstances beyond anyone's control have conspired to bring about CONFRONTATION much of it hostile, destructive –– even murderous.
NEVERTHELESS, the ultimate result is BOUND to be a UNITING of whomever is left breathing after the next worldwide conflagration.
Humanity will then have a chance to start all over again.
I imagine this vicious cycle has already been repeated many hundreds-if-not-thousands of times already in the aeons we've existed on this planet.
No. Mine is not a "biblical" view in any strict sense, but I think it's quite realistic.
After all human life existed for untold thousands of years before the Bible ever came into being.
The flowering and demise of the Hellenic Civilization alone should teach all thinking people that the Creation Fable as given in Genesis and Exodus, etc. no more tells the whole story than any of myriad other mythologies. It is but a few stones in the gigantic mosaic that is The Ultimate Truth of Being.
ALL of us –– not just Islamaniacs –– need to be more modest about our beliefs and more curious to understand, and eager to learn more about Reality.
When the Arrogance and Adamancy of the Abrahamic faiths –– the parent of which is JUDAISM –– are finally replaced with Modesty, Humility, Curiosity and more gracious, accommodating Spirit, we might start at last to bring in The Millennium.
As long as Pride, Self-Righteousness, Exclusivism and the militant ambition to DOMINATE and CONTROL prevail, our species will continue to live in man made Hell on Earth.
~ FreeThinke
Isn't there a book called The Browning of America? I haven't read that book, but I heard mention made of it.
ReplyDeleteBTW, have you ever seen these words from Abraham Lincoln?
Man is naught BUT prideful, self-righteous, exclusive, militant and ever seeking domination and control.
ReplyDeleteAs Nietzsche said, "the world is will to power, and nothing more."
Wait if you like for a second coming. You will die, ever waiting.
For "justice" and "wisdom" are opposed "virtues". Each, like the virtues of "temperance" and "courage" and much like the moon, simultaneously waxes and wanes in inverse proportions as cycles of time and periods of rotation complete. For it is only through knowledge of "difference" (not "sameness") that anything can be "known".
Perhaps like the Lady of Shalott, you mayest've spent too much time idling and looking out the tower windows at Camelot...
ReplyDeleteShakespeare, "Hamlet"
How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more.
Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and god-like reason
To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on the event,
A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward, I do not know
Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;'
Sith I have cause and will and strength and means
To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me:
Witness this army of such mass and charge
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
To all that fortune, death and danger dare,
Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honour's at the stake. How stand I then,
That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd,
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,
Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!
Male vs female principles. Courage vs. temperance.
ReplyDeleteNothing so orderly will happen. It will be messy entropy, a Hobbesean all against all...
ReplyDeleteWe've hit the apex and we're on the downhill side.
Yes, AOW. I am familiar with Lincoln's true sentiments regarding relations between the Caucasian and Negro races.
ReplyDeleteWhy not put it out here directly for everyone to see more easily:
Abraham Lincoln on Race Relations:
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races – that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality.
"And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro [sic] should be denied everything.”
~ Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) 16th US President
From the Fourth Debate with Stephen A. Douglas at Charleston, Illinois, September 18, 1858
(The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume III, pp. 145-146.)
Leftists along with many Conservatives -- both hysterical and puffed up with righteous indignation -- shriek and roar at me like wounded beasts whenever I denigrate Lincoln, whom I regard as the single most destructive influence in our short history, because leftists regard him as The Negro's Patron Saint, and Conservatives credit him with "Preserving the Union."
ReplyDeleteLincoln achieved but a Pyrrhic victory. His policy of wanton destruction produced more harm than good, and it opened the gates and paved the way for Tyranny to advance and ultimately take over a land founded in the quest for freedom and independence for the individual.
Truth often hurts, but it always heals at the same time. It's time we acknowledged it, and moved on to greater heights of Understanding and Accomplishment.
That said, I disagree with Lincoln on the matter of miscegenation -- just as i disagree with Leviticus on homosexuality and many lesser things.
The "evil" in these tedious, always nettlesome subjects lies in the way human beings have been conditioned by ancient tribal conceits and a long tradition of ignorance governed by tragic superstition to look at these perfectly natural phenomena with suspicion, resentment and murderous self-righteous intent.
Either we as a species amalgamate - OR - we extinguish ourselves in more and more conflicts at least as barbaric and ill-conceived as our Civil War but on a much broader scale.
~ FreeThinke
I, too have seen that Lincoln quote. In the context of that quote wouldn't it mean that the given reason for the Civil War is a lie?
ReplyDeleteActually, I've seen that argument as well. Lincoln and his handlers came upon the idea of the emancipation proclamation as the moral reason for the civil war and its atrocities when he couldn't get enough support for the war from the people.
How many valid reasons are there for the Civil War when the idea of emancipation is stripped away?
Religion always seems to arouse extreme emotions from almost everybody from devout religionists to devout atheists.I don't like to sound skeptical or cynical but as I've listened to some devout religious arguments over the years I hear more and more talk and detect the seeming blind embrace of literal biblical writings with the assertion that these are the word of God.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that God took the time to put pen to paper or parchment to enlighten the world but instead these are the words of mortals of mankind who assert they have heard the word of God—including Abraham, Moses and Mohammad. And I have great difficulty believing that a God in heaven would command one of his alleged creations to put his first begotten and beloved son on the butcher block to slit his throat to prove the unswerving love of the father for his father in heaven.
I'm not sure of the source off these stories but they are carried forward in the Christina religion which gets its origins from the Jewish religious writings of the Talmud and Torah.
Then, of course, the Christians go forth and propagate the idea that Jews are the "chosen people" of God. Why is that? And where has that brought us in the world today?
ALL of us –– not just Islamaniacs –– need to be more modest about our beliefs and more curious to understand, and eager to learn more about Reality.
ReplyDelete---------
I remember driving home from a Red Sox game with my niece.
We were talking about aging and I told her I think a critical antidote is to always keep the world interesting.
I have to agree , Freethinker, that religion is not an institution that promotes inquiry. That's not universally true but the Abrahamic religions are limiting.
But don't worry. Maybe the cosmologists are correct and it all expands to a point where a huge contraction takes place and we do it all again. BOOM !!
... a critical antidote is to always keep the world interesting."
ReplyDeleteDucky, if you mean by that being interested in the world, I would agree completely. Keeping the world "interesting" can also be done by methods much as we see today used by the media. I think that limits critical thinking individually since it becomes too easy to simply tune in to copy "the talking points" of the moment, while being distracted from the real issues and their fundamental causes and effects.
You took the thought right out of my head, Waylon.
ReplyDeleteIn my view we need to cultivate CURIOSITY while at the same time discouraging ourselves -- and others -- from MEDDLING.
Ducky, you seem to be at your best today. I'm glad to see you when you're not merely spewing snotty insults and regurgitating stale denigratory rhetoric.
I know you dislike Shaw, Waylon, but once again I think he hits the mark with this brief observation:
"All this struggling and striving to make the world better is a great mistake; not because it isn't a good thing to improve the world, if you know how to do it, but because striving and struggling is the worst way you could set about doing anything."
~ G. B. Shaw (1856-1950)
I never heard anyone say a word against Shaw, even hough we knew he was a Fabian, and also that at one time he attempted to start a movement to "reform" the English language by making purely phonetic spelling "official."
I happen to pride myself on having pretty well mastered the art of spelling and pronouncing our language properly. The quirks and oddities -- and even the inanities -- to me are an integral part of the identity of English. They enrich the language, make it possible to understand its history though etymology, and very frankly are just a lot of FUN to deal with.
That a profoundly gifted literary figures such as GBS would want to monkey around with the very thing that enabled him to reach great heights is one of those paradoxical phenomena that makes of life always something of a mystery.
At any rate, I thank GOD the language is not yet reduced to a "easy-to-learn" sort of CLODSPEAK.
Bu, let's not belabor the issue of Shaw. The negatives that have recently surfaced about him I learned from Glenn Beck -- himself so clownishly eccentric and hyperbolic a figure as to perpetually mar his own credibility -- even when I know POSitiVELY that he speaking the Truth.
~ FT
FT,
ReplyDeleteLeftists along with many Conservatives -- both hysterical and puffed up with righteous indignation -- shriek and roar at me like wounded beasts...
Ain't that the truth!
Because of all the vituperation in the blogosphere, I'm not blogging as much as I used to. I can't take all the conflict -- and, as you can surmise -- I'm not one to avoid conflict.
Until that conflict eats away at my soul, that is.
Lincoln was a white supremacist -- and that's a fact that few want to face.
ReplyDeleteEvery time that I bring up Lincoln's views on race in any of my classes, everybody gets all pissed off.
I, for one, don't believe that any President was a saint. Not even Washington or Reagan. That statement from me also pisses off people. So be it.
Interesting musical selection, FJ, but I think I prefer the version by Loreena McKennitt, if I want a musical interpretation of Tennyson's poem.
ReplyDeleteI consider myself very fortunate to have been able to afford the luxury of remaining inside my castle walls peering through the windows -- not at "Camelot" so much but at the cruelty and the more hideous events others have had to suffer with throughout history.
You may enjoy Tennyson's account of historic slaughter and conquest–––'tis a decorous, romantic way to portray violent aggression, rather like Delacroix's "Liberty Storming the Barricades" with bare breasts and head held high–––but I rather doubt you would have enjoyed taking part in the carnival of carnage Tennyson evokes in words of mythic splendor.
As for me:
I'd rather dine on Havilland-Limoges
Than hurl a javelin for a Doges.
Delicate viands decorously consumed
Beat being slashed, then crushed and doomed.
Why is it "manly" to yearn to die
In blood soaked mud 'neath a pitiless sky?
~ FreeThinke
Well, AOW, wouldn't you rather look at Washington and see a "saint," than have to put up with imbeciles who publicly refer to Barack Hussein Obama as "Our Lord and Savior?"
ReplyDeleteI don't believe in letting myself be "offended." Currently we are ruled -- hamstrung would be a better word -- by a new religion I call "OFFENDISM."
However, referring to this arrogant BASTARD we've been stuck with as "Our Lord and Savior" comes very close to qualifying as "offensive speech" to my delicate sensibilities. ;-)
You're right in your understanding that men and women -- even those who've done great things -- are not "saints" in the sense that sainthood demands perfection in every aspect of human interaction.
I doubt if any of the officially recognized saints were truly "saints" by that high standard either.
The best one could hope for in this life would be to dedicate oneself to striving toward an ultimate form of good that can never be attained all the while knowing your quest to be hopeless.
That in my never humble opinion is the task which all of have been assigned. It's a pity that too few bother even to try, isn't it?
~ FT
FJ, I have to add here that, while my admiration for Shakespeare knows no limits, I have always regarded Hamlet -- the character not the play -- to be an insufferable ass.
ReplyDeleteBut then, I think that of most who feel they have a bounden duty to wreak vengeance on evildoers. That's GOD's business, not OURS.
As Lady Macbeth said, "What's done cannot be undone ..."
True enough, so when dreadful things happen, 'tis best to feel gratitude for having survived, then do one's best to forget the horror and injustice, and MOVE ON.
Yes sir, I am that most despicable of all human beings -- a live coward -- and above all a PRAGMATIST.
If life hands you a lemon, don't sit in the curb and cry, "But I wanted an APPLE!" Get off your duff, go into the kitchen and make LEMONADE. Drink and express gratitude for it, even if you're not particularly fond of that particular beverage.
Consider yourself lucky that no one is forcing you to drink HEMLOCK at sword's point -- then PRAY that they never do.
~ FT
Loreena McKennitt, eh? Funny or strange coincidence you mention her. Her music is pretty amazing and since it's the season for many of her songs it reminds me I should dig them out and play the CD's for the Christmas season.
ReplyDeleteShe now lives in a smaller city not far from where I live in London, Ontario. But even more coincidental she was born in the same small town in southern Manitoba which I was born in. She's a bit younger than I am and I moved away from there when I was about 18 years old. After I left her parents were nest door neighbours of my parents for a while.
And, AOW, most people become irritated and unpleasant whenever the suppositions with which they are most comfortable are attacked or challenged.
ReplyDeleteIt's why we Conservative-Libertarians feel virulent hatred for Gramsci, The Frankfurt School, Freud, Alinsky, Emma Goldman, Samuel Gompers, Edward Bernays, and latter day iconoclasts and muckrakers such as Noam Chomsky, Seymour (Sy) Hirsch, Howard Zinn, Susan Sontag, William Rivers Pitt, and Greg Pallast, et al.
I should add Conservatives WOULD hate these people, IF they knew anything about them. Most of us have been kept ignorant until recently about the true role these types have played -- and continue to play -- in our undoing.
Most of them deserve just what Julius and Ethel Rosenberg got, but we are too kind a people to put an end to our enemies. We fight them limp-wristedly with feathers and tepid, equivocal rhetoric while they use bombs, machine guns, cunning deception and virulent invective.
~ FT
An amazing set of coincidences, Waylon!
ReplyDeleteFJ linked a musical version of The Lady of Shallott, which I thought pretty good, even though that kind of music normally doesn't interest me very much. Then, I just happened to see Loreena McKennitt's name for the very first time. It was also linked to The Lady of Shallott, so I thought, "I'd better give that a go while I'm at it," and liked what I heard.
Small world, isn't it?
~ FT
I learned of her through the mummer's dance.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful woman, isn't she?
ReplyDeleteI like the misty, mystical Mediaeval Celtic aura the video evokes -- except for the emergence of a modern accordion which sort of breaks the spell.
The music is hypnotic, soothing -- but too simple to be interesting for long to a devotee of Bach fugues, et al. like me.
~ FT
I'm a fan of the subject matter.
ReplyDeleteQuinlan Road is Loreena McKinnett's own label. She controls the production and marketing of her music herself. She started from scratch taking her harp to a weekend market in Toronto. People started requesting copies of her music which she recorded on tape as she started out.
ReplyDeleteShe does have a huge fan following around the world.