I just watched a fascinating show on the Valley of the Kings in Egypt on one of the cable “science channels.” Like many of their programs, it was an hour program with a half hour of content and another half hour of recapitulation, but that is another issue.
A comment made about one of the pharaoh’s tombs was that all of the questions the great king would be asked on his trip to the underworld were written on the walls along with the answers he/she would need to give to successfully make it through the gauntlet and into the afterworld. The trip apparently is aboard a boat and various gods and demonic functionaries would be the inquisitors.
The thought I had (please realize that I took a class in ancient near eastern history (as an elective) in college as I found (and still find) the topic fascinating), was that “who comes up with all of this bullshit?” I know of no recorded historical case in which somebody came back to life after being genuinely dead to tell us what would happen. (A Republican might call that a “legitimate death.”)
And it seems every religion has its share of absolutely batshit crazy stuff in its holy scriptures.
It seems that every culture has a substantial quota of bullshit artists: shamans, priests, ministers, high holy ones, etc. who will fill in the blanks, even if no blanks are evident. And, as an extension how is it that Christians think that all of those other religions and gods (there are thousands of gods in the historical record) are bullshit, but their stuff is gold?
I guess denial is not just a river in Egypt, it runs through the after life, too.
“legitimate death”… Priceless!
Here’s how i put it in a post ages ago: [in the last 6,600 generations] 17 billion unique human beings have been born, walked the earth, and have subsequently died. 17 billion and not one of those 17 billion have ever returned to the earth or managed to get some message back to our biosphere to confirm the existence of some ethereal netherworld beyond. Understandably, there will be those who say, “Hang on, Jesus did!” “Horus did!” “Dionysus did!” “Krishna did!” “Mithra did!” “Baal did, and so did Melqart, Adonis, Gullveig, Eshmun, Jarilo, Kaknu, Attis, Tammuz, Asclepius, Orpheus, Persephone, Ra, Dumuzi, Osiris, Kali, Zalmoxis, and even Lazarus too!” To these people I can only point out the intrinsic difficultly for a fictional character – be it Spiderman, Colonel Kurtz, Jesus or Dionysus – to re-join the living when they’d never actually left the living in the first place…. Now, I’m not a gambler, for from it, but 17,000,000,000 to Zero are terribly long odds against any narcissistically inspired afterlife.”
Comment by john zande — February 2, 2013 @ 3:26 am |
As an editor and writer myself, I must comment that you really do write well. Were it that many people read as well as you write. As a retired educator, I had great hopes for the power of education to transform lives and while it does do that, it looks like stupid is still holding its own.
Consider this a “legitimate compliment.”
Steve
Comment by stephenpruis — February 2, 2013 @ 8:30 am |
Comment by john zande — February 2, 2013 @ 1:25 pm |
Thank you. I, too, had some good teachers but didn’t become a good (not great) writer until I worked at my craft with no little intent to do a good job. It does take work which is what I was praising you for. Nobody I know learns it all on their own, but you do need to learn much of it on your own.
I often was asked if I were an English teach, which I considered a compliment . . . even though most English teachers are awful writers. (One assumes English teachers would all be good writers but writing is just one of many skills in an English teacher’s toolkit and not all are at all accomplished. Sometimes knowing too much about the process of “sausage making” can lead to some inedible results.
Cheers!
Comment by stephenpruis — February 2, 2013 @ 9:05 pm |