Holistic Religion Teaser: History Repeats Itself
More and more people capable of critical thinking refuse to believe in “God”. Many avoid religion. What’s left? Atheism.
Atheism tends to be hateful and lonely. If you’ve been hurt by morally corrupt clergy, no one would blame you if you opted to spend the rest of your life complaining about, resenting and hating religion. That’s your prerogative.
On the other hand, there is no need to be either hateful, lonely or deprive yourself of the comfort and structure of religion just because you don’t believe in “God”.
“Holistic Religion” – the book on which Holistic Church is based – is for people who reject faith in favor of reason. With that said, one of the chapters of the book explores:
- the concept of “God”
- creation and evolution
- who we are
- what is death
- what is Earth
Why would a book that introduces God-free religion explore these topics? Because it bothers me when people make mockery of ancient writings, including religious scriptures. Criticizing and ridiculing is easy. Searching for truth or new interpretations isn’t.
When it comes to ancient stories (including, religious stories) we forget a few things: humility, language and metaphors.
Believing everything wholesale is naïve.
Dismissing everything wholesale is arrogant.
Old tales contain a grain of truth for those who have the imagination and guts to look for it. (Many read Homer’s Iliad before and after Heinrich Schliemann. He was THE ONLY ONE who dared to approach it as a historical record which led him to the discovery of King Priam’s treasure.)
Language – like everything else – evolves in keeping with civilization. What does it mean? There weren’t, aren’t and can’t be words for things that don’t exist or are unknown to us. That’s why when language fails, we use – and have used – metaphors.
According to Wikipedia: “A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another.” Well, metaphors aren’t used for “rhetorical effect” alone. Sometimes, they’re used to describe things or events for which there are no words.
I’ll give you one example. Atheists on social media mercilessly disparage and even ridicule the Noah’s ark story. (“It could have NEVER happened”, they claim.)
How would you describe a bank that preserves the DNA of all living creatures on Earth to a peer? (One already exists. Several are in the works as we speak!). You might say that it is a type of a lab with a sophisticated long-term storage system.
How would you describe it to a 5 year old? A 5 year old isn’t familiar with the concept of a “bank”, leave alone “genetic material” or a “lab”, but knows what a sheep, dove or lion looks like.
Suffice to say, not that long ago, our civilization – and language! – was on the intellectual level of a 5 year old.
Taken literally, the Noah’s ark story is absurd. Viewed as a metaphor, it may not be.
Isn’t it conceivable – from today’s point of view – that it could be a historical event conveyed in a language a child or – primitive human – could understand?… Give it a thought.
Why did I pick the Noah’s ark story? Well, the Christian story is NOT original. The same story of a deluge and life-preserving ark can be found in other religious and non-religious ancient writings. There is a similar account in Mesopotamian mythology that’s nearly 1,800 years older. The name of the original “Noah” was Utnapishtim. The story itself is eerily similar and as we all know, where there’s smoke….
Why Noah’s ark? Because there were older civilizations on Earth than ours and they perished. History repeats itself while we often ignore messages from the past, instead of learning from them. Trying to understand (reinterpret?) ancient stories as our civilization advances could help us avoid repeating the same mistakes over and over again and hopefully, correct the course of OUR history.
Ridiculing ancient writings proves ignorance, not wisdom. Each time we revisit ancient tales we are better able to understand and / or interpret them.
I am not insisting that my interpretations are “right”. (They are merely explorations.) I’m insisting on not renouncing old writings before we are able to fully understand their meaning.
These explorations however constitute only a tiny fraction of “Holistic Religion”. Holistic Religion is “God”-free and faith-free; it doesn’t have a “dogma”. At its heart are ethical values, self-empowerment, empathy, and ecology.
The formation of Holistic Church followed the publication of the book. Ours is a Humanist Church and a community of individuals who share similar values.
Holistic Church supports self-empowerment and individual success, promotes ethics, suggests steps each of us can take to become more sustainable and counteract climate change, and A LOT MORE is on the way….