"Good and bad are not some cosmic conflict, between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary code of beneficial and detrimental, the 1/0 of sentience." Nailed it
Your historical analysis of the pantheistic vs monotheistic roots of our current society is valuable. Given the fraught situation, I would rather you had used a word to introduce this piece that is more closely associated with the historical, ancient, roots of this topic. I think another term, such as Biblical, Abrahamic, for example, used to modify "Guardian Angel" might be more in keeping with an historical perspective. You are very aware of the power of words, and use them powerfully, and brilliantly at times. Consider the possibility that your use of the term "Jewish," which resonates for all of us with people of today's world, might not be a serious distraction from your point, stop people from reading it, and may even be inflammatory, especially at this time.
Thank you for the reading and advice, though I long ago gave up trying to communicate with people who get their knickers in a twist over every bump in the road. All the identity politics and words have to be parsed for every bit of meaning is just arguing over deck chairs on the Titanic. And the ship has seriously started to tilt and those chairs are starting slide off the side. Consider the woke crowd appears to be on the Palestinian side, while their elite manipulators are on the Israeli side. The curtain is getting torn.
I have a Jewish brother in law and my daughter's fiancé is Jewish, or at least his father is, his mother's family is from Panama. Basically he's Californian. Neither would qualify as Zionists.
So the people I'm trying to talk to are the ones still willing to think outside the boxes.
I certainly appreciate your position. I was thinking that there are still some out there who have not fully swallowed the kool-aid, yet are coming from a place where everyone around them has. I would want to be sure that I had taken every step that would allow them to go forward and explore new concepts. I take that to mean not giving them any easy excuses to turn back. That was where I am coming from on this.
I understand what you are saying, that I should try to reach as broad an audience as possible and there are a lot of people who might be willing to think it through, but naturally avoid the fights where the sides are intractable. My experience though, is these people are not cohesive enough to be able to do much more than agree and go back to what they were doing and I identify with that. I'm not terribly social my own self.
So I'm trying to explore those interfaces, of the people with attitudes, but not totally zombified about them. There are a lot of people with strong opinions, but are holding to beliefs that are going to blow up in their faces in the not too distant future and will be forced to start questioning their beliefs.
Basically just trying to sow some grass seed, for when the grass roots start pushing up through the carnage.
The future is a continuation of the past, until it becomes a reaction to it.
Maybe, but I believe writers should write and not care about being inflammatory. I think that is part of the problem, people are too worried about the feelings of others than the truth and working past issues for the betterment of everyone. The old way of viewing the realm, at east for me is pretty much over. No more blurred lines. It's only good vs. evil and the teams are comprised of many races, religions, institutions and countries. I know the team I try to be on and I don't care about the other team's feelings....period. The other team is not "playing," in the same way you don't play gang banging, boxing, bare knuckle brawling, full contact Karate, or MMA.
There are angels and assholes in every creed and color.
The problem is the assholes are devious, because they wouldn't live long enough to reproduce otherwise. While the Angels are clueless, because everyone gives them a pass, so they don't get educated.
" It's only good vs. evil " that is indeed the old way. It depends on why someone is writing, whether to inform, enlighten, entertain, vent, reach a wider audience for what you think is important, write to the choir, etc. I don't think it is a moral issue, it is what are you trying to accomplish and to whom are you writing? And these days, it's also how many trolls do you want to attract.
Everyone writes for different reasons agreed. The writing itself is the test as to its good or evil. One can write positive truths and such or lies, falsehoods 'n such. Or even just musings of nothingness, such as me. "F" the trolls, they amuse me. I never pay attention to anything that I can't touch with a finger, see with my eyes or hear with my ears. None of this "online thing" matters, not really.
John, I'm glad you linked this at NC (despite the rules ;) ). I've always enjoyed your comments over there, but didn't know you had a Substack. I'll drop by regularly now.
This:
Good and bad are not some cosmic conflict, between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary code of beneficial and detrimental, the 1/0 of sentience.
reminded me of The Tao te Ching's warning against falling into the right/wrong trap:
Everybody knowing
goodness is good
makes wickedness.
For being and nonbeing arise together...
Tao te Ching #2 (Le Guin rendition)
It's helpful to remember that monotheism, at least in the context of the Hebrew bible, was part of the attempt to rehabilitate YHWH as the national god of the Jews after the destruction of the temple by the Neo-Babylonians. The first two steps were undertaken by Jewish prophets in exile: Ezekiel has a vision in which YHWH survives the destruction of the temple (Ez. 10); and Second Isaiah asserts that YHWH is no loser god but is instead the ONLY god (Isaiah 40 et seq.). The third step was Ezra's putting the Torah and the histories together to lay the lame for Jerusalem's fall not on YHWH but the people of Judah for their unfaithfulness to him.
That history of Jewish monotheism explains why an understanding of the cosmos so contrary to the natural order arose. The religion of Ugarit, often discussed and condemned in the Hebrew bible, drew from that natural order with its eternal battles among the Sea (Yam), the withering East Wind of Death (Mot) and the life-giving thunderstorms brought by the Rider on the Clouds (Ba'al), is a good and proximate example. In the henotheistic context of the Ancient Near East, monotheism was the only way to save Judah's god after his seeming total defeat by Marduk in the heavenly realms while Nebuchadnezzar rolled over the Jews on Earth. Why the adoption of monotheism is often peddled as some kind of advance in human thought, it's really just a desperate move to preserve an ethnic identity tied to a particular god.
"Good and bad are not some cosmic conflict, between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary code of beneficial and detrimental, the 1/0 of sentience." Nailed it
Your historical analysis of the pantheistic vs monotheistic roots of our current society is valuable. Given the fraught situation, I would rather you had used a word to introduce this piece that is more closely associated with the historical, ancient, roots of this topic. I think another term, such as Biblical, Abrahamic, for example, used to modify "Guardian Angel" might be more in keeping with an historical perspective. You are very aware of the power of words, and use them powerfully, and brilliantly at times. Consider the possibility that your use of the term "Jewish," which resonates for all of us with people of today's world, might not be a serious distraction from your point, stop people from reading it, and may even be inflammatory, especially at this time.
Joy,
Thank you for the reading and advice, though I long ago gave up trying to communicate with people who get their knickers in a twist over every bump in the road. All the identity politics and words have to be parsed for every bit of meaning is just arguing over deck chairs on the Titanic. And the ship has seriously started to tilt and those chairs are starting slide off the side. Consider the woke crowd appears to be on the Palestinian side, while their elite manipulators are on the Israeli side. The curtain is getting torn.
I have a Jewish brother in law and my daughter's fiancé is Jewish, or at least his father is, his mother's family is from Panama. Basically he's Californian. Neither would qualify as Zionists.
So the people I'm trying to talk to are the ones still willing to think outside the boxes.
I certainly appreciate your position. I was thinking that there are still some out there who have not fully swallowed the kool-aid, yet are coming from a place where everyone around them has. I would want to be sure that I had taken every step that would allow them to go forward and explore new concepts. I take that to mean not giving them any easy excuses to turn back. That was where I am coming from on this.
Joy,
I understand what you are saying, that I should try to reach as broad an audience as possible and there are a lot of people who might be willing to think it through, but naturally avoid the fights where the sides are intractable. My experience though, is these people are not cohesive enough to be able to do much more than agree and go back to what they were doing and I identify with that. I'm not terribly social my own self.
So I'm trying to explore those interfaces, of the people with attitudes, but not totally zombified about them. There are a lot of people with strong opinions, but are holding to beliefs that are going to blow up in their faces in the not too distant future and will be forced to start questioning their beliefs.
Basically just trying to sow some grass seed, for when the grass roots start pushing up through the carnage.
The future is a continuation of the past, until it becomes a reaction to it.
I appreciate the discourse. All the best.
Same. Life is the connections.
Maybe, but I believe writers should write and not care about being inflammatory. I think that is part of the problem, people are too worried about the feelings of others than the truth and working past issues for the betterment of everyone. The old way of viewing the realm, at east for me is pretty much over. No more blurred lines. It's only good vs. evil and the teams are comprised of many races, religions, institutions and countries. I know the team I try to be on and I don't care about the other team's feelings....period. The other team is not "playing," in the same way you don't play gang banging, boxing, bare knuckle brawling, full contact Karate, or MMA.
Jean-Baptiste,
There are angels and assholes in every creed and color.
The problem is the assholes are devious, because they wouldn't live long enough to reproduce otherwise. While the Angels are clueless, because everyone gives them a pass, so they don't get educated.
" It's only good vs. evil " that is indeed the old way. It depends on why someone is writing, whether to inform, enlighten, entertain, vent, reach a wider audience for what you think is important, write to the choir, etc. I don't think it is a moral issue, it is what are you trying to accomplish and to whom are you writing? And these days, it's also how many trolls do you want to attract.
Everyone writes for different reasons agreed. The writing itself is the test as to its good or evil. One can write positive truths and such or lies, falsehoods 'n such. Or even just musings of nothingness, such as me. "F" the trolls, they amuse me. I never pay attention to anything that I can't touch with a finger, see with my eyes or hear with my ears. None of this "online thing" matters, not really.
At least not to me. Regards
John, I'm glad you linked this at NC (despite the rules ;) ). I've always enjoyed your comments over there, but didn't know you had a Substack. I'll drop by regularly now.
This:
Good and bad are not some cosmic conflict, between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary code of beneficial and detrimental, the 1/0 of sentience.
reminded me of The Tao te Ching's warning against falling into the right/wrong trap:
Everybody knowing
goodness is good
makes wickedness.
For being and nonbeing arise together...
Tao te Ching #2 (Le Guin rendition)
It's helpful to remember that monotheism, at least in the context of the Hebrew bible, was part of the attempt to rehabilitate YHWH as the national god of the Jews after the destruction of the temple by the Neo-Babylonians. The first two steps were undertaken by Jewish prophets in exile: Ezekiel has a vision in which YHWH survives the destruction of the temple (Ez. 10); and Second Isaiah asserts that YHWH is no loser god but is instead the ONLY god (Isaiah 40 et seq.). The third step was Ezra's putting the Torah and the histories together to lay the lame for Jerusalem's fall not on YHWH but the people of Judah for their unfaithfulness to him.
That history of Jewish monotheism explains why an understanding of the cosmos so contrary to the natural order arose. The religion of Ugarit, often discussed and condemned in the Hebrew bible, drew from that natural order with its eternal battles among the Sea (Yam), the withering East Wind of Death (Mot) and the life-giving thunderstorms brought by the Rider on the Clouds (Ba'al), is a good and proximate example. In the henotheistic context of the Ancient Near East, monotheism was the only way to save Judah's god after his seeming total defeat by Marduk in the heavenly realms while Nebuchadnezzar rolled over the Jews on Earth. Why the adoption of monotheism is often peddled as some kind of advance in human thought, it's really just a desperate move to preserve an ethnic identity tied to a particular god.