*Evolution*
God: Now I want you to transcribe how I created human beings and this land they inhabit. It's really quite a complicated process, so listen carefully. First, I had to design elementary particles, then instigate this complex process, which I will call for now, "Big Bang". Then when earth was fully formed, I had to make sure it was a conducive environment, namely by forming an electro-magnetic field that shields the earth, creating the atmosphere, etc etc. And then, there is the entire process of creating organisms and diversifying them through the process, which I will now call, "evolution".
Author: *Stares agape*
God: *In frustration* Fine, this is the truncated version - I created the world in seven days...The first day, I created heaven and earth, then I created light and darkness, etc etc.
Author: *Smiles* That makes sense! Genesis 1. In the beginning, God created Heaven and Earth....
*Marriage*
God to prophets: Now my enlightened prophets and children, go preach to your brothers and sisters about the virtues of unions - whereby my creations come together and commune among each other, beyond families and tribes, communities and cultures.
Prophets to others: Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, for this cause, shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
God to prophets: Halt! When did I endorse such exclusivity whereby unions only extend to a man and a woman?
Prophets to God: My Lord, throughout my life, I have only seen such unions, please enlighten us.
God to prophets: Every single creation of mine contains my spirit. When one finds that one's path is barren of light, my other creations can come forth and allow their spirit to illuminate the darkened path. Such unions are diverse. When one is young, one shall have the company of one's parents or caregivers. When parents leave the fellowship through death, detachment or abandonment, one would still have the company of one's peers. The latter type of union that extends beyond familial ties is so fascinating that it is hard to describe. It can be in form of a man and a woman, which you are familiar with, whereby the two share the burden throughout the journey of life. Though in the past, a man and many women form such unions as during such times, many women needed the aid of a man. And as humanity consolidates and as my creations socialise more among themselves, other unions such as friendship, might be equally, if not more important than marriage. When procreation ceases to be as imperative to growth, unions between men and men, or women and women would be more common. And as gender roles dissipate, the term men and women wouldn't even be applicable. I would also not be too surprised when there come a time when humans and animals or even machines form strong bonds.
Prophets: *Stares agape*
God: Oh nevermind! Preach as you wish, as long as you convey the virtue to contemporary society.
*Religion*
God to prophets: Now my children of many regions, preach to your community that the Gods they worship, fear, sacrifice for, and use as excuses to persecution are unreal. Tell them that I am the only true God, and that my values should be embraced.
Hebrew prophet: *In hebrew* He is the only true God, conducting any other sort of worshipping is commiting idoltry, and should be condemened.
Arab prophet: *In arabic* He is the only true God, pray only to Him or be punished in Hell.
God to self: Oh dear... *sigh*
-Testimony-
Bryan:
Perhaps I am committing blesphemy, but since the tenets of the major religions fail to help me understand the phenomena I see happening on earth, I had to develop a faith that does.
Interpretation:
*Evolution* - Science
The first conflict between religion and science which I learned of was between Galileo and the Church. All occured because the Church interpreted the bible with contemporary knowledge that they had, and hence claimed that the bible spoke for them and against Galileo.
Suppose that God created the world using solid science, he could not have conveyed such knowledge and wisdom to human beings who have yet to discover such knowledge, be it evolution to the people of the past, or some crazy theory to the people of the 21st century. Hence, how can one use the Bible to refute scientific discoveries when the Bible was written in the perspective of the authors who have yet to learn these discoveries?
*Marriage* - Values
Many of times, I've witnessed people using citations of ONE or at most TWO phrases in chapters of the Bible to substantiate an accusation - the decadance of same-sex love; the deprecation of females; the unrighteousness of abortion. And half the times, the usage of the cited phrases is not even germane to the message of the chapter itself.
If God were indeed against homosexuality, don't you think he would dedicate at least an entire chapter regarding the sin, instead of just a few lines here and there in different chapters which do not even pertain to same-sex relationships. There is not even a parable on homosexuality; just a few lines or even WORDS here and there.
As mentioned above, if indeed the bible was written in the narrow perspective of the author, should we not try to understand the values that God has asked them to convey instead of reading their words per se? Aren't words are just means of translating God's values in the mindset of the contemporary authors and hence skewed based on the knowledge of the contemporary authors?
*Religion* - Reconciliation
Like a few others, I feel that the main values of the major religions I see today are the same! Can you be so sure that the Christian God isn't in fact the Islamic Allah? Can you be so sure that God wasn't wise enough to send two or more messiashs to different regions of the world to preach the same values?
*End of annoying religious rant*
2 comments:
If the written religion we see today are but mere translation of their contemporary simplistic minds, then how r we sure which part is true and which part isn't?
With that in mind, you try to interpret religion in your own way. But if everybody does their own interpretation, there won't be any fixed values left coz all are for people to modify. Then what's the point of "religion"?
Maybe it's just for the sake of convincing urself that u have someone of higher order to fall back to. That's it.
Hi BMGF,
I proposed that written religious books indeed are mere translation of minds of contemporary author; but simplistic, they are far from!
Like most authors, they are conveying the experiences of their lives which is blessed by God and much wisdom can be attained from it. In fact, I view almost every life story as a story from the "bible", because to me, all lives are inspired by God somehow.
And I don't think I interpreted "religion", but I admit to constructing "faith" based on my understanding of life instead of basing my faith on the doctrines of existing "religions".
What's the point of "religion"? That's a very good question because I don't think there is a solid answer to it. In our contemporary society, different individuals seek different things in religion, and hence attain different things from religion.
But for me, "faith" serves the purpose of bringing the peace of mind to individuals, and help make this journey of life a worthy journey.
Perhaps having the thought that there is someone to fall back to does provide comfort, but I've never thought of God as a higher order. In a way, God has created the miraculous bond between and within human beings such that we can fall back on each other - my parents; my friends - or even ourselves.
Stealing an analogy from "latter days": if we were all small dots on a piece of paper, I would like to believe that we are all connected; and from above, these small dots make a cartoon that has meaning to it. And that is my faith.
Because thinking of the world otherwise - that we are all disconnected dots that will never come together - was quite depressing. But for the last 19 years of my life, I am seeing how dots are formed and gradually connected into lines and then made into caricatures which in turn form an entire comic; and it makes me happy.
So if faith makes someone truly happy; I don't see any harm of having it.
And indeed, to me faith is flexible.. And no two faith needs to be the same. What makes me happy might not make you happy.
It's kind of like, the connection between human beings - my parents and I; my friends and I - is a creation of "God". And without these miraculous connections; if they were all meaningless, I rather die. And I have indeed viewed it as meaningless once, but I guess now in retrospect, I was mistaken.
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