Blossoming Dawn

As I sit by this semi-creek, 

The time is ripe to have my speak, 

Regarding this autumn-spring of mine, 

Blossoming further as my spirits shine, 

Life is O so good. 

I taste its fruits where I do go, in what I read, write and do, 

I feel my time is coming nigh and the joy that will ensue. 

In this dawn of life I have no fear, I walk on orange clouds, 

My heart is unfettered, weightless, free – the grace of glimmering mounds. 

Friends and foes will come and go, but I will carry on, 

I’ve earned my right to wear my crown – in my summer’s dawn. 

 07/20/07

Science and Religion: The Case of Galileo

Science and religion are like two worlds from distant galaxies (or perhaps better, from different parallel universes) colliding into each other head on. The difference being that both planets would be destroyed. In this case, however, science lives on and grows to better humanity while increasing our understanding of the universe. Religion continues to perish in the rubble of its dead idols; one of the reasons being, that science invigorates and gives substantial hope, whereas religion deadens and offers nothing but fear and false hope. As Galileo said, “the increase of known truths stimulates the investigation, establishment, and growth of the arts; not their diminution or destruction.” Indeed, the arts, yes, but not superstition. How shrewd he was in his wordings, and how afire he was for the truth. He lived in times of great constraint and peril, yet he did not let this hinder him from continuing his immeasurably important work, despite threats coming at him from every nook and cranny.

Nowhere is the fierce opposition between religion and science better illustrated than in the Bible itself. Shortly after man and woman are created in the book of Genesis a stern warning resounds from the Almighty: that they may eat the fruit of any tree, except for the fruit of the tree of knowledge (Genesis 2:16-17). Was this forbidden fruit called the fruit of sin, of wrong, of evil? No. The “fruit of knowledge.” As Friedrich Nietzsche so accurately puts it in The Antichrist: “Thou shalt not know.” Knowledge and science expose religion as mythology, and religious texts as the word, not of God, but of primitive, ignorant men, who declared their writings holy – so no one would dare question them.

Galileo is a man who dared to know, and beyond the Holy Scriptures. He was brought to trial before the Roman Inquisition for verses such as Psalm 93:1, which incorrectly tell us that, “The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved,” and for the fable of Joshua 10:12-13, where God stops the sun, instead of the earth, “in the middle of the sky” for it to delay “going down about a full day.” Suitably, the strength of the trial turned out to be a forgery by the Holy Office. And it took the threat of the rack by these so-called holy men to get him to recant his vital and groundbreaking discoveries. Now, in Cristiano Banti's famous 1857 painting, entitled Galileo facing the Roman Inquisition, what do we see? Is it not a god being tried by men so utterly unworthy, but granted authority over him due to a book suddenly on the brink of becoming obsolete in the realm of facts and truth? And so he stands tall and proud with his head held high, for he knows he’s done absolutely nothing wrong, and is in fact the highest breed of man - being tried by the lowest. He brings promise - they leave decay. For science evolves, nourishes and emancipates, while religion stagnates, corrupts - and fetters.

Jesus Being a Pest, Yahweh Being a Prick

In Matthew 26:36-45, Jesus requests three times of his daddy, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." Some people just crack under pressure, I guess . . . even the son of God himself. But I mean, come on! Three times?! Talk about being a pest! I thought he was all-knowing, so why would he have to make that feeble request even once? Didn’t he know that it “must be”? Didn’t he know that he absolutely had to die for the so-called sins of mankind and that there was no way out? Didn’t he realize, especially by that stage of the game, that even his omnipotent father couldn’t get him out of that one? I wonder how the rest of that conversation would have gone . . . the third time round . . .

JESUS: Please, Dad?! Pretty please with sugar on top?!

YAHWEH: No, Jesus! For the third time! Now stop asking me!

JESUS: Please?! I love you!

YAHWEH: You love everybody.

JESUS: But why do I have to go through all this shit? I don’t understand.

YAHWEH: Because of those two naked idiots in the Garden of Eden. They ate some fruit that gave them knowledge . . .

JESUS: I already know that stupid story. Come on! That whole thing about Adam and Eve is complete bullshit! They didn’t exist. Humans evolved from Australopithecus afarensis. There is no original sin, whatever the fuck that is.

YAHWEH: Yes, Son, but the Homo sapiens don’t know that yet. You and I just know that because we’re omniscient and created everything in the first place, Einstein.

JESUS: I know that!

YAHWEH: I know that you know that.

JESUS: Right. ’Cause you know all, and you and I are one. I am you; therefore I know all as well. Since we both have the same mind, I know all that you know, which is everything, ’cause we’re the one true God!

YAHWEH: Right. So why are you talking to yourself?

JESUS: I don’t know.

YAHWEH: Look, can we get this show on the road, please? I’ve got a lot of things to attend to. You can’t escape your destiny, Son. The Scriptures must be fulfilled. Now grow some balls and do this thing.

JESUS: Are you telling me that I have to be mocked, slandered, tortured and killed in the most heinous of ways as a “sacrifice” for the innocent disobedience of two nonexistent individuals, who ate a nonexistent fruit, from a nonexistent tree, which transferred nonexistent sin through the loins of all mankind?

YAHWEH: Oh, I’ll throw them all into hell forever if you don’t do it.

JESUS: But hell didn’t even exist until I started talking about it!

YAHWEH: Well, you’re not talkin’ your way out of this one, Son.

JESUS: But why do you want this? It’s all a sham!

YAHWEH: It’s the only way I can keep from taking my fury out upon them for all time . . . by watching you suffer and die.

JESUS: Your fury upon them for what? They’ve done nothing wrong, and you're the one who created them in the first place!

YAHWEH: I created them because I couldn’t get the little buggers out of my head, and they tormented me because they’re so fucking smug.

JESUS: What in the hell are you talking about, old man?! I’m about to get the shit beaten out of me and my ass crucified to two giant slabs of wood, and you’re babbling like a goddamn crazy person!

YAHWEH: I’m sorry, my son...
But until I’ve seen you whipped and beat, I cannot handle man,
Until I’ve seen you suffer, I cannot show the love I am.
Until I see your blood flow, and hear you scream in pain,
Every good deed that humans do will always be in vain.
Until I see them mock and tear you, and rend your skull with thorns,
My only joy will ever be to make them wish they were never born.
I put you there to suffer in agony, moaning with every breath,
My sadism saves mankind with your gory, gratuitous death.
Trust me, my son, don’t be afraid, for you know that we are one,
I cannot be sated until I hear you say that “it is done.”
Indeed you’ll die and descend to Hell where you’ll see dreadful things,
But then you’ll rise and sit by me and together we’ll rule as kings!
But until I’ve seen you ripped and pierced, I cannot tolerate man,
Until I’ve seen you in horror, I cannot be the being of love - I am.

JESUS: (...)

YAHWEH: Well? Any other questions?

JESUS: Jesus fucking Christ, you are really sick! Just what the hell was that?

YAHWEH: What, you didn’t like my poem?

JESUS: No, I didn’t like your freakin’ poem! Just how nuts are you? What is this?! What's going on?!

YAHWEH: You asked and you received, baby. Just like you preached.

JESUS: What is all this, one big joke to you or something? What’s going on here? And why am I talking to you if I am you? And if I know all that you know, why do I feel the need to keep asking you things? And why can’t I understand one goddamn thing you’ve been saying all this time? Why can’t I wrap my head around this whole ridiculous, morbid, horrible plot of yours? You’re not my father! I’m not the son of God! You’re not even God, are you?! You’re just a crazy voice inside my crazy head! You’re not real . . . are you?! (Listens) ARE YOU?! (Listens) Hello?! (Listens) Hey! Where the fuck did you go?! Hello?! (Listens) COME BACK! (Listens) HELLO?!

07/18/07