Light Fantastic!

We see, therefore it be!

But what are we truly seeing?

When Sun comes to budge, and the Moon floats up above, why is it that all escapes from me?

What is this light that reveals the world? Is it truly divine, or is it an act of Nature?

Is it mine to grasp or is it heretic to savor?

Leave me be- what about God? I thought his spirit was a light that never turned off?

How is it that I'm still enveloped in the dark?

Why is it, then, that I can manipulate His art?

Why is it then, that his light ceases to be, when the walls come crumbling down upon me?

Our relationship with light had always been one of reverie. Light gave us reality, for so much as it would reveal. Without light to show us the path, we would hopelessly be blind in the darkness. Light was a fire that burned within the eyes and illuminated all that we cared to look at, for so much as the Greeks were concerned. But if light is a fire that originates from the eyes, why does our vision fail us at nightfall or in caves and in other such dark places; why is there darkness at all- and why don't we get burned whenever we look at things?

I guess we can thank God for imaginative explanations, as their intrinsic magnanimity can never sustain credibility unless proven by human curiosity and the necessity to know the reasons for everything . Imaginative reasons typically provoke equally imaginative questions, such as what happened when Empedocles questioned the fire that burned in our eyes and postulated of the possibility that that fire was only an imitation of something truly much brighter that existed in nature, Such as the Sun- that one thing so bright it hurts to even look at; because whenever that big bright light in the sky is missing from view, nothing seem as luminated, and in fact everything just becomes duller. Wait, if the Sun is gone, everything becomes less bright? Could it be that...Sun...light...eyes...Sun...things... life...see. Sun+light=sunlight??????

Yes wai. And in what way does this and more about light prove true is the fascinating topic of the four part documentary called Light Fantastic brought to us by the brilliant folks of the BBC and their best friend, Cambridge University, presented by the dramatically overbearing and stereotypically bad toothed Simon Shaffer. Light Fantastic takes us back to the beginnings of the theory of light when men such as Empedocles and Euclid were developing the first theories as to the nature and function of light on the distance of objects during their lifetimes on the little island of Sicily, and from there we travel to Egypt to find our "madman" Muslim friend Al-Hasen in a dark lonesome prison, proving Euclid's theory through reflections in his dishes. From there we follow the Christian exploration into the light of God and their need to prove it was His light indeed, but sadly for them, as we see, their own efforts proved treacherous to their cause.
 
The first episode shows us how our intrigue with light's supposed divinity became the foundation for the way in we approach the entire natural world in our quest to discover what we don't already know. The theories, research, and experiments with light by some of the most famous thinkers are taken into context, such as those of Euclid, Friar Bacon, Rene Descartes, and Sir Isaac Newton. But I have yet to watch the last three parts, so who knows what the hell that's about.Watch if your interested, watch to become interested, watch if there is nothing else interesting. At the very least you'll most definitely be enthralled by the imagery if not the information. The whole series is here.  Hope you are enlightened!

Asper Etty's 'Bug'

Bug

"The return to a naked world forgotten along with the scars that marks the tide of repetitive seeding. It invites a metamorphosis from my cocoon back into the gelatinous state of inertia from which I had hardened long ago,
from whence I raped my way inside the reticulated lines of the vesper chanting choirs of vermillion tulips while they danced to the Daphne Shrub's listless screech of my eulogy.
Black noons awaiting; excommunicated from the night and her lone pale nipple from which I ravenously clung to feed my infantile dreams,
without ever opening my eyes to mingle in the witch's obsidian cauldron.
I return now to you, my ostentatious queen, under the mechanical squeals of a valley's capricious echoes...
Evolution? Change? Which of these amoebas divides into the better? Which of these can stand to look upon the universe without dirt in their eyes and clouds in their mind? I am returned; both are exiled.
Both are viral. An ideological plague of mythical proportions; distant visages of shattered mirrors reflecting my amputated dreams into the cryptococcosis flesh of God.
Scratching inch deep into the agoraphobic raptures that breed in the corporeal wells of time through spectral reverberation, solemnly luminescent in their deliquescent solitude, haunting my avaricious bowl of emotion for the fear of suffering an eternal ague.
There can be no light of change for I am the heralding darkness of unyielding truth that shaves your concerned brow barren. I am Change, returned and evolved.
I, Change, facilitate the atomization of my only hope for a nihilistic overture by the most dissonant and despised of the devil's symphony.
I, Change, cease to sail in the same muddied exoskeletal divans of the world where virgin blood quenched the ire of your desert. I am eradicated from solidity.
Only can I discover the trampled fields of marigolds, the only picturesque evidence of the satirical love of the Sun. Their stalks creak with effort. Yet they creak."

                                                                                                              -Asper Etty

Essential Readings of Essential People and their Essential Thoughts (in Chronological Order)

This list is a map which designates significant points en-route in the evolution of modern thought, beginning with the first reasonable inquiries of the famous Greek-Roman heritage and includes several important Chinese philosophers also intermingled in their corresponding times so we can see what was happening in the minds of the west and the east. Purchasing all of their works would certainly cost more than a penny, and a penny is a penny more than I currently have to spend, so luckily I was able to find all of their works from the MIT website which you as well can find here, all works complete and in alphabetical order from every one of these authors. I just rearranged the listing of authors to be in chronological order. This is sort of going to be personal experiment of mine to track the natural evolution of human conscious and to simultaneously investigate how these ancient thoughts influenced the world in each corresponding age, and the results of them as they shaped the ideas of the people who lived and pondered in the years proceeding, sort of like watching the infant mind grow decade by decade. You'll notice they are all ancient authors. After finishing with all their works, I'll move onto the classical authors from the dawn of the dark ages, through the middle ages, and until the brink of the Renaissance; and if I am still alive by the time I finish all of those texts, move on to the endless modern philosophies of the Renaissance through and until the future present date of my death. I invite you to join in the readings and discover the world as it was before and as we became it. To be read as listed and as Monsieur pleases; but to be read!

( completed)

Homer

Wrote in Greek

800 B.C.E.

Hesiod

Wrote in Greek

700 B.C.E.

Confucius

Wrote in Chinese

551-479 B.C.E.

Aeschylus

Wrote in Greek

525-456 B.C.E.

Pindar

Wrote in Greek

518-438 B.C.E.

Sophocles

Wrote in Greek

496-406 B.C.E.

Herodotus

Wrote in Greek

484-430 B.C.E.

Euripides

Wrote in Greek

484-406 B.C.E.

Antiphon

Wrote in Greek

480-411 B.C.E.

Hippocrates

Wrote in Greek

460-377 B.C.E.

Thucydides

Wrote in Greek

460-404 B.C.E.

Aristophanes

Wrote in Greek

450-388 B.C.E.

Lysias

Wrote in Greek

445-380 B.C.E.

Andocides

Wrote in Greek

440-391 B.C.E.

Isocrates

Wrote in Greek

436-338 B.C.E.

Xenophon

Wrote in Greek

431-349 B.C.E.

Plato

Wrote in Greek

428-348 B.C.E.

Isaeus

Wrote in Greek

420-350 B.C.E.

Hyperides

Wrote in Greek

390-322 B.C.E.

Lycurgus

Wrote in Greek

390-324 B.C.E.

Aeschines

Wrote in Greek

390-314 B.C.E.

Aristotle

Wrote in Greek

384-322 B.C.E.

Demosthenes

Wrote in Greek

384-322 B.C.E.

Demades

Wrote in Greek

380-319 B.C.E.

Dinarchus

Wrote in Greek

360-292 B.C.E.

Epicurus

Wrote in Greek

341-270 B.C.E.

Euclid

Wrote in Greek

ca. 300 B.C.E.

Apollonius

Wrote in Greek

ca. 295 B.C.E.

Apollodorus

Wrote in Greek

140 B.C.E.

Cicero

Wrote in Latin

106-43 B.C.E.

Julius Caesar

Wrote in Latin

100-44 B.C.E.

Hirtius

Wrote in Latin

90-43 B.C.E.

Virgil

Wrote in Latin

70-19 B.C.E.

Strabo

Wrote in Greek

64 B.C.E.-23 A.C.E.

                      

Augustus

Wrote in Latin

63 B.C.E.-14 A.C.E.

Livy

Wrote in Latin

59 B.C.E.-17 A.C.E.

Ovid

Wrote in Latin

43 B.C.E.-17 A.C.E.

Horace

Wrote in Latin

65-8 B.C.E.

Lao-tzu

Wrote in Chinese

6th century B.C.E.

Aesop

Wrote in Greek

6th century B.C.E.

Bacchylides

Wrote in Greek

5th century B.C.E.

Sun Tzu

Wrote in Chinese

4th century B.C.E.

Diodorus

Wrote in Greek

1st century B.C.E.

Lucretius

Wrote in Latin

1st century B.C.E.

Josephus

Wrote in Greek

37-100 A.C.E.

Lucan

Wrote in Latin

39-65 A.C.E.

Plutarch

Wrote in Greek

46-119 A.C.E.

Epictetus

Wrote in Greek

55-105 A.C.E.

Tacitus

Wrote in Latin

56-120 A.C.E.

Marcus Aurelius

Wrote in Greek

121-180 A.C.E

Apuleius

Wrote in Latin

124 A.C.E.-ca. 170 A.C.E.

Galen

Wrote in Greek

129-216 A.C.E.

Pausanias

Wrote in Greek

143-176 A.C.E.

Plotinus

Wrote in Greek

205-270 A.C.E.

Porphyry

Wrote in Greek

234-305 A.C.E.

Quintus

Wrote in Greek

ca. 375 A.C.E.

Ferdowsi

Wrote in Persian

935-1020 A.C.E.

Omar Khayyam

Wrote in Persian

1048-1141 A.C.E.

Sa'di

Wrote in Persian

1213-1291 A.C.E.

A million thanks to the PDL and ICA for their work in getting these classics on the web.

The Evolution of Religion and Science

I recently watched some videos by Carl Sagan (I love him) that battled with my ideals about religion. It can’t really be denied anymore (if you accept scientific evidence) that we had arrived on this planet without what makes us who we are. That is to say, without our intelligence. It was something that developed and evolved over millennia. It started with one question which eventually lead to another and like a domino effect we came to another barrier that resulted in another question as to what in the world (or out of it) it could be, and we just hurdled right over with any explanation we could apply that made sense, if not to everyone, at least to the individual who presented the question and theorized its answer.

For example, Carl placed himself in a hypothetical situation 100,000 years into the past when man was only just beginning to harness and manipulate the insurmountable authority that was fire.

We know that our ancient stoner ancestors were nomadic tribes that lived in hunter-gatherer societies and that Prometheus had introduced fire to these communities.  This acquaintance would then inevitably become an obsession and the focus, the epicenter of the community, the most important asset to it, worth any one of their lives. Why? Simply, because it made everything better. It offered protection, warmth, a means to cook food, weaponry, forging, light, landscape reformation (agricultural benefits as well as clearing land) and so on.

If there were a single object on this earth that could make all of our lives better in every aspect spanning the realms of comfort to security (the two basic necessities of any animal), wouldn’t it almost be considered polite on our part to praise such an awesome entity? Well this was in fact what happened, as we see the element of fire take on a divine attribute; and even today this day fire worship is still practiced symbolically in various sects and religions such as Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, and even with Jewish mystics to some degree (the burning bush).

So could it have possibly been the revelation of fire that introduced God, Angels, and Demons to humans? As Carl's hypothesis goes, we questioned the fire that brought light during the night, then we questioned the light that had always shown at night but who dwelled in the sky. Light is light, it must come from fire, as it is proved true at night in our caves. But those lights in the sky, could they be campfires like ours? Are there people like us who cook and see and are warmed by this fire? They watch us from above like we watch them from below. If we are below stuck on the Earth, then they are above and stuck in the Sky, because we never see them come down. These people must be sky people. They must have wings if that is the case, like birds need wings to stay aflight. But what about after darkness when all those lights run away with the night and that one large bright circle takes over and spreads its light all over our world? That must be their master's light because it is so big and His light is much brighter than the little ones.

Eventually it comes to a point where the human conceptualizes something very powerful that dwells above and they relate it to fire. Why? Because fire has both good and evil. It can make everything incomparably better, or it can make everything terribly worse. When it is happy, it takes care of us. When it is angry, we suffer. When it is sad, the lights disappear and his tears fall on us.

These are the primitive observations of the first humans. And their theories were derived only from what they knew from their own experiences. They based the acts of nature only from their own personalities, their own feelings, as that was all we really knew when intellect was still an infant. We understood the feeling of hunger, pain, and joy, the three things that motivate us to move. These feelings were associated with those primitive Gods of these natural forces, forces beyond human comprehension at the time. It wasn't until thousands and thousands of years later when people began to utilize fire to its full potential, creating weapons and structures, that it was necessary to create organization in order to have stability- comfort and security. The need for organization requires much innovation from a people who have survived in an unorganized fashion. This became the process of civilization. The only way to create is to observe what is already there then reapply the interpretation in a way that is suitable to the needs of the individual or society. This essentially was the birth of science; the human endeavor to understand the processes of nature, to understand the behavior of the Gods, and replicate and/or manipulate those forces to supplement our goals.

And we see how as science progressed through the ages, how it became refined and inquisitive and brought about intellectual revolution and sharpened reasoning, that we see the form of the Gods and Goddesses change according the reason we apply on ourselves and them; the reason for god, the roles of gods in our society, and the way of their actions (the forces of nature).

Over time we tamed nature to accomplish our goals, therefore we tamed God simply by our understanding of nature, but it was always believed that God was out of human reach; so with the combination of that reality of control and the belief that god was uncontrollable, the nature of God changed to fit this conclusion so that humans would not have lost the meaning of life that the supposition of the existence of God seemed to provide. God was no longer a wild unpredictable being, as we realized the true process and patterns of nature and what caused nature's behavior. And we were no longer just the subjects that were subjugated to their whims as we ourselves had control of these same powers; we ourselves could harness the forces of nature, but we were not and could not be Gods. But if we had developed the capability to utilize those same godly powers, what then becomes of the Gods who originally ruled those forces of nature? There must have been some other God if those Gods were false, something beyond those Gods, a true singular God who created this all, not dozens of Demigods. Those Gods were not real, it's unreasonable to believe that. The belief of those God's existence is unintellectual, based off of misinformed primitive humans who had not the means to know the infallibility of their belief, and was impossible for them to recover that knowledge that their Gods were only imaginary. If it were not for the technological advancements made through science as a result of the progression of our knowledge since then, then we might still believe in our imaginary friends, simply because we did not understand the truth of nature; that it was not controlled by ethereal deities but was the result of a series of causes and their effects, as we have so observed. But we now have that information; so what does it imply? Through the evolution and progression of our understanding of the universe, we seem to be proving more and more through the scientific process of hypothesis, experimentation, and conclusion, which gives us our intellectual beliefs, our definitive reasons as to why that every observable event or thing is a result of some cause; that God simply has no reign in the natural universe; that everything is subject to a reason, a cause, which we can discover. 

Those causes are subjects we still question today, and which we are consistent in finding answers to. Our growing knowledge of the universe threatens the idea that God causes this or does that and is responsible for this which happens in the world. And in the closer anyalyses of newer modern religions, such as the monotheistic approaches of Christianity, Islam, and Judiasm, this reality that God(s) that have no role in the natural world is reflected in their beliefs. God becomes no more an intangible force, God becomes part of us. The free will of the Gods that our ancestors believed themselves to be subjected to has become the very nature of ourselves, and is the mirror image of that single God that created all, that even created all those other false representations of God (if they ever were real). For example we can look at the general idea that man was created in God's image; we are the multiple representations of that one God of all knowledge and all power. In Christianity and Judaism, their shared creation story even tries to explain how our knowledge freed us from ignorance, but at the cost of eternal bliss because of our choice to question God, question his authority, by indulging the fruits of the tree of knowledge. 

So we see the evolution of religion from how it was before the knowledge we have now, and we see that it has been molded to fit our constantly changing knowledge of the universe. How then does religion still remain credible, if it is supposed to be related to something so divine, when it is endlessly being proved inconsistent to the truths of reality we discover? Religion seems only to be theory based on the limited ability of a people to investigate thoroughly the aspects of their beliefs. What they couldn't understand completely in the world they believed the only explanation was that these unknowable things were of another supernatural being's prowess; But with the onset of our intellectual revolution, and when we reason critically with those ideas; weren't those beliefs misinformed or under-informed conclusions? As modern people, we know the acceptance of conclusions based on misinformation is simply unreasonable; it is stupid because it is wrong. How can you believe in an old theory which is the cause of a misunderstanding, especially when we have a better, more reasonable understanding of it now that is the result of an unarguably better method of explicit scrutiny and experimentation, and from which our new conclusions and theories are constantly proven correct or false. How can you have faith in something that is tainted in your ignorance and your overall lack of understanding of the truth about subject?

These sorts of questions are asked and answered with much more substance in this video called Night: The Backbone of the Universe, presented by the late Carl Sagan, along with the evolution of science and human reason, including stunning looks into the revolutionaries that inhibited the quest for knowledge and became the model of the way in which we see the world now. I deeply encourage you to watch, learn, and interpret for yourself what Carl presents in this documentary if you really want a clear understanding of yourself in this world. The video is an hour long, but it extremely interesting and Carl is a fun guy to watch and listen to, so it's definitely worth stealing that hour from your sleep. It may unexpectedly cause additional hours of your sleep to be lost though, due to the intense unignorable thoughts that will be provoked. But active thought is better than passive thought I suppose- at least more productive.

Sort of an Argument for the Purpose of Religion and Why We Choose to Deny It

I feel that the fall of religion to the acceptance of the dominance of science and its revelations is not necessarily a morally bad choice made by modernity, but an unconscious act of the nature of humans, and that it may be entailed bad consequences. I’m not trying to determine right or wrong or discern moral from immoral, but seeing as the rightness of science has the overwhelming support of large fractions of society these days and its advancements in every field of research threatens to undermine the importance of religion in society, I feel it is necessary for someone to at least come to the aid of the most ancient knowledge that gave meaning to an otherwise meaningless conglomeration of flesh and bone and everything that these bags of meat have ever done since the acceptance of the possibility of a higher power.

In trying to understand the role of religion and the human tendency towards science, it must be made clear as to the instinctual nature of humans. It is my hope that the reader may be able to see the seeming naturalness and reason for our acceptance of science, and with the awareness of the missing necessity that science fulfills in humans, and how science actually addresses the fundamental animal instinct in humans, we may be able to see as to why a resurgence of faith in any religion may be more beneficial to society than the knowledge that science provides.

Without having to diverge into the many theories of human nature and habit, I will try to give the general deep-seated characteristics of our primal personality for so much as I can observe it.

As a species, we are likened to animals because we share the same initial primitive responses to the question of survival. I speak of the drives and motivations of any animal in their quest to survive. Some of these drives include the need to acquire territory for security, generate a genealogical legacy, live in general comfort (this encompasses adequate food and shelter), and a common desire to be at the forefront of all else, or basically to dominate everything. This drive to dominate is the ultimatum of all those drives mentioned above, and is a result of the fact that everything else is considered hostile if it is not the supporting means to reach our desired ends, which is survival and influence, or power to ensure this survival. It is like thinking that you must falter so I can persist, so that I can get ahead, otherwise if you are ahead, then I am behind.

We can see in a simpler form what I mean by taking a look at the food chain in the sea. Everything must feed, and the only source of food is each other. It is because of this need to feed in order to survive that all the aspects of Darwin’s theory of “Survival of the Fittest” becomes more than just concept but reasonable. And when we apply this concept to the human species, we can already deduce the raw reason for the way humans interact with each other and the world; which is for the betterment of the individual self in one way or another. It is selfishness, whether you can accept it or not, whether it is apparent or not; that is what it all boils down to.

But what I am speaking of now is already known by psychologists and biologists. It is self preservation in one form or another. Self preservation in human conditions can even be addressed in our social interactions, in the way we associate with other people. Just think about cliques in high school. An individual involves themselves with others like them, in an atmosphere that is conducive to the way in which they live; which suits the method that they pursue that allows them to survive with the most comfort, which is only justified by what they believe, as comfort is subjective. It is inadvertently, unconsciously, naturally associating with others like you in order to feel a sense of comfort which is the foundation that motivates further involvement with these like-minded people. Like monkey clans. But I won’t go any further explaining this idea of self preservation as I can’t credibly speak on the topic, it is only through observation and analysis that I think it makes sense and I hope that you are able to share this sense at the moment. It was important to be stated in order to create a foundation for the original topic expressed which was what the role of religion in society was and why religion has been rejected through scientific reasoning or human reasoning (interchangeable).

Religion has been diagnosed as a barrier to human social development and technological advancements. It seeks to hamper progress because of the rules that it endows on every basic human habits, our freewill, and our natural tendency to sin; effectively everything that makes us human. But I believe it to be a misconception of the ideals expressed in most if not all religions when what we deduce from the teachings of any religion that we must be bound by its principles in order to be happy, satisfied, and good. If you believe that religion demands and implicates such order as any of them may express is the desire of a God for its people,that is only because you have understood the natural human aspect, the human’s animalistic perspective of it only. That aspect, which I believe to be the result of a loss of meaning in translation as well as to human interference due to the desire to project opinion and influence on anything (it is all too well known the changes that text, language, and the understanding and meaning of an issue based on these undergo in the span of time, especially when the significance is applied and manipulated to fit the context of a certain regions and/or societies and/or ages), tends to veil the true underlying moral of the entire narrative. Essentially it is how you perceive the dictation of the religion, rather than the substance of it, that we either observe it as hostile or friendly and accept or reject it.

Religions are based on stories that take place over unspecified chronological points in a span of time. All we can truly infer without subjecting our reason when we try to decipher the actual amount of time it had taken not only for the events told within the selected scriptures to take place but also how long it had taken for them to be written, is that it must have taken a long time, such as with the Bible or Qu’ran or Vedas, as neither truly depicts the length of every single event save for a few, such as with the events that ensued Noah’s struggle with the Ark; and we are only left to refer to history to judge the approximate time-lapse of the rest. Still it is not the time that has any importance, but it is the message they are trying to portray, and that may be the reason why specific points in time are never mentioned.

These events are related to us through narratives, which suggest that the events at one point in time, and by some entity, had been observed, analyzed, and recorded. Those recordings always take a person or peoples into context; and from there, analyze their story which may include positive or negative proceedings, and from that, are concluded the higher morals and values that had been represented in the subject of the story either through their practice of the moral instigated or their non-practice. Their lacking, which we may call as a tragedy (like Greek Tragedies), is usually from where we learn the moral or value that the subject required in order to proceed positively in their transactions, but consequently suffered through various ways as they did not express those moral values. The magnification of these subjects by these narratives are done to show explicitly what is a good trait and what is a bad trait, and the outcome of acting on either one. It shows the natural human tendencies and compares them to the rare tendencies that are contrary to human nature, and explains how and through what means we can apply those rare ‘superior’ tendencies to our human nature; thus restating naturalism with supernaturalism. Those morals, values, principles, tendencies suggested in the stories tend to be the principles of the corresponding religion, and when we look at every religion’s principle morals, they are all the same. They all call for a change in our mindsets, attitudes, perceptions, morals, etc.

But let’s put aside the divine aspect of religion and their corresponding texts for a moment and let us see it as some choose to believe it as the work of men. What we are left with is the same scenario; they are stories taken from observation, and ideals derived from analysis of the human nature as stated before. They express the human condition and our behavior. Every tale in the texts of all religions expresses the human potential to surpass its own follies created by its own nature, whether it is according to a divine expectation or a human hope to outdo itself, its own nature. This feeling of overcoming one's self is also a plausible action of our nature. When we combine the presumption of our animal nature to dominate all else with our superb intelligence and awareness to apply the principles of ‘Survival of the Fittest’ to every act that involves mind, it is at the pinnacle of our application that we apply it to our individual selves, and therefore fight to surpass or transcend not just nature and the Earth, but ourselves. This is what we speak of when we talk about the spiritual and intellectual, the psyche and the soma, the subtle and the gross, earth and ether. We see this struggle to cope with the world and ourselves through the various lives that are made example of for us in the religious texts, and which allows us to deduce their significance. These realizations offer humans to see themselves through the magnifying glass of the reasoning beyond what we could reason on our own, otherwise if we were competent enough to do so then I most likely would not be speaking about it now. The reasoning of religion battles humans at the core of their being, their animal instincts, the force that motivates the way they interact with the world in order to survive it. It seeks to destroy the innate selfishness that is natural to our behavior. If you believe that selfishness is not a natural characteristic of our conduct, that is only because you have not realized it yet, because it is so natural to you, sort of like blinking when you sneeze.

Returning to the texts; the narrative may differ, but the moral is just the same. To have an idea of what I mean, you only have to refer to the Hero Myths that every culture, society, and civilization has created and manipulated according to their society’s conditions and circumstances. It might be that instead of the hero being known as Hercules, and their task having to clean an impossible amount of cow feces in one day from a barn, the hero might be known as Beowulf, and they may have had to battle a deceptive dragon at Earnaness. The incidents in the stories are different, but the moral (“anyone can do anything if they set their mind to it”) remains the same.

So we see that if we look beyond the way religion is dictated, beyond the demands it implies, beyond our conditional interpretation, we can distinguish the plain reality of what these religions and spiritual texts try to present; that is, the human condition, our nature, and what it is like, through another perspective other than human, to be human. And what they try to offer, though it can be intermingled in the useless language needed to tell the moral through a tale (which can make the process of understanding more complex when we scrutinize the details rather than survey the entire story, but more relative as it is expressed through human examples), is an enlightenment to our individual natures which influences and is reflected by the nature of society, considering that a society is only a collection of these individuals. But religion assesses our weakness, which can be unnerving and repugnant; as no one likes to admit their weakness.

Normally when we are confronted with such a hostile force that can expose this weakness, its presence is external and observable, but this new threat hits us in the core of our psyche, our conscious, and we don’t even know where it came from. Somehow, through our intellectual innovation, we can get around our weakness, but never can we really solve it, and transform the weakness into strength. Intelligence is our strength, and we exercise that to the fullest until our brains are ripped; and that is how we get around our physical weakness. But, for example, no matter how physically fit one may be, they will never be able to take down an elephant single-handedly. Even with 10 men it would be impossible, as the elephant is the size of 30 and has the strength of 30 in just its single trunk. Since we cannot on our own or even as a faction fight with an elephant and expect to win, we think of ways to do defeat the elephant while still trying to prevent harm to ourselves; thus we invent spears.

But I see religion's instigations and provocations not as a strike at our human weakness, but an attempt to separate those rare and noble strengths that delineates the human species from our animalistic nature which keeps us chained to the level of animals. Science does not offer such a revolutionary theory to the process of life and how to change it altogether, it only confirms in greater detail what we already know and leaves us without a counterargument or a new methodology for the process. It empowers the natural processes with the truth of the reality of the process and the exquisite detail that makes up the process, but no more than that is ever done. It explains how the process works, so that we may be able to use the process to our advantage, but it always fails to appropriately address and satisfactorily answer the why behind the how. Science itself is a result of the natural process, the behavior of animals; specifically humans. It is just a refined result of nature due to refined human reasoning due to the need to compensate by the human species for its lack of everything else, otherwise without our innovative intellect, we’d have remained gorillas in the Congo- without the Democratic Republic of. Absolutely this refined thinking is beyond all other possible product of another animal, much like a rhinoceros’ horn on our its forecastle is beyond the fabrication capabilities of the human biology. Our skill is a superior skill, there’s no question that it is what distinguishes a human from a rat. But it is still bound by the principles that define nature, as it was a consequential development of the process of nature; a consequence of the survival of the fittest, and is the unique method used by our species to exert our dominance over all others.

And we can see now the results of nature, which includes our own, and that this is truly the case as we have nearly mastered our world through the use of our technologies that grows ever more advanced with each passing day, synchronously with our need to master the process of nature itself. If we are to be able to master life, as that is the greatest stumbling block to humanity, we must be able to master death, and that is essentially our motivation for progressing in the fields of biology, medicine, physics, etc. so that we may be able to find a way to prolong it; or as we see from the infant form of science, alchemy, to prevent it all together. And who knows, maybe we will. In recent circulations of the Times of India, the most popular English newspaper in India, there have been many articles that stated scientific discoveries into the processes of aging and the genes responsible for it. Of course with this discovery and the injection of our curiosity and the individual desire of any single human to want to be to first explorer, the discoverer, the innovator, and overall a name to remember; and as should be expected from a good employee who is the pride of their occupation; someone will eventually investigate into how the gene functions, its process, its operation. It would be the job of geneticists and bio-engineers and so on and so forth to reverse engineer the gene in order to master its utility and apply it to the benefit of humanity. If they didn’t, not only would their vocation be pointless, they would be fired.

This is an example of the role of science. Science tries to offer various ways around complications. That is essentially what a tool does, and it is through scientific discovery that we develop new tools. We use a rock to break the shell of a walnut, which without the rock we most likely would never have been able to break through without subsequent suffering of the jaw or cracked teeth or broken fingers. Thus is the result of reasoning; we could not break it ourselves, and did not want to harm ourselves, therefore we need something else to break it. This is as well the result of innovation; we had not any tool to break the shell, therefore we tried a novel approach and used another object, a stone. But neither reasoning nor observation and innovation are exclusively characteristic to the human species. Monkeys use stones to break and even as weapons, birds use twigs for nests, and turtles use the moon to guide. It is the fact that we have developed and nurtured this skill of reasoning that we can now use steel to crack shells as well as to crack heads, cement for structures let alone forests of trees, and the moon, well, we can go there.

Initially we see it essential and noble and respectable that any inquiry into an impediment to human life is made, and once the inquiry is made it requires results if humans are to continue living in a progressive manner. But when we induce reality into this vision, we see already the infallibility in such discoveries as magnanimous as the discovery of the genetic process of aging. The earth itself can not sustain our dominance. Eventually the She will have to revolt, unless she should die herself, which we are now witnessing as the result of our scientific progress, and we are now observing and participating in the repercussions of our the advancement itself. Yes even the earth can feel the pressure of an oppressor, of someone or something that abuses its authority, and it will only be a matter time before it will not be able to sustain those pressures any further, and all things will suffer from its reversal of its own nature; from generous to covetous. This we know is fact when we look at the dwindling resources of the planet such as fresh water, land, and fresh oxygen (deforestation + air pollution), which will only diminish exponentially as the human population grows. Already we are considered at the tipping point of stability and chaos.So what then can religion offer us that science cannot? Science offers ways to get around, but what we need is an answer to solve the problem altogether, like vicoden can ease the pain, but it won't erase the source of the pain, and even by taking it we are damaging our livers for just a temporary subsidy from suffering. Symbolic, isn't it?

Through out this essay, my intent was not to try and convince everyone to revert to the lifestyle of the middle ages. I am only trying to bring to light the qualities, values, and answers that religion gives us; forgetting the source of its knowledge or the people that wrote it, but only looking into how it challenges our human nature and seeks to transcend our animalistic behavior, our Darwinian lifestyle of survival of the fittest. Religion tries to avoid this natural disposition to competitiveness and show that at the very bottom of everything we are all striving and fighting for the same cause, to save our lives. It shows us how to relieve ourselves of the struggle and accept it; that a progress can be made internally in the nature of the self rather than externally in the nature of the world, and that it is by the internal progress of the species that we can actually change the nature of the external world, or at least the perception of it, which really is the only thing that must be changed.. 

But if we consider what I had proposed with the brief idea behind the motivation of animals and the reality that human’s are predisposed to the same conventions, then the reason and cause of the recent decline in the acceptance of religion is fairly understandable. What is understood is that every entity on the earth is naturally bound to try and assert its dominance and authority against everything else on the planet for the sake of the prosperity of the concerned life of itself; which, since we are part of this natural world, goes against our primal instinct to survive if it is not us presently performing the assertion, and we react like a mirror with the same intent, to dominate this hostile force that threatens to dominate us, even though it uses the same means as us. An example would be throwing a wild healthy lion and a healthy man in each other’s midst. Obviously as the lion is not tamed it would attack the human either out of defense or encroaching hunger, and the human would attack the lion similarly in defense, or if the human had a notion of the lion’s presence beforehand, then they may attack preemptively to prevent being caught off guard. If he tried to run away, the lion would chase out of instinct, determining it as prey, so fleeing cannot be accepted in this hypothetical situation. The end result is that one of beings would have successfully endowed their dominance over the other. One will inevitably die, and the other will inevitably feast. The lion will unarguably be the victor of the two. Where the argument can be developed on behalf of the human and be considered as a reasonable case, is if the man uses his intellect and acquires a tool to aid him in his quarrel with the lion, and therefore place himself at a somewhat equal footing, or at the very least would take a step higher than where would have previously been without the tool-come-weapon against the lion.

Similarly on a much larger scale, science (a result of human reason and human nature), through intellectual advancement by understanding the processes of nature to a fuller extent and the technological achievements derived from the understanding, has today placed itself on an equal footing with religion (a result of divine and essentially unnatural reasoning, as it is supposed to be of ethereal origin); the biggest threat to the natural reasoning of human intellect, something that reasons against it. And by observing the decline in the populace’s adherence to religious morals, principles, and values, and the acceptance of what we know as the dignity and integrity of a conscious beings (which tries to imitate the values of religion but makes the division between morality and immorality much wider than religion insists it is), we could say that human nature has begun to administer its dominion over religion. We see evidence of this when we compare today’s culture with the culture of only a century ago. What we consider a human right to express has been distorted into the human need to define limits; that limits are only as limiting for as much as you accept to be limited, as inspired and influenced by our progress in science (which directly reflects the development of the human collective ego) whihc has pushed the boundary of the limits stated in religion, and it is only by a thin margin provided by the ancient religious morals now imbedded in the government constitutions which we are forced to abide by that we are saved from our own nature due to 'moral' limitations. But we see can see how far we have pushed those limits. Just turn on the television and you can see for yourself where our morals and values lie.

Before I begin to sound like a radical anti-modernist, I must present the thoughts required for you to consider a reacceptance of religion. Remember I do not suggest a respect and devotion to any religion, only an awareness of the morals and values that are shared by and define every religion, and to consider its value when brought under the light of our general culture and the nature of a human being. I believe these religious principles may hold a greater reward for humanity than science can provide, and that they can be a guiding instrument towards our development as a species that is capable of spirituality, because I feel that beyond the human aspect of religion that I have cared to detail previously, that there lies a profoundly brand new concept of morality that surpasses human reasoning and natural conceptualization, and is a model which we can replicate, though unnatural to the processes that govern the universe and at the end of the day ourselves, that can be reasoned out to understand its value and rationalized to determine its significance by we who have the intellect to do so.

This unworldly reasoning found in all religions questions human behavior just as deeply and critically as human reason questions the questioner’s legitimacy. And like I have said, we see this as a hostile act, as it struggles with us, regardless of the fact that it is done internally rather than externally; and conclusively we choose to reject it as we cannot stand to be made victim, and in order to preserve our humanity for whatever reason we may choose.

Somehow, at the conclusion of every religious text, they all point towards a fiery end to the world because of the human condition, the human disposition to ‘sin’. Whether this prophecy is true or not remains to be seen, but symbolically it has major significance as we now come to terms with the effects of global warming and climate change, and the recent revelation of a spike in the sun’s solar activity. All of these ‘warm’ factors suggest a hotter world, and scientists have agreed that a warmer world is not good for anyone or anything above and below the surface of the Earth. This however is off topic. Let me backtrack to the statement I made about this being the result of human sin. Does sin really mean bad? Is it possible that sin could actually be referring to the actions that could possibly harm not only another person, but the world altogether, moreover their own ego and integrity; and from this analyses of potential results of our behaviors, it is therefore concluded that these actions should be avoided as there is more probability of a negative result of them, even if we had the best intentions? It is my belief that when this God of everything tells us through these religious texts what humans should do or not do, or what is right and what is wrong; God is not actually fighting against or condemning human nature, but offering humans a way to transcend it, and if we take the warning of a world in flames to heart, this suggestion might be the only way to avoid such an end. And from what I can infer, it was never a command to act accordingly as desired by this Divine creature. In fact, free will has constantly been expressed in these texts as wholly in the right of humans to practice; that we can in fact do as we wish. What God seemed to be telling us though was that if we choose to hold fast to our animalistic nature, that it would prove unwell for not only ourselves but for all living things. From what I have proposed is that the core motivation of humanity, the nature of humans, is synonymous with an animal’s nature; the need to survive, protect, dominate, etc. in order to succeed in the time that we have on Earth. What these texts put forward is an alternative, a divine nature, one of compassion, selflessness, charity, awareness, resolve, good will, etc. Our nature and the so called ‘divine nature’ are at opposite sides of the scale, where humanity’s side seeks to gain more weight for whatever reason it so chooses, probably just so it can say it has more due to its predilection to selfishness, whereas the ‘divine’ side remains neither seeking nor avoiding. It just is, because divine truths can not be affected by earthly truths, and we have no reasonable idea or explanation as to what can diminish or increase its presence unlike ours which is malleable according to our will. They simply are at too high (or too low) of a frequency to get disturbed by our own tendencies.

You may be thinking based on what I have said about free will and global warming, that even if humans had been devoted to acting on the principles of this supposed divine nature, that regardless, we all would have suffered tremendously due to this predicted solar storm in 2012. But it is fact that it has occurred in recent times, I believe the latest was in the 19^th century, and we seemed to come out of it alright. I say, maybe with the onset of the temperature rise due to global warming, that this flare will only make it even hotter and ultimately less conducive to existence unlike two centuries ago. A sort of cause and effect is what the doomsday prophecies seem to show, rather than just inevitable death. And it related the cause and effect to our human nature; that our natural behaviors would have disastrous consequences unless we could change our very nature to something beyond that which is natural; an ethereal nature; divine, holy, etc. Simply put, religion offers that new perspective other than our own which is unavoidably conditional due to the circumstances we find ourselves alive in, and that is in nature! Let us try and see from a new perspective.

So it seems, like the days before Galileo, we still believe the universe revolves around us, except we don’t have that same faith we had then to solidify such a belief. But with the truth now out that we are nowhere near the center of the universe, not even the center our own solar system or galaxy, we must cease to ignore the parallel symbolism of that fact, and seek a rock from which we can have a source of stability. Science allows us to discover how we are because it questions nature, is the product of human reasoning, and is applied by us in order to seek that which can help us live better lives. Religion allows us to discover who we can become, it is the product of someone or something with reasoning beyond human concept and appeals to our nature to seek that which can help us overcome life altogether, rather than just find ways around it.You don’t have to call yourself a Christian or a Muslim or a Hindu or a Naskapi…Just try and see why these people address themselves with these titles, and call yourself whatever the hell you want when you discover the truth about the nature of the world, yourself, and the entire essence of life.

Four Principles to Theft

My stay in India has provided me with one very valuable thing in a surplus amount, and whether it has been for better or worse remains to be decided by the consequences derived from splurging on my wealth. So what are these riches I boast of? Time time time time time! The one thing you wished you could have more of is the one thing I can only pray of getting rid of. The reason as to how I made this daunting fortune is due to the presence of language barriers that have created relationship barriers, and relationship barriers that created social barriers; and ultimately those social barriers created an ample amount of monotonous time. I won't even get started into the role that stereotypes play in Indian culture. Though it is not the topic of discussion here, let me just say now, being American had no glimmering effect to the eyes of an Indian, other than that i would be obliged to pay for every meal if a conversation ever got far enough to entreat for one. This might as well be the summary of my stay in Mumbai for the most part. Anyways, why I even brought it up in the first place was only to impress upon you that I have had a lot of time to do just about anything I want, and I have endeavored fastidiously to take advantage of such an opportunity by engaging myself in music composing, writing, studying, learning the tabla (Indian drums), handing money to the poor in vast amounts (as that is an occupation in itself), learning Indian cuisine, reading way too much (e.g. the month of July =14 books), and playing chess every night with random elderly people that crawl along the cracked paths of Shivaji Park.

If you were to consider all the various ways by which I have been able to entertain and maintain a stable brain (to some extent) from the list of vocations above, you would probably believe that with the amount of time I claim to be in possession of, I would have and should have become supremely efficient and skillful in just about every aspect of all of these crafts, but I have yet to be critiqued and know my standings as of yet. Regardless, it was in performing one of these methods of 'time pass' as it is known in India that I believe I not only became well practiced in the skills necessary to reap the highest amount of rewards while actively engaged in it, but I have also developed a completely new and quite 'handy' skill. The distinct assassin of time I speak of is the noble activity of reading. And it was by deep engagement in reading that I had inadvertently developed a brand new skill. See kids? Reading is good!

Well generally speaking, yes, reading is great, not just good. But if you are a responsible and respectable citizen of modern society, you may be confused by the new found connotation about the important benefits of reading that I imply when I tell you that what I joyfully learned, and in all manners of honesty, greedily earned from reading was not the typical habit or positive productive improvement to the individual that an elementary school teacher might try to galvanize in their young students for the benefit of all. What I learned indirectly from my intensive reading regiment was how to steal more books for further reading. And it was through the principles that I am to speak of now that I have been guided towards success in just about every attempt so far.

Whatever reason you have accepted as justification for your decision to steal does not appeal to my concern at all, and to clarify why I ever had taken up this detestable profession was due to the fact that the money required to purchase these precious items had been dispersed amongst the poor, leaving me fairly equal to them in terms of fiscal worth. It does not justify the act, nor do I claim it to. I only lay these principles down for the hope that it adds a bit of class to an otherwise classless vocation; and also out of boredom. The credibility required of me for you to trust in the value of these principles is only provable by the amount of needless words I have injected into this log, so if you're are feeling a bit skeptical, so be it. Only through experimentation will one be able to truly appreciate what I have personally experienced. Therefore without further hindrance by syntax, let me begin by finally laying down the four fundamental principles to reaping the greatest rewards out of any attempt of the theft of any item:

1. The value of the stolen item is not derived from its actual market price, but from the technical difficulty of the swindle and the amount of risk involved. 

Technical Difficulty

  With this principle clear in your mind, you are now potentially capable of committing grand larceny by simply stealing a lighter from under the eyes of a cashier and his technological assistant, the camera. And don't be embarrassed by the fact that it is only a little red fire starter that 50 cents could have gotten you for 99% less the amount of stress. Failure would've resulted in that 50 cent lighter being multiplied 16 times the amount, plus a criminal record and a ban from the molested store. Let's not even ponder about the disgraceful infamy and parasitic regret you would suffer internally. But  in the event of success, well, you just picked yourself up a free lighter and defeated totalitarianism and consumerism in one strike! Time to smoke up!

2. More of your attention can be allocated to the target when little attention is placed on you. 

Simply put, avoid attention from anyone. Clandestine operation is the principle craft required of any thief. Use whatever strategic ruse that is correspondingly applicable to the scenario in order to diverge any attention whatsoever that could be placed directly on you. That also means, by every means, do not stand out. Wear, do, and say nothing that expresses your individuality as you are and must remain one of the million, not one in a million.

Only two eyes should be on you

Even your chosen method of distraction must not put you at the forefront of observation, such as purposely tripping over a magazine stall so that everything including you falls to the floor where you immediately take the ungracious opportunity to place the paper in any inconspicuous place on you. People will see you and laugh at you, not at the fallen rack. You entered without being suspect; therefore exit without being suspect.

3. The less the amount of resources consumed during the process of theft, the more resources available to be dispersed in revelry and celebrations afterward.


Do not look upon this lightly! To meet the requirements that this principle suggests takes much practice. "Time is money" as they say, and so should you, a thief, believe. Reflection on success is just as important as the success itself, otherwise success is reduced to another common occasion of life, and that is definitely not the case for the most part as success is usually intermittent and insochronous to the collective amount of failures or overall work required to achieve it; therefore, use the least amount of effort in order to supplement the reward and make it that much more lustrous. Try not to waste time on hesitation, suspense, or drama.

Eat less now, more to eat later. Get it?

It's simply unnecessary, as once the item is in your pocket you've already taken the obligation upon yourself to go henceforth into the darkness. Enjoy yourself if you must though. Especially try not spend in order to steal, its practically hypocritical. Trust me, I have witnessed people buy a coffee in order to steal a chocolate bar from the same counter they ordered from. As so rightly proclaimed by Captain Jack Sparrow and Mr.Gibbs, 'Take what you can; Give nothing back!" This I'm sure needs no more explanation. Remember never to allow avarice to become a natural characteristic of your hands unless you can properly recompense the blood that flows at the tips of those sticky fingers; the source of the greed. If you need an example, just think as to why rum has always been associated to the saturnalia of pirates. I'm not suggesting it is necessary to drink after success, only that the affirmation of success is appreciated by both the psyche as well as the soma. So how you choose to commemorate through rebellious carousal or innocent carnival is a choice that suits your personal values.

4. Always show courtesy and humility, please.

Now these are more of general first-class traits that we should all show at all times regardless of vocation, but I believe that it was thrice as much required by the men and women of a not so acceptable line of trade in order to compensate for the common agreement over its odiousness. It may sound hypocritical, but gentility, especially when genuine, is always appreciated, unless enacted on a cynic.

You can still have class even though you perform horrible acts.

So never doubt and never forget the importance of kindness and its relevance to times before, during, and after the act theft. If it seems negligible at first, just think of being active in Gentility as a precursor to a better outcome under any circumstance, and I will guarantee this with the prospect of my doors being unlocked for a full, alarmless week if it proves contrary. In terms of how it benefits a thief, think 'Stockholm Syndrome', without the hostage aspect of course (unless that's how you work, then the importance of this principle is multiplied tenfold).

Now it is imperative on my part to cement in your mind that there are no favorable odds when it comes to success and failure. It is a matter of either yes you accomplished the task or no you did not. Always ruminate on the risks beforehand. Here in India I have had much success as this is a place where the price of lost and missing items are a preferable sacrifice as to that of the cost of security cameras and enclosed spaces and the constant maintenance and cost of preservation of both. Though I have through experience had success in a few bookstores in the States, there is a much higher risk involved and it is impossible to use the excuse of stupidity as a defense, as is possible here, and to get away with the title confirmed with a slap on the cheek in the street rather than tattooed on your forehead in prison (depending on just how much you had tried to get away with).Quite literally in India, as I have been a first hand participant and know, one must drag the transgressor to the local police officer, wherever the drat may be, who rarely does anything at all even when the convict is placed before him. Insults and taunts are usually the only fine. This is typically not the case in western nations, so be aware. Good luck to those with bad hands!

Get To Know Me

(Part 1)


If you had at all any curiosity as to who I might be, well my bondage to common courtesy would have expected you to introduce yourself first since you are the visitor, but that same common courtesy binds me to the quality of general politeness; and since we've agreed you are the guest, it would be rude of me not to tell you about myself. SO here's the deal, you get to know me, and I get to know you, and if that's disagreeable to you, well, stop reading here. And no there's no bargaining. I would not dare convert to espionage in order to satisfy this sinful curiosity if I were thou, because remember, if you have decided to read this far you have basically agreed to the conditions i have set beforehand which are technically punishable by law as of now. Jesus is watching you     (O.O) <--Jesus

For one and a half years I've been living in a surrogate home for incapable, incurable, inequitable children. The name of the institution is My Grandfather's Flat located in the suburb of Dadar, Mumbai. That's right, Mumbai, India. And where in what village or city or town had I been previously living? Mission Viejo, California, USA. Now to allow you to get a sense of the senses that I sense almost everyday, I should first reverse course and set sail to the days that once were before the days that are now.

Mission Viejo is one of those quaint suburbs of southern California full of free flying, life loving, genuinely good spirited people. Everyone might know everyone; or at least you'd recognize most of everyone if you simply took 10 steps from any point in any direction and attended a sermon at the local Catholic Church- St. Kilian's- where just about everyone goes to perform their weekly act of piety, and have been attending probably since the day the city was opened, circa maybe 30 years ago (who really cares)? Unless of course they are a Protestant. Or a Jew. Like Daniel Hellfeld. Anyways and otherwise, if you'd like to run into the other half of the city, you could always take a 15 minute ride on the opposite side of town and reach Saddleback Valley Church and meet the obnoxiously rambunctious side of Christianity, and the majority of the attractive ladies; young and not so young alike. Yes, we've got the lions pride here ;).

Honestly the population of the city has never been a concern to me unless for one reason or another I felt bored enough to guess the amount, such as now; which I would reckon (and no we ain't nunuh therm hicks) there to be around twenty five thousand families into an average of three individuals per family equaling about seventy five thousand? That most definitely isn't anywhere near the right amount. Alright...so you can see why I normally do not take the time to make estimates concerning the city. Anyways, from what I have OBSERVED rather than CALCULATED is that it is possible that anyone could recognize probably one out of every three people if they lived here for a month.

This is due to the fact that most of the youth have known each other at one point, during some point in their lives, and it's typically from places such as the few schools and their collaborative summer programs or the city's lake where we have all unconsciously had rendezvous with every one of our fellows. And I wouldn't be surprised if that goes for the parents as well, although it always seems that they are too ignorant (or just tightly wound) to notice each other unless they see the smoke signal from the exhaust of a neighbors new car.

The city itself is very beautiful, clean, and organized. Were just out of the reach of the pollution that seeps from the skies of nearby city of Irvine; a sort of LA in the making, so our skies are blue and fresh nearly all year round. There are many bushy hills that plot the terrain which naturally create divisions with their oblique green slopes which are filled in by the very few fresh black roads that intersect Mission Viejo. Those divisions become housing societies, or to use a more civilized term; communities. Several of these communities I believe I could go so far as to say are popular in the southern Orange County region and get a lot of attention from the neighboring cities' high school and college students. Such communities include those of Pacific Hills, Canyon Crest, Auburn Ridge, Stoneridge, and the Lake Houses; all very exquisite places with very nice people that deserve to live there. They are typically middle class communities, with the better of them such as those of Canyon Crest and Stoneridge occupying the upper middle class, and the Lake Houses (for so much as I could derive from the massive grandeur of exterior of the buildings whenever I take a boat out to go fishing at the lake) endeavoring to be accepted into the lower upper class. But class has no value in Mission Viejo, as we are all too entranced by our happiness with the Lake and soccer fields and churches and schools to make such an insignificant monumental conglomeration of wood, concrete, and plaster determine our outlook on society. Or at least it never influenced my opinion; that is until I moved to India and realized the truth of discrimination. But we'll come to that later.

!!!!

Something completely unrelated but highly relevant: My eyes are presently on fire thanks to fact that I am cooking with chillies and had not the presence of mind to wash my hands before wiping the stream of tears that were already provoked by the scores of onions I had rightly cut to pieces. Curse Italian's and their wonderfully tasty spaghetti! I believe I'll have to be breaking this into parts as autobio's tend to be annoyingly exhausting to attempt in one sitting; and that is only made more so true when you are temporary blinded.)

Something of a Mural

A spectacular world is what I would expect to see

Every time I place myself in its way

Such as today

Beauty had claimed the skies more than I could believe

I was standing outside sometime

In the afternoon

When I took a drag of a cigarette

And I Gazed up

And I saw

That the atmosphere had been painted with several hues.

An orange haze was the first that shown

No doubt it was a polluted glow

Low it lay

in the streets it crawled

Guilt I felt for all of you

As I placed the butt to my lips

The smoke lingered and hissed

A prophetic scowl

Its silvery veil could not hide the amount

Of darkened grey beyond

That was the clouds

Floating above the orange tress of smog

Dowsed with tears it must have been

As I never felt so warm within

To see the earth so full of tension

I know now that alone I am not

I glanced at the ground

Blew smoke from my mouth

The cigarette slipped

And rolled carelessly down

Then I took a fresh breath

Or so much as was available

And I Gazed up

And I saw

That sky was not dark at all

It seemed to me

Cheering already

As an azure eye peeped

Out of the cloudy sheen

Through the rusty screen

And I could see it was much happier than me

Or at the very least

Had an eye that was clearer than mine

An eye clearer than light

I had never expected to see such a sight

As a painting in the skies

A slab of warm

Overridden by a neutral plight

And the blue eye of a peeping tom

All blended and brilliant

Radiant and supercilious  

It deserves to be left alone

The Terrible Truth

Oh what life could there be if did not revolve round me
So I created ye slaves to kiss me feet
But woe is me! Ye have broke free?
God damn thee! Oh wait, that is me

Two Long Years in One Long Tale

(Part 1)

Note: Based entirely off true events. Prone to exaggeration through overuse of adjectives.


Alone in my room; my neck slightly choked by a thick burgundy blanket that softly billowed like a cloud in passionate love down the length of my rigged body and flowed like a royal gown as it swept the light pink carpet behind me. I walked in circles; my eyes closed and entranced in a living dream, swaying my hands and arms in front and around me like I was performing a mystical waltz to the sound of a salty ocean coming from a fluorescent neon green and orange glowing box, a miniature model jukebox, from the oaken square desk in the corner of my room. I was in a meditative ecstasy.

Time, for some inexplicable amount of time, had been erased from the natural bondage of time during my lonesome expedition through the distant destinations of my imagination. If it were not for the unquenchable nasal voice hoarsely squeaking from the man of the early morning talk show that interrupted the mouse's modest attempt to show me the free world of creative reflection, I would have continued to float on and over the rolling waves of harmonious frequencies that resonated in the isolated islands of my room and mind. But in fact, it was so, and sound of his self deprecating, self conscious-less voice was the damned herald of reality calling me to wake from my dream.

A sudden blast of ice laden gales halted at once the course of the ship that evidently was the personification of my dream. My eyes lifted slowly and remained half realizing to my shadowy room. Only a slight suggestion of a Sun had appeared over the golden red hills a few miles through the window across my sights; still not enough to convince the darkness to abdicate its throne. The neighborhood remained well comforted in sleep and unaware of a ghastly blanket of fog that was greedily molesting our freshly paved streets. It was cold and silent; absolutely pleasant.

I strode to the corner of the room where the harbinger of bitter truth continued to proclaim that it was indeed 5:15 in the morning. I looked to my bed with the intent of finding  something, but I could not remember what exactly it was; only that it was a necessary tool if I were to do something I wanted to do. Inadvertently I became entranced by my cradle; a twin sized divan that could be spread flat like a casual bed or with a single forceful push could be transformed into a comfortable couch for three. It was not the ease of availability nor its potential complacent compliance to the whims of any occasion that I was admiring. It was the darkly tanned mattress itself that had my attention. More accurately, it was the imitation image of an outdated map of the old world that was stitched into its skin that I was captured by. Ancient nations, ports, seas, mythological monsters; all identified in Italicized Latin revealed to me an earth and its people of long ago times once considered present. It was remarkable; like looking upon the works of Da Vinci; I slept on a piece of art!

I followed the little depiction of a bird in mid-flight that appeared in seemingly random spots here and there that must have been a failed attempt to represent the direction of the migration of its flock until I came upon a long brown oval lump protruding from the Pacific Ocean. I Had discovered a monster of the sea! Short hairs the color of a dark rust shrouded its exaggeratedly tubular body. Large ears trailed the side of its long arrow shaped head and flopped lazily against the surface of the muddy waves. At the back end was a skinny hairy tail about the length of half an arm and on the opposite was a cherry sized black wet nose littered with thick whiskers like the cilia of an enlarged bacteria. A gem of a choker; black leather embroidered with shimmering stainless steel diamonds encircled the rolls of fat on its neck. Albino crystalline eyes were dotted in the center by an endless black hole and were rested strictly upon me. I could feel it dragging me  into its abysmal well  beginning with the fringes and hairs of my skin, then abruptly skipping the cold flesh underneath to tug directly at my soul.

The name of creature was well known to me. Bonaparte was its name. It was actually a he, and this was no monster of the sea; this was my best friend, my devoted companion; a wryly young dachshund, watching me for any signal that I may show that would express of my needing him at the moment. A good dog, slept only when I slept; awake for as long as I could bear it; never leaving me, altruistic to take part in the same vision as mine. And clairvoyant he had proven that day to be one his multiple skills, as the moment came when our souls met with one another through the portals of our eyes he lazily stood up and stretched, dragging the bottom half of his body as he came forward, revealing a red gasoline lighter in the place where he had been. If I had known any better the little boy had been waiting for this moment.

So I dared not disappoint either of our expectations as he had already surprised mine. I snatched the lighter that was warm from his body then opened the drawer of my side table and began to scrummage through all the useless litter inside that I hadn't the heart to throw as I could never know what time of what day I would ever chance upon needing their waste.

Two items I had retrieved from the treasure chest; a packet of cigarettes with four still left and all too seductive in their desperation to be kissed; and a bronze-red miniature tin box of Altoids-cinnamon flavored. A stack of unread books lay equally as untouched beside the desk. I grabbed the top one without any consideration as to the value of what may be inside, nor without any concern as to title or author. It was green though, if that compensates well enough for the reader's intrigue.

I sat down cross legged on my bed. Bonaparte creeped his way in the style as before to my side and snuggled himself in my blanket-come-robe. Methodically I opened only the cover flap of the book, as it was hard and well suited to the purpose. I brushed aside the graveyard of spiders and the dust that was like the dirt to our cemeteries. Once I had cleared the carnage and debris I brought forth the Altoid box and opened it carefully so as not to spill the contents inside.That being done as according to intention, I coaxed the dried buds into the crevice of the books and began the crush them into a fine almost powdery composition. A satisfactory amount was there, enough to replace the entire contents of a cigarette; more than I had in mind to use originally.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

"How can I do what you say, when what you say thunders in my ears?"


Therefore parents, do not yell at your children. Loudness can be terrorizing to those who cannot interpret the cause. Very few can learn a lesson through terror, other than to respond in the like if they are to send their message accordingly.

It's Nothing

“My hope exists in no thing and you say it is in nothing,

Is not nothing still something?

You jest with me and say something could be anything!

Aye, It could be anything; it could be everything!

You eagerly retort that my hope is in no thing,

I smile and reply, my hope is in nothing.”


-Asper Etty

An Attempt to Portray Christian Hope or Something...

The definition of hope is to think of the future with positive expectations; it is to rely on something wholly reliable; it is to trust in faith that the matter of the hope will be fulfilled. Though the concept of hope can be conveyed through various unrelated examples, such as a student who hopes to pass their mathematics exam; a wife who hopes their new home recipe for mousse au chocolat pleases her husband’s overzealous tastes, or a fan who hopes his beloved football team at the very least succeeds in getting to the first round of the NFL playoffs, the deviation of method can never contradict this singular, universal meaning of hope.

Keeping to this context, hope operates congruently when inscribed in the monument of a genuine Christian. Hope for a Christian is based on the message of the Bible, from which is promised that redemption from all sufferings, eternal happiness, and an everlasting life will be obtained at death, but only through faith in and devotion to God and His Word. This single message influences the thoughts and dealings of those who believe in its validity so strongly that they devote the substance of their lives faithfully, willingly, and accordingly to His teachings with the sole hope that it is true.

When the supporters of this belief congregate, they form in their ranks a society of likeminded people, also known as a culture; a collection of people who do, say, make, and think according to the values and principles that are the threads which the fabric of their society are stitched together. And With the amalgam of this brief understanding of the general description of hope and its significance according to Christianity, and the basic understanding of the structure of a culture, we can therefore carefully and acceptably express the whole from the sum of these fractions; that those who follow the guiding principles of the Word of God can be fittingly termed as a “Culture of the Word”.

The Culture of the Word, as explained in the previous passage, lives in the hope that all of their transgressions will be forgiven, and that at the time of their death their souls will be saved; they will transcend the world to exist in God’s heavenly kingdom. According to the message proclaimed in the Bible, this is an undeniable truth unscathed with exceptions, and stalwartly supported by tales of men and women, their lives, and their relationship with God told within. The most symbolic and significant of lives being that of Jesus Christ’s, from whom Christianity’s ideology and etymology is derived from.

Jesus was, and quite still is, the epitome of human disposition, whether in reality or symbolically; however one may choose to believe. He is the embodiment and the actualization of the Word; a testament to the legitimacy of the message of hope in the bible. The story of his life could be summarized in two words: suffering and faith. Through suffering his faith grew stronger; and as his faith grew the pain diminished. Anguish lost its crushing power because he believed in the hope of the message of the Scriptures; and in his insufferable death as a heretic, according to the verdict of man, he was reborn a king under the will of God. This was due to his constant efforts to put into practice God’s instructions, such as in charity, forgiveness, and the impartial spread of the message; and his overall hope, or faith, that God would relieve him and the world of all the sorrow, in reward of his sacrifice.

In our initial thought of Jesus simply as a man, there seems not a single defining characteristic that makes him unique to us, other than the hype about his conception. He certainly was not born with the normal lavishness, equipments, and garnishing of a king as Scripture claimed him to be. Conversely, he was born under suspicious circumstances (virgin birth), under inhospitable conditions (in a stable), and lived laboriously and in poverty throughout his entire life. But through his unfettered devotion to God, he proved himself to be a king among men. He had his hope and faith only in God and His Word, the Scripture. He did not have any curriculum to outline his life; only a hope in the promise that it would not be lived in vain.

This is the unique symptom of Christianity. They know not the reasons for events in life or what may happen as it continues along, but they are assured that none of it is meaningless; and through every triumph and every disgrace, they can have faith that at the end God will rescue them. They live according to a message that is not just one of concern, but one of solution. The Bible does not just speak of the goodness of God; it proves it, as we see by the example of Jesus and his sacrifice. The message has the audacity and original solidarity to be life changing news. It is like picking up a newspaper and reading the obnoxious bold print: WORLD LEADERS MEET TO DISCUSS NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT. At first glance, you are already shaking your head- “Yeah? So did my dad and his brother”. But as you look further, your eyes widen as you read, “All nations have agreed unconditionally to disarm and dismantle every weapon of mass destruction by nightfall…” Then your pupils dilate, “…and all other forms of weaponry to be demolished within a decade…” and the paper slips from your hands and falls to the floor, along with your jaw. The article states that the deepest fear and greatest threat to human existence, death, is to be erased from the earth, ensuring uninhibited life; much like the Word promises eternal life, by erasing the consternations of living and trepidation towards death. That alone already sounds too good to be true. But it is fact, and has been done (or in this case agreed upon). Still, to say all weapons are to be made completely void? A promise too dubious, is it not? This is the challenge; the test of faith. The promise of a better tomorrow has been proclaimed by the leaders of the world. All that is left is the individual to hope and believe it will be done, and be satisfactorily assured according to the facts that have already been presented.

Still, even in this unprecedented knowledge of a concrete, truthful statement, there still is a common worldly doubt of its legitimacy. Even though a great triumph has taken place over the greatest threat to humanity, people will still remain cynical and unconvinced that they can believe, they can hope, for such a ‘farewell to arms’. This is because having faith that our hopes will be fulfilled may seem today to be a daunting submission to uncertainty, as in the process of hoping we are subjecting ourselves to the infinite possibilities of the future and to have faith is to expect from the unexpected. This uncertainty is a result of the truth that life itself is lived with the uncertainty of tomorrow. When we inquire into a future with manifold possibilities and no certainty of any which outcome, we naturally in the process designate the certain from the uncertain and from that division judge where our values lay, and in finalizing the determination of values, we unintentionally direct which path that our hopes will run. Take for example the life of a soldier on the front lines of battle. He lives with the uncertainty of the next moment, as danger lurks behind every blink of the eye. Being imprisoned under these threatening conditions, he decides as to what has more value to him; the life of a comrade, the life of the enemy, or his own. Whichever he believes to be of most value, he would most certainly act accordingly to protect it in the hope that his devotion to the selection would prevent any harm coming to it. But being a soldier in a hostile environment that disperses an ominous lethal aura equally amongst its inhabitants, he knows that even with the best of his efforts and his solid devotion to preserving the life of his choice, he may not secure his hope. Thus is the reality of this world and all things that reside in it.

Returning to the fundamental choice of values, it could be considered that it is the origin of uncertainty and hopelessness, and is responsible for the ambiguity that has become a common trait in the character of modern society. The reason as to why such a simple choice of values has become the question of a lifetime is due to the fact that clear definition of morality and values has been concealed in the acceptance of the process of individuation; the formation of a personality based on the pattern of his or her environmental, experiential, and perceptional circumstances. Morality and values in other words are subjugated by the consequence of conditionings. Therefore, who can judge as to what is right or wrong and what has true value, as we all mature under unique conditions and are thoughts are biased due to this account. To evade furthering the suffering of trees, allow yourself to be temporarily robed and warmed up to this supposition. Now enter a hypothetical situation, where we ask a fellow where their values lie. Assuming this person has a generally good perception of life, they may reply that it is in the prosperity of their family and friends, to their honest integrity, and/or to their dignified work. We hear this response and smile genuinely and think highly of this person as these are all respectable values. But suppose we pursue the dialogue and ask why these things are important, it is more than likely they will reply proudly that they want the best in life for everyone so all may enjoy the perks of high social status such as that of security and comfort; a necessity to the personal progression required of today’s world and the hope of every human. And if we go so far as to ask why they hope for the best in life, the predictable response would be “Because there is nothing better”. Suddenly at this juncture, the interrogation swings from its original detainment in present livelihood over towards their values in the after-livelihood, as the earthly realm of human reason has little, if at all, any influence on the grounds of metaphysical ultimatums.

More often then not, when we reach this stage in determining our values, we become perplexed and a great uncertainty once again arises along with a feeling of hopelessness due to the reality of an unavoidable cessation of sense and livelihood, as the general agreement is that there is no certainty regarding the unknown afterlife. We can of course hope for something positive to be the reward for death, but our faith in that hope is a cracked foundation that separates further when we see that everything has the potential to be anything other than what we initially believed it had been as of yet. Such is the result of the progress of science which defines our generation; in which there never ceases to be a concluding aspect of the world that gives reason for life as every new scientific discovery in the fields of biology, physics, and astrology tends only to give reasons as to why there could never have been organic existence without the prompt of some kind of unique force that willed the universe to implode with subsistence. Eventually the recognition of death and the need to decide in the context of finalities becomes nothing more than a subjection of speculation towards something beyond our understanding that undermines the solid embrace of present preoccupation, and at the end of the day it is but a mere distraction from the decisions that are currently required of us and demanding our persistent attention. Common attitude is that this field of inquiry ought to be left to those who care to inquire on such an evasive and divergent theme, like a scientist or theologian or philosopher, as the rest of the population must worry about getting to work on time in order to place the food on the table in time in order to survive in our time! And here we have struck upon the insecurity of humanity when we ask the questions “What therefore is the purpose of the best of life when life ceases to be? What becomes of the requirement of self preservation when confronted with the truth of the self’s inevitable annihilation?” If one reflects upon these problems without the support of definitiveness to strengthen their own faith in the answer, one will most certainly crumble under the weight of uncertainty. Or in the act of staying true to ones animalistic nature, they would simply choose to object to reflection and remain ignorant to the hopelessness of uncertainty for the sake of the primitive function of self preservation. Summarily and most simply understood, it is a choice about whether or not to be concerned about the present or the future. But since the intangible future has unlimited possibilities and no obligation of loyalty to what one may hope from it, it is impossible to have any faith in it, whereas the present which is free for sensible discernment can be molded into the shape that satisfy one’s hope. Initially it would appear more reasonable to have made such a choice as to trust one’s hope in the malleable, uncontestable, defined world.

But let us hold back on this choice as it is suspect to be premature. Let us ask ourselves if we are certain that the future is truly uncertain? And are we so sure that the present is really anymore determinable than the future? Place this question in the metaphorical context of a car crash; we have control of the car when our hands are on the steering wheel and our mind is focused on the happenings in the road. Therefore you are in and have control of your present situation. But unexpectedly the attention of another driver in a separate car near you had been lost in a daydream. He veers into your lane and the two cars collide without hesitation from either side. Now let’s think for a moment. You are aware of your present state; you are presently driving. You did not expect, and almost certainly had hoped in opposition of the probability that another car would accidentally collide with you, otherwise you would have avoided it; thus the result of a vague future. But the actual incident itself, the collision, was not an act of the future, as you had not noticed the clash of the cars until it had occurred at that present moment and were only certain that it had taken place once it had passed and became an undeniable truth (assuming you had not suffered psychological trauma and happened upon a state of denial). In conclusion, we determine that nothing in life at any moment other than those that have already passed is truly definite. Our organic senses can show the possibility of a definite object whatever it may be, but it is not until we are subjected to the spirit, the will you could say, of the object in discernment that we can be confident in its definitiveness. If this is the case, what certainty do we really have of anything? What hope can we have faith in that is not already destined as a result of natural tendencies of things to perform treachery against us?

The answer lies in the awareness of an unnatural, ethereal, eternal hope. Awareness, permanence, and reliability are all constituent parts of the innermost hope in humanity. Unlike all other general hopes of obtaining material objects whose values are predisposed to biased conditioning (individuation of the personality), which stimulate momentary awareness whether positive or negative, and are subject to infinite change, this hope engages in an object which is absolutely permanent and beyond nature and material; therefore reliable as it is not subject to the natural behavior of the world. This hope is created through faith in a God. But the value of the components which make up this hope has been neglected all because the subject appears to be beyond our reasoning and comprehension. What faith can we have and how can we hope in something that has left no forensic evidence to deduce the truth of its existence? As Pope Benedict said, “Quaerere Deum – to seek God and to let oneself be found by him.”

This is a message portrayed by the Christian belief. That the only true hope we can have faith in being fulfilled is in the faith and devotion we shower onto God. Their source of this hope, the Holy Bible, is also referred to as the Word of God, and it is by reading the Word of God, that another entity, though still part of the same god, the Holy Spirit begins to resonate in you soul. Though it sounds farfetched and completely imaginary to any reasonable person, their hope for the revelation of its message is only solidified by their faith in that God. And their faith is solidified by the accounts narrated in the Bible of the truth of God’s message. Those accounts are most familiarly known to Christians as the books of the Apostles, and it is through the study of their memoirs, so to speak, their ideas, their faith, their actions, that Christians gain that factually knowledge they believe so strongly in.

            When we reflect on the life of the apostles and how these few men were able to revolutionize the ideology of the world and invigorate the sense of a timeless hope, we must identify what these men of faith contained in their hearts that allowed them to spread the message of hope to the rest of the societies they lived in. It is all too common to misinterpret that a culture of the Word is based soley on the Bible. This is certainly not the case, as the Bible is simply an assemblage of texts which depict the message of God. Therefore in order to asses how a renewed Culture of the Word can present its gift of Truth and hope, there must be a clear understanding as through what means the original culture of the Word, the Apostles themselves, advocated to the people of their times; not through the context of the Bible, but through the unique message now enfettered within its bindings. Only then the Culture of the Word can truly be termed as such, and honestly be capable of distributing the hope intrinsic to the Word of God.

            The question we are immediately impugned upon whilst ruminating on the methods of the Apostles is: How did the Apostles spread hope among a hopeless society? The Apostles had been designated by Jesus to spread the good news- the Gospel-of his resurrection and the fulfillment of the scriptures and to establish churches across the globe with this memorandum, but the actual documentation of the hopeful message took place over a period of about 1600 years; beginning with Moses in the 16^th century BC and completed by the Apostle John in the 98 AD. Over that 1600 year period, there was an assortment of additional men, from prophets to shepherds to kings- and even a tax collector- who were all ordained by God to record the history of His will. Most significantly, their writings were not even arranged into the book we now know under various names such as the Holy Bible, the Gospels, or New Testament until the year 390 AD! So if they did not have the guidance of Scripture, what did they have? This is the primary question whose answer can truly prompt the renewal of the culture of the Word, and thus, with its absolute understanding, allow the message of hope to be planted in every budding soul in the soil of society.

            For the Apostles, the knowledge, faith, teachings, and feeling of hope did not come solely from interpretations of holy text such like our common understanding is consequent of. It was derived directly from the practice, teachings, and experience of the Word that was personified in the personality of Jesus Christ. In his sermons, and in his life and how he lived it, Jesus revealed God to humanity, and shepherded us towards Him by disclosing the truth of the one and only Holy Father of mankind and His values, virtues, and hopes for us his children. Jesus taught and demonstrated that we could be united in spirit whilst still having divergent philosophies and methodologies, how we individuals could strive in our daily lives to love our neighbors as ourselves, and how the men and women who are faithful to God could show forth in their lives their dedication to the fulfillment of their ultimate hope and the principles of righteousness, which is through equal treatment, merciful justice, forgiveness, fidelity, loving service, abiding hope, confiding faith, integrity, altruistic devotion, and enduring peace.

            These were the values of God by which Jesus taught, lived, and died for. He sacrificed his life in order to proclaim this message; enacted with the hope that humanity could learn from their past mistakes, be righteous and distinguishable in their present thoughts, and know and have irreproachable hope that it is possible to seek forgiveness from God if one erred. These sacred morals were ingrained in Jesus’ example and became the light and inspiration for the Apostles which gave them the courage and faith to hope in God; that their devotion to the promotion of these values was beneficial for everyone.

With this new light of hope, they traversed the globe with a clear vision to spread the message of salvation that was symbolized by Jesus’ death, as clarified in Romans 8:1-4: “1Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. 3For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering.^c And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Holy Spirit.”

Wherever their journeys brought them, the knowledge of deliverance followed; empowering their faith and hope and encouraging them to move forward while immersed mind, body, and soul in the ethics and ideals of Jesus.  At every opportunity they not only preached the Gospel but also performed it through acts of piety, charity, and service to every man woman, nation, and institution in the name of God and thus made themselves the model of hope for all to admire and imitate. It was in this unyielding work to baptize the pagan societies they lived in with the message of the one true God that they created the first ever culture of the Word, bound explicitly by the morals and example of Jesus Christ and Word of God, and the hope and faith in its truth.

The result of this selfless band of vicars revolutionized the world and changed the course of history; and became the religion that we today know as Christianity. The virtuous condition of this pious religion, though, has dwindled over its 2000 year history. The light of the message, morals, and practices of Jesus have been muddied and veiled in the increasing darkness that has encroached upon the territories of man’s mind, and the significance of his sacrifice has been scrutinized, divided, torn apart, and tossed aside by the doubts arisen from scientific reason and exploration. Rather than understand the symbolism of his life, we refute it for its seemingly impossible application in the modern world, and we pay dearly for this mistake. The way a renewed culture of the world can bring hope to today’s society is by adopting the example of our spiritual ancestors, who matured in the light of hope and proved impossibility to be tangible through devotion to divine work; who brought hope to hopeless men and woman in a hopeless age. It is only through experience of that same light that we can become the beacon, the source that this light radiates from. If an entire inclusive empire of idolatry such as the Romans’ could be reformed by so few men, then why can not the parallel values of today’s worldwide community be rehabilitated by the millions more who carry the same message those few did? Although the Kingdom of God has been depicted in various ways, the general consensus of its universal significance and the moral requirements of men and woman to be citizens of it have always been disproportionately statuesque to all other matters; it is Heaven, God’s holy abode; Paradise, a place of perfection whose inhabitants are people of perfection. Why then, with all the definitive guidance of the Bible we now have that makes righteousness appear like an algebraic word problem, and the support of God that has been promised for eternity which is the known variable in this tedious equation, can not Heaven be on Earth? For the Lord’s prayer doth sayeth “On Earth as it is in Heaven”.