The story of the Fall is, it seems to me, one of the truest stories you can find.
Eve is cursed with great pain in childbirth. This is as a result, it seems, of obtaining knowledge. Well, fair enough. It seems to me that the price of our giant brains, and our upright posture, is difficulty, pain and danger in childbirth. Certainly more than in other animals, I reckon. And when I consider the dangerous and destructive uses to which Young Keith puts that painfully-bought intelligence, I sometimes think I'd have traded a few hours' less pain for the alleged benefits of being Homo Sapiens. And what a joke that self-awarded Latin tag is.
And then the key end result of the story. Having grabbed the fruit of knowledge, we are forbidden the fruit of the Tree of Life. So we have the knowledge to see the facts, but have the power only to mitigate them, for a short time - not change them. Animals will die, but they don't have to worry about it. They just are, and then aren't. But we thinking bipeds can see the horizon, but only guess what's beyond it. We are doomed to know that we are doomed. We have knowledge, but not eternal life.
The Tree of Knowledge, and the Tree of Life. I think we're gonna need a better Tree.
And thank God, we got one.
ReplyDeleteIs that the Fall, knowing we die? For me, it is the awareness of the effects our actions have on others. Moral choice, not being able to make the right ones because they may all lead to some level of wrong. And a brain with a huge ego that deliberately makes choices that are damaging to others.
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