Humans draw on experience. We are "genetically programmed" to do so. This is not necessarily a bad thing; if
anything, it is probably a neutral thing. But, as with so many ‘neutral’
things, practically anything from the internet to nuclear power, it is when
man’s reasoning kicks in that things start to change and take the hue of our
own intervention. Our intervention, more often than not, consists solely of our
experience on the matter. Knowledge is something hard to attain: it takes a lot
of time and effort, things that people rarely apply to their search of truth
(‘still won’t research and find all the root of the truth that he speaks of’[1]).
Experience is often the easy, effortless alternative. In this way, we cannot
claim fully objective understanding of and opinion on any single matter. All
this is about the understanding and absorbing of already existing things and
situations. But that happens when man’s experience interferes with reality?
There is only one truth; different interpretations of it confuse us and trick
us into claiming the existence of many different truths, something overly
convenient for many. However, when we speak of truth, convenience is rarely a
good thing.
On to the Garden of Eden: what a
magnificent little fairy tale. I will not engage in the process of explaining
in a reasonable way that there is no external force in the name of a ‘god’,
because this is not the place for it. I choose to draw on the truth, universal
as all truth is, that there is no god. Taking as a given that man has created
religion, for a variety of reasons (from reinstating our sense of belonging, to
many different political and economic reasons), it is interesting to search for
signs of our human experience that may have influenced the details of a
religion. As the title may suggest, I shall be occupied with Christianity. Let
us take the example of the Garden of Eden.
The Garden of Eden constitutes or
resembles a parallel universe, one in which the two first people to have ever
existed, only just created by God, live peacefully in the company of all
animals, surrounded by the virgin nature (note the use of the word ‘virgin’, a
word so beloved by Christian officials). However, happiness does not go on
forever; to define how much time passes before things go wrong is probably
impossible, as there is no sense of time in this fictional parallel universe.
At some point, anyway, Eve gets ‘tricked’ by the snake into eating the fruit
from the Tree of Knowledge, the very same tree that God had explicitly ordered
them not to eat from, and goes on to feed it to Adam as well. This is the first
instance of human experience reflected in this little story. Humans possess the
‘gift’ of curiosity (yet another neutral thing). Anyone who is in search of the
truth of things would argue that eating from a Tree of Knowledge cannot be a
punishable act, but, rather, everyone’s right. (Note that we cannot claim that
everyone should eat from the tree; we
all have the right to live in a lie, and no one can deny that knowing the truth
at all times may be impractical, even if the difficulty arises because of the very
people who live in the lie.)
Now, we have to keep in mind that,
the human experiences that are reflected in the details of any given religion,
while they may of course be accidental, many times they have a specific
purpose. In this case, the purpose is to deprive humans of certain indefeasible
privileges, according to the principles of Christianity. When Eve obeys[2]
her curiosity and takes a bite off the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, she
acts in a way in which many of us would have acted, were we in the same
position. And this is exactly the problem: Christianity is founded on the basis
of blind obedience to a higher authority (God) without ever searching for the
truth of the matter. This is why the word ‘blasphemy’, such a strong and
vicious one, is used to describe every instance of free and independent
thinking on the believers’ side. Here I would like to point out that, against
religion as I may be, my objection is not towards the believers in general, but
specifically those who, in the name of their religion, cause harm to their
fellow human beings; namely, those who obey their god’s will so blindly, that
they won’t even stop to think who they harm in the process of believing. Back
to the Garden of Eden. When Eve and Adam both eat the fruit of the Tree of
Knowledge, God emerges out of nowhere to punish them for disobeying him by
casting them out of the Garden of Eden once and for all, cursing them to a life
of labour. Note how the word ‘labour’ is being used today to describe hard
work, as well as childbirth (‘woman goes into labour’). The criticisms of this
particular instance are numerous.
First of all, here arises the
exquisite paradox of God’s almightiness. For one might wonder (and rightfully
so, since our faculty of thinking and reasoning about things shall not be
hindered by something as preposterous as a religion), if it was indeed so
important that Adam and Eve should not eat from the Tree of Knowledge, why did
God put it in the same place as they were? The answer to this paradox, as any
devoted Christian will claim, is that Adam and Eve should of course obey God’s
orders so that they would not be tricked by any factor, external (snake) or
internal (curiosity), into disobeying their maker. Then, why did not God create
Adam and Eve in such a way that it would be impossible for them to disobey his
orders?, the inquisitive mind would continue. The devoted Christian will once
again have the answer ready, as the brainwashing of religion is indeed hard to
defy: but, of course, God did not create humans to be mindless robots, but,
rather, he blessed them with the gift of free will. This is perhaps one
of the strongest arguments of Christianity against blasphemous inquiries of
this sort. Whether God has faith in human kind (what a twist) and believes that
we will not let him down by disobeying him, is to me unclear. I will leave it
to a better Christian than myself to answer this. However, the reason why we
are ‘blessed’ with free will is of no importance here: what is important is that the whole concept
of free will is, in fact, a falsity. Here, the paradox unfolds itself, if we
consider the following points. First off, let us establish the definition of
‘free will’: I believe it is commonly accepted that free will means that man
has the freedom to think and reason, and subsequently act in any way he/she
sees fit to the situation. The factors that may influence such a decision are
irrelevant; what we need to focus on in order for the argument to be developed
is that, in any given situation (extreme situations such as authoritative
states are not considered here), man has complete freedom to act in any way
he/she chooses.
Having established a coherent
definition of the concept of free will, let us go on to explain how the
Christian claim that humans are created by God possessing free will is
disproved. The ultimate aim of any good and faithful Christian is to live a
good and moral life, in order to gain a place in Paradise, once their body
dies. The goodness and morality in this case are, of course, defined by
Christian officials. Since free will is one of man’s faculties, however, it
stands to reason that we can always act in a way that is considered bad or
immoral (always by Christian officials). Should they lead a bad and immoral
life, Christians are condemned to spend eternity in Hell, a place of agony and
suffering. To get an idea of what is accepted as good and moral and what is
not, we can look at the Ten Commandments. According to them, stealing, killing,
lying and being unfaithful are considered bad and immoral. This is something
that we can all agree to, a universal code of ethics and morality, if you will;
i say it is universal, because all human beings are born equal, and all have
the right to life, to private possessions and to truth, among others.
Accordingly, depriving a human being of these sights is immoral and unethical.
However, the Ten Commandments go on to order Christians to do some things that
are not as universal and unequivocal; for example, ‘never speak God’s name in vain’
and ‘never swear’. Of course, the Ten Commandments are not the only source
Christians turn to when in doubt about the goodness and morality of their
actions. Let us not forget the ever-popular, all-time classic handbook, the
Bible. (Oh, the Bible. Even the very name of the holy book should spark some
faith into us, heathens. But maybe next time.) I will not elaborate on
particular examples, as my knowledge around the Bible is very little (as much
as I enjoy fiction), but it suffices to say that, along with some nice little
stories (including, of course, the Garden), the Bible is very much an index of
the ‘dos and don’ts’ of Christianity, for all the faithful to follow. That
would be a Christian code of ethics and morality, as opposed to the
aforementioned universal code. So far, we have established that Christians have
to live their lives in accordance to the teachings of Jesus and God’s orders,
in order to spend eternity in the beauty of Paradise, in the grace of God; if
they don’t, they are doomed to spend eternity in the fiery pits of Hell, in the
wicked company of the Devil. I believe that the paradox is clear now. We are
free to act on our own will during our lives, but we have to follow the
aforementioned Christian code of ethics and morality if we want to spend
eternity in Paradise. I think it is safe to assume that, concerning the
hypothetical afterlife (I say ‘hypothetical, as I believe no such thing
exists), no one in their right mind would choose eternal torture, physical and
psychological, over eternal peace of mind and serenity. Therefore, even though man is created by God as possessing the faculty
of free will, we are, in fact, not free at all to actually exercise it, if that
would mean going against the dogmas of Christianity; were we to do so, we would
be condemned to an eternity of suffering in the afterlife.
