In Lieu of Monotheism and The Internet

 (Spoiler alert: This started out, as most of these posts do as an “interesting thought” that got stashed in a file I call possible Walls.”  It hung out there for a while, sort of tickling back while I was drawing or something. Then we went back to Raleigh for a couple of weeks to do some pre-move cleaning, packing, fixing a dead AC unit, and, delightfully, spending a bit of time with the Raleigh kids and grand babies. Well, I have moved all my drawing paraphernalia up to Burr Ridge, so found myself working with words instead - specifically this post. It has morphed into if not the longest post on The Wall, certainly one of them. I tell you this to allow you to plan how/where/if you chose to read it.  It is not one you can glance over while standing in the checkout line at the grocery store. However, if you do happen to glance at it there, go grab another bottle of wine, or something stronger. Take it home. Put your feet up, and settle in, as Monty Python would say  “for something completely different.”)

As you can no doubt tell from the title this one will get a bit weird. It may not make it toThe Wall as it really only makes sense to me say, between midnight and 3 AM. But I must admit that the title is a bit of a lie. It was my intention to tackle both monotheism and the internet in this post, but - taking pity both on you and my wrinkly grey matter, I’m going to restrict this post to monotheism and take up the internet issues next time around.

The reason I was initially tempted to pair the issues is that they both have issues of connectivity. But as I said, I’m going to put the Internet on the shelf until next time. So on to monotheism. I think it was last week - pardon the uncertainty, we are down in Raleigh chipping at the absurd amount of work needed to get the townhouse ready to sell. Anyhow, I watched this video on recent excavations in the city of Pompeii. Apparently these excavations were the first ever to penetrate the nearly 20 feet of volcanic ash and other pyroclastic material from Mt. Vesuvius that buried the city on August 24, 79 CE. The tragedy struck with such swiftness that flight was futile and so many of the city’s residents died where they stood, engaged in everyday activities. Among those activities was folks making offerings at their household shrines to their household gods to secure prosperity, long happy lives, etc., etc. The gods apparently were not listening, or were perhaps busy elsewhere, hence putting those particular supplications “on hold.”

Monotheism, however, claims 24/7 service with unlimited bandwidth. Which assumes that the deity is always available.  That presumption raises the thorny issue of if there is an all powerful deity “out there” who is always connected and hence always hears human prayers - perhaps even those directed to other, erroneously conceived, deities, why do terrible things occur? Pompeii is only one horrific example from a human history littered with millions of disasters, natural and wroth by humanity. Events an all-seeing, all-powerful deity could, one assumes, prevent.

The monotheistic notion of an all powerful “always on” deity - dare we say AO?- gets further bruised when we consider the presumed extent of the “devine network.” While Zoroastrianism might lay claim to being the first monotheistic faith with roots reaching back some 4000 years; Judaism, Christianity and Islam all stem from the same millennia. So, one might legitimately ask, what was the “extent of all creation” over which these monotheistic faiths originally held dominion? How big a network were these early theologians, philosophers, prophets and priests talking about? Well initially, I suppose, what they could see. “All creation!” Spread out before them - “This is my Father’s world, All nature sings and round me rings, The music of the spheres.”  

It may also be important to remember that when these ancients - primarily from desert cultures - walked out at night to consider the wonders of the universe, they looked up and saw an unpolluted, star-strewn sky the likes of which you and I have never seen except on digital screens. No wonder they felt themselves at the center of existence, watched over by a deity who created it all - it was obvious, there, right before their eyes.

And then Hans Lippershey invented the telescope in 1608 and the very next year Galileo pointed the thing up into the sky - discovering to his amazement and eventual chagrin - that there were a whole bunch more planets and stars up there strongly suggesting that our third rock from the sun was not actually the center of the universe. And he was foolish enough to say so. The Pope was not amused and forbid Galileo to write or speak of such foolishness. Galileo apparently held his peace until 1632 when he published his basic theory, thinly disguised as a mathematical exploration of  Copernicus’s theory of the planets. Again Rome was not amused, and placed Galileo under house arrest for the rest of his life.

Those faiths and philosophies, firmly convinced of their accuracy, do not have a history of tolerance when it comes to alternative notions of existence and divinity. So for the last few thousand years established monotheistic faiths have slaughtered their way across much of the globe convinced that their theology was the “one true faith,” and others need not apply.

The more I think about it, I believe that the various versions of the monotheistic AO faiths simply bit off more than they could chew. It isn’t beyond belief that one deity could keep a handle on one planet - seeing the sparrow fall and all that. Maybe even a whole solar system. But as the late great astronomer Carl Sagan of The University of Chicago (my father’s alma mater) used to say “there are billions and billions of stars out there!” And further, it seems every day the James Webb Space Telescope aka JWST, reports on distant galaxies that continually expand the known reaches of the universe. Most recently a galaxy that is a whooping 31.96 billion light years from earth.

And then there was Stephen Hawking, only one among the many genius cosmologists who assert that the idea that “we are alone” is absurd.  Rather, they claim any simple analysis of existing data reveals that we are but one of many, many intelligent and technologically capable entities in the universe. That is a far cry from “my father’s world” and an incredible ask for a single AO monotheistic deity.

Which is, in part, why I think the ancient polytheistic faiths may have had a better idea. They seem to have practiced what I think of as “deity diversity.” Instead of making one deity responsible for everything-everywhere they divided the tasks. In a polytheistic world you had a deity in charge of the ocean, maybe fish and all “water” stuff, another deity for land, maybe farming, crops, etc. It appears that the tasks assigned to a particular deity vary according to the central needs of the culture. Northern trading and raiding cultures may have needed deities different from those needed by tropical or desert nomadic cultures. So different deities evolved.

Of course this still does beg the question of connectivity, functionality, and responsibility. Does the honoring of a particular deity have any impact on events in the deity’s “area of responsibility?” That is purely an issue of faith and belief - true with both monotheistic and polytheistic faiths. A herd of sheep sicken in Salem, Massachusetts in the 1600s? Widow Jones is a witch! “Off with her head!” Or something equally heinous in local puritanical Christian belief.  Crops fail in Ghana in the same time period? The local “crop-type” deity must be appeased with the appropriate ritual.

Belief in an exclusive relationship between a specific group and a deity who, through favored belief and ritual, impacts the occurrence of specific events in the world (and the afterlife) has fueled the evolution of religions. Such “my God” beliefs formed the basis of thousands of wars, and the creation of seemingly “billions and billions” of exclusively infallible narratives in print, art, music and video. And yet, while many claim it, no one seems to have gotten an undisputed lock on the nature of a, let alone a functioning example of,  a unique relationship between humanity and divinity.

We can view this seeming lack of divine connectivity in a couple of ways. Pessimistically we have the “Woe is me! Lost in a trackless wilderness!” perspective. More optimistically is the “Cool. I get to work this out myself!” Having always been an optimist, I have naturally constructed my own notion of a multi-layered set of relationships between whatever deity may exist and “my unconquerable soul.”

This might be a good time to get that adult beverage I mentioned waaaay back at the beginning of this post.  Or whatever other element - tea, coffee, CBD lotion, nicotine - that lets you relax in the face of strange information.

OK, here we go. When I leave home for any extended period of time, I travel with a small stuffed panda named Boswell. Pragmatically, both at home and on the road, Boswell provides the perfect padding between my pillow and the optimal head elevation for interacting with my iPad: reading, writing, watching videos, etc. Were that “padding” the panda’s only function I could have named him Paddington, after the famous bear in children’s literature. But this Boswell has a different function, drawn from the history of James Boswell, famed Scottish biographer. That Boswell is best known for his works on Samuel Johnson who was a towering British author of the era, but who seemed to have a penchant for thinking and writing in fragments. Boswell, in addition to writing the great man’s biography, apparently kept Johnson’s ramblings in some sort of order. I believe I once wrote a post here on The Wall pleading for a Boswell.

Frighteningly, as I mentioned we are doing “packing stuff” here in Raleigh and I just made my way through a two-inch thick file I discovered in a drawer. The file bears the title “Waiting for Boswell.” Within are essays, poems, short stories, and personal letters of significant import - but to uncertain recipients - reaching back to my grad school days in the 1970s!  Where was Boswell when I needed him most? I also found a 1980ish short story predicting the advent of, and potential dangers in, virtual reality.  Needed some work. So you see Boswell is not a recent fixation in my mind.

OK, let us assume I could take this Boswellian notion with me as I time travel back to the polytheistic world of Pompeii. Well, very first thing, I would move to somewhere waaaay far away from Mount Vesuvius. But I suppose that would be cheating. Second, I would construct my version of a Pompeian shrine to my household deity - Boswell the Panda. I would call it Boswell’s Hearth, and the physical representation of my household deity would be, of course, a panda. Sacred offerings? Any kind of bamboo would do. But what I would expect from such offerings to this somewhat restricted household deity would not be wealth, better crops, health - the normal household deity requests made at the time. Rather I would ask Boswell to remind me of Distilled Harmony, and its four tenets: Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity and Oppose Harm.

These reinterpreted versions of household deities, like Boswell, would allow a finer focus of piety. No need to worry about the entire - and swiftly expanding - universe. Rather the household deity would help focus our involvement in the everyday world, in your home and community. Ask not what your deity can do for you, ask what your deity would have you do to make your world a happier, more beautiful, more joyful, more peaceful place. Boswell be praised. Have a bite of bamboo while I go fluff him up a bit.