With an imagination, mankind became curious and began to wonder why certain
mysterious phenomena occurred. Why did people die, what was lightning and thunder,
etc.?? The storytellers invented a story to explain every mysterious phenomena that
occurred. The ancient Greeks invented many gods; Aeolus, the god of winds, Vulcan, the
god of fire, Venus, the god of love, etc. The Hindus invented other gods. The Mayans and
Incas invented their gods. The Romans had their pagan gods.
The Mind of Mankind
throughout its existence has promulgated powerful mythical ideas that
guided its people through the mysterious phenomena that constantly surrounded them.
Great religions were born, prospered, some survived and some along with their
civilizations, died. They all arose from the innate realization of a magic implanted deep
within their minds. The realization that some infinitely intelligent all powerful force must
have created all the magic that surrounds us. Imagination gave us the mental power to
perceive this magic.
An Infinitely Powerful Creator God
We cannot put any limit whatsoever on the power and wisdom of God. The best we
can do is ask for his guidance and blessing and do as Jesus commands, "Love God with
your whole heart and love your neighbor as you love yourself". The last part of this
command is a really tough challenge. It challenges us to see if we can live in peace with
each other in spite of our nature. I take it to mean - We should respect people the way we
would like them to respect us. (It seems simple enough!!)
Imagination increased the power of the traits we inherited from our distant animal
cousins, a thousandfold. These traits by themselves are not evil, they are necessary for the
survival of each species. However, when they were coupled with an imagination, the Mind
of Mankind exploded onto the scene. The nature of the Homo Sapiens species changed
forever (it became Homo Imaginative Sapiens). With an imagination mankind was now
able to invent words which eventually evolved into languages. Language in turn, gave
birth to the storytellers with their tremendous ability to enter into the minds of man and
create havoc. They could now create emotional hate and anger in the minds of people,
something the humanoids were are not capable of doing or even comprehending. The
storytellers were now able to play with peoples' emotions by telling them lies, half truths,
etc. thereby inciting hate, anger, prejudice, jealousy, etc.. By the time members of the tribe
became young adults, their minds were already weighed down with these stories plus all
the other tenets, customs and rituals that the tribe wanted to perpetuate. This process
continues today in our societies.
To counteract this evil side, mankind has a constant need for religious and moral
guidance, a strong need for positive storytellers to guide its people in the right direction.
Moses gave us; the Ten Commandments and preached of the one true God, the
Creator of everything. Jesus gave us; God as our Father, the Golden Rule and hope for
salvation. Mohammed revealed the Koran. Long before these men lived, a storyteller in
ancient Egypt proclaimed the idea that people possessed an immortal soul, a soul that
would live on after we died. He may have also described the place where our soul would
go when we died; either to Heaven or to Hell, (eternal happiness or eternal damnation).
Other storytellers preached additional religious beliefs, commandments and philosophies.
If a person followed these dogmas and obeyed their commandments, their soul would go
to heaven when they died, if they did not they would go to hell forever. These are very
powerful religious ideas that helped guide and keep mankind's dark side somewhat in
check for hundreds of centuries (and still do). Other stories, myths, superstitions, religious
dogmas, were created to spread these ideas. Great religious traditions and cultures were
created and prospered.
Unfortunately, many of these religious philosophies were also used to dominate
their believers lives and subdue their imaginations, evolving in some cases into some very
evil religious practices. Over the centuries millions of people were sacrificed, tortured and
killed as a result of these religious beliefs. Mid-evil “Christians” tortured and burned
people at the stake, the Aztec, and Carthaginian religions along with others, sacrificed
innocent people, (the Aztecs by cutting their victims hearts out). Mohammedanism
converted people “by the sword”, just to name a few. Religions are great teaching and
moral guiding institutions but they are created by men, the storytellers, and should be
accepted as such. As in war, men's desire to dominate other men is the primary intent of
these terrible practices.
I feel extremely fortunate to be living in this country, at the present time, under the
religious philosophies of Moses and Jesus Christ and the political philosophies of John
Locke, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Tom Paine, James Madison, the Iroquois
tribes, etc., rather then some of the more oppressive philosophers of the past ages.
Our Creator is infinitely wise and powerful.
Mankind does not have the power to “sin” against him in any way. We cannot offend God
nor make him angry or happy no matter what we do. Our imagination has given us a
tremendously inflated ego to even think we can influence him in any way or break any of
his laws. We have our devil but it exists only in the Mind of Mankind, it exists no where
else. It is part of our makeup that we inherited from our ancient ancestors coupled with an
imagination. We are much too insignificant in the scheme of things to think we can effect
God in any manner. He does not care one way or the other about our sins. It is for our own
good, that we try to suppress our evil nature. We cannot sin against God. We can only
“sin” against ourselves, our environment and the other living things we share this planet
with.
God created us exactly the way he wanted to, right down to the last atom, trait and
instinct. He does not make mistakes. We may have a “free will” but we also have all these
natural instincts and inherited traits, plus our storytellers’ tales influencing our minds,
along with hormones surging through our body that makes us act the way we do. We are
however, his creation and are very special beings in his eyes since we are the only life
form, on Earth, to whom he has revealed his existence. By giving us an imagination God
has challenged mankind to make its own destiny. Maybe he will help and guide us - if we
ask. Its up to us.
Mankind's imagination does have its limits. We can make full use of all of nature's
laws but cannot break any of them nor create new laws. We cannot even bend them
slightly. There are probably many subtle laws of nature that we have not yet discovered
and many laws that we do not understand and some we have not interpreted correctly.
God's natural laws are unbreakable. These natural laws of physics, (gravity, inertia,
quantum mechanics etc.), chemistry, mathematics, biogenetics (the laws governing
evolution and life), etc. extend in all directions across the entire universe, they do not
change or vary.
Each and every cubic centimeter of space, throughout the entire universe,
contains all the natural laws that it takes to run this dynamic reality. Conditions may
change but his laws do not. Where our Creator's laws end, the universe ends. God's
domain does not end at the boundary of the universe however, it goes on forever, (more
about this later ).
I believe in the Christian religion because I was brought up in that environment and
I appreciate the beautiful culture and traditions it has created through the ages. I was taught
these beliefs by other people. I however, know for sure that our God exists because,
although I cannot see him, I can see for myself the omnipotent effect of his creativity that
exists all about me, his interwoven all powerful natural laws guiding everything within the
universe (not the storytellers’ mythical tales). I cannot see gravity or inertia either but I
know they exist because I can observe the effects they produce.
I know God exists because he allows me to. Being human we all were given the
very special power to imagine the existence of our Creator in our own way. We all know
there is some all powerful creative magic, guiding everything in the Universe, its ingrained
in our minds. We can see his magic and wonder that is all around us through our physical
eyes and also through our “mind’s eyes”. I imagine God to be a little like the laws of
Gravity and Inertia. I cannot see these laws but I know they exist because of the powerful
effects they manifest on me and everything else in the universe. Their omnipotent
dominance also extends its powerful influence to every part of the universe at the same
time, but they are limited. Their influence ends at the border of the universe whereas
God’s influence zooms right past the border out to other universes he has created. God’s
domain is infinite. (If we are created in the image and likeness of God, it must be the
creative power of the Mind of Mankind, everything else about us is so ordinary.)
If God has given us an immortal soul and created such a place as Heaven, that's
great. We are in his hands, he knows best. (He certainly has the power to do so.) Simply
being aware that God exists is reward enough. No other life form on this planet has been
granted this Special Gift. Just being able to imagine there is a place such as Heaven makes
it a little more likely to be true.
God has placed the seed of the idea of its existence in our
minds so there is a possibility that it does. As far as Hell is concerned, that too has a
chance for existence but to me, makes no sense at all. Why would God create man exactly
the way he wanted and then torment him in Hell forever for acting the way he was
intended? For our own benefit, not God’s, it is up to mankind to control its “devils”. We
can ask for God's guidance and help to do this. It won't hurt to ask!
God gave us an imagination so that we could perceive him and his wonders. The
Mind of Mankind is forever trying to capture this magnificence through the arts and
sciences. Philosophizing about everything it encounters, painting pictures, sculpting
figures, composing prose and poetry, discovering and trying to understand God's natural
laws. Those beautiful cave paintings and palm imprints are one the earliest indications that
radical new beings had arrived on Earth. The philosophers, scientists, inventors, and other
creative imagineers are working ceaselessly, trying to discover God's secrets, trying to
determine the true meaning of the natural laws that he created to run his universe.
Our imagination is a Special Gift from our Creator - it is our 7th sense - no other animal has this sense. With this gift we are forever
obliged to try to discover the secrets and splendor of his universe, to enjoy and appreciate
the beauty of his creations, to enlighten the darkness of our ignorance, to enjoy the
standard of living we have achieved by using this power. To try to get to know him better.
Some philosophers believe that if mankind did not exist to perceive the universe, it
would not be a reality. Actually, there are probably billions of planets in the universe (the
universe is a really big place) inhabited by beings who have also received imaginations
over the ages just as powerful or even more powerful then ours. They have also been given
the opportunity to enjoy perceiving the mysteries of the universe. Maybe the radio static
we hear coming from space is a jumble of all the radio signals that has been sent out over
the ages by billions of other civilizations from all over the universe.
Would our universe still be a reality even if none of these other imaginative beings
existed? Actually this may be the reason God created imaginative beings in the first place.
What fun would it be to go through all the trouble of creating a beautiful universe and then
not show it off to anyone or interact with it in some way? It would be as if we built a
beautiful new complex machine and then just watched it run, never showing it to anyone
or interacting with it in any way.
Having an imagination has given mankind a special link with God. It has given us
the power to ask for his guidance and for special favors. It is the only way we can have any
effect on him whatsoever. Maybe he will heed our requests, maybe he won't. I think he
will..
The most important reason by far that the Creator did for mankind was to reveal his existence to us. Through our imagination he revealed the wonders and magic for mankind to preceive and to use for its own benefit. It gave mankind the power to raise our standard of living to astonishing levels never before attained in the animal kingdom. It is mankind's Special gift from its Creator.
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