SEARCH FOR IDENTITY

SEARCHING FOR IDENTITY

Since humans climbed out of their cave and wondered about the world around them and what it was all about, humans have questioned what they are doing on this planet and what becomes of them when they die. It was always about identity, what they were and what it was all about. Obviously, the biggest brute in the cave got his choice of the best chunk of meat and selection of women but as numbers grew, he had to delegate some of this responsibility to those around him. It was not possible to be everywhere.

Increasing human numbers even more created a need for more lieutenants, and a few will want to challenge some of the boss's decisions, such as in this selection of meat and women, leading to inevitable conflict. Such confrontations will continue either with one group incorporating another or simply wiping the other out. This continuing warfare doesn’t do anyone any good, so over time, those perhaps not advanced physically but smarter than the brutes will come up with ideas from which they can exert their own control. How to do this becomes very difficult, but then these people are very smart and understand that if you could insert some authority which would be unchallenged by the leader and their fellow man, they become this deitie's spokesperson who could unify the group and control even the strongest of leaders.

Over time, we then see over three million different types of religion form to address this missing agenda on what life is all about and, in one way or the other, to give it meaning. Obviously, all these Gods can’t be bothered with everything, so they delegate to these newfound priests who can pass on instructions to the groupthink. In this, they can come up with how, provided you pay your taxes and do what your master wants, there is a magnificent heaven waiting for you after you die, making any traumas experienced during life on earth inconsequential. Obviously, this was a worthwhile incentive. Otherwise, the leaders would find it difficult to get people to fight and die on their behalf.

So we progress over time, and these religious stories have to be integrated with reality and divine attention, becoming in many ways allegorical illustrations with occasional fact. In this, we have people fleeing Egypt towards a better life, crossing a Red Sea which wasn’t, in fact, parted but had historically because the sea dropped to a low level during that period in history. These people then mix in with the resident Canaanites tribes, drifting around for the allegorical 40 years in which Moses was meant to have wandered looking for the promised land until the ultimate group, later called Jews were established. Again, Moses had to have some form of authority to lead a whole nation even though it is unlikely that he was discovered by Pharaoh’s daughter floating down the Nile in the basket or that he became a dominant figure that could bring about plagues as a demonstration of a link and being able to receive written instructions from God. Pity of course, that Moses then smashed God’s tablets in a rage before anyone else could see them.

So we start off with this new God Yahweh, who, as in Harry Potter, became “He who must not be named”, also at the time, having a wife, Asherah, until the Egyptians sacked the city of David, scaring these new Jews. This had them ditch all the other remaining lesser gods to become monotheists promising themselves that they were now God’s one and only chosen people. While this then helped unite the people, this new tribe remained at odds with the Romans until this was tempered with the rise of Christianity, later recognized by the Romans under the turncoat Jew Yosefus as a good way to keep these Jews in control since they were never happy paying their taxes. Again, in the divergence later becoming Christianity which was really the basis of antagonism against the Jews is illustrated by Jesus overturning the money changers tables in the Synagogue given that usury or compound interest was illegal yet followed by Jews becoming rich. This casual reference then followed their misfortune up to the present day since as Shakespeare suggested in "The Merchant of Venice", no one liked Jews unless they wanted to borrow money.

So if one follows this brief history of where we have reached today, it might be difficult to comprehend exactly what has been achieved where in reality the underlying questions still remains from that time in the cave, where humans ask themselves the same question of “What are we doing here and what happens when we die?” The search for the meaning of existence still has not been answered and intensifies the conflict between these three linked monotheistic religions, all with the same God, just separate rules.

Again, we had the foundation of Judaism, switching to Christianity, later to be incorporated by the Romans until the rise of the Arab tribes culminating in their sacking of the invincible Constantinople. Hence, with the emergence of these warring tribes, they were smart enough to see what benefits religion had given the Romans, so they incorporated their own version to suit their waring agenda of the time. To overcome a possible challenge should facts conflict, under the illiterate Mohamed, the designers of this religion ensured that what they said was his word became the ultimate truth and not to be challenged no matter what facts might get in the way.

Taking this expanding view of history, it can be seen that we still have the confusion of countries seeking dominance over others, taking us right back to the emergence from that cave. From the start, all humans have added religion as an offering to what comes next in defining our existence. In the absence of proof, it is just as easy to go along with the concept of a heaven, even when no one offers any possible suggestion as to what goes on up there since it can’t just be singing hymns nonstop. Nor is there a logical explanation of what benefit crowds would get from 72 virgins.

So the ultimate question remains. Here we see the dominance of America as the number one global power getting first choice at the best hunks of meat and the more powerful the selection of women, while other societies struggle towards becoming number one. The similarity, to the cave analogy whether one likes it or not, is confronted by the religious question of my God’s rules a better than your God’s rules even if it’s the same God. The problem is now we are no longer fighting each other with sticks and stones but have access to atomic weapons which could wipe out humanity as we know it.

Looking at the devolution of society around us with the rise of the woke pathway leading people searching for significance and identity, is it a far stretch to suggest that this reverts back to that initial question of humans still desperately searching for some meaning of life and their relevance desperate for some answer? Would some reasonable answer to this question prevent humanity from blowing itself into smithereens before Elon Musk’s suggestion of a multi-planet existence is realised? So, what would satisfy individuals humans that their existence has some personal identity or meaning? Is death just an inevitability to grin and bear it, make the most of what we have and just become other people’s memory? So many questions.

So for the answers, yes, one can take comfort in having children who might carry on the memory of ones existence, or you could have become famous, or infamous, and be remembered by others documented in history. But you will also be dead. The hypothesis, therefore, is that if someone could provide a successful valid answer to that ultimate question, humans could better coexist and remove the possibility of Agamemnon…