musings on software development, writing and life

I read an interesting description of the Adam and Eve mythos the other day. I was reading a book by Israel Regardie, and in a footnote there is a short blurb about the concept of us choosing to become conscious creatures by “eating the fruit of knowledge”. So rather than mankind being “tempted” and falling to weakness, it looks at it from a point of view that we were previously happy like all other creatures, and we chose to seperate ourselves and become aware – with this came knowledge and all the things we now worry about that animals don’t.

It may seem odd but I have never really contemplated it this way before. I’ve never been truly comfortable with the idea of the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve being literal, but this line of reasoning had never come up. When I explore it, it makes a great deal of sense – the “fall” didn’t introduce pain and death into a world where there was none. Carnivores didn’t suddenly become such having been originally created to eat grass, which is what I was taught. The beauty of the universe is it’s vast complexity – the ecosystems in our world are intricately balanced (or were, before we got stuck in) and as such they require the natural circle of predation and survival. What really happened (if you follow this line of thinking) was that Man chose self awareness. Once done – we were no longer able to survive unconsciously as do the animals. Knowledge of our nakedness could be seen both as a literal thing and as a euphemism but either way it is indicative of the kind of thing that affects us once conscious and unconscious thought are seperated.

As we have grown and evolved, we have seperated ourselves further from our unconscious knowledges – we no longer really experience a lot of the feelings we have, or have any conscious experience of our bodies or simple acts like breathing. In theory, that untapped reservoir would still be there for us to access did we but know how – and reaching back as close as we can to that original state of being is the ultimate aim, because obviously it brings us closer to that divine beginning.

Whether any of this means anything I don’t know but it’s a very interesting viewpoint, and explains some things a lot better than my sunday school teacher ever did…

If anyone has comments, I’d be interested

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