There is a certain conceit about humans today. We think that we are the most knowledgeable people who have ever been on the planet. And yet there are so many things we do not understand much about, and there is also evidence that some early peoples had a wealth of ideas and knowledge.
We come with the prejudice of our present; we think the people of the past must have been cruder, more ignorant. Yet the indications from the very earliest cities are teasing: their diversity suggests different purposes at work, not a uniform development from hunting to agriculture and then commerce. And, for example, many peoples had knowledge of the cardinal directions and they accorded them with significance in their lives….? What does that suggest?
Then you can read a piece of history, how there was a plague, a natural disaster or a violent skirmish, and everyone died. So everything that was known by those people was lost forever. And meanwhile we might wonder if those people who died did not know wise things, amazing things. We are the inheritors of loss as well as gain.
But we are triumphalists; we worship progress, and place our hopes in that. We think that anything that was lost was learned again, or was not worth knowing. We think the ancient people may have been devoted, but they were mistaken. They were superstitious, believing in dark spirits and magic. We have learned knowledge, and we know that magic is only tricks and sleight of hand.
We say we know there is no evidence for the things of spirit. No one has found Atlantis, no one has found the fairies at the bottom of the garden. That has even become a joke. We are modern.
Yet, even when the first cities were made, there were memories of times no longer known. The first books of the Christian Bible were written after the ninth century BCE, long after the first cities had existed. In Genesis we are told that the whole world, with animals, birds, plants and humans, began with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. This is the story that came to endure over much of the world since then.
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of god was moving over the face of the waters; and God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.” (Genesis, chapter 1)
There were five more days, culminating with God creating humanity in His own image: “In the image of God He created them, male and female, and He told them to be fruitful and multiply”.
In ancient China the story goes differently. In the mists of the Kunlun Mountains, the First Ancestor was born when Lady Yuan of Jiang trod on the big toe of Di’s footprint and swallowed the egg of the Dark Bird; she conceived in awe. She gave birth to Prince Ji and to Hou Ji, Ancestor Millet. This happened at the Hidden Temple below the summit where the Tiger Spirit dwells.
In Australia, the world before the world began was, as in the Bible, without form and void. In the Dreamtime the land was first shaped and all the forms of life came into being. The totemic beings, such as the Rainbow Serpent, transformed the landscape and still live as the rocks and hills and watercourses. The moon and the sun and stars came to life. The tracks for following animals wove their way through the land, and there were ceremonies and rites for the maintenance of the health of all things.
I learned about Creation at Sunday School. We coloured in pictures of Adam and Eve in the Garden, enjoying the free gifts of the fruits and herbs. Often there were two pictures, the first of which was trouble-free. We were allowed to enjoy that for a brief moment. Then we were given the second picture, and a conundrum too hard for a child – there was one fruit that was forbidden, yet Adam and Eve ate of it. It contained the curse of knowing good and evil, and Adam and Eve were cursed and sent away from the garden to spend their lives in labour and in pain.
It was a hard lesson. Eating the apple was wrong, but we were told by our parents to eat apples every day because they were good for our health. And I never understood why it was wrong to know the difference between good and evil, and our parents reminded us of the importance of knowing that every day too. It was only years later when I read the Tao Te Ching that I understood.
“When people see some things as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see some things as good, other things become bad. Being and non-being create each other. Therefore the Master acts without doing anything and teaches without saying anything. When his work is done he forgets it; that is why it lasts forever.” (Chapter 2; Stephen Mitchell)
I learned early that some things will never be explained to you. The dominant requirements are to remember and to obey. The older knowledge was obscured.
This article is an extract from the book FUTURE: The Spiritual Story of Humanity. Find out more: https://www.glennmartin.com.au/big-picture
Image: Michelangelo, The Fall of Adam and Eve, as depicted on the Sistine Chapel ceiling (taken from Wikipedia)