Hearing the Voice of
God
Reading the Voice of
God
Questioning the Voice of
God
The Evolution of the Religious
Mind
It is easy to recoil at the amazingly cold and cruel
stories we find in the Bible of the behaviors of men in the name of their
God. We see that most of it was done because these men were told to by
"God." They never saw God, or if they did it was from behind, or in a
cloud or burning bush...but they did hear the voice in their head.
As a kid, I wondered what kind of father was this
character called Abraham, who when told by the voice in his head to go offer his
son up to the god in a human sacrifice, simply said, "oh, Ok." There
is no emotion expressed by this man. He has the mind of a
zombie.
The Old Testament is like that. Many of the players,
especially the people under the leadership figures in the Bible, simply do what
they are told without any introspection or personal thinking. As a result,
we have men who sacrifice their daughters because they said whatever comes thru
the door goes to the god. We have armies hacking and wacking their way to
glory hearing the voices in their head of the leaders urging them on by the
voices in their heads too. We have a Moses who gets pissed off when gone
on a mission to pick up the Big Ten, one of which forbids murder, and then
orders "each man to kill his neighbor. And in that day about 3000 died," no
biggy. No one seems to tell Moses, "what are you nuts?" They just do
it.
The prophets, both major and minor are god haunted by
the voices of the god in their heads. They conduct their entire lives
obeying what others cannot hear and do not experience. Their quirkiness,
rather than seen as a mental illness or malfunction, is seen as a special
calling and people fear them. And while often wrong in their prophecies, we
forgive them and project it ahead a few more years to another time to cover up
their errors.
This is a huge topic but one I always wondered about.
Why is the OT so violent and the stories full of examples of people doing things
that would never be tolerated today? What's going on
here?
Julian Jaynes, author of The Origin of
Consciousness and the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, may have an
answer.
"At one time human nature was split in two, and
executive part called a god, and a follower called a man. Neither part was
conscious."
And what changed this man who heard the voice, much
like a schizophrenic would, in his head telling him what to do either by the
King or by the god?
Writing.
Writing came to humans about 3000 years ago. At first
they were pictures such as hieroglyphs as in Egypt but in time letter were
formed and books were written. This allowed humans to save their thoughts
and examine them. This broke the cycle of the Bicameral mind and people,
slowly began to wake up and hear their own thoughts and question others over
them. They also started to hear the voice of the gods less and less, which
was a very disturbing turn for the worse.
Jaynes shows that the Illiad, written about 1260 BC is
almost devoid of human emotion and introspective characters. They just do
what the voices or the gods dictate. However, in the Odyssey, written in the
900's BC, we see much more introspection and awakening of the individual.
This was a transitional time for human thought. This is story time and
when the Old Testament story comes on the scene.
To me it explains most of the seeming inhuman
characteristics of many OT characters.
For example, we have the little boy Samuel, hearing
his name called by God, but only in his head. He goes on to be a rather weirdly
respected prophet who makes a career out of hearing the voices in his head. Saul
on the other hand, is vilified in the OT for his independent thinking and
"disobedience" to God and the men who hear the voices. Actually, Saul was
more awake in his personal consciousness. He introspected where Samuel did
not. Samuel was god haunted. Saul was not and it confused him.
Saul was told to do things by Samuel he did not understand. He was derided for
things that today we would say, "well, I'd wonder about that too." When
Samuel doesn't show up, as he said he would and at the time he said he would,
Saul takes charge, makes decisions and of course, gets nailed by Samuel and the
voices in Samuel's head for doing so. One man was unconscious and one was
more conscious, and it wasn't the prophet of God.
This theory of human consciousness also explains why
we see God fading from the picture in the OT. We start out with God
practically being everyone's best friend, accessible (in the mind) and ever
present. As the story unfolds, God has to be seen in symbols such as
snakes and idols, clouds and pillars of fire. He's still there and most
can still hear the voice in their heads telling them what to do or how to be,
but fading.
Soon God drops out of the picture and now needs other
humans like kings and priests to tell everyone what the voice of God in their
heads says to do. Most obey and hear the voice of the Kings and Priests as
they once heard the voice of God.
In time, around 1000 BC we have even the Kings and
Priests losing touch with the voice. The Psalms are full of "why art thou
so far off?" "Why have you forsaken us?" and "Why do you not speak with us
anymore?" Over the next 3000 years humans seek a hundred different ways to
recontact God. Necromancy, idols, lots, oracles, smoke and prayers.
Whatever the Urim and Thummin was, it was a way to figure out what the silent
God in the head wanted Israel to do. Today we have oija boards, crystal
ball gazers, ministers and priests to tell us what God wants from us as we
question it all having become more conscious and scientific of thought.
Ministers and Priests today don't hear the voices
either, well most don't, but they have the book and supposed records of those
that still did.
From this period of time, those who still hear the
voice become the prophets and conclude it must be "Sin" that has separated them
from the voice and so the concept of sin was born, both national and
personal. And so all the stops are pulled to get back on track, to no
avail. Those who are not as conscious go to war with those that are more
conscious. Religion is born big time and people end up on one side or the other
and the rest is history as most humans now have awakened in their introspection,
question asking and individuality.
While I suggest a long read of Jaynes view, the short
of it is that the human brain is two brains. The right hemisphere can see
and think but cannot speak. However, to this day, hallucinations and voices come
from the right brain. The left hemisphere can both see and speak because
of the Broca and Wernike's areas of speech. Whatever the right side sees,
it must connect to the left to speak it.
For example. The right brain and eye sees things
on the left. The left brain and eye sees things on the right.
Together they see it all. When the bridge between the two is cut or
damaged we have a fascinating reality. When shown slides the right sees
the left one and the left sees the right one. When the left slide injects
a bit of Porn to the right eye, the person sees it but can't talk about
it. Talking is left brain and the bridge is cut. The left eye see
right slides with no porn so has no reaction. The person starts to
giggle or get red because the right eye sees the porn the left eye cannot. When
asked why are you giggling. The left side which can speak says, "I
have no idea!"
In the past, the right brain heard to voice of the
gods, king or priests in their heads on the right side as do modern
schizophrenics. The left side talks about it.
This may explain why Egypt could build such a
civilization. Pyramids weren't built by slaves. They were built by
unconscious zombies of sorts who did not think for themselves. A nation
would need to be at peace for the most part to build such things and the vast
number of humans would need to be easily told what needed to be done and
why. They said, "Ok" just as Abraham did.
All this change in human consciousness because writing
allowed humans to think more introspectively and as they did, the voice of the
gods, prophets and Kings could be challenged and the rest is
history.
Religion is the remnant of the unconscious bicameral
mind struggling to reconnect itself and all who can be affected by it back to
the voice and will of the gods. It is why we have the division today
between science well done and religion badly explained. It is why we have
critical thinking today and ten thousand denominations. We both want to
keep and let go of religion and the voice in our heads has now been replaced by
the old old old written word about the time when the voice was heard. We
now are expect, "by faith," to hear the old voice and obey it because most
don't hear it and don't trust those who say they do. "God says," is the
now the same as "The Bible says." Of course it is not. We are
smarter than that now because most have woken up and are more conscious than in
"Bible Times."
Those who will not see the flaws, mistakes, errors,
contradictions and so on in the Bible may be less conscious, not by intent, but
by the meme that we buy into that the book is the old voice of God, now not
heard, written down so we can still hear it. However when you write
something down, you are now able to examine the whole thing and see the
mistakes, errors, contradictions and such in the text. The only choice
then is to either find and apologetic for them or realize that perhaps it is not
what we were always told.
It explains why most can see the contradiction but the
loudly rabid cannot and won't.
It explains all the craziness of religion and those in
the COGs who still lead by declaring them more in touch with the voice, through
the book, than others.
It explains the Hagees, Parsleys, Swaggerts, Hinns,
Weinlands, Flurrys, Packs and you pick literalists of this present world.
It explains the sincere who also don't hear the voice
but are willing to trust the Book and those men who say they still hear it and
should be followed.
Big story. Fascinating. This can get too
long.
The Origin of Consciousness and the Break Down
of the Bicameral Mind
Julian Jaynes.
It is not rebellion on our part. It is not
scoffing. It is awakening from the old unconsciousness of the Old
Testament views and behaviors, laws and control to individual thinking and
decision making.
While individual waking up and consciousness causes
its own problem at times, staying asleep and unconscious is not its cure.
