This is a very noisy world because people love the noise they manufacture, as if, somehow, it made them more powerful, or safer, blanketed and dummied down by their noise-making institutions and toys. Now there is another, older noise resurfacing, at least in America (include Canada in that as there is no longer any difference between these political entities), and that is the rumble of revolution. Not an organized marching band type drumming and giving of orders to man barricades, but bravado talk from people who have no intention of sacrificing anything to making anything 'right' which in their minds has gone 'wrong' and needs redress. It's pathetic, even as talk, because it has no direction, no leadership, and definitely no intelligence has as yet attached itself to this rumble which may instigate random acts of localized violence against the wrong people and nothing more.
As I was reading through "White Gold Wielder" (from the Thomas Covenant Chronicles by Stephen R. Donaldson), I came upon something that reminded me of what Earthians are like. Quote: " 'The Waynhim are made creatures. They have not the justification of birth for their existence, but only the imperfect lores and choices of the Demondim. And from this trunk grow no boughs but two—the way of the ur-viles, who loathe what they are and seek forever power and knowledge to become what they are not, and the way of the Waynhim, who strive to give value to what they are through service to what they are not, to the birth by Law and beauty of the life of the Land. This you know' …"
And so it is, ever since Earthians gained knowledge that allowed them to differentiate between good and evil. To gain this knowledge was a bold and dangerous move whose consequences could not be anticipated. The Makers feared this more than anything because it was in innocence they had nurtured their made creatures so they could manipulate them at will, control them, keep them in blind servitude, in slavery. The discovery caused the Makers to lose control. The made creatures soon realized that from knowledge came choice. From choice arose responsibility. Two paths opened before the made creatures with their new-found knowledge: the path of the ur-viles, of power over, of murder and self-justification (as exemplified by the story of Cain and Abel and down to the story of Bush and Iraq over weapons of mass destruction) and the path of the Waynhim, of the servant through self-sacrifice. Spiritually and mentally speaking, the race basically split in two, with the vast majority stampeding after power and wealth, and a tiny minority holding itself back, refusing the bait of the Matrix, the lure of power and money and in so doing, saving the rest time and again.
Of course it makes no sense to become a part of that minority unless we know (not just believe, but actually know!) that 'everything is on its way to somewhere' (as eloquently put by George Malley in the movie "Phenomenon") and it doesn't all end in meaninglessness at one's physical death. How can one know this? It's always been stated as a matter of belief, of believing in. But can we really know this?
Doesn't that question bring us back to our attainment of forbidden knowledge way back when? At the time we could not access the mythical 'tree of life' by which one could live forever, but as with knowledge, wouldn't it have to be a logical 'matter of time' before we did reach that tree? So, why didn't we? Why are we still searching, or believing in religiously inspired fairy tales, or 'dying' by giving up altogether in despair or hedonism?
That's an easy one to answer: because of the noise. By institutionalizing noise, the Matrix effectively cut off understanding. It destroyed, or blocked, our ability to reason our condition and situation vis-à-vis the cosmos. It brutalized us and made us once more the slaves of institutions that we were before we opened the gate to knowledge. We essentially did nothing with our gained knowledge because we were interfered with and continually dummied down. Those who did express a desire to explore their knowledge and shared it with the rest were persecuted and killed—all at the instigation of the Matrix. The Matrix created a new 'doorway' to life and that was through institutionalized belief systems. Heaven, for example for Christians, could only be gained through the Church, and the Church's ways could not be challenged under pain of eternal damnation in a lake of burning sulfur—in hell. This is basically true of all successfully organized religions.
Religion, like government and money, has a particular kind of noise it uses to rally the sheeple. Its pronouncements make no sense unless one has faith. Faith, of course, is nothing more than a powerful delusion, a sort of brainwashing. Proof? Faith is at its best when none of what it claims to stand for is actually being produced.
As for government, it is best known as a thoroughly perverted institution made up of the most successful liars.
And as for money, let the current debacle in corporate mega-mismanagement be witness to the fact that it too is nothing more than smoke and mirrors. Its gospel, its noise has been its advertising and the wasteful gadgetry it has inflicted upon the planet by putting it in the hands of overgrown children who never learned discipline, responsibility or felt the least concern for the well-being of others. Of the three Powers mentioned, perhaps money has created the greatest amount of noise to drown the people in meaninglessness. Its claim to fame is it did this by simply catering to the Earthian's innate selfish pleasure-seeking nature.
If we were certain that our individual life continues on after a physical termination; if we knew that it goes on pretty much the same way it was lived here, that no magic happens at death to suddenly make us perfect and wonderful mindless creatures in some heavenly institution for the mentally dead, what would that do to our current mindset or approach to life?
What if we were certain that having chosen to become a better person/being, we entered a new phase in which we continued to struggle towards that which is 'good'?
What if we knew but chose not to care, instead carrying on in our selfish ways that we would be taken over by another group of Power Controllers, bought and sold and installed on some world, perhaps even this one, to slave at another dead end job, living another life in futility and ignorance, mind blunted, blinded, brutalized within the noise of the Powers?
The question is, what if we knew, not believed or suspected nor hoped, but really knew, we indeed are in a state of permanent change requiring us to make endless choices that have timeless reverberations; choices that can aid and abet the Powers; causing us to get sick, to kill one-another, to destroy our world(s); or giving us choices that courageously implemented can make our worlds into literal 'heavens' that we can actually experience as living beings?
What if we realized that once we partook of knowledge we became the ones who must change the face of our world, or worlds, without interference from any Power or manipulative divinity? What if we became convinced that we are 'it' and no help forthcoming from anywhere to change our condition, and that condition is basically 'eternal' until we changed it?
Well, we do know this. It is the brutalization caused by the noise, the advertising, of the Powers, of the Matrix, that keeps us from accepting what we know. So we remain slaves to ignorance and fight over the bones of our fleshless beliefs, enslaving our world, destroying each other in pointless competition and deadly wars that only destroy what is left of anything good on this world and in the end dying without knowing.
Revolution (however well organized) against any aspect of the Powers, or taking on a Power with any force once tried and failed or previously absorbed, will only meet with check-mate because all our moves have been entered in the Powers' computerized programming and will be instantly and successfully countered. Only by surprise, by something entirely new, possibly something that cannot be programmed in the Matrix computers because it would be like a virus, can anyone hope to succeed. But before anyone can see this possibility, one must overcome the noise of the Powers.
And that demands a few simple things: the willingness to self-sacrifice to the well-being of 'others' (namely for strangers and enemies!); detachment (in its mystical/spiritual aspect); self-empowerment (living without expectations of any 'help' arising from any other source but those I cause to arise from within myself.)
"Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. This is as true of humans in the finite space of a planetary ecosystem as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive"--lessons of Pardot Kynes, First Planetologist of Arrakis.
(from Dune by Frank Herbert)
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