It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on..." The War Prayer, is a short story by Mark Twain about blind patriotic war and the God who is on both sides. Written around 1904, published after his death in 1923.
Part 1
Part 2
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the Read more [...]
Posts tagged God
The War Prayer – Mark Twain
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on..." The War Prayer, is a short story by Mark Twain about blind patriotic war and the God who is on both sides. Written around 1904, published after his death in 1923.
Part 1
Part 2
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the Read more [...]
Joseph Campbell – The Hero’s Journey
In The Hero with a Thousand Faces Joseph Campbell looks at myths and psychology - showing the connection between the stages of the "monomyth" seen in religion, movies and the journey of each of our lives. I'm using this book along with some other Joseph Campbell books and videos for my class...
"The mythological hero, setting forth from his common-day hut or castle, is lured, carried away, or else voluntarily proceeds, to the threshold of adventure. There he encounters a shadow presence that Read more [...]
Is “God” a Fractal?
When I inside and outside my "self", I see one thing: fractals. Fractals explain to me the microcosm and the macrocosm that our cells, bodies, societies, galaxies, and possibly universes and beyond, are a part of.
Have you seen the "Power of Ten" clip? This is a MUST. It zooms out at the power of 10 every second out to the edge of our universe and then zooms into through to the quantum quark inside your hand. Out of every youtube clip I've ever posted on this blog, this is my favourite:
Compare Read more [...]
What makes more sense?
What makes more sense?
1. That God selected ONE species to be his “chosen” species, abandoning all His other creations to nothingness.
OR
2. That God values ALL of his creations. The idea that humans are the only creations with souls, is a narrative created by humans not God.
What makes more sense?
1. That God selected ONE group of people to be His “chosen people, to help them conquer other groups of people (as long as they obeyed Him) and to punish all other people in the world who strive Read more [...]
Can Buddha help us deal with the elephant?
I am starting to understand what Buddha meant when he said all life is suffering. No matter which financial situation you are born into, we always want more. It is very rare we reach a stage where we happily say “enough”. The more chocolate I have, the more chocolate I want. The more countries I go to, the more countries I want to go to. The more money I have the bigger apartment I can get, the better the car, the more vintage the scooter, the more designer the clothes, the better quality Read more [...]
Capitalistic karma: reinterpreting reincarnation
Walking up in the mountains outside Kathmandu I contemplated the connection between the world’s inequalities today, the actions of one’s ancestors, and the idea of karma and reincarnation that I had been reading about in some books on the Eastern Religions.
Be they the ancestors who split from the group to discover new worlds fifty thousand years ago, or be they the innovators of new technologies that won them last century’s battles, the connection is pretty clear... and I wondered, is this Read more [...]
Free Documentaries: The Truth Is Free
Bored? Never! Check out this website: http://freedocumentaries.org/index.php
In particular I recommend:
Manufacturing Consent - Noam Chomsky ... if you haven't seen this one you better watch it NOW!
The War on Democracy - The US manipulates politics of South America
The Power of Nightmares - The rise of the Religious Right in America, and Islamic Fundamentalists.
Jesus Camp - SCARY!
The Story of God - explores the history of humanity's search for our creator.
Zeitgeist - as I Read more [...]
The Spirit of the Times (Zeitgeist)
In the hidden-away tranquility beneath the branches of large shadowy trees, in the Secret Garden hostel in a mysterious little town called Vilcabamba, in Ecuador December 2008, I met a man with white hair and a white beard. It was from this man that I first learned of the Zeitgeist...
The word “Zeitgeist” comes from the German word Zeit, which means time, and Geist, which means spirit.
So basically Zeitgeist means the “spirit of the times” and according to wikipedia this Read more [...]
How to create a world war
Among my Internet surfing I came across a “creationist” website – the belief that the world is around 6000 years old – a figure derived from tracing back the genealogy in the bible from Jesus to Adam, and the seven-day creation. This belief is growing so much that more than 40% of Americans believe this and do not believe in evolution!
Obviously this creation story clashes with the Story of the Universe I am presenting in my Big History Blog Series. I think it is always important to read Read more [...]
