The Moral Axis of the Universe

In my previous post, God as a Figment of the Human Imagination, I ended with a significant line from The Evolution of God author Robert Wright; he said that there is a moral axis to the universe. "I believe that there's a purpose unfolding that has a moral directionality. I have barely the vaguest notion of what might be behind that and whether it could be anything like a personal god or an intelligent being or not. That's another question. I don't know. But I will say it's-- whatever is behind it, if something is, it's probably something that's beyond human conception."

Beyond our human conception. That explains my statement,"Most of us figured that out long ago, after we took a second look at all of the nonsense in the Bible. " Humans have been attempting to put a human face and human characteristics on that moral axis for eons even though it is 'beyond our human conception' to be able to. The fundamentalists, however, are convinced that the ancient, desert-wandering, nomadic Hebrew tribe 'got it.' For the fundamentalists, this tribe 'figured out' what this Moral Axis of the universe was like as well as how this Moral Axis communicated to them. They even wrote down the words the Moral Axis spoke for all of us to see. It was awful!

What an insult! What arrogant tribal pap!

Who, in today's world, some 3000 years beyond that rendition of the Moral Axis, actually gives any credence to that accumulated tribal babble? The man called Jesus of Nazareth surely didn't verify much of it at all. He talked with women, even a Samaritan woman. He told his fellow Jews to put away their swords. He embraced the diseased, the outcast and the marginalized of society. He instructed them to love one another. What a rebel. No wonder the elders of the temple had him arrested.

The Hebrew 'figment of their imagination' named Elohim reflected every longing and weakness, each prejudice, all of the desires and fears of the Hebrew people. They made Elohim in their image and it was a pitiful conglomerate of ancient myth, magic, malevolence and mayhem.

The 21st century world is becoming more unified, more homogenized. We are, as Wright said,

' approaching a global level of social organization. And if people do not get better at acknowledging the humanity of people around the world in very different circumstances, and even putting themselves in the shoes of those other people then we may pay the price of social chaos. So the system is set up that way. And that's just an intriguing fact to me that seems to create a kind of moral axis that we can't help but orient ourselves toward or try to orient ourselves toward.'

Biblical literalists or Koran literalists just don't get it at all. They are stuck. They are stuck worshiping a god who little resembles this 21st century world. They are stuck with a tribal god, a figment of the imagination of wandering tribes who needed a specific type of god who would legitimize their actions and upon which they could rest their worries.

Tribalism is dead. Insularity is passe. Boundaries are fading. Cooperation and codependency are today's standards. A literal 'new world order' is sprouting up all across the globe. Ancient tribal religions have no place in this changing world. We are newly-connected to one another. Religious isolationism flies in the face of this new movement.

Those who wish to hold on to the past, to embrace the god of Abraham with all of 'his' violent smiting ways, with 'his' intolerance for the other, are mere obstructionists in this unfolding reality. Their time is past, like the horse carriage. They need to move out of the way as we open the doors and windows and let refreshingly fresh air flow in.