The Devil. Woooo...
So I'm getting out of my car this morning to get into the office, and as I'm turning off the car, the radio barks, "Tonight! On NBC, an event never before seen. Does the Devil exist?"
Unbelievable. Not for the shameless attempt to manipulate and soften up an already-paranoid-and-end-time-fearing public. No -that's a given, and I'm quite jaded enough now to expect it.
No what's fascinating is that I'm reading a book right now, In Search of Zarathustra, that is changing the way I view most of western history and religious thought. I know what you're thinking (are you thinking?) - "oh, that's that guy that Nietzsche wrote about." Um... kind of, but not just that.
For the briefest of summaries - Zarathustra (or Zarathushtra, to be proper) was the prophet from ancient Persia who taught the way of thought known now as Zoroastrianism, basically a belief system that the world is a battlefield between good and evil, and people are here to fight evil and cultivate good.
Sound familiar? Or course it does, and it predates almost every other western religious teaching of the same nature. There's more, but I'll wait until I read the book through a few more times before I try to comprehend it and even paraphrase it worse here.
Pick it up, if you're looking to expand your realm of thought, and are willing to challenge assumptions you have about the history of the idea behind the Devil (woooo....).
Unbelievable. Not for the shameless attempt to manipulate and soften up an already-paranoid-and-end-time-fearing public. No -that's a given, and I'm quite jaded enough now to expect it.
No what's fascinating is that I'm reading a book right now, In Search of Zarathustra, that is changing the way I view most of western history and religious thought. I know what you're thinking (are you thinking?) - "oh, that's that guy that Nietzsche wrote about." Um... kind of, but not just that.
For the briefest of summaries - Zarathustra (or Zarathushtra, to be proper) was the prophet from ancient Persia who taught the way of thought known now as Zoroastrianism, basically a belief system that the world is a battlefield between good and evil, and people are here to fight evil and cultivate good.
Sound familiar? Or course it does, and it predates almost every other western religious teaching of the same nature. There's more, but I'll wait until I read the book through a few more times before I try to comprehend it and even paraphrase it worse here.
Pick it up, if you're looking to expand your realm of thought, and are willing to challenge assumptions you have about the history of the idea behind the Devil (woooo....).
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