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On Civilization 17

The Ever-unfolding Marriage of 

Loewenmensch and Venus of Hohle Fels

They gathered in the Valley of the Gods, as they did in the late afternoon of every day. All the gods and goddesses who represented devotees of the major world cultures and civilizations. They discussed the demands and the problems, the tragedies and the controversies that were brought to them that day. And they partied, drank from their various nectars, relaxed, and loved. Sometimes they included friends from the human world. Mensch and Hohle Fels could be seen there from time to time.

In my opinion “religion” is a word that everyone thinks they understand, but for which there is no universally accepted definition. It’s a non-word – simply a space-filler for ideas that we cannot fully explain nor comprehend. Spiritual is another of these words. The use of such words implants exclusive codes within dialogs, as well as discourses, around religion – not just the esoteric ideas that have been embedded within various religious practices, but also the popular conversation around which religious practice revolves.

The interesting thing about religious practice in the second and first millenniums BC, was that people had a much closer relationship to their gods than generally do practitioners today. Their gods were less abstract and more defined – more approachable. They had human personalities and failings. I can imagine, for example, Greeks, gods and citizens alike, sitting around a long, very long (as there were many gods in those times) holiday table, celebrating their mutual merriment – with wine provided by Dionysus.

It seems that this period, roughly the last 2,500 years BC, was the time when our penchant for creating and relying on the unknown imaginable increasingly developed.

A continuing project by Martin Gantman.