Maybe the Original "Bibles" were Cave Art


More and more cave art is being found in Southeastern U.S. Perhaps scholars of cave art are prejudiced, but they consider cave art some of the most important written history of humans.

Historians are good at writing about wars and leaders. There are ancient documents, plaques and murals telling who won the battles and who the kings were. What was in the mind of average citizen is something else. As author Steven Prothero wrote, one way of considering what various religions stand for is figuring out what is on the mind of the average member. About Christianity, he says it is about sin.

What we (or at least I) would like to know is what was on the minds of people who were illiterate? What worried or inspired them? We know a little from what is called oral history. Then there is the written record, cave art.

Animals still draw the interest of artists. Today I was on a road trip to our favorite apple orchard for our annual two bushels of apples. We drove by a sculpture on a farm I have seen many times before. Mounted thirty feet on a pole is a large statue of a bull. In ND is a huge statue of a dairy cow. Around the Minnesota lake country are several birds. On the walls of caves are animals drawn 40,000 years ago.

The cave figures, however, include many half animal, half female human. Are we to believe the artist actually saw such a creature? Hardly. It had to come from conversations or beliefs at the time. Perhaps the artist and people around the artist thought human women originally came from animals or animals came from human women. It's fun to speculate, maybe Eve's original sin was passed down from thousands of years before. 

Whatever were the bizarre ideas reflected in cave art they are no more bizarre than those of today's great religions including Christianity. Humans coming back from being long dead, humans floating into the sky, humans suffering in a fiery hell and sin all came from the same place as the cave drawing to half woman/half lion, the human mind.

That billions of people still hold ideas as bizarre as those in cave drawings means humans have not evolved as much as we like to think.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Maybe the "Original Sin" Should be Reassigned

Image
We can all agree most Catholic priests are fine people and not guilty of sexual abuse. What Catholics must face, however, it that their church harbors executives who are dishonest . There is an incredible story about the Argentine Bishop Zanchetta. The Pope worked with him in Argentina and they are considered friends. Around 2015 Zanchetta sent nude pictures of himself and they began circulating world wide. He also was too friendly with young seminarians and some left because of him.  Three different officials say they made formal complaints to the Vatican about Zanchetta between 2015 and 2017. Yet, in 2018, the Vatican claimed it was unaware of any complaints about Zanchetta. This might be a good time to repeat the Catholic hierarchy claims to have the sole authority handed down from Jesus to what the faith stands for. It condemns as sinners those who practice birth control, have abortions and gay sexual relationships. Handing the hierarchy this responsibility would make som
Read more

The Religious Capitol Invaders May Yet Win

Image
So much about U.S. society and religion can be learned from the Civil War and what happened afterwards. After its defeat, the South started a myth about the unethical soldiers from the North. The South fought for principles of God and states rights. The North did not. It was the South, this propaganda told the country, that had the high moral ground.  The Capitol invaders, encouraged by Trump, swallowed the myth that Biden's election was stolen. Thus, they think they held and still hold the high moral ground. This was reinforced by the cross and prayers during the invasion. Even with Trump is gone, we will see political opportunists like Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley stroking crowds and feeding the same lies as Trump. Like "the South will rise again" these gullible followers will talk of victory over the unclean. After the Civil War the South rallied around the phrase, Lost Cause. For decades, and maybe to this day, there are ceremonies remembering fallen martyrs, Re
Read more

Father Frank Pavone, the Ultimate Crook

Image
Recently, the Vatican defrocked Frank Pavone. His diehard fans are outraged. This is because he cleverly manipulated his fans and the press all the while living well from donations and, apparently, abusing some women. By making abortion the "sin" of the century, and himself the main opposition to this one sin, he himself could get away with any sin he pleased.  As the link points out, Pavone was the perfect priest for the Trump era. Trump is so self-important laws have no role in his life. He felt accountable to no one. Women were there to be had. Pavone and Trump are interchangeable.  Pavone was very successful raising money. In his mind, abortion was so important in Catholic beliefs and he was so important in anti-abortion the money he raised opposing it was his to do with what he liked. The Catholic Church, the brand name he used to raise this money, thought the money belonged to it. When he gave the Vatican the bird, it gave him walking papers. With polls showing the majo
Read more