THE PREMISES OF PARADISE
This blog describes a world free of all human wrongs. There are probably many such worlds among the astronomical likely number of planets in the universe that can support intelligent life. I refer to these worlds collectively as Elysium.
I first describe exactly what would make possible a world free of all human wrongs. I then describe an imagined visit to Elysium from Earth. Finally I present a collection of poems that convey ny vision of Paradise.
If any reader is encouraged to act in a way that makes Earth more like Paradise, the blog will have been worth creating. And everyone is encouraged to take a first step in this direction by making a donation to the Neighborhood Center of the Arts in Grass Valley, California, where developmentally disabled adults have the opportunity to create art. Here is the link to their website: https://www.ncagrassvalley.org/
The Premises of Paradise
What is wrong with the way people live never goes away. Wrongs may grow or be diminished over time. The victims of wrongs are replaced by other victims. The perpetrators of wrongs are replaced by other perpetrators. But what is wrong never disappears. There have always been wars, cruelty, oppression, exploitation, cheating, deceit, inequality, and indifference.
And this In spite of the never ending chorus of criticism from the wise, in countless sermons, lectures, and books.
There must be a very deep flaw in human nature that accounts for this persistence of wrongs.
Identifying this flaw is difficult, because we do not have an unflawed species to compare mankind to.
But considering the likelihood of an immense number of planets in the universe that can support intelligent life, we can certainly wonder if on some of these planets there might be such unflawed species.
At least we can try to imagine what their secret would be, how they would fundamentally differ from humans.
The home planets of these supposed intelligent species free of human wrongs I refer to collectively as Elysium, after the place of a blessed after life in some ancient religions, and referred to by Schiller’s “Ode to Joy” and Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony”.
Well, for starters we can imagine that these Elysians would always follow the Golden Rule, instinctively. They would never harm another in a way they would not want to be harmed.
But what exactly would make that possible? Clearly more than hearing the Golden Rule taught as a model way of acting, as humans often do.
I suggest that this way of behaving would be rooted very deeply, in what could be called the premises of their lives. These premises would make up their understanding of life, their vision of life, how they see the life around them.
And I would like to suggest that the premises that could explain a way of living free of human wrongs can be summed up in two words: identity and eternity.
A vision of identity that resembles that of our hypothetical Elysians was expressed by Jesus of Nazareth at Matthew 25:40, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”
Here Jesus is identifying Himself with all other people. He sees that His identity and their identity are one and the same. The consciousness in Him is also the consciousness in all other people.
And this vision of an Elysian’s identity with all others sees his neighbors as other incarnations of himself. His consciousness seeing the world from his viewpoint, has been, or will be, their consciousness seeing the world from their viewpoints. He himself has lived, or will live, all of their lives.
Someone with this understanding of his identity with all others would have no inclination to gain at the expanse of others. He would see that the other’s loss will be his own loss sooner or later. In treating others as he would want to be treated, he would be treating himself as he would want to be treated.
According to this understanding, this vision, there is really only one life that all share, as it cycles through all bodies. And that implies the second premise, eternity.
The Elysian understanding of our identity with all others implies that our death leads to rebirth as one of those others. So death cannot end our life.
But for this one life that all share to be eternal, there would need to be a reason that the entire sequence of lives cannot come to an end. And this is based on the metaphysical understanding that is itself the reason for believing in a person’s identity with all other lives.
This metaphysical view is a radically different way of seeing the relationship between our awareness of the universe, and the universe of which we are aware.
If we reflect on our experience of anything around us, say a clock, where can we draw the line between the clock and our awareness of it? In fact we witness a single, seamless whole, which is awareness-of-the-clock. There is no separating what in the experience is the clock, from what in the experience is awareness. And all our experience of the universe has this quality. So we are left with the view that reality is not divided into two different parts, a physical universe on the one hand, and our awareness on the other hand. Reality instead is seen as a seamless whole we can call Being-Consciousness.
This seamless whole, being reality itself, cannot go out of existence. Over time, it can only change its perspective. And an Elysian would see other people as being the same reality as himself, experiencing from a different perspective.
With this vision of the nature of reality, Elysians would believe that they have eternal life. And that is the other reason their species could live free of human wrongs.
As Ernest Becker explained, the driving force behind self-aggrandizing behavior is death anxiety. To give ourselves a sense of security, in spite of knowing we are going to die, we inflate ourselves with socially recognized distinctions. We try to make ourselves heroes, demi-gods, very important, very special. We try to stand above others, outrank them, surpass them. dominate them in any way we can. We try to win socially recognized competitions, defeating those we compete with. All of these efforts Becker called “immortality projects”. Success in these immortality projects gives us an illusion of being safe from the threat of death.
This drive to stand above others is seen everywhere. We achieve an illusion of immortality by being essentially too good for other people.
The wealthy are too good for those without wealth.
The owner of a mansion is too good for the owner of a modest house.
The Rolls Royce driver is too good for the Chevrolet driver.
The manager is too good for the worker.
The CEO is too good for the manager.
The general is too good for the private.
The full professor is too good for the adjunct lecturer.
The famous is too good for the unknown.
The best -selling author is too good for the unpublished writer.
The movie star is too good for the extra.
The virtuoso soloist Is too good for the second violin.
The victorious athlete is too good for the defeated athlete.
The scientist who makes a discovery is too good for the scientist who does not make the discovery.
The prize winner is too good for the person who does not win the prize.
The beautiful is too good for the plain.
The handsome is too good for the unattractive.
The person walking a Great Dane is too good for the person walking a Chihuahua.
The owner of the latest iPhone is too good for the owner of an obsolete cell phone.
The Marathon runner is too good for the person who does not run.
The fit is too good for the out of shape.
The fashionably dressed is too good for the unfashionably dressed.
The person knighted by the Queen is too good for the mere commoner.
There are two important facts to note about all of these ways of being too good for others. First, none of them provide protection from the death that is inevitable for all of us. No matter how much better than others we are convinced we are, and no matter how much this judgment is reinforced by our admirers, we shall still die. So all of these immortality projects are futile efforts to provide ourselves with safety that is impossible to acquire.
Secondly, our success in these immortality projects often comes at the expanse of hardship for other people. We see the harmful results of immortality projects most glaringly when whole nations competing for dominance go to war. And also when the greed for wealth leads to the oppression of exploited workers, toiling at meaningless work to make others rich.
Vast inequality results from these efforts at self-aggrandizement. And the gains of the winners in these competitions are paid for by the losses of the losers.
Of course without the need to protect ourselves from death, there would be no death anxiety driving any of this self-aggrandizement.
And since Elysians would believe that they have eternal lire, they would feel no need to protect themselves from death. They would have no death anxiety. And therefore no force driving them to self-aggrandizement,
To stand above others, to be more special than others, to defeat others would have zero appeal for them. Because they would see their neighbors as other incarnations of themselves.
Identifying themselves with their neighbors, and feeling no death anxiety in the light of their assurance of eternal life, Elysians would live without self-aggrandizement or need to dominate others, without any competition. They would live to make their neighbors happy.
So what would life be like without any competition and without any trace of self-aggrandizement? People would share their joy in the beauty of Nature. They would sing and dance to celebrate the eternal life they all share. They would make sure that no one has any hardship. They would not acquire artificial products beyond what they needed. The artificial products they need would be produced working as absolute equals, and distributed to all equally. The happiness of the workers as they produce artificial products would be given weight equal to the benefit of the recipients of the products. They would be sure that their production and use of artificial products did not cause a deterioration of their environment that threatened their well being. Not acquiring artificial products to aggrandize themselves, they would have far fewer artificial products than we do. Their life would be much simpler than ours, with far fewer hassles and problems and glitches.
This life they share could last for a billion years. And living for each other’s happiness, their life they share would be an endless joy.
And if Elysium exists, and the inhabitants’ understanding of life that I described is true, we shall all be reborn there eventually.
the Premises of paradise 