10 years ago someone said to me, “These days you may not even know your next door neighbor, but you exchange emails with your buddy in South Africa twice a week.” I looked out the window at the house next to mine – barely knew the neighbors – and yes I was sitting there sending emails to someone in some far-off country.
Every week I get on conference calls and say hi to everyone and barely think twice about the fact that I’ve got 17 people from Texas, four from Perth, one from Amsterdam, one in Alaska, one in Lebanon.
Ever heard Thomas Friedman’s “McDonalds theory of world peace”? He observes that with only one exception, no two countries with a McDonalds have ever gone to war with each other.
Can you imagine, say, the US going to war with Australia? Think of all the emails the senators and congressmen would get: “Hey, stop trying to kill my customers! And by the way, here’s a list of 115 blogs from people who are trapped in the Siege of Sydney right now!”
The world is truly a strange and wonderful place. Just before I went on a trip, I loaded the first season of The Dukes of Hazzard on my video iPod so my 10 year old son would have something to watch while we trucked down Interstate 80.
That TV show ran in 1979 – the year that *I* was 10 years old. I said to Laura, “Who would’ve thought that 25 years later you’d be able to download an entire season of the Dukes of Hazzard onto a device that’s half the size of a pack of cigarettes, and our kids would watch it in the car with headphones and a 2″ screen?” We shake our heads in amazement.
OK, so what does all this have to do with spirituality?
Equality and technology… They have everything to do with spirituality.
Let’s start with equality.
The United States Declaration of Independence makes a world-shattering declaration that transformed the modern world:
“We hold these things to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
In his book “Democracy in America” (1835) Alexis de Tocqueville carefully traces this statement and its idea of equality backward through history and lands at Galatians 3:28, the words of St. Paul:
“In Christ there is neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, slave nor free. All are equal in Christ Jesus.”
Before Paul said this, no one had ever made such a bold and sweeping statement. No one. Not the Jews or Babylonians, not the Egyptians, not the Greeks, not the Chinese. The concept of equality came first from Paul.
This idea got planted in western civilization and began to grow and develop, little by little dismantling slave trade, sowing the seeds for democracy and spurring technological and political progress. Tocqueville says that from 1100 AD to the present, every major development led to more equality, not less. The Magna Carta. The invention of the horseshoe. The invention of the gun and the post office and the printing press and democracy.
If you live in a democracy and you’re thankful for the ability to vote, if you’re thankful that people generally consider you and themselves to be just as good as anybody else, then thank Paul. And his Rabbi, Jesus.
Because – despite what the Declaration says – equality really is NOT self evident. At least it wasn’t to any of the ancient world prior to 2000 years ago. On the surface, we’re all different. Some are stronger. Some are smarter. Some have more money. Some are politically connected. Some are more savvy.
And some people get the scraps.
You have no principle to guide you but winners and losers. Which, divorced from any overriding sense of equality or individual dignity, is a cruel master.
But when Paul said this, he was declaring that there is an underlying *spiritual* reality, that yours and my true identity doesn’t come from accomplishments or money or power but from our Heavenly Father. That once we know that true identity we’re no longer slaves to money and power and accomplishments and the ‘natural’ order of things.
If you’re thankful that Western Civilization today considers all people to be intrinsically equal, be thankful that a young couple in Bethlehem gave birth to a baby who was to become the most loved, most hated, most argued about, most written about, most influential person in the history of the world. One who taught that the greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. One in whom there is no male or female, no Jew nor Greek, no slave nor free.
So then how about technology?
Science itself is, at its core, a presumption of discoverable underlying order. A belief, an assumption (which cannot be proven in advance, by the way) that when an apple falls from a tree it does so because of some law of nature that caused it to do so. That there was a string of cause and effect that can be traced back to explain why this happened.
The apple did not fall from the tree because, say, Zeus was having a snit with Apollo and that’s why there was the lightning storm which is why there was a wind that caused the apple to swing back and forth and fall from the tree…. no, it happened for rational discoverable reasons. That God made a world which could operate consistently on its own without Him constantly making corrections from the outside.
So far as I can tell, the inspiration for this belief first came from Wisdom of Solomon 11:21:
“Thou hast ordered all things in measure and number and weight.”
(The Protestants omitted that book, but our Catholic friends thankfully left it in.)
If a scientist does not presume that there is a rational reason for what he is about to investigate, there is nothing for him to investigate at all. Belief in rationality comes from belief in a rational God. A God who wants us to discover His universe. For whom such discovery is an act of worship.
If you read the history of science over the last 500 years, the only reason science succeeded in the West – after getting started but failing in Greece, Rome, China, Egypt and in the Arab world – is that Christian theology understood God to have created the universe to operate according to fixed discoverable laws. Theology made that prediction, then people had a philosophical basis for having a scientific method.
In his fascinating book “The Victory of Reason” historian Rodney Stark further explains that the forward march of technology began after the fall of the Roman Empire and has marched steadily forward ever since. Equality implied that slavery was wrong, so people had to develop technology in order to free their slaves and still get the work done.
So… part of the inspiration for inventions like water wheels was a belief in dignity and freedom and the rights of the individual.
Technology is supposed to empower people, not enslave them. Because, as Paul said, in Christ, all are equal.
If you trace these ideas back through history, equality and technology and even iPods and Democracy have everything to do with our very beliefs about the universe and about God. And yes, even Jesus.
Case in point: it’s politically incorrect to say “Merry Christmas” cuz it’s too religious. Instead you get a tepid, watered down “Happy Holidays.”
It’s because Christ is offensive. When a guy smashes his thumb with a hammer, he doesn’t say “Krishna” or “Buddha,” he says Jesus Christ. Because that’s the most loaded, most powerful word in the English language.
There’s no name you can invoke that’s more powerful than the Son of God.
~~~
Do you know what the most important invention in the history of the world was?
It wasn’t the computer. And it sure wasn’t the light bulb or the telephone. (Or even the electronic voting machine.)
It was the printing press.
In 1445, Johannes Gutenberg invented the world’s first movable type printing press. He didn’t know it, but he was unleashing a revolution that continues to this day. Even the mighty Internet in the 21st century is just an extension of Gutenberg’s original, revolutionary machine.
The first book he printed was the Bible. And that led to controversy, too, because Luther translated it into German, the people’s language, instead of Latin, the lingo of the religious elite.
Suddenly, ordinary folks could not only afford a copy, but they could read it for themselves instead of getting some guy’s slanted interpretation. Soon the cat was out of the bag–there were copies scattered all over Europe.
It’s no coincidence that the scientific enlightenment and industrial revolution began in earnest within 50 years of this. Not that it wasn’t already underway (it had already gathered considerable momentum) but now that ordinary folks had access to knowledge and the freedom to pursue it, the possibilities were limitless.
The printing press took the handcuffs off of knowledge and spirituality, and the world has never been the same. Equal access to knowledge empowered people everywhere, and it was only natural that the Renaissance, and in time, democracy too would follow.
Every year at Christmas we celebrate the person who inspired these revolutions. Jesus’ teachings were radical and scandalous. He claimed to be the Son of God. He said he would rise from the dead, and according to the historical accounts, he did. He stepped into the world and split time in half: BC and AD. And his words still resonate throughout the earth today.
Still rolls the stone from the grave.
In the spirit of what Jesus taught us, I hope that you’ll use our 21st century printing press, the Internet, to not enslave but empower individuals. To bring more equality, to make the world a better place for your fellow man.
Thanks for reading.
Perry Marshall
Martin Ward,
thanks, but blaming “homo sapiens” is rather futile. If we are all guilty, no-one is. And if a Supreme Principle of goodness made us all, why did s/he include evil?
Jesus Christ did not have a ‘church’ or hierarchy of priests. He didn’t urge us to attack or burn ‘heretics’. He didn’t sexually abuse or harm children, or defend those who did. He damned them utterly.
Christ was not a patriotic troops-blesser either. “Blessed are the peacemakers”. The idea of a ‘just war’ was an invention of religion. OGT
Old Git Tom.
“Jesus Christ did not have a ‘church’ or hierarchy of priests. He didn’t urge us to attack or burn ‘heretics’. He didn’t sexually abuse or harm children, or defend those who did. He damned them utterly”.
I echo your sentiments and that was the essence of my post.
Hi Perry,
I have been receiving your emails for some months now, and I find them very interesting, but not only: They have anwered a lot of my questions on evolution, creation and God. I am a mechanical engineer, graduated 1974, studied chemistry, physics, mathematics, thermodynamics, fluids, etc etc. and have been working all my life in a God-blessed, economically and historically rich (even though resourcesless), little island in the centre of the Mediterranean, an island that has seen three thousand years of written or traceable history and 10 K years of stone buildings that are the oldest in the world and an enigma to archeologists.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%A6a%C4%A1ar_Qim
I have always been fascinated by life on this planet, what/Who caused it. If it came through chance or by intelligence. I always came to the same conclusion, namely: intelligence cannot be the result of chance. Stupidity cannot produce life. Only intelligence can give life to a collection of elements and chemical compounds and I always came to the other conclusion, namely, that science will one day prove all this. I believe in science because it is a perfection on its own. It is based on immutable laws that no man, politician, journalist or scientist can bend, stretch or twist. If I try to break the law of gravity by walking off a cliff I would surely die. If I fly on an aeroplane its becuase fluid dynamics obey perfect laws. If I add a particular number to another particular number I would always get the same and right result, no matter how many times I carry out the addition, because mathematics is a perfect science. This was all created during the first billionths of a second of the big bang. It was an explosion of immense energy. Before that nothing existed, not matter, not space nor time. I cannot comprehend what this means. A nothingness. Can a nothingness exist? Can it create a universe? How can a universe fill a nothingness? How can one fill with matter something which does not exist? But it has, resulting in the universe that we can see and measure and which includes the planet that contains carbon-based life, you, me and all the rest.
What triggered this reply e-mail was your mentioning of Paul of Tarsus and his declaration of equality. I have read and heard the gospels many a time, the acts of the apostles etc etc, but I never realised the importance of Paul’s declaration until you metioned it. IT IS JUST FANTASTIC. And for us Maltese it is even more so. In the year 60, Paul was shipwrecked here, he spoke semitic because he came from Tarsus in Syria and the Maltese of that time were descendants of what is today Lebanon. They were also Roman citizens as Paul was too. So the affinity was automatic. They understood each other and he cured the sick including the local governor, Publius, and preached Jesus. He stayed here for the 3 months of winter before heading on towards Rome. We Maltese have been Christians since that time, with, some historians say, a break of a few centuries during the dark ages.
Then Malta was ‘ liberated’ by Charlemagne’s forces and the rest is history. However, these days, we are being inundated with political correctness, atheism, with young upstarts declaring even that today’s progress is not a result of 2000 years of Christianity, but in spite of it. Then I challenge them to carry out a thought experiment: Remove from Europe everything that was done, built or carried out by or due to Christianity and see what remains. Of course the answer is that nothing remains. THEN THEY SHUT UP. They quote evolutionary theory, Darwin, science etc and declare that whoever believes in a creator is a dimwit. This de-Christianisation is happening fast as has occured in the rest of Europe and the prospects don’t look good at all. The EU has approved a constitution which has refused to include a clause which states that Europe has its roots in Christianity. All this, I believe, has implications:
One: That God will not let Europe be Godless.-He is filling it with Muslims who go their ‘church’ every Friday. (Today, more European muslims attend their mosques on Fridays, then Christians attend church on Sundays)
Two: He is letting Europe destroy its own economy.
Three: A new Europe will emerge, soon.
Why am I predicting this: Because it is, theistically, the logical conclusion.
Way back in the 60’s when I was just a teenager, I had predicted the rise of a person who, from within the echelons of power, would change Russia and end the cold war and the nuclear threat. Why: Becuase the other option was nuclear armageddon and/or total global communist domination. And God would never let that happen. So the only option was an internal collapse of the Soviet Union.
I also believe that all this de-Christianisation attack will soon end too. It will be a surprise for many like the fall of the Berlin wall was.
Thanks for your emails,
Albert
darwin senjaya.
Very wise words my friend. Since none of us know the real answer in the ‘cut and dried’ empirical sense, why don’t we open our minds and hearts to all the religions and each other’s beliefs. In spite of all the sick and distorted interpretations and self interest views the world’s great religions basically teach the same thing. There is a book named ‘The parallel Teachings of Jesus and the Buddha’. One taught there is a God and he was the son of God. The other taught there is no God and we are a refuge unto ourselves for who else can be our refuge? Yet many of their teachings are parallel. Maybe that tells us something.
Just received this update email from,,Author: Praven, Comment to Mr.Perry,
On this issue,I must side with Praveen as it is written.
I was born and brought up reasonably strict Catholic. It took me 59 years to realize that, ALL denominations cant be GOD”S Church such as claimed.
The Catholic church has made un-excusable blunders in its existence, up to this day.
http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=windswept+house+malachi+martin&aq=1&aqi=g9&aql=&oq=Windswept+House&gs_rfai=CCQcZH5Q3TIiTLoXyzASyxoD_CwAAAKoEBU_Qc6MN
Though I realized many years before, it took me a long time and education to realize the example given by most in the clergy was contrary to REPUBLICAN CIVILITY !
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civic_virtue
and christian ethics.amongst others…
http://www.religion-online.org/showbook.asp?title=802
I firmly believe in The GOD of Creation,being “SPIRITUAL” is now my claim.
Without getting into all the details of past denomination, cults and what ever turns people on to argue,fight, wars etc.
I found much descension,etc. not what my education taught !
We all are born into a family. What their belief is what we inherit and learn to respect till for what ever reason and study we come to what we think is “THE TRUTH” !
As I researched into several other denominations,Seventh Day Adventist,Church of Christ, Nazarene,Baptist,Methodist,and others,I found as Praveen explained,”That we are all family”.
Amongst families, there are good and bad members as Adam and Eve experienced with their 2 sons. And ,YES,it seems that there are some people that are inclined to evil more than others,as history and up to now our days we are exposed to.
I personally find a big reason for evil behavior is “being exposed to such life style, as a result,the abuse and brutality impose on those people will change minds.
Of course,ignorance and naivety is the most influencial exposure….
Martin Ward, Old Git,Bill Davison, ALL have good points…
I personally try to live and treat people the way I wish to be treated..
But,it does not guarantee that I will be treated as such,,in fact, my own,3 out of 4 children have gone the way of the Video ” Scavenger Hunt 1979″
http://www.ovguide.com/movies_tv/scavenger_hunt.htm
Such events makes one wonder what goes on in people’s minds,especially when they where brought up to have christian ethics. ?????
I cant blame all decendants of other families for the behavior of others,,,for, they are the final results of What “THEY DECIDED TO BE” after they emancipated,which we all do…
I respect others for their convictions,,I dont have to subscribe to it..
Martin Ward,
sorry! I missed your gist.
A great source of error for many of the religious is to misread ‘Word of God’ for ‘All the Words of God’. If God exists, s/he can only transmit as much knowledge as human beings can understand. This implies a dynamic, two-way relationship, as with student & teacher. It is then not a one-off transmission of the sum total of divine wisdom. That is as unlikely as teaching quantum physics to first-year infants. OGT
@neutral_observer :you said it all ;beautifully
Hi Perry,
As always, a good and thought provoking write up – this time on on The Dance of Equality…
However, this time you have made an overly bold statement (dare I say even a mistake). You stated ‘…only reason science succeeded in the West – after getting started but failing in Greece, Rome, China, Egypt and in the Arab world’. Science itself has been built up over time and all the above contributed to it. For instance Copernicus’s great ‘discovery’ that the earth spun around the Sun was based on astronomical data and hypotheses of Tycho Brahe along with original data from Arab astronomers. You can’t say Science has succeeded because its an ongoing process – its not a done deal & journey has not yet ended. Also success is subjective here. Currently the West is pioneering most advances in Science. In time to come this may change. You could have used the word ’succeeding’!
The basic difference between, chistian/Islamic religion and Hindu Dharma.
Christian/Islamic try to impress the god in order to enter heaven but Hindus seek and try to understand god in any form or way.
Christian/Islamic believe god can be reached through only one way and Hindus believe though god is one but many ways lead to god.
There are many Hindus who worship Mohhemmad and Jejus along with their dieties, but help me find a simgle example where any christian or islamic is worshiping anything outside their (so called misleading) sacred texts.
Jai Bharat!
Hi Perry,
Once again thank you for sharing your God given time,talent & treasure. Yes in did there is an interplay, interrelatedness between this three facets of our human existence (equality,technology & spirituality)The very core of our being that which is our spirituality(as made in the very image & likeness of God,that which we got our dignity) compels us towards an advocacy of equality.By what through the utilization of our inherent gift of rationality,intellect,& will making use of technology for the common good and continues to do so,through enovations,through an awakening of our awareness of God’s Manifestation (Theophany/Christophany)within our self & outside of our self.
the precious people did not work violence it’s other,i means he resfected some one…also help of future of humanity.