Jeff
No Gods No Masters
May 24, 2007
At the close of an Age
By
Joseph Campbell
…….here we touch upon a crucial problem of the religions of our time; for the clergies, generally, still are preaching themes from the first to fourth millenniums B.C.
No one adult mind today would turn to the book of Genesis to learn of the origins of the earth, the plants, the beasts, and man. There was no flood, no tower of Babel, no first couple in paradise, and between the first known appearance of men on earth and the first buildings of cities, not one generation (Adam to Cain) but a good two million must have come into this world and passed along. Today we turn to science for our imagery of the past and of the structure of the world, and what the spinning demons of the atom and the galaxies of the telescope’s eye reveal is a wonder that makes the Babel of the Bible seem a toy-land dream of the dear childhood of our brain.
Today we know, for the most part, that our laws are not from God or from the universe, but from ourselves; are conventional, not absolute; and that in breaking them we offend not God but man. “ By my love and hope, I conjure thee, cast not away the hero in thy soul “
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