Month: September 2017

Absolutely.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

We all have heard of absolutes, but I’ve noticed that there seems to be a lack of general understanding about what exactly an absolute is and how we can tell it is there or isn’t. So I thought I would attempt to define it.

I can give you an easy example of a material absolute: Suppose I was sitting next to a table lamp. I can touch the lamp, I can see the lamp, I could even smell it if I wished. The lamp is a material absolute. No human being could change the fact that the lamp is real.

Now suppose someone were to say that they don’t believe the lamp is really there. They might disbelieve their eyes, or perhaps there is something wrong with their sense of touch. Even if they cannot feel the lamp, or see it, does that mean the lamp isn’t real?

Well you could say I am hallucinating the lamp, then I run into the same problem in reverse. Just because I can see it or feel it, does that mean it’s real?

The fact is, either the lamp is there or it isn’t. Those are two absolute realities. Only one person can be right and one wrong.

If the lamp is there, then it doesn’t matter whether the other person can sense it or not, it’s still there.

Does that make sense? But I can take it a step further.

Assuming the lamp is there, the other person might say that as long as they don’t believe it’s there it can’t affect them. I could turn it on or off and they could see or not see, but they might say it doesn’t matter.

I could even hit them with the lamp and they couldn’t feel it.

But if I were to injure them, that would prove the lamp is real.

(You might say that an injury isn’t real if you can’t feel it, but what about a bug bite? Or a head injury that knocks you out. You might not feel either, but one at least is certainly life threatening. Actually the worse the injury, in some cases, the less you can feel it because of damaged nerves.)

If nothing happens to them, then I was in error.

So the question is not if there is an absolute, but which absolute it is.

But what about believing in a lie? Doesn’t that harm you?

Yes, but that’s proof of my point. Truth (reality) will harm you or help you whether you believe it or not. A lie will not harm you until you let it.

It’s the difference between hallucinating a truck barreling toward you on the highway and actually standing on the highway in front of a moving truck. The first one will hurt you only if you believe it and do something stupid; the second will hurt you whether you believe it or not. Unless you move.

Truth is like a truck. Dangerous when it’s coming against you; but life saving if you’re inside it. (Trucks save lives don’t they?)

Lies on the other hand are you hurting yourself. They are nothing in of themselves, except a trick.

An absolute then is a thing not subject to change no matter the circumstance.

You’ve probably heard that matter cannot be created or destroyed, only changed from one form into another. Matter (like the lamp) is an absolute for us.

And I dare say there are absolutes far more sure then material ones.

You know a tree by its fruit.

Now, and you probably saw this coming, suppose the lamp was God?

Many people cannot feel God, many more cannot see Him; but some claim to have felt Him and some claim not to.

We’ve seen that seeing and feeling themselves are not proof of the absolute of anything.

Even though God is not a material absolute, the same rules will apply. Either He is there or he is not. One person is perceiving the truth, the other is blind.

I think the evidence of God is much the same, without the lamp on, one cannot see; without God, there is no meaning in life.

If God were to strike someone they might not recognize it as Him but there would still be a blow. A mark.

The question is not if the absolute is there, but which it is, and if you will believe it.

Notice that at the moment there is just as much probability for atheism as theism.

This whole exercise might seem totally obvious; but nowadays it isn’t. Many people believe there are no absolutes, so theoretically the person who sees and the one who doesn’t are equally perceptive.

But it doesn’t work: Real things leave an impression. It could be a bruise or it could be an effect on your life, but it will be there; whether you see it or not. The proof is in the damage or improvement in your condition.

This works with emotional things too. We see it in the effects addictions have on people, addictions of all kinds, activity and substance related. The people themselves may fail to see the difference but their family and friends don’t.

It is no good trying to pretend that blindness isn’t real. All kinds of blindness.

Oddly enough I don’t hear it talked of a whole lot anymore. Being blind to the truth.

Okay that about wraps this up, but if anything in this post was unclear, please comment and let me know, I am open to suggestions. It’s a tricky subject to tackle.

Until next time–Natasha.

Advertisement

Breaking it down.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

“[M]an has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to having a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily “true” or “false,” but as “academic” or “practical,” “outworn” or “contemporary,” “conventional” or “ruthless.” Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don’t waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong or stark or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That’s the sort of thing he cares about.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

If you haven’t read this book, read it. It is devilishly insightful. (Ha ha.)

I thought I’d follow up on my Your God will be My God post with a post delving a bit more into the why behind the matter.

It’s true that many of the youth of today have no real idea of what it means to believe in something.

But it might be less obvious why that is.

Everyone has their own theory. But the funny thing is, even one person has so many different causes for it that you’ll here the same man blame the government, the school systems, the church, the parents, and the youths themselves, all in the course of one or two conversations on the subject.

So ladies and gents, I am here today to simplify this mess as best as I can. I believe you can narrow every single problem down to three basic causes.

But first let me define what problems I mean a bit more:

I am referring to the moral ambiguity or just plain confusion of the younger generations.

I am referring to the spinelessness of the older generations in general to stand against this tide.

I am referring to the blind adherence to the principals of society that many people exhibit.

I am referring to the unbelievable corruption of the authorities of said society.

There now, I hop that’s enough to intrigue everyone.

First of all, as Lewis points out in the above, youth now (and then when he wrote it) hear scores of different worldviews presented to them. Often the worldviews are blended into each other so that they are barely distinguishable. Every one declares their personal worldview to be true. The youth is often not given any measuring stick to go by, and so remains confused and unable to stick to any one thing.

But what has changed in the past sixty years is that now, many people will not even try to compel the youth to believe in what they themselves believe in. Instead they will say “whatever works for you.”

This philosophy is fed to the youth from every imaginable source, including their parents and all too often the church, so if they meet someone who thinks that’s a load of crap, they think that person is the odd one out, never realizing that in terms of history, they are the oddballs. (Every homeschooler’s experience.)

But that’s where the second problem comes in. The older generations may not even totally believe that philosophy, but they are afraid to go against it because a lot of major power sources in the world are busy promoting this idea. Unfortunately, often the courageous men or women who dare to oppose are shut down by said sources, sometimes they are shut down by their own friends or fellow workers.

This explains why people blindly go along with this stuff. And why the most corrupt individuals are the ones who rise to power in this sick system.

But I can break it down more than that.

This is nothing new. The root cause of all this is the same thing: Sin.

Sin comes in three parts. There’s the sin of the individual, the sin of the world at large, and the sin of the devil. And I mean what he causes specifically.

It might sound nuts to blame the devil, but if you can’t accept that, then think of it as the reason why sin keeps getting worse. Something is constantly causing new ways for people to be corrupt, call it what you will, you can’t deny that things get worse over time.

The sin of the individual in this case is that every human being is selfish, and every human being tends to think more of themselves then they should. IT is all too easy for people to be lazy about what they believe. Pluralism is not popular because it is wise, peaceful, or inducing to happiness; it’s popular because it’s convenient and easy. A get out of jail-free card.

The sin of the world is that as a whole, people tend to act in the worst ways. Peer pressure, mob mentality, you know the drill. Sometimes that’s not the case, but whenever a lot of people get upset, sooner or later some of them will let their emotions get the better of reason.

And that stems back to individual sin.

And then all you need is some misguided or misguiding leader to step up and you get a whole movement going which could be pure idiocy. Often it turns to pure evil. (Holocausts, the reign of terror, the after effects of the Civil War and Civil Rights movement.)

Messed up people create messed up societies which choose messed up leaders, and so the cycle goes till a righteous generation chooses to end it.

But this generation is being robbed of the ability to even figure out what righteousness is.

The thing is, Pluralism is spoken of like its a fact. But it’s a belief. By its own philosophy, it has no more credit than any other morality.

But it keeps its followers blind to its own contradictions. They stay that way because of sin.

But there is hope.

One thing pluralism cannot change is that some people do instinctively know that right and wrong are real. And these people may yet see through the deception.

But it would help if more of us could help them see that the deception exists.

Not wanting our beliefs challenged is an old human flaw, if it even is a flaw. (I think it’s really just a twisted version of a very healthy wish for stability.) But we need them to be.

And by the way, there is a cure for the sin problem. It’s Jesus.

Those are my thoughts on this for now, until next time–Natasha.

The Princes’ Quest.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

I’m going to review a movie you have probably never heard of: The Prince’s Quest. 

This movie is, as it tells you, about two boys. One is named Azur, the other Asmar. Azur is the son of a nobleman, who had blue eyes. Asmar is the son of a nurse, with brown eyes. Asmar and his mother appear to be of Middle Eastern descent, I am not sure it is ever clarified what, but my guess is Arabic, because the Nurse tells both the boys a story about a Djinn Fairy. Or Djinn Princess, she’s referred to as both.

The story goes like this:

A small boy

Becomes a big boy

Crosses rivers and valleys, puts out fires

And he saves the Djinn Princess

Together they live in happiness

Happiness.

It sounds better in the native language she uses, but I can’t write that for you.

This song is a sort of prophecy, and both boys want to be the one to save the Djinn Princess.

But meanwhile, Azur is being trained in the arts of nobility, dancing, riding, and what not. Asmar is watching and trying to learn by imitation. But they have their share of tiffs. The worst  being over only having one parent, (though Azur says Janine is his mom also,) an dover who will save the Djinn fairy.

Azur’s father gets tired of him fighting and associating with these lower class citizens so he sends him off to boarding school and drives Nurse Janine and Asmar out. With no money and without even letting them pack their belongings.

Azur grows up and declares to his father that he intends to sail across the sea and search for the Djinn Fairy. His father thinks this is nonsense and doesn’t seem to consent, but Azur sets sail anyway, till a wave comes up and sweeps him overboard. He washes up on the shore of a strange, and he thinks ugly, land. And realizes he’s lost everything. No one could find him here.

Azur goes looking for people and finds some, who speak the language of his Nurse, though he remembers only a little. But he doesn’t get much of a chance to try for everyone runs from him and one man spits at him, telling him that his blue eyes bring bad luck.

As stupid as this seems, Azur believes that he has no choice but to pretend to be blind for the rest of his life.

He gets directions to a city from a different group of folks who think he is only a blind beggar, and on the way he meets a guy whose name I forget, but he offers to be his guide if he’ll carry him on his back. Claiming to have a problem with his own legs. They proceed to the city, where his “guide” proceeds to criticize everything, but the people do give him alms. And some food too.

I forog to explain earlier, but the prophecy of the Djinn fairy also involves three keys. One of fire, one of spices, and one of steel.

While Azur is walking around, his guide mentions that the keys are reputably hidden in the temples of each thing. At least we see two temples, one of heat, one of spice. The Temple of heat has been all dug up in the search for the key, but Azur, never opening his eyes, feels along the outer wall and finds the key hidden behind one of the stones, which was hot.

Later he finds the spiced key on the peak of the Temple of Spices.

After this Azur is told where the house of Janine is, whom he recognizes as his old nurse. She is now wealthy and owns a huge property and a lot of servants. With the help of his guide he finds her door and knocks. They don’t let him in, but he begins yelling for “Nanny” and Janine opens the door. She doesn’t believe it’s him, she says she left Azur across the sea. She says Azure did not have his voice. And Azur was not blind. Azur answer all these in turn, and answers the last by opening his eyes. Janine gasps and embraces him.

After that it all happens pretty quickly. Azur is brought in, and fed, and told about what happened to her. Janine makes the servants stop talking about his eyes. Asmar is also at the house, but he is less enthused to see his brother. He is bitter over what Azur’s father did.

Janine agrees to help Azur with his quest, just as she is helping Asmar. She sends Azur to see the Princess ( I can’t remember or spell her name) who gives him three gifts to help him. She gave these same gifts to Asmar, and now there is none left. (If you think this is convenient, then remember this is a fairy tale.)

The two men set out, and endure many difficulties, finally they reach the tunnels and caverns of the mountain where the Djinn Fairy is supposed to be. They get close, but then they are attacked by other men looking for her, who are not so honorable. Asmar gets stabbed for warning Azur, and Azur carries him into a tunnel. They find three doorways, one of fire, one of gases, one of sword blades. Azur uses the two keys he has, and then the one Asmar (of course) had, to open each door. Asmar is fading fast, but Azur carries him on till they come to two doorways. One leads to shadows, the other to the Djinn fairy. Azur chooses one in a hurry as Asmar is saying he’s going to die.

They find only blackness. But just as Azur is despairing, a voice gives command for light, and the whole room is lit by hundreds of light djinns, and the Djinn Fairy herself is sitting behind a wall of glass. Azur reaches for her and the wall shatters.

The Djinn fairy is able to save Asmar. But then they can’t decide who it was that actually saved her. Both boys say it was the other. They bring in more and more people (pretty much all the principal characters) to decide, no one can. Finally the Djinn fairy calls her cousin the Elf Fairy to come and decide. The Elf Fairy appears. She is white and blue eyed, whereas the Djinn Fairy looks Arabic.

She can’t choose either, but everyone else realizes that the answer is clear. One Prince for both fairies. The Djinn Fairy chooses Azur, and the Elf Fairy prefers Asmar. Neither Prince seems to have a preference. Everyone ends by dancing and living happily ever after.

This took way longer to tell than I expected, so I’ll try to sum up briefly why I thought it was worth sharing:

This is a very old sort of story. But that doesn’t mean it lacks depth. It covers themes like forgiveness, brotherly love, treating people equally no matter what they look like, and also self-sacrifice and true worthiness which comes from bravery and unselfishness and honesty. (Yes, like in Pinocchio.)

Three is also plenty of mythical danger and obstacles to satisfy the fantasy lover.

The only real flaw is in production. The movie is clearly low-budget. But once you’ve got through the first ten minutes, you stop caring, and the art is still pretty stunning in its own style.

Anyway, it may be out of stock, but if you can find it anywhere, I recommend checking it out.

Until next post–Natasha.

P. S. (Would you believe spell-check doesn’t recognize the traditional way to spell djinn? Honestly.)

What I learned from ASL.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

They say third times the charm: But I have failed for the third time at the Driver’s Test.

I blame the system at this point.

Even if I am really just that poor at Driving, there’s nothing I can do about it except try, try again.

Here’s a thing you all may not know about me, I am a language buff.

I am studying three different languages currently. Fluency is slow coming since I am self taught with limited resources, but it’s still fun.

Lately I’ve had the opportunity to expand my knowledge of one language, ASL, by mingling with  both deaf people and sign interpreters.

Here’s some things to know about deaf folks, they aren’t insulted if you use that term. If you use “Hearing impaired” they think it means someone who is only partially deaf. It’s not like with blindness. (I don’t know if it’s the blind or the seeing who decided we needed to say “visually impaired” instead.)

Also, ASL stands for American Sign language. But there’s a few other sign languages used in America. There is English signing. Which it not the same as British signing. English signing is word for word. American sign is supposed to convey the idea of what you’re saying more than the individual words.

When you can’t hear what someone is saying, you have to learn to understand a lot by just watching them. So it’s better to use less motions so there’s time to watch facial expressions too.

Now I’m hearing, and I have no deaf relatives, which a few decades back would have made me a pretty rare anomaly in deaf culture. Only a few hearing people used to be familiar with sign language. But now that it’s taught in school, even hearing folks are becoming interpreters and being part of the deaf community. Which is pretty much the community no one else is aware of unless they’ve known someone who knows someone in it.

Folks are trying to make it possible for the deaf to be a part of regular society. Job-wise anyway.

Anyway, I took a fancy to ASL a few years back and have studied it off and on since, as well as taught a little of it to s couple people. Unfortunately I’ve yet to mean someone else with my passion for language.

You may wonder why I’m sharing this.

Well, for all I know, a deaf person could have clicked on my blog and I never knew it. So hey, if that’st he case, welcome aboard.

But more than that I think that learning ASL has changed me somewhat. Just how much is yet to be determined. If I choose to pursue a real career in it, then it’ll change my whole life. If it remains a hobby, who knows? You never know what might come of something like this.

But even at a basic level, knowing ASL has opened my eyes to the world of non verbal communication.

I have been one of those folks who had trouble looking people in the eye, and picking up on body language. That I should take to signing is somewhat ironic, since it’s made up exclusively of both those things. But I never had a real problem in the signing context with looking at people.

I wonder now if it also improved my ability to perceive people’s body language.

It’s been so long and there’s so many other factors that it’s hard to say for sure. But I do think I see communication differently now.

I think everyone should be fluent in at least one other language if they have any ability to learn it at all. Mentally it will make your brain stronger and give you a better grasp of your own tongue. (And most people who aren’t Americans already know this.)

But I have found a spiritual element in it too.

Trying to learn another language is humbling. It makes you realize how dependent on language we are as humans. And how little you know when you thought you knew a lot.

Also I sometime think of how God knows every single language, and it makes no difference to him.

Honestly, maybe I just feel less different from people of other cultures. Different languages can be intimidating, but once you’ve learned one, you realize that they all have meaning and the people who speak them express themselves just as you do.

Because if humans can’t communicate, what can we do with each other? Nothing.

Which is not to say I don’t get a little fun out of being able to puzzle other people who speak only English, what can I say? I’m human.

But what I really hope is that I’ll make connections because of this hobby of mine. I believe that our gifts and interests are given to us both for our own enjoyment and to help other people. even if helping them starts with just understanding them. I can’t tell you how much that has helped me at difficult times in my life.

Well, that’s all for now, until next time–Natasha.

Your God will be my God.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

You know what the most important question anyone can ask you is? What do you believe?

I think we undervalue this question now. Everyone has an opinion, but no one has to be affected by it anymore. Our opinions are just floating around on the breeze.

Funnily enough, that used to be how we’d define not having any beliefs.

I feel like if one of the heroes of even two centuries ago (or even one) was to come back alive and see how we think now, they wold be incredulous.

They would be disgusted with out lack of backbone.

Now that is not everyone, I understand; but here’s the thing, this pluralism has become like the flu, it sneaks up on you and breaks in new ways that aren’t always recognizable as what it is.

I would venture to say that a lot of young people and plenty of older ones are believing in pluralism without even being aware of it.

Here’s why I think this:

I’ve complained before of how young people will just shrug when it comes to moral issues. You know the drill, if it gets too difficult for them, they just say “Well everyone’s entitled to their opinion.” They say it automatically without thinking about it. And they will defend that position up until they or you are too frustrated to keep talking, but they will never stop to think they might be defending something that has no basis in reality.

I don’t blame them for the nonsense that they are taught, I blame them for being unwilling to question it. Not that that’s anything new. People have always been that way and it is just more obvious now than it used to be.

The thing is, I hear this from christian youth as often as non-christian. I am always surprised that they can shrug off the problems with certain movies and music and lifestyles as being “that person’s choice” or “what they believe.”

Then it hit me: The thing I have never considered is that the youth of today think that Christianity is their religion because they personally believe it. Not because it is superior to any other in of itself.

I really think this is it, and with other religions than Christianity too.

Nowadays it is almost nationally accepted that people believe what works for them, because it works for them, and not because it is fact.

Now you can disagree about facts all day long, and someone is sure to be nearer the truth than the other, but neither may have it totally correct. That is a legitimate debate and one that can be given more or less credit based on observation.

But if observation itself is reduced to a matter of personal taste, then what are we left with? Nothing but flimsy opinions that have no real foundation.

It is actually inconceivable to many youth that there could be One Right Belief. And if you say you think there is, they will get frustrated at you from being so stubbornly opinionated.

If it’s true that people believe what suits them best, why do we have martyrs? Why do we have zealots and radicals?

Do you think radical Islam is the religion that best suits the needs of most of the people who believe it? Or is it just what their taught and never allowed to question? They may very well fervently believe it. But that doesn’t make it true.

Pluralism is destroying a lot of people’s souls, they believe it, does it follow that it’s good for them?

Has it been good for the country overall? Or any country that’s fallen into it?

The answer, if you look at statistics and not at the Media, is no. A resounding no.

I would venture to say this country has never been worse off than it is now.

The people in this country have no respect for it anymore. People on both the left and right end of the spectrum.

I can’t say I exactly blame all of them. Our country has been divided so long it’s no longer debatable. (It’s about the only thing both sides agree upon.) The truth is, when there are no absolute values, then there can be no healthy country. There is no way to keep people in order who can’t tell right from wrong. even criminals used to know they were criminals. Now they will defend thier actions as not wrong but just freedom of expression. OR just them not bieng able to control themselves becuase of how messed up they are.

And sadly, even in the Church, many people don’t actually believe in Christianity in full.

The very basis of Christianity is that there is one God. He decides what’s right and wrong. Either we are for him, or we are against him. There is no gray area. There is no middle ground. There is no thin line between Him and the Evil One. No, the line is a huge chasm. The difference is whether you fall into it or not.

People can reject this view. But if they say they believe it, they better realize that means the cannot believe anything else. If something contradicts the Bible, it’s out.

I say this because it is something millennials really don’t understand about faith. Faith involves loyalty to one person or one group of people. It means their enemy is your enemy, their friend is your friend.

Ruth understood this. She knew that if she went with Naomi it meant she could no longer worship a pagan god. “Your people will be my people, your God will be my God, where you die I will die, and there I will be buried.” She told her.

One last thing: I do not say that every young christian who has pluralism mixed up with their faith is damned. I think many of them are sincere and godly in other ways and don’t realize the contradiction in their theology. I would even say their own souls may not be in danger.

But the problem is, other peoples’ are. Everyone’s soul is in danger when it has no rock to hold onto.

So here’s to the faithful ones who still are holding on to absolute truth. You’re not alone.

–Natasha.

 

 

 

 

A myth retold.

/ toseealife / Leave a comment

You ever hear the myth of Cupid and Psyche? It’s pretty cool. It was the inspiration for my favorite book “Till we have faces.”

In a nutshell it’s Beauty and the Beast with a few strange twists.

Psyche is a beautiful beyond belief woman, who is being worshiped instead of the goddess Aphrodite (who is goddess of love and beauty) which makes Aphrodite furious, so she sens her son Eros (whom we all know by his roman name Cupid) to make Psyche fall in love with some hideous person or beast. In the process however, he accidentally scratches himself with the point of an arrow and falls  in love with her himself.

Well, you can imagine how Aphrodite feels about this, but she doesn’t do anything for awhile. Psyche goes to an oracle for advice, since she’d getting lonely and tired of only being worshiped and not really loved, the oracle (I believe upon Aphrodite’s instruction) tells her she is fated to marry a monster. Well, Psyche isn’t too happy about this, but somehow( the reasons vary) she ends up on a cliff and the West Wind comes an carries her to this great palace. Where he is waited on by invisible servants and visited at night by her husband. Whom she never sees. (This is like the original Beauty and the Beast, not the Disney version.)

Psyche is enjoying herself with no qualms until her sisters pay her a visit. (Either Eros lets them or his mother or they somehow find her themselves, I’m not sure.) We’ll say Eros lets them in this account. Her sisters fill her head with suspicions about her husband, what if he really is a hideous monster? Finally she agrees to look at him by night, the very thing she was forbidden to do. So she does this that night, but he turns out to be a gorgeous god with angel wings. While she’s gaping at him in adoration a drop of hot candle wax falls on him from her lap. He wakes up, scolds her for breaking his trust, and leaves her there. Aphrodite hears all about it and decides to punish Psyche in some pretty dramatic ways. She sets her a lot of tasks that seem impossible. But creatures ranging from ants, to eagles, to other gods, all help her complete the tasks.

Finally she is given one last task. Getting beauty from Persephone, the queen of the underworld. Psyche successfully gets a cask from her, but even though she was warned not to look in it, she does. (Some say because she wanted to look better for her husband whom she was supposed to be reunited with.) Well, it turns out what was in the box was death. Or else the beauty in it was so intense no mortal mind could take it in. Whatever the case Psyche immediately passes out. Either into death or just unconsciousness.

Eros finally comes back to her, after being kept away by his mother for a long time, and revives her. Then he brings her up to Olympus and she is given immortality. Zeus patches things up between her and Aphrodite somehow, and they all live happily ever after. (As much as Greek gods do.) Psyche also is given wings. Butterfly like wings if I remember correctly.

In Greek psyche means “Soul” and I’ve also heard it means “butterfly.” Which I think fits. I think the Greeks were onto a thing or two when they came up with this myth.

The myth is a metaphor for the soul. I’m sure it’s been interpreted different ways, but here’s my guess at it: The soul has to mate with love in order to fly. But before it can be fully united to true love, it must be free of its bondage to selfish, vengeful, jealous love (represented by Aphrodite.) That kind of love is just lust really, it wants to be admired and fulfilled but never give anything back in return. And if you know anything about Greek mythology, you know Aphrodite is responsible for screwing a lot of people up because of her matchmaking. (To her credit, she also makes some happy marriages along the way.)

Eros, or Cupid is considered a monster because he forces people to fall for each other with his arrows. People fear love because it leads to many reckless things. At least I always thought that’s what it meant.

C. S. Lewis puts a different spin on it when he shows that people fear Eros because they do not understand him, nor do they know him. Even though by all accounts Aphrodite does more to mess people up, Eros gets the credit for the damage she does. Eros is seen as a  brute because he seems to devour people. In that they are never seen again after they are taken to him. But Lewis digs deeper and shows that after being with a god, mortals are ruined for ever being content with mere mortal companionship again. Which makes their families angry and jealous, and makes other immortals like Aphrodite furious.

The really odd part is where Psyche dies. In any other Greek Myth, she’d be doomed for disobeying Aphrodite’s instructions. (It happened to other people.) But in this one, in an odd twist, she is forgiven and brought back with no lasting consequences. And she is reunited with her husband and made immortal. Did you catch that? The soul is made immortal after being united with love?

What’s really interesting is that I’m fairly certain this myth predated Christianity, yet all the basic elements of Christianity are in there. Psyche breaks the god’s command, ends up enslaved to another god who wants to punish her, she dies, she is resurrected, and she lives forever; because of love.

On top of that, Eros is Aphrodite’s son, so you could also see it as a representation of how Christ atones for us and makes us right with the Father.

It’s a powerful myth because it rings true. It’s one of the only Greek myths I know of where mercy wins out over the gods queer justice. It also reflects the truth, as Lewis shows, that the gods ways are unsearchable for mortals.

I like the myth both in its original form and in its retelling and I can’t figure out why no one is doing a retelling of it in movie form. Someone get on that!

Anyway, I hope you liked it, until next time–Natasha.