by LJ Frank

 

 

 

 

 In a scattering of archaeological digs around Earth one finds among the fossils, artifacts of humans – a demonstration of consciousness of the world around them and their search for understanding. Magic, rituals, and animism were ancient ingredients in their seeking of why and the whom of their existence. Teeth markings on bones, the sacrifice of others, the hanging tree are disturbingly pervasive not from pure hunger but of empowerment to be endowed with the core existence of the “other”.  Adaptation was an intricately woven characteristics of necessity and so intertwined that they appeared fused together, for the sake of survival of a family and tribe. The fittest passed away, the adaptive survived. Was there a difference in the mind of the nomadic tribesman between necessity and adaption?

Ancient man inquired of his creation in poetic, song, and oral traditions. That wonderment is one of the roots of religion. Was the creation of humans a necessary act of evolution or simply chance; why would a humble Creator want eternal praise from his creation when ultimately that creation will die and the planet will die and all will return to ashes floating in space…how do other conscious creatures of the universe existing among countless inhabitable planets spread across millions of galaxies view necessity, the nature of a Creator and conscience? Is the invention of the idea of God not only one of necessity but of vanity?

“The might of necessity brooks no resistance.”   Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound, 1. 104. (410 BCE)

The quotes about God and necessity are endless.

“… there was an old sinner in the eighteenth century who declared that if there were no God he would have to be invented. And man has actually invented God. And what’s strange, … it’s not that God should really exist; the marvel is that such an idea, the idea of the necessity of God, could enter the head of a such a savage, beast as man…”  Fydor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov, BK, v, Ch. 3. (1880 CE)

The question remains…why is there a need for the question in the first place let alone an answer? We don’t know and the dead are silent. Humans speculate. Curiosity. In that curiosity speculating is greater awareness of perhaps why we grasp for the material, as the immaterial requires a deeper search. For any number of people a faith is essential. For others faith is not a necessity. Though self-awareness and adaptation are irrevocably linked to necessity for good or ill.