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A Covenant With Truth


Chapter 6:   Defining Doctrines


"Where is this rift between scripture
and the God that we say we are worshipping...?"




We are all sojourners here...
Only passing through this life...
Each of us... a witness to this life...
Each of us... a participant in this life...
And we are the fruit of this life.

We all are perplexed creatures...
Needing something sure on which to set our feet
And to base our lives.
We yearn to find that which is certain...
That which is true.

We are beings of brilliant intellect
Who seek to be wise...
For our very survival...
That we might have dignity...
That we might be respected by others as we compete for life.

We desire justness... for life to be right...
That we might have peace in our dealings with others.
We must have purpose...
To endure struggles and suffering.

We need a definition...
A sense of who we are as individuals...
A special truth that brings each of us out of oblivion.
We want to find what it is that is singularly ours...
That thing that is our crown and our beauty...
That truth that gives each life meaning.
And surely our own whole truth
Is our soul... is our unique state of humanness.

We are perpetually searching...
In what seems to be a vacuum... even a vastness... of questions.
What... is Truth...?
Where... is that Truth...?
How many versions of Truth can there be...?
Where is the rock on which we can set... our... feet... solidly...?

Sages, clerics, scholars, philosophers, and scientists...
Wise men in all corners of the world have searched for it...
In forests of scriptures and in proclamations of prophets...
In theories, in science, and in the stars...
Looking for those inalienable Truths
That would answer the seemingly unanswerable...

What is the meaning of life...? the definition of... life...?
What is... humanity...? Who... are we...?
Who is God...? Where is God...?
Which religion is right...? Which doctrine is wrong...?
What are these interpretations of scripture about...?
Is the world really going to end...?

How did mankind become so lost...?!

When a society uses Holy Scripture
As the moral basis for their laws...
As the guide for their lives...
How can there be confusion...?
How can there be disagreement...?
As to what those scriptures are telling us...?

There are contradictions within the scriptures...
So how could anyone say that
They believed every word written in them...?

How is it...?
That we can use Holy Words to oppress each other...
Condemn each other... hurt each other... kill each other...?
Where is this rift between scripture
And the God that we say we are worshipping...?

If the doctrine is... that we must become obedient...
Who or what are we...?
Just an extension of someone else's understanding...?
A servant of someone else's free will...?

What is our "free will" anyway...?
Are we supposed to believe that our free will
Is that "state of sin" that we are born with...?
That we need to be saved about...?

What is this strange sense in us
That yearns to express itself...?
That has only been thought of as "rebellion"...?
What is that "will" in us
That struggles with all that we are...?

Isn't it truth?
Isn't our free will our access to our own truth...?
Isn't obedience just another form of slavery...?
Surely... obedience can't be that Truth that we're looking for
That will free us!

Where is this idol that we must imitate
In order to be "good"?
Who is it that decides what that idol should look like...?
Who is that human being
That everyone else is supposed to be like...?
That has held us in his chains...?

Can anyone really lift all those links of chains
That have been laid upon us...?
Why do we need so much help... just to be human...?

But... then again... how do we know
What is right or wrong
Unless someone else tells us what it is...?

How do we discern "morality"
If we aren't taught it...?
Isn't morality taught...?
And isn't morality based in doctrine
And reliant on obedience...?
Is there no other source in our world for morality...?
Why does it take a revelation from God
To know what morality is...?

If life is predestined...
Why bother living it...?
Are crime, injustice, and suffering also predestined...?
Are the terminally ill also predestined...?
Born only to suffer...?

If we are only actors
Playing out a script written long ago,
That script certainly has been a sorrow-filled tragedy
Of war, chaos, and misunderstanding.

What is life itself...
If it has already been decided...?
What is the point of living it at all...?
Is this just an excuse for us...
When mistakes are made...
That... it was "meant to happen"...?

How can we accuse God of causing all of our hurt and pain...?
That everything that happens in this world is God's will...?
If that is true, then... is it God's will
That we "sin" just so that we can "be saved"...?

Isn't it more true
That it is mankind's will that is reality in this world...?
That what we see is mankind's version of life...?
That... this reality is only one side of that coin...
That gift of life...
That we hold in our hands...?

Couldn't it be more true
That there is another version of life...?
That other side of the coin...?
That we know is there, but we just can't see...?
Another reality that is like a Dream...?
That is something more true and beautiful...?
Something more whole...
How life would be... if we were in harmony with it...?

And yet... not quite seeing that beauty...
We adjust to the imbalances in the reality we live.
This "truth"... what it is... as it is...
Like a mathematical reckoning
Reduced to its most basic definition...
Is the real Law in this real world.
And balance must find its way through it.

Isn't it surely true
That freedom of life is integral to truth...?
And that "life" and "freedom" are synonomous...?
Isn't it more true that
God creates from life...? uses what is in life...?
That He shepherds this life...? towards that Dream...?
And towards that Truth...?

But, if so... how can we know what... that is...?

If the world is going to be destroyed,
Why bother taking care of it...?
Why bother saving it...?

If only the chosen will be saved,
What happens to the rest of us...?
Do you want to live in a new world
That is built on the deaths of millions of human beings...?
Your fellow human beings... who weren't chosen...?
Beliefs of being "chosen" or "not chosen"
Can only inspire real nightmares...
Hitler... for instance.

Who can choose the chosen
If it is not God Himself...?

And chosen for what...?
Chosen to live...? chosen for eternal life...?
Just by claiming that Jesus is your Savior...?
Isn't that just a bit of hocus-pocus...?

Chosen...? being somehow better than everyone else
Who has had to live what is often
A very hurtful and confusing life...?

Have we ever even taken the time
To realize how vain such a doctrine really is...?
What such a doctrine really means...?

If there are only going to be 100,000
"Elected" to go to heaven...
To be lifted into the sky when the rapture comes...
That big, beautiful blue sky...
Doesn't that make it rather against one's best interest
To go around converting others...?

If there are only just so many tickets to heaven
Wouldn't it be more wise to let bygones be bygones...?
Lest someone steal your seat...?
That seat where you can watch the misery below...?

We are losing the scriptures,
If they aren't already lost.
There is possibly one scripture somewhere in the Bible
To justify any act that one might ever wish to commit...
And another scripture to condemn it.

There has been so much lost
In the translations of the scriptures...
Lost in the usage of an ancient vernacular...
Lost by translation into another vernacular...
That it is now possible to twist any scripture...
Interpret any word...
In order to have it take on
A justification for ourselves.

This is similar to defining "adultery"
As a thing that a woman does... not a man.
A man can have up to four wives,
And in fact, be true to none.

So often we say, "in the name of Almighty God"
Or "in Jesus' name"... but...
In Moses' Laws, there is one that says,
"Thou shalt not take the name
Of the Lord thy God in vain."

That major law is supposed to mean "cussing."
You see, part of obedience training
Is that one is not allowed to cuss...
Never mind that it is generally
In bad taste to cuss in public...
It's possibly a mortal sin...!
Especially if you use the word "God" in it...!

"... take God's name in vain"??
If you were the king of an earthly nation,
How would you like it
If people claimed that they were your closest friend...?
Isn't that called "brown-nosing"...?
Getting real mileage out of mentioning the name of God...?
Claiming to be part of his social circle...?
Speaking "as if" one were he...?
Speaking in his absence...?

At best, no matter who we are...
We can only hope that God likes us
Or that He enjoys our company and helps our cause.
It just can't be assumed.
He will be what He will be.
His name... is what He is.

Isn't it possible that our very souls
Are defined by what we glean from Holy Scripture...?
By what we consider acceptable for ourselves...?
By what we consider acceptable for humanity...?
By... how well we know our own humanity...?
And the humanity of others...?
By... how well, indeed, that we know God...?

Doesn't this defining of scripture
Take place in the mind and the heart of each of us...?
And that defining becomes
The defining of our very soul...?

If the scriptures are holy...
Perhaps they are holy by the power that they have
To refine... and to define... the heart of each of us.
And if they are holy,
Why do we read them with anything but love
And pureness of thought...?

Isn't reading the scriptures with impure eyes...
Searching for justifications for hurtful beliefs...
Something like looking for pornography in its contents?



Chapter 7.   The Human Heart






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