By
Valinda
Hunter
July 4,
2001
Long, long
ago people did not understand many of the things that they saw around them. They
saw lightning in the sky and heard thunder and they did not understand what
caused lightning and thunder. They were frightened because they did not
understand lightning and thunder.
They saw the seasons change from warm
summertime to cold wintertime and back again to warm summertime. They did not
understand why the warm weather turned cold. They were frightened because they
did not understand the changes in the seasons. Sometimes they were afraid that
it would turn cold and stay cold forever and never get warm again and all the
plants would die and the people and animals would not have any food.
They saw stars and planets and comets and meteors in the night sky and
they did not understand these lights in the night sky. They were frightened
because they did not understand these lights in the night sky.
Sometimes
there were floods and the water would cover all the dry land that they could
see. They did not understand what caused the floods and they were frightened
that they would be carried away by the water.
Sometimes they felt
earthquakes. Sometimes they saw volcanoes spew forth smoke and ashes and hot
burning rocks. They did not understand what caused earthquakes and volcanoes and
they were very frightened.
Sometimes they got sick or saw other people
get sick. They did not understand why people get sick and they were very afraid.
Because they did not understand what caused lightning or thunder or
floods or earthquakes or sickness or these other things, they thought these
things must be caused by very powerful super-humans. They thought these
super-humans must be very powerful to be able to do all of these things. They
were afraid of the super-humans that they imagined but they wanted to get to
know them better. The people of long ago thought they could make friends with
the super-humans and then the super-humans would take care of the people and not
hurt them with their great powers. The people of long ago thought that the
super-humans could stop all of the bad things like floods and earthquakes and
sickness from happening.
But the people did not know how to make friends
with the imaginary super-humans. They made guesses at what they thought the
super-humans would like because they knew what they themselves liked. The people
liked good food and pretty things so they thought the super-humans would like
good food and pretty things too. Sometimes they built special tables called
altars for the things they wanted to give as gifts to the super-humans.
Sometimes they would take the food and pretty things and throw them in the
volcanoes or other places where they thought the super-humans lived. They
thought that doing these things would make the super-humans happy.
The
people kept trying to make friends with the super-humans by offering gifts and
the people called out to the super-humans to hear them and to help them but the
super-humans were not real. The super-humans were only make-believe. The
super-humans were only characters in stories that people told each other.
But many people still thought that the super-humans were real and that
they were not answering because the people were not doing the right things to
make the super-humans happy. Many people came up with their own ideas about what
would make the super-humans happy. Different people had different ideas about
who the super-humans were and had different names for the super-humans. The
people thought the super-humans were like the men and women they knew and gave
them names like Jupiter, Zeus, Jesus, God, Christ, Isis, Allah, Yahweh, Jehovah,
Saturn, Venus, Mars, Thor, Woden or Odin, Frigga, or Mary.
We can still see the names
of some of these super-humans all around us. The month of January was named for
Janus, the Roman super-human
who governed doors and gates and all beginnings. The month of March was named
for Mars, the Roman super-human of war. The day Wednesday was named for Woden's Day or Odin's Day, the
Norse supreme super-human. The day Thursday was named for Thor's Day, Thor was the name the Norse
people gave the super-human who they thought made thunder. The day Friday was
named for Frigga, the Norse
super-human of love and home. The day Saturday was named for Saturn's Day, Saturn was the name the Romans
gave their super-human of agriculture and also one of the lights in the night
sky. The holiday of Easter was named for Eastre or Ostara or Astarte, who was named by many people as the
super-human of springtime. The holiday of Christmas was named for Christ, one of
the popular super-humans in the Western world today.
Many people were
very afraid of making the super-humans angry with them. They were afraid that
the super-humans would do bad things to them or not help them when they were
sick or in trouble. They argued over which of the super-humans was the most
powerful and which was the best to have as a friend.
The people argued
and argued and argued some more. Each one thought they had the best idea about
which super-human was the best and most powerful. Each one thought they knew
what the most powerful super-human wanted most of all. They kept arguing.
Sometimes some of the people even made wars and did very bad things to other
people because they had different ideas about the super-humans.
Finally
some modern people stopped calling out to the super-humans and started looking
for other explanations for the causes of lightning, thunder, floods,
earthquakes, sickness, and the other things that the people of long ago thought
were caused by the super-humans. These modern people who wanted to understand
how the world really works learned many things and wrote many books. They
learned that people don't need the imaginary super-humans because people can
love one another and learn to take care of themselves.
Playing
make-believe can be fun but it is important to understand the difference between
playing make-believe and what is real. Part of growing up is learning to
understand the world in which we all live.
Valinda Hunter
Posted with permission