jesus

well. you're probably all tired of it, but i got re-inspired after i went to work at the pool tonight to talk about it more.

the lifeguard that works before me is taking a "begginings of Christianity" at UW. i barely got to talk to her about it, but then ended up having an good conversation with arturo.

the way i see it, is kinda what i was implying a million times in the last posts. that times are bad and people are looking for someone to step up and lead them out of their misery. enter jesus, muhammed, buddah, lao-tzu, rigoberta, or whoever will take the task.

but i think this time i want to focus on jesus cuz i know his story the best.

the roman government was being a bitch. it's governing lands from afar and really has no idea of the culture that it's lording over. for the first time that anyone can remember, the people around the sea of galilee are being taxed. taxed nonetheless by that foreign ruler.
bad times.

jesus gives his lectures, his teachings, his parables and some listen. but the ruling government doesn't like what he's doing. they call him heretical but what really was jesus doing? he was trying to bring everyone back to the basics, the base philosophy of how to live your life.

he got enraged at the temple for those bastards trying to make a buck off of the jewish religion. selling birds and sheep for offerings? gambling in the house of God? what is this?!

so he puts a new spin on the old religion. live a good life. live well under your government. treat your neighbor well.
it's a great way to live.

but years and years pass, jesus becomes diefied, stories are told of how he feeds thousands with a few loaves of bread and some fish. people think he's the son of God. the religion grows.

but what happens? again, it comes full circle and again people are looking to gain money and power from the new religion. the basic concepts are lost and people blindly follow whatever manipulations can be passed on for someone's gain. the catholic church grows, gains power, takes over europe.
again, reformation. martin luther, pissed, steps up and tries again.
fast forward a few hundred more years. protestant churches are big man in america and now back the country's ruler. Roe gets bought off and people are being told what they should believe.

alright. that was a little aside. but how arturo put it was like this. or maybe i made this example, but used shit arturo had told me.

arturo's passion is kung fu. he moved up here from san fransisco away from his old sifu (chinese for sensei). his old sifu was badass and started this huge organization.
up here in redmond, there's another sifu who was trained under the guy in san fran. the problem, arturo tells me, is that this guy doesn't care how well his students learn the art. to get the most out of a move you need to twist the waist along with the punch. but this guy could care less. he's all about the money.
the first time he saw arturo even before he asked about giving lessons, he was wondering about his fee.

a flagrant disrespect of the art to begin with, and then not even a wish to teach it well. the guy has gotten into the merchandising of his kung fu and has totally lost sight of what was really important. passing down a tradition that extends many-a generation.

this just seems to be the way things are. a religion/culture/kung fu style/way of life/etc is created to solve some sort of misgiving or an unbearable lifestyle. but given time and the success of the enacted way of life, people figure out ways to personally become successful in its use and bastardize in order to maximize their own personal/monetary gain from the system already in place.

so what was once a helpful agent to people becomes warped into a pile of crap that only helps a powerful few.

so why do people fall into the trap?
fear.
everyone wants to feel a belonging to something.
that for some reason life is worth living and on down the line there will be and answer and a reward for living a certain way.
but there is no right direction. i think instead of being told what to believe people should just explore life on their own.

fuck religion. it may tell you how to live life, but maybe you only need to take the basics from it and relie on your on intuition to fill in the gaps.

cuz seriously, what kinda changes could be made over the last 2000 years to the religion of the big, bearded man in the sky?
sketchy monks doing what they 'think' God would have intended to write, misinterpretations of those who may not know aramaic or greek that well, people who make crap up just to answer contemporary question that the bible makes no references to . . . the list goes on.

i mean shit. think about it. up until about 10 years ago Christopher Colombus was this badass dude that found America and led every white man to their manifest destiny. but now we know him as the murderer and pillager of thousands of Taino indians. and it's only been a quarter of the time that jesus' background could have been made legendary!!

so take from religion what you may, but i personally see it as important, but just important history. read between the lines. elaboration of stories has existed since the dawn of time. think creation stories (outside of adam and eve), think mideval stories of dragons and elves. its all about keeping people's attention.
the old testament knew how to do it. deciet, stories of wars and kings. the new testament has stories of overcoming adversity. it's all in there. check it out.