One of the things I like about the throne of God and the creatures that guard it is they are surrounded by eyes on every side – perfect metaphor for circumspection. No wonder they cry ‘holy!’
Interestingly, deception is first represented in scripture as the opening of the eyes. Gen 3: 5-7. Perhaps then this is where the idea came from that the eyes of truth are closed. The shuttered view of the fundamentalist cértainly suggests that this is indeed so and that the open minded, from this point-of-no-view, are sons of Satan.
The Theological Supremacists, as arrogant and extreme as their counterparts in Race, or Class, (same attitudes only instead of niggers or buttoos [Jamaicanism for knave] they say ‘pagans’) always confident they are right and righteous. Their sense of ‘righteous’ does not derive from circumspection but tunnel vision. Reality is what ‘eye’ alone say it is. No other perspective needs be considered.
So these Fundamentalists have great freedom to think and act unilaterally. Spraying whether church or Mosque with bullets, or in much more sophisticated, organized and sustained acts of war / terror (take your pick….murder in any language comes straight from the heart…a heart blind as a bat to any ‘truth’ but one’s own) When its one man against the world, as long as ‘God is by my side’- frequent fundamentalist fantasy / delusion, I will prevail … and in such fervency of spirit, lines between courage and cowardice are blurred. Absurdities such as suicide and slaughter in God’s name, become common place. Life loses its value.
Religious Fundamentalists, Orthodox Extremists, Theological Supremacists are all around. Whether they call themselves by this name or that…the particular religious doctrine is irrelevant – Muslim : Sunni or Shia; Christian: Evangelical or Catholic; what all have in common is a morbid obsession with the idea of being closer to God than everyone else. They have become the Covering Cherubim protecting the throne of God zealously which they imagine would fall but for their heroic vigilance.
Their religion, rather than connecting them to the world and empowering them in it, removes them from worldy connections and the resultant alienation is what pushes the soul to extremes.
Back to the picture of the throne room. What has been shattered in our society is true circumspection….a thing born of empathy not fear. The holiness of he who is seated on the throne is derived from connectedness to, not distance from creation. We need to discover the God who sees all, now that we have discovered, or at least claim to, the God that sees me.
YeKengalé 