Good vs Evil - a ponderance on the imagery used.
Friday, November 14th, 2008
by alphaxion
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Think of evil.
Now what does it look like to you? I’m pretty sure most of you out there have an image of something with horns, hooves and fangs. If not that then it’ll be something equally as base -a human in the throws of violent fury.
Think of good, and look at the picture in your mind that you have formed now.
I’m sure you now have a mental image of pure white, supernatural beings that can’t possibly exist in the animal kingdom. Or, if not that it’s of self sacrifice. Both of which being anti-nature if you will.
This is no accident that evil will symbolise everything we can say really exists and that good exists outside of nature (hence supernatural) because when you boil it down to the very base level, our concept of evil is really the natural urge for self preservation and is one of the most animalistic tendancies we humans possess.
Our imagery of good on the other hand represents our control over these base animal urges, which is why they are symbolised by things totally alien to the natural life on Earth because stopping the selfish action goes against one of the fundamental rules of nature - survival at any cost.
This schism is very noticable in our religions where they elevate humanity above the animal kingdom, as something seperate and special. Anything that reminds us we are just like every other animal on this planet, and therefore a potential question over our purpose and origins, is suddenly labeled evil or sinful.
This is prolly nothing new to you guys n gals, but is a stream of thought I felt I had to scribble down somewhere.
If you disagree or agree with the above please post your thoughts into the comments, I’d love to see where I’m going wrong or if I’m on the money.