Swirling thoughts and feelings with this prompt. First, to the actual practical personal experiences. I have felt under-dressed, over-dressed, and wrongly dressed. Truthfully, some of my most embarrassing moments have had to do with the clothes or, in one case, shoes that I had on. I have needed very much to cover something(s) up – sometimes with success, sometimes without. “Fig Leaves,” though, and the biblical story call forth the ah-ha moment of the beginning of sin. Even before God’s banishing Adam and Eve from the garden, we have – in this passage from Genesis – these moments (1) eat the fruit, (2) see the nakedness, and (3) experience the shame. Shame of nakedness is learned, not innate. Spend time with a group of toddlers. Nakedness might pique interest and curiosity, but there no shame. Be aware of couples in committed relationships. Nakedness might evoke ethereal love, admiration, maybe humor sometimes, lust, but there is no shame. There is a moment in parent-child relationships when opposite sex parent and child when nakedness becomes problematic. Instead, though, covering up, what if parents talked with children about anatomical differences as preliminary indicators of gender-identity and in a matter-of-fact way went forward continuing naked interactions and conversations. How different that might be for adult and young person?
Back, though, to the notion that the story of the fig leaves was the beginning of the notion of sin in the Western European/Middle Eastern Judeo-Christian philosophy/culture/religions. What if – WHAT IF – we raised a generation or two of children growing into adulthood WITHOUT sin as a major component of describing behaviors, mindsets, motivations, and outcomes and WITHOUT the notion that release and relief from “sinful” thoughts, feelings, and behaviors has to come from somewhere, someone outside the self. What if we taught that each of us has within us the options of kindness and unkindness, generosity and stinginess, helpfulness and unhelpfulness. What if we taught that kindness, generosity, and helpfulness are the better choices not because of the benefits those attitudes and behaviors give to others and the larger community but because of the benefits that those pivot points for motivation and action give to us – realization of our value to self and other, realization of our exquisite gift of giving to self and others, and the realization of our participation in helping the pushing forward of self and community.
It's like the kaleidoscope where one micro-turn of the movable cylinder shifts the pebbles into a whole different configuration to the viewer. Let’s do that with our choices, our hopes and dreams, our lives.
— Marmar
Back, though, to the notion that the story of the fig leaves was the beginning of the notion of sin in the Western European/Middle Eastern Judeo-Christian philosophy/culture/religions. What if – WHAT IF – we raised a generation or two of children growing into adulthood WITHOUT sin as a major component of describing behaviors, mindsets, motivations, and outcomes and WITHOUT the notion that release and relief from “sinful” thoughts, feelings, and behaviors has to come from somewhere, someone outside the self. What if we taught that each of us has within us the options of kindness and unkindness, generosity and stinginess, helpfulness and unhelpfulness. What if we taught that kindness, generosity, and helpfulness are the better choices not because of the benefits those attitudes and behaviors give to others and the larger community but because of the benefits that those pivot points for motivation and action give to us – realization of our value to self and other, realization of our exquisite gift of giving to self and others, and the realization of our participation in helping the pushing forward of self and community.
It's like the kaleidoscope where one micro-turn of the movable cylinder shifts the pebbles into a whole different configuration to the viewer. Let’s do that with our choices, our hopes and dreams, our lives.
— Marmar
So hopeful. The philosophy you describe is what the "hippies" tried to do. But something always derails it. Something in humans enjoys conflict.
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