The Sunday Mail
FROM the observations made in recent weeks, it has now come to our attention that Scriptures are either considered fact or figurative.
If factual, the Scriptures will be read as literal (“taking words in their usual or most basic and plain sense without metaphor”). If figurative and representational, there are symbolic and allegorical, and associated with typology and tropology.
Typology is “the study and interpretation of types and symbols” while tropology is “the practice of interpreting the figurative meaning”. There is the “searching for or exposition of the concepts and general principles”.
This is the deeper metaphorical, allegorical and homiletical application of a text. There is also a comparative study of religious traditions. This is the plane in which Hebraic Rabbis and Yahoshua the Nazarene presented teachings using allegory, parables, physical or natural things with deep truths.
This column has always and shall remain taking Scriptures figuratively, symbolically and allegorically.
First, it has been discovered that there is a duality in human nature or in every human being. The Hebrew Scriptures projected what was already known by older civilisations like that of ancient Egypt, Sumeria and Indus Valley, when it is said “male and female, (the Divine) created them” (Genesis 1:27).
Right from the beginning, humanity was and is still divine in every respect (Genesis 1:27, 2:7) and the human body was and is still the bearer and vehicular expression of that divinity (Genesis 1:27, 2:7).
The dual aspect of human nature is also found in the two brain chambers and the central subtle channels in a spiral double helical movement that entwine latently in the sacrum bone at the base of the spinal column, the “serpent power”.
Second, “Adam and Eve” (“Adamah” and “Chavah” in Hebrew) were not historical human beings but collective figurative and humanisation of physical, mental and intuitive energies found in every human being in varying proportions.
This means “Adam and Eve” were representative of the universal masculine and feminine energies, respectively. This shows that if the Scriptures were to be read literally and historically, they will turn out to be false.
Third, at metaphysics level, a human being has both the feminine (heart, intuitiveness/creativity) and masculine (mindpower/willpower) qualities to be human.
This means whether biologically male or female, each human is an individual bearer and a vehicular expression of both mental (masculine/will, that is active, expressive, assertiveness, strength) and intuitive (feminine/wisdom, that is nurturing, receptive, calmness, gentleness) energies.
In Genesis (itself a narrative derived from earlier traditions), the non-historical but mythical Adam symbolises the mind (will and intellect); and Eve is the heart (desire, passion and emotion).
The two are connected through the spinal column, which is represented by the serpent, itself representative of active sexual energy within all of us.
It heals or harms the world depending on our willing and effortful relationship with it.
(“Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.” – Numbers 21:8)
If the non-historical but mythical “Adam and Eve,” respectively, symbolise one’s will (discernment, drive, rational faculty and the ability to verify) to act and wisdom (desire, urge or intuition) to relate, it then follows that both a man and woman have the faculties of will and wisdom and perversion occurs when intellect is ignored making a person subservient to desires or urges only.
Or if the will is ignored it leads to inaction, inertia, lack of interest/concern, lethargy and apathy.
When we dis-connect our own wisdom (heart, feminine) and will (mind, masculine), this is the “fall” from divinity within. This is metaphorically “self-exile” or “death”.
The “fall” is the immersing oneself in lamentations, bitterness and victimhood. It is then our individual effort to retrace the route we used to dis-connect so that we are able to re-connect with our own indwelling divine power through “knowing thyself” and the “golden rule”.
To “know thyself” is to integrate the will (mind, masculine) and wisdom (heart, feminine) psychologically on our own, and biologically when a male and female connect with each other in love and affection.
The non-historical but mythical “Adam and Eve,” respectively, symbolise one’s “psyche” (Kether in Hebrew, will and drive) and “nous” (Chokmah in Hebrew, wisdom and desire).
Metaphysically, the representativeness of the collective “Adam and Eve” or individual Eve is the first movement of the mind in its balanced contact with life at a higher state.
This higher state is the world of ideas, the storehouse of archetypes, marking out the possibilities of material forms and relationships, which is seen in what are called the Seven Cosmic Laws of Nature.
Feedback: [email protected], and Twitter @shingaiRndoro. A gallery of previous articles is found at www.sundaymail.co.zw/author/shingairukwata.
