Do Not Follow Your Heart
Summary
A wise person, no matter his or her beliefs, understands that human motivations and desires are naturally selfish. We humans think and act from the shallow perspective of personal experience on behalf of our biological imperative: self-preservation. Our view of others, our understanding of the gods we create, and, most importantly, our actions in the world are corrupt because our core motivation, “me, myself and I,” is corrupt. Self-preservation and self-interest are coded in our DNA. How can anyone mitigate an elemental biological impulse? You can't. There is no ideology, philosophy, or belief system that can change human biology. So how is the Bible different? It assumes the worst. It supposes that all human beings are stubborn and that all human beings will always refuse to change. Its hope is not in humanity, but in the possibility that despite ourselves, a few people with “ears to hear” might be willing to follow a commandment that goes against our nature. In the Gospel of Mark, such a commandment is preached as widely as possible for our sake and for the sake of the common good. Richard and Fr. Marc discuss Mark 7:14-23. Episode 166 Mark 7:14-23; Subscribe: http://feedpress.me/the-bible-as-literature; “Bummin on Tremelo” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http:// creativecommons .org/ licenses /by/3.0/A wise person, no matter his or her beliefs, understands that human motivations and desires are naturally selfish. We humans think and act from the shallow perspective of personal experience on behalf of our biological imperative: self-preservation. Our view of others, our understanding of the gods we create, and, most importantly, our actions in the world are corrupt because our core motivation, “me, myself and I,” is corrupt. Self-preservation and self-interest are coded in our DNA. How can anyone mitigate an elemental biological impulse? You can't. There is no ideology, philosophy, or belief system that can change human biology. So how is the Bible different? It assumes the worst. It supposes that all human beings are stubborn and that all human beings will always refuse to change. Its hope is not in humanity, but in the possibility that despite ourselves, a few people with “ears to hear” might be willing to follow a commandment that goes against our nature. In the Gospel of Mark, such a commandment is preached as widely as possible for our sake and for the sake of the common good. Richard and Fr. Marc discuss Mark 7:14-23.
Episode 166 Mark 7:14-23; Subscribe: http://feedpress.me/the-bible-as-literature; “Bummin on Tremelo” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http:// creativecommons .org/ licenses /by/3.0/
