The Three Cultures and the Sacred

[Mole]

Only spoken cultures have sacred books. By contrast literate cultures don't have sacred books.

For instance, it was the spoken culture of Islam that created the Koran; and the spoken culture of Christianity that created the Bible; and the spoken culture of Judaism that created the Torah; and the spoken culture of Hinduism that created the Bagavad Gita; and the spoken culture of China that created the Analects of Confucius.

And this makes sense, for in a spoken culture there is nothing rarer or more valuable than a book, or to be more accurate, a manuscript, and so naturally the manuscript becomes sacred.

But in a literate culture where tens of thousands of books are created each year, it is impossible to see one book as sacred. No, in a literate culture the literal interpretation becomes sacred.

But as we move out of the literate culture, which itself moved out of the spoken culture, and into the electronic culture, what will we find is sacred?

 

[INTP]

But as we move out of the literate culture, which itself moved out of the spoken culture, and into the electronic culture, what will we find is sacred?

free porn

 

[Qlip]

I think you put too much stock in your personal spoken/literate/electronic paradigm as primarily defining of a culture. At least it's too much to assume that people agree with your premises. Maybe you should start a thread on the premises.

 

[xisnotx]

Only spoken cultures have sacred books. By contrast literate cultures don't have sacred books.

How can an illiterate culture read and write sacred books?

 

[Stanton Moore]

But as we move out of the literate culture, which itself moved out of the spoken culture, and into the electronic culture, what will we find is sacred?

Excellent question, Victor. What do think the answer is?

 

[Coriolis]

Only spoken cultures have sacred books. By contrast literate cultures don't have sacred books.

For instance, it was the spoken culture of Islam that created the Koran; and the spoken culture of Christianity that created the Bible; and the spoken culture of Judaism that created the Torah; and the spoken culture of Hinduism that created the Bagavad Gita; and the spoken culture of China that created the Analects of Confucius.

And this makes sense, for in a spoken culture there is nothing rarer or more valuable than a book, or to be more accurate, a manuscript, and so naturally the manuscript becomes sacred.

But in a literate culture where tens of thousands of books are created each year, it is impossible to see one book as sacred. No, in a literate culture the literal interpretation becomes sacred.

What about the Bahai scripture? It was written directly, in a literate culture.

What about the many Native American spoken cultures? There are individual reflections, famous quotes, historical and cultural descriptions, but few (if any?) widely reverenced texts. Much of what has been written was was recorded by outside scholars for cultural preservation purposes.

But as we move out of the literate culture, which itself moved out of the spoken culture, and into the electronic culture, what will we find is sacred?

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MEDICINE

2000 BC: Here eat this root.

1000 AD: That root is heathen. Here, say this prayer.

1850 AD: That prayer is superstition. Here, drink this potion.

1940 AD: That potion is snake oil. Here, swallow this pill.

1985 AD: That pill is ineffective. Here, take this antibiotic.

2000 AD: That antibiotic doesn't work any more. Here, eat this root.

 

[AgentF]

What about the Bahai scripture? It was written directly, in a literate culture.

this is true.

note:
- it espouses the advancement of science* and its harmony with religion. *including technology :>
- its sacred texts (not translations, transcriptions or copies--the original texts) can be viewed today at the Baha'i World Center Buildings in Haifa, Israel
- it was reported as the world's 2nd most widespread religion per Encyclopedia Brittanica.
(per their 2002 analysis; more recent studies offer an "Other" category, into which the Baha'i Faith has presumably been placed.)

 

[sprinkles]

What are you saying I cannot read it because I am a goldfish

bloop bloop

 

[Mole]

How can an illiterate culture read and write sacred books?

Of course they don't, rather there is a sacred priestly caste who can read and write manuscripts. And the priestly clerics read aloud the sacred manuscript to the faithful. We see the remnants of this in church today when the priest reads the gospel aloud to the faithful.

When of course the printing press was invented 1440 the first manuscript printed as a book was the bible. And the faithful learnt to read the printed bible. And so our spoken culture started to turn into our literate culture by the individual reading of the bible. And this led to the violent split between the aural, spoken culture of catholics and the visual, literate culture of protestants.

And in moving from a spoken culture to a literate culture, we moved from an aural culture to a visual culture. An interesting remnant of this aural culture remained at my catholic boarding school as our classes and sport and worship were ordered by the sound of a bell - a quintessentially aural way of ordering.

And interestingly we are now being ordered electronically, with results quite similar to the spoken, aural culture of the past. So everything old is new again.

And for whom does the bell toll? It tolls for us now, electronically.

 

[Mole]

Excellent question, Victor. What do think the answer is?

As we move from a predominantly visual literate culture to an electronic culture involving all the senses, we can only look backwards to our previous aural spoken culture to see what we may regard as sacred.

And I am immediately struck by the sacred feminine. We see this today with the rise of feminism. My Sovereign is feminine, my Prime Minister is feminine, my Commander-in-Chief is feminine. I myself grew my hair long and wore a sarong as a tribute to the sacred feminine.

And everywhere I look around Canberra we have upmarket massage parlours. These parlours are introducing us once again to our tactile sense.

And after being compelled by law to sit still in class and focus visually on the printed text, students go dancing to rediscover their proprioceptive sense. And to break free of the privileged eye, and discover their sense of movement, the proprioceptive sense, they take powerful drugs to put themselves into a deep trance where they love everyone, and everyone love them, as they learn to move freely.

So literacy privileges the eye, and now the electronic mediums are teaching us to experience all our senses, including the eye.

But most of all we are replacing the literate individual with the electronic tribe, such as the etribe of Central.

 

[Mole]

I think you put too much stock in your personal spoken/literate/electronic paradigm as primarily defining of a culture. At least it's too much to assume that people agree with your premises. Maybe you should start a thread on the premises.

The literate culture depends on argument and premises. And as I move into our electronic culture I find I dislike argument, agreement and disagreement. And premises depend on a linear, sequental view, whereas electronically everything is connected to everything else, just as you and I are connected across the globe.

 

[WALMART]

It's funny, I can ALWAYS tell which threads you've started based squarely off the title.

 

[sprinkles]

Of course they don't, rather there is a sacred priestly caste who can read and write manuscripts. And the priestly clerics read aloud the sacred manuscript to the faithful. We see the remnants of this in church today when the priest reads the gospel aloud to the faithful.

Getting rid of that is a big improvement if you ask me.

 

[Qlip]

The literate culture depends on argument and premises. And as I move into our electronic culture I find I dislike argument, agreement and disagreement. And premises depend on a linear, sequental view, whereas electronically everything is connected to everything else, just as you and I are connected across the globe.

Unlike say.. the Talmud, another work that you'd classify as spoken culture, yet based in argument and premises. I just can't figure out why if you insist on floating in your little universe, why you need to try to use factoids to enforce it on the world. Just drop that stuff and let the ones who want to dance with you dance. It would be a better dance than you have now.

 

[kiddykat]

The electronic culture has it's pros and cons. People will find whatever they want sacred to them, so long as it has meaning and they agree with it.

Sadly, a lot of what's posted online is a bunch of junk, and an extension of marketing in the new era. These supposed articles published online with statistics and studies to prove credibility, really aren't that academic.

True academic resources are unfortunately expensive for the public to get a hold of. So when you have people ascribing and taking so-called "scientific literature" online from these .com sites at face value, you also get a generation and culture of people who stop questioning and passively take in information as though it is their written Koran or Bible.

But the beauty about electronic social media is that people can share knowledge and information with one another in a way that's more intimate and convenient compared in IRL when people are in a rush or don't have time in fast-paced communities. Isolated cultures that are illiterate seem to enjoy more genuine face-to-face interactions, and their social mores for living are differently the same. Even though they don't have a text to live by, they have poetry through music and dancing that gives meaning to their connection just like every other human being/social creature on this planet.

 

[sprinkles]

Uh oh, peoples makin sense all up in yo thread Victor
Whatcha gonna do about that?

 

[Mole]

Getting rid of that is a big improvement if you ask me.

The priestly caste of the spoken culture transform into the priestly caste of the electronic culture under another name.

 

[Mole]

Uh oh, peoples makin sense all up in yo thread Victor
Whatcha gonna do about that?

All of literature is written in the language of common sense, except for the poems of Arthur Rimbaud, and I plan to slip the bonds of common sense and join him.

 

[Mole]

Unlike say.. the Talmud, another work that you'd classify as spoken culture, yet based in argument and premises. I just can't figure out why if you insist on floating in your little universe, why you need to try to use factoids to enforce it on the world. Just drop that stuff and let the ones who want to dance with you dance. It would be a better dance than you have now.

If you can't hear the beat, there is no need to dance with me.

 

[Mole]

It's funny, I can ALWAYS tell which threads you've started based squarely off the title.

I think of them as headlines.