A threat greater than "Global Warming"

There is not a day that goes by that I am not struck to the core at how violation of the Eighth Commandment “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor” (false witness meaning lying, or giving incorrect information) has totally corrupted humankind as a whole and threatens the salvation of millions of people.

I’ve written in the past about this Commandment, mostly to educate people that “bearing false witness” not only means a direct lie, but also includes deceptive information, including intentional omission of correct and full information. I’m not going to work on that dimension of education in this blog posting, about what the sin encompasses, although it will be obvious as I discuss the pervasiveness of the problem. Rather I want to instruct you as to why “not telling lies” and “not intentionally providing incorrect or incomplete information” is a Commandment and therefore one of the basic instructions by God to humanity, upon which you will be judged.

First I must emphasize that the Commandments are for people’s benefit, not for God’s. God does not need the ego trip of worship, obedience, or more souls in heaven. There is an abundance of angels and saved human souls in heaven and it is not like someone is “missed” if they are not there (if they are in the other place, the one that is eternally hot). Notice that Jesus said there is more rejoicing over a soul that repents and gets to heaven than there is over people who are naturally good and have achieved heaven; Jesus did not say that those in heaven are bummed out over those who don’t make it. There is no sadness or sense of loss in heaven because the concept of loss or lacking does not exist in the presence of God. Even the closest of people, such as a parent and child, or a romantic couple, do not notice the lack of the other person if they are split due to sin, where one is in heaven and one is in hell. The one in heaven does not notice the lack of the one who is in hell. Being in the presence of God is simply too powerful and complete an experience to notice any lacking at all. This does not mean that people are not “with” their loved ones in heaven, but they feel total completion with the people who are there with them, and do not notice the ones who are not. For example, even the loneliest orphan on earth, with parents bent on going to hell, is surrounded in heaven by a host of company and will not notice the absence of the biological parents who, for example, sold him or her into child slavery. The orphaned child will be with the generations of righteous people who are their ancestors who have achieved heaven and, of course, the angels. So God does not create a Commandment because he needs the attention or because he will be bummed to the max because someone does not make heaven, or because someone in heaven “needs” even the direst of sinners because of some earthly blood or romantic relationship.

So why would God have a Commandment prohibiting false witness? The fact that it is one of the fundamental Commandments means it is an enormously important prohibition. It’s not in the “Gosh it would be nice if you all did not bear false witness but hey, boys will be boys and girls will be girls, wink list.” Moses did not seem to get a list of “minor stuff” that it is “frowned on but hey, God knows it’s hard for people to be good.” God gave THE list that is essential for 1) humanity’s physical survival, 2) humanity’s spiritual survival and 3) salvation of the soul to heaven.

Humanity’s physical survival

In case you all haven’t noticed each person gets one life and at some point that person perishes. People, and animals, live on a world that is full of abundance of food, water, and opportunity for shelter. However the world is a dangerous place due to both the realities of existence and subsistence, plus the actions of other human beings. By the first point I mean that people who do not have food, water, protection from disease, shelter and a means of support die. It’s a physical fact of living in a fallen (flawed) world that people are not in glorified bodies sipping nectar out of the clouds. People have been given a fertile and forgiving earth, but it is an earth that has limits on what it can provide. Through the centuries millions have died in times of drought and famine, for example, or disease. This differs from the lot of animals in one way and that is that humans learned to collaborate for their existence. If an animal lacks food it and its offspring perish without a chance of animals in the next town sending Care packages, or telling them of better food opportunities thirty miles in “that direction.” Animals have lived for hundreds of millions of years, though, because they adapt to what is available where they can thrive, and develop patterns of migration where necessary. When people split away from the animals due to their developed means to communicate and be self conscious evolution and adaptation virtually stopped and collaboration began, within families, between families, and eventually clans and tribes, and increasingly sophisticated social groupings.

At the most basic level, hunter and gatherer people had to be very precise and accurate in order to survive. In fact, skills such as mathematics developed from the need to be accurate for survival (for example, knowing how many bushels of grain were stored for the winter). It would not even occur to early humans to lie. In fact, early humans evolved toward increasing precision because their very survival depended on the accurate sharing of information. Who would be the idiot to tell people that they should go a hundred miles through the snow because there is a magic field full of food there, and when they get there yell “April Fool!?” It would not even occur to the early humans to lie. And even today you can see what happens when there is a lack of information. The tsunami wiped out hundreds of thousands of people because a warning system was not in place. So if you think about it, you can imagine how important it was for the earliest humans to be absolutely precise and as honest as possible in their collaboration and sharing of information.

The trouble began when humans became competitive. There is a temptation to endanger and lead astray someone who is perceived to be a rival, or to cheat in order to “get one over on someone” in order to obtain a financial or power advantage. The illusion that this was a conquered and well understood world broke down the natural lack of motivation to lie in early humans because lying no longer conferred an immediate penalty such as a lost hunting party, or a starved populace. Once there is enough abundance and knowledge people start to feel that they can lie in order to manipulate circumstances to suit their own interests. And this is a huge danger. Look at the toxic materials that enter into toys and household items. Look at the outbreaks of bird flu, food contamination, HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, just as three examples of health threats that are exacerbated by lying or withholding information. There is still a fundamental survival penalty for individuals, groups, nations and humanity as a whole for lying or withholding vital information. I am boggled when I see how virtually no one seems to understand that.

Humanity’s spiritual survival

By spiritual survival I refer to both sound mental health and fulfilled religious/higher power requirements of humanity. It has been demonstrated in decades of study that the unpredictable is the most potentially mentally destructive force on both individuals and groups of people. Babies who receive abuse are the youngest victims of unpredictability. Parents should be consistent, present nurturers. When they are not the baby’s mental wiring is damaged.

Humans need structure and predictability in order to be sound of mind. Yet somehow there has developed a worship of the unpredictable, the “me first,” the overstimulation of adrenaline and outrageous “surprise” in even the most innocent of entertainments. Somehow society thinks it is good and desirable to be unpredictable and outrageous. I have argued for decades against babies and the youngest children even watching anything on TV, for example. Young babies are busy learning predictability when they first learn to trust that when mom or dad leaves the room that they will come back. Toddlers are still learning what is real and what is not real (see survival reasons discussion above as reminder why that is important). TV is too strong a medium for children because it is over-stimulated short bursts of activity of artificial circumstances taking place with sounds and motion that are not even three dimensional in the room. TV and so forth, no matter how “well intentioned” or “educational” blows the brain circuits of babies, toddlers, and the very young. And as children grow to be adults they have an array of choices that they have never had before, due to the general prosperity of humanity. Yet their very ability to make good choices is compromised by societal lying. There are lies of fact and lies of “spin” and there are lies of illusion. I don’t even have to go into them in specific because you all know what I mean. But in general, young people and adults are saturated in false scenarios with every moment on TV and in the movies. The false scenarios are both too rosy and too gloomy. People are swimming in vats of false witness. At the extreme you have child predators disguising themselves on the Internet. As a baseline you have people who manipulate your feelings, moods, thoughts and actual economic security by direct and indirect lies. I cannot think of a bigger potential for a huge fall of humankind than the fact that there are no longer facts and reality as the baseline of a human’s existence, at least in the prosperous Western secularized culture. And like I said, the false scenarios of entertainment and social pressures are both too rosy and too gloomy. People no longer remember what it is like to be a person, are not allowed to grow serenely from child to adult, and no longer remember how to even have a neighborly discourse without lying and spinning. I wish I was exaggerating but I am not.

The second part of this concern is the ability to relate to God. God speaks only the truth, and is the truth, as God is all knowing, and all of the material and spiritual world are under the purview and part of God’s infinite boundlessness. In addition to the needs for humans to be honest in order to maintain physical and spiritual health, humans need to be able to understand the not-lie when it is spoken to them. And God only speaks the truth. When people lie to each other constantly, they no longer can hear God. Lies are like actually putting sealing wax in each ear. This is because lying (including the omission of truth) is motivated by self interest, even if it is as silly as being amused and entertained in front of the TV. That is why there is the expression “suspend reality.” People used to watch an hour of TV knowing they were “suspending reality” but then they would get back to reality of home, family, job, the future, and their faith. This is the World War II generation I’m mostly speaking of. There was no blurring of TV, for example, and reality. My dad was a night watchman and a deputy sheriff who was a World War II vet. He could watch an hour of “Have Gun Will Travel” or “The Untouchables” and it was just an hour of suspended reality. He did not change how he spoke, what he did, who he socialized with, how he treated his family, how he thought of himself, what products he bought as a result of watching an hour of TV. Now that separation is unthinkable. One cannot listen to an hour of radio or watch TV without being worried about being fat, broke, smelly, unloved, not cool (or as they say today, being “hot”) and without having one’s values and very existence constantly challenged, lied about and spun. So with that as context, how can a human today who is saturated in lies and omission of truth hear God in prayer? God only tells the truth, even if the truth at that moment is just to comfort a person and let him or her know they are not alone. When one has ears that are filled with lies and spin, one listens only for lies and spin. People start treating God as a consumer choice. They look for flash and spin. They “evaluate alternative products.” They tell God, if they even speak to him at all, what is what, but all based on a life that is filled with lies and omissions of truth. Truth sounds suspiciously boring and oppressive. As the Pope recently said, even the prospect of eternal life sounds like a bore to modern humans. Egad, if you are going to be bored by eternal life and bliss at least please don’t ruin it for everyone else, for the children, for those who yearn for their time in paradise in due course of their life’s time. But by constantly lying, spinning, providing false promises implied in entertainment and advertising, and even by painting such a dark world through gothic, conflict ridden portraits of life, one can no longer hear the author of life, God, when he speaks. One can no longer believe what is written in clear language in the holy books to understand.
Not only is one’s ultimate salvation imperiled, but even while alive the absence of being able to hear God threatens one’s spiritual survival. Humans were meant to know God (though not necessarily to understand completely), and God has made himself abundantly clear and accessible in the Bible and in the Qur’an. When people were more whole than they are now, and when much more of their daily existence was predictable and secure (if not strictly speaking safe, for example war or disasters) the reading of the Bible or the Qur’an was a pleasurable treat, their touch with God and knowing him, understanding him. People did not hold “Tomb Raider” in one hand and the Bible in the other and go, “Gosh I need some entertainment.” The Bible, and the Qur’an, was like nourishment and their treat. This is also the place that people could be sure of the truth. Nothing is in the Bible or the Qur’an that is put there to make you uncertain about your goodness, uncertain about life, uncertain about your appearance, or to sell you a product or service. In fact, you read about people who paid for your security and peace of mind with their lives, and of God’s love for all humanity, despite many disappointments. So when the Bible was in the home and in the school, kids and adults could “suspend reality for an hour or two of playing cowboys” or whatever, because they had the foundation of reality that allowed them to have fun as a treat. Life was not the self gratifying distorted freak show that it is today. Without God and the truth there is a void that is filled with cheap lays, drugs, alcohol, behavioral addictions and increasing perversion. It is not so much that drugs take a person away from God, in fact, but it is the lack of God that creates a gaping hole that is tempted to be filled by drugs. As people are increasingly living in a world where the “norm” is to have people constantly lie to each other, withhold or manipulate information and perception one can no longer hear the truth when it is spoken to them, because it seems almost too simple and dull.

Salvation of the Soul to Heaven

Whether you are a Jew, Muslim or a Christian you have an abundance of accurate information available at your fingertips to live in hope of eternal paradise upon death. Like I said, it is all there for your benefit, not for God’s.

God knew that bearing false witness not only imperils human beings physical and spiritual survival but also their ability to achieve heaven, avoid hell, and be “saved.” During Biblical times, and the time of the Qur’an, contracts and writing were virtually non-existent. People dealt honorably with each other via oral “witnessing.” I’ve written a goodly amount on understanding witnessing and how witnessing is one of the many ways that the accuracy of the Bible and the Qur’an are attested to. But to summarize God taught humans how to make agreements with each other based on several people coming together, recognizing the truth, and attesting to it. One of the earliest examples is the purchase by Abraham of land for the burial place of his wife Sarah when she had passed on. There was no bill of sale, and there was no advertising of funeral parlors. Abraham desired a specific piece of land and with witnesses acquired that land, following rules and procedures that God had taught people to do. I cannot describe the peace of mind that has been lost by humans from those times when honest verbal attestations of truth were the process of both business and social life. When people lost the ability to honorably witness with each other they lost the ability to understand God’s very instructions to them. The insidious concept of “agenda” has polluted virtually every modernized person’s thought process and perception. When people lost witnessing with and to each other, in the Biblical sense, they lost the ability to understand and believe the people who witness to God in their fullness. At “best” people cherry pick the Bible and Qur’an to seek false justification for their agendas. At “worst” they do not recognize the witnessing of God at all. Rather than study the entire body of witness to God that is presented in the Bible and the Qur’an (though in Islam they do not call it witnessing as often as in the Bible, but they do affirm witnessing in the Qur’an) people ignore it since it is no longer a concept humanity understands or they read it with shaded glasses seeking justification of agenda (whether Islamic terrorism or self congratulatory Christian sects). People who no longer live in a society of witnessing cannot understand the truth of the holy people who witnessed to God in the ancient times. Worse, people assume that the authors of the holy books are wired the same mentally as people today to be self seeking advocators of agenda and spin. They do not understand that truth telling, full disclosure and witnessing are directions given by God for day to day living as an entire way of life. Thus the Eighth Commandment is not about avoiding telling one lie. It is saying that people should live via the process of witnessing and that the witnessing must always be truthful.

A big light bulb ought to be going off in people’s minds right now. Modern people forget their roots. The roots of this commandment was a society whereby witnessing was a day to day process followed by rich or poor, pious or less religious, in both religious and secular matters. Witnessing was the pen, paper and SPEECH of Biblical (and Qur’an based) times. It was the way of life and the outlook of people. You can see remnants of it when in old books and movies people spoke of “a gentleman’s word” or “word of honor.” But already then it was not the way that God intended. Just as Jesus said that where several people gather in his name, there he is found, God taught that humans should regulate themselves in both their discourse and agreements via the witnessing of several people, in truthfulness and honorable intentions (intentions are “covered” in the Commandments about not coveting). The light bulb that should be going off in each reader’s mind is that this Eighth Commandment was based on instructions that God gave (both in the Bible and the Qur’an) for witnessing as the process by which people spoke to each other and reached agreement.

This is why the entirely false society humans have forced each other into has divorced people from even understanding the Eighth Commandment and its purpose, and put humanity in a dire position. There is not a day that goes by that I am not worried, disgusted, alarmed and repelled by how far people have fallen away from God just on this one Commandment alone and on their own basic self understanding of it and lack of mutual respect. It literally nauseates me as I see what alienation from understanding and following the Eighth Commandment has done to humanity as a whole. I fear for the souls of everyone involved for surely you must now understand that this is not a matter of “venial” sins, “white lies,” “marketing,” “spin,” or “entertainment.” People are not only “false witnessing” but they are no longer “witnessing” at all in their lives in the way that God instructed them for their own survival. It is an unbelievable and dire peril that I cannot over emphasize. Deception, illusion and the abandonment of true witnessing has already lost many uncounted souls and threatens literally millions today.