1.5 The Flood and the Tower
Noah and his family “landed” on the shores of a new reality. Having gone from walking and talking with God, Noah found himself in a world in which he could no longer even be sure God exists. This reality was very hard to come to grips with. While he had been willing to partner with God in the expansion of the Quintentium, the true cost was almost more than he could take. Like so many after him, Noah turned to alcohol to alleviate his longing for a world he could no longer engage with.
One night, passed out from his intoxication, Noah was discovered naked, by one of his sons; Ham. Upon entering the tent and seeing his father’s naked form, Ham was struck by the differences between him and his father. Prior to the Flood he had been blind to all the distinct characteristics which set him apart from his father. Up until now they had been too trivial to even notice. But suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, all that made him and his father different from one another leapt out at him from reality.
This discovery was so shocking to Ham that he ran to get his two brothers; Shem and Japheth. Hearing from Ham that which they could not even imagine, Shem and Japheth determined to cover up their father’s nakedness and turn a blind eye to the discovery of Ham. Having been made aware of these differences Ham was incapable of returning to a world in which they could not exist. It would be like you and I trying to watch the gorilla video and return to a perspective which blocked out the gorilla.
Waking up to find what had happened, Noah proclaimed the fate of his sons. Shem and Japheth, maintaining the assumed unity carried over from the world prior to the Flood, would prosper and excel, along with all their descendants who would inherit this perspective. Ham however, would be doomed to struggle with what he knew to be true from his experience before the Flood, and that which his senses now made apparent to him. All of his descendants would be caught up in this as well, inevitably fracturing and falling into infighting as they tried to work through their differences.
What happens if you have two groups of people, one of them united and cooperative and the other focused on their differences and constantly squabbling? The people who are united will eventually come to dominate those who can find no source of unity. Noah, in his wisdom and foresight, saw this immediately and proclaimed it to his sons. Despite being made aware of their fate, Ham and his descendants were incapable of going back to the way they saw the world prior to the Flood.
As with the creation of the Quintentium, its expansion saw an increase in the ease with which individuals, and now their differences, could be perceived. Prior to the Flood these differences were immaterial. Prior to the Flood they saw everyone the way you and I see the people we love. Does it really matter to you how tall they are, or what color their hair is? Of course not, once you get to know them their character and unique personality is what you love about them. In our world, the world of the expanded Quintentium, these important characteristics are hidden from us, they have to be discovered.
Before the Flood, these personality traits, the characteristics of the soul, were as obvious to everyone as how tall people are is to you and me. You can discern them even from far away. In such a world, who would take the time to notice that people are different heights? You might think this is not the case, but consider the ‘red’ robin. Have you ever stopped to wonder why it is called ‘red’ when its feathers are obviously orange? This is because to our ancestors, the difference between red and orange was so slight it was beneath notice.
Likewise, the gorilla, when you think counting passes is important, is also beneath notice. We do not perceive reality. We perceive what is currently important, according to the story we are telling ourselves. Having passed through the Flood, and having chosen to turn a blind eye to what Ham had seen, Shem and Japheth lived within a story that made the differences between individuals unimportant. They carried with them the same story they had believed before the Quintentium was expanded. So for them, this remained the reality.
Ham may have very well wanted to remain with them in this story. He did not go searching for the discovery he found that night in Noah’s tent. It was thrust upon him by reality. If his brothers had been willing to work with him, to incorporate this new found knowledge, they may have been able to reconcile their story with reality and come to a greater knowledge of the Truth. This was not what they chose to do. The consequences of this soon forced God to once again intervene in the lives of his children in order to protect them from themselves.
God knew that the unity of Shem and Japheth’s descendants was not a genuine, fleshed out, sustainable unity. It was an unappreciated inheritance which all of them took for granted. If they were to come into possession of real power the bonds between them would inevitably break under the temptation power brings. Power leads you to think you can force others to obey your will, but as children of God, there is no power which can compel us to do anything.
Once this standoff began, their previously immaterial differences would be used to justify the use of force. Those in power would seize upon whatever they could find to make their opponents out to be foreign and dangerous. At this point, their physical traits and characteristics would suddenly be important enough to warrant noticing. If this inevitable breakdown occurred after their unity had seen them attain extreme mastery of the physical world, then the consequences could be annihilation.
Imagine if Genghis Khan had possessed atomic bombs. Do you think Humanity would still be here? So God stepped in to scatter Humanity, so that their unsustainable unity did not lead to their destruction. As he had with the expansion of the Quintentium, God moved with as much force as was possible, while still leaving the possibility of restoration open. The unified people of the earth were scattered and broken up into the smallest unit possible: tribal villages of 130-150 people.
Each of these new tribes was given their own language, to insure their dispersal and separation from one another was complete. Finding themselves unable to even communicate with one another these tribes were forced to spread out and cover the earth. As they did so they continued to break up and divide every time their number became too large to sustain peacefully. This went on until the day when the whole earth was settled and all the variety and distinctness of Humanity had found expression in a tribal community.
Such constant fragmentation meant no group or community could ever make very much progress. Within the expanded Quintentium (from this point on, simply ‘the Quintentium’) progress and the discovery of reality depended on cooperation and communal endeavor. Communities of 130-150 were entirely incapable of making significant progress in this direction. Who knows how long this state of affairs went on for. In my opinion, the fact that we made it out of this situation is the most staggering fact of history.
Somehow, through unimaginable difficulty, the Human family started to put itself back together. Our ancestors found ways to unite their disparate tribes. By setting aside their superficial differences they began to establish a common story through which to move through the world; together. This source of unity was in a common belief that there was more to reality than what the Quintentium revealed to their senses. The common story which supported the reunification of Humanity was the story of Religion.
Religion was the only possible candidate for establishing sustainable unity across peoples. A recognition that the spiritual world exists is the only thing all people, despite culture, values or language can agree on. The specifics of what the spiritual world looks like are open to debate, but the fact that it exists is a Truth all people, everywhere, have acknowledged across time. All people have also agreed that it is of primary importance. How to engage and connect with it provides a universal question which all tribes sought to answer.