The Holy Invisible Egg

Image: - Artistic Representation Only

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'Gulliver's Travels,' (1726, amended 1735), by Jonathan Swift, is a satirical novel on human nature. The story loosely is about a middle class englishman, Gulliver, who goes on a sea voyage and is shipwrecked on the island of Lilliput. In Lilliput, there are basically two groups of people - high-heeled Tramecksan and low-heeled Slamecksan. The animosities between these parties run so high, that they will neither eat nor drink, nor talk with each other.

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There exists a further rift between the ruling Little-Endians and the persecuted Big-Endians, who interpret in different ways the sacred text: "That all true believers shall break their eggs at the convenient end."

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So what does this story of Lilliput and its inhabitants have to do with current world events? As an atheist, who doesn’t have a religious dog in the fight, watching the confrontation between christianity and islam is like watching the Little-Endians and the Big-Endians (from 'Gulliver’s Travels'), arguing and going to war over from which end they should open an "invisible egg." The Little-Endians have non-negotiable faith that the only way that the "invisible egg" can be opened is by opening it at the pointy end and the Big-Endians have an equal amount of non-negotiable faith that the "invisible egg" can only be opened at the non-pointy end.

Each group's indominable and non-negotiable faith encourages their adherents to believe that no matter what happens, that their fight is a just and noble battle against evil. And that the other side must be inherently evil, or at the least, very rude and uncivilized for suggesting otherwise. This "faith mentality" is what allows each side to continue behaviours which are potentially damaging, harmful, or at least non-productive, to anyone else who doesn’t share their non-negotiable faith.

Meanwhile, the skeptics, atheists, agnostics and assorted other non-believers, are sitting around scratching their heads and saying - "Excuse me, but what makes you so convinced that there is an invisible egg in the first place.?"

The Beatles - "I Am The Walrus"

"The time has come," the Walrus said, "To talk of many things: Of shoes and ships and sealing wax; Of cabbages and kings. And why the sea is boiling hot; And whether pigs have wings." - Lewis Carroll

jonathan+swift , gulliver's+travels , satire , islam , christianity , atheist , agnostic , lilliput , egg , faith

This is a video of Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert arguing which religion is better Islam or Christianity.