THIS DAY ALL GODS DIE
This is the essay printed in our cd. It’s an explanation of the album’s title. We’re posting it here for those of you who don’t have the cd.
Despite the images which it immediately conjures, the title of this record is not meant as a hymn to atheist doctrine. Nor is it the product of satanic or pagan daydreams so often encountered these days. The “gods” we speak of are not found within the pages of holy scriptures or upon the highest altars (for in truth, the power of these gods has faded to a distant memory, paraded about once a week by the dwindling faithful). We speak of the beliefs and traditions which Mother Culture has both elevated to the highest plateaus and driven deepest into our hearts. We speak of the gods which they live by - those beliefs which they bow before and to which they swear their allegiance. The belief that man is the pinnacle of creation/evolution, inhabiting a niche above the chaos of his biological surroundings. The belief that it is the destiny of humanity to impose order upon the chaos of nature, elevating humankind above the mere concerns of biological survival. The belief that it is the destiny of humankind to conquer and rule the world. The belief that there exists one right way to live - that the things that have worked for thousands of cultures for millions of years suddenly became insufficient a few thousand years ago with the birth if our culture. The belief that our culture (born only in the most recent tenth of human history), more so than humankind, is the pinnacle of humanity’s evolution.
These gods do not bring joy, or peace, or comfort. In fact, these gods have brought us to the brink of destruction - have taught us a new taste of despair previously unknown to humanity. And yet these gods are not abandoned. In fact, they are held all the more tightly, as if they were afraid to discover that all the gifts of civilization and technology which their gods bestow are but despair and disease gilded in fool’s gold. In their quest for power they have blinded themselves to the terrible truth; that those to which they turn for salvation are capable of granting only anguish and suffering. In their desire to rule the world they have forgotten one crucial point; that the world (including humankind) was ruling itself for millions of years before the birth of our particular culture. And how, in the few thousand years of our culture’s existence, have we brought the world so near to destruction?
We have no easy solution, and we offer no life-changing doctrine. But our culture’s faith must be shattered. This day, all gods die. This is not a call to arms, or a cry for liberation. We don’t ask that you live your life for our cause - in anger, sadness, and misery. We only ask that you live in defiance of their gods. Live your life as an enemy to their beliefs. Perhaps you will find that life is happier not spent on your knees before gods which care nothing for the world. Live your life so that each day is spent making the world in which you exist, making the community of life to which you belong a happier, better place. Spit in the face of their gods. Make your life one in which others can see that there exists more than one right way to live. For with each life which turns it’s back on their beliefs, the gods which make up the foundation of their culture fade further into oblivion.
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