Star Trek’s “Who Mourns for Adonais?”
"Mankind has no need for gods. We find the
One quite adequate.”
--
Kirk, "Who Mourns for Adonais?" star date 3468.1.
In Greek mythology Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto, and the twin
brother of Artemis. In “Who Mourns for
Adonais?” the Enterprise is suspended above a planet by an energy field
resembling “a human appendage”, the hand of Apollo. Apollo invites, though it sounds more like a
command, the bridge crew to come down to the surface for a joyful celebration
of their return home. He offers rest and
happiness and requires only their worship in exchange. In time he requires that the entire crew beam
down with the exception of Mr. Spock. “But do not bring that one, the one with the pointed ears. He is much
like Pan and Pan always bored me”. After
which he will simply destroy the ship by crushing it with his hand. Thanks, but no thanks is the general
consensus of the landing party. In the
ensuing dialogue between Carolyn and Apollo, she is able to learn the fate of
the gods, a foreshadowing of Apollo’s eventual fate. “What happened to the others? Artemis,
Hera? They returned to the cosmos on the
wings of the wind. You mean they
died? No, not as you understand it….
Your fathers changed. They turned away until we were only memories. A god
cannot survive as a memory”.
E pluribus unum
is the Latin phrase applied to the seal of the United States meaning, “Out of many one”,
which was added to indicate, that of the various nations represented by the many
people which comprise the United States, you nevertheless have one
nation of people. In the study of
religion, monotheism is, by some, considered to be a rather recent practice. Studies of ancient religions suggest,
according to some, that many of the most ancient religions were polytheistic. I would argue that the opposite is true, that
while several ancient religions were polytheistic, monotheism was the prevailing
belief from the beginning.
The typical evolutionary development of
religion held among a vast number of academic scholars commences with an
impersonal force referred to as Mana. One characteristic of this “force” is that it possesses
an uneven distribution throughout all flora and fauna. Not unlike the midi-chlorians
referred to in Star Wars, but I digress.
The second step in the evolutionary development
of religion is believed to be Animism. This religious belief is centered around a belief in natural and
ancestral spirits. Natural spirits reside
in animals, plants, rivers, fields etcetera. Destruction of any of these can result in the
destruction of the spirit which resides in them. Ancestral spirits are finite, their
respective powers are limited, for example, they are not omniscient.
The third is Polytheism. The Greeks, among other nations, were considered
polytheistic. It is believed that polytheism
sprang from animism on one of three ways.
First, that an ancestral spirit was elevated to the level of divine status. Second, that a natural spirit was elevated to
the level of divine status, or that third, some abstract principle was elevated
to the level of divine status.[1]
Henotheism
has been considered the fourth evolutionary development in religion. In this stage exists a multiplicity of gods,
yet only one is worshipped. As to which
was worshipped, that was dependent on the person, someone could just pick one
of a variety of gods to worship.
Finally, Monotheism was considered
the final step in the evolutionary development of religion. However, the biggest problem with the
evolutionary model of religion is that the kind of development it describes has
never been observed.[2] The evolutionary development of religion held
by so many academics actually runs contrary to the way evolution supposedly
works, from the simple to the more complex, as such, its development should move
from monotheism to mana, not the other way around as is believed. So, it is not “out of the many one”, but “out
of the one, many”.
All that being said, Cultural
Anthropologist E.B. Tyler believed that the most widely held theory was not
actually that religion began with mana but that it started with animism.[3] However, one of his students, Andrew Lang, when
surveying the many anthropological reports about local cultures, specifically
those coming out of Australia, he realized that while many tribes lived on an
animistic level, there were some who held a belief in a single god, which could
not have evolved out of animism.[4] Nevertheless, he was unable to show that
monotheism was the starting point of religion, enter Linguist Wilhelm
Schmidt.
Professor emeritus of philosophy and
religion Winfried Corduan has cited the aforementioned Wilhelm Schmidt on his
work in original monotheism. Schmidt’s
work on original monotheism was accomplished via a method known by scholars as cultural
history, the purpose of which was to identify a chronological sequence among
prehistorical cultures.[5] He
employed two examples in this effort, the first involved the telling of a
simplified story with four variants and the major elements of each. The variant which includes all the major
elements would be considered the original. The study works this way:
A The farmer went
to town to sell his pigs.
B The farmer went
to town to sell his cows.
C The farmer went
to market to sell his cows.
D The rancher went
to town to sell his cows.
The main elements
of A include farmer, town, pigs.
The main elements
of B include farmer, town, cows.
The main elements
of C include farmer, market, cows.
The main elements
of D include rancher, town, cows.
So, A, B, and C has the “farmer” as the
main character. A, B, and D have the “town”
as the primary location. B, C, and D
have “cows” as the merchandise sold. But
only B contains all of those elements, therefore, B would be the original.
The second example Schmidt employs is one of migration. Here the example involves two tribes, tribe A and tribe B, one of which would have entered a particular region prior to the other.
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All
things being equal, it seems pretty clear that the people of tribe A came later
into this territory than those of B, and that A brought cultural innovations
that B is lacking. Most probably, then, B is therefore, the older
culture.... These cultures were, in fact, not only the materially least
developed cultures but also precisely the ones that fell in line with the
originally monotheistic cultures, as stipulated already by Lang....
Schmidt was able to demonstrate that as cultures improved their material
standing, they also moved away from this original monotheism but were likely to
show a vestige of the monotheism that they had once held before they departed
into one of the supposedly earlier stages according to the evolutionary
theory... among all of these traditional cultures, it was the most ancient
(that is, materially least developed) cultures that featured exclusive worship
of God and almost no magic.... Thus, Schmidt concluded that there is
solid evidence for an original monotheism.... Consequently, we can
conclude that there is good anthropological reason to believe in the thesis of
original monotheism.[6]
Furthermore, the apostle Paul pointed out
that, “his (God’s) eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly
perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been
made”. (Romans 1:20) So, natural revelation, also referred to as general
revelation, indicates in some sense at least, that God exists. This type of revelation is considered
“general” in the sense that it is visible to all. Natural theology reveals to us what can be
known about God from the natural world, namely, “his eternal power and divine
nature”. Also, man’s conscience is
witness to his own knowledge of God’s existence. “For when the gentiles, who do not have the
law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even
though they do not have the law. They
show that the work of the law is written in their hearts, while their conscience
also bears witness…” (Rom. 2:14-15, italics mine). Which begs the question, has the God who
prepared the gospel for all peoples, also prepared all peoples for the gospel?[7]
When I was completing my degree, my final
course was in World Religions. Throughout
the course I began to recognize that certain beliefs in certain cultures showed
evidence where inroads for the gospel may be possible. I shared this observation with my professor,
and he suggested I read missionary Don Richardson’s book, Eternity In Their
Hearts. In the book Richardson cites
numerous accounts of original monotheism that appear in various cultures around
the world. Everything from the Incas of
South America to the Santal people of India, and the Karen tribe of Burma et
al.
One of the accounts in Richardson’s book cites
the Athenians of Greece during the 6th century B.C. when a
devastating plague had struck the city. The
cultural-religious practice of both the city and of the country was
polytheistic, yet any appeal to the gods seemed to go unanswered. A councilman speaking on behalf of the
priestess was advised to set sail for the island of Crete and fetch a man there
by the name of Epimenides and bring him to Athens, he would know what had to be
done to appease whatever god the Athenians had angered. When he arrived, he instructed the Athenians to
gather sheep and stone masons and early in the morning bring the sheep out to
pasture to graze, those sheep who do not graze but lie down, build alters on
which those sheep should be sacrificed. When
Epimenides was asked which god’s name should be inscribed on the alters
Epimenides replied, “the deity whose help we seek has been pleased to respond
to our admission of ignorance. If we now
pretend to be knowledgeable by engraving a name when we have not the slightest idea
what His name may be, I fear we shall only offend Him!”[8] As such, he simply instructed them to apply
the phrase agnosto theo, “unknown god” to each alter. Within a week, the effects of the plague were
abated. Much praise was offered up to
the “unknown god” who had saved them. Over the passage of time however, the incident was forgotten and the
alters fell into disrepair. Years later one
of the alters was restored, it was the alter that the apostle Paul had
discovered on his arrival to the city, “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every
way you are very religious. For as I
passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar
with this inscription: ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as
unknown, this I proclaim to you”. (Acts 17:22b-23). This afforded Paul the opportunity to present
the gospel to the Athenians.
So, when Kirk makes the assertion, “We
find the One quite adequate”, that observation appears to be substantiated
historically and culturally. Certainly,
the Athenians discovered “the One quite adequate”, though that did not dissuade
them from continuing to practice polytheism. Nevertheless, they have the law written in
their hearts, their conscience bearing witness to the fact. Not only that He exists, but also, as I have
shown, monotheism was the prevailing belief from the beginning. Not polytheism, animism, henotheism nor any
other type of religious ideology.
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[1] Winfried Corduan.
Neighbouring Faiths: A Christian Introduction to World Religions. (InterVarsity
Press, Downers Grove, IL. Second Edition, 2012) p.36.
[2] Ibid. p.38.
[3] Ibid. p.42
[4] Ibid
[5] Ibid
[6] Ibid. pp.43-5.
[7] Don Richardson, Eternity
In Their Hearts. (Bethany House Publishers, Minneapolis, MN. 2014 Edition)
p.30.
[8] Ibid. p.14.
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