Only Fools ...

To be read as a monologue by a jester or other comedic foil in some manner of play or novel or other narrative pursuit. Simply the ramblings of one whose sole joy comes in considering the magnitude of the silliness of others. Written by me as a way to process some thoughts without thinking too heavily on the implications.

Only fools dream of heaven and hell.

Or at the least, only fools dream of hell, as some measure of sense could be made of a case for heaven. Take as you like the world we have before us in all its splendour with all its sundry creatures and objects and such. Well such wonder being present simply by some cosmic accident is as foolhardy as a belief in faeries and enchanted forests and the like, so we imagine some manner of creative entity. Being personal folks ourselves and being so inclined to find personality in the various and myriad wilds around us, we are likewise given to imagine that creative entity somehow being personal itself, even if by observation we find that plenty of creation might happen without personality as such, no matter how unlikely. Of course then, we press some manner of empathy on such a creative personality, the like of which we find in ourselves, we being the presumed pinnacle of that creative’s pursuits, and by that same manner presume some measure of care and keeping-like on the part of that creative. Thus by the existence of the creative entity, being personal and such, and bearing to some extent some responsibility of care and keeping by way of an empathy we imagine, there is a notion that some heavenly hereafter might possibly exist as a source of permanency to those notions!

But why then, would a heaven necessarily imply a hell?

For certain, we see that there are those less inclined to the common good, the positive with which many seem to assume we should proceed in this mortal existence. And we, being the imperfect lot we are, tend to drive toward a model in which crime implies some measure of punishment. Those things, certain, are reasonable observances based on our present reality. And if as we presumed before there is some creative, who like us bears some manner of empathy and the like, then we might further presume some punishing force for those who, being imperfect as we have assured, fall short of the creative’s standard.

But why then would that punishing force necessarily be a hell?

Would not it follow that the punitive cost of imperfection be in true opposition to the plentiful reward of its own opposition? Being that if a heaven exists, whereby one is to live forever in the presence of that creative force, and that if the reward for eschewing imperfection to one’s best effect and effort should be a near-eternal existence, regardless of the form, then would it not follow that the perfect penalty for such perfect imperfection might actually be something much less heinous than a hollow existence wherein one is punished in the same manner by which we, as imperfect beings we are, punish our own? Would it not follow that the proper opposition to living in perpetuity might be dissipation, dissolution, dispersion, and otherwise de-materialisation in like kind of perpetuity? That is to say, death?

I see a kind of hope in it, really.

Not in the notion of a eternal evanescence, no, but in the notion that one might be properly tortured interminably and that in receiving said sentence might one day in a long and far flung future be freed from torment to engage with the life long-lived of those less imperfect than themselves. Where a true death might be a true end, an immutable termination, a final imprisonment might be simply a stepping stone to sobriety and rehabilitation-like. That such a hell could bring about the same reward eternal as awarded to others. It’s somewhat of a pipe dream, as such.

But if we strip that away, that hope, and look at it the way it’s sold, it feels different.

Those who believe in the hell, believe it everlasting and unending pain. `Such is as it should be’ they reason `for not being righteous’ which is their word for being less imperfect `enough to be saved from that fate’. But is not oblivion a greater risk than is a reckoning as the like of that whereby one is immortal but persistently suffering? Again, there is a sense of rehabilitation in that space, and it reeks of a fear of nothingness.

And when we strip away that rot, does that not harm the view of heaven as well?

For if you believe a hell is a fair burden for a life unwell-led, then mayhap the reward of heaven is a fair joy for a life well-led in contrast. But if hell is simply an escape from oblivion, then there is a deeper fear at its heart that might call into question the gain of heaven and the motivation by which such a notion even emerges.

Why, suppose, must the world exist except by some cosmic accident?

That question, and its answer, tend to fuel all of this at its very heart. But consider, if we ignore the question and focus on the result, that being heaven and or possibly hell if such things make any measure of sense in any manner or in any case. Why would a creative entity capable of the full of creation, the stars, the trees, the people, the birds, the fishes, and even the tiniest of specks, why would such a creative entity ever take notice of the insignificant specks that are we, the people of this one lone world in a distant far flung system? It beggars belief to assume that something far more immense to us than we are to the ants might even take notice of all of us, let alone the actions of even one? Because what is the impact, on the whole, of our actions on this tiny little rock when compared with vastness of it all? And thus why would it matter?

And so we are a step back and asking again, why must there not have been a cosmic accident? Why must there be some creative entity, and thereby some heaven and potentially some hell. The whole thing unravels, don’t you think, when you approach it from that end? And in unravelling returns us to our origin, the very start of this all.

It takes a great fool to dream of hell, and a coward to dream of heaven and the personality behind it.

But who am I to claim such things. Feel free to go on continuing in whatever silliness you seem to believe is the most likely. I shall take my leave and in time find who is right and who is.