To Be A God

It is about five in the morning and you’re sitting at your table staring out the window at the barely illuminated tree tops. As you sit there, cup of coffee in hand, a quote comes to your mind, and as it is your nature, you ponder over it.

Oscar Wilde said, ‘the mere basis of religion is fear’. Is that true, you think? Was religion merely an illuminated and glorified law keeping propaganda? Maybe it was developed just to keep humans in check. For we are but a race of cowards; man after man praying to an unknown God in fear of Judgement Day.

You think about Rabe’a al-Adiwiyah, seen running through the streets of her hometown with a torch in one hand and bucket of water in another. Her simple motive, to burn down the gates of hell and put out the fire so people don’t love God for the fear of hell. But was fear really as bad as we made it out to be? Do we not do everything out of fear? Fear of disapproval, of society, of public humiliation? Why is fear of God so different then? Why is it so heinous an act that we pretend to love God not fear Him? In doing so aren’t we just afraid of public disapproval again?

Maybe our whole moral compass is ruled by fear; maybe society as we know it won’t exist without this ambiguous fright we have. But once again, who says that’s such a bad thing? Maybe the only way to be true to our nature is to let go of all our fear and watch the world burn around us. Maybe it needs burning. Maybe once burnt we would find a purer world nestled in the glowing ambers of deceit.

You grin as you drain the last of your coffee. You don’t know the answer to any of these questions; no one does. Maybe you were just thinking about it to put off doing your homework. Yet you feel invincible. Indestructible. Undefeatable. Infinite. Maybe this is what it felt like to be a God?

Signing off with 143 days and 143 sonnets left.

-Pretentiously, yours.