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Like the previous biblical stories we looked into, Noah's Ark is an illustration about human's difference from animals, the wise' difference from the fools.
Adam and Eve tackled the idea of shame(lust and gluttony) and self reflection; Cane and Abel explored jealousy (envy and wrath) and forgiveness; and now, Noah's Ark, which plays with the ideas of foresight and perseverance and despair(sloth).
[Soon to come is Tower of Babel, on greed and pride]
Noah's experience with the flood is very similar to experiences we would deal several times in our lifetime. Many times, we will be told of the correct advice to avoid failures, but will be tempted to go against it. People around us will think of us as fools for being overprepared, over-disciplined. But in reality, these people are just making excuses to justify their vices - to keep doing what is fun and expedient.
The effort in building the ark symbolizes many things. It could be efforts for our body with regards to health, it could be our efforts for studies towards a career, efforts for relationship with a partner, etc. It's grand scale is to metaphorically show how hard it will be. It took him more time to build it, than the flood itself. (Some sources say 20-40yrs as per the book of Genesis). Just like Edison once quoted "Success is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration."
And then, time will inevitably try to test our perseverance. Even if we know in ourselves that we did the right thing, we will have doubts. As to what Noah felt in his 150 days, with no signs of hope. It will feel the same to efforts we did to whatever cause. Oftentimes people lose hope.
Loss of hope will make us fall into despair. The dark feeling of "there was never a hope." We start to believe that the right decision was wrong to begin with, and sadly, the vision of success will not be seen real, more like an illusion. We just take our suffering, and just blame things that are out of our control. This state will snowball us into further failures and further despair.
Noah fought through this and persevered. And that is exactly what we should. It is better to constantly remind ourselves on why we exerted the effort to begin with. And regardless of the result, the fact that we struggled to the best of our abilities, maybe, just that fact is what will save our humanity. Even in failure and in death, never lose hope.
The story is truly an allegory of the human condition, than it is a story of some guy who believed in God and was saved. The story of how fools think "you only live once" (so do what you can?), and the wise thinks "you live everyday (to see through the challenges), and only die once."
Adam and Eve tackled the idea of shame(lust and gluttony) and self reflection; Cane and Abel explored jealousy (envy and wrath) and forgiveness; and now, Noah's Ark, which plays with the ideas of foresight and perseverance and despair(sloth).
[Soon to come is Tower of Babel, on greed and pride]
Trivia: in the original Mesopotamian myth about the flood, god punished people simply for being noisy and loud. This was probably adopted but edited to better cover the sin of sloth performed by the people who was killed in the flood.
Noah's experience with the flood is very similar to experiences we would deal several times in our lifetime. Many times, we will be told of the correct advice to avoid failures, but will be tempted to go against it. People around us will think of us as fools for being overprepared, over-disciplined. But in reality, these people are just making excuses to justify their vices - to keep doing what is fun and expedient.
The effort in building the ark symbolizes many things. It could be efforts for our body with regards to health, it could be our efforts for studies towards a career, efforts for relationship with a partner, etc. It's grand scale is to metaphorically show how hard it will be. It took him more time to build it, than the flood itself. (Some sources say 20-40yrs as per the book of Genesis). Just like Edison once quoted "Success is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration."
And then, time will inevitably try to test our perseverance. Even if we know in ourselves that we did the right thing, we will have doubts. As to what Noah felt in his 150 days, with no signs of hope. It will feel the same to efforts we did to whatever cause. Oftentimes people lose hope.
Loss of hope will make us fall into despair. The dark feeling of "there was never a hope." We start to believe that the right decision was wrong to begin with, and sadly, the vision of success will not be seen real, more like an illusion. We just take our suffering, and just blame things that are out of our control. This state will snowball us into further failures and further despair.
Noah fought through this and persevered. And that is exactly what we should. It is better to constantly remind ourselves on why we exerted the effort to begin with. And regardless of the result, the fact that we struggled to the best of our abilities, maybe, just that fact is what will save our humanity. Even in failure and in death, never lose hope.
The story is truly an allegory of the human condition, than it is a story of some guy who believed in God and was saved. The story of how fools think "you only live once" (so do what you can?), and the wise thinks "you live everyday (to see through the challenges), and only die once."
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