Who Has Not Eaten the Apple?

Did you ever consider it that way? I mean the title and subtitle above, that the story of Adam and Eve and the apple is about the will power; and is allegory for the entire human race. Think about that for a minute. It is not about just two people, but about all souls and what happened when they let their will power "slip" outside of the true, natural structured Order of the Universe (God's Will).

If you have read some of my other hubs, you would know that I tend to speak about the unity behind the diversity in life, in religions, in belief systems and the importance of the mystical aspects thereof. Every religion, every spiritual belief system, every philosophy is based on this concept of being outside the Order; of course, they don't call it "will power", some call it sin, evil, but it is the human ego that we are talking about.

I have pondered a lot about that, about why there is that human need to talk about this point in various ways. For instance, when one calls it sin or evil, I believe it is meant to be understood as something "outside one's self", something that is not the True Self, but something that the free will given True Self, was in that split second tricked into accepting or allowing, hence where immediately "serpent" slipped in. And that is a good perspective to take, for it is not meant to be self condemnation that creates a sense of unworthiness.

So, the next logical step of common sense is, why would the true self allow or accept such a thing? Obviously, the soul (True Self) was innocent and ignorant, immature with undeveloped individual will power enabling the soul to stay within the structured natural Order. By free will choice, yet in innocence and ignorance (and a little coercion by the "serpent"), the soul chose to step outside of that Unity with the Universe, and the "serpent" stepped in and got a foothold on control of individual "will power". And the rest is history.

Our individual will power is not completely our own, of our True Self, but a confusion of truth (of the natural order) and lie (outside the natural order). Here is where East met West, where the older understandings of the Natural Order (such as in the Tao as One, original Hinduism where gods were meant to mean manifestations of the One God and later Buddhism which is about the Self) met the newer religions of Abraham (as God the Father) through which the concept of God came about. Where the unity in our diversity IS.

The God concept as a personal God had to come about because of the natural order of healing for the soul/psyche; to help souls regain that sense of Unity with the Universe. Since souls were getting a bit lost in their attempt to realign with the Truth in the older philosophies, because the human ego had come to accept the joys and the suffering of the desires of human life, the sense of being human had to be dealt with at a more finite level of understanding, so the more personal Father God concept was a natural step to bring us full circle.

The full circle is defined as a soul that "ate the apple", chose by free will innocence and ignorance, (and coercion) to step outside of the natural Order to consciously understand the who and why of their place in the Unity of the Universe. And I am not saying it is sin and evil as means of condemnation; but the natural act of a soul seeking one's place in the Universal Scheme. It is allegory for what happened, not the eternal tale of condemnation as a worthless sinner.

None the less, those acts are our responsibility because we performed each act and many others as we have continued to try to perceive, or rather not conceive of the duality of it all !

The serpent, the not self, the will power that has been subverted, is a force, an energy coil of habit from repetition that has wound itself up tight in non-alignment against the natural order. We see what happens when the natural order continues on its path which naturally tends to try and unwind the coil, when there is violence and the many forms of inharmony that harms self and others, it is our free will choosing out of fear and doubt to try and maintain the misuses of will...it is habit and comfortable, what the afflicted soul knows and feels secure in.

The only answer is to accept our position in the Universal Order of Life/God's Will, by allowing and striving to understand in what ways our individual will is not in alignment with the Universe of Natural Order. We have to stop perpetuating the will of the ego that wants what it wants at the expense of one's own True Self and that of others.

That is what mysticism is all about, psychology is a step in that direction...to "see" what is our will and what is the Universal Will and what are repetitions that need to change to allow the coil to unwind. That "seeing" cannot be done without merging with the Universal Will Power, accepting the concepts of God through our own individual understanding, where religions, philosophies and even the sciences can be helpful at doing. Sometimes  looking into not only one or the other of these areas may be necessary, because all aspects of the human ego and the True Self are involved.

The force of energy that is "the evil serpent", "the devil", the "not self" can only survive by self perpetuation, and when joined with other selves perpetuating the actions of the will that are not in accordance with the Universal Will. The force of evil is a conglomerate of energy, made up of souls that once had a whole and true soul, that chose to use the power of their mind that is outside of the Universal Will, believing that mind was better than the God Mind working through them. This conglomerate cannot perpetuate its self without continued taking of the energy from other souls to be used in misuses of the Natural Order.

So, understanding that we can learn to connect with our own internal True Self that is One with God as the Universal Order, we can stop our human ego desires that perpetuate and feed the force of evil. Person by person, one act of will at a time, we all learn to starve that force of its energy by taking our energy of misuse of will out of the formula, allowing the Universal Will to "take control", then that coil of force eventually can not exist, evil will not exist.

As we see the populations of the world in turmoil, we see wills colliding. I choose to see this as proof of souls choosing by the power of their wills, choosing good over evil. Sometimes souls are at a point in their evolution where they believe that they have to use the power of their wills to rise up, and even die in their fight for a better life; to rise up to overcome the misused will of others in power. In the eyes of some, this choice may seem wrong; who's to judge? are we living their life? how would we know what or why they chose that way to go. I consider the United States, for instance, where would we be if the Founding Fathers and the population of that time had not chosen to take a stand against the king of England.

Contemplation, prayer, decree, devotion and meditation are also important to connect with that Universal Will to strengthen us and show us the difference between our human will and the Universal Will of God. That "knowing" is unique to each individual, but isn't it interesting how certain people can get together to accomplish a common goal.

The answer is easy, it is in the doing that is the challenge, for it can not be accomplished without our acceptance of the diverse concepts of God understood as desiring the same core things in life as being the Natural Order of Life.

No one religion or philosophy is right or wrong, but are there to be looked upon as a whole picture of the progressive revelation of God as the Universal Order. Each individual is unique, and needs to find the pieces to put together their whole puzzle of True Self, some need specific pieces on their path of life to get past the human ego foibles. We are here to help each other accomplish that, not hinder with judgments of saint and sinner or infidel.

We are spiritual beings having human experiences-Lao Tzu