Eden

[Verse 1]

Let me tell you a story as old as time: the story of Adam and Eve

It starts with a god who wanted more

God had just created the heavens and the earth

He had the angels by his side, but they had no will of their own

And so the autonomy to love or reject him was never theirs

All but for one: the one was called Bringer of Light: Lucifer Morningstar

Lucifer was the fairest and most intelligent of all the angels

He was the closest thing to God's image, and in his likeliness, Lucifer felt restless

He began to question and doubt God; He doubted the hierarchy opposed upon him

He felt God was arrogant

In his frustration, Lucifer built a throne that stood even above God - and declared mutiny

A war ensued; God being all powerful, came out the victor, and banished Lucifer from the heavens, and exiled him to Earth

Once again, God was alone with his power

Perhaps from loneliness, perhaps from curiosity, perhaps from a desire to share love;

God began to work on his greatest project yet: a being that would mirror himself: the human,

Two humans specifically: Adam and Eve

They were placed on a paradise built for them on Earth: the Garden of Eden

In the garden, God placed a tree that bared fruit that would grant anyone who ate it powers bestowed only to a god;

To tell good from evil, left from right, to live righteously, or to sin

He named this the Tree of Knowledge

God told Adam and Eve they could eat whatever they wanted in the garden, but never the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, and if they disobeyed him, it would be punishable by death

The basic way the story of Eden is told is that Eve was tempted by Lucifer in the form of a serpent to eat a fruit from the Tree of Knowledge

Convinced, she bit the fruit, and she passed it to Adam, and he did the same

Suddenly, ultimate knowledge filled their minds, and they realised they were naked, and felt shame

God discovered this betrayal and felt angered, he exiled Adam and Eve, and cursed them with the life of a mortal;

They would work, they would bare children, and they would die: the fate of a human

Now look deeper

[Verse 2] (Ren, Eve, Both)

And the story of the serpent tempted me, by telling me I would gain ultimate knowledge, and that god would spare me

Both were true

This wasn't some great deception, meaning that Satan, and the likeliness of God, perhaps understood his intentions

In fact, the only lie uttered in the Garden of Eden was by God, who did not end up condemning Adam and Eve to death

This could be seen as an act of mercy, but the sheer fact that the tree existed, and that humans were initially cut off from this knowledge may imply some part of God was afraid

That if humans were granted the gift of perception, they, like Lucifer, would have the power to reject him too

[Verse 3] (Voices are yet to be annotated)

The fact that there stood a beautiful tree, that could grant this knowledge in the first place, implies that a small part of God, supposedly all-knowing, perhaps wanted and intended the humans to bite too

In the bible, Satan was an exiled angel of free will

Humans are exiled descendants of Adam and Eve also with free will

Not only do we share the similar fate to the devil, we were also both constructed in the image of our creator;

Meaning our behaviours, in some shape or form, imperfectly echo his

We could assume that this kind of god had his doubts as the most powerful being in the universe;

He has no one above him to turn to with questions, and no one to doubt but himself - an incredibly lonely and isolated existence

We must only assume that the common thread between God, Lucifer, and us is the desire for more: an eternal curiosity

A desire perhaps birthed from a seed of loneliness: if not, why would we exist in the first place?

[Verse 4]

The constantly looping bittersweet irony is whether gifted by some omnipotent god, or simply a by-product of billions of years of evolution

Here we stand, in 2023, as creatures with free will;

The only creatures that understand and define good from bad

Creatures with the potential of a god

And what do we do with that free will, my friends?

We willingly walk to the edge of a cliff

In the name of progress, we jump off the precipice

The empires we build ravage the earth

The natural order of things are necessary to survive: any systems which do not honor homeostasis eventually perish

Our free will overrides our own biological instinct

We can take more than we eat, we can kill more than we need, we can willingly create weapons with the potential to burn everything we built to the ground

We willingly decide to bow to the altar of greed, the most insidious and destructive of all sins

We put our faith in corporations who pose as rulers

We willingly allow ourselves be overruled by outdated power systems, ran by corrupted politicians and bloated dictators, who claim domain and dominion over an open and free land

We willingly elect the corrupted when the decision was always asked to build something better

We willingly create an opposed apparation because of ideas we are force-fed through our phones and television sets

We always have the will to reject these things, but we adhere to them, as if they were the laws of physics

[Verse 5]

War, famine, pestilence, greed

These aren't things imposed upon us by an all-powerful god, or by his demonic adversary: they are here because of us

Not because of free will, but because of our inability to use it

We must be motivated to be better, not out of fear of an eternal damnation, but because the choice exists: because we love ourselves

Because we have the power to absolve ourselves of so much unnecessary suffering

Take a second to be in this very moment

In this moment, how much suffering is happening all over the planet, right now?

How many people are dying of illnesses that could've easily been cured, but aren't because of the selfishness and greediness of humanity?

How many people break their backs and reject their own passions to simply afford bills and food?

How many of us crave distraction from existence?

How many of us numb that pain in whatever way necessary?

How many children are being abused?

How many people sleep cold and hungry on the streets?

How many people become cogs inside a machine that's destroying itself?

How many soldiers have been forced to fight in meaningless wars?

How many humans have killed for ideals they don't believe in or understand?

How many people have died to the greed of another man?

And how much of this was avoidable?

[Verse 6]

As written in the Bible, "Satan was not condemned to hell, Satan was condemned to Earth

He lives there, amongst other creatures with free will, who always have the choice, and still chose their own undoing"

Ladies and gentlemen, this is our self-made hell

The bittersweet irony is this is a creation of our own design

I'll leave you with this:

Consider what you have done here today

You have worked together, as individuals, collaborating to form a giant neural network

A hivemind, capable of achieving incredible things

We have lent on each other's strengths to solve puzzles, and decipher riddles, and we've done so to win money

Imagine applying that same spirit and determination to creating the closest thing we have to paradise, here on Earth

By using the power of collaboration we can work together to even the playing field for everybody

Our dystopias can become utopias, our [?] can become [?], our hells can become heaven, right here on Earth

And this sentiment applies to atheists, agnostics and believers alike

Myself, I'm an agnostic who believes

I believe in us

We must do better, because we can choose to

We must be better, simply because the option exists

Thank you