Gospel & Universe 🪐 Preface

Rivers of Change

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Heraclitus - Rivers in Time

Heraclitus

In general, one can define agnosticism as doubt which operates between theistic belief and atheistic disbelief. It might also be seen as the philosophical equivalent of Heraclitus’ river of constant change. On this page I’ll use Heraclitus’ river to get at the distinction between hard and open agnosticism, and to get at the way both types flow together into the unknown.

A simple definition of agnosticism is difficult, for two reasons. The main reason is that the topic is immensely complex. In time and place, agnosticism ranges from the mythic texts of Ancient Mesopotamia to the existentialist writings of 20th century France. It’s also hard to define agnosticism because there isn’t one single form or type. Each person will come up with their own version, although it’s also possible to say that there are two basic types, which I refer to as 1) HARD and 2) OPEN.

1) HARD, closed, or exclusive agnosticism features a strong or fixed belief in doubt. As reflected in the first chart below, the lines drawn by hard agnostics are clear and somewhat divisive. As a result, hard agnostics are likely to reject mysticism & stoicism, and to argue strongly against fundamentalism & positivism.

Compare this with the chart I presented on the previous page, which uses the same categories yet shows the perspective of the open agnostic:

2) Soft, OPEN, or inclusive agnosticism features a larger sense of doubt, one which includes self-doubt. It also connects with and looks into perspectives that differ from it, with the assumption that we can’t truly explore another perspective if we’re totally convinced of our own. In this sense, doubt is the thing which allows us to open up and fully consider if a different perspective might be worth a deeper exploration, even a commitment.

Generally, when I refer to agnosticism I mean the OPEN type — that is, a doubt which questions theism and atheism yet which also questions the primacy of doubt. This type of agnosticism allows for in-depth exploration of philosophical alternatives, although both hard and open types end up rejecting these alternatives. The rejection of the open agnostic is more temporary and qualified, however.

I should also note that I don’t tend to use the paired terms hard/soft and closed/open because soft can imply weak, and closed can imply rigid. Because I see both types as positive, I use hard/open instead (I mean hard in a positive sense, as in hard science). The terms exclusive and inclusive are meant as descriptive rather than evaluative. Exclusive can be seen as negative or positive (as in exclusive club) yet I use it as a descriptive, as in exclusive offer, exclusive focus, or exclusive category. This binary does however favour the inclusive type when I argue for equality and democratization (which I see as necessary for freedom of thought and freedom of choice).

In terms of Heraclitus’ river of constant change hard agnostics focus on its overall shape and its basic element (H2O). For them, the function of the river remains constant, and the watery contents of the river change in a constant way from one moment to the next. Heraclitus is supposed to have said, On those who step into the same rivers, different and different waters flow.

Open agnostics also use this river symbolism extensively, yet they see the river of constant change as a restricted or tentative truth. They note that rivers come from brooks and streams, and then flow into lakes and oceans. They can overwhelm their banks or change their course, or they can dry up and disappear. Those who step into the same river two months later may find that there’s no river to step into. They might amend Heraclitus’ statement to: On those who step into rivers, different and different waters flow, yet the rivers themselves may also change their course or sink into the earth.

Space may seem a fixed or solid thing, yet time proves it to be otherwise.

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Rivers in Time

From a longer perspective, we humans have existed for a mere million years. Only in the last six thousand of these have we accomplished the complex patterns of organization that we call civilization.

For the first three of these, the Tigris and Euphrates were the most influential rivers of civilization, flowing down from the northern hills to the Persian Gulf, carrying with it basic things like numbers, letters, and laws, which the Mesopotamians pressed in cuneiform script into clay tablets.

For the next two thousand years the great rivers of complex civilization flowed into the East China Sea, the Indian Ocean, & the Mediterranean.

In the Far East it was the Yellow and the Yangtze rivers, flowing down from the western mountains to the Pacific Ocean along with their inventions & bureaucracies, their silk-robed philosophers and drunk poets looking upward to the Milky Way, which the Chinese called The River of Heaven.

In India it was the Ganges and the Saraswati. For Hindus, the god Shiva caught the raging river of the Milky Way and set it safely on Earth as the Ganges River. As the goddess Ganga, the river flows through Shiva’s beard to the Bay of Bengal, bringing with it the melted snow that once fell from the sky, and once sat in ice-packs at the top of the world. This frozen water once rose from the misty sea, which was once the destination of mighty rivers.

The Saraswati was once the haunt of the Vedic poets, and has long since dried up. According to Hindus, the Saraswati now flows underground toward Prayagraj (a.k.a. Allahabad) into a triumvirate meeting with the Ganges and Yamuna. Fifty million people gather along the riverbanks for the festival of the Kumbh Mela.

Heraclitus may use the river as a symbol of constant change, but the river changes its symbolism over time and across space.

The Tiber, Yellow, and Ganges represent different things — and these differences multiply when one adds other rivers, such as the Jordan, Acheron, Mekong and Amazon. For instance, the symbolism of the Jordan flows into the symbolism of the Greek Acheron and the Roman Tiber, creating in time symbols of the Judaeo-Christian world.

Meteorologically and hydrologically, rivers may operate according to the same principles, yet the civilizations that develop on their banks see rivers differently. The more complex the civilization, the more complex the differences.

It used to be very difficult to change a river, and yet this ability allowed the Mesopotamians and Egyptians to expand agriculture and build cities that could be sustained by it. Jean Bottéro cites an early text, Enki and Ninhursag, in which Enki, the god of sweet water, brings nourishment to the southern Sumerian desert:

The myth wants to explain how Tilmun changed from a type of desert into a region that was, if not civilized, at least economically productive and capable of feeding "the land," i.e. Sumer. The transformation was due to Enki, who came to settle there with his wife for that very purpose. His first act was to introduce, instead of the Bitter Water of the riverline marshes, Sweet Water (drawn) from the soil by digging wells. Soon the land was covered with cultivated and useful grains. (Mesopotamia: Writing, Reasoning, and the Gods)

Mesopotamians naturally see their rivers, and also see the very idea of a river or the source of sweet water, according to their own geography, history, and myth. The way they see their rivers would make those rivers seem strange to faraway peoples, even the ones who also developed great civilizations along the banks of their rivers.

For instance, the Mesopotamians saw death in terms of a boat sinking in the Euphrates, and they saw (like the early Jews and Greeks) the afterlife as a grim, vague subterranean existence. They also write about Dilmun, a place of “long waterways, rivers and canals, whereby water will flow to quench the thirst of all beings and bring abundance to all that lives.” In the epic Gilgamesh the hero is guided by Urshanabi the ferryman to a mythologized Dilmun, where he finds the only man who survived the Flood (Utnapishtim, later Noah). Gilgamesh also finds out that the afterlife is for the gods (and Utnapishtim), but not for humans. Later, the Greeks, the Romans, and the Italians also see death as a journey across a river. Yet they don’t sink into the river. Instead, they continue to the other side, with Charon as their ferryman. Also, the afterlife becomes a place where everyone can go, like the Egyptian version of the afterlife. In Dante, the afterlife is as large as an underground inferno, a mountain, and the sky.

The relations between rivers and cultures has continued to change over the last six thousand years. Just recently, the Chinese have blocked the massive power of the Yangtze at the Three Gorges, a feat impossible to imagine when Chinese culture was developing along its banks.

Dusk on the Yangtze River

The river was once a bathing place, a god, a place to find fish, and a route to somewhere downstream. In time, the same river, which Heraclitus tells us never changes, becomes a goddess flowing through the hair of a god, a haunt of the Muses, a baptismal font, a convergence of deities, a watery passage between this life and the next, and an energy source of 111 terrawatt hours.

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