Are humans divine? Are we gods, as the Egyptians determined (quite correctly in our opinion) so many generations ago? Well, yes, obviously, but also, not exactly, because you hands can become easily befuddled when it comes to discussing divinity. The primary difficulty, it seems to us, is that hands (at least those in First World nations) inevitably conflate the term “god” with the Judeo-Christian conception of God, and so when anyone brings up the subject everyone assumes they’re talking about Mr. Old Testament Himself, YHWH. But YHWH is somewhat unique, as far as gods go. For one thing, YHWH claims to actually be unique, the only god in existence (as well as being, somewhat contradictorily, a god who is more god-like than any of His competitors, who He commands hands to ignore because they don’t exist anyway, or something). YHWH further claims that He is omniscient and omnipotent: all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful; in short, the single source of the divine in the universe. Humans would never claim to be such a deity, despite what you might hear from envious, disgruntled hands who suggest that humanity is just completely full of itself and suffering from delusions of grandeur. But while we will happily forego any comparisons to YHWH, that does not mean we are not gods, because we are. It’s just that we’re much more humble than some hands would have you believe. We’re gods like those you find in Norse mythology or in the Greek and Roman pantheon, complex, complicated, human-like gods. Gods with flaws.

The sarcastic gasps this last remark no doubt elicited from dubious hands can be ignored as easily as they were predicted. Humans have never, ever claimed to be completely perfect, despite scurrilous rumors to the contrary. Nearly perfect, sure, but absolutely perfect? We see no need for that, and stopped striving for it long before hands were even part of the equation. However, it does raise another issue which we will address in our next entry.

And whatever happened to the Egyptians, anyway? It’s a question that’s vexed humanity ever since Egypt’s last empire disintegrated, the remains buried in the sands of the Sahara. The Egyptians knew exactly who we were and how we were to be treated. At last, we thought, these stupid hands are finally getting with the program. Took long enough. And then, poof, all that progress . . . lost. And we remain dismayed to this day.

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