I learned something old today. I did not know “Homo Sapiens” meant “wise human.” Marrian-Webster gave the etymology as “New Latin, species name, from Homo, genus name + sapiens, specific epithet, from Latin, wise, intelligent.”
In a News Week article by Lonnie Aarssen*, he said: “I propose that at some point we became what we are today: Homo absurdus, a human that spends its whole life trying to convince itself that its existence is not absurd.”
Life is absurd because we each are brought into existence and then, at some point, cease to exist; we are no more. It is absurd to think that there is nothing more to living than what we experience as we live. I looked up “absurd” and found these synonyms: preposterous · ridiculous · ludicrous · farcical · laughable · idiotic · stupid · foolish · silly · insane · harebrained · unreasonable · irrational · illogical, bizarre, and Incongruous. Yep, that sounds like how I have viewed my life in different periods.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines absurd as “the state or condition in which human beings exist in an irrational and meaningless universe and has no ultimate meaning.” Once again, I have reoccurring thoughts that my life is meaningless. It’s not a good feeling, not at all.
I think I have what Lonnie Aarssen calls “self-impermanence anxiety (SIA).” SIA is a fear that death will annihilate all I have done and all I have been. Eventually, it will be as though I have never existed at all.
Humans have developed two strategies to quiet this anxiety: “escape from self” and “extension of self.” Escape from self, as I understood him, is finding something to take my attention off my short life, sports (preferably a willing team), intoxicants, friends, anything that brings pleasure. Extension of self is self-inflation, to feel more significant than I am. This is where I envision a massive funeral, with a protracted procession with lots of people mourning. Another extension is the pursuit of fame and fortune. Still, another is family, leaving behind a bunch of little Freds. Also under this heading falls religion, any religion, including, but not limited to, Christianity.
Lonnie Aarssen’s understanding of human life is reasonable, right on the money. It makes logical sense in an emotionless, scientific way. It is tempting to consider this a better picture of life than any religion. However, he quoted a familiar Russian thinker and writer, Leo Tolstoy, and that got me thinking. Here’s the quote; “For a man to be able to live, he must either not see the infinite or have such an explanation of the meaning of life as will connect the finite with the infinite.”
For me, life’s meaning is the connection of the finite with the Infinite—not just infinite but Infinite, no, INFINITE. The Infinite, I believe, is that self-existing Being who has nothing finite. That’s God, the endless self-existing and self-revealing Creator and sustainer of all life forms and even those forms that have no life. He alone is my origin and my destination. He is my purpose and my process of fulfilling that purpose.
For me, to solve the problem of impermanence is to establish an identity in the permanent. Aarssen correctly said life without this connection is absurd. It is so because we have been excommunicated from the Garden of Eden, separated from our Creator. Every absurd juncture in my life has found resolution in the presence of the ever-present Creator.
Herein is the Good News, the Gospel. My Creator has offered me a way to reestablish an eternal connection with Him—living a life of intimacy with Him as He had created it. The absurdity of living in time alone is vanquished. Significance is permanently established. My life is significant because my Creator says so! Not because I accomplished something of importance but just because He says so. And so is yours. Any human who accepts His offer of connecting with the Infinite is a genuine Homo Saipan, “a wise human.” That’s better than being a “Homo Absurdus.” Life without His Life is absurd!
I have found a translation of the New Testament that is new to me and insightful. It is the First Nations Version, an Indigenous Bible Translation of the New Testament, FNVNT. It presents John 10:10-11 this way,
“Thieves enter only to take away life, to steal what is not theirs, and to bring to ruin all they cannot have. I have come to give the good life, a life that overflows with beauty and harmony; I am the good Shepherd, the one who watches over the sheep. I will lay down my life for them.”
*HOMO ABSURDUS: WE NO LONGER DESERVE THE TITLE OF ‘WISE HUMAN’ HOMO SAPIENS, BY LONNIE AARSSEN, Newsweek, 5/6/19
Photo – Taken at Monterey, California, while on our trip down Highway 101, Pacific Coast Highway.
Baldwin Heirlooms 