All problems of humanity are derived from the condition of insanity, more than the assumed actions of God. There is nothing unsolvable in this world, except as hindered by the condition of insanity in our midst. Ignorance, resulting from a lack of education can be brought into the fray. But, lack of education, itself, can be commonly attributed to insanity. That is why even the highly educated ones are known to think irrationally. Until the problem of insanity is handled, there is no hope for human survival.
The furthest degree at which a person can be insane is when maiming his fellow men, as a means of addressing problems. At least the late former President Robert Mugabe, once confirmed that the Gukurahundi debacle was a moment of madness. Unfortunately, there are still many people, in our midst, passing for normal, yet entrenched in insanity. We have more insane people than those in mental illness institutions.
The first rung of insanity concerns superstition, which is convoluted by religion. When deeply obsessed with religion, it is impossible to think rationally. Imagine those appealing to the ancestral spirits to influence yields in the fields, instead of committing oneself to plan and hard-work for production. What has let down Africa is religion, more than the mind usage. A superstitious person is a slave to traditions and superstitious beliefs.
Such people are as abnormal as susceptible to committing heinous crimes, without acknowledging responsibility. How can one imagine a person raping his own ten-year-old daughter? The courts, often convict such people with stiff jail terms, yet expected to be aware of their abnormal conditions. That, simply shows that even those presiding in such court decisions would also be insane. There cannot be anything like a normal rapist in this world.
There is no rational-thinking person who sexually enforces himself into someone without her consent. Sex, itself, is highly stigmatized, because of the prevalence of insanity in our society. To a rational individual, women cannot be treated as sex objects, except for the insane people. There is more to sex than just the pleasures of intercourse. When failing to see that simplicity, one would, obviously, be embroiled in insanity, as behaving like brute animals.
The same goes for those injuring their considered enemies. A normal person does not have enemies but takes the responsibility to eradicate insanity in his environment. Unlike other species, created with instinctive defensive mechanisms, humans have nothing to fall back on, except the intellectual capacity to reason. Depending on natural habitat, animals are equipped with survival abilities. Baboons and monkeys climb trees and steep cliffs with fascinating agilities.
Animals are capable of handling survival challenges, using their inherent instinctive gimmicks, peculiar to their respective instinctive nature. A lion has strong canine teeth that can tear the toughest meat from any of its prey, including a thick-skinned buffalo. The ingenuity of lions, bringing down a buffalo, is fascinating to humans, though capable of manufacturing airplanes and computers.
A tiger survives during the coldest temperatures, due to its cold-weather-conditioned skin. Humans can perceive the wisdom and ingenuity with which such species were created, in their diverse peculiarities. It is doubtful that any of those species, get fascinated by gimmicks, displayed by each of those diverse species.
Only humans are equipped with intellectual capabilities to even study the causes of animal behavior. Humans are highly vulnerable, without the appropriate protective clothing. They can freeze to death, in cold climates. Humans are, however, capable of manufacturing protective weapons against predatory animals, though unable to fly, like birds. But humans can use their minds, to be up in the skies, traveling long distances, in short periods of time.
With the mind-capabilities, humans can achieve anything on this planet. The biggest question is on what causes failure. The Gospel Books comprise what is incorrectly attributed to the miracles of Jesus. Yet Jesus never stated that such miracles were unachievable by ordinary humans. It was the unbelief, causing failure to perform things considered miraculous, in solving human problems.
“Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you” (Matthew 17:19-20) (NIV).
This is one of the widely quoted Scriptures in the Bible but highly misunderstood. Nothing was marvelous, about such performances, except appreciating that humans were created with mind-power to handle any problem. This is why Jesus constantly chided those disciples for lack of faith. Jesus knew about the mind-capabilities of humans, to make great achievements in this life.
Amazingly, humans are capable of producing highly sophisticated nuclear weapons to eliminate fellow human beings. This comes from insanity, assuming that the competitive mind should be used to dominate others. Ordinary humans seek to suppress those viewed as, potentially, more capable of solving survival challenges.
Even the parental guidance is tailor-made to suppress the genealogical offspring. In the name of cultural traditions, children are not allowed to know or explore innovative ideas, without parental consent. The children are adjudged as normal when maintaining the illogical consideration to suppress other fellow human beings. It is more about competition than commitment towards survival pursuits.
Those considered to be more intelligent than others are celebrated, as to invalidate those adjudged as weak. Trouble comes, when those having been perceived as poor performers, rise up, to overtake the celebrated ones. The suppressive environment does not accept the consideration of elevating the despised people. This is why Jesus was rejected from His home-town—this being another portrayal of the ground-work for insanity (Luke 4:24).
Under the insane environment, the success of one person is viewed as a threat, rather than deserving to be celebrated. Failures are covertly celebrated, rather than seeking to serve the considered poor performers to come up to acceptable levels. This scenario describes the unacceptable discordant nature of families and clans known to exist today. Let alone nations prone to rising up against each other—as characteristic of present wars.
It is a self-centered philosophy that subscribes to insanity, rather than an altruistic philosophy. The most unpopular people, treated as insane in this world, are those preaching the ideals of altruism. Understandably, when a rational person is outnumbered by the irrational people, the consideration of insanity is reversed. Basically this is what caused the death of Jesus on the cross. His highly effective methodology of solving problems was viewed as insane by those imbeciles, disguised as knowledgeable people.
The package, embracing the idea of invalidating another person, includes pride. That idea of invalidating other people implies uplifting the person’s credentials, more than uplifting his dignity, as created in God’s image. No-one hopes to get anywhere, in this world, without the production of acceptable credentials. “Show us your qualifications, before we can give you dignity,” goes the legendary philosophy of the so-called wise men of this world. It is the same idea with which the Pharisees invalidated Jesus, before conspiring to murder Him:
Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.” He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:38-40) (NIV) See [The significance of three days and three nights].
Jesus described those asking for proof of His Messiahship, to be a wicked and adulterous generation. He was not referring to adultery, as descriptive of sleeping with other people’s wives. Jesus was talking about God’s people having adulterated themselves with the pagan practices, having nothing to do with Godly principles. The idea of desiring proof, even with clear evidence in the teachings of Jesus, was not from God.
Demanding credentials is what sustains civilizations, even in our time. The potentially successful people, even when proffering workable ideas, get invalidated for lack of credentials. Although able to come up with workable ideas, the despised ones become willing to succumb, when lacking those credentials. Very few innovative people are able to withstand the opposition, before accomplishing their dreams. Many inventors are known to give up and die with their dreams. Satan’s schemes in tempting Jesus in the wilderness was demanding for proof that Jesus was the Son of God:
“The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’ Jesus answered, ’It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. ’If you are the Son of God,’ he said, ’throw yourself down. For it is written: ‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’ Jesus answered him, ’It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ‘All this I will give you,’ he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only’” (Matthew 4:3-10) (NIV).
When Jesus refused to succumb, He was showing wrongness in focusing on credentials, rather than the person, created in God’s image. Of course, it couldn’t have been impossible for Jesus to perform those miracles. Satan also knew that God had, actually, created humans in His own image, as to have dominion over everything.
By saying, “If you are the Son of God” Satan is insinuating that all human beings had lost their position as God’s Children. That was true of the generality of humanity, but this was not the case with Jesus, as the Messiah. Satan knew about the stupidity of humanity, more than the duped humans, themselves. Under Satan’s captivity, at the Garden of Eden, it became impossible for humans to even imagine being God’s children.
That captivity has got nothing to do with the physical nature of human beings, except the mind. This is why any tyrant ruler seeks to brainwash the populace, before entrenching himself into a dictatorship. Those who find it reasonable to actually, die defending a tyrant, do so out of uninformed assumption to defend a “just cause.” Yet all that would be a result of insanity, displaying the warped mindsets, in need of healing.
The term insanity refers to that which is abnormal or irrational. For instance, there are those who abhor homosexual people. Such homosexual critics would be unaware of themselves being also insane. The homosexuals were created in God’s image. It is therefore an insane person who seeks to disparage and destroy them. A sane person seeks to understand them, before establishing some cure for their abnormal condition.
This does not mean that the person seeking to understand those homosexuals would be approving of their abnormal behavior. The normal person seeks to understand them, before coming up with ideas to salvage them out of their apparent irrationality. This is what Jesus did, even to the extremely insane from the tombs, completely overwhelmed by the demonic forces:
“When he arrived at the other side in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were so violent that no one could pass that way. ‘What do you want with us, Son of God?’ they shouted. ‘Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?’” (Matthew 8:28-29) (NIV).
If Jesus did not condemn the two demon-possessed people, why do some Christians assume that it is “Christian” to condemn, the seemingly, equally demon-possessed homosexuals? A sane person is the one who understands the principle of doing unto others as one would like them to do unto him. Yet an insane person does the opposite, as unable to go out of His way, to understand another person’s predicaments.
This gives us the hint, in terms of the origin of insanity, as compared with sanity. Jesus illustrated the optimum standard for sanity, from the condition of insanity. The parable of the Good Samaritan is most appropriate when applying the principle of sanity. You are sane when constantly considering how best you can become valuable to other people. But you are insane, as long as constantly thinking about how best you can benefit from other people.
Andrew Masuku is the author of Dimensions of a New Civilization, laying down standards for uplifting Zimbabwe from the current state of economic depression into a model for other nations worldwide. A decaying tree provides an opportunity for a blossoming sprout. Written from a Christian perspective, the book is a product of inspiration, bringing relief to those having witnessed the strings of unworkable solutions––leading to the current economic and social decay. In a simple conversational tone, most Zimbabweans should find the book as a long-awaited providential oasis of hope.
The Print copy is now available at Amazon.com for $13.99
Also available as an e-copy at Lulu.com for $6.99
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