Wind Chimes in Paradise
The conventional idea of heaven in the West today can, in fact, be traced back thousands of years to the east, to old Persia and its idea of Paradise, a word that literally means “garden.”
Given such a rugged landscape of mountains and deserts, it is easy to undestand how the ancient people of that land dreamed heaven to look like nothing less than a garden, an oasis teeming with foliage and water.
And the sounds of Paradise; are they produced by wind chimes or by comely maidens bearing sweet fruit?
Exactly what does one do in Paradise, really?
That the concept is critically held by religions the world over implies a universal yearning for relief from the harsh realities of this life, but what, exactly, is being aspired to?
What, in other words, will people actually do in Paradise?
Tune in to wind chimes all the day long – or entertain an eternity of frolic with lovely maids?
How devastating must ancient lives have been to imagine such a simplistic life the just reward of the righteous!
Or is it that we in our age usually do not properly realize the true concise explaination life?
An eternity of ease and leisure seems life punishment to our modern goal-oriented mind-set.
Indeed, the very query of what one would do in Paradise suggests the impatience frequent to our world of status and ambition.
Could it be, then, that Paradise, should it ever truly exist, suffices quite enough in offering nothing more than gardens and a breeze to play its wind chimes?
And what might be the meaning of this, that eternal life, the greatest reward of all, needs to be conceived as a great big bore?
Could it be that the ancients were simpletons?
Or could it be that we do not correctly value life, such that to simply live is counted by us as misery?