This is in reply to various texts, and especially to add a few thoughts to a document on the nature and place of woman in the world by A. Van Luik. (OLDTST.TXT) In this document, the author made an extensive search of passages or texts that bring to light the male biases and misconceptions of the civilizations that lived in the times of the Old Testament, or pre-Christian era. So, this discourse is not on the nature of man and woman, but will certainly raise the subject as it relates to Old Testament biases that found their way in today's society.

We have now entered the Age of Enlightenment, the age that was foreseen by Jesus and all the prophets that have preceded him. It is now the time to let go of this childish conception of spirituality represented by the rites and exterior manifestations that have been the testing ground and the preparatory school for the age that we are in now. We are now leaving the kindergarten for the elementary school of life. These exterior manifestations that we find in all religions of the world, but more prominently in the Church of Rome, have all been for the purpose of teaching mankind through means that could be easily understood at their present stage of development. Therefore, man had to be taught by pictures, symbols, rites and forms, and this, in order to grasp the significance of the various concepts presented to him.

Just as a child will be shown various objects that are representive of an idea in order for him to crystallize the picture in his mind, so have we been shown a tangible representation of all the spiritual concepts that, in actuality, are an intrinsic part of the human form and the means through which we can have access to a greater perception of God's universe. It is for that sole purpose that the man and prophet Jesus came to earth. He came to show mankind that a man of flesh and blood can transcend materiality, and have access, here and now, to what is called Heaven, but is, in reality, man's true Home and Kingdom.

In the times of the Old Testament, and up to the times of Jesus, religious laws were intimately linked with the social life of those societies, and this, to the point where, through male bias and patriarchal authority, certain societal customs and rites easily became dogma, or if you prefer, the infallible word of God. As you may find througout the Old Testament, men had total authority over women, and to many of their contemporaries, they were considered as dispensable human beings, just a little higher than the animals, that were sometimes treated in a more humane manner.

From Genesis to Malachi, the Old Testament is the relation of man's journey on the earth plane. It is the story of the civilizations that preceded the coming of Jesus, their struggles and errors as well as their successes and failures as a people of God, on their way back to the Source from which they all originated. It is not the story of the Hebrews or the Jews. It is the story of all mankind, whose ways and customs, religious or otherwise, cannot be an example for the generations that followed them, including the present one. Man learns from his mistakes. He does not glorify them! The barbarian customs of the Old Testament have been replaced by a more human form of behavior, and, nowadays, it is not the custom for a man to give his daughters to prostitution in order to save a guest of the house: The owner of the house went outside and said to them, "No, my friends, don't be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don't do this disgraceful thing. Look, here is his concubine and my virgin daughter. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But to this man, don't do such a disgraceful thing." [Judg. 19: 23-24] The Old Testament is strewed with stories of the kind, and to think that a great number of people live their life according to many of these customs and ways of life is enough to make one's flesh creep. In the way that it is presented, and with a few exceptions like Job, which is an allegory of man'a journey on earth, the Psalms, that are nevertheless, a childish and endless praise to God, Ecclesiastes, which is, in fact, a book of philosophical thoughts, andProverbs and selected parts of the Prophets, the Old Testament should never have been put in the Bible and in the hands of laymen. Instead of being presented as the book of God, and with a few cuts of unnecessary details here and there, the book should have been placed in history classes where it belongs.

It is because it looks as though the misconceptions and male biases we find in the Old Testament have all been sanctioned by God, that it has become necessary to place the Biblical books in their proper perspective. This, not only because the Old Testament does not answer the criteria of today's society, but also because, in the eyes of a great number of Christians, the Leviticus, Samuel, Kings, Chroniques, and even the Acts of the Apostles, are more reminiscent of their own biases and misconceptions of life, and they even supersede Jesus' teachings, that have not found their way in the heart of those who, nevertheless, consider him as the only Son of God. Just listen to preachers in their pulpits and evangelists of today's TV ministries, and you will see and hear what I am talking about.

Because it is very difficult to discern true revelation in this array of kings, warriors and prophets, and also because history is so intermingled with the teachings, the Old Testament has become a dangerous tool in the hands of immature and inexperienced children, who see (I don't know how) in these verses of another era the infallible word of God. Not only do they see it as the word of God, but again they will try to give their own interpretation which, in most cases, contributes even more to widen the gap between man and woman, and serves to spread the biases and intolerance that we witness at the present time.

The nature of man and woman cannot be defined only in the outward appearance that each has assumed in their costume of flesh. That costume, the male and female body, is the means, freely chosen, to perform the specific task that each has also freely chosen in the present incarnation.

To say that man and woman are equal as mental and spiritual entities is a true definition in relation with the Universal Force or Energy (God) that each represents, for, notwithstanding what the Old Testament says, both man and woman are equal in the eyes of God. They have been created equal and both in the same manner, and the rib story has only served to perpetuate the male bias that man was lord over his household. This, of course, led to the physical, mental and spiritual abuse and enslaving of the companion God gave him to experience life in the physical planes. That desire to own and control had been the cause of the Fall, and man and woman were both created for the very purpose of relearning the laws of love and compassion with respect to their own environment (nature, plants, birds, animals etc...) of course, but primarily with respect to that companion they were given to share their earthly experience.

To say that man and woman are equal as physical entities is also, to a certain extent, a true definition of their role in the world, as expressions of the God they represent. Even though their perceptions are different, that is, even though they see things from a different perspective, the perception of one is as valid as that of the other. In the cosmic perspective of life, we have all been male and female, and we have all experienced those two specific aspects of life. Therefore, no one can envy the status of the other, for we have all been there before. So, what is it that sets one against the other in a constant fight for control and supremacy over the environment they both share? Why men are so reluctant to relinquish the dominating role they have assumed since eons of time, and why are so many women fighting to regain a status of equality, not only of mind and spirit, but an equality in skills and performance where they are set, one against the other in a competition that can only lead to distrust and disappointment?

The Old Testament gives us a very limited and narrow-minded view of world's history. Not so long ago, it was believed that earth was the center of the universe, and this to the point where it had become a Church's dogma with all the limitations that the word implies: the earth was flat, and the sun and the planets contemplated a stationary earth. Those who did not support that belief (Galileo among others) were tortured and condemned as heretics.

The Bible also teaches us that man began his journey on earth some 6000 years ago, and this, too, was part of the doctrine that no one could question or refute. Nowadays, even though some still hold to these fables, it is believed that earth began its orbital path some six billion years ago; that it is lost in an infinitude of planets in our own galaxy, and there are millions of galaxies in the universe. Is it small enough to humble us, or are we too proud and narrow-minded to accept the fact that God's attention is not centered on earth alone, as there are millions of inhabited planets in that universe we claim as our own.

If the Old Testament is the mirror of the evolution and progression of mankind in the physical world, then serious questions arise as to our ultimate destiny, for no 'sensible' God would tolerate the aberrations and atrocities we find in its pages. However, such is not the case. Life began billions of years ago and the period of time that spans the Old Testament is but a tiny part of the great scenario of life. The Flood of the Bible is but one of many others that have afflicted mankind. There have been many shifts of the earth, and continents may rise again or sink in the oceans, but man will always be there to finish what he began such a long time ago.

The people of the Old Testament were no better or no worst than many of those civilizations that preceded them, and the continent of Atlantis that sank into the sea twelve thousand years ago, is the striking example of a people who, at the peak of technological development, selfishly misused that technology and brought about the dowfall of their continent. So, the purpose, here, is not to downgrade the people of this specific era that has also given birth to Melchizedek, Elijah, Solomon, King David, the prophets and many other worthy people, but neither is it the purpose to put them on a pedestal and quote them as an example of virtue. Their customs and behavior were far from being examplary. They were worshipping a God in their image, a God of wrath and vengeance, a God who approved of their biases and misconceptions of life, and they were the reason why, at the end of that age, another avatar named Jesus incarnated into the world, to show mankind, once again, the road to the Kingdom and the secret of eternal life.

With the exception of the Gospels which, even though they have been tampered with, present a more accurate image of the Deity, the God of the Bible does not exist. It is a man-made God, a God of clay, a personal God that feeds on the worshipping of its creatures, a God that will disappear at the onset of the new humanity. The God of that new humanity is a God of love and compassion. He is the servant of all His creatures, and eagerly awaits their requests to fulfil their heart's desires. Man does not serve God. It is God that serves man.

I am already hearing the gnashing of teeth of all those who live their life according to those man-made principles we find in the Old Testament, and, unfortunately, in the Acts of the Apostles, that are, for the most part, the relation of the religious and social life of the people of that period, and can, in no case, be considered as God's Word. The Letters, written by Paul, a new convert, are stained with the biases and misconceptions of the Old Testament, perpetuated by his contemporaries, and are not truly representative of Jesus' teachings.

The true God of the Old Testament did not approve of their ways and customs and the destruction of Sodom and Ghomorra is but one of the many plagues and calamities that befell those civilizations that had gone astray and forgotten their own divine origin. However, those calamities were man-made or, if you prefer, the consequence of man' own ignorance of the laws of creation. God never punishes. It is the Law that takes care of whoever goes astray, and the cause and effect of each and every form of life eventually balance all creation.

So, instead of learning from their mistakes, these people invented a God who could understand and approve of their way of life. This is why, in the absence of Moses, they built a Golden Calf that they could see and worship, a God who would keep quiet and let them do as they wish. As the story goes, Moses came down from the mountain, and in a fit of anger, broke the tablets and burned in the fire the calf they had made with the gold of their jewels and adornments. And then the final blow from God: This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: `Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbor. (Exod. 32:27) And they did! Now, using your own inner senses, your intuitive insights, do you really believe that God would have ordered such a massacre, while at the same time giving Moses the tables of the Law with the commandment `Thou shall not kill'? Are we so blind and so narrow-minded as a species that we cannot discriminate and separate the wheat from the chaff? Are we so orthodox and closeted in our beliefs that we cannot even question the truthfulness and logic of what we find in books, be it the the Bible, the Baggavah-Gita or the Coran? Just take the time to read the Old Testament. See how cleverly the teachings were intermingled with the customs of these people, and you will understand why all these biases and misconceptions have been a part of man's beliefs for eons of time.

Even though Jesus taught us the law of love and compassion, and even though he left but one commandment `Love one another', his teachings have been distorted just as the teachings of the prophets of old have been misconstrued to fit into a mold of selfishness and intolerance that has lasted up to our days. Therefore, the relationship between man and woman has always been overshadowed by this patriarchal authority, emanating, not only from the Bible, but from many other books who teach that man and women were created equal while, at the same time, endorsing a male supremacy over women who were created, not as slaves, but as companions on the path of life. If everything we find in the Old Testament is only partly true, we cannot but come to the conclusion that, either that God is a masochistic and heartless God, or the book is simply not the book of God.

Even though many verses of the Old Testament are in total contradiction with Jesus' teachings, many people still live their life according to those erroneous principles. The Acts of the Apostles, too, have their flaws, and some of Paul's letters (Cor. 7: 1-2 & 8-9) show signs of the mysogynous tendency of those times, and there are quite a few passages that have nothing to do with spiritual teachings. In those verses, Paul writes that `a man does well not to marry', and a little further he says that it is good for the unmarried and the widows to stay unmarried; but if they cannot control themselves, they should marry'. Whether this advice applied to discipleship, or to the marital life in general, it is not said. It is nevertheless a strange advice for a spiritual teacher to give, for, whether one marries or not, has nothing to do with his, or her, own spiritual unfoldment. In either state, one can acquire wisdom and become enlightened. In the eyes of GOD, a protestant priest who marries has as much value as a catholic priest who remains celibate, and even more if that priest remains in the celibate state because of a doctrinal limitation. And this limitation is the worst stumbling block to spiritual unfoldment, for it places a human consideration (celibacy) over the free-will of the individual. So, with the exception of Jesus' teachings, the Bible is definitely not a fertile ground for the improvement of relationships between men and women, and, in the manner it has been presented, neither is it a fountain of wisdom for all those who are on a search for God and try to uncover the so-called mysteries of life. This is why, in the light of the impending changes of which we are now witnessing the first tremors, it is imperative to let go of all these exterior rites and manifestations of worship. It is imperative to destroy the idols, icons, and all representations of the Deity, for that Deity is right there within your own body. Once again, you are taught the same concepts and the same universal truths that the man Jesus taught not so long ago. Once again, you are told that you are gods; that you can do the things he did and even more, if you rid yourself of all theses limitations that have held you captive for so long. Concentrate on Jesus' teachings, and try to read between the lines, so that you can uncover and understand the universal concepts of love and compassion, the same concepts that you can also find within, in your own Book of Life.

Fernand