History is our responsibility.

• Author: Eisendrath, Craig
• Position: American Thought

"If mankind is to avoid destructive wars, or achieve modes of life enhancing the human experience, we must work to realize these goals."

MUCH OF Western thought, from its origins to the middle of the 19th century, was devoted to providing a defense against the world's insecurity, particularly the unacceptable idea of our death. In the beginning of Western culture, in Sumer, which is present-day Iraq, death was too prevalent, too ubiquitous to deny. Yet, our predecessors felt that universal forces, such as the sun, moon, winds, and waters, were timeless, and that they were the province of eternal gods who ruled the world. Even plants and animals had their eternal gods who manifested themselves in earthly forms. People might die, but these forms and their gods survived forever.

These notions evolved over time. The early Hebrews, Greeks, Christians, and others all offered different theories on the dilemma of mortality and impermanence--beliefs that still dominate Western philosophy and religion. Since the mid 1800s, with the growth of science and social thought, the notion of permanence began to dissolve, and a new way of thought sprang up--that we may die, but that the universe is ours to make for ourselves and our children, that we no longer can be passive, but must accept a new responsibility for the world.

In today's media-saturated age, where even well-educated individuals are more familiar with Britney Spears' marital misadventures than the philosophy of Plato, people are hungry for meaning found in the ongoing dialogue between science and religion. In my academic career, I have detected an enormous desire of individuals to get to the tough questions.

Gods and heroes. The first recorded attempt at an answer was by a mythical hero in Sumer named Gilgamesh, who was king of the city-state Uruk. The Epic of Gilgamesh tells the tale of how Gilgamesh achieves a heroic friendship, only to have the gods slay his friend before his eyes. Decimated by the loss, the hero realizes for the first time that he. too, is vulnerable, and then wanders the Earth to find some way to avoid death. Eventually, rafter numerous adventures, Gilgamesh finds Utnapishtim, a man who has survived the great flood--the model for Noah in the Hebrew Bible. Utnapishtim describes a plant growing at the bottom of the sea. Whomever eats this plant will achieve everlasting life. Gilgamesh dives to the bottom of the sea, retrieves the plant, and plans to share it with all the citizens of Uruk so that they will live forever. Just before his entry into Uruk, however, a serpent eats the plant and, as evidence of its immortality, sheds its skin. Gilgamesh returns home empty-handed. As he approaches Uruk, though, he sees its...