One of these parables involves the notion of a “Creator”. Many religions revolve around a single, all-powerful God that created all things  (monotheism).  Other religions are polytheistic, with many Gods, but there was generally one particular god that was most powerful among them and was generally regarded as the source, or creator of all things.

Creation stories differ wildly from one religion or culture to another, although they may be similar if they originated from a common source. The one commonality, a god that created all things, is behind many of the themes in nearly all religions. And that basis is used in Shadow of the Serpent.

Taken to its root level, one must go back to a time prior to this “God’s“ creation of anything. Nothing existed except “God“. If this is true, then what did “God” create everything from if nothing existed other than “God“? The answer is simple. Everything would have had to be created from God, and therefore is God. Creation is actually a constant, ongoing process. Destruction, in reality, ends up in transformation, which is actually another form of creation. The alpha and the omega, the sacred circle, seasons for all things, cycles… it’s neverending.

Many religions focus on “good” and “evil”. In Jewish, Christian and Islamic traditions, Adam and Eve were created “innocent”. Cristians believe in an original “sin” or “evil” that occured when Adam and Eve ate the fruit of a tree in order to become “Godlike”. Jewish worshipers do not believe in original sin because they don’t believe that one person would be punished for another’s sins. 

But, exactly what did it mean to become “Godlike”. Is it immortality? The ability to create? The ability to control the world around them beyond the natural ability of all other creatures? Agriculture and the manipulation of plants? Domesticating animals from nature? Weapons? It seems no coincidence that this story is dated to approximately the time of the first villages and cities. But, is this necessarily evil? Or is it natural evolution?

Humans had changed. They had knowledge. There was no going back. Eden was not just a place. It was a time. It was a transformation. And, this same story was also similar to an even more ancient Babylonian version in the “Epic of Gilgamesh”. The main differences were in name and number of “Gods”.

Ancient Hindus, Buddists, and Native American cultures also had creation stories from a single, god-like source. Hindus believed that the all-powerful “God” could be envisioned through many gods. Buddists believed that God is within each of us. Native Americans had many different religions, however, a great deal of them, across a very wide geographical area mention both “Wakan” which is sometimes interpreted as “the great mystery”, and the sacred circle, which is often interpreted as infinity, or immortality.

If “God” created all things, then all of these things would be true. We are all “God” and everything around us is “God”. This notion is somewhat hidden or openly displayed in nearly all religions. But that would make everything sacred. Good and evil would tend more to be that which is good for people, and that which is bad, or evil. Gravity, space, day and night, and everything on Earth seems to be ruled by certain rules of nature. All of those rules would be the power of “God” because nature is “God”.

And then there’s the search for miracles. Just about every religion involves miracles, or unnatural occurences that are beyond human knowledge, power and comprehension. The real truth is that everything is a miracle. We each live in an infinitely intricate world both internally and externally.

Just the fact that we exist, can think and live in a world so complex that a million lifetimes would not be long enough to understand even a minute portion of the world around us is a miracle. We don’t understand even the tiniest grain in a mountain of potential knowledge, yet, in our religion, we look for miracles. We can walk, talk, think, eat, love, laugh, and enjoy things… when we could have been nonexistent… and we look for miracles.

That is one of the facets behind the parables in Shadow of the Serpent/A Coyote Moon Story. Everything around and within us is a miracle… and we reside within the Creator of all things.

It’s not new. This has been going on for hundreds of thousands of years. Even our distant cousins, the Neanderthals, constantly kept the homefires burning. We use it to cook, because raw meat and stored food can make us very ill, or even become poisonous. We use it for heat because we don’t have enough hair to protect ourselves from extreme temperature changes. Later, we used fire for hardening wooden spearpoints, funerals, punishment, pottery, metallurgy, warfare, agriculture, and an endless stream of useful or defensive/offensive purposes. We’ve been using fire for so long, that we can no longer live without it, or some end result of burning.

You may or may not have read the introduction to Shadow of the Serpent. The main idea is that while progress can strengthen the whole, it also weakens the individual. There is no way back to our natural roots to which humans would willfully submit. The only thing that would turn humans back to living naturally would be a catastrophic global event. But that would most likely exterminate the human race. So, there really is no going back. We can no longer survive without the progressive evolution of our technology.

To make it clear, we would not survive without any tools, clothing, fire or energy sources and medicines. But let’s just focus on the need to burn. Could we even imagine another species constantly burning both organic and inorganic materials? And could we imagine another species that’s so dependent upon burning that they’d disappear if they stopped? I think it would be pretty scary to have another species on this planet that burns and transforms vast areas on both land and sea, puts itself above every other life form, and irradicates competitors without question. Of course, we do have competing subspecies (cultures) that accomplish a similar effect. 

But, we are changing. We’re now looking at new ways to create energy and replace the need for burning with alternatives. Is this a natural evolution? Taken from that perspective, humans are really quite odd compared to the rest of the creatures on our planet. We are an extreme on the planet called Earth. But, no matter how you look at it, we are in fact completely natural. We evolved through many different landscapes, and even waterscapes. There is nothing we use, invent or consume that does not originate or has not been derived from our natural environment. Humans are a very unique example of diversity within the natural realm.