This book review may not seem to follow the theme of my previous posts, but I think that part of the “slowing living” lifestyle includes activities that our modern fast-paced world denies us, and one of those would be reading and learning about the planet we live on.
I wanted to share that I’ve read this book not only because I found it fascinating, but also because I’m proud that I committed myself to reading an entire non-fiction novel that is quite lengthy. I forced myself to read for up to an hour each night before bed, (instead of the standard scrolling through social media like an unproductive zombie) and I feel that my diligence with this habit has really paid off only for the reason that I have been exposed to even more mystique about the planet we inhabit, the beauty of the human mind and what we were possibly capable of in the times of antiquity.
Fingerprints of the Gods is an exploration into prehistory and the possibility that there existed ancient civilizations that were more advanced than those of our modern times.
A quick google search of reviews of this book will show that skeptics criticize the conclusions that are made by the author. In spite of this I still think it is a good read since it covers some fascinating details about the world that the average person generally has no idea about. Details that might strike you as important.
For example, I had some vague idea that there was an “ice age” at sometime in the past. But it is a little bit more complex and devastating than my previous general understanding. Over the past 100,000 years there have been intermittent periods of glaciation and meltdown, conditions that would have made life extremely harsh and terrifying for our ancestors. Ice ages have always occurred, and there’s no reason to think that we are safe from another one coming.
The last global meltdown occurred between 15,000 and 8,000 years ago. This may be related to the worldwide phenomena of a myth of cataclysmic floods found in various indigenous cultures.
Aside from the flood story, there are other similarities of myths found in completely different places all over the world. The author of the book explores the phenomena of a story found in indigenous cultures which describes a world cataclysm followed by the arrival of a civilizing god who is beneficent and instills good morals among the population as well as knowledge of astronomy, mathematics and agriculture.
Another thing I learnt from reading this book is that the Earth, while it is travelling around the sun, and spinning on its own axis, also wobbles. It is a very slow wobble, but due to this movement, our view of the zodiacal constellations changes every 26,000 years (a phenomena called precession of the equinoxes). From what I understood, there are some who speculate that this earth movement could be responsible for periods of glaciation and meltdown.
I also found it interesting that, regarding ancient temples around the world, we cannot explain how they were built with our modern knowledge and technology. There are also ancient structures built in line with celestial patterns and the equinoxes. This conflicts with our idea that people in the distant past were simpletons with undeveloped technology.
My reflections after reading this book is that the world contains many more riddles and mysteries than we think and that we have a very shortsighted perspective on history. If many of the propositions held in this book are plausible, as evidenced by many credible researchers, then humans of an ancient past were very technologically evolved. It could mean that there existed a sea-faring human culture in the distant past who were extremely advanced and travelled the world at large, resulting in the global phenomena of similar stories.
Of course researchers and archeologists are left with very little to work with since most ancient documents have been obliterated from the face of the planet due to the Christianization of Europe and other places, which destroyed all sacred temples and places of learning.
Maybe the earth-based peoples of the very far past, by being in tune with nature, were able to cultivate ingenious human minds …
Anyway, it is definitely an exciting and intriguing read and will at least open your mind to the novelty of the planet. We are truly living on a magical place, a very magical yet dangerous place…
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