Your task is to take the story that Kings tells about how evil comes into the world — and change the story any way you want as long as the end remains the same: once you have told a story, you can never take it back.
Once upon a time a tribe of great apes existed. This tribe of great apes lived freely in the rainforest, jumping from tree to tree, swinging from branch to branch, and eating whatever they pleased. They kept to themselves and didn’t much interact with the other animals unless they hunted.
These apes were observant, always watching how other animals behaved. They knew where the birds would migrate when dry season hit and what time of day the rats would scavenge for food. They even knew when plants would bring about new crop and which parts of specific slow-growing ones were to be left untouched if they wanted to maintain a balanced environment.
One dry season, however, the temperature was unusually warmer. Some weeks were so hot that forest fires would occur. This would happen continuously until acres and acres of trees and plants were destroyed. The sun eventually found its way onto the forest floor, reaching the cracks and crevices that were once covered by the shade the leaves provided. As a result, the apes and all the other animals that shared the rainforest with them were deprived of the nutrition that came from fruits and vegetables.
Many animals became malnourished. A lot became ill and died after some time. The tribe’s population declined as a large number of old and young died. Parents mourned the death of their children, and children mourned the death of their parents. Afraid of the consequences of death and no longer existing, the apes tried to relocate and find new food sources. They rummaged through the jungle in search of an area unaffected by the heat. In a region they had never seen before, they found these strange plants that had fleshy stems propping up off the ground and supporting a cap which drenched downward. They covered a vast area of the rainforest, growing from miles on end. Some were as big and as tall as trees, but some hung around the bottom of the forest floor accompanying the grass and little pebbles.
Being cautious animals, the apes decided to wait and see how other species would be affected after consuming these strange things. They camped at the top of the trees to watch. Each day a different horde of animals would come by to feast on these strange plants. First there were horses that ate what seemed to be too many; they got aggressive, but ran faster than usual after devouring the plant. Second were a pack of wolves that ate and ate until they started fighting with one another. Third were a group of boars that bit off a mouthful and were rejuvenated. They ran off with a newfound energy.
The apes, having watched how the strange plant, in different increments, affected different animals, chose to eat the amount the boars ate. They didn’t feel satiated but were afraid to eat too much. The onset of effects was slow, but the effects got there. They felt something go off within them that increased their senses. Their vision, hearing, sense of touch and smell were heightened and they were now bursting with energy.
They made use of these new found powers to trek further into the rainforest, searching for more things to eat. They hunted all kinds of fruits, vegetables, and animals but made sure they didn’t eat too many. They knew overhunting would make an unbalanced environment, and they needed a balanced one to ensure their children’s survival in the future. How could you eat more pork in the future if you eat all the pigs now? They spared most of the young and the female animals and only ate what was enough. The effects of the plant would plummet after a few hours until they reached baseline again, so the apes would make back-and-forth trips, each time eating just a little more of the strange plant and delving further into the jungle.
Eventually, the forest-fire-causing-sun-rays caught up to their journeys and burnt the part of the jungle they had relocated to. The apes faced the same problem: starving and malnourished once more, but this time lost deep in the jungle. Mustering up the last bit of will power they had, the remaining members of the tribe trudged through the now barren landscape in search for the area that housed the strange plants. They retraced their steps and miraculously found the plants again. The tribe wanted its effects to last a long time so they decided to eat twice as much more than before.
But they didn’t get the powers they were so used to getting after having eaten the plant; instead they started to feel ill and vomit. They thought that they were going to die, that this was it for their species. They were only half right. After some time they recovered from the nausea and began to see their surroundings differently. They could see things they hadn’t seen before, hear sounds they hadn’t heard before, and felt the gentlest touch. The dried grass on the ground started to breathe and draw out geometric patterns that filled the floor, the remaining trees around them started to look alive, and the sun’s rays beamed out rainbows. They were overwhelmed by the visuals—colors, geometric patterns, and fractals continued to build on top of each other until the apes found themselves in an unfamiliar environment. They forgot everything: what they did to get to this state, what they were trying to accomplish before, who they were, who their friends were, and who their family was. Each ape was sure they were dead
It was a confusing and scary experience but after some time they returned back to the forest and back to being apes. For what felt like eternity, the apes were shown the secret of the cosmos. They no longer feared death and not existing, they knew a life after death existed for they had just experienced it.
Having conquered their ultimate fear, they decided they would just enjoy the left over luxuries available in the forest. They gathered the remaining strange plants and occasionally ate a mouthful for energy. The apes travelled through the jungle eating more than necessary and leaving nothing behind for other animals. They no longer cared for a balanced environment so they ate and ate until nothing existed but the long trail of scraps and corpses they left behind.
I read through Genesis before writing this one and didn’t know exactly what to write. I had a mini existential crisis when trying to directly answer how evil came into this world because questions about our existence is tied into the prompt as well. The story is based on Terrence McKenna’s “Stoned Ape Theory”–that our ancestors consumed magic mushrooms through which they developed self-awareness and a new level of consciousness.
I told this story to my mom and at the end she asked what the point of this was to which I explained that it was for a class and the idea was to tell a story about how evil came into this world. She was confused about how evil came into my story for the sun was one source, and the strange plant was another. I’ll leave that up to the rest of you to decide though, because I don’t even know myself. Ultimately, I think evil is just an idea; what one person may find right, another may find wrong. Therefore, I don’t think evil existed until we developed a conscience. In general Buddhist teachings, for example, suffering is evil and the point is to escape suffering; one can do so by reaching Nirvana in order to escape the cycle of death and rebirth. So essentially, in this perspective, evil comes into the world right when one enters it.
Works Cited
Arnold, Lee. “Stoned Ape Theory Might be More than Just Stoner Logic.” Mysterious Universe. 8th Kind Pty Ltd, 3 Jan 2014. Web. 5 Jun 2015.
Red. “You Do Not Exist: A Look Inside Ego Death.” Ascensium. Ascensium, 19 Feb 2013. Web. 11 Jun 2015.