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Exclusive Commentary
by Gary L. Coffman
4/17/07
PHARAOH’S DREAM REVISITED
Dreams
are an endless source of fascination, even for those who claim to
never have them. Ironically they simply don’t know how to awaken properly to
recognize they have been dreaming. But, that’s another story. Dreams have
played an important role in literature and our culture, sometimes combining
the two, as in the Old Testament in the story of the Egyptian pharaoh’s
dream and its interpreter, the imprisoned Hebrew, Joseph. In our nightmare
time of global climate change and the impending disasters it portends, it
might be wise for us to revisit Pharaoh’s dream and glean from it what
lessons might be relevant to our time, that might serve to rescue us from
the consequences of our profligacy, if that is possible.
For those unfamiliar
with the tale, in Genesis 41 of the Old Testament, the king of Egypt is
direly troubled by a series of dreams he has had that his “magicians” have
been unable to interpret to his satisfaction. The content of the dreams is
that the pharaoh is standing along the banks of the Nile and seven handsome
cattle emerge only to be devoured by seven scrawny cattle that follow after
them. In a subsequent dream he witnesses a stalk of corn bearing seven plump
ears that are soon devoured by seven withered ears blighted by a searing
wind. Obviously, this is of critical importance to the ruler of Egypt, that
there is some hidden meaning of crucial significance to his realm, and that
meaning must be disclosed.
Enter the Hebrew,
Joseph, falsely imprisoned, but possessed of the ability to correctly
interpret dreams, as attested by the pharaoh’s butler. Brought post haste,
Joseph correctly interprets the dreams as seven year of plenty followed by
seven years of famine for the nation of Egypt. Impressed, the king elevates
Joseph to second in command of the country to store up the surplus of the
good years to nourish the lean years. A shrewd and viable policy that none
may obstruct. Is there a lesson here to be learned anew in our time of
nightmare vision of what is to come, unless we take action to mitigate it?
Succinctly, Joseph proposed a policy of ‘conserve and preserve.’ As Basil
Fawlty might have observed: “Brilliant!”
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There are times when all concern of profit must be put on
the shelf, if humanity really cares about humanity. Not only America, but
all nations need to be preparing for the lean years, for they are sure to
come, and they will come, with a vengeance beyond our imaginings. And no
nation will be willing to be altruistic when its ass is on the line.
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Alas, we are dull.
Only when calamity confronts us are we grudgingly willing to move. What
is needed by this nation and all others is a commitment to “conserve and
preserve.” Perhaps the number seven is relevant here. We need more than just
changing incandescent lights to fluorescent; we need more than an exchange
of carbon dioxide credits among industries. What we need is a wholesale
shutdown of the economy of all nations by fourteen percent. What is that
number, you ask? It is one seventh. One additional day of each week, that
each industry or service shuts down completely, except for health care,
police enforcement, and fire services. A three day weekend for workers, but
one day without transportation and gas stations; without NFL, NBL,
N-whatever; without Oprah, Sally, NPR, whatever crap passes for music and
“talk” these days, without air conditioning, without the stock market going
into panic mode over a transient “crisis.” Just the sounds of silence, the
smell of the world as it was meant to be, even if we do stink a bit
personally (after all, that is the test of true love, isn’t it?) and the
sense of time enough to experience what matters, that has always seemed to
elude our grasp.
What more can we do to
prepare against the lean years?
Perhaps restoring the
lakes we have bled dry for profit. The Tulare Lake basin has been dry
for decades for the purpose of agricultural egotism. That agriculture is
doomed, if the climatologists are correct. Restoring the lakes now, even
though it may displace homes and even small towns, may economically prove
more efficacious than the wholesale destruction of agriculture at a
sustainable level for the general population.
Curbing rampant
population and business growth in urban centers, where water is in
diminishing availability is vital. Such expansion should only be limited to
where resources are demonstrably available for an extended future. Los
Angeles is clearly not an option, unless parasitism has become fashionable.
We have had our share
of “fat” years with no real preparation for the “lean” years. It is time
that we prepare. Is there a national store house for the nation that would
provide even a subsistence level of basic food for the populace, and I don’t
mean Twinkies or “Cheese Mac?” I must admit to a level of disgust with
popular media that espouse the necessity of shrimp, over-priced seafood,
exotic fare as “essentials for optimum health to ‘score’ on their next
date,” when many citizens can’t afford their latest prescription for
reducing American’s chances of contracting this or that latest medical
“epidemic.” The economic recovery of New Orleans is certainly not a
reassuring lesson in our ability to recover from even a limited catastrophe,
especially when the profits of the wealthy are involved. There are times
when all concern of profit must be put on the shelf, if humanity really
cares about humanity. Not only America, but all nations need to be preparing
for the lean years, for they are sure to come, and they will come, with a
vengeance beyond our imaginings. And no nation will be willing to be
altruistic when its ass is on the line.
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I begin to look at human beings as just so many
multi-million sacks of protoplasm, without mind, without heart, without
soul. Jelly fish floating on a seemingly indifferent sea, waiting for their
departure, comfortably.
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If it appears I am a
pessimist about our chances as a species, I must confess, I am. We, who
have had so much to give, seem unwilling to sacrifice as the occasion
demands. When I see youth strolling the street home from school “plugged in”
to their I-pods, CD players, game players, or cell phones, oblivious to the
real world around them, my heart sinks. When I see parents filling the
streets in gas guzzling modes of transport that are superfluous on their way
to fashion-influenced spending, why do I despair? When I see men and women
acting out roles that are not of their own making, but of some amorphous
style maven or cinematic idol, why am I perplexed? When I find the homeless
on the streets and hospital patients unceremoniously dumped on Skid Row, why
am I appalled? When the nation’s wealthiest CEO’s and politicians continue
to receive obscenely gratuitous tax breaks, severance packages, and minimal
sentences for ethical violations, that no ordinary citizen could expect
after a lifetime of devoted service, why am I disheartened? I begin to look
at human beings as just so many multi-million sacks of protoplasm, without
mind, without heart, without soul. Jelly fish floating on a seemingly
indifferent sea, waiting for their departure, comfortably.
Perhaps our time has
come and gone, and we should graciously make way for a new creation that
may, millions of years hence, recognize its responsibility as a cooperative
player, rather than pillager, in Gaia’s scheme of things. The goddess will
have her way in spite of our desires. It is a pity, really, that we have
left so many nuclear warheads buried in the earth, ready to self destruct at
some future date when we have abandoned them due to climatic necessity, or
simply forgotten where they are or how to access them to disarm their
warheads. To those few who do survive, she might relent and allow them to
live in harmony with her, as she did with the natives of this continent
before the Europeans arrived. It is quite simple really. Accept the gift of
life, and say, “Thank you,” to the “Great Mystery,” or try to wrest her
benevolence by force, in the expectation of profit and pleasure, and perish
utterly.
It is not enough that
we adhere to Joseph’s interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream. What Joseph and
his God prescribed was limited. There was no real sense of man’s place in
the scheme of all life, just human life. We must move beyond that limited
vision and embrace the totality. Man is but a part, a very mean and viral,
not vital, part of life, if left to his uncontrolled impulses. What is
called for is a renewal and commitment to all life on this planet, not just
our own. Our inflated vision of ourselves was sagely encapsulated by William
Shakespeare in “The Tempest,” when he has the magician Prospero remark, “We
are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little lives are rounded with
a sleep.”
What a tragedy, that
one seemingly gentle and ectoplasmic species’ existence should throw
into question the survival of all creatures of the deep, the land, and air,
for one brief moment of glory as it sought to redeem an ingrained illusion
of a lost Eden by becoming as God Himself and failing utterly. The
warehouses of Pharaoh and Joseph could not begin to encompass what is called
for in the years of fat and famine ahead of us. May our children forgive us,
for I believe we do not have the will or wisdom to sacrifice the frivolous
and the fashionable for the benefit of all life. We have become a rampart
infection of this globe and only a raging fever will make the planet whole
again. How ironic that this dark dream should have come to pass by our own
hand.
Gary L. Coffman is a writer, poet, and retired English teacher.
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