From Stone To Heart
Stone to scroll to codex to heart —
God's law copied over, right from the start,
with no regard for how people evolve,
no context considered, no problems to solve.
First, stone — for a people of chaos, no smarts,
every detail they needed chiseled in parts:
how to eat, how to grieve, how to relate,
how to stand before God and not meet their fate.
But time passed and people learned, so you'd think
they'd employ their own agency, pause at the brink —
instead rulers piled on more honey-do's,
codex after scroll, more rules, more taboos.
We just clutched them, performed them,
into pretzels we twisted —
separate meats, don't walk too far,
don't do work, unless loopholes existed,
Rest on the sabbath, slaughter the lamb,
wash your hands, wash your hands —
Do it because I said so, ma'am.
The rote recompense of it, evident futility,
everyone losing the point of utility.
But God saw
and knew what was needed
was not another addition
but a culling, compression -
a radical decision.
Much the way we reduced
programming to zeros and ones,
God rolled up the whole of the law.
Distilled it, reduced it —
no more chisels, no scroll, no more flaws —
he wrote it not on stone nor on paper
but wrote it on the heart:
Love God. Love your neighbor as yourself.
The law didn't disappear.
It came home to roost —
every command ever written
fulfilled, introduced
into just these two rules.
So do them.
