I used to think that the story of Noah's ark did not have much relevance today. I saw it as a story that explained for ancient peoples why there were sea shells up in the mountains.
I know the Earth is old, and plate tectonics causes mountains to rise up from the sea. I didn't need that old story to explain what would have been a mystery to people living thousands of years ago.
Then I learned about the flood created by the waters of the Mediterranean breaking through the Bosporus to create the Black Sea. I understood the story as a cultural echo of that pre-historic event.
That was quite a catastrophic event.
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More recently, I learned that "ark" means "chest". I saw the story as metaphor: a lesson for those who hear it to hold fast to everything in their chest, and its opposite. Every 'thing' in their chest.
Hold on to all of your emotions, all of what you feel within your chest. Everything and its opposite. Love and anger. Curiosity and caution. Joy and grief. In other words, don't suppress or repress your feelings. Feel your emotions... even the uncomfortable ones.
Hold on to it all, in the sense of embrace and acknowledge and feel. Do not allow any part of you to be lost, but keep all of your being as part of you, and you will make it through the difficult and challenging times. Have integrity
Another way of reading this story metaphorically is to see all the different animals as representing different human character types. Don't alienate or ostracize people who are outside the norm just because they are different. The various human character types interact to make a more diverse and successful human society. The different perspectives that the various characters bring to the mix of human society can help us, particularly in times of challenge, when established patterns of thought and ways of seeing may be insufficient to the challenges we meet.
How to make the big problems in the world much smaller. (Many small problems would disappear.)
Biological Model for Politics and Economics
