Post2Week7

After having watched all six parts of James Hall's video presentation Lawrence Pilgrimage I would like to revisit the issue that was raised in class on Wednesday I believe. One of the parts that we watched in class on Wednesday was part four. It related to the Kebra Negast that we read for that class day. The issue that was raised was roughly about the idea of story making in terms of religion. I do believe that the Kebra Negast was referred to as being a work of fiction in some way or another or rather to that extent if anything.
Assuming that it is indeed a work of fiction, the issue about believing in it and worshiping it came up. After having watched part four of Hall's Pilgrimage we raised the issue about the idea of making up a story about Lawrence University. The story was about how, according to legend, the Fox River was patrolled and led by a large mystical gazelle that now appears on the Lawrence seal. The gazelle had to flee because of civilization and left two droppings outside of Briggs, now known as One Rabbit Two.
I don't see how this story can just get dismissed so fast without really regarding it at all. I think that it might just be that we all believe that it can't be possible mostly because it directly affects us as Lawrentians. By that I mean that perhaps the feeling is disbelief that something like that could exist here on this mundane campus in a mundane town. That dismissal of the story of Lawrence legend carried over to become a dismissal, more or less, of the Kebra Negast. Now I know that people believe in the Kebra Negast just like how people believe in the Bible, so why is the Kebra Negast dismissed and the Bible isn't?
I feel that just because you don't believe in something because it is not your religion that it doesn't make those religions false. I understand that most religions conflict with each other so they all can't be true but that doesn't mean that they all are entirely false. This idea of the legend of the gazelle could very well be true as well as the Kebra Negast. The issue, it seemed, was the idea of story telling or rather the making up of stories. If the Kebra Negast works for people then why won't the gazelle one work too? I don't really see a difference in the two types of story tellings. They both more or less fill in the blanks and spaces of history and they seem to work as well. Most other religions, if not all, do the same thing too - they have stories that explain events and things - and there is no true way to tell if they are made up or not but they are believed in nonetheless.