The Bible and Wisdom II

For those who have been listening to these lectures here for many years, what I am about to say may not be particularly surprising. For others, it will seem grotesque when the nature of memory is discussed in the following way. What is the outward appearance of human memory? It is that it remembers yesterday, the day before yesterday, and so on, back to childhood. But then it breaks off. This memory did not break off in the distant past, not in childhood, not even at birth; but just as people today remember what they themselves have experienced in their personal lives, so people in ancient times remembered what their fathers and grandfathers had experienced through entire generations. Memory was a spiritual force that spread through generations. Over centuries, memories were preserved in the distant past, and this different form of memory was linked to a different way of naming.