Earthseed: Invented Religion and Science Fiction
At the heart of Parable of the Sower (1993) is a religion, Earthseed, crafted with painstaking care by the novel’s 15-year old protagonist, Lauren Oya Olamina.
Lauren is a prophetess who derives the verses that make up Earthseeed: The Books of the Living not from divine revelation, but from deep reflection on experience. It is the product, as she says, of “discovery rather than invention, exploration rather than creation” (p. 78). We learn about Earthseed first in contrast to the faith of her father, the informal leader of their embattled community and the best person Lauren knows. Flatly rejecting the theism of her father’s Baptist theology, Lauren’s Earthseed affirms only the inevitability and pervasiveness of change.
All that you touch
You Change.
All that you Change
Changes you.
The only lasting truth
Is Change.
God is Change.
Like Rev. Olamina and the wall that protects their neighborhood from the chaos outside its gates, the God of Lauren’s father represents stability and security.
This religion is a reassuring, but futile, defense that creates the illusion that things will remain the same, perhaps even can go back to the way they were. The “god” of Earthseed, on the other hand, is not something to worship or even to call upon for defense or revenge. Instead its hard truths provide comfort and a framework for action for the growing band of adherents whom Lauren attracts.
Drawing on Buddhism, the second law of thermodynamics and existentialism, Earthseed asks that we confront the inherent instability and precarity of life. Instead of defending against change, Earthseed urges us to yield to change when necessary and remain alert to opportunities to affect change and thereby shape god. Eschewing the “sprinkle of mysticism” that Lauren’s lover Bankhole thinks is necessary to make a religion successful, Earthseed directs us to take root among the stars (p. 77).
As a scholar of religion and a straight up Sci-Fi nerd, I’m fascinated by the many invented religions found in this genre.
Besides Earthseed, consider Star Wars’ Jediism and the Bene Gesserit order of Dune. SF and religion are about world-making. Like Octavia Butler, religious thinkers often take a hard, critical look at the world we’re living in and ask not only “How can this get better?” but also, “How could this get so much worse?”
It is uncanny how well Butler anticipated our own dystopian moment: a transformed climate wreaking havoc on the weather and extreme income inequality. When asked how she so vividly predicts the future in her fiction, Butler answered, “All I did was look around at the problems we’re neglecting now and give them about 30 years to grow into full-fledged disasters” (Essence Magazine, 2000).
What kind of world do we want to inhabit? What are the alternatives to the realities we currently inhabit? How do we develop the communities and ethical foundation necessary to build and maintain better worlds?
A person launching their college career has a lot to learn from Lauren Olamina and Octavia Butler. Find your teachers everywhere. Keep your eyes open for opportunities. Fix your mind on noble aspirations, and find a crew of fellow travelers to help you attain them.