    5

    The True Route to Utopia

    The appeal of prophets often lies in their ability to paint a picture

    of  an  irresistible  utopia,  and  to  convince  us  that  this  better  world  is

    almost within our grasp.  Marion Keech, the woman who

    communicated with extra-terrestrial Guardians, promised her

    followers that they would shed all earthly ills and bathe in blessings

    they could scarcely imagine--after they had been whisked away from

    our decaying galaxy.  William Miller, the founder of Seventh Day

    Adventism, predicted that God would come to rearrange the world we

    know, and that those who followed Miller would find themselves

    possessors of a sparkling new paradise.  And Karl Marx explained that

    the elimination of capitalism would trigger the creation of a whole new

    human nature, one which would flood the greedy dens in which we

    live with brotherly goodwill.

    The supernatural predictions of Keech, Miller, and Marx all

    failed to materialize.  And yet, in a strange way, every one of them bore

    the seeds of a hard-nosed truth.  The power of ideas to draw individual

    humans into a structured mass can make the utopian prophecies of

    world-views come true.  If the system of belief pulls together a large

    enough superorganism, the faithful will, indeed, taste a bit of heaven.

    Nearly two thousand years ago, a group of believers drew

    together around Joshua, a young carpenter from the relatively

    impoverished northern hill-town of Nazareth, convinced the parable-

    spinning woodworker was the Messiah.  The believers were Jews, a

    people who had been living under the oppressive thumb of distant

    conquerors on and off for nearly 750 years.6  At the moment, the Jews

    were dominated by the arrogant, militaristic Romans, who had

    swallowed up the Hebrew state and made it part of The Empire.  The

    prophets of old had predicted that someday a savior would come who

    would liberate the Jews from their humiliation.  That champion would

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