How many of you have read the Brave New World by Aldous Huxley?

Question

What spiritual lessons did you learn from it?

Thank you

I believe the book inspired many movies like Equillibrium.

It describes a world in the future where humans have abolished all wars, and are seemingly happy, but theyve also gotten rid of what makes us human.

its one of my favorites too ^^

Answer 1

Without God, the whole world is upside down.

Answer 2

Pookong rocks!

Seriously, I carried away the idea that people need goals and a sense of ownership of their lives. Society is not supposed to be a well-run machine with a place for everyone and everyone in their place. Compare a vacuum cleaner. When it gets blocked, the motor turns faster, becoming more efficient, because there's no more air to push, but it doesn't do anything. So Bernard's world of entertainment and distraction works very efficiently, yet adds up to nothing meaningful. He only grows when he is exposed to contradictory ideas, like those of the Savage.

This doesn't ennoble the Savage, he's got just as many hangups as Bernard, but he has the freedom to explore different ideas. Bernard's only option is Coventry, complete removal from a world that can't tolerate ideological "contamination".

The problem with utopias is that they require a limited set of rules and concepts. They can't grow or change. But life is all about growth and change. Religions are the same way. They are started as a defense against the perceived, random cruelty of the world. In their beginning stages, they relieve suffering, solve problems, explain the incomprehensible to those who would otherwise be unable to cope. But at some point, people start writing stuff down, crafting creeds and rules, proclaiming absolute answers for the changing world. And all thinking is suppressed except for apologetic defenses of the new faith. Then new conditions develop, new understandings of the world arise, challenging the creeds that "everyone knows", and the saving faith becomes another oppressive tyranny. Exile, excommunication and execution keep the faith pruned, "pure" and dead.

You have to keep growing. You can't just draw a line and proclaim, here is perfection. Even a religion must listen, learn and grow, or it will stagnate and become rancid, like Bernard's world.

Answer 3

I'm surprised that schools will allow you to read it, let alone require it. It might be a bit heavy going at first. I would suggest you find a copy of Ayn Rand's short novel "Anthem", and read that first. It's not as long or dark as Huxley, but it might be a good quick read to ramp up to the subject. It might also be a good reference should you have an essay test. Where Huxley leaves you to figure out what's missing in the "perfect" society, Rand pretty much spells it out in a single word.

Answer 4

That's one of my favorite books, actually.

One of the things I learned from it is that for every step of "progress" mankind takes, something must be sacrificed:

The people in Brave New World didn't have to worry about competition; their class was chosen at random before they were "born."

There was no need to fight, because there was nothing to fight for.

There was no emotional pain, because there was no love, and death meant nothing.

I don't know how "spiritual" the lessons I derived from it are, but those are just some of the lessons that I learned. I could write pages about that book.

Answer 5

It was a super long time ago -- back in High School I believe (1983). Not sure what spiritual lessons I might have derived from it -- but I did gather insight towards being true to myself through the reading of it. Might be time to reread and see what I gather from its pages this time around. Good question!

Answer 6

It's one of my favorite books, but apparently I've drawn very different conclusions from those everyone else has drawn. I don't believe it's a pro-God, pro-religion treatise because if it was, then why would Huxley have written it? Huxley was agnostic/atheist, and one of his later works, Island, which depicts a blissful, utopian society in contrast to our own, portrays organized religion as one of the biggest obstacles to happiness and stability in human personality and society.

It's true that the Savage in Brave New World longed for a less empty world, a more romantic world like those he'd read about in Shakespeare and had been raised to believe in his Native American/Christian society, but it doesn't idealize this concept either since he ends up physically punishing himself and later committing suicide. The world presented in the book also has it's own flawed belief system. The worship of "Ford," material possessions, mindless sex, and the effeciency of the industrial system. That is that society's religion. It's not that different from our own, in a way, if you think about it. Sure, we pray to God or G-d or Allah and Vishnu and his avatars and Jesus Christ and deities like that, but most of us, even those of us who claim another religion are still in a way worshiping post-industrial, consumer-capitalism.

I think instead of promoting God, the book is promoting self-inquiry, non-conformity, individualism and free-thought, which in of themselves can be "holy" in a way; while also criticizing materialism, consumerism, industrialism, collectivism, conformity, etc.

Answer 7

I have (it's one of my favorite books), but I can't say that I learned any spiritual lessons from it.

Answer 8

SPIRITUAL lessons? The only lessons I learned from that book were social and political lessons, and the dangers of Fascism disguised as nationalism.

Answer 9

Consumerism is evil.
Civilization comes at a price.
There will always be death.
We marginalize outsiders at our peril.

Answer 10

I read it. It's one of my fav books. I learned that Godless societies suck.