Talking animals is one of those concepts that presently falls under the category of "impossible things." We are not socially permitted to expect or believe that any animal will ever be given the gift of speech. Birds of paradise are not really an exception. They are merely reproducing things that they have heard. When I am talking about speech, I am saying that these animals can communicate on a level that humans communicate with each other.
The heavy occurrence of talking animals in fairy tales leads me to believe that it was an actual thing. It was even recorded in the Bible. Some might argue that the talking donkey in question was merely being puppetted by God, but I don't think so because of the context around what the donkey actually said.
You see, the donkey in the Biblical tale was being abused by a man named Balaam. There was something only it could see blocking its way, and the human, seeing him as stubborn, began to beat him. Once God gave him the temporary gift to communicate, the donkey goes on to ask why in the world he was being persecuted after a lifetime of good service. The donkey had no idea why his master would not just... understand something was wrong. The donkey was clearly not being puppetted. He was expressing his own frustrations with Balaam. The only direct intervention from God came in the form of allowing the donkey to interpret and speak his mind.
Animals do have feelings. They can get frustrated. They go through a lot of similar emotions that we do, but they don't, under normal circumstances, have the cognitive ability or the bodily structure to express how they feel. But if they were given the ability, you can bet that they would have something to say.
Being given the ability to speak will not make them any less of an animal though. When Balaam's donkey was given the gift of gab, he was still very much a donkey who would still live a donkey's life. Even if he was permitted to keep talking, he wouldn't say much more than, "Is it time for hay? Do you need me to carry this? Can we stop and rest now? Wait... what are you gonna do with that branding iron there?" All donkey thoughts. And I don't really think there is anything particularly interesting about donkey thoughts other than the fact that we are actually hearing them spoken out loud.
But imagine a time in our history where there may have been quite a number of animals speaking here and there. There are many reasons why this could have been happening. I'll cover two of them.
The first concept was the idea of Magical Saturation. This happens in an age where magic and mysticism is more prevalent. The animals are talking because the people ruling the Earth want them to be talking. And so we let them. As I pointed out before, they will only speak to topics that naturally concern them and nothing more. They are still animals, you see.
The second concept has to do with Angelic Genetic Intervention. This is the idea that angels were manipulating animal DNA and combining it with their own in order to produce strange results, such as a talking animal. In these cases, the animals might act a bit more like humans and exhibit far more intelligence. They may also, at times, attempt to walk upright. This is also something we have noticed in older fairy tales, but not all of them.
Most angelic hybrids usually end up looking a bit more gaudy though. By gaudy, I am referring to a human body with a realistic animal head on it. But there might be other ways the genetic code could be manipulated. So this is a possibility.
Despite hardly anyone believing this is possible, we constantly surround ourselves with talking animals in cartoons. Bugs Bunny. Mickey Mouse. Yogi Bear. I could name a whole lot more, but I think you got the idea. We seem to be okay with talking animals from a purely fictional perspective, at least. We accept these ancient tales of people speaking openly with animals as a regularity. We accept that it is a canon part of the Bible. Yet ask anyone if animals can talk, and they won't give you very much positive feedback. It's impossible apparently. Despite being surrounded by the concept, nobody really believes in it.
My point is that we seem strangely comfortable with something that the vast majority of people call ridiculous. And all I am saying is... it's not really that ridiculous. It just doesn't happen anymore. But maybe someday... Well... You never know. History has been known to repeat from time to time.
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In the Bible, after the Flood, God told humans to eat animals as they eat plants. What if people didn't eat animals because they were talking during that time? What if animals lost the gift of speech when the speech of men was confounded at the Tower of Babel? Truth is indeed stranger than fiction, so let us entertain the "impossible" possibilities.
ReplyDeleteI wondered about the Tower of Babel too, but there isn't enough evidence. Its hard to tell what happened at this point.
DeleteA very fascinating thought talking animals. Why not, we very well may have some ingrained memories of animals who talked that inspired anthro fiction. Of course an animal would still be an animal, most of what they talked about would be food.
ReplyDeleteI thought that too. It seems to obvious to us even though it never happens.
DeleteIt's a good thing dogs cannot talk. If we could understand what they were saying, it would make about as much sense as their barking. Better to let them keep making funny noises.
ReplyDeleteWell, I don't think it was precisely like that in the old days. It would probably be like that now though.
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