The Great Rift Valley

Tomorrow I set off for Kenya, arriving in Nairobi early enough to remind that time does exist before 8am. I'm hoping to spend two days there finding my feet, before potentially heading to Hell's Gate National Park where I will awe at nature's wonder that is the Great Rift Valley.

Caused by shifting tectonic plates over 6 million years, with the usual seismic, volcanic and general geological activity, it starts in Lebanon, descends through Israel and the Palestinian territories (creating the lowest point on dry land in the Dead Sea), Sinai peninsula, down through the Red Sea, into Ethiopia, into Kenya (where it causes the many lakes to form...Nakuru, Naivasha, Victoria, etc...), then splits in two and continues southward.

Coincidentally, I travelled to Israel, the Palestinian territories and Jordan at the beginning of the summer; a trip I had long awaited to do, but only just now found the right time. So not only does the Great Rift Valley divide the Western plate from the Eastern plate, it also neatly separates my summer as the starting point for two (incredible) journeys.

However, this is a mere note compared to what it can truly represent. Research has hypothesised (convincingly) that the seismic activity in Africa between these two plates caused a group of prehistoric ape like creatures to be divided. Those left on the West side of the valley were surrounded by jungle and high trees, so they learned to climb, and those left to the East of the valley were surrounded by long grass, so they had to learn to stand on two feet to see any oncoming predators. It was a step towards vindicating Darwin, but also in correcting him. We did not come from monkeys, but from a common ancestor. The speed of evolution was increased as a direct consequence of an earthquake. Evidence that has been found in the area includes the legendary Lucy - the prime example of bipedal ancestor of homo sapiens. So not only does it separate the West from the East, but it also separates man from beast.

However! There is more. On the northern tip of the Great Rift is none other than the founding stones of the Abrahamic religions: the Dome of the Rock (under which sits the rock that supposedly created the world and where Abraham came to sacrifice his son to Jehovah (after which Jerusalem was named) before and angel stopped him, and where the Prophet Muhammed came to ascend into heaven on a one night journey from Mecca) which sits on the Temple Mt (destroyed originally by Babylonians when Jewish faith first became monotheistic, and Jesus predicted its destruction and subsequently was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD marking the exile of Jews from Eretz Yisrael), Mt Sinai on the Sinai Peninsula (where Moses descended with the 10 commandments, 613 rules of the Torah, and God roared to the 600,000 Hebrews present at the time), the Dead Sea (where the Dead Sea scrolls were found, some of the oldest known Hebrew scriptures), the Jordan River and Jericho (where Jesus was baptised, lived and was tempted by the devil), Sodom and Gomorrah (the depraved cities of Genesis), Mecca itself, the Red Sea, etc....And on the other end is evidence to the contrary, evidence for evolution.

The Great Rift not only divides man from beast, West from East, Asia from Africa, the developed from the underdeveloped, it divides science from religion and finally God from man.

Interestingly enough, internal division in these two adjacent but divided worlds has caused much violence based on identity (Check out Identity and Violence by Amartya Sen): the Crusades, WWI and the Jewish/Palestinian conflict have scarred the northern tip of the valley...and not so far removed, British colonialists, Rwandan Genocide, military dictatorship have marked the southern tip of the valley. A topic a bit too ambitious for this post...nonetheless, it would seem that division and violence are intertwined together, but independent of religion and science.