Transformation

People roll their eyes when you talk about the butterfly as a symbol of transformation. As if it is just banal, so commonplace to turn into an entirely new creature!

Really, it is a spectacular event, a miraculous metamorphosis, and just by being able to name the parts of a caterpillar, chrysalis or butterfly, or rattle off words to describe the process like holometabolism, histolysis or histogenesis doesn’t mean we really know what goes on in that metamorphic event.

Ask MetaFilter describes the metamorphosis this way:

Whilst inside the pupa, the insect will excrete digestive juices, to destroy much of the larva’s body, leaving a few cells intact. The remaining cells will begin the growth of the adult, using the nutrients from the broken down larva.

The way I read it, that means an organism is killed and then used to create a new organism. In Sunday School, they called that being raised from the dead.

Which is hardly banal. I mean, do you know anyone (other than divinity) who could pull that off?

Well, a caterpillar can!

Transformation

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