THE GOD-WORD AND OTHER CONCEPTS
Umm … you’ve probably noticed. I’ve tried to avoid it. The God-word. The thing is that the word is so loaded that it’s become a serious hindrance. “What’s in a word?” we ask. But when it comes to the God-word – a great deal. It’s amazing how much baggage can be hung on just one word.
Some clever folk ask, “Who created God?”, and often the honest answer is, “We have.” The ideas, conceptions, ideals and what not, with which the word God has been endowed, are almost entirely of human origin and conception. The God of religion has been largely conceived in the mind of human beings.
We’ve even gone so far as to consider that He has a particular name or names in one language or another, forgetful of the fact that a human word is just a sound or a sequence of letters to which – in our minds – we have ascribed a meaning. If you don’t happen to speak or read that language, then that word has no meaning at all. And anyway, languages evolve and die. They, too, are human creations.
The One Being, the Silent One, is beyond all names and concepts. He is nameless. “The name that can be named is not the real Name.” His big Being is the essence of our little being. Did we but know it, there is no difference between the two. He is what we are, and we are what He is. That means that He is within us, for us, of us. Any hint of an idea that He is ‘out there’, ‘up there’ or even ‘in there’ – that He is anything other than the essence of our own being – is fallacious. In fact, when we even conceptualize Him as our own ‘essence’, we have gone astray. He has got nothing whatsoever to do with any of our concepts. He’s not what we think.
Yet, although we may think we understand all this mystical stuff about the One, and know that He is beyond all human conception, we may still cherish a concept in our mind of a God built somewhat in the image of our own cultural conditioning.
And if we put all our effort into trying to realize a mental concept, to feel the presence of an intellectual construct, then that concept will hold us back. Such concepts, held without our even realizing it, can unknowingly hinder us.
So let’s call Him anything but God. Let’s pretend we never even heard the God-word at all, and start from scratch in our understanding of the One Being. In fact, let’s let go of any attempt to form any opinion or concept of what He is like. Let’s admit that we can’t understand Him. After all, the Buddhists get along fine without a concept of God, as we might understand it. They have no problem developing a deep spiritual life in the absence of a God-concept. They seek a state of being. Nirvana. But is there a difference between God and nirvana? Only in the realm of concepts.
And while we’re on the subject, let’s realize that all our other concepts are just that, too. Just mental hot air inside our heads. Just constructs. And that includes our concepts of heaven, hell, soul, reincarnation, the creation, and a bunch of other words we’ve largely avoided in this book because they’re loaded with all kinds of cultural and religious stuff, and trigger a conditioned concept. Yes, and our concepts of the mind, the One Being, the Word, and so on – they are all just concepts. We can use them as tools, as communication devices, as ways of trying to understand things at a human level. But if we get to thinking that our concepts are reality itself, then we’re on the wrong track. Or so it seems to me, in my conceptual mind. A description of something is not the thing itself.
Realizing that our understanding of God is mostly conceptual is significant when we get to thinking whether or not such a Power really exists. The existence, or otherwise, of a God is a question asked by everyone who wants to understand things for themselves. Yet the enquiry is rarely prefaced by a rigorous consideration of what we actually mean when we speak of God.
Just ask ten people what they understand by the word ‘God’, you will probably get ten different answers. Most will offer confused conceptions drawn from a mix of social, religious, cultural, and personal influences. Some will describe a God based upon religious beliefs and the reading of religious texts. Some might cast Him in an anthropomorphic light, as a God given to human emotions, liable to be pleased or to take offence at human conduct. A few might portray Him as a universal spirit or as a transcendent, absolute Reality. The varied conceptions will reflect each individual’s mindset, but can never begin to touch the Reality.
We may know God by any name or understand Him by any concept – none will do Him justice. Many folk instinctively reject the God or gods of religious doctrine, yet consciously or unconsciously know Him by another name. As Nature, Beauty, Love, or simply as Something – unknown and universal, beyond all human conceptions and divisions.
Those who try to debunk the notion of a God sometimes take the easy way. It’s very simple. First, you set up a straw God, choosing the most bizarre aspects of the many prevalent conceptions of the Divine. Then you set fire to it, taking the concept apart with the weapons of bald reason, cynicism, and ridicule. But it’s a facile approach. Gives atheism a bad name. Anything can be ‘proved’ by setting up a ridiculous Aunt Sally, and then demolishing it. Many spiritually-minded people also reject such conceptions of the Divine, realizing that there is a far more intelligent way to understand the nature of the divine Principle at the heart of things.
Whether or not we believe in such a Power, a fair discussion of the matter requires proper consideration of the notion of God, of the one divine Being. And acceptance of the fact that should such a Being exist, then His nature is going to be far beyond the reach of human argument, discussion, and description.
In reality, proof or its absence play little part in whether or not we believe in the Transcendent. Heartfelt belief or non-belief in Him do not really arise from reason and logic, though they may be supported by it. They arise from awareness, consciousness, perception, and understanding. If we have an inner sense that there is something bigger than ourselves, holding everything together, then we will feel that we believe in a God, however we may conceive of Him. If we are so inclined, we may then try to justify that belief by reason.
But if we have no such feeling, and think that “life, the universe, and everything” provide no indication of the existence of a higher Being, then we will have no such belief, and may argue the case accordingly.
Of course, cultural, religious and social influences may also have a significant part to play in our belief or non-belief in God. And mere belief in the existence of a divine Power is not necessarily companion to a spiritual disposition. Belief needs to be transformed into awareness and experience. Yet whatever our beliefs or experience, it is important that we feel free to consider things for ourselves, and respectfully allow others to do the same.
