• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

What does the word God really mean to most people?

Frog

Cult of Kek.
It seem like everybody has their own opinion on the word so much as to give the word a false reality. Take the word Love instance, it is used about as much or more as that of God.

Do we have to ask everybody what they mean when the word God is used in conversation or can we all just get behind a single idea.

Would be it true to say we know nothing of what anybody really means when they say speak and every word that breatheth out of man is contradictory or relatively useless. Nihilism starts to make sense.
 

Attachments

  • download (9).jpg
    download (9).jpg
    40.7 KB · Views: 0

dfnj

Well-Known Member
It seem like everybody has their own opinion on the word so much as to give the word a false reality. Take the word Love instance, it is used about as much or more as that of God.

Do we have to ask everybody what they mean when the word God is used in conversation or can we all just get behind a single idea.

Would be it true to say we know nothing of what anybody really means when they say speak and every word that breatheth out of man is contradictory or relatively useless. Nihilism starts to make sense.

Nihilism never makes sense because it is self-contradictory. Yes, one interpretation of reality is everything is meaningless. But it is also meaningless that it is meaningless.

God is just a word. Nobody denies the existence of the word God. We do not experience "God" the way we can experience "apple". Many religious traditions believe in a pantheistic type God where all of existence is evidence for God's being. And other traditions believe in a Abramaic God who exists in our words, language, and deeds as we judge each other. If you believe in an omnipotent God, then since God is just a word, then God can be both pantheistic and Abramaic at the same time. Many people just accept that there is not a single shred of evidence for the existence of God but then choose to believe in a particular type of God out of faith. It may be delusional nonsense to atheists, but for people of faith, holding the assumption of a particular type of God exists and is real allows them to live a particular type of life experiencing a sense of a divine nature to existence. Is it right, is it wrong, on the cosmic timescale everything we think and do is completely insignificant. But it is also completely insignificant that it is insignificant. So we might was well choose a particular delusion that gives us divine meaning in our lives since it really doesn't matter either way.

God is just a word. What the word God represents is all that is, all that will be, all that could ever be imagined, and all that could ever possibly be realized. God is unique in our language because it represents all words and semantic associations. God is more than the Flying Spaghetti Monster. If the Flying Spaghetti Monster represented everything God represented, then it would just be God with a different spelling.
 

stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
Hello Frog, welcome to RF

Very good question you started with in your first post
[We had this question before, but so far not all members could agree to the same definition]

For me God means:
"That which is the cause of Creation"
"Bigger than the biggest AND smaller than the smallest AND all in between"
 
Last edited:

Jim

Nets of Wonder
It seem like everybody has their own opinion on the word so much as to give the word a false reality. Take the word Love instance, it is used about as much or more as that of God.

Do we have to ask everybody what they mean when the word God is used in conversation or can we all just get behind a single idea.

Would be it true to say we know nothing of what anybody really means when they say speak and every word that breatheth out of man is contradictory or relatively useless. Nihilism starts to make sense.

It’s a way to make analogies between our relationships with the world around us, and our relationships with people. The word “God” takes the place of a person in each analogy, but the kind of person it represents varies widely. That person can be a cruel and unprincipled warlord, or a wise king, or a loving father, or a magician, or whatever He needs to be, to fit the analogy.
 

stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
Would be it true to say we know nothing of what anybody really means when they say speak and every word that breatheth out of man is contradictory or relatively useless

Seems a smart observation. Silence is the language of the wise. So babbling seems the language of the "unwise"
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
It seem like everybody has their own opinion on the word so much as to give the word a false reality. Take the word Love instance, it is used about as much or more as that of God.

Do we have to ask everybody what they mean when the word God is used in conversation or can we all just get behind a single idea.

When people use the word 'God' (with a capital 'G'), I think most are referring the the highest principle in their personal hierarchy of being. What that is will vary between individuals based on their religious or spiritual belief structure.

Would be it true to say we know nothing of what anybody really means when they say speak and every word that breatheth out of man is contradictory or relatively useless. Nihilism starts to make sense.

This is only true if one makes assumptions. If one is unclear about what another is communicating, the onus is on them to ask questions before coming to a conclusion.
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
God is the ideal being, the most holy and virtuous one. The one who makes all things possible. The Benevolent One. God is all about brotherhood and sisterhood. God is all about charity. God is omnipresent, omniscient, ever present in time of need. God is the defender of righteousness. The Maker of dinosaurs and kimodo dragons. The author of all souls. The Lord of righteousness whom bestows free will upon us all. God is from everlasting to everlasting. The Great and the Just is God. Perfect Peace and Justice. All knowing! The Judge of All. God is Love.

If God is real then i promise to do my darndest to never eat pork again.

God!
 

Frog

Cult of Kek.
Seems a smart observation. Silence is the language of the wise. So babbling seems the language of the "unwise"
I am on your level too. I have read many times on alternative forms of Christian mysticism such as (truthcontest) which is a compilation of many prophets and masters, and they seem to agree that words that come from the mind are coming from an impure state by an organic being, its mind the devil. Basically, and all we have to do is reach the christ-conciousness or godhead spirit-conscious found in the present moment to ascend into the infinite. Some aspects of this I can agree completely with. I have felt flickers of the infinite and im sure many here have under times of sudden awareness.
 

Frog

Cult of Kek.
This is only true if one makes assumptions. If one is unclear about what another is communicating, the onus is on them to ask questions before coming to a conclusion.
ughh, how on earth will I get that many volunteers. I would really like to know just how many people think this about god and think that and categorize them all. Humans are not abstract when it comes to a primitive ideology such as Christianity, i bet there would be less than 2 dozen classes or sub categories, some I would imagine would disagree completely with any notion of the word.
? my question mark is brokenÉÉÉÉÉ
 

Earthling

David Henson
The question isn't so much what the meaning of the word god is,that is simple. Anyone or anything that is considered mighty or is venerated. The difficulty lies in the application. You have to ask, not what one means by using the word god, but rather who the person's god is. In predominately Muslim countries the term Allah is evident. The God. In Western culture the term could be applied to anyone or anything. Nearly all gods have names, but using the name itself is ambiguous regarding divinity. On the other hand an atheist or agnostic can use the word God without attributing divinity to the god, so use of the word doesn't imply personal devotion. I suppose in context all of this will manifest itself. The meaning, the name, the application and the devotion or lack thereof.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
ughh, how on earth will I get that many volunteers. I would really like to know just how many people think this about god and think that and categorize them all. Humans are not abstract when it comes to a primitive ideology such as Christianity, i bet there would be less than 2 dozen classes or sub categories, some I would imagine would disagree completely with any notion of the word.
? my question mark is brokenÉÉÉÉÉ
Your keyboard setting switched to another language (Canadian multilingual, I'm guessing?). Press the left ALT & left shift key together to change your language to the next one in the list. If that doesn't work, press them again.

If it still doesn't work, look in your system tray for the language setting icon.
 

David T

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
It’s a way to make analogies between our relationships with the world around us, and our relationships with people. The word “God” takes the place of a person in each analogy, but the kind of person it represents varies widely. That person can be a cruel and unprincipled warlord, or a wise king, or a loving father, or a magician, or whatever He needs to be, to fit the analogy.
Its a term thats metamorphed into a separate term from nature itself. Noahs ark is easy from a pre literate aboriginal perspective its impossible from a modern literate perspective. I had this conversation in a thread ken ham and noahs ark. I pushed the story back into pre literate history and my gosh the atheists had a heart attack. That was interesting in how they manifested a totally christian view in that regards!!!!
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Based on how most people use the word "God," I infer that it means a magical being who:

- grants wishes, albeit capriciously and inconsistently, and
- is always right and always agrees with the believer, making the believer consider themselves automatically right on all important issues.
 
Top