Depends on the sect. I'm henotheisic, for example. There is no one way in this faith.
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Question about God. or Gods
- Thread starter Spirit of Light
- Start date
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
Depends on who taught you. My Hinduism does not need Gods.
Your father was also an atheist?Depends on who taught you. My Hinduism does not need Gods.
stvdv
Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
True that depends on the Teacher. Another Teacher went one step further: Only God (Consciousness) exists (is real)Depends on who taught you. My Hinduism does not need Gods.
I love Hinduism. Everything "seems" possible. 1 for All, or All for 1. And everything in between, and even outside also
stvdv
Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
No. Every one in my family was/is a theist. Though it was my deeply religious grandpa, a Smriti writer, who put me on the way to atheism by accepting Big Bang, evolution, plate tectonics, etc.
Readings from a 20th Century Hindu Law Book (Smriti) | Interfaith forums
From there, a road lead to atheism.
My father was and I am, a 'siddha'. We attained enlightenment. So to say, that I have gone farther than my grandpa or my father.
Readings from a 20th Century Hindu Law Book (Smriti) | Interfaith forums
From there, a road lead to atheism.
My father was and I am, a 'siddha'. We attained enlightenment. So to say, that I have gone farther than my grandpa or my father.
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Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
For me, that is a fact. And science supports that.Is that a belief or a fact.
"The model describes how the universe expanded from a very high-density and high-temperature state, and offers a comprehensive explanation for a broad range of phenomena, including the abundance of light elements, the cosmic microwave background (CMB), large-scale structure and Hubble's law (the farther away galaxies are, the faster they are moving away from Earth). If the observed conditions are extrapolated backwards in time using the known laws of physics, the prediction is that just before a period of very high density there was a singularity which is typically associated with the Big Bang."
Big Bang - Wikipedia
By many "Daos", are you meaning to refer to the Tao? There is no "many" of that. There is only the Tao, or the Way.
From Wiki:
"Laozi in the Tao Te Ching explains that the Tao is not a "name" for a "thing" but the underlying natural order of the Universe whose ultimate essence is difficult to circumscribe due to it being non-conceptual yet evident in one's being of aliveness."
There is no plural Tao.
Deity forms are aspects of our own psycho-spiritual makeups. Different gods archetypally represent different aspects of ourselves. Abrahamic monotheism creates a bit of a dearth when it comes to being able to relate to the divine as a human, having difficulty finding something one can relate aspects of themselves to any higher form. For instance, where is the Divine Feminine in Jehovah? The monotheistic God tends to be too limiting in this way.
Nobody who speaks about God sees the full truth. No ideas about God are the full truth.
Monotheism if understood in the context of say, the Tao, or Brahman, as Singular, can hold and contain all images of God. However, in the history of the Abrahamic traditions, an individual tribal deity form, Yahweh, become promoted above the other tribal deities to become the "one true God". I see this as a political move in order to unite the tribes with their various and favorite gods to a collective deity form, like having a single flag for the United States makes everyone an American. We all pledge our allegiance to that symbol.
While there may be spiritual, metaphysical reasons for holding a monotheistic view, when it comes to its history in society, the driving force, or rather a major contributing force is political. "We need one God we can all come together behind and support as a nation". That the only thing that can get rid of the naturally differing views that arise regarding the nature of the divine.
All images of God are not its Reality. They are faces we put upon the Infinite to speak to ourselves and one another in the culturally, and humanly relative realities we live in. Face of God evolve, right along with us. As it should.
I think like you, I try to make sense of the mythologies of my parent religion, both rationally, and spiritually. Understanding that concepts of God, are different from experiences of God, as well as understanding the evolution of social and cultural landscapes, as well as understanding the relative nature of reality as perceived through the our minds, brings some practical as well as meaningful framework on which to look into these "transcendent" aspects of our humanity.
God as we conceive Him, does not exist. It is a reflection of ourselves, both our social and cultural self, as well as at times that of our "higher Self" exposed through transcendent experience. But it is still an image of the mind. And the Reality beyond that image, is what is truly "God". It exists, beyond conception. So we need to be open to seeing beyond the set of eyes we filter reality through. Understanding how we frame reality and how that shapes its truth to us, is the beginning of seeing beyond it.
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Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
At least till the delusion dissipates. Then you can go back to the simple and direct.
Chop wood
Carry water
I guess it all depends on what you accept as truth. I was raised to believe in one God and the Bible as his written word. It itself explains the existence of other gods.
In Eden for example, satan wanted to "be like God" and have humans do his bidding. He was the first false god....self appointed. Jesus called him "the ruler of this world".....a 'wannabe' deity who tries to mimic the true God to deceive mankind into false worship. At that early stage he was alone.
Then other angels rebelled like he did and materialized to engage in what angels were never designed to do...to cohabit with women and produce offspring. These grew into gigantic creatures with violent and licentious dispositions.
The flood of Noah's day eliminated them from existence, but the legends about them were carried by the flood survivors all over the earth and were embellished over time to become the gods and demi-gods of Greek and Norse mythology.
The Bible is my only guide and I see no need for other gods. I am especially repulsed by idolatry, so when I see people make images of strange looking gods, it just turns me right off.
To me Jehovah is the true God...our one and only Creator....and the Bible answers all my questions in a satisfactory way, eliminating doubts.
The Dao is the wisdom that emanates from the Source of reality...
Daoist ideologies have Three Pure Ones that manifested reality, these were the origins of Lao Tzu, in other words he was the same as a Bodhisattva/Avatar.
Buddha is an incarnation of Vishnu, where there have been 24 incarnations, the 25th is the rider on the white horse (Kalki)...
The same as we find in the book of Revelation, that there are 24 Elders who sit around the throne of God Almighty, the 25th is the rider on the white horse...
In the past these were called the Divine Council (Psalms 82:1), in the Bible there is one Source, El Elyon (God Most High), and then the Elohim which is plural Divine Beings.
The Quran tries to rectify the same issue, it references the Divine Council (38:69, 37:8), and basically summarizes that we should worship the Source, not the beings made by it.
The problem is after the Babylonian Exile, Judaism tried to remove polytheistic ideas they encountered, and in the process changed the contexts.
Clear examples of this can be seen in Deuteronomy 32:7-9 where the God Most High divides the nations among the Elohim, and gives Israel specifically to YHVH.
No one sees a full jigsaw puzzle, until we know where the pieces go, and how they fit; which sometimes requires knowing how the overall picture looks to know if it is right.
The Bible says the plural Divine Beings (Elohim) created reality, with Yah-Havah (Lord Creation) being the same as saying Lord Brahma...
Where both breathed out a song/word and made reality, both served the Source.
In my opinion.
Maimonides (based on the Talmud if I'm not mistaken) brings the origin of polytheism - worship of other entities besides God: At first, mankind worshiped God. Then they began worshiping His servants - the sun, the clouds, etc, because they were dependent on those for day-to-day needs. Then they discovered that by doing certain acts they could make the sun shine, the clouds rain, the plants grow, etc. And this was easier than turning to God, who doesn't automatically give whatever you want. So they tossed away God and stayed with the cosmic-servant-worship, which eventually evolved into various polytheistic religions.
I think we have a better understanding of these things today through the tools of modern research as to the evolution of polytheism and monotheism, than a Jewish philosopher who lived in the 12th century. Anthropology sees animistic systems first in human evolution, then later polytheistic systems, then henotheistic systems and monolatry (the worship of one primary deity while not denying other deities), then monotheism appears coming out of those, which sees there is only one God and no others. This didn't appear in history until Egypt in the 14th century BCE.
There are reasons why this is the natural progression which we find historically to be generally be the case. It follows developmental lines in how we relate to the world from early childhood development, where everything is seen as controlled by invisible threads connected to oneself, i.e., the cloud is following me; my shadow is attached to me and I can control it, etc.
This then gives way to an externalization of power that the forces of the world are controlled by other more powerful beings than ourselves, the spirits and gods, etc. This then becomes consolidated into another system of magic in monotheism where everything is controlled by a single deity, rather than multiple ones. This then eventually can and does give way to other systems of power and control, such as rationalistic systems, and beyond.
I'm not an expert in anthropology, so to me it seems like a theory. And Maimonides provides a different theory. So why should one hold that one theory is better than another? I mean, do we have a way of asking the ancients what went on in their minds?
MonkeyFire
Well-Known Member
Elohim (Jewish for YHWH) is the God of gods.
Basically what sets the Abrahamic religions apart from all the other religions is their insistence that there is only one God and we should only worship this one God. This belief is due to what we view as revelations from this God and experiences we may have on our own.
Interestingly, monotheism or related beliefs are actually a lot older than most people think. It's common even in indigenous tribal religions to have a supreme deity and then many lesser spirits who help with the running of nature below it. That's how West African Voudon works, which is why it is easily syncreticized with Catholicism. Some Native American tribes have their Great Spirit and so on. Even the polytheistic Japanese Shinto religion has a supreme deity that is above all the rest in their mind - Amaterasu. The earliest known evidence of human worship of deities seems to involve some great mother goddess. The grand pantheons of classical paganism are really the newer developments in history. But even the ancient Greeks were discovering monotheism on their own before Christianity was accepted. Plato already had his notion of the One and Zeus was clearly being seen as the supreme Creator and all-mighty father of all (sound familiar?) by his more educated followers.
So monotheism really isn't that strange. It can be deduced by observing that there's an underlying unity to nature and that the universe is harmonious, follows laws and is not chaotic as you might expect with a system of many competing forces or entities. Does that mean that the other deities (small 'g' gods) human worship are evil entities fooling people? I don't think so, at least not all of them. I think that's a paranoid and simplistic explanation. After all, some of these deities apparently encouraged virtue, honor and an appreciation for truth, beauty and the good in their followers. How could that ever be evil, from whatever source you get it? It could be viewed as confusing the trees with the forest. The point is to look beyond and higher to see the true picture. Either way, polytheism is just another chapter of humanity's striving to commune with and understand the Divine, even if one views it as being in error.
Interestingly, monotheism or related beliefs are actually a lot older than most people think. It's common even in indigenous tribal religions to have a supreme deity and then many lesser spirits who help with the running of nature below it. That's how West African Voudon works, which is why it is easily syncreticized with Catholicism. Some Native American tribes have their Great Spirit and so on. Even the polytheistic Japanese Shinto religion has a supreme deity that is above all the rest in their mind - Amaterasu. The earliest known evidence of human worship of deities seems to involve some great mother goddess. The grand pantheons of classical paganism are really the newer developments in history. But even the ancient Greeks were discovering monotheism on their own before Christianity was accepted. Plato already had his notion of the One and Zeus was clearly being seen as the supreme Creator and all-mighty father of all (sound familiar?) by his more educated followers.
So monotheism really isn't that strange. It can be deduced by observing that there's an underlying unity to nature and that the universe is harmonious, follows laws and is not chaotic as you might expect with a system of many competing forces or entities. Does that mean that the other deities (small 'g' gods) human worship are evil entities fooling people? I don't think so, at least not all of them. I think that's a paranoid and simplistic explanation. After all, some of these deities apparently encouraged virtue, honor and an appreciation for truth, beauty and the good in their followers. How could that ever be evil, from whatever source you get it? It could be viewed as confusing the trees with the forest. The point is to look beyond and higher to see the true picture. Either way, polytheism is just another chapter of humanity's striving to commune with and understand the Divine, even if one views it as being in error.
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That doesn't mean he wasn't onto something. Also, that neat delineation of stages of human religion is simplistic and untrue. I think it's outdated. The earliest examples of human religion appears to be some sort of mother or fertility goddess cult judging by those "Venus" figurines along with animal cult totemism and shamanism. We don't see these pantheons of deities until within the last 10,000 years or so. If I'm mistaken, I have no problem admitting it.
it's a theory based up researching multiple cultures and looking at the evidences, then seeing how it fits the data. It's a scientific approach.
Maimonides did not utilize these tools, as he lived in the pre-enlightenment world which did not use a scientific approach. So the information we have, and theories based upon that information, are more realistic and better supported. So, there is greater weight given to those with supporting data, over thinkers of the 12th century, when it comes to things like this.
Yes, in fact, we do have a way to see what was in their minds through these sciences. We analyze literature, architecture, pottery, and a list of things which give insights into daily life, worldviews, religious practices, and so forth. That's the power of modernity.
Milton Platt
Well-Known Member
Lyndon, I'm confused. How can you believe there is only one god and be polytheistic?
pol·y·the·ism
/ˈpälēTHēˌizəm/
Learn to pronounce
noun
- the belief in or worship of more than one god.
Wouldn't you say, though, that all (or much) of archeology is speculation?