Soul Notes

NATURE OF GOD

Each of us, regardless of our religious orientation, has an opinion of what God may be. Unfortunately, mankind has tried to define God in humanistic terms. and that has caused us enormous problems through the centuries.

First, let's get rid of some serious misconceptions about God. We must begin by overcoming the name distinctions that somehow seem to give this one deity, many different personalities. The religious doctrines that use a certain name for God may be different, but, God, Allah, Jehova, the Great Spirit, Yaweh, Ometeotl, the High God, Brahman, and others, are all the same Supreme Spirit. Look to your own experience for an example: a man in the family can be a son, an uncle, a husband, a father, a brother, a nephew, a cousin, a senior vice president, a little league coach, a neighbor, and so forth, depending on the relationship established between him and another person but, he is the same guy, regardless of the title. So all of us, regardless of religious affiliation, relate to the same Supreme Deity. And, that means that regardless of our religious affiliations--- we are all bound in spiritual commonality to our one God.

Next, if we remove sexual reference to God, another barrier falls, increasing the commonality between the male and female genders, as they relate to God. Since we are on a roll here, let's eliminate race and culture from any concept of God and all the rest of the barriers come crashing down. Seeing God as a Supreme Spirit that is completely neutral to human characteristics, allows all human beings to have the same God. You see, in all religions, God is a spirit and, a spirit has no need for any of our human physical attributes. It doesn't need skin color when it has no skin, or sexual distinction when it doesn't have sex. Then, when we recognize that the spirit within each of us is also equally neutral to various human qualities, but identical to the spirit of God, now we've got something. Each of us is the same as the other. Each of us has within us, the spirit of God.

Placing the male gender on the Supreme God is found in all religions that have a single deity, and even some with multiple deities. The Greeks had many Gods, but Zeus, a male figure, was the top God. The Egyptians also worshipped many Gods of both sexes, but Ra, the masculine God of the Sun, was their chief God. When women show up in ancient religions and mythology, they occupy a lesser role than the males. Is that a surprise? It shouldn't be. Women have been treated as inferior from the days of the Adam and Eve story. The female race has always been considered secondary to the males in every society on earth. That does not mean it is right, but it is a fact that impacts modern day religion.

Since procreation of the race is the only biological reason for gender, sexual differences in a spiritual world seem absurd. Jehovah, has no need for sexual organs and therefore no need for sexual distinction. Also, the early writers of biblical works had to make God a "he", or a "she" because there were no other options. Today, with a concept of God as being a massive force of energized intellect, the term "it" would be an appropriate pronoun, but "it" was not a Hebrew or Aramaic word. So, in a masculine dominated society, where "he" or "she" were the only words available, the pronoun"he" won.

Then, we have the "old man in the sky" or "father figure" misconception. That doesn't work because, again, God is a spirit. Religious literature tells us, universally, and repeatedly, of God's form as a spirit. Spirits do not get old. Aging is a deterioration process of a living organism---like the human body. Spirits, from ancient descriptions to new scientific theories, appear to have the properties of energy, which can be changed but, can never be destroyed, therefore energy is eternal. If we consider God as the ultimate intellectual energy in all of the universes, our idea of an old man in the sky becomes childish and ridiculous.

When we understand God as a Supreme Spirit without gender, without age, without race, without any of the physical characteristics of being human, we can then begin to understand how we can be "created in God's image." We too have a spirit that is ageless, sexless, raceless, and without human physical characteristics. That, my dear, is our soul. It is our soul that is created "…in the image of God…." and that image is spiritual.

Somehow, the simplicity of a single Supreme Deity, common to all mankind, has eluded us throughout time. It is now pretty clear that, in general, people did not understand God in prehistoric days; they did not understand God as they were writing the texts that later became the world's Bibles; and people do not understand God today.

Much of the Old Testament writings depict God as a spiteful, angry being that picks and chooses among people, who to like, and who to hate. "Fear God" is the message. That God plays nasty tricks on people, can't control its own anger, has questionable loyalty to those that are obedient and faithful followers, and places guilt and potential damnation on billions of its creations, because of the shortcomings of the first two people. Hardly something that deserves to be worshipped or revered. Even in the New Testament, God is portrayed in a less than merciful role on many occasions. Immediately after the birth of Christ, an angel supposedly told Joseph to get his family out of town ---and quick. So he did. In the middle of the night, he packed up the baby Jesus, Mary, their belongings, and left. Turns out that king Herod had ordered every male child, under the age of two, ''in Bethlehem and all the coasts thereof", to be killed. Well, that is a lot of innocent children, and for what? Jesus was safe. He and is family were gone---halfway to Egypt by then. How could a merciful God have sat back and watched that happen? All those little children slaughtered during the first ever, Christmas season. That's a very bad start.

So, how do we reconcile these descriptions, and atrocities allegedly sanctioned by God, with the belief in a Supreme Spirit that represents ultimate love? Very simply. By elevating God back to the position of respect and of control that God deserves and by removing God as the cause, or as a willing participant, in our day to day lives and the calamities that confront us.

Even though, throughout the five books of the Bible, written by Moses, and elsewhere, God is often portrayed as a vicious being with barbarian-like qualities, my challenge to any biblical scholar is to prove that it was God that actually ordained and directed these acts, against my theory that God was not involved at all and, that Moses was a power hungry, ego-maniac who wrote his documents in a manner that made it appear that his own hatreds and perversions were direct orders from God himself. Remember, Moses was carrying a lot of emotional baggage. He was set adrift by his mother at an early age; raised by Egyptians who ruled harshly over his blood-line people; then, murdered a soldier and tried to hide the body, fled Egypt and was given a young girl in the town of Midian, who got pregnant and bore him a daughter, a daughter that he left behind when he and his family returned to Egypt following the death of all of his enemies. He claims to have been chosen by God to lead his people to the Promised Land, but after wandering around for forty years in the desert, he never did get there. Was he lost or was God lost? Seems that he was lost. He was a charismatic leader and people would listen to him. Once he had their ear, what better way to force his own will upon them than to claim that he was the very instrument of their God?

Now, there is a critical point here. It appears that the human race, beginning with Moses, has degraded God down to the size that we can understand and to which fits our own concept of the world around us. Until relatively recent, in earth time, the "universe" was the earth, the canopy of visible stars and planets, our sun and the moon. God, as described in those early days, fits neatly into the day to day lives of inhabitants of such a small little universe. The ancients claim to have spoken with him and witnessed his direct involvement with their lives, yet Jesus Christ tells us that no one has ever spoken to, or seen God. Muhammad was given the Qur'ãnic Revelation by the Archangel Gabriel. Muhammad did not see or hear God directly. Zoroaster, who preceded Moses, Jesus, Buddha, and Muhammad, was enlightened through meditation, but, he did not see or hear God either.

Was God really so involved with every day life back then, but not now, or would it be more reasonable to agree that God has not changed, early biblical writers just tried to force him into every event on the planet so they could make their point? But, as much as we know today, we still want God to come down to our level.

You want God to be personal to you, like the close girlfriend that you talk to, or your golfing buddy that knows some of your intimate secrets; someone you feel comfortable confiding in; someone you can count on when your life seems a little out of control; someone with whom to share your troubles, Do you see a pattern here? Do you see yourself and your everyday relationship with a Supreme Being? Do you see that you want God when you need God? Do you see that you need God when things are going wrong or bad in your life? We want a God that is a friend, a buddy; someone we can go to for help; someone that will listen to our problems and then take care of us in a fatherly way. By equating God to a spiritual "daddy" (I actually heard a preacher use that terminology) we reduce him down to our size.

Well, stop it. Hold on a minute. Clear your head. Listen to what is being said here. Listen to the childish way you have been taught, and the childish way you believe!!

God is the supreme ruler and the omnipotent power of all of the universes. God is a dimension of energy and power of a magnitude that is completely beyond our comprehension. And part of God is in you at this very moment. God is not "daddy in the sky" that you can love up to and get what you want from him; someone that will give into you because you are his child; someone that set the rules but, will change them because you begged or promised things in return.

Somehow, we just can't get past the self-serving notion that we are in control and that God is just sitting around waiting to show his benevolence by showering us with benefits, if we just ask. We place us at the center. If we don't ask we don't get. The whole idea that you can just turn to God, in prayer, and be granted your wishes is a carry over from your Santa Claus, and Tooth Fairy days. More importantly it leads to great disappointment that can even damage your faith when you are denied an important wish. If it is in the plan of God --- it will happen. If it is not in the plan of God---absolutely nothing will cause it to happen and, unless you have a better connection than all of the great biblical leaders (including Jesus Christ who, on the eve of his crucifixion, prayed for God to "…let this cup pass from me…") you are setting yourself up for a long and painful fall. God is the almighty Supreme Spirit that rules all of the universes and God's plan wins out every time, regardless of who you are, or who you think you are! Even Jesus acknowledged that by adding, "…nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt."

Listen carefully: God expects you to get involved with God's interests, it is not the other way around. You can wrap yourself in the security blanket, that "God loves me", and try to feel protected. You can throw out all manner of words and symbolism that give you a false sense of security, like, "God is my shield"; "he is my rock"; "he is a loving father and I am one of his children;" etc. The truth is, God is none of those things. God is God, an almighty and Supreme Spirit to which you owe everything; an almighty and Supreme Spirit of which you are a part. You are created as a spiritual being, modeled after God. A spiritual being existing on the earth---not an earthly being existing with a spirit.

Human beings were created through a developmental process over time, and when the cognitive senses (the ability to reason and comprehend) were formed, man was given "the image of God", the cosmic truths and the knowledge that supreme purity and goodness exists. However, not all men understand that they have the image of God within them and, even those that do understand are on different levels of attaining full development of reuniting their spirit with the spirit of God.

You are here to develop spiritually and that is what God is interested in. God did not "allow" all of little the children to be slaughtered on the first Christmas, it just happened. That is why aunt Virginia died such a painful death from cancer; that is why hundreds of thousands of soldiers die in wars; why people are slaughtered on our nation's highways. Those are human events of the human body and the physical world. When we try to bring God down to our level and to involve him in every thing in our life, we reinforce the false belief that he is always there to help us if we just ask, or if we just pray hard enough.

We live a double standard with our prayers. If we pray for aunt Virginia to live, and she does, we call it a miracle from God, right? When we pray for her and she dies, we call it the will of God. Once again, our ego gets in the way. If she died, then our praying was a failure so, we throw it back at God. "Hey, wasn't my fault, I prayed but, it was the will of God". If she lived we take great pride in telling everyone how we prayed day and night, at home, in the shower, at her bedside, and our prayers were answered by God. No mention of God's will is there? Apparently, God was going to let her die till we stepped in. Oh, we give some credit to God, but the center of attention is on us and our prayers. Remember the words "thy will be done"? Well it means all the time, in every situation. The will of God is not something you are going to change---ever.

Sad times can happen when people spend hours or days in prayer, and yet the prayers seem to go unanswered. Think for a moment of all of the comments you have heard regarding the death of a loved one. I have a few of the most popular:

Why did he have to die this way?

Why did she have to die so young?

What, did God not hear me?

Why did God ignore our prayers?

I have lived a good life, why is God punishing me?

Why did God turn his back on me?

Where was God when I really needed him?

Each of these questions, and many more that may come to your mind, reflect a disappointment with God. Some even reflect an anger that God didn't come through when he could have done so. It can be argued that these feelings toward God are a direct result of the buddy-buddy relationship that we have tried to establish with this Supreme Being. God is not our buddy waiting to come help us out in our physical world. God is not the "man upstairs", or the "old man in the sky". God is the master and creator of all of the universes. God alone set all things in motion and has all things working on a schedule and a plan. God is a spirit in a spiritual world and concerned only with your soul. If you can get a grip on that idea, the rest comes easy, the pieces begin to fit, the answers start pouring in.

We are taught repeatedly in all religions, that it is not what we possess, or who we are, or how long we live that means anything to God. All those things are human, physical things and God is a spirit. God couldn't care less. But, if it has to do with your soul, now you have God's attention.

We have been taught repeatedly to fear God, not just in those words alone, but in alternatives. We are trained that God is waiting to swiftly punish us if we commit a sin. People ask all the time; what did I do to deserve this? Why is God punishing me? That's ridiculous. We are first taught that God has the ultimate punishment---to condemn your soul to an eternal damnation. Then, why be vindictive now? Think of it another way. For your soul to grow, it has to be challenged. That is the way God works. Give God a little credit for loving you and being a little smarter than you.

Fear has many faces in religion. Not only do we fear that God will punish us now, but we are taught to fear Satan, demons, and burning in Hell for all eternity. Quite simply the churches have blown it. Rather than spending all of their time filling us with fear, they should be constantly reinforcing us with love. I would hate to think that my children "love" me, because it is better than a worse alternative; that they are motivated to profess that they love and honor their father because if they don't, something really bad is going to happen to them. That is not love at all. But is that why you say you love God, because you fear what God will do to you now and after you die? Be very honest when you answer that!

Are you beginning to see how hard this gets for religious leaders if we take away the fear factor? All of a sudden, they would have to convince you to love God based on its own merits. They would have to struggle harder to understand God and to present God to you in a manner that makes you want to love God for being God. They could no longer relax and fall back to their old tried and tested reason of "love your daddy in heaven or go to Hell." They couldn't threaten you with demons and satanic beings. They made it easy on themselves from the very beginning. If I have a choice to "love God" or burn in Hell with demons pulling my skin off, well, I am no brain surgeon, but professing a love of God comes real easy; whether it is in my heart or not is another issue.

Wanting to go to heaven so you can avoid Hell is the totally wrong approach. Wanting your soul to be in the presence of its Creator, the giver of life and love ---regardless of Hell, is the correct approach. Today, and in the past, many people who claim to be "religious" do not love God as much as they fear the devil.

Would most of the people in church today, be there if they knew there was no Hell? Would they desire for their soul to be with God if they knew there was no devil? Would they seek a closeness with God at all? Probably not. We have been taught to love and worship God, because the alternatives are very, very bad!

Without Lucifer, or the devil, or Hell, or demons, you would have to find another reason for all the bad things in the world, including the ones you do. The writers of the first biblical documents struggled with evil. They didn't know what caused evil deeds so, they invented an ugly, spiteful, conniving, demonic creature to be the archenemy of God and let him be the tempter and destroyer of man. Everyone has failed to identify the real evil, when all they had to do was to look in the mirror. There is no such thing as an evil force. Oh, there are evil deeds, but to think there is an evil, satanic force, whose purpose is to corrupt mankind, is in the same category as thinking there is an Easter Bunny.

Such a concept of there being no evil force goes against the basic doctrine of Judeao-Christain-Islamic religions. They need an evil force so you can seek salvation; so you will need help in the great war between good and evil; so you will be frightened into doing good and doing the "right thing". Buddhists, on the other hand, put it right back in your lap, as I do.

In his introduction to The Tibetan Book of the Dead, Francesca Fremantle states, "…buddhism looks for the basic cause of sin and suffering, and discovers this to be the belief in a self or ego as the center of existence. this belief is not caused by innate evil, but by unconsciousness, or ignorance of the true nature of existence."

Think it out yourself. Don't you have a problem accepting the idea that God would have created evil? Well, if God did, then why? Was it funny to plan torment for man for all eternity, and creating evil was the best way to do it? On the other hand, if God didn't create evil, where would evil come from? We accept the Supreme Deity as being the ultimate of goodness, fairness and love, right? Well where does the creation of evil fit in with that? Is God not powerful enough to control heaven? God is omnipotent, right? Well, to believe the Lucifer story means God lost control. Lucifer and thousands of angels were plotting an overthrow of heaven. Does that fit with what you imagine could go on inside of a heaven ruled by an all powerful God? I don't think so, and I don't think it did.

Don't look at evil as a demonic force. Look at evil as mans failure to adhere to the cosmic rules set up by God. Those rules are found in the teachings of Zoroaster, Buddha, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, gurus of the Vedas, and others. They are the standards by which man is to interact with man, based on love and compassion and being involved in the activities that develops and enhances the image of God within us. They are the rules of life which light the paths we are to pursue in order to work our way toward spiritual perfection and ultimate oneness with God.

"But, Christ refers to Satan", you say. Sure he does. He was speaking in parables. He referred to Satan as the challenges that face man in his daily, worldly existence. He could not go into a detailed description of soul, mind, cognitive reason, cosmic truth and the interaction of these factors, which cause the actions of mankind. He had to speak in terms that could be easily grasped by his audience. Need proof?

In the books of Matthew and Mark, Christ is foretelling of the coming events when he will be humiliated and tortured and crucified. Peter, his beloved follower and disciple challenged his words at which point Jesus rebukes Peter as follows:

"get thee behind me Satan, for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but the things that be of men".

Do you think Jesus was calling Peter, Satan? Did he believe it was Satan there before him rather than his favorite disciple? Jesus was standing there with his disciples and was rebuking Peter, yet he says, "get thee behind me Satan…".You and I both know that he was speaking to Peter, in front of the disciples, and that was his way of saying that those are the words of the world, not the truths of God. He was saying that you are not paying attention to me but responding in a worldly manner. He was saying that the things and thoughts of the world must be put behind you and you must take a clear and unrestricted view of God's message. There was no Satan there, only man's failure to listen to God's message.

See the difference? When we remove evil as a demonic force, we are left with man's own failure to comply. Man then has no scapegoat. He has no devil to blame. He has no "voices" to accuse. He is (you are) forced to take full and complete responsibility for his (your) actions. Now, you and you alone are fully accountable. Most all religions have a life review phase as one of your first experiences in the spiritual world. That means you are standing there with all of the armor off, totally vulnerable, and with no one, maybe for the first time, no one to blame--- but yourself.

God is a spirit. God is the ultimate force of energy and power in all of the universes. God has set everything in motion, and while we may pick and choose certain human activities, God's will and overall plan can not be changed. We must worship and honor God in a manner that befits a king of the highest authority. We must avoid the belief that we can drag God from his throne of power--- down to our petty human endeavors. We must become aware of our own soul and struggle to master those things that are of an interest to God, not wait for God to get involved with our interest here on earth. And, we must love God, without fear, for making us a part of the universe and for allowing us to exist and to share the glorious wonders of creation for all eternity; recognizing that our soul is here to learn, to interact with other souls, and to develop to the point that it can, one day, reside forever with its Creator.