| Subject: Re: Apology from God |
Author:
Paul
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Date Posted: 13:50:08 03/18/01 Sun
In reply to:
Ben Hursh
's message, "Apology from God" on 11:25:56 03/18/01 Sun
A few thoughts on this direction, just for fun. Frankly, I have never gotten the God thing at all (and I was raised Southern Baptist!), but I offer this, probably touching off a rocking-chair, beer-swigging debate of some sort. Of course, everything I say from here on out is simply just a
bunch of words, like leaves blowing across the porch.
God: The concept of something greater than ourselves, a mystery, an unknowable but perhaps intuited dynamic
that is "not" us. We typically we see ourselves in relationship to God but God as other-than-us, ourselves "outside" or perhaps "within" god, relating to the god-concept as we live our finite lives. And as our finite lives are going (good or bad, in our local opinion), we can appeal to the god-concept for solace, assurance, an outlet for our frustration and sense of violation, for whatever we need. God is a handy tool in getting through life, like a rake or a spoon. (Was that thunder I just heard?)
The characteristics of concept-god are really only the ones we imbue upon the concept of him/her/it. God, in this rap, is really just an extension of the concept of ourselves, fixing the idea of a "divine" or greater reference point relative to our sense-of-finiteness reference point, which is me, here and now apparently stuck in the world with all its horrors and its beauties. I am confused and so I anchor myself in a concept to make some sanity of my confusion. God as concept-anchor against the insanity of finding myself
on this planet and trying to make heads or tails of the
situation.
Raging at God, therefore, is simply raging at myself, in the
context of whatever my model of all this is. Not to deny
the validity or the genuineness of such a rage, but I think Ben said it well. As one comes to an understanding that there really is no difference at all between out-there and in-here, between finite and divine, between my situation and predicament and me AS situation and predicament, then this God-concept can't help but have the air let out of its considerable tires, because it was alive and relevant only through personal localized projection, via the perspective of finite only. When this perspective breaks down, then concept-god simply goes out the window as previously defined, and suddenly there is no one outside of myself who I can rage at as separate from me. This includes god, my dog, my loved ones, Bill Clinton or George W. Bush (pick your poison), the IRS, the goddamned washing machine, you name it. Suddenly my spoon or my rake is rendered unenergized and frankly irrelevant to the immediacy of what it going on. Suddenly I find myself simply eating with my hands, unable to apply any tools whatsover. Suddenly, as Ben says, it is just a mystery.
And then what? Then what of God? What is God in this still
greater context? Well, it's still concept. I would proffer that even then god is just one possible word out of many possible words to attach to what simply is.
The leaves are finished blowing across the porch.
Could you please pass me another Corona?
Paul
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