God is kind of a dick.Okay, I take it back. I don't believe that God is a dick. I don't even necessarily believe in God (but, for the sake of this post, let's act like I definitely do). I had to get that statement out of the way, though, so that the rest of my statements would seem less Christian-offensive in contrast.
What I really mean is, people tend to make God out to be a dick. Not atheists, but the Christians (and Muslims, too). He seems very concerned that you don't disrespect Him, that you put Him on a pedestal, that you don't believe in gods other than Him. But let's step back for a moment, and look at who we're talking about.
This person, is not a person. He is a pre-person being. A being that predates the entire universe. He, coming before biology existed, can't even be a he. What is a he in a species that has no she? It created the universe, created life, and is aware of all of our thoughts and actions. It is omniscient, omnipotent, and infallible. It is literally the perfect being. It is God.
When someone has lived a long time, maybe ninety years, we expect them to have gained some wisdom with their age. Wisdom that comes from many experiences, and seeing things from different perspectives. Well, God has seen all of history, and, not only that, has the perspective that comes from seeing the world through the eyes of every being that's ever been on it. When an ant is following a scent trail, God gets that, in a way that none of us ever will. When a bee chooses to kill itself by stinging something, God feels that fatal determination. When a junky, after three hours of hating himself, gives up on sobriety and snorts a line of meth into his nose, God feels everything he is feeling. Even murderers, and child molesters. God understands all of their thoughts and drives, because God is not limited the way we're limited, and It's not at all affected by how we believe It's supposed to be limited.
I would like to think that all of us that believe there is a God share this version of It that is actually perfect. That is full and complete. I don't think that most people believe in a God that doesn't understand a feeling that a contract killer is able to understand.
So, when I hear people preaching about an over-sensitive God, or a jealous God, or a God that's quick to anger, I have my doubts. I'm not a particularly jealous person. The more jealous someone is, usually the more we think they're a dick. Would that make me better than God in this one area? How ridiculous.
Quote the Bible to me, if you want. If God ever appears to me and tells me to live my life based on a collection of documents found and aggregated by humans, written by humans... well, why would It do that? Who decided that the Bible was the word of God, anyway? I bet it was a human.
And I won't expect God to overreact about this decision, like a touchy emperor. Because, while the devout tend to paint God as being a major asshole, I don't think that's true.
I came across this after re-reading a post on Science Not Fiction that we both commented on and noticing that you left the only comment I agreed with prior to my own comment; and while I am a Muslim, I have to agree with you on this. I don't understand the image of God presented by most major religions, either. But as I recently realized, this image is a reflection of the fact that religions are institutions run by humans. And humans can be jealous, vindictive dicks. Especially when they get ahold of the notion that they represent this Higher Power that coincidentally happens to share their worldview and is actually just a projection of their own desires and a tool used to further their own agendas. Now, I'm not going to quote the Bible or the Qur'an, for that matter; but I do want to point out that there's a lot more to faith and religion than the institutionalized aspect. Science and religion are not inherently at odds, and religion is something that is really... real. I urge you not to write off everything you can't explain as hokey, because you might wake up one day and find yourself feeling truly empty. And in parting, I'd like to leave you with this quote from a friend of an acquaintance: "Any time somebody tells me I’m going to go to hell on the grounds that I’m not christian, I tell them that I like to think that God values one’s compliance with His proposed archetype of righteousness than one’s rationale for doing so, and if they tell me I’m wrong and God is going to send good people to hell for not believing in Him then I mention that that’s not really the type of person I want to spend eternity with anyway."
ReplyDeleteThank you for the comment. While I don't necessarily disbelieve in God, I'm not religious, as I'm sure you gathered. I'm not entirely against religion. One issue I have with it is that the belief that you already understand the way something is (the way the universe is created, for instance) tends to keep people from pursuing more info about it. Of course, not everyone understanding science is not a tragedy.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, I've seen religion do great things in peoples lives, and the peace of individuals is very important, I believe, sometimes more than the knowledge of of any one truth.
However, I think that the only way a person would feel emptiness by lacking religion is if they were raised with religion, and then lost it. I don't believe that religion is a necessary part of a happy life for everyone, though I think it is true for many.
I'm glad that you seem to be an open-minded muslim. Too many people, religious and science-oriented alike, would rather turn off their minds.
Also, I'm curious what comment I made in the other blog that you agreed with.
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