Sunday, 5 February 2023

Relativism in Religion?

Does the Universe Reflect the Attributes Ancient Cultures Assigned to God?

Cosmology Theology

7 min read

Human beings often marvel at the cosmos, hoping to find meaning, inspiration, or signs of a creator. Yet when we examine the origins of religious concepts, we discover something fascinating: religious figures such as Christ's Heavenly Father or the Gnostic Monad were shaped by non-religious ideas found in ancient Greek philosophical works about nature and the heavens.

The Problem with Modern Religious Belief

In churches today, people are expected to simply believe in creeds and supernatural occurrences described in religious texts—questionable propositions such as walking on water and resurrection. This relativism, believing in that which is usually unacceptable but only when situated in church while retaining one's skepticism in private life, is quite baffling.

If we stripped away all our religious belief systems, the unimaginably supreme cosmos would not change one iota. We might hold conventional ideas of the supreme being, usually depicted as a male figure decorated with adjectives fit for the cosmos itself. But upon reading Old Testament scripture, we find this supposed almighty deity was defeated by an old Moabite army who worshipped a deity called Chemosh (Kings 3:26-27). This somehow equated to Chemosh winning.

If we multiplied that ancient Moabite army a million times over and turned them into planet-sized warriors, they would disappear in the vast eternity that houses hundreds of billions of galaxies.

All is one

The Universe as the True Supreme Being

When it comes to adding attributes to deities, we often take inspiration from the universe itself. The Online Etymology Dictionary (2021) notes that "universum" and "universus" mean "all things as one, everything." "Versus" from "vertere" means "to turn back, transform or be changed." For hundreds of years, the universe has meant all things in one—entirety.
It sounds Neoplatonist, but the universe has been seen as God by various traditions in some way or another. The simple answer is this: the universe was here before humanity, religion, or philosophy. Therefore, why isn't the eternal universe more closely bonded with God across all Abrahamic faiths?

The majesty of the universe is self-evident to me—it's awesome! If God is all things, or almighty, then surely this universe is under his control, less powerful than he is, right? How do you prove that? Even smaller ideas of God and his angels, demons, and fairies require proof. Given the attributes we assign to them, you might imagine it would be easy to prove, but it's not! Why?

Nature Predates Our Stories

The mountains were shaped long before anyone proclaimed El Shaddai as their lord. We wrote stories setting ourselves above nature, but it's our biology that emerged from what we call nature. Nature provided us the skills to develop literacy to question it. Nature and the universe are essentially the same—we contain stardust, ingredients from the cosmos. That's kind of like a DNA-positive result, not forgetting the origin of DNA itself.

Defining the Divine

To represent a general definition of God, I examined common words gathered from popular sources including Merriam-Webster, Britannica Dictionary, and The Free Dictionary. Sifting through these sources, I grouped common denominators, leaving a clear picture:

Being, Spirit, Mind, Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent, and Worshipped.

The words "Being, Spirit and Mind" encapsulate existence and consciousness perfectly well—essentially the same meaning. You can argue and reduce this to the soul, but the same consciousness and being are central to the human experience. 

It's not unreasonable to agree with materialists who might argue that ancient devotees projected the human mind onto the universe in some act of anthropomorphism. Right or wrong, notions of the almighty in pantheism or panentheism aren't cognitive biases, but alternative perspectives.

If we consider worship, one of the key descriptive words, the act itself indicates a perception of God—as if worship itself contributes to the existence of the deity. Faithful engagement with a perceived deity reflects back on us, creating the relationship between devotee and deity. Belief is powerful and effective, often resulting in humans ascribing attributes to their deities and defining them.

Models of God


The Universe Meets Divine Criteria

Cosmologists say the universe contains unlimited energy and power, which relates to what religion has been calling omnipotence. Our galaxy alone is 100,000 light-years long. Photons (light particles) move at a constant 670,616,629 miles per hour. A light-year is the distance light travels in one Earth year—typically about 6 trillion miles. NASA says we have hundreds of billions of galaxies in our observable universe. It is all-powerful, given that it is undeniably everything we know, with much more packed away beyond our observation.

The idea of omniscience is openly debated and rejected by certain Eastern religious philosophies of mind, while quantum mechanics continues to make slow progress in understanding consciousness.
We can't scientifically prove or disprove consciousness. 

Earth from space

However, the universe is believed to support basic microscopic life at the very least. Subatomic particles connected light-years apart are connected by quantum entanglement. The universe does not have to meet our criteria to be supreme and almighty. Heraclitus said that no man or god created this eternal cosmos, but this is refutable by global religions, regardless of how such philosophers unintentionally inspired the theologies from which they might argue.

Ancient Philosophical Influences
Consider The Logos, Rhema, Panta Rhei, and Plato's Timaeus. We all know how Aristotle inspired Saint Thomas Aquinas. Christ was held synonymous with The Logos, and Gnostic Christians essentially copied and pasted Plato. If we simply put Hellenic-Jewish cross-cultural pollination under the lens, it would explode with evidence of philosophical borrowing!

The question remains: if the universe itself displays all the attributes we assign to God—unlimited power, eternal existence, omnipresence, and even the capacity to support consciousness—why do we continue to search for divinity in stories that pale in comparison to the cosmic reality surrounding us?







Reference


The Online Etymology Dictionary (2021) Universe [Online] Available from: https://www.etymonline.com/word/universe#etymonline_v_4519

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