Union of abstract metaphysical and personal anthropomorphic God concepts
Addendum to Personal Thoughts, added 11/22/2018
This note is an addendum to some of my philosophical thoughts which I have expressed in my history earlier. My daughter Laura and I have been engaged in a “Philosophy Club” since my retirement, and we have had the chance to read many writings of contemporary and classic philosophers together. As I have been going over some of the writings of the early church scholars of the middle ages, and thoughts by Sartre in his book “Being and Nothingness”, I was struck by a possible link between these thinkers and the concept of being a child of God, and having a better conception of how a personal and caring conception of God could be expanded by the ideas of some of these great thinkers.
First of all, an idea proposed by the early church scholars is that God is of necessity outside time/space/being and this characteristic is what enables him to be a First Cause and ongoing Sustainer of reality within our being and universe. He is thus the Uncaused Cause of all. He is thus not subject to temporal causation Himself. Such a God is of necessity beyond human comprehension.
Secondly, Sartre’s idea of the human self is of a “nothingness” which also cannot be localized or defined in terms of material or space. It is that subjective part of us which is at the cusp of each instant of time, creating a new reality instantly and continuously by virtue of free will and choices which to a great extent shape our personal world moment by moment. This concept of self, outside temporal causality, is also beyond human comprehension.
There appears to be perhaps a link between these two ideas. The link seems to be that both metaphysical God and metaphysical human self are outside time and space, God being the ultimate creator, but the human self also being engaged in a more minor and personal creation epic.
There is an apparent consequence, quite profound, of the above ideas. In my mind it gives room for a God who can be part of being as much as we ourselves are. This in that both God and the self in the above definitions are outside time and space, giving justification to the idea that God’s “Self” could be part of a Being like us, and part of a Being who is partially or perhaps optionally inside space and time as are we. Thus the Self of God stays outside causality, time, and space in the analogous manner as the human self is outside causality, space, and time.
We have now a Creator (God), and a little creator (ourself). We also have an infinite Self (God), and a finite self (ourself), with these Selves which both create being outside causality.
This allows a God who can be thus conceptualized as a parent, and a self which can be conceptualized as a child of God.
We now have hopefully begun to unify the epistemological God of necessity with the theological personal and loving God with whom we can relate. A God not limited to be a mere philosophical abstraction.
This line of thinking also supports the idea, as we are God’s children, of eternal development or becoming more like God over time if we so choose.
This then leads to a very interesting nature of reality, which is both circular and linear in nature. Circular in that we have humans becoming parent Gods over time, which then beget or create more worlds and human children. An infinitely repeating cycle with no beginning or end. Linear in that the future is in continuous development, and hence reality itself develops, changes, and grows over time. A good analogy would be an apple tree producing apples and seeds growing into more apple trees. Thus the apple tree presents a cycle, but a cycle not just as a repetitive loop, but one which generates growth and causes new effects and changes the scope of the loop itself, hence being linear and circular simultaneously.
A neat observation is that this view of reality also tends to link eastern views of reality with western views of reality. Eastern views being circular and western views being more linear. Maybe reality, if conceptualized as above, is both circular and linear in nature.
It’s been fun for me to see that my interest in philosophy has had the effect of strengthening my faith. Reason is only a partial and incomplete path to faith, but for me it is also an enjoyable and productive hobby.
So there you have it! If you have read this you deserve a medal!
This note is an addendum to some of my philosophical thoughts which I have expressed in my history earlier. My daughter Laura and I have been engaged in a “Philosophy Club” since my retirement, and we have had the chance to read many writings of contemporary and classic philosophers together. As I have been going over some of the writings of the early church scholars of the middle ages, and thoughts by Sartre in his book “Being and Nothingness”, I was struck by a possible link between these thinkers and the concept of being a child of God, and having a better conception of how a personal and caring conception of God could be expanded by the ideas of some of these great thinkers.
First of all, an idea proposed by the early church scholars is that God is of necessity outside time/space/being and this characteristic is what enables him to be a First Cause and ongoing Sustainer of reality within our being and universe. He is thus the Uncaused Cause of all. He is thus not subject to temporal causation Himself. Such a God is of necessity beyond human comprehension.
Secondly, Sartre’s idea of the human self is of a “nothingness” which also cannot be localized or defined in terms of material or space. It is that subjective part of us which is at the cusp of each instant of time, creating a new reality instantly and continuously by virtue of free will and choices which to a great extent shape our personal world moment by moment. This concept of self, outside temporal causality, is also beyond human comprehension.
There appears to be perhaps a link between these two ideas. The link seems to be that both metaphysical God and metaphysical human self are outside time and space, God being the ultimate creator, but the human self also being engaged in a more minor and personal creation epic.
There is an apparent consequence, quite profound, of the above ideas. In my mind it gives room for a God who can be part of being as much as we ourselves are. This in that both God and the self in the above definitions are outside time and space, giving justification to the idea that God’s “Self” could be part of a Being like us, and part of a Being who is partially or perhaps optionally inside space and time as are we. Thus the Self of God stays outside causality, time, and space in the analogous manner as the human self is outside causality, space, and time.
We have now a Creator (God), and a little creator (ourself). We also have an infinite Self (God), and a finite self (ourself), with these Selves which both create being outside causality.
This allows a God who can be thus conceptualized as a parent, and a self which can be conceptualized as a child of God.
We now have hopefully begun to unify the epistemological God of necessity with the theological personal and loving God with whom we can relate. A God not limited to be a mere philosophical abstraction.
This line of thinking also supports the idea, as we are God’s children, of eternal development or becoming more like God over time if we so choose.
This then leads to a very interesting nature of reality, which is both circular and linear in nature. Circular in that we have humans becoming parent Gods over time, which then beget or create more worlds and human children. An infinitely repeating cycle with no beginning or end. Linear in that the future is in continuous development, and hence reality itself develops, changes, and grows over time. A good analogy would be an apple tree producing apples and seeds growing into more apple trees. Thus the apple tree presents a cycle, but a cycle not just as a repetitive loop, but one which generates growth and causes new effects and changes the scope of the loop itself, hence being linear and circular simultaneously.
A neat observation is that this view of reality also tends to link eastern views of reality with western views of reality. Eastern views being circular and western views being more linear. Maybe reality, if conceptualized as above, is both circular and linear in nature.
It’s been fun for me to see that my interest in philosophy has had the effect of strengthening my faith. Reason is only a partial and incomplete path to faith, but for me it is also an enjoyable and productive hobby.
So there you have it! If you have read this you deserve a medal!
Comments (16)
I studied Being and Nothingness, or attempted to, as an undergraduate, and was completely stumped by it; I literally couldn't understand the first page. In the years since, I have become somewhat more familiar with Sartre, and have learned to understand him a bit better because of having studied Husserl and some of the earlier phenomenologists, and also through his other, less technical writings.
But I confess, I see Sartre as being a committed and even vociferous atheist. I am dimly aware of some other recent writings that explore his idea of 'being and nothingness' in the greater history of the idea of the self in Western philosophy, but even so, I had the impression that Sartre was adamantly opposed to religious consciousness and ideas. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Whereas this passage here:
Quoting Elrondo
Seems much closer in sentiment to some of the classical metaphysical theories, such as, on the one hand, Plotinus (whose dying words were reportedly 'Try to raise the divine in yourselves to the divine in the all'); and on the other hand, the Vedanta, which is grounded in the philosophy of the Upani?ads (e.g. especially here.) And also various streams of Christian mysticism, which incorporated many ideas from Plotinus. And also it is similar to ideas found in many of Alan Watts' writings, such as Behold! The Spirit, and The Supreme Identity. So, as you say, linking both 'eastern' and 'western'.
I love how compatible your thoughts are with his way of thinking and I love how it makes a beautiful sense of time, without beginning or end, and one where the concept of divine purpose actually seems to make sense (something the church fathers never quite managed).
“God” is basically a representation of an unseen personal/human ideal. We wish to become more than we are.
Quoting Elrondo
I am curious which part of Sartre you are drawing that representation.
In Transcendence of the Ego, there is a source prior to the Cogito but it is not presented as outside of temporal causality. Quite the opposite of that, actually.
Also, regarding that book's reference to the self being beyond comprehension, it is presented more as a limit of personal experience than as a Kantian type of limit to any further understanding.
Sartre is pointing toward a boundary between the conscious and the unconscious. One cannot directly experience the unconscious by the way they are defined as separate. But it is not beyond perception as a reflection of other people.
More of a drive by shooting than a hijack.
Maybe you could start a thread on what you want people to focus on.
Great comments and thanks again!
I am totally cool with a god being outside time and space, but how could such a god be a being like us?
Such a god could not experience what we experience and therefore could not have knowledge of the experience of being human, and therefore could not be a being like us. We experience time and space as limited and that includes a life span and losing people we love. Isn't there an argument that Jesus was the solution to this problem? God had to become incarnate to have the experience and therefore gain the knowledge of being human. But then one has to believe the Hebrew and Christian mythology to believe that, and I do not know why we should do that?
Nice analysis.
The classical description of God as eternal, changeless, immutable, perfect being does seem at odds with the notion of God as personal, loving and involved in the affairs of the world.
Likewise the notion of God as omnipotent engenders the problem of evil and God as omniscient engenders the problem of the future and of free will.
We can of course just proclaim God is mystery, is transcendent of our understanding, or is known to us only “through the veil of perception” or “through a glass darkly”
Of course people seem to like to talk about God quite a bit and to speculate about his nature or to develop a conception they feel worthy of worship and belief.
Personally I use the conception of God found in Process Theology and inspired by the writings of Alfred North Whitehead in process philosophy.
Under this conception, God has a dipolar nature. God has both a primordial (eternal changeless aspect) and a consequent nature (taking in and responding to the experience of the world).
The primordial nature of God corresponds to all of the possibilities for the world of beauty, creative and experience. These possibilities are actually “deficient” and must be actualized or realized to be complete.
The Consequential nature of God is the taking in of the experience of the world (its joys, its sufferings) preserving this experience in its presentational immediacy (objective immortality) and then providing possibilities for creative advancement for each near event or occasion of experience..
God is not omnipotent for other entities and actualities have their own agency, freedom and independent but God is a powerful influence on the progress of the world providing for continuous creative advance but the future is open and creation is an ongoing process..
Anyway this is a form of panentheism (the world in God) and this particular variety is derived from process philosophy and is found under the category of process theology in the philosophy of religion.
God is your companion, fellow traveler and fellow sufferer. The notion of God suffering is antithetical to much of traditional religion but Jesus on the Cross is certainly compatible with such a view.