PARADOXICAL

The faith chronicles

Wednesday, September 03, 2025

 

Reviewing God

Reviewing God

Is the God you believe in really God, or just the kind of God you want, just the image of your own mind's creation -- in psychological terms, just your pathetic projection of your own weaknesses?

The nerve of this guy to ask, but what a wonderful question.

Unfortunately for the author, US academic and writer Reza Aslan, I have encountered such effrontery before. In a retreat talk or something of that sort, I think, by then Fr. Chito Tagle or some other noted cleric, I learned that it is a question originally posed by one daring philosopher, Ludwig Feuerbach. It was he who first needled believers by claiming that the God they worshipped was just a projection of their inmost longings (as for power, praise, etc.). Good thing Aslan noted it at the outset, getting it out of the way.

But it is in supporting his claim using world history that Aslan's book is highly engaging as to be unputdownable.

The first time I've read a survey of the world's faiths or religions, it was then Pope John Paul II's interview transcript-turned-book "Crossing the Threshold of Hope." But Aslan's book is the first of its kind I have encountered in which the history of man's predisposition to believe in a soul, spiritual word, a god, or an afterlife is traced. Even for a Harvard professor, Aslan's scholarly scope is simply breathtaking: from pre-Homo sapiens stage to the various stages in which humans attempted for the first time to do paintings, perform rituals, worship idols, and build temples until these beliefs and practices evolved into a belief in one God and the practices of various religions today.

Weaving together threads from archeology, history, anthropology, philosophy, psychology, neurology, and the arts, it is a fascinating discussion, to say the least. It is so absorbing that I had to pore through even the endnotes in reduced font size until I got dizzy and had a mild headache.

To sum up in broad strokes, these are what Aslan observes to be the major developments in the history of how we humans perceive God:

- Belief in the soul
- Worship of ancestors
- Creation of spirits
- Formation of gods and pantheons
- Construction of temples and shrines
- Establishment of myths and rituals
- Monotheism (the Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity, and most especially, Islam)
- Ditheism
- Trinitarianism (Christianity and Catholicism)
- Pantheism

Aslan ends his discussion by concluding that his exercise in tracing such a history of the world's religions paralleled his own spiritual journey, and that is why he ends up discussing pantheism as the belief he most subscribes to now, the belief that God is in everything (which is, incidentally, something I have heard before). From being a Christian, then Muslim, he discussed how he ended up choosing to believe in pantheism (the belief that God is in everything) instead, because, if I am reading him right, it is the one belief that does not envision God as something man-made but philosophically speaking, a God that is not formed in the image and likeness of man but the reverse: God as He is, whatever it is He wills to be.

Of course, this reader does not share such a controversial conclusion ("Everything is God." "You and I are God." Me: Of course not!). In fact, as a believer of Christianity as a religion that is a divine revelation of truth, not at all a human creation (but one that requires the agency of human cooperation), I find it laughable though not surprising because it follows a logical train of thought.

In my own observation, a lot of religions claim to have come from divine revelation via a chosen messenger: we may refer to how the Muslims, Mormons, and Iglesia ni Kristo, for example, recall their origin story. Can you argue with people's version of such accounts? You can't. I won't even try. To the uninitiated, it's probably a matter of choosing which messenger to believe.

In any case, whatever your religious inclination is, reading Aslan's academic take on the matter is a highly rewarding experience and even helpful in your own spiritual journey. Personally, in the final analysis, the book strikes me as a scientific and historical account of how man has searched for God and developed its primitive conceptions of god (or more accurately, assorted idols, from Ashtoreth to Zeus) through a length of time that seems to be an entire geological age in scope ("hundreds of thousands of years"), until the one true God with a capital G finally said enough, entered history through Jesus Christ, and revealed his true nature as a triune God.

(Grateful acknowledgment: Joey Ferrer)


Comments: Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]





<< Home

Archives

01/01/2004 - 02/01/2004   02/01/2004 - 03/01/2004   03/01/2004 - 04/01/2004   04/01/2004 - 05/01/2004   05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004   06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004   07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004   08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004   09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004   10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004   11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004   12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005   01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005   02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005   03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005   04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005   05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005   06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005   07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005   08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005   09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005   10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005   11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005   12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006   02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006   03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006   04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006   05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006   06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006   07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006   08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006   09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006   10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006   11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006   12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007   01/01/2007 - 02/01/2007   02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007   03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007   04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007   05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007   06/01/2007 - 07/01/2007   07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007   08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007   09/01/2007 - 10/01/2007   10/01/2007 - 11/01/2007   11/01/2007 - 12/01/2007   12/01/2007 - 01/01/2008   01/01/2008 - 02/01/2008   02/01/2008 - 03/01/2008   03/01/2008 - 04/01/2008   04/01/2008 - 05/01/2008   05/01/2008 - 06/01/2008   06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008   07/01/2008 - 08/01/2008   08/01/2008 - 09/01/2008   09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008   10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008   11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008   12/01/2008 - 01/01/2009   01/01/2009 - 02/01/2009   04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009   05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009   06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009   07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009   08/01/2009 - 09/01/2009   09/01/2009 - 10/01/2009   10/01/2009 - 11/01/2009   11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009   01/01/2010 - 02/01/2010   02/01/2010 - 03/01/2010   03/01/2010 - 04/01/2010   04/01/2010 - 05/01/2010   05/01/2010 - 06/01/2010   06/01/2010 - 07/01/2010   07/01/2010 - 08/01/2010   08/01/2010 - 09/01/2010   09/01/2010 - 10/01/2010   11/01/2010 - 12/01/2010   01/01/2011 - 02/01/2011   02/01/2011 - 03/01/2011   03/01/2011 - 04/01/2011   04/01/2011 - 05/01/2011   05/01/2011 - 06/01/2011   06/01/2011 - 07/01/2011   07/01/2011 - 08/01/2011   08/01/2011 - 09/01/2011   09/01/2011 - 10/01/2011   10/01/2011 - 11/01/2011   11/01/2011 - 12/01/2011   12/01/2011 - 01/01/2012   02/01/2012 - 03/01/2012   03/01/2012 - 04/01/2012   04/01/2012 - 05/01/2012   05/01/2012 - 06/01/2012   06/01/2012 - 07/01/2012   07/01/2012 - 08/01/2012   08/01/2012 - 09/01/2012   09/01/2012 - 10/01/2012   10/01/2012 - 11/01/2012   11/01/2012 - 12/01/2012   12/01/2012 - 01/01/2013   01/01/2013 - 02/01/2013   02/01/2013 - 03/01/2013   03/01/2013 - 04/01/2013   04/01/2013 - 05/01/2013   05/01/2013 - 06/01/2013   06/01/2013 - 07/01/2013   07/01/2013 - 08/01/2013   08/01/2013 - 09/01/2013   09/01/2013 - 10/01/2013   10/01/2013 - 11/01/2013   11/01/2013 - 12/01/2013   12/01/2013 - 01/01/2014   01/01/2014 - 02/01/2014   02/01/2014 - 03/01/2014   03/01/2014 - 04/01/2014   04/01/2014 - 05/01/2014   05/01/2014 - 06/01/2014   06/01/2014 - 07/01/2014   07/01/2014 - 08/01/2014   10/01/2014 - 11/01/2014   11/01/2014 - 12/01/2014   01/01/2015 - 02/01/2015   03/01/2015 - 04/01/2015   04/01/2015 - 05/01/2015   05/01/2016 - 06/01/2016   07/01/2016 - 08/01/2016   08/01/2016 - 09/01/2016   02/01/2018 - 03/01/2018   03/01/2018 - 04/01/2018   07/01/2018 - 08/01/2018   04/01/2019 - 05/01/2019   05/01/2019 - 06/01/2019   09/01/2019 - 10/01/2019   02/01/2020 - 03/01/2020   04/01/2020 - 05/01/2020   05/01/2020 - 06/01/2020   06/01/2020 - 07/01/2020   07/01/2020 - 08/01/2020   08/01/2020 - 09/01/2020   09/01/2020 - 10/01/2020   01/01/2021 - 02/01/2021   10/01/2021 - 11/01/2021   11/01/2021 - 12/01/2021   12/01/2021 - 01/01/2022   05/01/2022 - 06/01/2022   06/01/2022 - 07/01/2022   08/01/2022 - 09/01/2022   10/01/2022 - 11/01/2022   02/01/2023 - 03/01/2023   08/01/2023 - 09/01/2023   10/01/2023 - 11/01/2023   12/01/2023 - 01/01/2024   01/01/2024 - 02/01/2024   02/01/2024 - 03/01/2024   05/01/2024 - 06/01/2024   07/01/2024 - 08/01/2024   08/01/2024 - 09/01/2024   09/01/2024 - 10/01/2024   10/01/2024 - 11/01/2024   11/01/2024 - 12/01/2024   01/01/2025 - 02/01/2025   03/01/2025 - 04/01/2025   04/01/2025 - 05/01/2025   05/01/2025 - 06/01/2025   06/01/2025 - 07/01/2025   07/01/2025 - 08/01/2025   08/01/2025 - 09/01/2025   09/01/2025 - 10/01/2025  

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

Subscribe to Posts [Atom]