25. lokakuuta 2010

Akse Pettersson

Essay subject number 4.

"It is another paradox, but God as the true absolute must be Satan too. Only then can God be said to be truly omniscient and omnipotent […] The absolute God must include absolute negation within himself, and must be the God who descends into ultimate evil." (Nishida Kitaro, 1870-1945; last writings – Nothingness and the Religious Worldview)

The question of whether God as an ultimate being truly exists is one that has puzzled philosophers in all ages, after decades of seemingly end less debate and thousands of works on the subject it seems we are non the wiser.

What is the purpose of God, and to what path does it point us to? If we start by assuming the possibility of an existing deity, we must ask what we expect from him/her/it. There are many cultures and societies where gods are not regarded as omnipotent or utterly virtuous, in some cases they can actually be quite dodgy characters. This is the case for instance with old Greek deities, there are many a legend where the gods of Olympus have participated in all kinds of unmoral activities, this is also the case with the Asa gods of the Vikings, not to mention the Indian pantheon of gods.

In these cultures the people have eliminated, maybe by instinct, the problem with an omnipotent godhood. Their gods have walked amidst humans, talked with humans and indulged themselves in human activities and thus have they also been fragile and flawed as we humans are. It is but in religions where only one godhood is accepted that the problem of an absolute God rises. In these religions, for instance in Christianity and Islam, people have rested a great responsibility on their God. The deity thus has all power in his hands, the power to do good, and the power to do evil.

The main source to the problem of godhood flows from this very sentence: "and the power to do evil". In Christian and Islamic religious history it has not been an acceptable view of godhood to trust evil to his hands as well, but if he is omnipotent, he can also make the choice to produce evil.

If we would accept a dualistic view, the problem would become easier to deal with. Many cultures thus also have a negative pole to the good and omnipotent god. In Christianity it has been Satan, in Hinduism this is represented by Krishna who has got two sides, one side is the side of a creator, the other one the side of the destroyer.

Such is the case with Janus the two faced god as well. We will regard the problem from different views. First we will discuss the Teodice problem: How can God be both omnipotent and good, when there is so much evilness in the world? There are a few different options to choose from.

A. God is good but not omnipotent, for he has not, or cannot remove the evilness.

B. God omnipotent but not good, because he has not removed the evilness, though it’s possible that he might.

C. God is evil and omnipotent.

D. God is evil.

(E.).God is evil and good.

The problem is similar to the rock of God: Can he create a rock so big he cannot lift it? If he’s omnipotent this should be possible. We require omnipotence from our God, but give him a task that he should not be able to commit. It’s paradoxal that we even ask these questions, since the outcome seem to be so obvious.

It seems that God must be both good and evil, in order to exist in the boundaries that we set for him.

Sometimes when philosophers reach a dead end, they have explained themselves out from the situation by adding the existence of God. When Descartes methodically questioned everything, he came to the conc lusion that even science, and empirical facts may be false, if a betrayer exists, or a demonic entity that obscures our sight. When he realized this he backed of by stating that god must in his omnipotence and in his goodness not allow it to be true. Some scientists have said that they believe God is hard to understand, but not malicious, and thus is absolute truth in their reach and within the human grasp in general.

When one states something like this it seems like he has not thought of the concept of God.

An exception was Berkeley, who referred to God only as neutral observer of the world, this view of neutrality is not always followed in his other works though. But in this neutrality I think he touched something very important, but I will come to that later. Although many of us use the same word for a divine power, we do not refer to the same thing. Why could not for example, the gravitational law be a "God"? It’s an effect and a state in the world that we can perceive, isn’t it?

If we must choose between an omnipotent God and a good God, which one will we choose? It’s clear that these two statements negate each other. If our God is good, then a part of our world and reality should be good as well, but what would the other part consist of? Can we say we have a general definition of what good is? Is it the same thing for all of us? What qualities do we regard as good? Is being autonomous a quality we want in our lives? And furthermost: is it a quality that is granted by God? I my opinion it is not, being autonomous is something that is solely in our hands and our power, and in interaction with the surrounding world. It’s also a quality that grants us the power to choose between different choices in life, some of the choices being good, and some of them bad. It is these choices and the results of the choices that make up the concept of good and evil. If there is a God, he would also be under the influence of the concept of right and wrong, and his actions would be judged after that. I.e. if this world is evil then our God is evil, if our world is good then god is good too. If it’s both, then he’s both as well.

If we choose an omnipotent God, then we claim to believe that everything is in his power, but that does not mean that everything is in his will. He has the freedom to make the choice to let everything happen with its own course, what this course would be, and what would give the motion to it is another question.

If this God chooses to rule single handedly, then everything is dependant on his character. If he chooses to make the world good, then it will be good, and if not, then it will be something else or something in between.

If our God is evil but not omnipotent raises an interesting question: Again, God has a certain amount of power and his sphere of influence in the world should be expected to be visible, but if he’s not omnipotent it leaves the possibility of another deity or another power totally possible.

What would this power be, and could it be omnipotent but neutral, and thus also allow a good God? In this case we would have a certain balance, which could be seen as a great pantheon of godly power. And that this power as a subject would be the "God" as we see him/her/it.

What would be the outcome of such a possibility? In what position does it put us? In this case our free will would be something that is granted to us, and not something that we have chosen to posses, whether the usage of it is free we cannot know.

If we regard God as the true absolute, it is true that he must be Satan too, but in my opinion there is no paradox here. The word "God" does not implicate whether he/she/it is good or evil. He could be neutral, or ambivalent. These statements do not negate each other. God as a power must be objective and neutral, but God as an incarnation of a religion can be either one (good or evil). I.e. the Christian and Islamic God would be good, when Satan would be evil. In interaction with the free will of people and each other they would not negate each other, but rule together, not as different religions, but as factual states in the world.

This dualism of godly power annoys some people, but for me it is obvious. If a godly power exists, then it cannot exist without the other, this we can see empirically; for the world is consistent of many values.

The state of godly power only becomes a negation when we grant all the power to one idea of "God". If a Christian refuses to believe in the existence of other deities than the Christian god, he makes his God into a negation that must descend into ultimate evil; the same rule goes for every religion that is not ready to compromise its beliefs.

The ultimate evil that Nishida Kitaro refers to is nothing but the obligatory result of one single God. And thus it becomes a negation and proves that the single existence of a sole God is impossible to think of. We must accept the existence of several gods or only one neutral godly power, it is also good to remember that an omniscient God need not be omnipotent. The alternative to all this is to believe in no God at all.

The sole purpose of religion is to give the means for the explanation of our existence and our world, if it fails in this task it becomes irrelevant and utterly false. The path it shows us is a path of endless questioning and a path of disharmony with other cultures and religions. This is the ultimate evil that Nishida Kitaro speaks about.

There is no path to understanding and tolerance; they in their selves are a path.