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The author Armstrong maintains that the history of God is the
history of human struggle to find a meaning in life and the
universe; but human existence without God remains shrouded in
mystery. Whether a reality or illusion, the idea of a singular
Divine being, whether Yahweh, God, Ishvara or Allah, has
continued to exist since antiquity and has served as a potential
source of world religions, philosophies, social and moral orders
and cultural identities. God and religion cannot be separated as
they are intermixed. Each religion develops a distinct ideology
to address people, and new religious systems supplant the old,
reflecting the changing social and economic conditions. The
author emphasises that religion, on the one hand, has bestowed
the highest moral and spiritual values, adding richness to the
quality of life but, and on the other it has also acted as a
catalyst for violence and religious fundamentalism.
The simplest
argument for the existence of God rests on the ground that the
world as constituted could not have come into being on its own
without some power or force having created it, which Aristotle
has identified as the "unmoved mover," a necessary
being who designed the world but cannot be defined by human
reason. To Aristotle the whole world is a Divine Reality and God’s
highest gift to man is soul, the life-force or self. Aristotle
thought that a transcendental power is absolutely necessary as a
guiding principle of life, though he admitted that we can only
make efforts to perceive the reality of God but cannot fully
grasp it. Quite indifferent to the question of God, Aristotle’s
pupil Plato was concerned with individual conscience, good life,
and the question of justice.
The Jews, the
Christians and the Muslims produced their own versions of God
but in their interpretations there is striking similarity.
Eliminating the multiplicity of Gods, these religions are
essentially monotheistic with their faiths entrenched in a
single Supreme and absolute Divinity. By 235 A.D. Christianity
became one of the most important religions of the Roman Empire.
Though the focus
of the book is mainly on Western religions and philosophies, the
author briefly discusses the Hindu and Buddhist ideas of God.
Armstrong shows that the Hindus see God as a transcendental
force, incomprehensible, but in popular imagination many gods
representing natural phenomenon and tradition continue to be
reverted and sought after mainly for the gratification of
mundane interests rather than spiritual quest. Among the Hindus,
not the philosophical and metaphysical notion of God, but
popular devotion (Bhakti) has proved much stronger. While
eschewing metaphysical details, Buddhism emphasised on leading a
good life with a purity of mind and noble action, depending
purely on a spirit of self-reliance.
In religious life
Prophets occupy a pivotal situation. Jesus and Mohammed had
become a source of infinite experience for the followers of
Christianity and Islam. Christ’s death released a new kind of
life and creativity. Not making any concession to polytheism,
Prophet Mohammed provided a strictly rational code of conduct
for the Muslims.
According to Islam
God is noor (light), which can be seen in his multiple
activities. In Islam there is a justification for fighting a
righteous war in self-defence for the preservation of human
values. To the author, Christianity is basically a religion of
sorrow and suffering. However, the Western world has remained
uneasy about the doctrine of Trinity. Both Christianity and
Islam spread astonishingly in the world through violent and
peaceful means contingent on the conditioning circumstances.
Armstrong
emphasizes that all religions change and develop, and if they do
not, they become obsolete. The existence of religions depends
primarily on perceptions of the believers. Most of the religions
see God beyond all human categories, who cannot be reduced to a
formula, and in such cases religious imagination turns to the
abstract nature of a deity. On the other hand, God is not
treated as an alien object but is seen as an exploration in the
depth of psyche. The author’s own view is that the human view
of the transcendental is a fact of life, and cannot be explained
through rationalistic analysis. God is not a Tory, socialist or
revolutionary, but a Divine reality that exceeds all human
thought and experience.
Examining the
question of God, Thomas Acquinas had asserted that God’s real
nature is incomprehensible to the human mind. Martin Luther
evolved his doctrine of Justification. For him God could be
perceived through suffering and the Cross. Faith, not enquiry,
is the way to seek the bliss of God. Rejecting the role of
intermediaries, Luther communed with the Divine directly.
Due to the growth
of scientific ideas there began to appear a distinct change in
the perception of God. The Copernicus system offered a challenge
to the Biblical explanation of the earth and sun. Spinoza, an
atheist, identified God with the order that governs the
universe, a principle of law and eternal laws in existence.
Without denying God, Newton confirmed the natural and physical
world. A fierce controversy raged between men of faith and
science in the nineteenth century, and God began to be denied
any place in the universe on rational grounds. To Nietzsche, the
idea of Supreme God was a frightening prospect, and later Sartre
thought that absence of God ensures a positive liberty. But
those who question such views assert that science could be
tested empirically but not God, who is beyond concepts, not
amenable to any discourse and verification.
Armstrong’s own
idea of God is closer to mysticism and yoga. God of the mystics
is a unifying force of the highest human ideals. Mysticism
provides means of apprehending the reality of God through
strenuous imaginative efforts for which intelligence,
discipline, dedication and self-criticism are the necessary
instruments. The avenging force of fact is that human beings on
their own cannot endure emptiness and desolation in life, and
have to face trials and tribulations for which such forces are
created to tide over their immense difficulties. Thus God is
perceived as a filler of strength and supporter to face the grim
and sordid realities of life.
In this work the
author has given a judicious survey of the views of prophets,
philosophers, religious thinkers and scientists on the meaning
of God. Such an approach sharpens our understanding of God and
religion. This book is in fact an encyclopaedia of God. From a
structural point of view this work is neither chronological nor
thematic, but a curious blend of both which leads to imbalance
and repetitions. Despite this structural flow, this study is
indeed a challenging book, scholarly, brilliantly researched and
lucid, a first-class study of God, religion and the meaning of
life.
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I
think that Rabindranath Tagore’s poetry is an exploration of
spiritual awareness. In Gitanjali he wrote a poem in which
the creation was new and the stars shone bright in their splendour
but the best of them fell and since then as a solitary wayfarer
Tagore has been seeking the ‘fallen star’, the ‘glory of all
heavens’. Like Tagore’s unceasing search, the human quest for
the Divine has remained unending throughout the ages since the idea
of God emerged about 14,000 years ago. No society has ever dismissed
the idea of God. A spate of literature has appeared on God, and on
no theme has been so much thought about and meditated on as that of
God. And yet the last word on it has never been said. Each age has
its idea of God. Those trained in the austerities of scientific
discipline find no place for God in the universe and yet the idea of
God continues to affect the lives of millions of people in the
world.
