On the bus ride home from Dewalegama, I was thinking about God, and Gods. I hope I don’t offend anyone with this post, and I hope no one thinks less of me for this, but… I believe Gods to be fictions. And yet they are fictions with such a powerful hold on the human psyche, and they recur in almost every culture (albeit with different names, faces, and biographies. Why? Because every God and Goddess is the embodiment of something transcendent in the human experience. LOVE. WAR. DESTRUCTION. PROTECTION. EARTH. DEATH. These are the things that scare us, sustain us, and above all mystify and amaze us. What is Divine, what is Power, what is Transcendent if the love of a mother for her child is not? What is miraculous if not life itself? What do we fear more than the ending of that life, this turning of animate and thinking to completely and irrevocably inert? This is the thing which animates the Gods, and what gives them power (in our minds). Their divinity comes from transcendental human experience. And that, I think is why Gods have such prevalence in societies, and persistence in our minds.
4 comments:
At the basic level, I agree with your thinking about the reasons for the existence (creation?) of gods.
I'd definitely be interested in talking about gods in more depth winter term if you're interested - it's something that's always intrigued me, but the internet makes it hard to have philosophical discussion.
Anyway, I'm glad you're still having a great time! Best of luck!
I agree, though I still sustain myself with some similar fiction (which varies day to day). On a similar note, I suggest you read Terry Pratchett's Small Gods for an interesting take on the whole thing
hehe. I've been studying too much for my sociology final, because I can more or less quote my professor about this (and I think I agree with him). His idea is that you can come up with whatever ideas you want about gods - why they've been created in so many different cultures, etc. - but even if you decide there's some other human cause for religion, that still doesn't prove that some type of god or transcendental force doesn't really exist, independently of human belief.
Which, come to think of it, is kind of frustrating.
anyway. Have fun pondering...
Oh yes, we humans are limited. We can only describe with what we know. there is always something greater than ourselves, both as individuals and as a conglomerate. it is beyond us, and yet we try to understand and explain it. Mystery is. yes, i'd like to talk more about this!
In the meantime, live well, love well and journey safely!
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