Reading: Religious Conceptions of God by T. Rees ISBE

Who is God?

It is by faith, the Bible tells us, that we can begin to know God. Faith shapes our study of God. Even when we attempt to have our study of God be done in a logical, orderly manner, faith stands at the core of our understanding. Historically there have been attempts to frame the study of the truths of God in a variety of ways. One was to establish the truth of God by philosophical proofs. Another was to develop the teaching about God into a system of theological statements about God. And yet another way was to observe what was happening in the world around us as we study what it is to practice faith.

One of the most pressing questions for the study of philosophy in western thought has been, “Is there a God and does God make a difference in the world?” As we look back in history, people have given historical evidence of a belief in the existence of God or gods. Humans had the idea of God long before anyone tried to write a carefully planned treatise which would express the truths of God.

Faith is as universal as humanity. Almost every religion involves some idea of God (Buddhism is one exception as it is known as a “nontheistic” way of life). Besides the Christian faith, there are several others which teach the reality of God. Hinduism has millions of gods who are emanations of the great force known as Brahmin which gives life to the world. Animist faiths give various natural events and phenomena the quality of gods. So the sun is a common object of worship, storms embody the wrath of the deity, and so forth. Islam reveres Allah.

The existence of a faith, however, does not mean that there is a well-developed system of thought which draws into a unified whole the teachings of that faith about God. Christianity, however, has spent two thousand years thinking about the truths of God. Christians have over time left a significant legacy of thought about God. Yet this thought is not just theorizing about God, it is also worthy of devotional reading so that we may come to know more of God himself as we reflect on his self-revelation in the Bible. Our ability to think and to logically reflect on the teachings of the Scripture allow us all to bring order to our knowledge of God.

In the Bible, we do not have a systematic ordering of the teachings of God. Instead, the Scriptures are the record of God’s interactions with people in the world. There are a few passages where the authors spend time reflecting on who God is and what he has done in the world, but by far the majority of the Word is a record of humanity’s experiences with God as he revealed himself in their lives. None of the Old Testament authors ever worked out a philosophical statement about God. God is simply spoken of as reality. Only those who are fools will say in their hearts that there is no God (Psalms 14 and 53).

The New Testament has more reflection on the concept of God and God’s significance in the cosmos. But, here as well as in the Old Testament, there is no system of teaching. When we, then, want to work out a system of teaching of who God is, we must engage in an interpretive effort as we ponder the truths of God as the central character in all the events in the Hebrew and Christian communities.

Defining the Idea of God

The great Lutheran theologian Melanchthon, a close associate of the Reformer Martin Luther, gave us this definition of God: “God is a spiritual essence, intelligent, eternal, true, good, pure, just, merciful, most free and of infinite power and wisdom.” Another definition from the time of the Reformation comes to us in the Belgic Confession, Article 1: “We all believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths that there is a single and simple spiritual being, whom we call God—eternal, incomprehensible, invisible, unchangeable, infinite, almighty; completely wise, just, and good, and the overflowing source of all good.” As one can readily agree, the attempt to define the person of God is no easy task. No simple single word will do. Our language is too limited to express the wonder of God in just a few words.

 The Knowledge of God

The deep concern for us as Christian leaders is to always be ready to give an account of the hope that is in us, as the Apostle Peter advises in his first letter, chapter 3. The source of that hope is and always will be God. There have been various ideas of God in the history of humanity. These ideas are challenged by the Bible's revelation of God. The following are some of those ideas:

(1) Animism:

Animism is the belief that non-human entities, including animals, plants, and often inanimate objects or phenomena, possess a spiritual essence. In the language of the philosophy of religion, animism is one of the lowest (and perhaps the earliest) forms of religion. It believes that these entities interact and speak with people, and receive pleasure or displeasure from human actions, and the belief in their existence often leads to active reverence and worship. According to this view, the world is full of disembodied spirits, regarded as similar to man's soul, and any or all of these may be treated as gods.

(2) Fetishism:

Fetishism is used in a more particular sense of the belief that spirits take up their residence, either temporarily or permanently, in some object and this object, as endowed with higher power, is then worshipped. 

 (3) Idolatry:

Idolatry is a term of still more definite significance. It means that the object selected is the permanent habitation or symbol of the deity; and, generally, it is marked by some degree of human workmanship which enables it the more adequately to represent the deity. People then address their worship to objects, whether fetishes or idols, as being the homes or images of their god. It is a common idea that the spirit has a form similar to the visible object in which it dwells. Paul reflected the pagan idea accurately when he said, "...we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man" (Acts 17:29).

(4) Polytheism:

The belief in many gods, and the worship of them, is an attitude of soul compatible with Animism, Fetishism, and Idolatry, or it may be independent of them all. The term "polytheism" is more usually employed to designate the worship of a limited number of well-defined deities, whether regarded as pure disembodied spirits, or as residing in the greater objects of nature, such as planets or mountains, or as symbolized by images "formed by the art and imagination of man" (Acts 17:29). In ancient Greece or modern India, for example, the great gods are well defined, named and numerable, and it is clearly understood that, though they may be symbolized by images, they dwell apart in a spiritual realm above the rest of the world.

(5) Henotheism:

There is a tendency, both in individuals and in communities, even where many gods are believed to exist, to set one god above the others, and consequently to confine worship to that god alone. This tendency can be seen in the cultures of Babylonia, Egypt, India, China, or Greece, for example. This attitude of mind has been called Henotheism--the worship of one god combined with the belief in the existence of many.

(6) Pantheism:

Pantheism is the belief that the universe or nature as the totality of everything is identical with divinity, or that everything composes an all-encompassing, transcendent god. Pantheists therefore do not believe in a personal or anthropomorphic (having human form or human attributes) god. Eastern religions are often considered to be pantheistically inclined.

(7) Deism:

Deism is the belief that reason and observation of the natural world are sufficient to determine the existence of a Creator, accompanied by the rejection of revelation and authority as a source of religious knowledge. Deism gained prominence in the 17th and 18th centuries during the Age of Enlightenment especially among intellectuals raised as Christians who believed in one god, but found fault with organized religion and did not believe in supernatural events like miracles, the inerrancy of scriptures and the Trinity. Pantheism and deism, though they have had considerable popularity as philosophical theories, have proved unstable and impossible as religions, for they have invariably reverted to some kind of polytheism and idolatry.