The benevolent Father

God. What's the first image that springs to your mind when I utter the word? Depending on your religious and cultural background, it's probably one of the following:

1. An old man with a long flowing beard and a kindly face
2. A multi-armed Vishnu lying on the Shesh-Nag
3. A trident-wielding Shiva meditating on Mt.Kailash
4. The face of Buddha surrounded by an ethereal halo
5. Jesus on the cross

There are several striking things that I find result from the above exercise. One, everyone, whatever their beliefs, have a concept of God - including those claiming to not believe in a God at all. Two, this concept is usually highly anthropomorphic. Three, its almost always a male. Four, this image usually embodies some very deep spiritual quality - love, kindness, benevolence, sacrifice, detachment... While all these are interesting in their own ways, I'll largely talk about the first two in this post.

The Bible talks about how God created man in his own image. Anthropomorphism is interesting in that it uses this concept to effect the exact opposite - creating a concept of God in our own image. In my mind idols and anthropomorphic images have a very specific origin in the history of man - they were primarily meant to be tools, ways for people to access more abstract concepts in a tangible way. It is indeed rather unfortunate that the caveat that these tools were no doubt created with - namely, that they are inaccurate representations to be used only as a starting point on one's search for truth - has been discarded by the wayside somewhere along the road of mankind's history. Not only that, these images have now become larger than life - they have permeated every level of our society, and are the fulcrums on which the cogs of the human machine turn. And worst of all, they are frequently the points of dissension amongst groups of people and go so far as to cause wars.

My adviser often likes to use this quote by George F.Box in his presentations - "All models are wrong. Some are useful." That's how I'd like to think anthropomorphism had its genesis - as a wrong, but nevertheless useful, model of a reality we cannot ever hope to comprehend. It is a sad commentary on the state of society that the model itself has become greater than the quest for that reality.

The Baha'i faith talks about God being an unknowable essence - one we can never hope to know or understand with our finite minds; and yet one who's qualities and attributes are reflected in all of creation. If we actually go beyond the superficial, we see striking parallels to this concept in all other religions as well. In the Gita, Arjuna describes the Lord, Krishna, as being "inexhaustible", "without origin, middle or end", and "of limitless glory" (chapter 10, verses 18-19). In spite of these words, a quick history lesson tells us how, over thousands of years, Hinduism became extremely anthropomorphic, with the priests using the concept of idol worship as a way to control an unknowing populace. It was precisely to counter this that the Buddha - who is accepted by most Hindus, even, to be an incarnation of the Lord - sought to bring the concept of a God back to its abstract self. The Quran breathes the same words - most Muslims generally believe that Allah is unknowable.

Where many cleave to such an anthropomorphic understanding of God, we also have, on the other hand, those who are repelled from religion precisely for the same reason. Claims of atheism always discomfit me a little because I really think that a lot of self-proclaimed atheists aren't really against a concept of an extra-worldly reality, but are just against the image society has of that reality. When asked, most people generally admit to some kind of belief about what it is that really underlies this world of existence. So it is really the myths propounded by organized religion that a lot of people are against - not the essential spirit itself.

Today I believe humanity has reached a level of maturity that makes the tool of anthropomorphism redundant. With the shrinking of the world to a global village, the access we enjoy to knowledge and information, all we really need to do is open our hearts, shed our preconceived notions, and go out and search.