Pantheism
(There are many adherents of Pantheism.
Among the Westerns’ Famous
people like Einstein, Words
Worth, Spinoza., William
Blake, Oscar Wilde
, John Keats, and von Goethe others have
declared them them as Pantheists . Among the Religions like Hinduism ,
Taoism are supposed to be Pantheists. Let us glance
through…)
Pantheism is the belief that everything composes an
all-encompassing, immanent God, or that the universe (or nature) is identical with divinity.
Pantheists thus do not believe in a personal or anthropomorphic god. Pantheism is derived from the Greek roots pan (meaning
"all") and theos (meaning
"God").
Pantheism is
similar to the ancient Hindu philosophy of Advaita (non-dualism) and is an
exact representation of the ideas of the
Vedanta. Pantheism
At its most general, pantheism may be understood
positively as the view that God is identical with the cosmos, the view that
there exists nothing which is outside of God,.
Others include some of the Presocratics, such as Heraclitus and Anaximander. The Stoics were pantheists, beginning with Zeno of Citium and culminating in the emperor-philosopher Marcus Aurelius. During the pre-Christian Roman Empire, Stoicism was one of the three dominant schools of philosophy,
along with Epicureanism and Neoplatonism. The
early Taoism of Lao Ziand Zhuangzi is also
considered pantheistic.
The Catholic church regarded pantheism as heresy. Giordano Bruno, an Italian monk who was burned at the stake in 1600
for heresy, is considered by some to be a pantheist. English theologian Daniel Waterland defined pantheism as: "It supposes God
and nature, or God and the whole universe, to be one and the same substance—one
universal being; insomuch that men's souls are only modifications of the divine
substance
Hinduism
It is generally asserted that Hindu religious texts are the oldest
known literature containing pantheistic ideas.
In
Hindu Sanatana Dharma theology, as per the divine revelations i.e.the Vedas, Brahm/Parabrahma is the
one unchanging, infinite, immanent, and transcendent reality which is the
Divine Ground of all things in this Universe. If one adds two whole parts the
result is one whole and if one whole is subtracted from another whole the
result is another whole – it means there is one whole universe and it is all
pervaded by "Thee". Since the universe has come forth from the
Divine, all things and beings are sacred and must be treated so in human
thought and action. The Divine sleeps in minerals, awakens in plants, walks in
animals and thinks in humans.
Just as all rivers lead to the one ocean, Hindus believe that all
religious pathways lead to the same eternal truth. Sanatan Dharma therefore
teaches religious tolerance. Even within Hinduism, there are different
approaches to reaching the Divine based on an individual’s own characteristics.
This idea of pantheism is traceable from the Puranas which are the nearest
allegorical representations created for the masses whereas Vedas were for the
highly literate. All Mahāvākyas (Great Sayings) of the Upanishads, in
one way or another, seem to indicate the unity of the world with the
Brahman. It further says, "This whole universe is Brahman, from Brahman to
a clod of earth." Pantheism is a key component of Advaita philosophy.
Taoism
In the tradition of its leading thinkers Lao Tzu and Zhuangzi, Taoism is comparable with pantheism, as The Tao is always
spoken of with profound religious reverence and respect, similar to the way
that pantheism discusses the "divinity" of the Universe. The Tao te Ching never speaks of a transcendent God, but of a
mysterious and numinous ground of being underlying all things. Moreover Taoism
stresses the importance of living in harmony with Nature. Zhuangzi emphasized the pantheistic content
of Taoism even more clearly: "Heaven and I were created together, and all
things and I are one." When Tung Kuo Tzu asked Zhuangzi where the Tao was,
he replied that it was in the ant, the grass, the clay tile, even in excrement:
"There is nowhere where it is not… There is not a single thing without
Tao.
Other religions
One
philosopher believes that there may be more pantheists than theists worldwide. There are elements of pantheism in
some forms of Christianity, Buddhism, Sufism, Judaism,Gnosticism, Neopaganism, and Theosophy as well as in several tendencies in the major theistic
religions. The Islamic religious tradition, in particular Sufism and Alevism has a strong belief in the unitary nature of the universe and the concept that
everything in it is an aspect of God itself, although this perspective leans
closer to panentheism.. Many traditional and folk religions
including African traditional
religions and Native American
religions can be seen as pantheistic.
Einstein
on Personal God
Einstein
expressed his skepticism regarding an anthropomorphic deity, often describing
it as "naïve" and "childlike". He stated, "It seems to
me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot
take seriously.
Einstein stated: "I have repeatedly said that in my
opinion the idea of a personal God is
a childlike one.
The
problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. May I not reply with a
parable? The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the
universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library
whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues.
The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know
who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The
child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious
order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to
me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured,
toward God. We see a universe marvelously arranged, obeying certain laws, but
we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the
mysterious force that sways the constellations. I am fascinated by Spinoza's
Pantheism. I admire even more his contributions to modern thought. Spinoza is
the greatest of modern philosophers, because he is the first philosopher who
deals with the soul and the body as one, not as two separate things.
Osho,
on God.
There is no need for anybody to begin it, because there is no beginning to this universe, and there is no end.
This question has been exploited by all the religions, because everybody wants to know who began the universe, because your minds are so small they cannot conceive a beginningless universe, an endless universe, just eternity to eternity. Because you cannot conceive that vastness, your question arises, "Who created the universe? Who began it?" But if there was somebody already to begin it, there was a universe. Do you see the simple arithmetic? If there was somebody already to begin it, then you cannot call it the beginning, somebody was already there.
If you think that God is a necessary thing... it gives you consolation that God created the world, so you have a beginning. But who created God? Again you fall into the same problem.
And all the religions have said that God exists eternally, there is no creator of God. If that is true for God, why is it not true for existence itself? It is autonomous, it exists on its own. There is no need of any creator because that creator will require another creator, and you will fall into an absurd regress. You can go from A to Z. But who created Z? The question remains standing, you simply go on pushing. But the question is not solved because you have asked a wrong question.
The universe has no beginning, it is not a creation by anybody. It has no end. And remember, if it had any beginning, then there would certainly be an end. Every beginning is a beginning of an end. Every birth is the beginning of death. So it is good. Get rid of God, because if he can create the world he can destroy the world. And any world that is created is bound to be destroyed sooner or later. If there is birth, there is death. Only a beginningless universe can be endless.
So your problem is just because the capacity of the mind is very limited. That's why I want you to go beyond mind. Only no-mind can conceive the beginningless, the endless; the incomprehensible becomes absolutely clear. There is no problem at all. Those who have risen beyond mind have also risen beyond God simultaneously. God is a need for the mind, because the mind cannot conceive infinite, eternal things. It can only conceive very limited things. The question arises because of your mind's incapacity, its impotence. You ask, "God is dead, but that creates the question, `Who began this universe?'" But have you ever thought that God will not solve the question? On the contrary, the question will be pushed a step back: who created God? Any hypothesis that does not destroy the question is absolutely useless. Any answer that keeps on pushing the question further back but does not touch it at all, is not the answer.
The only answer you will find is in your own experience of eternity. Then you will know nobody has created it. It has no beginning, no end. You don't have any beginning, you don't have any end. When you experience it within your own self, you know existence is autonomous, it is not created.
A created thing cannot be more than a mechanism; it cannot be an organic reality. A car is created, man is not created. If man is also created he becomes a mechanism, a robot. You can dismantle a car, take all the parts apart -- the wheels and everything -- and you can put them back and the car will be perfectly okay. But cut a man into pieces and then join them together -- with German glue! -- still the man will not be back. An organic phenomenon cannot be dissected. The moment you dissect it, its very mystery disappears. Then you can join those parts, but you will have only a corpse, not a living human being. It is the dignity of existence that it is not created.
The very
idea of God is because our mind cannot comprehend eternity. Once you rise
beyond your limited mind to an unlimited no-mind, you can conceive all that was
inconceivable before. No God is needed.
Now the time to enjoy some poems on
Pantheism
If through infinity
the same
thing flows, eternally repeating,
if an arch, though manifold, can mightily
hold itself together,
If all things pour out lust for life,
the smallest and the biggest stars,
Yet all this striving, all this struggle
Is eternal peace in God the Lord.
thing flows, eternally repeating,
if an arch, though manifold, can mightily
hold itself together,
If all things pour out lust for life,
the smallest and the biggest stars,
Yet all this striving, all this struggle
Is eternal peace in God the Lord.
If through infinity
the same
thing flows, eternally repeating,
if an arch, though manifold, can mightily
hold itself together,
If all things pour out lust for life,
the smallest and the biggest stars,
Yet all this striving, all this struggle
Is eternal peace in God the Lord.
thing flows, eternally repeating,
if an arch, though manifold, can mightily
hold itself together,
If all things pour out lust for life,
the smallest and the biggest stars,
Yet all this striving, all this struggle
Is eternal peace in God the Lord.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I hear and behold God in every object…
Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty four,
and each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass.
I find letters from God dropped in the street - and every one is signed by God's name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.
Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty four,
and each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass.
I find letters from God dropped in the street - and every one is signed by God's name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.
Walt Whitman
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