Moses, Jesus and Muhammad believed in the same God and yet, not quite the same God. Each of them created a version of that 'same' God, the result of their different personalities, ambitions and needs.
With the possible exception of Jesus at times, they believed their God to be something external to themselves. I am unable to believe in an external God, an internal God, ‘that of God in everyone’ (whatever the ‘that’ means) or in any other kind of God. If you do not believe in any kind of God, then real human beings have to be the answer to the unreal Gods; the answer but not a replacement. We are human beings and all we need to be are good human beings, not godlike human beings.
In 1 John in the New Testament, you will find the sentence, ‘No man has ever seen God.’ That doesn’t matter to me and I hope it doesn’t matter to you. What must matter, though, is that we have seen each other. Not only has no man or woman ever seen God but they have never heard God either; what they have always heard is someone claiming that their words are God’s words. If a God were to ever speak to me in a dream, I would not be at all surprised to hear it say:
You, Peter, came to the conclusion some time ago that anyone who said they had a God, was a ventriloquist and that their dummy was the only kind of God they could possibly have. Their ‘God’ was within them, for they were simply talking to themselves!
The ventriloquist’s dummy can be loving, helpful and forgiving, only if the ventriloquist decides to be loving, helpful and forgiving. The dummy is only as good as the ventriloquist and he who has seen the dummy has seen the ventriloquist. Remember also that if the ventriloquists did not exist, then their Gods would not exist.
I now want to tell you a little more about what I am and what I am not. I am not a resident in any building, no matter how grand. I can reside only in human beings. I cannot answer prayers, only human beings can sometimes do that.
I now need to tell you what I have had nothing to do with. I have had nothing to do with the creation of the universe, not even with the creation of the Earth; not with a six-day manufacturing process or with a lengthier evolutionary process. I did not even exist until I was created by some human beings, after they had evolved to a state where they could ask some deep questions and come up with a fairly shallow answer – me. There are some who, able to accept a theory of evolution and even a “Big Bang” at the beginning of it all, insist on saying that I must have existed before these things happened, so that these things could happen. Utter rubbish! I have no idea how it all started and unless someday you somehow find out, then I, your dummy, will never know. I have not created the flea or the mosquito, nor have I created the gardener or the singer of songs. These are simply some of the infinite number of pieces which go to make up nature. Only you, or other parts of nature, can help or hinder nature.
Only nature exists, and nature is the whole of what exists.
I know that you, Peter, will agree with everything I have just said because it was you who said it. One request before I go; please ask your friends never to use the meaningless phrase, "God is good". It is only human beings who are or could be good and who can also take good care of their "Gods." I conclude with a saying from the Gospel of Thomas (translated by Professor George MacRae). 'Jesus said, "If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you." Peter Mavromatis lives in Tasmania. He is a Quaker Attender and has been a member of SoF UK for eight years or so.