What has God got to do with it?

Can't believe I didn't see this obvious thing before...

The definition of evil is the turning away from God. This is the ultimate sin and the cause of suffering, hell and damnation.

This definition works in every world religion (including Buddhism). With this equation people since the dawn of time have realised that to alleviate worldly sufferinsg they need to turn to God and appease Him. This is done in a number of ways from making offerings to Him, or making offerings to other people (generosity) through to more sedate methods like prayer and meditation.

What I can't believe has been so profoundly missed however is that the turning to God or not has nothing to do with God at all!

It is clearly written in the Abrahamic religions (Judeism, Christianity, Islam, Ba'hai etc) that Man ate from the Tree of Knowledge and so gained the knowledge of Good and Evil and so gained the power to disobey God. But this then gets forgotten in the delude of spin in favour of God.

The point for every religious person to realise from the humble mendicant through to the fanatical holy warrior is that the only tool that God has over man is persuasion. The choice of Good and Evil lies entirely within Man. Threaten to behead an impious heretic and all that is being wielded is persuasion.

It matters not how Great is God if this fails to impress the free Man.

Now this is probably a lot of Nietzsche. But what it is not is a rejection of God. The fact still remains that if we lose sight of God we suffer - be that through God's active vengence or simply a Law of reality.

So the central tenet of Buddhism that we must seek salvation through our own effort is nothing other than the truth of all religions. Bunyan's Christian seeks God and salvation by no other means than his own efforts - this is the methophor for all our salvations from suffering by whichever road we seek to tread. This is the most established, universal and invariant Truth that Man has realised during his eons upon earth.

A Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, a Wicken, a Jain, a Buddhist, a Hindu, a Zoroastrian, a Satanist, an Animist, a Confusionist, a Daoist: all these and more believe that the difference between suffering and well-being lies in our own efforts to follow God. It is not God Himself who makes us well.

BUT how easily this is misunderstood. A Man who belies that God is so easily mastered and bought off by a few prayers and offerings; a Man who becomes arrogant and believes that he can do as he wishes and then attend church or do some dana or charity to appease the God - this man is the worst of all Men. For him suffering is endless and his charity is worthless.

God it must never be forgotten is the All Powerful and only through humble respect of this matter can we follow Him rightfully. It is like the Man who stands at the window to throw himself off. In freefall he believes he need only make amends with the earth before impact to be saved. The wise Man of course realises the Law of Gravity and knows that flight in the face of it is futile. Freedom is not like the former, but continual awareness and respect of the Law like the latter.

This point is a favourite of Jewish writers who explain to the dumbfounded that the Jewish God is All Powerful and beyond comparison and explanation. To worship Him is not to expect anything in return. If one is pious and dutiful but still ends up in a concentration camp to think that God is unjust is simply to lose ones humility and believe ones own judgement over Gods. Here is a lesson for all those who lack faith in God - he is immesurable and humility comes in the form of acceptance and non-judgement!

So why Abrahamic religions should be stereotyped as slaves to God and Buddhists stereotyped as rejectors of God is a mystery. Maybe it is simply the inability of common men to see the duality of all things - that what is one way needs the other way to be what it is. To be free to chose Good over Evil is both to be slave to Goodness and master to Goodness at the same time.

If we want to catch a living fish, must we also catch some river too! Some will say that we haven't completely caught the fish if it is in the bag with a bit of the river too. And yet the man who completely catches the fish soon has a dead fish. But does a man with a dead fish have the same thing as a man with a live fish? So has a "fish" really been caught?

When one speaks of fish:
One must have river and fish as one.
When one speaks of river:
One must have river and fish as one also.

This links with the natural selection, evolution stuff.

p.s. I mentioned Satanists in the list of religions. These are ironic fellows for sure. They believe in Good and Evil. They believe in God and Satan (few religions believe in Satan it is true). They recognise that rebellion from God is called Evil. They probably also realise that Suffering is caused by Evil. Yet they turn to Satan to end their suffering! Certainly he can offer them gains, but these gains lead to suffering. So it is an odd religion for those who wish for anything other than suffering. And if they wish for freedom from the Law then why turn from one master to another? But I include them because at root it is through their own actions that they get what they get.