SIR, HAVE YOU SEEN GOD? ... 1
Is there a God? Sure, there is and He/She dwells as the immanent principle in Nature, as Nature itself and as the transcendent principle thereof. But He is not known to the senses which are His derivatives. He, being pure consciousness, existence, bliss, is known only to the purified intellect, to the senses shorn of material dross and to the heart that yearns for Him alone and nothing else in this vast world of diverse delusive dreams.
Man sees his universe through his senses that carry the imprint of his anthropomorphic conceptions about everything. As such, his idea of God is also bound to be coloured by his human consciousness, by his human interpretation of the mind and its impressions. There is simply no escaping this fact and herein arise deep philosophical questions whether God or anything for that matter is definitely knowable by the human mind.
These are deep philosophical matters and I will not go into them but shall keep the matter as simple as possible with the focus on the possible existence of God or otherwise and our possible knowledge of Him or otherwise. I shall, for the sake of linguistic convenience, stick to the masculine gender in reference to God, although, God cannot be contained as such to any particular gender. Accordingly, in Indian languages we have the third person common gender which makes matters convenient in such expression.
Countless sages and saints have testified to the existence of God and their reports we need to examine for their veracity of content and conformity to principles of knowledge. Mere acceptance of any statement coming down from antiquity on the basis of blind faith or enforcement through arbitrary injunction might have suited the medieval mind in many countries but India since ancient times has applied the strictest rational rigour and reserved the highest amount of scepticism in regard to claims spiritual and has thus arrived at a body of spiritual knowledge that has passed such scrutiny and, hence, been called the Vedas or the accumulated treasury of spiritual truths. It is a vast collection of evidence, principles, formulations and aphorisms posited and recorded, initially orally and subsequently rerecorded in writing, by unnumbered sages of India's ancient past who claimed to have had the direct experience (aparokshaanubhuti) of God or the immanent and the transcendent reality that underlies, interpenetrates and surpasses phenomena.
End of Part 1
Written by Sugata Bose
Is there a God? Sure, there is and He/She dwells as the immanent principle in Nature, as Nature itself and as the transcendent principle thereof. But He is not known to the senses which are His derivatives. He, being pure consciousness, existence, bliss, is known only to the purified intellect, to the senses shorn of material dross and to the heart that yearns for Him alone and nothing else in this vast world of diverse delusive dreams.
Man sees his universe through his senses that carry the imprint of his anthropomorphic conceptions about everything. As such, his idea of God is also bound to be coloured by his human consciousness, by his human interpretation of the mind and its impressions. There is simply no escaping this fact and herein arise deep philosophical questions whether God or anything for that matter is definitely knowable by the human mind.
These are deep philosophical matters and I will not go into them but shall keep the matter as simple as possible with the focus on the possible existence of God or otherwise and our possible knowledge of Him or otherwise. I shall, for the sake of linguistic convenience, stick to the masculine gender in reference to God, although, God cannot be contained as such to any particular gender. Accordingly, in Indian languages we have the third person common gender which makes matters convenient in such expression.
Countless sages and saints have testified to the existence of God and their reports we need to examine for their veracity of content and conformity to principles of knowledge. Mere acceptance of any statement coming down from antiquity on the basis of blind faith or enforcement through arbitrary injunction might have suited the medieval mind in many countries but India since ancient times has applied the strictest rational rigour and reserved the highest amount of scepticism in regard to claims spiritual and has thus arrived at a body of spiritual knowledge that has passed such scrutiny and, hence, been called the Vedas or the accumulated treasury of spiritual truths. It is a vast collection of evidence, principles, formulations and aphorisms posited and recorded, initially orally and subsequently rerecorded in writing, by unnumbered sages of India's ancient past who claimed to have had the direct experience (aparokshaanubhuti) of God or the immanent and the transcendent reality that underlies, interpenetrates and surpasses phenomena.
End of Part 1
Written by Sugata Bose
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