Do We All Worship the Same God?

[Ody]

I believe the doctrine of the Trinity was implicit in authentic Old Testament Judaism. Certainly Abraham knew God as the Holy Trinity.

But that is fodder for another thread. I don't want to sidetrack this one.

Have any way to back up the son aspect of the trinity in judaism? Do you have any TRUE FACTS in regards to that Abraham knew G-d as the trinity?

 

[Darkdale]

I'd say we all worship different gods.

 

[Squirt]

Do we?

In order to make this poll somewhat intelligible to all, I am making a few arbitrary assumptions in posting. They are as follows:

1. Christians means those who have been baptized with water in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and who profess the beliefs described in The Nicene Creed, regardless of denominational or sectarian affiliation.
2. I have assumed that all such Christians worship the same God, the Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. If you wish to argue that they do not, start a new thread. This is not the right one for such arguments.
3. Those persons who do not profess the beliefs contained in The Nicene Creed, are not regarded as Christians for the purposes of this poll and thread. If you wish to argue that they are Christians, start a new thread. This is not the right one for those kinds of arguments either.

I hope all that is clear.

Well I voted "Yes. All religions worship God from different perspectives." And I'm glad I did so before I read your narrowly defined interpretation of who a Christian is. In your eyes, I don't even qualify as a Christian myself.

 

[Buttons*]

I'd say we worship different aspects of ourselves.
Whatever we've found fits us best, whatever we've been raised with, or whatever makes us feel a certian way, we follow what benefits us best when it comes to blind faith/beliefs.
(or maybe this is the wrong place to put this....)

 

[Revasser]

I went ahead and voted "Other". As has been stated, the poll is very slanted toward the Abrahamic faiths and Christianity in particular, so nothing but "Other" really fit.

I say different religions (if they're theistic religions) worship different gods for the most part. The Abrahamics all seem to worship the same god. They have different ideas about the nature of that god and how is the best way to go about worshiping him, but I would say it's still the same entity.

For the rest, I think there are many gods. Probably far more than humanity has ever been aware of, though only a few seem to take any interest in us. They are separate, distinct beings. They might be made of the same "stuff", like humans are made of the same stuff, but they are separate entities, just as we are. I, personally, find the idea that there is a "One True God" to be very presumptuous and I while I don't find the "All gods are One God and all godesses are one Goddess" idea to be quite as unpleasant, I don't agree with it either.

Yes, I'm a "hard" polytheist.

 

[Valjean]

I'd say Christians, Jews and Muslims have a similar concept of God, but somewhat different traditions of worship.

Hindus have a rather different concept of God(s), a whole different metaphysic.

 

[James the Persian]

I voted 'I don't know'. I believe that there is only one God and that we all must therefore be worshipping the same God (though skewed in different ways by our (mis)understanding of Him) or some of us must be worshipping things that are not gods at all and thinking they are God. Which of these any one person, culture or religion falls into, I simply cannot say. I have no difficulty in believing that some gods might be demons masquerading as such but nor do I have any problem believing that the human factor simply causes distorted images of who God is. Until we meet God face to face, I don't think any of us will truly know such things.

James

 

[Smoke]

I think we all worship different Gods. Not only are the Hindu Gods different from the Christian God (for instance), but different Christians have completely different conceptions of their God. In effect, they worship different Gods.

There's something to be said for the idea that we all worship different aspects of the divine, or that we all worship the divine from a different perspective. But if one of us worships Elvis, and another worships Marilyn Manson, and another worships Britney Spears, doesn't it muddy the waters a lot to say they're all the same "God"?

I believe that the vast majority of people who worship are rather careless about what they worship, and in most cases are worshiping what amounts to their own psychological projection. When people say things like:

• "God hates ****"
• "God doesn't want his people to be sick"
• "God wants you to prosper financially"
• "God accepts your suffering as an offering to him"
• "God forgives your sins"
• "God will judge you/us/them for ... "
• "God answers prayer"

I think what they're saying really doesn't have anything to do with the divine at all; they are, in effect, deifying their own thoughts and emotions. So in that way, there are as many gods as there are worshipers, or even more.

On the other hand, when Orthodox Christians say that we cannot know God's essence, but we can know him in his energies, and followers of Vedanta say

Each god or goddess represents a different aspect of the one God. And since God is infinite, it's no wonder there are so many different expressions! (reference)
​

then I think we're very close to something like different ways of approaching the mystery of the divine. I think the explanation given on a Kemetic website comes very close to expressing the mystery in terms that people of different faiths can understand:

Kemetic Orthodoxy falls between a number of dichotomies Westerners commonly draw in discussing religion. It recognizes that the human intellect is inadequate to comprehend Netjer in Its totality. Netjer is both hidden and unknowable. Yet, how can humans interact with an unknowable being? The Kemetic worldview, in similarity to Eastern systems, finds an interesting way around this limitation; the same workaround expressed in Hinduism: monolatry, or the belief that Netjer manifests in countless expressions -- where Deity is one unknowable power expressed in human terms in subjective, plural manifestations we can commune with and make sense of. There is more than one Name or "face" of Netjer; however, a practitioner prays to the Names one at a time and when working with one particular Name of Netjer understands that Name to be one reflection of Netjer's abstract totality, sometimes referred to as the Self-Created One. (reference)
​

For those who share this understanding, that the divine is essentially unknowable, and that "the names that can be named are not the eternal Name," there is a lot of common ground regardless of what form our worship takes.

But if we imagine that we understand the divine, and think that what we imagine corresponds to the reality of the divine, then I think we've drifted into the basest kind of fantasy and idolatry. One of the things I dislike about Western Christianity is its tendency to over-explain, to imagine that God can be circumscribed by definitions. That tendency isn't limited to Western Christianity, but that's what I have the most experience of.

Any God that can be circumscribed by human definitions or can be grasped by the human understanding is, to my way of thinking, a false God. There are countless of these false Gods, and I don't believe their worshipers worship anything -- when all is said and done -- but themselves.

But there is one divine Mystery, and people may express that and approach it in different ways, whether they speak of one God, many Gods, or no God.

 

[Squirt]

...different Christians have completely different conceptions of their God. In effect, they worship different Gods.

So if the President of the US is, in my opinion, the epitome of what a President should be (which, incidentally, is definitely not the case!) and the President of the US is, in your opinion, the worst President the Country has ever had or probably will ever have, does that mean we have two different Presidents?

 

[Smoke]

So if the President of the US is, in my opinion, the epitome of what a President should be (which, incidentally, is definitely not the case!) and the President of the US is, in your opinion, the worst President the Country has ever had or probably will ever have, does that mean we have two different Presidents?

The President of the US is one person who has an objective and verifiable existence. The same cannot be said of God.

 

[Squirt]

The President of the US is one person who has an objective and verifiable existence. The same cannot be said of God.

Whether God can be proven to exist is entirely beside the point. For the sake of argument, all Christians can agree that He does. With that in mind, please tell me how their differing understandings of his nature and attributes means that they are not worshipping the same divine being.

 

[Smoke]

Whether God can be proven to exist is entirely beside the point. For the sake of argument, all Christians can agree that He does. With that in mind, please tell me how their differing understandings of his nature and attributes means that they are not worshipping the same divine being.

The president exists, and his existence and characteristics can be verified, even if different people take different views of those characteristics.

If I say, "George W. Bush is a wonderful, compassionate, godly man, the best president the United States has ever had," my view may not be accurate, but it's my view, however flawed, of an objective reality. There is a reality corresponding, however incidentally, to my view.

On the other hand, the god I worship may be entirely in my head, and correspond to no reality whatsoever.

If I believe that Elvis is God, that his mother was a virgin, and that Elvis suffered and ultimately died to atone for our sins -- if my view of Elvis, in other words, corresponds exactly to the traditional Christian view of Jesus, but I ascribe all the attributes of Jesus to Elvis -- then is my religion the same as yours? Do we worship the same God?

If on the other hand my terminology is Christian, but what I believe about God corresponds exactly to what is known about Elvis, do we worship the same god, or different gods?

 

[sushannah]

I voted other because, according to the wording in the poll, there is no seperate category for Jews only, or Muslims only believe in the one true G-d.

I believe only Jews worship the one true G-d because Christians worship Jesus, and make him G-d.
As a Jew I worship the G-d of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. These two can never be the same. Would the same G-d who told the Jewish people to keep the law and the commandments for all their generations come and make that same law null, then judge the Jewish people for being keepers of the law and not living by faith alone?

 

[Squirt]

The president exists, and his existence and characteristics can be verified, even if different people take different views of those characteristics.

If I say, "George W. Bush is a wonderful, compassionate, godly man, the best president the United States has ever had," my view may not be accurate, but it's my view, however flawed, of an objective reality. There is a reality corresponding, however incidentally, to my view.

On the other hand, the god I worship may be entirely in my head, and correspond to no reality whatsoever.

If I believe that Elvis is God, that his mother was a virgin, and that Elvis suffered and ultimately died to atone for our sins -- if my view of Elvis, in other words, corresponds exactly to the traditional Christian view of Jesus, but I ascribe all the attributes of Jesus to Elvis -- then is my religion the same as yours? Do we worship the same God?

If on the other hand my terminology is Christian, but what I believe about God corresponds exactly to what is known about Elvis, do we worship the same god, or different gods?

Your example is so far fetched that I'm not even going to bother to comment on it. In my opinion, when it comes to God's nature and attributes, Christians focus far too much on their differences and not enough on their similarities. If we all have to have an identical understanding of who God is in order to all be worshipping the same God, you'd have a hard time finding more than a handful of people who have the exact same understanding of Him. I've talked to numerous Catholics, for instance, each of whom has a slightly different understanding of what the Trinity is. And these differences exist between members of the same denomination. I'm not a Catholic, but if a Catholic were to offer to pray to his God on my behalf, I would gladly accept his offer, believing that the same individual who heard my own prayers was also hearing my Catholic friend's prayers.

 

[Smoke]

Your example is so far fetched that I'm not even going to bother to comment on it.

I don't think the notion that Elvis is the savior is a bit more farfetched than what I've heard televangelists say. I could have given a more true-to-life example, but then somebody's sure to say I'm making fun of their religion. And they wouldn't be far wrong, either.

The point is, do beliefs matter? If not, then why is it important to be a Christian at all?

 

[Smoke]

I'm not a Catholic, but if a Catholic were to offer to pray to his God on my behalf, I would gladly accept his offer, believing that the same individual who heard my own prayers was also hearing my Catholic friend's prayers.

What if your friend were a Mormon, or a Jehovah's Witness?

What if he were a Jew or a Muslim?

A Hindu? A Scientologist? A Satanist?

What if he -- like myself -- didn't see God as an "individual" at all?

 

[Squirt]

I don't think the notion that Elvis is the savior is a bit more farfetched than what I've heard televangelists say. I could have given a more true-to-life example, but then somebody's sure to say I'm making fun of their religion. And they wouldn't be far wrong, either.

Well, in that case, I suppose it's best you don't!

The point is, do beliefs matter? If not, then why is it important to be a Christian at all?

I think they matter, and I think God wants us to have an accurate understanding of Him. I also think He's a whole lot more forgiving of stupidity than we give Him credit for.

 

[Squirt]

What if your friend were a Mormon, or a Jehovah's Witness?

What if he were a Jew or a Muslim?

A Hindu? A Scientologist? A Satanist?

What if he -- like myself -- didn't see God as an "individual" at all?

I don't know for sure, and I definitely wouldn't want to answer with respect to how I feel about the God/s of any of these religions specifically. I'd definitely say that I could accept any of the Abrahamic "versions" of God as being the same God I worship. Obviously, I would draw the line somewhere, but I believe my perception of God is flexible enough to allow for some degree of "inaccuracy" between religions.

 

[Smoke]

I'd definitely say that I could accept any of the Abrahamic "versions" of God as being the same God I worship. Obviously, I would draw the line somewhere, but I believe my perception of God is flexible enough to allow for some degree of "inaccuracy" between religions.

So what are the implications of that? Do you believe that when a Baptist or a Catholic says Jesus is God the Son, and that you must believe that to be saved, and a Muslim says that God cannot have a Son, and Jesus is prophet, and a Jew says that Jesus was either an apostate Jew or a good Jew whose teachings were later miscontrued by Gentiles -- do you think these people are just disputing about trivialities? But yet you do think perhaps the Hindu conception of the Divine is a little too far off?

If Bob is adamant about worshiping a Triune God, and Frank is adamant about worshiping God as a non-Trinitarian Unity, do you think they worship the same God without realizing it? If they don't know what they're worshiping, how can anybody else be sure?

 

[Squirt]

So what are the implications of that? Do you believe that when a Baptist or a Catholic says Jesus is God the Son, and that you must believe that to be saved, and a Muslim says that God cannot have a Son, and Jesus is prophet, and a Jew says that Jesus was either an apostate Jew or a good Jew whose teachings were later miscontrued by Gentiles -- do you think these people are just disputing about trivialities?

No, I don't think these things are trivialities. God is who He is, regardless of who we conceive Him to be. I believe that (1) we were all created by the same God, (2) this God loves us all equally, and (3) we are all ultimately answerable to Him. Even though I have some very specific ideas concerning Him, I am simply not the kind of person who can say that if you don't share these ideas, you are worshipping an entirely different being.

But yet you do think perhaps the Hindu conception of the Divine is a little too far off?

I don't know. I try to make it a point to withhold judgment about things I know virtually nothing about.

If Bob is adamant about worshiping a Triune God, and Frank is adamant about worshiping God as a non-Trinitarian Unity, do you think they worship the same God without realizing it?

Yes I do.

If they don't know what they're worshiping, how can anybody else be sure?

God can be sure. He knows the Hindu's heart just as intimately as He knows mine. I'm sorry, I can't say it any more clearly than I have. Perhaps we are simply at an impasse.