Error: Unable to create directory /home/demockra/public_html/wp-content/uploads/2010/09. Is its parent directory writable by the server? Copernicus and the Search for God

I started my search with hope, but in the end there was nothing, but that’s OK. My search spanned many years, many books, and many miles traveled. It is a journey made in some way by all of humankind, an effort to correlate religious belief within the parameters of authenticated history and science. While I was never a regular Church goer, after a brush with cancer, I decided to explore the options.

Just as man has developed over the centuries, so have religions evolved and developed to mirror man’s progress. In the very beginnings were the worship of the sun, natural phenomena, and the spirits of the animals. With the establishment of city states, so came the idea of King/Gods to give strength and courage to their soldiers in battle, by convincing them that the sacrifice, even of their lives, would be rewarded by their God/Kings. [This theory is explained by Jared Diamond in his best seller Guns, Germs and Steel.] The Gods were depicted as enhanced versions of themselves, living in improved versions of our cities, suspended above us in the sky.

From those early beginnings, education, philosophy, and the sciences emerged. With more knowledge of the known world, the old City Gods seemed primitive, and all encompassing religions with one God became the norm. The first of these monotheist religions that grew around the Indus valley in India was Hinduism. The beginnings of Hinduism in India occurred around 2,000 B.C.E. Much of its beliefs were imported with the Dravidians, who entered India from the North already with many of the basic beliefs of what was to become Hinduism. It retained the old Gods at a base level, but assumed the belief that at a higher level, God was one, but man was too lowly to comprehend the higher complexities. Buddhism, which in many ways is more of a philosophy, was then born with the Buddha in 563 B.C.E . Many devout Hindus claim to this day that Buddhism is really just an offshoot of Hinduism.

The area where all our western monotheisms or one-God beliefs started was the Middle East. There Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all arose with very similar and overlapping histories. Jerusalem is of course central to all of those faiths. It is intriguing that some of the main beliefs of our Abrahamic faiths are taken directly from the pre-Abrahamic Gods.

Validation of the Faith

For as far back as faith has been around, humankind has attempted to validate that faith through the scientific philosophical approach. [Here I am indebted to Karen Armstrong for her amazing book, A History of God.] Thousands have sought over the ages to prove the existence of God. Indeed, probably all of us have at some point. The Greeks were probably the earliest recognizable true philosophers. They rejected mythological answers to solve the basics questions of heaven and earth. Probably the most intense and prolonged questioning occurred in Iberia during the 700 years it was under Arab rule, while Europe was still deeply mired in the Medieval mud. It was there that the sharpest religious minds from Judaism and Islam cooperated closely to try to reach a proof, any proof. From all of this evolved the most elaborate theories, doctrines, and suppositions, all as improvable as the original question. The mystic approach, where students look deeply within their own being, has proven more successful to its adherents. Christian Mystics, Muslim Sufis, and Hindu Sadhus have all turned their focus inward through a variety of modes of contemplation. Sufis whirl in concentric circles; Sadhus contemplate, often in poses for hours or days on end in positions that would be extremely uncomfortable for most of us for even a few seconds. Some Monks go without speaking for years on end in an attempt to hear the small inner voice. Even hippies have tried this approach, perhaps the easy way with Mescaline, LSD, Magic Mushrooms, and other mediums. Unfortunately, these approaches probably reveal more about the complexity of the human neurology than the nature of God.

Religious opinions change almost on a daily basis in an attempt to remain pertinent to societies own changes. For right or wrong, it has been essential to keeping stability in many societies by helping keep a promise of a better life after death for those who live indigent livelihoods and as a mechanism for keeping a people united under a common tribal identity against a common enemy with supposed lesser beliefs.

Should Have Religion Died in 1543?

In 1543 Copernicus’s seminal work, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres), posited that the heavens did not revolve around the earth, but the other way around. Arab and Indian scholars had of course knew that for centuries, but this was the first time it was proven to the Christian world. Before this, everything was about us and our planet. Our earth was the center of the universe, all things revolved around us, and, of course, our God overlooked us, judged us, rewarded us, and helped us out in times of trouble. After 1543 we were an immeasurably tiny part of billions of galaxies that extend outward for millions of light years.

The End of My Journey

So is this the end of this journey that I strangely found very satisfying?  The question then is what drives us to religion, and how it is sometimes used to manipulate us. It is a truism that all of us, from the age where we first have a brush with death, be it the death of a relative, friend, or pet, feel the need for a power that makes it alright. The need for religion makes talented salesmen of religion rich, powerful, and influential in every society around the globe. In areas where religion is strongest, it is essential that our leaders adhere to the true faith. Barack Obama would have stood no chance of election if he had declared himself agnostic, yet reading his autobiographical book Dreams From My Father suggests that he valued the works of the church in their help to the poor in Chicago and the dedication of some of the ministers. However, nowhere is there any statement of his own faith. Although I have no doubt that is he a Christian, the fact that he doesn’t seem to wear it on his sleeve, but rather seems to live it through shared values is probably one of his greatest strengths.

Once we accept that belief can transcend evidence, we are programmed to accept without question what those good Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and Hindu leaders tell us. That is why religion has caused so many conflicts over the ages. Today, of course, medieval tortures have been reinvented to use on those lured into battle by their own deluded religious teachers and leaders.

Religion in one form or another has been with us from the beginning of time and will probably be with us until the end. Einstein himself believed in no formal religion, but thought that their must be some master equation which could be used to harmonize all things. It was this equation which he saw as God’s design. He did not believe that humankind played any role, above being a tiny part in “the equation.” Alas Quantum mechanics, whose theories Einstein opposed vehemently throughout the latter part of his life, with its basis being a lack of any order, has moved physics further from any such unifying equation.

The final question then must be: Has mankind benefited from religion, or has all of it been a chain around our necks. Clearly, as mentioned before, it has been a necessity for stability in many societies. Without this stability, the conditions for economic growth and progress may not have been sufficient. Also, it has been a solace to many in times of great stress or sorrow. It has helped countless people through times of intolerable hardship, famine, plague, and wars. Religion left alone and not seized upon by power hungry individuals, states, or countries, can and has been a power for good. I look on the Dalai Llama, Mahatma Gandhi, and the Aga Khan as shining lights in that respect.

Unfortunately, where religions have evolved into powerful advocacy groups on their own behalf, with their leaders’ power-hungry egos inflated by their own sense of gravitas, they inevitably do more to divide and deride than to resolve, pacify, and heal. Religion will continue to hold sway for many more millennia, so it essential for us to understand in an historical rational way the damage that can be caused by the lack of separation between state and religion. In the end, that was the main lesson of my personal journey.