Monday, July 13, 2015

Psychologically speaking








Yesterday, just after finishing writing "Seven pithy criticisms of God", one of the toes on my left foot really started to hurt. This could have been divine retribution, or it could have been ascribable to aging, the problematic evolutionary design of feet, or simple bad luck. All of these explanations would richly support my arguments (such as they were) in yesterday's post, briefly, that God could stand to be considerably more friendly and open handed and nicer. The pain in my toe could also be a metaphor for me kicking my foot against the stone wall of the world. That the world is a stone wall would support my contentions about God as well, I suppose, but I'm pretty sure that ultimately, what this last one is truly all about, is me.

And so it is when one tries to talk about God. No matter how good someone is at it, Chuang Tzu, or Jesus, Nietzsche or Leila Ahmed, no matter how professorial, priestly, historical, funny, objective, wise, spiritual, detached, or scholarly, the thing you really end up talking about, deep down in the truth of the thing, is yourself. Your culture, your politics, your parents, 

yourself.




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