Do Not Believe in God
By Steve Gillman
I take the following poem to be an example of getting past
words with poetry, of pointing more directly at some truth, rather
than trying to "recreate" it in a logical argument
or definition. From the title you may think that it is a poem
that will try to convince to not believe in God. When you read
it, you might think the opposite. But be sure to read what I
have to say below about the meaning and the author.
Do Not Believe in God
Do not believe in god
Do not have faith
SEE GOD
in stars and sunlight
and the face of your lover
HEAR GOD
in wind and waves
and the music of the birds
TASTE GOD
in berries and beer
and meals eaten with friends
SMELL GOD
in flowers and forests
and the air after a storm
FEEL GOD
in snow and sand
and the warmth of a fire
KNOW GOD
in love and longing
and your hunger for beauty
RETURN
again and again
return to these things
FORGET YOUR CHURCHES
They are cages for God
that capture only humans
BELIEF IS HERESY
FAITH IS IGNORANCE
And you are killing love
and truth and beauty
every time you speak his name
At first the author seems to be suggesting that the experience
of God is more important than mere words or beliefs. But what
about the last stanza. What does "belief is heresy"
mean? What does "faith is ignorance" mean? And how
are we killing love and truth and beauty by speaking His name?
Heresy is (more or less) holding ideas which go against a
religion or "authorized" belief. If we see that the
author's "religious" stance is to experience God, and
that belief gets in the way of that, then it makes sense to refer
to all belief as heresy. The irony is evident, since this is
stated as something to believe, but it nonetheless makes the
point.
Why is faith ignorance? This is relatively easy to understand
once you look at it the right way. If you know that something
is true - especially by direct experience - you need no faith,
right? You need no faith in trees or rocks, because you can touch
them, see them, smell them. It is only when you are ignorant
of the truth, or attempting to invent it or replace it with a
falsehood, that you need to have faith.
Faith arises from ignorance, but it also gets in the way of
truth, and acts to maintain ignorance. How can you be open to
seeing what is true if you have already decided by faith to accept
a version of "truth" of which you have no direct knowledge
or experience? The old man in the sky may seem more reasonable
than the Spaghetti God, but with no real evidence or experience
of either, they are equally silly beliefs, and faith in either
simply means closing your eyes and heart to what might be truly
known.
What about speaking his name? If you recall the ten commandments
of the Old Testament, people are not to carve images of god,
or worship such things as false idols. But what about the idols
carved from the very language we use? Are we not creating a very
human idea about God and worshiping this? Don't we have this
image in mind whenever we here any of his various names?
We have seen what the idols created by our words can do. How
many millions have been killed in the name of God? Most religious
people imagine that their idea of God could never be used in
such a way, but what about the simple replacing of real human
response to others with worshiping of his name? Isn't that a
killing of love? And can we see the truth and beauty of the world
when we are speaking his name and arguing over what it represents?
Words are not reality, nor are names. When they point to reality,
they serve their purpose. But what about the man who in the name
of God and love tortures and kills fellow human beings (certainly
a common and recurring event in history)? Is he pointing at the
reality of God or love, or in any way manifesting them? Or is
he using words to justify something else?
It is easy to assume that we would never use words in that
way, but when we are under their spell, we are used by THEM.
Create any definition of love that you like, for example, and
with a bit of "intelligence" it can be used to justify
terrible and unloving actions, because all words create a limited
view of reality if we look only at the definitions that go with
them - any definitions!
BELIEF IS HERESY
FAITH IS IGNORANCE
And you are killing love
and truth and beauty
every time you speak his name
The author, by the way, is an atheist. This will discredit
the poem in the eyes of many, since it seems to suggest a true
communion with God of some sort. The reader is even led to assume
that "do not believe in God," could mean do not believe
in any human description of God. Of course, the poem could be
about the "religious experience" which represents God
to some, but something else to the author. In any case, is it
relevant who wrote it? If a person points at something which
you can verify with your own mind and experience, does it become
less true because of who is pointing? |
