Is the religionist’s God different from the philosopher’s God?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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Hare Krishna question is the religionist god different from the philosopher’s god answer first we need to understand what these two concepts mean before we can understand whether they are different or the same generally the concept the religionist god refers to a god who is the object of worship and devotion this refers to the god who is who is prayed to and whose grace is sought so as I said this is the god of worship and of devotion whereas the philosopher’s god is generally a god whose existence and power is inferred through philosophical analysis so for example people may do some philosophical reasoning I think that oh that world exists so this world has some order therefore this world must come from somewhere and that somewhere that source of this world must be god and in this way the god who who is more a focus of abstraction and meditation and intellectual meditation abstraction means intellectual conceptualization and subsequent meditation that god is called as the philosopher’s god whereas the religionist god is the god who is the object of worship and devotion now are the two different no they are different conceptions of the same god conceptions that are arrived based on different notions which different people have or different focuses that different people have in their lives so for example when people have people are on the karma marga at that time the conception of god they have is largely the conception for religionist god where the idea is that we worship god we praise him and we become devoted to him and then he gives us certain things in return so there is there is certain amount of assurance to to the idea of such a god because in the idea of such a god there is there is satisfaction oh god exists and god will provide for me that there is somebody who will take care of me in contrast the philosopher’s god is more a gyani conception of god now often generally we say that the path of gyana leads to a impersonalism so even if so similarly the a lot of intellectual extraction leads to a conception of god which is different from which is more of a concept than a person so for example Aristotle talked about the unmoored word so his idea of a god was a person who was not at all a person who did anything he just set things in motion and afterwards he is so perfect that he doesn’t have to do anything so such a conception of god is like a frozen perfection that god as a concept is perfect and that’s how he stays eternally and therefore he does not have to do anything more than that so now this conception of god is a very as I said an abstract conception of god which is which may hold a certain intellectual appeal to certain people but this is not the god of religion this is not the god where one can devote oneself to so now that means the god of religion has emotional appeal but it does not have much of a intellectual appeal because the point is that we may say that there is a god who will protect me who will take care of me but then sometimes in spite of praying to the god things may not be taken care of or for that matter sometimes taking care of one person may require harming another person so does the god take care of me and harm someone else or how do things work out it will be very confusing so it is not a very intellectually satisfactory conception of god on the other hand the intellectual conception of god does not give much emotional satisfaction so beyond the religious god and beyond the philosopher’s god is the spiritualist god it is the god who is talked about in the concept of bhakti bhakti is the most evolved form of spirituality and this conception of god is both emotionally and intellectually appealing and how is it this way because the bhagavad gita offers this conception of god wherein there is distinct emphasis in bhakti but there is tremendous grounding in philosophy on which this emphasis in bhakti is established so the idea is that the religious god is the god who does things for us and the philosopher’s god is the god whom we just meditate on but these two conceptions of god are joined together in the understanding that this god is not just a matter as the bhagavatam says not just a matter of gheem gheem that is the philosopher’s god where you know meditate meditate on that absolute truth but then it is bhu raha rasi ka bhui bhav ka ha pivata bhagat rasaan this is the god to be relished so if you would consider the negative axis zero and positive axis so the religious god is a god who it is promised will take care of us at the negative axis level that means at the negative axis level means that where we have problems god will solve those problems we have desires god will fulfill those desires Now, as I said, in the material level, not all desires can be fulfilled, not all problems can be solved. And therefore, this conception of God is intellectually unsatisfactory. From there we come to the zero, where, on the origin point, where we have the philosopher’s God, where God is not so much a matter of emotional reciprocation as just intellectual conceptualization.
But beyond the philosopher’s God is the devotee’s God, whom we meditate on spiritually and whom we emotionally relate spiritually with spiritual emotions. So rather than thinking of God and what he will do for us at the material level, the focus shifts to how we can reciprocate love with him at a spiritual level. So are the religion’s God and the philosopher’s God concepts which are referring to different Gods? No.
They are different conceptions of the same God and the fullest conception of that God is understood at the spiritual level, where the appeal of both the religion’s God and the philosopher’s God is reconciled and elevated to its highest form. Thank you. Hare Krishna.