Anthropomorphism and God

Normally I hate using big words on my blog to describe religion or Christianity in particular, but... I have had this topic on my mind for quite some time and have finally decided to write about it here. I believe that this is one of the tell tale signs that man created gods and not the other way around. When I read the bible I do not see any imprint of the divine, in fact it all looks like a product of human fabrication.

I generally attack Christianity because it is the number one religion in the world with the most adherents, and because it is what I know. But the analyses contained in this article is relevant to all religions past and present that worship some form of deity that is similar to man.

So let's start this article by defining that big word that is included in the title of this article in the simplest way possible. According to the Sage dictionary that I have on my system it is defined as: 'The representation of objects (especially a god) as having human form or traits.' It is important to understand that this definition is needed to understand not just today's religions but those of antiquity as being of human origin.

It is interesting to note that our gods, from the beginning of time have always been described as having some sort of human form or traits. Many ancient gods are also described as gender specific by his/her (goddess)followers. The Greeks and the Romans religious beliefs were a perfect example of anthropomorphism. They generally believed that everything in the universe, including random acts of nature were determined by the gods. Disasters were the physical display of a gods displeasure with his/her adherents.

The biblical God is said to be omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing), and omnipresent (everywhere at once), and finally ineffable (defying expression or description). Yet, the bible is chock full of descriptions of this god and coincidentally he seems all too human for my taste. In fact, all of those divine traits are overshadowed by his human traits. This God displays both positive and negative human traits that if we are to take the bible at face value betray the sacredness of God himself.

Most of the time we hear from believers that God is love but we seldom hear that he is also jealous and a consuming fire as described in Deuteronomy 4:24. God hates certain acts or deeds, he is jealous of other gods, he punishes and curses those that oppose him etc. All of these negative traits in my opinion don't belong to a deity who is supposed to be holy, perfect, and without sin. When you think of it doesn't the bible teach that hating and cursing people is a sin? The bible teaches that you should love your enemies and bless them that curse you (Matthew 5:44). Yet God can't seem to adhere to his own Word.

Why is this disparity so contradictory to what we hear about God from his adherents? Because it is not the word of God but the word of man, it's as simple as that. God is said to be holy yet his words and deeds as ascribed to him by the many authors of the bible betray this assumption.

The bible teaches that we were created in His image Genesis 1:26 when in fact the truth is the other way around. We created God in our image and I believe that if we were any other species capable of worship our god would look just like us as is illustrated in the 2001 movie 'Planet of the Apes.' In this film the apes were awaiting the return of their chimpanzee messiah Semos. Many have stated that God is the creation of primitive man in a pre-scientific age. In closing I second this opinion.