The Creator

God is subtle but not malicious; that nature though difficult to understand ought to the root to be simple and beautiful. ALBERT EINSTEIN. (1923 AD.)

Having answered, as best as we can today, the question, What is the universe?, comes the question why is there a universe? Man began thinking about the why question long before he was able to ask the what question. Almost universally, in parts of earth remote and inaccessible from each other we find evidence of the concept of a Supreme Being. The gods existed before God. In his own character, man created in his imagination, gods of various strengths and abilities, to explain the environmental and emotional phenomenon over which he had little control. Fire and wind were the earliest gods because of the intense harm they could cause. Various hierarchies of gods were created but almost always they had a relation to those who created this imagination. Black tribes painted gods black, whites white and so on. The gods therefore were merely an extension of man's insecurity with nature and himself. Placating gods gave man something to do when nothing would work; and that alone served the purpose of removing frustrationthe ultimate goal of human mind since it began to think and developed the instinct to survive. Evolutionary changes in the ability of human mind to contemplate continued to complicate the concept of gods. The distorted concept of gods continued to evolve even in more "civilized" societies such as Greeks with their Zeus and Hera, Apollo, Hermes, Aphrodite and many others.

The concept of one God began with the Ten Commandments delivered by Moses, around fourteen hundred years before Christ, from Mount SinaiJehovah. Later, the Greek philosophers of pre-Christian era dwelled at length on the concept of God and so do the philosophers of the modern day. All agreeing on one thing that God does exist or perhaps it should exist.

The problem in explaining the concept of a Supreme Being lies in the vocabulary and philosophy used for incarnating the Being. For example, we, as a rote response, assume that there must be a First Cause or that all events must be preceded by other events. This theory of continuity leads us to God; at this point the trail must stop. Ironically, if it is so, then the trail just might as well stop anywhere along the line. Just as we extend the trail to God, about which we say is not preceded by anything, we can say that any object is the end of the trail and thus there is no need to have a continuum.

The reason why we end the trail with God and not any sooner is because what we can see or visualize is subject to alteration and distortion by our senses; what we can not, is unalterable and thus God must exist for us to be able to explain everything. He must be over an above the First Cause.

Fallacious and incomplete as they may be, these are the only thoughts we got so we must build on them. We must, therefore, for the present argument, assume that God is all knowing, well-intentional (for our benefit) and Supreme Being, all of the characteristics which are humanly, for beyond that, we cannot visualize. And this is just right also for it is enough to help us achieve our goal of attempting to understand this universe. The questions such as should we worship God or does He control our destiny will be discussed later in light of the need to have these questions answered.

The conflict between the scientific and the mythological concepts of God arises because we fail to agree on the level at which the instructions of God or the Grand plan of God is instituted. There is no difficulty in accepting the theory of evolution, if it is accepted it was defined by creating the statistical odds theory (discussed elsewhere) by God (more discussion under Eve's Genes). From here on the explanations become easy to give. Theologians often do not extend the authority of God to high enough level for this conflict to resolve; scientists confuse the concept of God with physical principles, which are actually derived from much larger principles set forth, about which we know little today.

In reality, there is no conflict between science and religion. God exists; He created the universe; He instructed it to function under an operating system which takes over in designing and destroying the universes. An important instruction to the operating system is the flexibility in adapting to various circumstances and conditions. Man may find it difficult to visualize such continuously flexible system, based on firm scientific principles. This is because the basic premise that scientific principles are inflexible has not been questioned, at least not yet. We are unwilling to accept that there are living principles which operate to achieve a desirable end; several smaller rigid principles constitute the larger paradigm. It is like examining a large circle; broken down to smaller bits, the parts of a circle appear straight lines which make up a circle ; the straightness of the smaller lines will be perfect only when the size of these lines is closer to naught. This is the basic principle of the science of calculus. How well it applies to the functioning of the universe is succinctly evident.

Whatever man knows today or will ever know will not be sufficient to explain the question of the source of the universe: God. But for its own survival, man must answer this question, flawed as this may be, to fulfill his innate need to know. Having answered this question, he will be better able to cope with life. The inquisitive nature of man, like his innate and unique ability to communicate through language, is programmed at conception for had he not been curious, he would have been at much peace with himself, like many animals. And this may be a sufficient reason to understand the relationship between man and his universe, through God.

Philosophers and scientists, often the same people, however, raise the question, Why and how should we pray?, at a more fundamental level. Emily Dickinson puts it well:

Prayer is the little implement
Through which men reach
Where presence is denied them.

Should man worship? Why should man submit? Why does man pray? Who programmed man to find solace in believing the unbelievable? These are the questions that begin the archaic debate about religion. The remarkable success of religion throughout the history of mankind is a sufficient argument to become convinced of the utility of religion to people at large and thus it must be promoted to the betterment of mankind. This is one system that actually works. It helps us get to the ultimate goal of our lifeinternal contentment. Whether it is through meditation in the Buddhist teachings, through the trinity concept of Christianity or through kneeling at Kaba, they all lead to similar self-content through self-constraints, a training of mind to control its chemical reactions, which, if allowed to run rampant, destroy human mind.

To be successful, religions must be universal in their approach, i.e., they should appeal to the masses and not only to specific segment of societies. And what does appeal to people at large is a religion with hard teachings. All those ideologies which have soft teachings or rationalizations have never been successful.

Conflicts in religions teachings are many and instead of weakening, these make religion more reverent. Assertive religions fair better. It is because the communal nature of man makes him a willing prey to subservience, either to other men or to God; religion, therefore, is a natural extension of man. Let us not forget that man has been programmed to obey.

If everything taught in a religion would be transparent to all, it would not a very impressive religion. In fact the more a religion is able to exert upon its teachings, the more it will find ardent followers. People who revert to religion are not interested in analyzing things; they want quick answers to all questions and they want to be told what to doa style that is more common than otherwise in most religions. Somewhere in the great Divine plan, there is a requirement for man to have a source of venting-off his frustrations. Religion relieves his frustrations by providing answers to all questions not just some. It can provide explanations for all phenomena, natural or supernatural and thus provides greater comfort to human mind than is possible through submission to any other doctrine.

Man prays to help himself. God may have little involvement in this arrangement.