ON MAKING GOD'S ACQUAINTANCE

 

Nicholas F. Gier, Professor Emeritus, University of Idaho

 

You cannot love God, for you do not know him.

            -- Ludwig Wittgenstein¹

 

It is often said that one of the superior elements of the Judeo‑Christian religious tradition is its idea of an intimately personal God.  Many Jews and Christians allege that they can become acquainted with and establish a friendship with the divine person.  They can do this because the biblical God, as opposed to more speculative ideas of deity, is a divine personality par excellence.

 

Even though people claim to be friends with their pets, we must insist that it is only persons who can befriend, love one another, and enjoy each other's company.  In most religious traditions God is viewed as the supreme person and intimate acquaintance is possible with this person because God has what John Hick calls a "psychic face." 

 

In the first section I lay out some of the criteria of personal acquaintance and apply these to the God of the Hebrew Scriptures.  Drawing on some biblical passages and using what I call the "Hebraic" principle, I conclude that such divine‑human encounters must be taken figuratively or at least as indirect form of communication.  In the second section I discuss the possibility that, using the example of an intimate pen pal, we can be friends with divine persons without any direct experience of them.  Even if this pen pal friendship is taken as genuine personal acquaintance, I show that it does not work in a theological context.  Finally, in the last section I analyze mystical accounts of divine encounter and discuss these in the context of a revised pen pal analogy.

 

The Hebrew Encounter with God

When we say that we are personally acquainted with someone, we are claiming that we not only know that the person exists and that he or she has a certain name, but we also imply that we know what sort of person he or she is.  Millions of people know that Bruce Springsteen exists and great numbers have seen him in a live performance or at least on one of his videos, but only comparatively few have made his personal acquaintance.  If given the opportunity, the ordinary fan must be tempted to ask a Springsteen friend: "What is he really like?" 

 

It is obvious that just seeing people and knowing their names does not count as grounds for being acquainted.  The familiar face of mass media images does not become the "psychic" face of personal acquaintance until there has been intimate experience of mutual exchange with the person in question.  Only in such circumstances are we able to tell what sort of person is our new acquaintance really is. 

 

Initially, it seems that the personal experiences of the divine related in the Hebrew Scriptures fulfill the criteria of personal acquaintance quite nicely.  The Hebrew Yahweh is not only a divine person but a divine personality par excellence.  Making friends with a disembodied rational substance with no personality does not make any sense at all.  In contrast to Aristotle's God or the yogis' Ishvara, who, following the Boethean tradition, would be divine persons but not personalities, Yahweh has a "psychic face" by which he makes himself known to a selected few. 

 

For example, Moses regularly meets Yahweh "face to face, as a man speaks to a friend" (Ex. 33: 11).  Moses' relationship with Yahweh is as close as that of Abraham's.  Recall that Abraham bargained directly with Yahweh about the fate of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 18:22‑33).  Moses' friendship is so strong that he feels confident enough to actually give Yahweh advise, e.g., that he should not destroy the people of Israel in a fit of anger (Ex. 32:11‑13; Num. 14:13‑16).  Abraham and Moses appear to stand higher than the prophets, to whom Yahweh makes himself known in visions and dreams, but to Moses he "speak[s] mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in dark speech; and he beholds the form (temuna) of the Lord" (Num. 12:6‑8).

 

The Hebrew temuna means the physical form of God, and it is not to be confused with the more well known "image of God" in Gen. 1:26, which, according to archaeological evidence, originally meant that first Adam and then Christ stands as a representation for human beings on earth.² Making graven images of the Lord's temuna and any other heavenly form is expressly forbidden by the Second Commandment (Ex. 20:4).  It is at once fascinating and puzzling to discover the existence of a Jewish hymn traditionally sung at the opening of the ark.  It is called the "Hymn of Glory" and it contains a detailed description of "the likeness (temuna) of the Lord."  It speaks of the Lord's hand, "a helmet of victory upon his head," grey hair in old age and black plaited hair in youth. 

 

The editors of Jewish prayer book I have used cite biblical passages from which these attributes are drawn (Dan. 7:9; Song of Sol. 5:2,14; Is. 59:17; Ps. 98:1).  The most famous allusion to the divine physiognomy is the reference to Yahweh's hands and back in Ex. 33:23.  This is the incident in which Moses asks to see Yahweh's "glory," the visible manifestation of the divine reality, but Yahweh answers with the famous prohibition that "man shall not see me and live."

 

The biblical texts give us conflicting evidence.  In one (Num. 12:6) Moses beholds the physical form of God, but this one explicitly prohibits such an experience.  Does the Hebrew God have a real face and body which humans are prohibited from seeing, or is this simply figurative language to preserve the transcendence of God?  The hymn cited above contains a clue to the correct answer.  The vivid images refer only to divine actions and works; they do not apply to the divine essence at all.  "In images they told of thee, but not according to thine essence; they but likened thee in accordance with thy works."³

 

If someone had asked Moses what God was really like, he would have had to respond, as the biblical texts themselves sometimes indicate and orthodox theology demands, in the abstract terms of Rudolph Otto's mysterum tremendum and the wholly other.  As Yahweh alternately appears in or as a fire (Ex. 3:2), a "pillar of cloud" (Ex. 33:9), in a whirlwind (Job 38), as the "angel of the Lord," even as the "adversary" (šatan, Num. 22:22), we obviously should not take the face or form of God in any literal sense.  To do so would have the result of undermining the genius of biblical theology.

 

The Hebraic Principle

The greatest theological contribution of the ancient Hebrews is what I call the "Hebraic" principle, the recognition of the transcendence of God, which assumes a unique ontological distinction between God and his creatures.⁴ John Calvin expressed the Hebraic principle in the motto finitum non capax infiniti; and Søren Kierkegaard insisted that there was an infinite qualitative difference between God and creatures.  It is also worth noting that the Hebrew word qados translated as "holy" does not mean the goodness of God, as Job so dramatically discovered, but it means the separation of God from his creation, his absolute transcendence.

 

The ancient Hebrew writers not only overcame the primitive anthropomorphisms of earlier writers, but also made a clean break with other Near Eastern views in which, for example, gods battled with sea dragons or mated with human beings.  These stories thoroughly confused the difference between the divine and nondivine, a distinction that the priestly writers were committed to preserve.  Therefore, with regard to the texts above, we are compelled to take the theological high ground and relegate the anthropomorphic passages to figurative speech. 

 

A strict application of the Hebraic principle would not only involve the inability of seeing God and the denial of a divine body, but it would also require that divine communication always be indirect, through the messengers (malakh = angel) and masks of God the Hebrew writers portray. A consistent application of a basic biblical principle requires that we give up the idea of having direct experience of a divine physiognomy and personality.  This coupled with a prohibition of using the divine name undermines the claim that we can make God's acquaintance.

 

The Pen Pal Analogy

One might respond that direct experience of a person is not necessary for one to become his or her friend.  Let us imagine that one day Susan begins receiving daily letters from a secret admirer who identifies himself as Bob.  The letters become more warm and intimate and Susan is especially struck by Bob's sincerity. After consulting some of her friends, she decides to answer the letters, suggesting that the two meet and get to know one another better.  By return post Bob responds that, for reasons he cannot divulge, it is impossible for them to meet face to face or even to speak over the phone.  He also refuses to send any pictures of himself.  He reiterates his admiration for her and insists they continue their friend­­ship through the mail.  The two communicate in this manner for many years, exchanging the most intimate details of their lives.  When Bob dies he leaves Susan a large fortune. 

 

The pen pal analogy appears to demonstrate that one can become friends and even develop strong feelings for a person one has never met personally.  The intimate contact over the years has certainly given Susan a good idea of what sort of person Bob is, but one might still insist that she still does not know what Bob is really like.

 

Even if we grant that the pen pal analogy is a good one, does it work theologically?  The religious analogue for Bob's letters is divine scripture, while Susan's letters must be like the believer's prayers.  I am assuming that Hebraic principle not only excludes a divine face and body, but also divine speech.  This means, as even many religious people believe, that scripture is human writing inspired by God, not written or spoken by God. 

 

Already we have a problem: would Susan consider Bob a friend if he communicated through intermediaries?  One could not say that people could become acquainted, let alone friends, in such an indirect way.  Please note that the problem is intensified by the fact that religious prophets do not have direct access to God.  While Bob's words are communicated directly to Susan, God's Word is at least twice removed from the ordinary believer. 

 

Furthermore, if prayer is the analogue of Susan's letters, there is a certain incongruity in the fact that answers to prayers are indirect or nonexistent.  There is also the problem that, at least for orthodox Christian believers, divine communication ceased nearly 2,000 years ago.  The direct (albeit written) dialogue which Susan enjoyed with Bob is absent from any known religion, except the most esoteric forms. 

 

Finally, there is the dilemma about which scripture--the Bible, the Qu'ran, the Bhagavad­gita--is the correct message from God.  Susan could not be sure exactly who was writing the letters she got, but at least she was not receiving competing and contradictory messages from her admirer.  A strong sense of trust is required for both Susan and the believer, but there is obviously a greater leap of faith involved in the latter.

 

We can imagine that even though Susan has no picture of Bob, she would over the years come to form an image of him in her mind. Such an image would serve as a more palpable impression of the strong personality she experiences in her daily letters. Again the religious analogue is not as convincing.  While Susan is reasonably certain that she is communicating with the same, real person over many years, religious believers have to admit that they cannot be so sure.  Indeed, a skeptic could challenge the faithful of the world with the Feuerbachian hypothesis that the divine personalities they claim to experience are nothing but socio‑psychological projections.

 

The contrast between a possessive and jealous Yahweh and a compassionate Bodhisattva does not necessarily lead to an either/or choice between two deities, but it may be reduced to a difference in cultural and religious perspectives.  This solution seems to be required by the Hebraic principle.  There is one God who is a person, but the divine personality is of our own making: our own culturally bound way of relating to the divine person.

 

Although I differ with him on one crucial point, the preceding argument follows the thesis of John Hick's book God Has Many Faces and the companion article "Is God Personal?"  Hick proposes that God cannot be said to be personal in himself, but only in relation to many personae which devotees have created as a result of their interaction with the divine presence.  Thus the biblical God's persona changes from "the primitive tribal deity who urge[s] his people on to deeds of barbaric savagery...to the gracious Lord of heaven and earth who calls his people to be 'a light to lighten the gentiles.'"⁵ I chose this passage because it reveals a fundamental difficulty with Hick's proposal.  Just as Ronald Reagan would not accept the persona that most Europeans have created for him (viz., a warmonger), no self‑respecting God would accept the imputation of genocide carried out by marauding Hebrew warriors. 

 

Any legitimate meaning of "personal" will certainly involve reciprocal interaction on a one‑to‑one basis.  I have experienced that my own persona as a campus activist changes significantly when I have met and worked with faculty who have criticized me in the past.  With the capacity of direct communication, finite persons at least have the opportunity to correct personae which have become wild caricatures.  Unfortunately, the hidden God of the Bible has to suffer the indignity of some Christians who continue to defend, for example, the genocide of Near Eastern tribes as the direct command of God.  Distortions such as these tell us more about the people involved than the being they worship. 

 

Are Mystics Acquainted with God?

The foregoing response to the pen pal analogy might be criticized for ignoring the mystical tradition and its accounts of the divine presence.  Just as Bob is placed at a distant location, I followed the analogy with regard to God's distance as well.  The mystics, on the other hand, speak vividly about God's immediate presence, ultimately ending, in most cases, in the dissolution of the self into the Godhead. 

 

For our purposes in this section I propose to change my pen pal analogy in one odd, but logical way. Let us say that Susan invites Bob to move in with her, but she still respects his desire not to be seen in person. To this end Susan sets Bob up with a self‑contained apartment in her house and meals are provided and messages exchanged in such a way that Bob does not reveal his person in any way. Susan is now able to be become acquainted with Bob in a new way: she feels his immediate presence at all times, even though their communication is still mediated through written messages.

 

We now have an analogue to test against accounts given by the great mystics.  I will treat these reports in the same phenomenological way that I did the biblical passages above.  St. Teresa, for example, writes that she felt Christ's presence close to her--on her right side to be exact.  She did not actually see Christ, because he had no form; in addition, she thought she heard him speak to her.  This voice, however, was not external audition, but it was heard with a mystic inner ear.  The "seeing" was even more illusive, for Jesus was "visible" to neither "the eyes of the body nor of the soul."⁶

 

Initially, Teresa was so anxious about these experiences that she went to her confessor for advice.  (In contrast to the biblical prophets, the medieval mystics were suspicious and thoroughly self-critical about the validity of their experiences.)  Significantly, he asked her how she knew it was Christ, if she experienced no form.  Her answer is typical of the mystics: she said she was Amore certain of [his identity] than if I saw him."⁷ Notwithstanding the power of this testimony, I contend that we must side with Teresa's confessor and insist that genuine personal acquaintance requires at most direct experience with a psychic face of some form or at least intimate experience of the sort I have suggested in the Bob and Susan scenario.

 

A general survey of other mystical experience reveals that the divine attributes reported are rather abstract.  The mystics say that the divine presence expresses power, goodness, fullness, love, beauty, justice, and light.  Only the expression of love comes close to qualifying as a personal attribute.  But here is important to stress that there is no evidence of any specific response from the divine presence.