{129} (cont’d)

II. What is the religious idea of God?

The thinking I have described is —if I may be permitted the expression— religational thinking. It is religational thinking because it consists in a thinking that proceeds from the power of the real, which is a formal part and formal terminus of religation, to a different term, such as the absolutely absolute reality upon which this power is fundamented. And this transition is what makes that the thinking may formally be a religious thinking. It is not the case of something arbitrary. Because the discovery of the different dimensions of the power of the real qua real throughout the whole of history is something quite complex, but it is neither fortuitous nor arbitrary. The multiple dimensions of the power of the real in a certain way form an organic whole, constitute its internal functionality —not in the sense of causality—, its internal structure. Therefore, religious thinking has to advance from this functionality of the power of the real to the absolute reality of God. And precisely here is where throughout history the different divinities appear¹.

{130} 1) It is a question, in the first place, of a transcendent power. The power of the real is a transcendent power, and as such it is what we still call “the Most High”. The primary form as to how religious thinking has thought the reality of a transcendent power is precisely the heavens, not only as a vault, but in addition with everything there is in it: the heavenly bodies, at least as they show their differences, and everything that proceeds from heaven: thunder, lightning, etc. Among the heavenly bodies the one most specially noted is the Sun, which not only has the property that it gives warmth and life, but in addition sees everything.

2) In the second place, the power of the real is vivifying in the sense that it presides over the cycles in which life is producing itself. Therefore it is not an arbitrariness that civilizations, primarily matriarchal, may have rested this vivifying power of the real precisely in the Moon. It is that which in a religious way regulates the seasons, the fertility cycles, etc.

3) In the third place, the power of the real is a power separating the forms of things. Things distinguish themselves because some are more or less separated from the others. This means that they proceed from a certain lack of differentiation within which the force of the real gives them a separated reality. In water things appear to be somewhat confused, but from it they spring with their distinct form. The divinization of the waters has its roots in this point. The idea of living waters, of sacred rivers, and the ocean itself as divinity, emerges in history precisely in this moment of religious thinking: the step from the power of the real as separation of things to the subsisting entity, which produces them.

{131} 4) The power of the real is, in the fourth place, a power of germination. We always think of reality as a composite of atoms. In history it has been thought of more from the perspective of living beings, and with good reason. Then the power of the real is a power of germination. Forms not only separate, but afterwards some generate others. From this comes the idea of Mother Earth, goddess Earth.

5) We have in the fifth place the power of the real as a power of organization of the living beings. These are not born chaotically. They are born attributed to some parents, to a certain genealogy. From this appeared the cult to the tree, insofar as this idea of genealogy was ascribed to the tree.

6) In the sixth place, the power of the success of the harvest, especially in the matriarchal civilizations. There we have the agrarian divinities that preside over the harvest, and above all the divinities that intervene from the moment of planting, before the collection of the harvest.

7) The power of the real bonds men among themselves. And then, as man is being carried to God this way, he encounters some divinities that have blood bonds with men with whom they have established a family connection. The god of the family, and the god of the tribe appear. This is clear, for example, in the theophoric names of the Semites: ’Abiyah, “my father is God”; ’Ammiel, “my uncle is God”; ’Ajiyah, “my brother is God”, etc. And also the names in which God appears as an eponym from which the tribe descends. Not in the sense of the tribe itself, but of an origination, as reflected in the expression “the God of the fathers”, which appears in the Old Testament. It is not the case of a totemism, because as it is well known the Semites did not have any totemism, nor is it a mere sentimentality, but is the expression of a {132} transcendent bond. Phantasmic thinking is thinking of superior things, but taking the starting point from schemes that belong to the Earth, such as the blood affinity.

Besides the blood bonds, divinity ties men through bonds of sovereignty. Let us think at least about the texts in which God appears as King of Israel, or as “Lord of Heaven”, Ba‘al Shamen, to whom the Jews of Elephantine still invoked, as it appears from their papyri².

The gods appear also as binding men through contract. Varuna in India is not only a god of heaven, he is also a god that sees everything, who knows everything, and then is the guardian of all contracts.

8) The power of the real is the power of birth and death. This has been personified in one form or another in divinities like Ištar in Babylon or Astarté in Phoenicia, which are precisely the goddesses of birth.

9) The power of the real not only bonds men, but also defends them. Then the warrior gods appear. For example, Indra in the Vedic religion, or also Yahweh tseba’ot —the “Yahweh of hosts”— in the religion of Israel.

10) The power of the real is a power that fixes destiny, personified in many religions, for example in the Móira of the Greeks.

11) It is also the power that constitutes the cosmic oneness. {133} The goddess Rta of the Vedas, the Díche of the Greek religion.

12) The power of the real is the sacralized power. Where “sacralized” does not mean a value, but that the complete reality is something destined and surrendered to God. It is the case of a sacrum facere. It is the personification of sacrifice as supreme entity, for example with the identity of the Atman with the Brahman in Brahmanic speculation.

13) It is a power, which fills everything, not in the sense of space, but in the concrete sense of the atmosphere. For example the Iranians made of Zwaša, the atmosphere, an important divinity.

14) It is the power of indefinite time, the eternal God, as the Hebrews used to say, and who appears as Zrvan in the Iranian religion, etc.

It would be quite lengthy to extend this list, accessible to anyone interested in the history of religions. At any rate, we see that religious thinking has ascended from the power of the real to the gods, to the divinities. And it has ascended by a totally concrete line: observing where the supremacy rests. The problem then is to find what determines the line on which supremacy rests. That is the decisive question: What is the line in which this supremacy must be established? The answer to this question in the different religions is not a question of abstract dialectics, but of experience lived absolutely. For example, it would make no sense for a nomad to place the line of supremacy on the idea of a king. The line of supremacy is determined by absolutely precise and concrete situations of man. Be that as it may, in the line of supremacy religious thinking not only has elaborated an idea of God, but it is there that this thinking pretends {134} to have its alleged truth. What do we understand by a religious truth?


III. In what does its alleged truth consist?

Religious truth is the truth of a faith. This must not be forgotten: it is the truth of a surrender. The truth is not only the conformity of thought with things. That would be the truth of logic. But the radical and primary truth is something different, it is what I have called real truth. And this truth has three dimensions. In the first place it is a patent truth, in the second place a firm truth, and in third place an active truth. As an example of a patent reality, we know that primitive man, at least in the primary civilizations, believes that thunder is the voice of God. They have there in one form or another the patency of the divinity. Reality is firm. For example, Israel is full of exclamations calling God “my rock”, “my support”, etc. And it is a reality, which is always effectively present. All we have to do is refer to the Horeb theophany, where Yahweh says to Moses: “I am who am”, and “I will be with you” (Ex 3:12-14), he is not referring, of course, to an aseity in the sense of an identity between essence and existence, but to being constantly with the people of Israel.

Therefore, taking all these three dimensions at one and the same time, they are the ones, which constitute the reality-truth. And this reality-truth is precisely the type of truth that a faith alleges to have within a social body with a particular type of life. Of course, since no one on Earth has been able to control the object of this faith, the {135} meaning of religious truth is not one belonging to a conformation or to an adequation. It is the case of a different meaning: it is the sense of a way. The one that is convinced of the truth of his faith believes that if this line were to be extended, and were he to arrive face to face before the God in whom he has faith, this God without doubt might be very different from the one he had imagined, but would confirm the path taken in order to reach Him. This is the only thing that religious truth can pretend. Religious truth consists in this “toward” in which man directs his thought towards a divinity, conceived by religious thinking on a line of supremacy. If it is here where the essential difference of religions is inscribed, we must then lastly ask ourselves, In what does the difference in gods consists? That is the most important question of all.


{136}

§ 4

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ESSENTIAL DIVERSITY

Above all it will be necessary to repeat that it is the case of a diversity, which is situated in a particular direction, in a “towards”. It is not the case of a place, but of a direction, of a “towards”. It is neither the case of ignorance nor of knowledge of things. Sometimes it is thought that, once a trip has been made to the Moon, it is no longer possible to believe that it may be a goddess. However, much before the trip to the Moon was accomplished the Earth was known, and during millennia it has been thought that the Earth was a mother goddess. It is not a question of objects, but of the direction “towards”. In this line of the “towards” is where religious thinking is formally inscribed.

Therefore, in this “towards” religious thinking encompasses a diversity, due mainly and above all to the progressive enrichment of the idea of divinity and of the power of the real. It is an enrichment of the power of the real. In the long and weighty enumeration of the dimensions of the power of the real it has been observed that each dimension, in a certain way, enriches the previous one, or at least the group of the previous ones. Nothing strange then that man in his way towards the divinity may find himself embarked on different ways. Then we must ask:

In the first place, Which are those ways?
In the second place, if these ways are equivalent.
In the third place, if they are not, In what does the internal essence of the difference of the religious ideas about God consist, and consequently of the religions?


{137}

I. Which are those ways?

Historically, these ways have been essentially three.

A) Polytheism. In the first place, we have the richness of the power of the real that, as we have just seen, has taken to the substantivation of many divinities in the course of the different social bodies: the divinity if the Earth, the divinity of Heaven, the divinity of the Sun, of the Moon, etc. This is called a polytheism. Polytheism is the way of the “towards” in the sense of dispersion. Projects different aspects of the power of the real over different real entities. That does not mean, obviously, that all of the gods in polytheism may hold the same rank. There is always a supreme god in the assembly of gods³. And this is not an arbitrariness, because it responds to the very characteristic of religious thinking, which consists in {138} making the transit from the power of the real to system of divinities. And the power of the real is an organic complex: prescinding from the allusion to causality, it must be said that functionality integrates the power of the real. Molded this power by the religious thinking into different divinities, it is obvious that they cannot be a loose lot, but constitute the substantive system that makes the power of the real possible, i.e., they constitute a pantheon. This “pantheonality” —sit venia verbo— of the gods is founded in the complex functionality of the power of the real.

For this reason polytheism has much to say in the history of religious thinking. If the divinities constitute a system, this means that each one of the gods in some way reflects the whole pantheon. For this reason when man addresses not only one god, but my god, he does this not because he denies all the other gods, but because in that god he is particularly addressing, the references to all the other gods are implied. However, he invokes him as if he were the only one. And this as if is precisely what has been called henotheism. This henotheism is something characteristic of the Vedic religion, as it has been pointed out repeatedly since the time of Max Müller, but it is not exclusive to it. Thus, for example, Babylonian texts have been found where ’Ilu is simply invoked, which is the generic for “god”, used here as a proper name. This is henotheism on the march. It is not easy sometimes to distinguish henotheism from monotheism. In many points the difference between henotheism and monotheism is oscillating. As we shall see further on, when Abraham or the patriarchs think of their ’Elohim they do not pretend to take a stand concerning the gods of other religions.

{139} B) Pantheism. However, man can take a different way, which consists in thinking that the power of the real as a functional organism resides, if not in one reality, at least in something that belongs to the whole of reality. This is the way, not of dispersion, as polytheism, but of immanence. The supremacy would then be the patrimony of one Law. In the end it is what in a more of less erudite manner can be called pantheism. Of course, this way has taken many diverse forms. Thus, for example, Tantrism, Jainism, and Buddhism do not deny the gods. The gods exist for a Buddhist, what happens is that they are not supreme beings, but are subject to the supreme Law of the cosmos just as the rest of the universe. Further still: the Buddhist that reaches blessedness is happier than the supreme one among the gods. The latter are not supreme realities. The same occurs with Tantrism and Jainism. That is why they are called religions without gods, and correctly, if we understand by gods the type of gods I have just described. Now then, in these religions there exists the divinization of the Law of the cosmos itself. In China this Law has two principles; a luminous principle, Yang, and a dark principle, Yin. In Buddhism the Law appears as a dharma, as a conduct, which means at the same time, law and doctrine. In the non-Buddhist, but Brahmanic India there appears, as I have mentioned, the deification of sacrifice, and the identity between the Âtman and the Brahman. In the West the cosmic religion of the Stoics appears followed later by all the pantheisms a la European. As I shall soon indicate, this way, similar to the one from polytheism is not so absurd or nonsensical, indeed it also has a lot to say in the history of religions.

C) Monotheism. There is a third way, which without denying any of the dimensions of the power of the real, and without also denying {140} that each of these dimensions may be the terminus of a divinity, considers, nevertheless, that this divinity is always the same. Of course, through this way the idea of divinity is constantly being enriched. It is the typical case of the shock between the religion of the Israelite nomads who penetrate Canaan with its sedentary Canaanite civilization, and the ba’als. That Ba’al may be the dispenser of thunder and rain did not mean that there was an imposition on the Israelites to admit the divinity of Ba’al. Many thought that the unique and supreme divinity of Yahweh could be admitted next to entities that inhabit the other world, who, without being gods, have a direct relationship with the Earth. In this way a Ba’al dependent of Yahweh could be admitted. The reaction of Yahwism was absolute: the only dispenser of thunder and rain is Yahweh. It is the way of monotheism, the way of transcendence, different from the idea of dispersion, and from the way of immanence.

This monotheism admits degrees and types. Thus, for example, the way of several demiurges is not impossible metaphysically, although religion is not the same as metaphysics. The idea of several demiurges, which is no obstacle for monotheism, has been, however, a serious corroder of the idea of monotheism. There are also other complex forms of monotheism. In the early preachings of Zarathustra, as it is preserved in the only Zarathustran texts we possess, such as the Gâthâs of the Avesta and some of the Yasnas —certainly not easy to translate from any point of view—, there appears no other god but Ahura Mazda, which the Greeks, vocalizing poorly, translated as Oromásdes or also Oromázes, and means wise Lord. Yet, in the Gathic predication two spirits appear, the Spenta Mainyu or good spirit, and the Angra Mainyu or evil spirit. It is the case of two spirits, but not two gods. {141} It did not take long for the good spirit to be identified with Ahura Mazda. Then the evil spirit remained substantivated as an anti-god. This was the beginning of the Persian dualism. However, without having to reach this level, and keeping in touch with the strict idea of Ahura Mazda in the predication of Zarathustra, in the Gathic texts we come across some entities, called precisely Amesha Spentas. Amesha means “immortal”. Spenta is difficult to translate. I think that those who base it on an approximation to the Lithuanian szweńtas, and translate it as “beneficent”⁴ are correct. At any rate, the “beneficent immortals” are six for Zarathustra: Vohu Manah, the Good Thought; Aša Vahišta, the Best Truth; Xšathra Vairya, the Good Law; Spenta Armaiti; Wisdom; Haurvatat, Wealth; and Ameretat, Immortality. What do these six entities represent? It is curious that in the Gathic texts these entities appear in a case that is grammatically the instrumental. For some it would be something similar to what occurs in Sanskrit, Vedic or Latin, when the subject of sentences in the infinitive is in the accusative. Christian Bartholomae said we must resign ourselves to think that it is the case of true subjects in an instrumental case, and that they, therefore, represent subjects of a sentence: they would be six different entities of Ahura Mazda, each one of which exerts its own action⁵. It is not the only possible interpretation. J. Markwart, whom no one paid attention to in the beginning, maintained that {142} they are strict instrumentals⁶. To me the current translation seems excessive, following Markwart, which says, for example, Ahura Mazda “insofar as wisdom”. This is to convert the instrumental into the nominative of Ahura Mazda. But also, we should not interpret these entities as some kind of Platonic forms, as was done many years ago by the great translator of the Avesta, J. Darmesteter⁷. Whenever I have been engaged in the translation of these difficult texts I have tended to think that we are dealing neither with hypostatic entities nor mere aspects purely instrumental of Ahura Mazda. It would be something intermediate, similar to the close example we have in the sapiential books of the Old Testament. Wisdom is not an entity distinct from God, but also it is not a mere aspect of Him. This would be too little for Sirach. The Ameša Spentas are rather qualities or hypostatized dimensions within the divinity itself.

Prescinding from the question whether this is the correct interpretation, the important point is to be aware that monotheism admits different forms.

_________________
¹ Even though it is inevitable here to make certain repetitions of what was said in the first chapter, please note the difference in perspective: it is not a question of analyzing the power of the real, but of enumerating different types of divinities.
² In these papyri the Jews of Elephantine (Egypt) called Yahweh (written as vhY), mare’ shamayim (“Lord of Heaven”), wherein resonates the name of baal shamayim, the “Lord of Heaven” of the Semitic pantheon, cf. A. Ungnad, Aramäische Papyri aus Elephantine, Leipzig, 1911, p.3 (P. 13495). There is also a baal kadosh probably associated with celestial wisdom, cf. ibid., p.71 (P. 13446e).
³ In the 1965 Madrid seminar Zubiri said: “In almost all primitive civilizations there are some supreme beings omniscient and creators, like the god of heaven, particularly his solar form. And there are some inferior gods, the gods of thunder, the gods of rain, etc. that are inferior because they are not omniscient and cannot do everything, but they can and know what to do, and on these things the ultimate possibilities of man on Earth depend. What happens is that as civilization becomes more complex and the list of ultimate things becomes larger —or of things that man estimates his existence ultimately depends— the number of gods becomes larger, even though in the beginning they only had an inferior status. With this the supreme beings do not recede into oblivion, but draw back to a transcendence in which they have no direct involvement with men, except —and that is why they continue being gods— when men address prayers to them, and —at least in some tribes— when they complain about their lot on this Earth. However, the supreme beings, even when distanced and almost converted into dii otiosi, into otiose gods without anything to do, do not loose that dimension of possibilitators and compellers, precisely because prayers are still addressed to them or at least men complain about the destiny imposed on them.
⁴ Cf. Christian Bartholomae, Altiranishes Wörterbuch, Strasburg, 1904, c. 1621.
⁵ Christian Bartholomae explains his interpretation of the instrumental as a subject of sentences in the infinitive in his Studien zur indogermanishen Sprachgeshichte, vol. II, Halle, 1891, p. 124. from this stems his interpretation of the Ameša Spentas as divinities, cf. his Die Gatha’s des Avesta. Zarathustra’s Verspredigten, Stuttgart, 1905, p. VII.
⁶ Cf. his translation and commentary of the Yasna 43, in J. Markwart, Das erste Kapitel der Gâthâ uštavati, Roma,1930. Also A. Meillet denies that in a text with such an archaic form like the Gâthâs the subject may be expressed in the instrumental, cf. Trois conférences sur le Gâthâ de l’Avesta, Paris, 1925, pp. 45-46.
⁷ Cf. J. Darmesteter, Le Zend-Avesta, Paris, 1892-1893, specially in vol. III, pp. LIII-LIV.