Is God Dead?

See Note below

“God is not dead. The man to whom God revealed Himself is dead.” I found this quote when I was reading an essay on Byung-Chul Han, South Korean-German philosopher. I came to know about him only when Sintra, fellow blogger from Portugal, pointed him out to me in a comment. The quote prompted me toward a deeper inquiry about the philosopher-theologian who is just a year older than me.

  The crux of what Han said above is that the kind of human being who experienced the world as charged with divine presence has largely disappeared. That is, we have come to a civilisational situation that prevents us from experiencing the divine as our ancestors did.

The ancient religious person lived in an enchanted universe. A thunderstorm was not merely weather; it was a supernatural sign. A dream was not random neural activity; it could be a message. A mountain was not just geology; it was sacred space. Reality was infused with divinity.

We people today inhabit what sociologists call a ‘disenchanted world.’ Scientific explanations have not necessarily disproved God, but they have removed the need to invoke God in explaining everyday events.

The prophets of old received revelations. Today we receive WhatsApp texts – or some such stuff. Information is abundant today, but meaning is scarce. Revelation demands silence, patience, contemplation, and receptivity. Information demands speed. In short, the conditions necessary for revelation have been crowded out by the constant noise of digital life.

Furthermore, the societies of our ancestors accepted mystery. Not everything needed explanation in those days. The sacred existed precisely because some dimensions of reality remained beyond human comprehension. Our civilisation tends to regard mystery as a temporary problem awaiting a (technical) solution. Science has achieved astonishing successes by asking questions and seeking answers. Yet this habit can create the illusion that everything is ultimately reducible to data and calculation.

The sacred retreats when everything becomes transparent. Han often argues, as I understand from my limited reading about him, that modern society is obsessed with transparency. But absolute transparency destroys depth. Love, beauty, art, and religion all depend partly on mystery.

Another aspect of this mystery is what is called transcendence. Humans always felt an urge to transcend the mundane realities of everyday existence. Food, family, career, and social obligations may occupy much of life, yet people rarely find them sufficient. Across cultures and historical periods, human have sought experiences that lift them beyond the routine and the ordinary. Religion was the most potent entity that helped them achieve that transcendence.

Instead of religion, what brings transcends readily and passionately today are nationalism, consumerism, celebrity culture, political ideology, and technology. Han would say: The sacred has not disappeared from public life; it has migrated. What was once invested in gods is now invested in brands, national identities, technologies, and personalities.

Man remains a worshipping animal, nevertheless. The difference today is that our gods have metamorphosed.

I am tempted to draw a contrast between how Rama of the great Indian epic and we the modern humans view the forest. For Rama, forests are inhabited by sages, gods, demons, and cosmic forces. Nature is alive with meaning. For us, the same forest is an ecological resource, tourist destination, or economic asset. Worse, we go to the extent of decimating an enormous rain forest to build ports, airports, industrial corridors – and economic development.

What has changed from Rama to us is the way we look at the forest – as well as everything else. Hans would say that the sacred vision has disappeared, not the sacred reality.

The ultimate question is not whether God exists. It is whether modern humans still possess the interior silence, humility, and openness required to encounter the divine. Let me venture to paraphrase Han’s quote above: God remains possible, but the human being capable of receiving revelation has become increasingly rare.

 

Note on the cover photo: I took this photo some ten years ago when I entered a church in central Kerala. As I’ve said many times, I feel drawn to religious places, though never to religion. The priest who is sitting on a pew caught my attention. His posture didn’t look prayerful in the traditional sense. Yet he was having his rendezvous with his God in his own personal way, I could feel. His body language might contain faith, exhaustion, gratitude, uncertainty, or all of them at once. Such complexities remind us that religion is lived inwardly, and no state can legislate the shape of a soul.