I am a Pantheist and have been since reading Spinoza at 15. Around the same time I read the Bible cover to cover. Spinoza taught me more about God than the Bible or any church. Here is the lengthy story.
I was brought up in a somewhat devoutly religious Christian family, we attended church nearly every Sunday. At the beginning it was the First Christian Church, later, due to my grandmother's demise and my father's sour attitute toward that church, my family fished around for a bit and finally settled on the Nazarene Church.
I was old enough to have clear memories of the Nazarene Church, they are an offshoot of Baptists because they thought the Baptists were too liberal. No dancing, jewelry, lots of hell and little salvation, very fundamentalist.
My father, in addition to being Christian and taking up with a fundamentalist sect, was a well read person who believed in learning about science and history in a secular setting. By the age of 10, he begin to discuss philosophy in addition to religion around me, as I was precocious, bratty, and indulged (visualize Bart Simpson). One thing the church could not stand was human evolution, something that fascinated both of us, beginning with Leaky's contribution to the 1965 World Book Annual Science Book. Essentially I got the impression that my father was going through the motions of going to church because he felt it was the moral thing to do rather than the completely intellectually honest thing. He was really big on the idea that the purpose of Christianity was to teach us morality, as he referred to Christianity as the greatest moral influence on mankind.
However, I was conflicted because the church taught the primacy of the believer's faith over any secular knowledge. Finally, I revolted and refused to go to church one day, but was forced to mainly by my mother. After that my father, apparently being somewhat embarrassed by the episode, allowed me to ditch church. To this day, my mother blames herself for forcing me to go to church against my will as the reason I became a "heathen."
I did go on a lark one last time in 1970 after at least a six month absence. In the meantime I had managed to con my parents into letting me grow my hair long (actually halfway over my ears!) for the compelling reason a seventh grader at the time would have, namely impressing the ladies. Some people at the church made it clear I, and my long hair, were not welcome. While I wanted to ask what they felt about that guy hanging on the cross at the end of the church, I was as usual polite and accomodating when off my turf (unlike my online personality at EvC). I have not attended a church service since except to attend baptisms/christenings, or to get away from drill sargents in basic training.
My family consigned themselves to my evident aethism and hippiedom and continued with the Nazarene Church, even after we moved from Fresno to Morro Bay. They got along well with the pastor and he even visited weekly, indeed even loaned me his books on Berkeley, Locke, and Hegel.
One of the things he said, in an evident attempt at conversion, was that philosophy was inferior to religion because in philosophy man attempts to seek God, while in religion God seeks man. I considered his argument, then and now, as great support for my position concerning religion.
Eventually, there was a falling out between my family and the Nazarenes. The pastor took a lengthy Hawaii vacation which did not sit well with my father as he believed religious people should not be wealthy, or at least wealthier than us. The final straw was when he came back and sermonized there were 100,000 devil worshipers in the Rose Bowl Stadium that very Superbowl Sunday. My sister, who until then was one of the most devout followers of both the church and the Dallas Cowboys made a choice, as did my parents, they became Presbyterians.
My father remained a Presbyterian until his death in 1995, my mother became a deacon in the church until last year when the ravages of age began to affect her perception of reality. One thing she believes, is that we are judged by the New Testament (not old). As to my devout sister, she married into the Lutheran Church where she, the pastor, and her coreligionists support the sciences as they either work for or are retired from Los Alamos National Labratory. No conflict between evolution and religion there, blame it on those evil secular graduate degrees in the sciences from world renowned universities, if you must find fault.
Now for the meat of this post.
I am a Panthiest, primarily Spinoza Panthiest because:
God is the totality of the universe, both what can and can not be apprehended by the senses. This does not mean that each person is God, it means that all are part of God.
The knowledge of God is the highest good.
I believe that God is best known through the works of God instead of the books of people. Therefore the study of nature, either subjectively (humanities) or objectively (science) is the primary path to the knowledge of God. Books are secondary commentary and vastly more subject to error. The Bible is a collection of parables which are not meant to be taken literally.
I deny the divinity of Christ, as I consider him a person. Possibly the second most exceptional person in history, but still a person. This is because God is not a person, therefore God does not have children in a human sense. God can not be fully known in an anthropormorphic manner.
Reason is the way to know God, passion is secondary and usually contrary to reason.
There is no such thing as heaven or hell.
There is no personal immortality, however there is impersonal immortality.
Morality is inherently subjective.
Rituals are meaningless to Pantheism.
IMHO there is but one God and Spinoza is the last great prophet (for now).
For more about Spinoza see:
Spinoza, Benedict De | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
For more about Pantheism in general see:
Pantheism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
I would like to add that according to Pantheism there is more than one path to understanding God. Pantheism is very similar to philosophic Taoism, Advaita Vedanta, and Matayama Bhuddism. However, any attempt to seek God through any religion, as long as it is sincere and it does not interfere with the rights of others to believe according to their understanding is always a step in the right direction.
I deeply admire the sincerity, knowledge, and intelligence of most the Christians (and most athiests and a few outside of either description) in this forum and as far as I am concerned that goes double for you Phat.
Edited by anglagard, : speling and art
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