Is God an atheist?

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>> First of all I would like to say that I'm not claiming to be sure on the

>> arguments I here presents. Like I said I find it very difficult to

>>discuss

>> Krishna's acintya-shakti.

 

>acintya kalu ye bhava na tams tarkena yojayet - that which is inconceivable

>cannot be discussed in terms of human logic.

 

Yes!

 

>> >> So when the atheist says God doesn't exist then it's true? I guess it

>> >> is then. But at the same time it's also true that He exist.

>>

>> >Of course it is not true. How can it be true that God doesn't exist?

>>

>> Well, because all contradictions exist in God - including both His

>> existence and His non-existence.

 

>One of the definitions of God is that He sac-chit-ananda. If He is sat, how

>can he not exist?

 

Because all contradictory things exist in Him. Therefore God is both sat and

asat at the same time, but in God it's just not a contradiction. It's only a

contradiction from the material perspective.

 

>> >But >for the atheist He doesn´t exist.

>>

>> Here's how I think: God includes all possible contradictions, but when

>> they are in Him they are in harmony, which means that in Him they are not

>> contradictions at all. If this is true then it follows that the

>> contradiction of Gods existence and His non-existence also exist in God,

>> but in perfect harmony. So when the atheist says that God doesn't exist

>> it's both true and false at the same time. However, the atheist can't

>>give

>> any good argument as to why God should not exist, because the atheist

>> can't refer to Gods acintya-shakti without also recognizing the existence

>> of God at the same time.

>

> Or?

 

>Atheists don't accept that anything is acintya.

 

What about mayavadis? Don't they believe that the brahman-effulgence has all

contradiction in it - in harmony? But anyway, the atheists can't use this

argument, because they don't know about or believe in God.

 

>> >It's not a logical contradiction to say that if God is almighty He can

>> >prove that He doesn't exist, just like He can prove He exists.

>>

>> As I see it almightyness is a logically contradictory term.

 

>It is not as long as you accept almightyness. If you don't accept God's

>almightyness it is a c ontradiction, but if you accept that God is almighty

>there is nothing illogical about it.

 

As I see it, if you accept allmightyness you accept logical contradictions,

because allmightyness violates the "principle of contradiction" which is one

of the three principles that logic is based upon. The principle of

contradiction states that a given object can't both be A and not-A in the

same context.

 

Now, let's take the example of "Can God create a stone He can't lift?" If

God can create such a stone, then He can't lift it, and then He's not

almighty. And if He can't do it, then He's not almighty. Therefore, whether

we answer "yes" or "no" then we end up saying that "if God is almighty then

He's not almighty", which is a violates of the "principle of contradiction"

in which an object can't both be A (in this case almighty) and not-A (in

this case not-almighty) in the same context. And we obviously also violates

it if we say "yes" and "no" at the same time, because then God would both be

able to lift the stone and not lift the stone in the same context.

 

This is of course seen from the material perspective. From the spiritual

perspective the "principle of contradiction" doesn't hold, because Krishna

can both have the quality A and not-A in the same context in everything he

so desires.

 

>>It leads to

>> contradictions like "Can God create a stone so heavy He can't lift it?"

 

>It is not a contradiction for God, because He can do both. It is only a

>contradiction for the consitioned mind. Therefore Jiva Goswami says, that

>the only way you can understand God, is to first accept He is

>inconceivable.

>If you don't accept that you have no way of understanding God.

 

Yes! In God the contradiction exist in harmony which means that there's no

contradiction at all. But from the material point of view, as I see it,

there's a contradiction, as described above.

 

I think this is nicely described in Sri Isopanishad:

 

-------------------------------

tad ejati tan naijati

tad dure tad v antike

tad antar asya sarvasya

tad u sarvasyasya bahyatah

 

tat--this Supreme Lord; ejati--walks; tat--He; na--not; ejati--walks;

tat--He; dure--far away; tat--He; u--also; antike--very near; tat--He;

antah--within; asya--of this; sarvasya--of all; tat--He; u--also;

sarvasya--of all; asya--of this; bahyatah--external to.

 

TRANSLATION

 

The Supreme Lord walks and does not walk. He is far away, but He is

very near as well. He is within everything, and yet He is outside of

everything.

 

PURPORT

 

Here is an explanation of the Supreme Lord's transcendental

activities as executed by His inconceivable potencies. Contradictions

are given here by way of proving the inconceivable potencies of the

Lord. He walks, and He does not walk. Such a contradiction serves to

indicate the inconceivable power of God. With our limited fund of

knowledge, we cannot make accommodations for such contradictions; we can

only conceive of the Lord in terms of our limited powers of

understanding. The impersonalist philosophers of the Mayavada school

accept only the Lord's impersonal activities and reject His personal

feature. The Bhagavata school, however, accepts the Lord as both

personal and impersonal. The bhagavatas also accept His inconceivable

potencies, for without them there can be no meaning to the words

"Supreme Lord."

 

 

Prabhupada actually says, as far as I can see, that these are contradictions

given to us as a hint about Krishna's acintya-shakti. From the ordninary,

that means the material, point of view these are actually contradictions,

because they explicitly contradicts the "principle of contradiction." But,

as Prabhupada also writes, these are not contradictions for Krishna, because

He can accomodate such contradictions in an ucontradictory manner.

 

What I'm trying to say is that for the material intelligence, which relies

upon material logic, God is, in many ways (for example in His almightyness),

contradictory. Therefore God can't be fully understood by material logic.

However, we can understand Gods acintya-shakti (at least we can understand

it more) when we rely upon sabda-pranama.

 

This is how I see it!

 

Ys, AKD