Putting Words in God’s Mouth
History is full of prophets, sages, and mystics who have dared to speak on behalf of the Almighty. Often, this self-imposed right is used to declare that God demands we care for one another, that we feed and clothe the poor, that we be generous with our time and talents, and that we live lives of righteousness and virtue. However, perhaps just as often (and more often by the day it seems to feel), this right is used to cast down this group or that, to disparage and demean and demonize, and to declare authority over what the Lord of the universe wants or feels.
Overall, speaking on behalf of something larger than yourself is not in and of itself a problem, especially when many people can all acknowledge the wisdom in a person’s words or when those words are used to better the lives of others. However, when those words are used as weapons and God portrayed as a wrathful overlord rather than a benevolent parent, then we have a clear issue. Even the potentially benign or helpful can become problematic when we aren’t careful with how it is preached or followed.
For example, when we say that God desires the Jews to inherit the land of Israel, we may very well receive the horrors being carried out in Gaza. When we say that God cares deeply about our sexual behaviors, we may harvest purity culture, sexual shame, unfounded guilt, and warped sexuality. When we declare God to care deeply for this or that or to be indifferent to one thing or the other, we begin to shape the very essence of the world and the way we navigate through it. This is why theology matters, and this is why we must be careful with the words we use to discuss faith and religion. It is also why we must be careful in what sources we allow to speak on God’s behalf.
Of course, in the grand scheme, this gets to the heart of a much larger issue. How are we meant to know what God wants? How can we possibly tell whether someone is accurately speaking for God or if they are only speaking to their own desires? If you ask a Methodist, they may respond with the Wesleyan Quadrilateral - Scripture, Reason, Experience, and Tradition. They may tell you that we can understand God through the fourfold approach of comparing and overlapping the Biblical texts with the Church’s inherited tradition while interpreting them through personal experience and human reason. But, one of those foundations is still a book full of people speaking on behalf of God, and how are we meant to trust them? How are we to know they are right?
This is where I once again turn to perennialism. It is my view that we can only come to understand the nature of the divine by following the shared threads that pass through the many faiths and philosophies of the world. If only one or two prohibit something, then maybe there is no reason to believe this is a divine mandate. However, if the majority preach a similar idea then perhaps it would be wise to listen. As Christ says, “When two or three are gathered in my name, there am I with them.” (Matthew 18:20). Or, for a more modern approach to a similar idea, “The wisdom is in the room”, meaning that it is as a collective that we approach the wisest decisions.
I believe that God is the Ground of Being - the very essence through which we exist. In that sense, God does not love. God is love. God does not desire. God is desire. God does not know. God is knowledge. In short, God is the ground of all that is good and righteous. So, when humanity as a collective put together traditions that emphasize generosity, love, tenderness, compassion, charity, and selflessness, perhaps that means we are honing in on that which undergirds all things. And perhaps those aspects of religion that reflect judgement, hate, disdain, and control are not reflections of God, but merely reflections of us in our imperfection, particular because, despite the prevalence of such imperfections in religion, it seems very few of them can agree on which things are beholden to these negative categories. One faith prohibits pork because it is dirty while another prohibits beef because it is holy. One faith prohibits same-sex relations while another has nothing to say on the matter. One faith preaches against the worship of many Gods while another is built upon it. The restrictions are temporal and local, but the liberating messages are universal.
Either way, it can be dangerous to speak on behalf of God, but I’m much more amenable to it (and likely to partake) when the words we speak are words of healing and reconciliation rather than words of harm and division. And I like to imagine that God would agree.
