Reading Blog V: Mary Kate Curry

A History of God by Karen Armstrong

The conclusion of this work left me unsettled and I remained unconvinced of Armstrong's thesis. This chapter focuses on various theologies of the 20^th century, and the question of whether or not the concept of God will remain valid in the years to come. Though there are myriad interpretations and ideas about God and the extent (if any) of the role of such a Being in the contemporary human world, it appears that the vast majority of the philosophers and theologians in this chapter (…fundamentalists aside) would agree that the historical conception of God is no longer adequate; and that we cannot apply the God of our forebears to our scientific paradigm. The overall suggestion was that we must reject personalistic notions of an anthropomorphic deity in order to create a valid faith applicable to our world.

One of the most interesting things for me within this chapter was the dominant theme of the necessity of a religion or belief, with a very small minority arguing the opposite. Even those thinkers who condemned God as a terrorizing historical conception did not do away with a faith system; they replaced the old devotion to God with a devotion to humanity. This throws away the idea that another (an other, an-Other, etc) is necessary at all. But, does this make ‘humanity’ the new ‘God?’ And if so, can one rightly say God is dead? Or is this simply a new mantle, joining a vast collection? Does the destruction of the word ‘God’ truly destroy, or does it just eliminate those historical connotations that are the most-well known?

I believe that yes, of course God has a future. But will that future be identical to what the word God conceptualized in the past? Decidedly not—and why should it be? And which conception exactly would remain perpetuated? The idea of God as an historical figure, as the burning bush, as the long-bearded, enthroned King of Kings, is dying, certainly. And that death joins the countless ranks of the other deaths that word has known. Religion shifts with the times; the conception of Yahweh shifted again and again with the growth of the Israelites. The word God has infinite connotations, and I fervently believe that no one person can ever truly understand what the man next to him believes, because every word, every adjective, means something else to a separate set of ears. Whatever is chosen to fill the void felt within may be labeled “God” by one, as easily as it is labeled “poetry” by another.