Café Philos: an internet café

Have you ever asked yourself, if this or that god were my neighbor, what kind of person would he be? Would you want someone with his personality living next to you? Or, if having called the police on him numerous times to no avail, would you contact your real estate agent, sell your home, and move to a better neighborhood?

It should be no news to us that gods have personalities. Gods, after all, are created by people, and in the image of those who created them. Since people have personalities, so do their gods.

Now, you just know that whoever created Kuan Yin, the Chinese Goddess of Compassion, was a good neighbor. And Kuan Yin herself would make a good neighbor. But that's certainly not true of all gods. The Greek god, Dionysus, would make a good neighbor only if you were young enough that you didn't need much sleep and you liked to party on the wild side.

I confess I do not think the Judeo-Christian god of the Bible's Old Testament, YHWH, would make a very good neighbor. I think YHWH is created in the image of an abusive, woman hating man. That thought has led me on numerous occasions to speculate to myself that the reason he claims to be the only god is because he wishes to hide from us, and all the other gods, the fact his mother, the Goddess, abandoned him in the desert because he was such a brat to her. Ever since he was abandoned by his own mother, he has hated women and desired to oppress them. Thus, there is no mention in the Old Testament of who he married. She's been kept out of sight and possibly barefoot. What kind of neighbor won't even allow his wife outside to hang the laundry up to dry?

Whether I am right or wrong about YHWH, it is indeed true that some gods would not make good neighbors. You have to wonder what kind of personalities their creators had? As Krishnamurti said, "A petty mind cannot conceive of anything other than a petty god."