By God!...Or Not

Dr. Rajesh Bhola
India
Aug 30, 2013


The majority of us will die fighting a losing battle against aging, struggling against the inevitable advance of disease and perhaps disability. Finally and inevitably many of us will die - suffering. If God exists and God made the world, why did he make it so full of suffering? If God does not exist then we are locked without hope in a world filled with gratuitous and unredeemed suffering, and there is no hope for deliverance from evil. If God does not exist, life is ultimately meaningless. And ultimately all of mankind is doomed to perish in the death of the Universe. Not believing in God is thus a philosophy without hope.

Does God exist? This ‘controversy’ was raked up by legendary theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, in his book The Grand Design. “God did not create the Universe, and the ‘Big Bang’ was an inevitable consequence of the laws of physics. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the Universe exists, why we exist,” he says. The concept he talks about, which he has named as ‘M-theory’, makes the ‘Creator of the Universe’ redundant. Evidence has been found that the Universe had an absolute beginning about 13 billion years ago, in a cataclysmic event known as the Big Bang. The Big Bang represents the origin of the universe from literally nothing; all matter and energy, even physical space and time, came into being at the Big Bang.

There are scientists who believe that this Universe is infinite and eternal. However, if the universe is infinite, it means it never had a beginning. David Hilbert, perhaps the greatest mathematician of the twentieth century, states that the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality; it neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. Infinity is just an idea in our minds, not something that exists in reality. Since past events are not just ideas, but are real, the number of past events must be finite. Therefore, the universe must have begun, at some time, for it to exist today. The proponents of this thought have therefore been forced to adopt the hypothesis that there exist an infinite number of randomly-ordered universes, composing a sort of World Ensemble, of which our universe is but a part. During the last 40 years, scientists have discovered that the existence of intelligent life depends upon a complex and delicate balance of initial conditions that were present at the Big Bang. Earlier, scientists had believed that whatever the initial conditions of the universe, intelligent life had evolved. 

Even if God does not exist, the rational thing to do is to believe in Him. It is irrational to prefer death, futility and despair over hope, meaningfulness and happiness. Even atheist philosophers like Sartre, who has thought very seriously about this problem, admit that the existence of God has great significance for man. We may or may not believe in God – or whether he exists – but there is no denying human suffering, and there is no one to blame for it. There is no escape from it, though we do try our best to do so. Self-mortification, being hard on oneself, also does not work. Enlightenment comes when we start facing the realities of life as they come our way. Let us not rely on an external or an internal God. It is more important to be enlightened than to be a religious practitioner. Do not be selfish by exhibiting that you are close to Him; drop that dissipative selfishness. On the other hand, do not wear yourself out by feeling guilty that you are not pursuing daily religious rituals. Instead, start doing something more positive in your life. Begin with facing your own despair. You will enter a wholesome, constructive, positive and satisfying way of life - when you will stop feeling frustrated about what you cannot do anything about, and start doing whatever you can do something about. 

Dr. Rajesh Bhola is President of Spastic Society of Gurgaon and is working for the cause of children with autism, cerebral palsy, mental retardation and multiple disabilities for more  than 20 years

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