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A Few Words on Pantheism
A Few Words on PantheismfromSchopenhauer, Arthur. Saunders, T. Bailey, trans. Parerga and Paralipomena.inSaunders, T. Bailey. "A Few Words on Pantheism." Religion: A Dialogue and OtherEssays. New York: Macmillian and Co., 1891. 55-58.THE, controversy between Theism and Pantheism might be presented in an allegorical ordramatic form by supposing a dialogue between two persons in the pit of a theatre at Milan duringthe performance of a piece. One of them, convinced that he is in Girolamo's renownedmarionette-theatre, admires the art by which the director gets up the dolls and guides theirmovements. "Oh, you are quite mistaken," says the other, "we're in the Teatro della Scala; it isthe manager and his troop who are on the stage; they are the persons you see before you; the poettoo is taking a part."The chief objection I have to Pantheism is that it says nothing. To call the world "God" is notto explain it; it is only to enrich our language with a superfluous synonym for the word "world." Itcomes to the same thing whether you say "the world is God," or "God is the world." But if youstart from "God" as something that is given in experience, and has to be explained, and then say,"God is the world," you are affording what is to some extent an explanation, in so far as you arereducing what is unknown to what is partly known (ignotum per notius); but it is only averbal explanation. If, however, you start from what is really given, that is to say, from the world,and say, "the world is God," it is clear that you say nothing, or at least you are explaining what isunknown by what is more unknown.Hence Pantheism presupposes Theism; only in so far as you start from a god, that is, in so faras you possess him as something with which you are already familiar, can you end by identifyinghim with the world; and your purpose in doing so is to put him out of the way in a decent fashion. In other words, you do not start clear from the world as something that requires explanation; youstart from God as something that is given, and not knowing what to do with him, you make theworld take over his rôle. This is the origin of Pantheism. Taking an unprejudiced view ofthe world as it is, no one would dream of regarding it as a god. If must be a very ill-advised godwho knows no better way of diverting himself than by turning into such a world as ours, such amean, shabby world, there to take the form of innumerable millions who live indeed, but arefretted and tormented, and who manage to exist a while together only by preying on one another;to bear misery, need and death, without measure and without object, in the form, for instance, ofmillions of negro slaves, or of the three million weavers in Europe who, in hunger and care, lead amiserable existence in damp rooms or the cheerless halls of a factory. What a pastime this for agod, who must, as such, be used to another mode of existence!We find accordingly that what is described as the great advance from Theism to Pantheism, iflooked at seriously, and not simply as a masked negation of the sort indicated above, is atransition from what is unproved and hardly conceivable to what is absolutely absurd. Forhowever obscure, however loose or confused may be the idea which we connect with the word"God," there are two predicates which are inseparable from it, the highest power and the highestwisdom. It is absolutely absurd to think that a being endowed with these qualities should haveput himself into the position described above. Theism, on the other hand, is something which ismerely unproved; and if it is difficult to look upon the infinite world as the work of a personal,and therefore individual, Being, the like of which we know only from our experience of the animalworld, it is nevertheless not an absolutely absurd idea. That a Being, at once almighty andall-good, should create a world of torment is always conceivable; even though we do not knowwhy he does so; and accordingly we find that when people ascribe the height of goodness to thisBeing, they set up the inscrutable nature of his wisdom as the refuge by which the doctrineescapes the charge of absurdity. Pantheism, however, assumes that the creative God is himself theworld of infinite torment, and, in this little world alone, dies every second, and that entirely of hisown will; which is absurd. It would be much more correct to identify the world with the devil, asthe venerable author of the Deutsche Theologie has, in fact, done in a passage of hisimmortal work, where he says, "Wherefore the evil spirit and nature are one, and where natureis not overcome, neither is the evil adversary overcome."It is manifest that the Pantheists give the Sansara the name of God. The same name is givenby the mystics to the Nirvana. The latter, however, state more about the Nirvana than they know,which is not done by the Buddhists, whose Nirvana is accordingly a relative nothing. It is onlyJews, Christians, and Mohammedans who give its proper and correct meaning to the word "God."The expression, often heard now-a-days, "the world is an end-in-itself," leaves, it uncertainwhether Pantheism or a simple Fatalism is to be taken as the explanation of it. But, whichever itbe, the expression looks upon the world from a physical point of view only, and leaves out ofsight its moral significance, because you cannot assume a moral significance without presentingthe world as means to a higher end. The notion that the world has a physical but not a moralmeaning is the most mischievous error sprung from the greatest mental perversity.© Copyright 1998 Patrick Beherec(or original author)Homepage: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/9567/Index.htmlSchopenhauer Page: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/9567/SIndex.htmlThis page hosted by Geopages. Get your own Free Home Pagegeovisit();
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