The Evolving Concept of God   Fr Michael Panachickal V C     Man's knowledge of God is subject to evolution. This article is an attempt to discover the truth by examining the evolving concept of God.      
The knowledge that we have today about the universe is the sum total of what we gained by degrees subject to evolution and development. In days of old, man believed that the earth was flat. Later he came to know better. He thought that the earth was one of the heavenly bodies and since the sun kept revolving around it, we had day and night. This was only a partial truth. Still later, man came to know that the sun is the centre of the solar system and the earth is a planet revolving round the sun. Likewise, we know today that day and night are caused alternately because the earth rotates on its axis. It is after several centuries that we have come to this knowledge. In a similar manner, the knowledge about God is acquired gradually, step by step.
 
Why did our first parents, who ate the forbidden fruit, run away from God and hide behind the trees? We reply it was through fear, a sense of inadequacy. If Adam and Eve had the knowledge that God is an all-merciful God who welcomes and embraces the repentant sinner, and reinstates him as his own son, like the prodigal son's father, they would not have fled from God's presence and hidden behind the trees. The knowledge of God's mercy is the knowledge of God that Jesus imparts through this parable. So it is clear that our first parents could not turn to God because they lacked the knowledge of God's infinite mercy. God knew that man would never acknowledge or believe in his goodness if he revealed it at one stroke. He, therefore, took centuries to manifest it through his words and works. In olden days, God intervened through his prophets at different times and in diverse manner, until he completed his self-revelation through the incarnation of his Son. The perfection of the God-head is fully revealed in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
 
God revealed to man, who hitherto lived in the knowledge that God punishes those who do evil, that he blesses those who do good.
 
To those who believed that failure, defeat and adversity were God's punishment for going away from him, God said: "If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land"(Is 1:19). When God said he is one who bestows prosperity on the righteous and the obedient, he was revealing, in part, his goodness.
 
To those who were thirsting for revenge, to pay evil back with evil, God said: "Revenge is mine"(Deut 32:35). Those words were powerful enough to turn barbarian man away from the desire to take revenge, leave the matter to God and be at rest. Jesus proved on the cross that God does not take revenge or curse or destroy. He who said that he came to fulfill the law and the prophets, completes the partial knowledge we received about God from the Old Testament. What Jesus does is to personify the infinite love of God (on the cross) and draw the mind of man to himself. No sinner is attracted to a God who punishes and destroys sinners and avenges himself on them. He may be so fearful that he gives up sin. That is the morality of the old dispensation. The law was given by Moses. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
 
Will God take revenge on those who continue in sin and do not repent? Will he abandon them to destruction?
 
God will not take revenge or destroy anyone. Most failures are the inevitable results of ignoring God. Despair, fear, grief, adversity, lack of peace are all the consequences of disdaining God.
 
But then, can illness, danger, treachery and such adversities not afflict those who live in God's grace? Yes, they can. But such people will rise above these disasters. Their misfortunes will not make them desperate or plunge them in grief. On the contrary, they draw these people closer to God. Such people are united with Jesus who conquered the world on the cross. They too will defeat the world, crush the head of Satan.
 
Perhaps we can say that God permits adversity in the sense that he acknowledges and accepts man's freedom.Since man freely chooses to defy God, God also acknowledges the consequences of that defiance and so permits these adversities. God is one who is waiting to save man from every kind of suffering. He has only a saving, redeeming plan. He saves and shows mercy. Just as the Heavenly Father is merciful, he commands us to be merciful to one another. The perfection of the Heavenly Father is the mercy of the Cross. We have to become like unto God. If God is one who takes revenge, those who have to become like God, may also take revenge. This we know is not right.
 
When we stand on the earth and look at the sun, we think the sun rises and sets. But when the sun looks at us, it appears as if the earth, bearing us, revolves around it, alternately facing and backing onto it. A similar difference exists between God's perspective and ours. Man experiencing God's love, returns that love- that is the meaning of God's forgiveness. If we say God does not forgive, it means that those who are not of the same mind as God-those who do not turn towards him-cannot expereience that infinite love.
 
When God speaks to man he can use only human language. He can make him understand only from man's point of view. He can approach man only according to human psychology. When we come to know God through all these means, we are enabled to look at matters from God's perspective. With this approach, we can then convince others of the truth.
 
Until the time when all men will be united in one faith and reach the perfection of knowledge about the Son of God, we have to continue to teach about God from different points of view and in various ways.
 
 
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