God and Man ~Guideposts for Spiritual Peace and Awakening
ー Written by Masahisa Goi
Chapter 2: The Relationship between God and Human Beings
What is a human being?
In answer to this question, I would expect to find extremely few people who can clearly state what the human existence is. This question, which passes through people’s minds without ever really capturing their attention, is the most fundamental one for creating happiness in the human world, and it is also the most difficult question to answer. When a person understands what sort of existence a human being is, and what exactly the ‘self’ is, that person has been liberated forever. When many people are able to answer the question, humankind will have been delivered of its suffering and heaven will be realized on earth.
Up to now, many philosophers and people of religion have confronted this issue. Those who were able to resolve it fully became awakened ones. Those who were able to understand it partially became scholars. Others, who understood it incorrectly, terminated their own lives or else became materialistic thinkers or activists who served to further confuse the world. And since those who could understand the real nature of human beings have been few within each era, humanity has remained confused up to the present.
At this point, before proceeding to the main subject, I would like to briefly describe the views on human nature which, I believe, lead to human deliverance.
People who recognize that a human being is not merely a physical body, but that within the physical body there is something—known as life—which is actively working, and who live according to this understanding: these people have taken one step on the stairway to heaven.
People who have reached the thought that spirit is master in a human being while the physical body is subordinate: these people have climbed the same stairway two or three steps.
People who believe that human beings are created by God and are God’s servants and nothing else, and who fear God’s judgment in everything, but are cautious in their deeds and cling to God: these people are still far from a true understanding of human beings; however, if they do not hurt others, they are able to climb the stairway to heaven.
People who think that human beings are creatures made by God, but that since God is love, if they positively keep acting in the spirit of love, unhappiness will never visit them: these people are also climbing the stairway to heaven.
People who do not particularly think of God or spirit but just sincerely perform actions of love with a bright and straightforward attitude: they also are able to climb to heaven.
People who, though they know nothing aside from the physical world, can spontaneously perform actions of love with bright feelings, believe in the existence of God, and live with the conviction that this world will surely improve: these people are already living in heaven.
People who know that man is a being who accomplishes the creation of that which has shape in this phenomenal world by freely utilizing the divine law of life, with the realization that a human being is spirit, and that the physical body is one of a human being’s embodiments and is not the true human being itself, and who put this understanding into practice: these people are awakened ones. Their minds are completely free from limitation. While having a physical body, they realize that they are, in truth, spirit. Knowing that spirit is divine life itself, they express their sense of oneness with God and others through their actions. Two examples of this would be holy people such as Gautama and Jesus Christ.
Knowing the true human being is the same as knowing God. No matter how hard one may seek God, if one’s actions are lacking in love and sincerity, one does not know the reality of a human being and cannot find true peace of mind.
The preciousness of a human being does not depend on the greatness of the physical body, or on the excellence of one’s knowledge. It is good to have a lot of knowledge, but if this knowledge is not rooted in the true nature of human beings, or spiritual wisdom (divine wisdom), it will, rather, entrap humankind into misfortune. Though the theories of the materialists are very elaborate, when they are put into action they create a restless society and disturb the world situation. This is because those theories are not based on divine wisdom. In other words, the materialists are not aware of what a human being really is.
As I did in the past, the majority of people in this world think that a human being is a physical body, and that the mind is a function existing within the physical body. They believe that a person lives in this society for some fifty or sixty years and then is reduced to ashes and disappears into nothingness. They are convinced that with death everything terminates.
Does the disintegration of the physical body mean the end of a human being? I promptly answer No!
Most people feel that a person is somehow born into this world by chance, maintains his or her physical body by eating and drinking, functions as a member of society, marries, raises children, then passes away and disappears into nothingness. The majority of people have lived according to this view, from birth to death and from lifetime to lifetime. Yet, not being wholly satisfied with this kind of life, do they not feel some vague and uneasy thoughts, whether large or small, recurring in their minds? This kind of life seems too meaningless and purposeless. People feel that there must be something else beyond this kind of life, but they do not know what it is. And yet, though they do not know what it is, they are not positively trying to discover what it is.
These are the feelings of the general masses. Among them, a few are unsatisfied with the way things are, and embark upon social reforms or join ideological movements. Others enter into the interior of their own minds in deep pursuit, and come to know God and spirit. Both are efforts that aim at breaking through the anguish that people are experiencing in their present lifestyle.
The masses are drifting. With the shifting of time, they are being carried right and left by the violent whirlpools of humanity’s karma.
What good does it do to grasp at the whirlpools of momentary elation and anger? Though those whirlpools may appear to hold the highest of joys, they fleetingly pass away.
That which has shape is a shadow of that which does not have shape. If one sees nothing more than the visible, tangible aspect of something, one will not be able to rise above one’s suffering. Even if social reforms are realized by changing only the shapes and forms of things, humanity will not be rescued from its anguish. Thoughts which adhere only to the world of material substances, or the world of forms or shapes, models, organizations and systems, are what ruin mankind—they certainly cannot save it.
Human beings are not of the physical body alone. God, the life that prevails throughout the universe, divided out its creative power into individual personalities; and those individual personalities are human beings, who strive to draw the perfect image of God within the world of shape by interrelating and cooperating with each other on the horizontal plane as they fully and freely command their given powers in all directions.
God is the principle of life and the principle of creation prevailing throughout the universe. Human beings are the children of God who are trying to activate God’s life in the world of shapes and forms.
If you are able to understand this relationship between God and man, you will be able to live unperturbed by any fluctuations in this phenomenal world. Now I would like to write about this relationship in as much detail as possible in the following chapters.
Dios y el Ser Humano (Spanish Edition)
Deus e o Homem (Portuguese Edition)