Does God exist?
Most of the scientists down the centuries have been in a doubt about the existence of God. Recently, the last book in the name of renowned physicist Stephen Hawking got published — “Brief Answers To The Big Questions”. This modern scientist proclaims that “there is no God. No one directs the universe.” And he adds that “For centuries, it was believed that disabled people like me were living under a curse that was inflicted by God. I prefer to think that everything can be explained another way, by the laws of nature.”
These statements as answers to eternal questions by Mr Hawking are merely logical and intellectual conclusions; not any subjective experience or the realisation of c o n s c i o u s - ness. But God and Godliness cannot be tested in sciencelaboratories as objects. Science can e x a m i n e objects as they are material things, but it cannot treat living beings the same way. The same process cannot be applicable to the spirit. And the spirit does mean the spiritual phenomenon, something alive — something that pulsates in all human beings including Mr Hawkings’ and other beings, and the wholeness of nature. This experience and realisation of spirit pervading all beings in the cosmos and the vastness of nature is Godliness. This Godliness is not something that will curse anyone — as it is a blessing, and its realisation is blissfulness. God does not inflict such curses as deformities or disabilities — God does not interfere at all. Such things do happen naturally — as one finds both healthy fruits and rotten fruits on the same tree. We all are born out of the same existence and nature — Ram and Ravana, Krishna and Kansa, Buddha and Angulimaal, and Jesus and Judas. It is an phenomenon of energy and its manifestation in various forms. Nothing good or bad — simply inclusive of all dimensions and aspects of one life. Existence at its inner core is advaita — nonduality.
In his discourses on the upanishads, Osho says: God is existence — it is not that God exists; God is simply synonymous with existence. Really, to say that God is, is to repeat. God means is. It is bad language to say God is, because the very “isness” is God. God means — “isness”. To say God exists is wrong. God is existence.
“God is not a person. That is one of the greatest m i s u n d e r - s t a n d i n g s , and it has prevailed so long that it has b e c o m e almost a fact. Even if a lie is repeated continuously for centuries it is bound to appear as if it is a truth.”
Let us make God free from all concepts of personality.
Osho concludes: God simply means Godliness. It is because of this fact that Buddha denied the existence of God. He wanted to emphasize that God is a quality, an experience — like love. You cannot talk to love, you can live it. You need not create temples of love, you need not make statues of love, and bowing down to those statues will be just nonsense. And that’s what has been happening in the churches, in the temples, in the mosques.