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(10-14-99)
Worthy of Worship Thu Oct 14 06:59:30 1999
(found posted at deja.com alt.religion.hindu)
There is an old saying that there are three types of people. One who worships God for fear of hell, and that is the worship of the slave. One who worships God for the desire of his reward, and that is the worship of a merchant. And one who worships God because he is worthy of worship, and that is the worship of the free-man.
"Worthy of worship" is good for examination.
You see God as author of universe. He can do what he wants with his creation. He can make people pray to him, or curse him, as per his wishes. He do not need to send Muhammad to tell people anything. If he wishes you pray, you pray. You do not need Muhammad to tell you pray.
Now think of human author. He writes book. creatures in his book have to make prayer to the author. Some he writes as praying to him -- and for such praying they get good stuff. Some he writes as refusing to pray, and they get hurt real seriously for that.
Is such author "worthy of worship"?
To me he is worthy of pity. Why would the author want worship from those he wrote himself? Very stupid plot. Bad author. Maybe got beat up often as child, so writing stupid book where he can have creatures pray to him. Nobody will buy such book.
To you such author is worthy of worship?
So you see, "worship of the free" cannot exist in authoritarian religion. It is only the first two kinds. But kind 1 and kind 2 sometime are very clever. They delude themselves and tell themselves they are kind 3. (He can beat me up real bad, how awesome he is, he must be worthy of worship...)
Think about if you are going to be judged in a court of law. Before the trial, you tell the judge that if he judges against you, you will torture him and kill him. If he judges for you, you will arrange nice sex and other goodies for him. Is that a way to get impartial judgement?
Same way, anybody judging "worthy of worship" must prove
to themselves that they have courage to make real
"judgement". That means being able to say "no, not
worthy of worship" if necessary. If that is not even
possibility in mind, there is no actual judging "worthy
of worship", only deluding of self.
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