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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Y2K" data-source="post: 2609912" data-attributes="member: 35049">Ultimate Reality according to the three major monotheistic religions - Judaism, Christianity and IslamJudaism, the earliest monotheistic religion, is about the personal God who revealed himself through the story of the Jewish people. We find it in the scriptures called the Torah by the Jews and the Old Testament by the Christians.In the very beginning of the Old Testament, God is presented creating the universe out of nothing (ex nihilo) and does not manifest it out of his own substance as Brahman, or out of a preexistent matter as Indra does. This "nothing" has no ontological statute, it is not a primordial substance, because prior to creation nothing existed except God. The Psalms state:In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. Like clothing you will change them and they will be discarded. But you remain the same, and your years will never end. (Psalm 102,25-27)The creation presented in the book of Genesis is an act intended and completed by the creator, not out of necessity, but out of love. The beginning or cause of the world is not an impersonal necessity or a blind manifestation of an undetermined nature, but the product of the free choice of a personal God. Being consequent to the idea of the fundamental unity of the world in Brahman, pantheism has to consider the physical world and humans as manifestations of Brahman, manifestations of the same primordial essence to which they are destined to return. For this reason, it can be said that the impersonal Absolute is incomplete without his "creation", i.e., without the manifestation of his potentiality. The manifestation of Brahman is a necessity derived from its very nature. In pantheism creation is always a transformation (or manifestation) of a primordial impersonal unity. It is not a replacement of "nothingness" with "something", but a transformation of the ultimate reality from one ontological condition into another. What once existed in unity becomes multiplicity and manifestation. Therefore the nature of ultimate reality and that of creation prove to be quite different in the monotheist perspective. The personal and triune God of ChristianityAccording to Christianity, God reveals himself to be personal and triune. He exists as God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, without beginning and without having his origin in a primordial impersonal essence.There are some important points to make clear about the origin and meaning of the term "person" (Latin persona, Greek prosopon). Initially used in the Greek ancient theater for the actors’ mask, the term designated in Hellenistic philosophy "the masked face of the impersonal being". The term used for the impersonal essence of reality was ousia, and its determined, singular forms were called hypostases. If Christian theology had been only a form of Hellenistic philosophy, it should have said that the hypostases - Father, Son and Holy Spirit - are mere functional aspects of the divine nature ousia. The novelty brought by Christian theology is the fact that each person of the Holy Trinity has the fullness of divine nature, and the ontological character of the Ultimate Reality is defined by the reality and relation that exists between the three hypostases. A major contribution in defining this aspect was made by the Cappadocian fathers of the Church (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory of Nazianzus).Therefore the Holy Trinity should be understood neither as a sum of three Gods (tri-theism), nor as a mono-personal God that assumes successively three distinct forms (the modalistic heresy). God’s being does not exist outside the three persons, but only as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and they are the only way for God's existence. So there cannot exist an Ultimate Reality "beyond" or "above" the Holy Trinity, as in pantheism (Brahman as the ultimate nature of the gods). Therefore none of the three hypostases, Father, Son or Holy Spirit, can be considered a kind of Hindu Ishvara, a first manifestation of the impersonal Brahman. Christian theology overthrew the values of Hellenistic metaphysics in order to adapt its terms to the newly revealed reality. In defining divinity, the accent must be transferred from an impersonal Ultimate Reality to the personal character of the Holy Trinity and the relation between the three hypostases. Here is the origin of the term "divine person" (from the Latin persona), and (derived from it) the term "human person".The triune God exists by himself. In his revelation to Moses, he called himself "I am who I am" (Exodus 3,14). This means that he is self-sufficient, that he does not depend on any exterior element. His existence is expressed through love, omnipotence and omniscience, among which there is perfect unity and harmony. None is manifesting itself by infringing on the other because the Holy Trinity is perfect in love, will and deed. Associated with these characteristics are justice and immutability. God’s immutability is not a reminder of Brahman Nirguna's immobility, but an absolute stability in truth and goodness. Likewise, when the Apostle John proclaims that "God is love" (1 John 4,8) this should not be interpreted as an expression of the impersonal primordial energy, but as form of expressing the supreme unity of the tri-personal communion. It doesn't just mean that God has love, as a quality, but that he is love, which is the way of being in the Trinity, each person existing not for himself, but for the others, in a perfect communion of love.(One can use the following links for more information on the concept of the Holy Trinity:Gregory of Nyssa, On the Holy Trinity, and of the Godhead of the Holy Spirit; On "Not Three Gods"; Early Christians on the Trinity)The God of the Bible admits no deeper Ultimate Reality beyond himself. He is not an Ishvara manifested out of Brahman (or a Deus manifested out of Deitas, according to Eckhart), a god that comes and goes, located far beyond the impersonal absolute. The triune God of Christianity does not admit the existence of a "deeper reality" in which he originated, because he says:I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God (Isaiah 44,6).He cannot be equated with any god of the Hindu pantheon. They are only aspects of an impersonal Absolute, manifestations that will finally be absorbed by it. The triune God of Christianity is different from Krishna, who periodically manifests and annihilates the universe (Bhagavad Gita 9,7-9). According to Christianity, God does not create the same world many times, but just once, and then not out of any necessity that surpasses him. Neither can he be equated with the "Hindu trinity" Brahma (the creator), Vishnu (the preserver) and Shiva (the destroyer). The three Hindu gods are reminiscences of the old Vedic polytheism, from where they have been later assimilated as primary products of Brahman's manifestations. As a consequence, it is absurd to define a superior and esoteric way (apara-vidya), that aims at the impersonal Absolute, and an inferior exoteric way (para-vidya) for those who are so limited that they are satisfied with a personal manifestation of the absolute. Christianity cannot be assimilated as a form of bhakti-yoga, a way accessible for the inferior and weak people to attain the impersonal Ultimate Reality of the world.</blockquote>

Verification: Hathara warak wissa keeyada? (Hathara wadi karanna 20)

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