Week 2—Sunday Job 23:1-2, 8
Job 23:1-2, 8
GOD THROUGH PHILOSOPHY AND MORALISM
There have been two great attempts to find God apart from the Word became flesh. They are the attempts of philosophy and the attempts of moralism. The attempt of philosophy has been seen in the great philosophical nations—Greece, India, and China. The great philosophical systems were all three completed just before the time of the coming of Jesus. They took humans as high as they could go by philosophical reasoning. Beyond these systems, the human race will not progress in philosophical thought. The human brain strained itself to the utmost and having reached its apex went progressively bankrupt as an adequate method of finding God. At its highest, in the Vedanta philosophy of India, the philosopher could only say of Brahma: “Neti, Neti”—“Not that, Not that.” That was the very highest it could say, and its word was negative. The Word of philosophy was word and that word was “No.” It had no positive affirmation to make about the nature and character of God. It was the tacit acknowledgment of bankruptcy. Lao-tse said the final word about God is Silence, and Shankarachariya, the great philosopher of India, said the final word about God is “Not that.” They both came out to zero.
If the attempt to find God by philosophy was completed just before the coming of Jesus, so the attempt through moralism, or the Law, was also completed just before his coming. The attempt to find God through Law was a noble attempt of a great people, the Hebrews. Never was such a moral system built up as was embodied by the Law, and never was the end product so disappointing. It produced the Pharisee, who stood in his pride and said, “I thank God I am not as other men.” And Jesus pronounced the doom of this attempt at finding God when he said: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20). Their highest could not reach the Kingdom. Both philosophy and moralism fall short.
O God, when our best was not good enough, and when our highest could not reach the Kingdom, you came to lift us to yourself. What mercy. What humility. What grace. We are speechless before the wonder of it. Read our thankful hearts. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: May no one looking at me ever say in the quest for God, “Not that.”