Are gods insignificant unless they do something?

[Zzyzx]

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What is the significance of gods unless they do or have done something?

What have your favorite gods done lately (or ever)?

How do you know what they do or did? Did someone tell you? Read a book? Have a psychic experience? Use your imagination?

Is there any verifiable evidence that any of the thousands of proposed 'gods' has ever done anything?

Before humans learned about cause-and-effect in terrestrial matters, they credited ‘gods’ with being responsible for rain, flood, drought, storms, insect plagues, diseases, crop failures, thunder, darkening of the sun or moon, etc, etc. With those accounted for without need for ‘gods’, what is left for the ‘gods’ to do in respect to humans?

[Menotu]

[Replying to Zzyzx in post #1]

Interesting. A 'god' (or God if you want) can be whatever one wants: money, career, a car, a person, a lifestyle, a belief...at least from my experience.
What makes a god powerful are those that believe in it and use it to control their lives (outside those proven instances of gods doing something physical ).
But it's not what something does or doesn't do that make it significant, it's how that thing that was done (or not done) impacts someone's life IMO.

[brunumb]

[Replying to Zzyzx in post #1]

A 'god' (or God if you want) can be whatever one wants: money, career, a car, a person, a lifestyle, a belief...at least from my experience.

Your experience notwithstanding, that just makes the concept of God meaningless and frankly ridiculous.

[Menotu]

[Replying to Zzyzx in post #1]

A 'god' (or God if you want) can be whatever one wants: money, career, a car, a person, a lifestyle, a belief...at least from my experience.

Your experience notwithstanding, that just makes the concept of God meaningless and frankly ridiculous.

Maybe
Personally, I don't care if someone has a god in their life. God, money, sex, career...whatever they want to make their god let them. But don't try to make me believe and live like they think their god demands.

[Clownboat]

[Replying to Zzyzx in post #1]

A 'god' (or God if you want) can be whatever one wants: money, career, a car, a person, a lifestyle, a belief...at least from my experience.

Your experience notwithstanding, that just makes the concept of God meaningless and frankly ridiculous.

Maybe
Personally, I don't care if someone has a god in their life. God, money, sex, career...whatever they want to make their god let them. But don't try to make me believe and live like they think their god demands.

Fair enough as far as not believing you need to live by their demands. I'm with you on that one.
The point is, the way you define a god makes humans ignostic towards the concept of a god.

This has meaning:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/diction ... h-dict-hed
1God : the supreme or ultimate reality: such as
a: the Being perfect in power, wisdom, and goodness who is worshipped (as in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism) as creator and ruler of the universe

If a god can be literally anything, the word loses all meaning. I get the 'idea' of making your car out to be a god for example, but that meaning of god has its own meaning seperate from the gods supplied by humans that come with edicts attached. So for clarity, it would be more accurate to consider making your car or favorite football team an idol. Calling such things a god goes too far IMO.

[JehovahsWitness]

If a god can be literally anything, the word loses all meaning. I get the 'idea' of making your car out to be a god for example, but that meaning of god has its own meaning seperate from the gods supplied by humans that come with edicts attached. So for clarity, it would be more accurate to consider making your car or favorite football team an idol. Calling such things a god goes too far IMO.

I don't think so; that which we worship becomes our god. "Money is his god" is not a "meaningless " sentence. The meaning is conveyed that this person has made money central to his life and he will do anything to obtain it.



WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A GOD AND AN IDOL?


An idol is the focus of our adulation, that which we imitate and seek validation and approval from, but making someone or something one's god indicates that and more. It indicates handing over control to that thing, total submission. The idol is about what you give to the object/person ...the god is about what the object of devotion has in terms of sovereignty over one's person. In short, the idol doesn't own you, the god does.


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[Clownboat]

If a god can be literally anything, the word loses all meaning. I get the 'idea' of making your car out to be a god for example, but that meaning of god has its own meaning seperate from the gods supplied by humans that come with edicts attached. So for clarity, it would be more accurate to consider making your car or favorite football team an idol. Calling such things a god goes too far IMO.

I don't think so; that which we worship becomes our god.

I was a Christian that worshipped a god concept. To compare my worship/adoration that I had for my god to anything another person feels for money or a football team is to not understand my level of worship/adoration.

Therefore, when it comes to Clownboat, god concepts and football teams are very different things. If your god concept deserves no more adoration then a football team, then you do not share the level of adoration that I had as a believer.

"Money is his god" is not a "meaningless " sentence.

Correct. Claiming anything can be a god is what causes the word to lose meaning.

When someone says, 'may god have mercy on your soul', we know they are not talking about a football team, money or a car. This is because words have meaning.

The meaning is conveyed that this person has made money central to his life and he will do anything to obtain it.

This does not follow from a claim that money is a god. If someone talks about money being their god, we know they are not talking about actual god concepts. They are using hyperbole.

god verb
godded; godding
Definition of god (Entry 2 of 2)
transitive verb

: to treat as a god : IDOLIZE, DEIFY
https://www.merriam-webster.com/diction ... h-dict-hed

It seems you're trying to turn the verb god into the noun god. I could idolize and diefy a football team. That's a far cry from them being the creator of the universe.

[Menotu]

[Replying to Clownboat in post #54]

The point is, the way you define a god makes humans ignostic towards the concept of a god.

That's fine by me

If a god can be literally anything, the word loses all meaning.

Words don't have meanings in of themselves. It's people to attribute meanings to them. If one wants to allow that definition to be void of all meaning, that's fine for them. If not, that's fine for them as well.
As no god can be proven, it must exist through faith and belief, both of which are totally personal. Therefore, god or God or god (et al) are personal as well. How do we know this? Because what I think about God isn't totally what another thinks about God.

[nobspeople]

[Replying to Zzyzx in post #1]

Gods can't be proven and so they're personal. Someone can believe in anything enough to make it a god to them. How that god acts with that person is, really, only up to that person to worry about.
In other words, what that god does or doesn't do is up to that person and, likely, it's only them that needs to be concerned about it.
Beyond that, a god doesn't need to do anything other than be created by someone and be worshipped.
It's up to the person to determine how good that god is or isn't. They should be honest about it but, well, they're human and humans aren't honest.

For me, a god doesn't need to do anything to be worthy.