Can you read God’s mind? I know I can’t
I woke up early Friday morning to our house shaking. Realizing it was not in a tornado or something that required an immediate evacuation, I thanked God for the safety we were in and tried to go back to sleep. But this strange question popped up in my mind: Were there any gay parade scheduled in a near by city?
Of course, this is not my usual reaction to geological phenomena. It just happened that a couple of months ago I read something linking gays to earthquakes, and I wanted to write a posting about it. The latest realignment of tectonic plates in the Midwest seemed to be the right backdrop for that posting. Here it is.
Religious people feel a strong connection with God. A personal and warm sense of proximity to our creator gives many of us comfort, strength, and enough boost to carry on when the going gets tough. Some people, unfortunately, get a bit too close.
I, like many others, may occasionally feel tempted to gage how much God is happy (or unhappy) with me. If I have a good week at work, is it because God is smiling upon me? If my car breaks down in a very untimely fashion, is it because I did not focus enough on my duties to God?
I think a tiny little bit of that is not bad. Being aware of God’s presence, and that He notices us, is not a bad thing as long as we do not jump to conclusions about Him immediately responding in a divine fashion to every thing we do - that is to say, as long as we do NOT claim we KNOW why God did, or did not do, something to us or to someone else (for example, neighbors’ car stolen because they do not go to church, or a boss deserving a serious heart attack for being mean to his/her employees).
Unfortunately what may be, in a very limited fashion, OK for each of us individually, could become a seriously dangerous thing to do by someones who claims, or are perceived, to have a special connection with God.
Main Street Methodist Church
Bay St. Louis, Mississippi
The images of Hurricane Katrina are in our collective memory, with close to two thousands killed, whole cities destroyed, and hundreds of thousands uprooted from their homes.
But to some, it was not the laws of physics, meteorology and statistics at work. It was a Divine decision to teach us a lesson. Pat Robertson seems to think Hurricane Katrina is related to the legalization of abortion (see video there). He and Jerry Falwell blamed September 11 terrorist attack on abortionists, gays, and the ACLU. John Hagee stated that the hurricane was an act of God, punishing New Orleans for “a level of sin that was offensive to God” and that it was actually meant to disrupt a gay pride parade in New Orleans.
Seven thousand miles away, another ‘man of God’ disagreed with Hagee regarding why God’s wrath descended on the poor people of New Orleans. It was not the gay pride parade. It was the US foreign policy.
“Hurricane Katrina is a punishment meted out by God as a result of U.S. President George W. Bush’s support for the Gaza and northern West Bank disengagement”, Israeli Shas Party spiritual leader and former Chief Sephardic Rabbi Ovadia Yosef said.
But when it came to gay people and their impact on the laws of nature, Hagee found an ally in a member of the Israeli parliament from the same Shas party who blamed gays for earthquakes in Israel: “A cost-effective way of averting earthquake damage would be to stop passing legislation on how to encourage homosexual activity in the State of Israel, which anyways causes earthquakes”. That funny statement was the reason behind the weird thought that came to me soon after I felt the quake.
Flawed thinking underlies all these people explaining what God really means when we have a tsunami, a failed space shuttle mission or when tectonic plates find a new position of equilibrium. This is not restricted to Christian or Jewish hyper-religious figures. Similar efforts to read God’s mind occur amongst some Muslim preachers as well. In all of these case, the ‘men of God’ are comfortable telling us that God used nature to send the rest of us a message endorsing the political agenda that they support.
How arrogant of them on one hand, and demeaning to God on the other.
In all the holly books of Abrahamic faiths, God used a lot more reason to persuade us than he used indiscriminate, disproportionate, and actually misdirected forces of nature. The wisdom of God’s actions - be it a natural disaster, a good harvest year, victory or defeat in a war, or simply catching the flu - is impossible to decipher. Could these events, great or small, have a divine reason behind them? Yes, but none of us is capable of reading God’s mind or knowing his specific intent.
The Quran tell a very revealing story about Prophet Moses, peace be upon him, insisting on joining a Holy man to learn a bit of how God works. “May I follow thee on the understanding that thou wilt impart to me something of that consciousness of what is right which has been imparted to thee?” (Quran 18:66). He was warned that it is too difficult for him to fathom, “[The other] answered: ‘Behold, thou wilt never be able to have patience with me for how couldst thou be patient about something that thou canst not comprehend within the compass of [thy] experience?” (Quran 18: 67 & 68).
The story gets more exciting from that point on with the sage killing the child of two God-conscious parents, putting a hole in the boat of orphans that helped the sage and Moses cross a river, and finally the sage helped build a wall for the villagers that were hostile to them. Moses gives up at that point, the sage explains to him the wisdom behind the strange series of deeds and they part (Quran 18:70-82).
If Moses could not understand God’s wisdom of simple everyday events, who are we to claim that we can read God’s mind?
Fellow bloggers and readers: tell me what would be your religious perspective on man reading the mind of God.
Khaled Hamid, 48, is an American Muslim. He was born in Egypt but has lived in Canada and the United States for nearly 20 years. Since 2000 he has worked as a physician in St. Louis where he lives with his wife and two sons. He is especially interested in civil rights issues and inter-faith dialog. 
Thanks for the good words.
Some great thoughs there Thank you
No one can read God’s mind or another person’s mind. Nor should any one of any religion believe everything literally that they read in the Bible or the Quran. People should worry more about living in the present time and living by the principles of good and evil. Everyone is taught what is good and knows evil. Unfortunately, many choose evil over good. It’s really that simple.
However, I do have many, many questions for God if I see him one day (I hope he does not judge my redemption on that). My religion teaches that God is compassionate and forgiving and does not punish.
Dr. Hamid, I have another question. You spoke a lot about the First Amendment, freedom of speech. I am very disturbed lately with CAIR trying to silence voices that they say spread Muslim hatred. However, in this country we are supposed to have freedom of expression, yet CAIR doesn’t seem to agree. As far as I can tell, what these people are saying is an honest assessment. I find this extremely disturbing. Again, if they don’t like it here in America, perhaps even if they are Americans, why don’t they move to the Middle East where they won’t have to tolerate so-called hate speech.
As a Christian Catholic, we are attacked on a regular basis not only in the main stream media,
but also by such wonderful people as Bill Maher on HBO. As much as he makes me puke with his religious hate speech, as an American I understand that he has the right to mock my religion and I have the freedom to choose not to listen to him. If enough people agree, HBO will cancel his show. If not, then so be it. I don’t care what he says.
The Post-Dispatch regularly attacks the local leader of my faith, Archbishop Burke. They would never speak about Muslim leaders like they do about him. Most of us Catholics just take it all in stride. Many that have more character than I, just refuse to purchase the PD. That’s just the way America works.
A CENTRIST, it was famously stated by (I think) Mr. Justice Holmes, that the right to freedom of expression stops when your hand hits my face.
On the question of Archbishop Burke, I’d suggest that he has gone out of his way to be a public disciplinarian. Anyone who does that, invites commentary and publicity in response. I think the larger question about groups like CAIR and others gets back to this black/white, right/wrong squabble. I do think that the press in America has done a terrible job of educating the American people about Islam. The various crazies around the world who use Islam as justification for their hatred are not really all that different from those in this country like Matthew Hale or Fred Phelps who use Christianity to justify their hatreds.
What does “Joe Middle-America” visualize when he thinks “Moslem”? He sees a bearded man with wild eyes who is carrying an AK-47 and laughing as he pulls the string on his bomb-laden belt on a public bus or in a crowded restaurant.
For me, God’s mind just doesn’t work in a way that it can be “read”. I think God is concerned with how we treat each other and the world in which we live. As a scientist, I don’t believe God causes earthquakes or tsunamis or natural disasters to punish us.
Many faithful Christian’s seem to believe that God is only about rules and judgment. That if we just follow “the rules” then everything will be OK. I think God asks much much more of us than trying to discern the meaning specific natural or individual traumas . . . a practice that has little to do with the Abrahamic traditions per se.
I believe that God is with us and no “mind reading” is necessary. What is required is surrender to in the moment to the quiet voice of Love that counsels us when we have the patience and skill to put our ego’s aside and listen.
I believe you can read God’s mind with regard to your own personal endeavors. Jesus showed us how to love - which is an endeavor. Love of God is a matter of being true to God, yourself and others. Truth - another endeavor - is essential and we must value endeavors like love and truth more than events. Love facilitates forgiveness and truth sets us free. The life of Jesus shows us the endeavors God wants us to have. Turning to God in prayer, scripture reading and sacrificing personal wants confirms them.
“He has told you, O man, what is good:
And what does the LORD require of you
But to do justice, to love kindness,
And to walk humbly with your God?”
Micah 6:8, NASB
Attributing natural disasters to the hand of God is OK, as long as the right lesson is being learned. Example: The destruction of New Orleans (I’ve been there, twice, on construction trips) could be God’s Judgment due to things like Falwell and others proclaimed. More likely, it’s God’s Judgment against our destruction of the Mississippi Delta and the protecting islands that used to be out in the Gulf. In other words, our sin of failing to be good stewards of the earth is going to bring about our destruction. Katrina was a warning.
Dr. Hamid, I did a little research on my question of whether or not there is a global caliphate of which you disagreed with and accused me of spreading hate speech. This is what I have found for what it is worth to you:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=56286
And from a piece by William J. Federal he sited the book of Sura from the Quran.
A Centrist:
I will not debate every article, book and person that does not like Islam or does not understand it, and expresses it in the vast cyberspace,. You need to do you homework studying Islam if you care to know anything about it. I do suggest a very reasonable translation of the Quran with great commentary by M Asad called the Message of the Quran (http://www.amazon.com/Message-Quran-Muhammad-Asad/dp/1567441386). It is your choice whether to seek understanding Islam better or, alternatively, to select what reinforces some other held beliefs about Islam if you think you already know the truth.
I have come against Muslims and atheists who hold opinions about your own religion (Christianity in general, and Catholicism in particular) that are similar to your attitude towards Islam. None of them made any effort to understand Christianity from neutral sources or from its original scripture before agreeing with every thing negative they hear about it. I hope you are better than they were.
There position was “Christianity is a horrible religion and nothing can change that because is the a fact. Period”. Think about it for a second from their point of view: Crusades, Protestant vs. Catholic massacres, intra-European wars, colonization of the Africa, Asia, the New World, near extermination of aborigines in many places, largest scale of slave trade in history, apartheid and racial segregation states not to mention two World Wars (and possibly a third if some of our current leadership have it their way) Not to mention IRA in northern Ireland, ETA in Spain, or Genocide in Rwanda (with the recent conviction of catholic clergy in genocide by the courts there).
Actually, even Nazi regime still counts as Christian for some people, I will leave it up to you to find their arguments and judge how valid it is about the Church and Papacy complicity with the Axis forces in WWII.
The links between Racism in the south of USA and in apartheid South Africa on one hand, and the Church on the other hand, (at least some churches) mount, in some people’s minds, to a solid historic proof that Christianity - in the core - supported those horrible regimes.
Of course I can tag along Serb and Croat atrocities in Bosnia, Army of God in central African nations, Lebanese Phalangist Christian massacres in Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps , etc. Before accusing me of being selective, I will tell you I am being selective, so you can see how bad your religion would look like if one wishes to be selective.
What to you is defined as a religion of love and peace is to others a religion of hegemony and White domination.
I do NOT subscribe to such opinion; neither does 99% of my Muslim community. Most of us understand that religion is one of many factors that shape history and politics. And when it does, is it a minor factor, dominated by economy, human greed and human desire for a sense supremacy material and moral, even if it is a fake one.
I happened to agree that Christianity is a religion of love and peace, NOT because you said it, but because I did my home work learning about it, not from Hagee, Falwell, Paterson Jim Crow law or from the opinions of the abundant zealots. I learned it from original scripture (in proper historic context) and from Christian friends and non-friends that I see around me every day.
Can you count 5 or 10 Muslims you know personally? If you can, have you tried to reach out and talk to them? Not to preach them, or convert them but to KNOW them?
And just to cover of the points you raise:
- CAIR is not against the first amendment, the same way Anti Defamation League is not against it. But, this is country where there are laws against hate, libel and slander.
Asking the courts of law to assess whether these laws apply in certain situations is NOT restriction of the freedom of expression.
- If someone accuses you in public of being a child molester because you are Catholic, do you consider that as actionable slander? If a school near you refuses your participation in their activities because you are Catholic, and they are worried about their children, what would you do?
- You mention that your friends ‘who have character more than you’ (in you own words, not mine) boycott the PD for its criticism of the local Catholic leadership. CAIR public campaign against Michael Savage and his hate speech got many decent people to boycott him and not advertise on his show. That is NOT violation of the first amendment. It is actually an exercise in it (the freedom of assembly part), by recruiting people with the same sense of decency to stop something that is indecent simply by not funding it with ad money. And, let me quote you verbatim again: “ that’s just the way America works”.