The question is “How does the Hindu world view God?” Well, that is a good question.
In my study of Hinduism while writing my book, I ran across something that stuck in my mind, …and it stayed there, …and it was true: “If at the end of your study you think you have a clear understanding of Hindu teachings, you probably do not.”
A common word for God in Sanskrit (a literary language since the 3rd century) is Brahma, or Brahman. But, let’s not forget that Hinduism has literally hundreds, or thousands, or god and goddesses.
As I wrote in my book, “the basic Hindu view of God is impersonal. …utterly beyond all possibility of conception. In Spinoza’s formulation, God’s nature resembles our words about as much as the Dog Star resembles a Dog; the most that can be said for these words is that they are pointers — our minds do better when they move in their direction than in the opposite. God lies on the further side of being as we understand it.”
The Upanisads represent the evolution of thought in Hinduism, the teachings of the sages, and were composed between 800 — 200 BC. The Svetasvatara Upanisad, by way of example, explores these questions: “What is the source of the universe? What is ultimate reality? Where do we come from ? By what power do we live? What is that, which being known, illuminates everything else?” So, through the natural evolution of thought, Brahman began to be viewed as the universal power.
But, Brahman became increasingly abstract and difficult to grasp. Brahman was called the “thread” that strings together all creatures. Brahman is in everything (”ultimate reality” as one text described), and Brahman is spirit. Because Brahman is spirit, It cannot be perceived, at least not by ordinary means.
While Brahman is ultimate reality, Brahman is unknown and unknowable. So, the many gods and goddesses are, therefore, the many different expressions of the one reality, Brahman. The true meaning of the many god/goddesses in Hinduism, which gets lost in human understanding of images/icons being worshiped as idols, are ways to enrich the understanding of the the divine, while guarding against confusing image and reality.
That’s the reason why these images/icons are made not to be human — they are simultaneously human and nonhuman to remind people that the gods are not like us, cannot be reduced to finite status. Example: multiple arms indicate the great power of a god; many heads suggest a god’s universal knowledge. While hard for Westerners to understand, each of these helps give shape to the unseen, and allow Hindus to glimpse some aspect of the divine.
Hindus do not worship to all gods equally, or even attempt to do so. While they can have more than several gods/goddesses, they usually have a personal deity of choice. It is not uncommon for family members, or a congregation type group, to be devoted to different gods/goddesses.
To the Hindu ways of thinking, as I continue to study, the ultimate reality is “so far beyond our imagining, so complex and so rich in potential, that a single image, or even a mere handful of images, is not sufficient.”
So, one can readily see that the God known as Brahma is neither viewed nor understood in the same manner as the the religions of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. This subject was, needless to say, one of my curiosities (see link http://www.majorreligionsoftheworld.com/about_book.php ), and the reason why I wrote the special report, The Case For The Existence Of God (see link http://www.majorreligionsoftheworld.com/book_special_reports_major_religions.php).
In my e-book at http://www.suprarational.org one chapter makes a basic comparison between five religions:
The word God, as used in English, is Allah in Arabic, Brahman in Sanskrit and ha-Shem (the Name) in Hebrew. God is Theos in Greek, the first written language of the New Testament. Nirvana in Buddhist Sanskrit can also mean absolute Truth: ultimate Reality.
Hinduism had no one founder; the Vedas advanced orally about 200 years before being recorded in Sanskrit from ca. 1300-600 B.C.E. The Hebrew Bible developed at least 300 years after Moses, ca. 1000-400 B.C.E. Gautama had been born a Hindu and taught in Prakrit; Buddhism’s first written canon was in Pali nearly 400 years later, ca. 17 B.C.E. Jesus was born a Jew and preached in Aramaic; the New Testament had evolved from ca. 100-367 C.E. Muhammad spoke Arabic; the written Qur’an was formed within 30 years of his death in 632 C.E. Some scholars say that the oral traditions of Hindu and Jewish texts were first written in the 3rd
Century B.C.E.
Hindu scriptures also refer to Ishvara, a more personal aspect of Brahman, and often to Vishnu and Shiva, two of Brahman’s trinity, plus incarnations in Krishna and Rama. The Hebrew Bible uses the sacred, unspoken, YHVH (YHWH) for God; Adonai replaces it when reading Jewish scriptures. Ha-Shem is used in conversation. Mahayana and Vajrayana vehicles may consider the Dharmakaya (“dharma-body” or Buddha-nature) more correct than Nirvana, final realization of the Theravada. In the first written New Testament, Jesus referred to God as Abba (Father) and Lord applied to both the persons of the Father and the Son in the Trinity. In the Qur’an, al-Haqq(the Truth, the Reality) is supremely the title of Allah. Islam has “99 Beautiful Names” for Allah’s perfection; other faiths credit many attributes to God. In English, Absolute, Almighty, Deity, Supreme and other words are used to refer to God; divine, holy, omnipotent, omniscient, and other adjectives usually apply only to God.
The Vedas, most sacred to Hindus, were rejected by Buddhists who also defined many Sanskrit words differently, e.g. nirvana. The first five books of the Hebrew Bible, the Torah, are most revered by Jews and are studied by most Christians. Practices and customs may vary between countries, as apparent among the predominately Muslim states, or blend in local mythology, such as in Hinduism on Bali. Doctrine for any one religion may differ between its divisions or their branches, like within the many Protestant denominations.
In Vedanta, Brahman is considered as the One God; Hindus of Shaivism, Shaktism and Vaishnavism may worship a chosen god, goddess or incarnation who emanates from Brahman. In Judaism, behavior and worship may vary among movements: Conservative, Hasidism, Orthodox, and Reform. Mahayana Buddhists rely on guidance of others and prayer; Theravada stresses self-reliance and good works; Vajrayana has secret rituals and metaphysics. Eastern Orthodox, Protestant, Roman Catholic, and other Christians differ often on grace, the Trinity and sources of doctrine. Ibadi, Shi’a and Sunni Islamic sects disagree on Muhammad’s successors and on the status of imams; Sufi orders among them may worship differently. Hindu texts written in classical Sanskrit sometimes changed when translated into India’s 17 modern languages or into English. The Hebrew Bible varied in Greek and Latin; except for Protestants, the canon of Christianity’s Old Testament included many books not in Judaism’s canon. Buddhist texts in Pali and Sanskrit were often interpreted differently in other Asian languages and Ch’an/Zen downplays the use of scriptures. The New Testament has had many changes during translations, literal and idiomatic. The Qur’an was written only in Arabic for more than 1,200 years; first translations were in the early 1900’s, but are not considered true Qur’an.
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