Is God Nothingness?

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Qoeleth

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The following proposal is purely speculative theology. Just a theory, but maybe worth considering-

I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God). Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
  • God, like Nothingess, communicates with us most truly through Silence.
It seems to make a bit of sense…
 
Qoeleth said:
The following proposal is purely speculative theology. Just a theory, but maybe worth considering-

I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God). Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
  • God, like Nothingess, communicates with us most truly through Silence.
It seems to make a bit of sense…
Click to expand...
From nothing comes nothing.
Something exists.
A creator of something must exist
The creator is something, not nothing.

Based on this you post makes no sense.
 
Qoeleth said:
The following proposal is purely speculative theology. Just a theory, but maybe worth considering-

I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God). Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
  • God, like Nothingess, communicates with us most truly through Silence.
It seems to make a bit of sense…
Click to expand...
The defined Dogma of the Church is that God Exists and He is One ( utterly simple, Pure Existence). " Nothingness " is not. Non-being and nothing would be synoymous. God ( Pure Existence) therefore cannot be compared to non-being ( nothingness). God is not just a concept, He actually exists. " Nothingness " is a concept pure and simple, that is a concept that has no existence, no being.

You would be better off just to study Thomas Aquinas. A fairly easy introduction can be had from " Aquinas " by Edward Feser. 👍
 
Linusthe2nd said:
The defined Dogma of the Church is that God Exists and He is One ( utterly simple, Pure Existence). " Nothingness " is not. Non-being and nothing would be synoymous. God ( Pure Existence) therefore cannot be compared to non-being ( nothingness). God is not just a concept, He actually exists. " Nothingness " is a concept pure and simple, that is a concept that has no existence, no being.

You would be better off just to study Thomas Aquinas. A fairly easy introduction can be had from " Aquinas " by Edward Feser. 👍
Click to expand...
True. Pure simple ‘existence’ (i.e. existence unqualified by any ‘characteristics’) of Aquinas and Plotinus and others seems, though, to be a quite similar to nothingness.

It seems impossible to ‘imagine’ a purely, utterly simple ‘One’. Is Nothingness the most viable simulacrum of ‘simple’ ‘existence’?
 
fred_conty said:
If you think about it, God is the opposite of nothing.
Click to expand...
There was a thread some time ago on the opposite of nothing. Is the opposite of nothing ‘everything’, or ‘anything’? Or, mathematically, if the opposite of 1 is -1, then the opposite of 0 should be -0.

Nicholas of Cusa said that in God opposites are united. This seems to be the case for nothing (+0 being equal to -0).
 
davidv said:
From nothing comes nothing.
Something exists.
A creator of something must exist
The creator is something, not nothing.

Based on this you post makes no sense.
Click to expand...
What about the doctrine of creation ex nihilo?
If the creator ‘is’ then, in fact, it is not really ‘ex nihilo’?
 
Qoeleth said:
The following proposal is purely speculative theology. Just a theory, but maybe worth considering-

I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God) Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
  • God, like Nothingess, communicates with us most truly through Silence.
It seems to make a bit of sense…
Click to expand...
Is God actually nothingness or in some respects like nothingness?

For a being that is beyond understanding and predication we sure talk a lot about his designs, plans, nature. heck, we Catholics even claim to know where he was born!

I don’t understand the parenthesis in the third point, we return to nothingness…like God?:confused:
 
Qoeleth said:
There was a thread some time ago on the opposite of nothing. Is the opposite of nothing ‘everything’, or ‘anything’? Or, mathematically, if the opposite of 1 is -1, then the opposite of 0 should be -0.

Nicholas of Cusa said that in God opposites are united. This seems to be the case for nothing (+0 being equal to -0).
Click to expand...
The opposite of nothingness as everything; wouldn’t that result in an actual infinite? Aren’t actual infinities impossible?

Why should we accept Cusa’s thesis and antithesis anymore than the power of contradiction from Descartes or the possibility of God commanding us to hate him from Ockham? I mean, they all are incoherent positions.
 
On second thought, what is the meaning of everything as opposite to non-being? What is everything?

I don’t understand why you associate nothingness with being. You don’t seriously think that being is kind of or analogous to non-being,much less identical with non being, do you?
 
God is a Person who knows and loves. You mistake of thinking that because the spiritual dimension does not occupy space, it means that it is “nothingness.”

Ideas do not take up space either, and ideas are not “nothingness.”
 
Qoeleth said:
The following proposal is purely speculative theology. Just a theory, but maybe worth considering-

I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God). Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
  • God, like Nothingess, communicates with us most truly through Silence.
It seems to make a bit of sense…
Click to expand...
You’re acting as if nothingness is an entity. It isn’t. Nothingness doesn’t exist. All “nothing” is is a lack of something that’s there. “Nothing-ness” is nonsense. It’s a lack of something there…ness? The trait of not being in existence? It’s silly.

Now take out the “ness” and see how this looks stripped bare.

-Nothing is eternal and changeless-False. God is eternal and changeless.

-Nothing is beyond understanding and prediction"False. God is beyond understanding and prediction.
  • Everthing that is came from nothing, and unto nothing will return (like God).-False. “Everything” will not return to nothing, because God won’t.
-Nothing is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothing.-God is the Father of all, and nothing is getting “reabsorbed” anywhere.
  • Nothing, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.-How can nothing be present? I’m present. You’re present. If something is present that’s clearly not nothing.
  • Nothing is entirely invincible and impassible.-God is.
  • Nothing (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.-This makes no sense, ness or no ness.
  • Through nothing, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.-Why are we assuming this is true anyway? Why does everything need to disappear? What an assumption!
  • God, like Nothing, communicates with us most truly through Silence.-Nothing, nor nothing"ness", doesn’t communicate.
By nothing “ness” I assume you mean the quality of being non-existent…except if something doesn’t exist it has no qualities. So nothingness as a concept is really just “nothing” anyway.

There are even more problems than that though. Let’s say that “Nothingness” really is a thing:

. Does it answer prayer?

. Did it actively create the universe?

. Does it continually sustain all in existence?

If you answer “yes” to these questions…then you’ve just described God, and we’re only calling it “Nothingness” because you said so.

Furthermore, how is “nothingness” the Father of anything? Why are we assuming things get absorbed into nothingness?

I think that this is a post that seems very profound when you first look at it but the deeper you look into it the more you realize that it’s really pretty silly and ridiculous mumbo-jumbo. Very little of substance is written here, if anything.
 
Qoeleth said:
What about the doctrine of creation ex nihilo?
If the creator ‘is’ then, in fact, it is not really ‘ex nihilo’?
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I think, and correct me if I’m wrong, that this is an oft-misunderstood doctrine. It is not saying that nothing at all existed and then was created, but rather that the things needed to form the Earth did not exist yet until God decided to make them. Before He decided to make Creation, there was nothing there-out of nothing, God created.

This isn’t to say that there was nothing, period, though. Only that there was nothing we could call “Creation”-only a Creator.

Am I understanding this correctly?
 
NeoScotist said:
On second thought, what is the meaning of everything as opposite to non-being? What is everything?

I don’t understand why you associate nothingness with being. You don’t seriously think that being is kind of or analogous to non-being,much less identical with non being, do you?
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Well, God’s ‘being’ is different from our ‘being’, and the ‘being’ of other things in the universe. This kind of infinitely simple being (of God), untouched by time and space, could be compared to Nothingness. What we experience as ‘being’ has nothing in common with the ‘Being’ of God. Therefore, maybe Nothingness is a valid image of God.
 
Further to my original proposition, the Christian practice of apaphatic contemplation is, to all intents and purposes, a meditation on total Nothingness.

Nothingness can be experienced as loving, understanding, benevolent, infinite, powerful, wise, the harbor of peace.

When a person says, “Nobody loves me”- are they really saying “God loves me”? When a person says “Nothing last forever”, are they really saying “God lasts forever”? When a person says “Nothing matters to me”, are they really saying “God alone matters to me”?

It’s a thought…
 
Qoeleth said:
Further to my original proposition, the Christian practice of apaphatic contemplation is, to all intents and purposes, a meditation on total Nothingness.

Nothingness can be experienced as loving, understanding, benevolent, infinite, powerful, wise, the harbor of peace.

When a person says, “Nobody loves me”- are they really saying “God loves me”? When a person says “Nothing last forever”, are they really saying “God lasts forever”? When a person says “Nothing matters to me”, are they really saying “God alone matters to me”?

It’s a thought…
Click to expand...
Nothingness is just that…a lack of existence. It can not be experienced as loving, understanding, powerful, etc. because if you experience that, you are experiencing something that is an element of existence.

Furthermore, your assertion that “the Christian practice of apaphatic contemplation is, to all intents and purposes, a meditation on total Nothingness,” is a complete misunderstanding of the spiriutal. To repeat my earlier post (#12), You make the mistake of thinking that because the spiritual dimension does not occupy space, it means that it is “nothingness.”

God is existence. Nothingness is not. That is obviously not the same thing.
 
Qoeleth said:
I would like to suggest that maybe ‘God’ is actually nothingness. Nothingness seems to fit the following features of God:
Click to expand...
The weak point in your theory might just be that it says that God, like nothingness, does not exist.
 
Qoeleth said:
Well, God’s ‘being’ is different from our ‘being’, and the ‘being’ of other things in the universe. This kind of infinitely simple being (of God), untouched by time and space, could be compared to Nothingness. What we experience as ‘being’ has nothing in common with the ‘Being’ of God. Therefore, maybe Nothingness is a valid image of God.
Click to expand...
I for one like it. The mystics seem to make this comparison but I never really got it until now. I think it may be more valid than the anthropomorphized images most use. Than again they say that our image of God says more about us than God. I wonder what this says about me?
 
Qoeleth said:
Nothingness can be experienced as loving, understanding, benevolent, infinite, powerful, wise, the harbor of peace.… It’s a thought…
Click to expand...
To answer a suggestion like God= Nothingness, to me seems like the biggest blasphemy at all, for God is not “nothingness” (match the “absolute nothingness” in the Zen-Religion) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen
but God very much contrary to such abstruse thoughts: God is ALL! The absolute contrary of “nothingness”. So, such suggestion like God= Nothingness, actually hurts badly and Christian thought.

In the opening post is stated:
  • Nothingness, like God, is eternal and changless
How by all means, could ETERNALNESS and CHANGELESS, form a Nothingness?!
No “nothing” ever was eternal and changeless.
  • Nothingness, like God, is entirely beyond understanding and predication
And let’s ask; how on earth could the many things we can’t comprehend - be nothing, which is inexistent?! So, all we don’t get is inexistend?..
  • Everthing that is came from nothingness, and unto nothingness will return (like God). Nothingness is “the Father of All”, and eventually everything is re-absorbed into the arms of Nothingness.
Excuse me, but this is the top of nonsense. Nothing that exists came out of nothing, since God created all there is, and God is not “nothing”. God had not to create material to create everything, but God created averything out of His most Holy Will and Spirit - of the HOLY SPIRIT, which we name the “Third Person in God”.
  • Nothingness, like God, is paradoxically both absent and present, transcendent and immanent. It is outside of time and space, yet all around us.
And therefore existing and not as the word “nothingness” indicates; inexistent. In fact, the one and only immanent and really being existence there is! Always having been and being in all eternity.
  • Nothingness is entirely invincible and impassible.
Invincible and impassible is only a real “nothing” in an empty space. God however is the opposite, and He made that “empty space” which HE filled with the Universe and the creation He “rendered” - created by His mere will.
A “Nothing” can not create anything and be it even another nothing.
The Nothing; a fiction before God’s creation couldn’t even be nothing, before God made that empty room for His very own universe and the rest or rather all of His creation, including finally us.
  • Nothingness (the Void) holds all thing in ‘Being’, is everywhere and nowhere.
No! Nothing can’t hold anything, or it remains being nil and nothing and not even empty space - simply inexistent.
  • Through nothingess, paradoxes like “The First will be Last, and the Last will be First” make sense, because eventually everything becomes nothing, poverty, riches, honour and humility are all levelled.
Sorry, but you fell into a trap of a twisting of Jesus’ words in Mt 20,36. Jesus explains there, that very often and most likely in heaven, those who where least people on earth, will be the highest in heaven. Not the slightest thing becomes “nothing”, for nothing hall stay veiled, for all will be revealed as we read in Mt 10,26: …for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. So, nothing that was, or occurred, or was said or done, ever becomes nothing. All that’s right in this statement is, that HUMAN “poverty, riches, honor and humility are all leveled” are nil before God, as before God other values are crucial.

Of course we can’t see God, as God Himself said to Moses, that no living person is allowed to see His face - if he does, he will die - as Jesus too said, that no-one saw the Father, but Him, Jesus himself. SO, how dare we to say, God is nothingness, because we can’t see Him?! Jesus however said, that we will see the Father, after we crossed that door named “death”, but he who believes in Him, will live, tough he dies.

God is not at all “nothingness” - God is ALL and all is God.

Yours
Bruno
 
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