Soren Kierkegaard, the great Christian philosopher, wrote that "God does not think, he creates. God does not exist, he is eternal." Athiests ignorantly deny God because they can't find empirical evidence. At the same time religionists claim they do experience God, many claiming to even talk to "him", but mostly they "feel" his presence.
But, experience is anthropomorphic. God can't be experienced any more than can eternity and his mind can't be known because thinking is not his function. Knowing his creation is knowing his work, surely, but not him directly. Experience relates to things. You are a thing. All you experience is a thing. God is not a thing. You can't experience not thing, God. He doesn't exist, he creates. When my religious friends say they can feel the spirit of God they are really feeling themselves. That is, their religious experience is a form of self love, self worship. Finally, Being is not the same thing, infinitely. Each instance is all there is and the next an entirely new creation but based on the preceding. Does a waterfall ever change? Can you put your hand in the same river twice? Essence does not precede existence. Existence precedes essence; Existential means this. To say essence precedes existence is to claim to know God, an impossibility. The form of a table is new for every instance of table, just like the river or the waterfall.
But, experience is anthropomorphic. God can't be experienced any more than can eternity and his mind can't be known because thinking is not his function. Knowing his creation is knowing his work, surely, but not him directly. Experience relates to things. You are a thing. All you experience is a thing. God is not a thing. You can't experience not thing, God. He doesn't exist, he creates. When my religious friends say they can feel the spirit of God they are really feeling themselves. That is, their religious experience is a form of self love, self worship. Finally, Being is not the same thing, infinitely. Each instance is all there is and the next an entirely new creation but based on the preceding. Does a waterfall ever change? Can you put your hand in the same river twice? Essence does not precede existence. Existence precedes essence; Existential means this. To say essence precedes existence is to claim to know God, an impossibility. The form of a table is new for every instance of table, just like the river or the waterfall.
