God: Western versus Eastern

Recent discussions on religion include discussions where Eastern (Indian) religion is used to refer to Western (Judeo-Christian) religion. I’m not sure it is right to do that, and I have other questions as well. So with respect to the holders of Indian religion online, I would like to open this forum for discussion of sticking points between Western and Eastern religious structures.

  1. If there are aspects of God, each devoted to a different aspect of the universe – one of form, another of matter – why does the world agree as well as it does? We seldom see forms or matters/energies zipping about without one another. It seems more that they are in agreement from the same cause. Or are the Indian gods in perfect unison? Then if they have the same will, how do they differ from each other and from the top God?

That pretty much covers my questions for now. …or at least the ones I can put in the form of an argument.

My understanding of Hinduism (which is somewhat limited) is that we are all manifestations of Brahman. God and reality are inseperable from one another. The gods seen in Hinduism are manifestations of Brahman in the same way that humans and the rest of reality is a manifestations of Brahman.

Despite this, Brahman is totally unknownable. It is like asking what our conciousness is made of – the question doesn’t make sense. However, we can realize that we are Brahman.

If you like, you can think of Brahman as being like the active intellect, but the active intellect of reality itself and we, reality, everything that we are are nothing more than its passive intellect.

Xunzian,

That sounds like using Indian names with Western theology/philosophy.
However, I’m not sure it answers my question(s).

I was trying to explain Indian concepts using western theology/philosophy/cosmology because, well, that’s how it has been explained to me. I know very little about Hinduism, only enough to be able to compare/contrast it (very simplistically) with Buddhism.

So, as to your question, the universe agrees with itself as well as it does because it is all Brahman. Your hand is very different from your eye(s), yet they are able to work in delightful union because they are of the same creature.