Is God God or is God who we make God out to be? Is God Real or is God that created surface on which we project our own hopes and desires? Does our impression of God begin with our own intuitive wisdom or does it depend on what others have impressed on us? Is God God or is God the God of what has been handed to us-our traditions. Of course we are not always aware of being impressed by other's opinions. So, what about that God we have inherited from others? How Real are these passed on impressions? How trustworthy? After all it is not an easy everyday occasion to receive a direct revealing communication from the Real Thing. What do we know? It seems logical to begin with the Written Word. How dependable is the Written Word, the Scriptures of our Faith, of any Faith? How reliable is the written translation of oral traditions that reach far back into the mists of early history? Who was there to accurately record? Whose words were cited? Were these the actual words or were these words the gist of what one was thought to have said? Would two different witnesses hear the same words or come away with the same message? And what about recording history? Whose writings were chosen to survive and whose writings were lost or intentionally destroyed? And for what reason?
Who can remember what happened or what was said generations ago in another time and in another place from a written tradition much less an oral tradition? Was what was recorded the actuality of the event or the actuality of the person or was what eventually became recorded the impression of the person, persons, or sect, reporting? Where did they get their information? Did they take liberties with the translations? How much information actually survived? Were stories pieced together from long lost fragments? Did the Written Word then echo a reality or a particular point of view or a particular bias, a particular persuasion, or a particular identifying period in history? Would a nomad living in a precivilization life style report the same eye witness account as a person merging into an early civilized farm community, village, or settlement? Different people-different situations, different life styles, different points of view, different impressions of God. So...is God God or is God who we make God out to be? Is the God of our traditions God or is the God of our traditions the God our traditions make God out to be.
