Claiming to speak for God is the ultimate folly

Claiming to fully know God, to speak for God, or to read God’s mind in order to decipher His intentions, these claims and assertions have always seemed so arrogant to me. How can one possibly know self-aware infinity? Hashem is infinite. Beyond words. No human, no matter how brilliant, can fully grasp God. We can try to theorize as to God’s plans, we can try to define God, yes, of course, we’ve been attempting to do that for thousands of years with countless people claiming to be inspired by the Divine Truth, channeling it, even possessed by it.

Here come the dogmatists (fanatics) who start quoting from their beloved books and telling you to read this page and this chapter, this passage. How can you encapsulate the totality of divinity in one book? Infinity in one book? Absurd. Clever quotes and sentences don’t bring us closer to fully understanding God. Nothing can bring us to fully understand the Creator. Most likely – ever. Hashem is a mystery. Indeed, transcendental. It’s best to accept this.

The only exception I can think of is when God decides to grace us, or some of us, with the understanding of what it feels like to be Him. I can hear the chorus of zealots now, telling me, screaming at me, that their way of interpreting God or (so-called) God’s word, is, indeed, the only way to get to God.

That’s the problem with zealots: they don’t think outside of what’s written in their book, outside of their paradigm they were often born into, so, perhaps, they are unable to see anything beyond it. They don’t really want to exchange views. Sure, they can fake interest but they aren’t really interested in what you have to say – their aim is to convert you and whatever you say, as long as it doesn’t adhere to the dogma, must be heresy, demonically inspired, take your pick. Nodding?

Yes, I’m sure you’ve met many people like that. Welcome to the club.

After all, you’re wrong. You don’t believe in the Divine Truth. You’re not going to be saved.

There’s arrogance to this, isn’t there? Sometimes, it’s in-your-face. ”We’re going to be saved, you’re going to burn in hell, we are better than you.” As if hell must be only about fire and brimstone. Even the idea of hell as separation from God makes more sense than medieval sulfur.

Now, some religions are clever. If you didn’t get the chance to come across their truth here on Earth, or accept it, you’re going to get another chance after death.

And then, you have this implicit, subtle, arrogance. Your interlocutors seem nice but you can tell there’s this undercurrent of arrogance in not so much what they say but how they say it. Their body language. The more you get to know them, the more obvious it gets and the more their fanaticism starts to creep out from behind the mask.

Now, you might say we all look for what we want in others, that it’s being overly sensitive, but come on, we all know what arrogance looks like. Arrogance can be explicit, where there’s no room for interpretation (you can almost imagine that person sitting on their high horse with that smug smile on their face looking down on you like a medieval lord), it can be seemingly benevolent sexism, such as hand-kissing (God have mercy, talk about torture) or it can be patronizing treatment disguised as concern or pity. Many, many ways one can show arrogance. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Sure, we can’t be too sensitive, but if it quacks like a duck, then it’s a duck.

Strangely, or maybe not-so-strangely after all, the ones who are the most arrogant are often mediocre minds who hide behind feeling special (I’m saved, you’re not) to give their ego a boost and hide their inferiority issues. I doubt the Good Lord likes that kind of arrogance.

To sum up – by all means, let’s pray to God, let’s talk about Him, let’s try to decipher His plans and intentions, let’s worship Him. But let’s not say things like, ”I speak for God and I know him through-and-through,” let alone, ”I am God.” God might not take kindly to impostors who, let’s face it, can never be nearly as impressive as the Creator.

Yes, we do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but something tells me Hashem isn’t a fan of those who claim to fully know Him or claim to be Him.