The notion of "God as cause" is not the only formulation out there. But you are correct that the God notion generally involves self-identification and self-propogation. As does all manner of upadana. The question is, how best to confront it head on and understand it within oneself. Different people will digest their kamma of God-belief in different ways. Some will understand the term "God" differently than you understand the term. That's why this type of discussion sometimes unravels at the level of semantics.tiltbillings wrote:It goes to the idea of a god, in whatever way, that is the cause of the world, a god with whom, in some way, for whatever reason we concoct, we must identify.Jechbi wrote:This [commentary reference] goes to the relatively narrow issue of paticca-samuppada and the not-self conditions that give rise to each phenomenon. It does not go to the broader issue of whether the notion of "god" in all its myriad permutations must in all circumstances and without exception be immediately abandoned.Yes and no, but your point here makes the Kosha’s point above.Jechbi wrote:... [the God concept] is unnecessary except for the person who has a deep-rooted kamma of understanding the term "god" in a certain way, usually in a different way than the caricature "god" that's so easy to dismiss. For such a person, the "god" concept is the kammic framework within which he or she must work. It's what she's stuck with. Eventually, one hopes, we all will arrive at the experience of truth beyond concepts. But meanwhile, we each are the owners of our kamma. We work with what we got. I think a lot of this is an issue of semantics.
"Delve with the knife, thou wise one."