Naming the Unnameable. Dr. Rev. Matthew Fox

Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth

       One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Global Faiths

      Sheer Joy: Conversations with Thomas Aquinas on Creation Spirituality

      Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society

      Hildegard of Bingen, A Saint for Our Times: Unleashing Her Power in the 21st Century

       Hildegard of Bingen’s Book of Divine Works, Songs and Letters

       Western Spirituality: Historical Roots, Ecumenical Routes

      Wrestling with the Prophets: Essays on Creations Spirituality and Everyday Life

      Whee! We, Wee All the Way Home: Toward a Prophetic, Sensual Spirituality

      The Pope’s War: Why Ratzinger’s Secret Crusade Has Imperiled the Church and What Can Be Saved

       Meditations with Meister Eckhart

      4

      Introduction

       God Has a Trillion Faces

      The ancient Vedas of India tell us that “The One Existence the wise call by many names.”

      How many names for Divinity are there? Do the names for God change? Ought they change as humans evolve and as circumstances of life evolve around us? Are we among the “wise” that the Vedas speak of who are eager to call the One Existence by many names? Do we have permission—and maybe a serious responsibility—to change our understanding and naming of God as we mature as individuals and as we evolve as a species and as we face a critical time, a “turning time,” in human and planetary history?

      The great medieval mystic Meister Eckhart declared: “I pray God to rid me of God.”

      Apparently he was so convinced in the need to allow God and our names for God to evolve that he actually prayed to God to move on from being “God.” He challenges us further when he declares: “The highest and loftiest thing that a person can let go of is to let go of God for the sake of God.”

      How many names for God have humans come up with? And which ones might serve us best today and what new ones beckon us? One answer to that question is a simple one: There are as many names for “God” as there are languages in the world, for each language calls God by a different word. Examples: God (English); Gott (German); Dieu (French); Dios (Spanish); Allah (Arabic); Gut (Norwegian); Theos (Greek); Deus (Portuguese); bog (Russian); Dia (Irish); Elohim (Hebrew); Marta (Polish); Kalou (Fijian), etc. etc.

      But that is by no means the whole story. For one thing, each language may well have multiple words for “God.” For example in English we can talk of Divinity; Spirit; Creator; Deity; Godhead; Goddess; and much more. If this is true in English no doubt it is true in other languages as well.

      Every religion offers its name for the Divine: Brahmin; Krishna; Tao; Buddha; Tara; Allah; Yahweh; Adonai; Tagashala; Wankan Tanka; Oshun; Isis; Christ, to name a few.

      So where else do we come up with alternative names or images of God? The Sacred Scriptures of the world are one such place; and the mystics of the world are another; and science is another. The Muslim tradition boasts a powerful practice of reciting the “99 Most Beautiful Names” of God and in many ways that practice has inspired this short book wherein I present 89 current names for Divinity that I think are most beautiful and wonderful and useful for our times. I am grateful for that Muslim practice to which I am indebted and which I have often prayed myself.

      The ancient scriptures of Hinduism known as the Bhagavad Gita tell us this: “God has a million faces.” St Thomas Aquinas, medieval theologian and mystic, goes even further. He says that every being is a name for God when he says: “Even the very ones who were experienced concerning Divinity, such as the apostles and prophets, praise God as the Cause of all things from the many things caused.” Aquinas, in this amazing passage, goes on to name 49 names for God that sixth century Syrian monk Dennis the Areopagite found in Scripture alone and discussed in his foundational work, The Divine Names. What follows from his statement is that there are literally multiple trillions upon trillions upon trillions of names for God. Countless creatures—therefore, countless faces, countless names. But at the end of his treatise (which I reproduce as an Appendix in this book) he says no being is a name for God because “God surpasses all things.”

      If there are trillions upon trillions of names for God, who am I, and who are you, the reader of this book, to dare to choose only 89? Well, first of all, this book is unfinished. It is open ended and that is why the last pages of each section are left blank so you may add your own most wonderful and useful names for God. Secondly, while there may be trillions upon trillions of names for God, it is clear that we humans are limited. We can only take so much input and reflect deeply on a very finite number of thoughts and concepts and names. So this book presents a very finite number, a working number, of possible names for God. Hopefully they might prove useful and inspire other useful names from the reader.

      In this book I seek to offer a finite number of names for God that I sense might be useful for us in the difficult “in-between” times in which we find ourselves at this dawning of the post-modern era. I include a modest meditation with each name to assist a kind of “unraveling” and unpacking of each name. I invite the reader to deepen the experience by his/her own meditation and investigation. Some have called our times “apocalyptic” and philosopher Theodore Richards points out that “apocalypse” also means “revelation.” Perhaps, in dire times, deeper mysteries are revealing themselves, unveiling themselves, to us. But we need to listen deeply. We need to develop our muscles of contemplation. We need to cease projecting and to learn anew to let go so that we can listen truthfully to the “hidden Word” of silence. From this hidden place of silence, this “cave of the heart” as Father Bede Griffiths calls it, might emerge some new and fresh language for a spiritual awakening, for rich names for Divinity, for a global renaissance. Hopefully, this short book can assist that important task.

      As humans undergo deep changes, so too does our understanding of God or Divinity. Both Meister Eckhart, a medieval mystic activist, and Alfred North Whitehead, a twentieth century scientific philosopher, agree that Divinity evolves. “God becomes where all creatures express God,” notes Eckhart. Thus, our names for God increase in possibilities and evolve as evolution continues all around us. Deepak Chopra sees God’s evolution this way: “What actually evolved was human understanding….We think that God changes, because our own perception waxes and wanes. The messages keep coming though and God keeps showing different faces….As awareness evolves, so does God. This journey never ends.”

      Which, among the trillions upon trillions of God-names might serve us the best today? And serve the planet the best? And therefore serve God the best? That is the question that this book is presenting. Hopefully, it will be useful, for as Aquinas insisted, a “little knowledge about important things is far more important than a lot of knowledge about unimportant things.” A fresh understanding and language about Divinity may assist us to come up with fresh understandings of ourselves and thus the societies and institutions we feel called to give birth to as we struggle to assist other species to survive and to survive ourselves, to be sustainable, even to thrive and become beautiful and worthy of our holy existence.

      Meister Eckhart warns us that when we talk about God we stutter and stumble. This is important information, that no word does God justice and no person or ideology holds a trademark on the word “God.” Humility and reverence are required even to enter into the conversation. A certain receptivity is required to enter into authentic God talk. Hopefully that spirit of reverence, humility and receptivity imbues this book and those who pick it up.

      My method in this book will be to offer a useful name for Divinity and offer a modest meditation on the same. The name may come from scientists; or mystics; or Scriptures;