Creation conundrum
The question “Why did God create the world?” only leads to more questions, which are nothing but refutations or justifications of our own notions and assumptions. But now, by dropping all pre-conceived notions, we will try to understand what the world is and who God is. We will then consider why He created the world.
Vedanta has a knack for classifying everything into “minimum categories”. Elaborate explanations are abridged into aphorisms of a few words. Infinite varieties are reduced to a few groups. Let us classify the world into its minimum components. The world consists of innumerable human beings, animals, plants, insects, trees, mountains, rivers, clouds, the sun, the moon, stars etc. These are all names given to forms with certain qualities. Forms cannot exist without qualities; names are given to forms, and forms are recognised by names. The world consists of names, forms and qualities. All three are interdependent. So, that which existed before creation must be nameless, formless and quality-less. That entity is called God in religion and truth in philosophy.
God is therefore neither man nor woman. Any name, form or quality attributed to God must be part of creation and not that which existed before creation. Also, the world consists of innumerable objects; there is also time and space to consider. Are they part of creation, too? Objects cannot exist without time and space, or time without space and objects, or space without objects and time. Time, space and objects are interdependent. The three are part of creation. Therefore, that which existed before creation must be timeless, beyond space and beyond objects. Also, something cannot come out of nothing. The world cannot come out of a void. Hence, something had to exist before creation. That something should be formless, nameless, quality-less, timeless, space-less and objectless. It is therefore of the nature of pure being or existence.
Now if we see the nature of truth or God from this standpoint, creation is a logical and actual impossibility. When creation itself is not there, where is the question of the motive behind creation? The world as we see is constantly changing. How can a changing entity emerge from a changeless entity? How can the changeless modify to become the world? It cannot. Nothing was ever born from that kind of reality. That is the highest truth.
Swami Tejomayananda, head of Chinmaya Mission Worldwide, is an orator, poet, singer, composer and storyteller.
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