Questions 10 to 13 - The Attributes of the Divinity
Spirits's replies to Allan Kardec
"No, they lack the aptitude to comprehend it."
"When their spirits are no longer eclipsed by matter, and when they have finally purified themselves enough to be able to approach God, then they will see and comprehend God."
"Yes, some of them. Human beings comprehend them better only as they progressively overcome matter, but they can at least get glimpses of them through thought."
"From your own point of view, yes, because you believe that in so stating them you therefore have named all of them. Nevertheless, you should understand that there are things that transcend the intelligence of the most intelligent person, things your language cannot define, because it is limited to your ideas and sensations. Your reason tells you that God must be perfect in those attributes to the nth degree, for if God lacked any of them or was not perfect in them to the nth degree, God would not be superior to everything else, and thus would not be God. In order to be superior to everything else, God must not be subject to any change and must not be imperfect in any way imaginable."
Allan Kardec's remarks:
God is eternal. If God had had a beginning, then either God would have had to have sprung from nothing or would have had to have been created by a being that existed previously. Reasoning in this way, we arrive little by little at the idea of eternity and the infinite.
God is immutable. If God were subject to change, then the laws that govern the universe would have no stability.
God is immaterial. This means that God’s nature differs from everything we call matter; otherwise, God would not be immutable but would be subject to the transformations of matter.
God is one. If there were several gods, then there would be no unity of design or power in the organization of the universe.
God is all-powerful because God is one. If God were not powerful above all else, it would mean that there was something more powerful or at least as powerful. It would mean that God might not have created all things, and those that God did not create would have had to have been the work of some other god.
God is supremely just and good. The providential wisdom in the divine laws is revealed in the smallest things as well as in the largest, and this wisdom makes it impossible for us to doubt either God’s justice or goodness.
KARDEC, Allan. The Spirits’ Book. 3.ed. International Spiritist Council, 2011.
Allan Kardec's remarks:
The inferior nature of their faculties makes it impossible for human beings to fathom God’s innermost nature. While humanity is in its infancy, people often confuse God with God’s creatures, imputing to God their own imperfections. However, they ponder the nature of things more deeply as their moral sense develops and thus they acquire a truer – though always incomplete – idea of God that conforms more to reason.