Roger McCann
Friedrich Nietzsche’s metaphor “God is dead” is no more literally true (as claimed by many) than Chicken Little’s “The sky is falling.” It is true that some Gods, such as Aten in ancient Egypt, have died in the sense that they are no longer worshipped. However, other Gods are definitely alive, at least for their worshipers. Among these living Gods are monotheistic Gods, including YHVH (Judaism), the Christian God, usually simply called God, Allah (Islam), Waheguru (Sikhism), and Baha (Baha’i Faith). Believers in each of these monotheistic Gods deny the supremacy, if not the existence, of the other Gods. Nonetheless, I will argue that seemingly irreconcilable Gods do not necessarily refute the possibility that there is only one God.
I can hear readers saying, “What’s the problem? Scripture and religious tradition assure me that I believe in the One God.” The problem is that believers in a different God receive the same assurance from their scripture and religious tradition. This makes monotheism far from obvious to an unbiased observer, as evidenced by the list of recognised religious faiths recently released by the United States Department of Defence. Assessing the compatibility of many Gods with monotheism may seem like a purely theological or philosophical undertaking, but it is not. The Department of Defence’s list of recognised religious faiths includes The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS, Mormons) as a non-Christian religion, a classification that is an evangelical Christian assessment (https://www.npr.org/2018/01/05/576082548/deep-differences-remain-between-mormon-and-evangelical-communities). I expect this classification will be changed by the time you read this commentary. In any case, it shows that at least one assessment of the compatibility of Gods with monotheism influences the policy of the United States government.
Two thousand years ago, Mithras was more popular in the Roman Empire than an assortment of Christian Gods, including the God of Jewish scriptures, with Jesus not divine (Ebionism), the God of the Jewish scriptures with Jesus divine but distinct from God (Arianism), and a pair of Gods consisting of the God of Jewish scriptures and another God who sent Jesus (Marcionism). The triune God worshipped by most Christians today did not become official Christian doctrine until the First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. At this time, the God of Judaism and many of the Gods of Hinduism had been worshipped for over a thousand years, while the Gods of Islam (7th century), Sikhism (15th century), and the Baha’i Faith (19th century) were yet to exist in human consciousness. Today, Mithras and all the Gods in pre-325 AD Christianity, except the Trinitarian God, are historical footnotes, while the Gods of Judaism, Hinduism, Trinitarian Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, and Baha’i Faith are worshipped daily by billions of people. If the past is indicative of the future, some currently worshipped Gods will die (no longer be worshipped) and currently unknown Gods will be born (emerge into human consciousness). In fact, a new God may be emerging as you read this commentary. In 2023, the editor-in-chief of Christianity Today claimed in an NPR interview that evangelical Christianity is moving so far to the political right that “the teachings of Jesus himself are seen as subversive”. Is this a new God being born? Only time will tell. If monotheism is to be more than merely a tribal denial of other Gods, it must account for the future birth of Gods, in addition to accounting for the current existence of multiple Gods.
Some readers may be sceptical about God being born, in spite of many occurrences in Christianity. For example, a God’s birth was influential in the split between the Western (now Catholic) and Eastern (now Orthodox) Churches. The phrase “and the Son” was gradually added to the Nicene Creed over several centuries in Western liturgies, until the Holy Spirit was eventually described as proceeding “from the Father and the Son” in Western liturgies, rather than only “from the Father” in Eastern liturgies (https://greekreporter.com/2026/04/05/catholic-church-orthodox-church-differences/). Since differences in the Trinity correspond to different Gods, theological differences concerning the Holy Spirit made the God of the Western Church different from the God of the Eastern Church. Similar births of Gods occurred when Protestant groups split from the Catholic Church and from each other. Many argue that these are not actually separate Gods, but they ignore that in most cases the Gods have fundamental differences. For example, in 2020, the United Methodist Church split over how God views same sex relationships (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-thousands-of-us-congregations-are-leaving-the-united-methodist-church/). The Gods of the resulting denominations are undeniably different; one accepts same sex relationships, and the other doesn’t.
Traditional monotheism has only one True God, with all other Gods being false. The first paragraph contains the names of five of the multitude of Gods that some portion of humanity considers to be the True God. Innumerable theological arguments, wars, and genocides over millennia have been unable to resolve which, if any, of these Gods is the True God. This suggests that monotheism has been misinterpreted. An ancient Indian parable, The Parable of the Six Blind Men and the Elephant, implies an alternate interpretation of monotheism.
Six blind men heard that an elephant had been brought to the town, but none of them knew its shape. They decided that they could learn its shape by touching it. The first blind man touched the trunk and said, “An elephant is like a thick snake”. The second blind man touched the elephant’s ear and said, “An elephant is like a large fan.” The third blind man touched the elephant’s leg and said, “An elephant is like a tree-trunk.” The fourth blind man touched the elephant’s side and said, “An elephant is like a wall.” The fifth blind man touched the elephant’s tail and said, “An elephant is like a rope.” The sixth blind man touched the elephant’s tusk and said, “An elephant is like a spear.”
The elephant represents an encompassing True God, and the limited experiences of the blind men represent different aspects of that God, which are themselves Gods to their believers. Thus, Gods are mysteriously aspects of an encompassing True God, much as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are mysteriously aspects of the encompassing triune Christian God. One God becomes many, not many Gods becoming one, as in some ecumenical beliefs. This is basically the belief of many Hindus who believe that the pantheon of Hindu deities merely represents different aspects of a single God, Brahman. Note that an encompassing True God allows for the birth of a God as the revealing of a previously undisclosed aspect of the True God. This view of monotheism creates a paradox in which each God is simultaneously true (for the portion of the True God it represents) and false (for the portion of the True God it does not represent).
I do not claim that an encompassing God is necessarily THE answer to ‘How is monotheism possible?’, only that it shows that seemingly irreconcilable Gods do not necessarily refute the possibility of monotheism. “Oh! Let us never, never doubt / What nobody is sure about!” (Hilaire Belloc, The Microbe)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr Roger McCann has a BA from Pomona College and an MS and a PhD in mathematics from Case Western Reserve University. The first half of his working life was spent as a university professor, and the second half was spent doing research and development in the oil industry. He is now retired in Western North Carolina. McCann has over 60 refereed publications and presentations in pure and applied mathematics, hydrology, and various aspects of technology related to the oil industry. I have also written two mathematics textbooks and edited the proceedings of a technical conference. Since retiring, McCann has published two articles in Philosophy Now: Is God Irish?, Philosophy Now, Sept/Oct 2012, 22-24, Is A Judge Of Knowledge Shipwrecked By The Gods?, Philosophy Now Jan/Feb 2014, 24-27. Reprinted in Philosophy Now: The Ultimate Guide to Theory of Knowledge.
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