Blog 2023/09/27

Blog 2023/09/27 [∞] God is self-existing [∞]

A common question by scoffers on social media is "Who made God?" We don't need to satisfy their scoffing, but it is helpful to know what God has said about it.

Before the beginning in Ge 1:1 there is an invisible and silent aleph א. By formation it means that before the beginning he existed in a triune nature יוי that were one א. Yod-vav-yod souunds like 'ee-oo-ee' almost yahweh יהוה, the name God told Moses to call him. The first and last yod's in יוי are the same letter and represent God above and God below, the Father and the Son. They are connected by the Spirit represented by the diagonal vav ו.

The aleph is also the number 1 in Hebrew. The word 'aleph' means 'one thousand'. The last letter, the final shin which looks like a four legged shin ש, is the number 1000. The aleph tells us he is the beginning and the end. The first and the last.

Yahweh means "I am". It says he is self-existent, he has no maker. He told Moses that he had not been known by that name previously, even though the name had been known previously. This is not a contradiction. The name also means 'creator of calamity'. He was about to send plagues upon Egypt, and they would know that he was the one sending it. They had not previously known him as the creator of calamity.

when God created, he could not create outside of himself since there was nothing outside of God. 1Ki 8:27 But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?

When he created he opened a void within him. Ge 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

He created all thing in himself. Colossians 1:17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

We have the illusion that we are the reality and God somehow permeates all. But it is the opposite. He is the reality and we are in him.

The word את is use twice in Ge 1:1. It is the first and last letter of the common alphabet. It tells us that when he created the heaven and earth, he created everything in them from the beginning of time to the end. He is outside of time. Time is an illusion and an artifact of the fall, by which we are reminded of the consequences of sin, seeing all decay.

God said that He alone is God, and there was no God before him. Isa 43:10 Ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

Self-existent is a good way to describe this particular attribute. Is this circular reasoning, to depend on the Bible to show what God is? No. Because the discussion does not start in a vacuum. You may know before you believe. The scoffer says he must believe the verse before he looks. This is patent nonsense.

You look for the lost sock in many places you do not believe it can be until you find it. The verse is a claim. The question is: How to you validate the claim?