What Is God? Theism, Pantheism, and Panentheism

Since the dawn of time, humans have been trying to formulate conceptual frameworks for understanding God. Among the infinite variations of theories, theism, pantheism, and panentheism, are some of the most prominent attempts at grasping Divine reality and its connection to our world.

The primary difference between theism, pantheism, and panentheism lies in their different formulations of Divine immanence and transcendence. Immanence and transcendence are essentially different conceptions of the relationship between God and the world. By exploring the relativity between ourselves as embodied creatures and what we perceive as a greater Reality, a plethora of different relational models were outlined along the course of human history.

While only some conceptions of the Divine are anthropomorphic, all attempts to answer the age-old question of ‘What is God?’ have involved varying treatments of ‘What is God in relation to humankind and their world?’. The human being has always been central to the question of God, not only because he or she undertakes the question, but because answering it presupposes an understanding of our relationality to the Divine, whatever our answer may be.

Theism

Theism is the belief in at least one deity. While there are many different classifications of theism, the most common is monotheism, which is the belief in only one personal deity. This form of theism is the general God concept adopted by orthodox Abrahamic religions, although views drastically vary according to the different traditions within each religion. Theism particularly emphasizes Divine transcendence, where God is conceived as a separate being and the line between God and creation is strictly defined. The emphasis on separation is established on ontological grounds, where the nature of the existence of God and the world are deemed distinct, although related as Creator and created. The transcendent ontological connection can be illustrated by the allegory of an inventor and her invention, for while the inventor is the cause of the invented object, the two are separate entities.

Divine immanence in theism is formulated within the dualistic God-world relationship framework established by their view of Divine transcendence. In contrast with deism, theism maintains that God is actively involved in human affairs and the world. The doctrine of a personal God, the general hallmark of theistic traditions, qualifies the Divine entity with characteristics that mediate the God-human relationship, allowing various forms of worship.

Although the qualities and rituals may differ across different theistic beliefs, the view of Divine immanence is entirely rooted in the dualism necessitated by their understanding of Divine transcendence. Without the dualism of the theistic relational model, the doctrine of a personal God and all forms of worship would not be possible. For in the absence of the God-human dichotomy, who is there to worship who when the worshiper and the worshiped are considered One? Such is the case in non-dual philosophies such as pantheism and panentheism.

Spinoza: Pantheism and Panentheism

Etymologically, the word pantheism is derived from the Ancient Greek roots of pan, meaning all or everything, and theos, meaning God. As the word suggests, pantheism is the view that everything is God, classifying it as a non-dual, or monist, relational model. While Baruch Spinoza, a prominent Dutch philosopher of the 17th century, did not use the word pantheism to describe his philosophy, his works have tremendously popularized pantheism due to their emphasis on Divine immanence. Notably, he writes in his canonical work, Ethics, that “God is the immanent and not the transient cause of all things”.

Unlike theism, the view of a separate personal deity is logically impossible in pantheism, where God is viewed as the sole reality that exists of which humans and the world are a manifestation. Spinoza uses the words God and Nature interchangeably, emphasizing the non-personal and abstract nature of the Divine. While traditional pantheism typically only emphasizes Divine eminence and disregards transcendence, Spinoza argues for both, leading philosophers such as Martial Gueroult to consider him a panentheist rather than a pantheist.

Panentheism is the view that the Divine is simultaneously within and beyond our world. The unicity of the pantheist identification of the Divine and the world necessitates that the former simultaneously transcends the multiplicity, duality, and limitations apparent in its manifestation within the latter. As Spinoza notes, “God is the absolutely infinite being, the substance consisting of infinite attributes, each of which expresses eternal and infinite essentiality” (Spinoza, 1677). Spinoza presents a form of substance monism, where everything that exists is derived from, and is reducible to, a single underlying substance or reality whose infinite attributes constitute the essence of everything that exists.

From this perspective, “the essence of human beings consists of certain modes of God’s attributes” (Spinoza, 1677). Unlike theism, the human-God relation modelled by Spinoza entails a polarity between the expression and the Expressed rather than a dichotomy of two separate beings. While all forms of existence are finite modes of Divine expression, the Divine simultaneously transcends them in its infinite potential for expression inherent in its infinite attributes. In this sense, Spinoza’s philosophy bears great resemblance to Ibn Arabi’s doctrine of Divine Self-disclosure.