The Fictional Creation of God and Man. Faith as Passion and Play: Essay (ePub)

In this essay, an attempt is made to understand "faith" as enthusiasm, passion for "God" as the fictional image of the creative human being. This fictional God is existentially needed by man. This is how faith becomes a play: 1. Man, who longs for meaning and security, has invented the God of the Bible, with his human and supernatural qualities, as his creative image. 2. The fictitious God and eternal, almighty Creator, who can be addressed as a person, gives meaning, love and security to the human being, who is also created by him as a creative image. 3. Man believes in this fictional God insofar as he realistically defines "faith" as "enthusiasm for something" or "passion for something." 4. Man and the fictitious God, the whole of nature, presumably possess an identical creative essence, through which they share in an infinite creative principle in everything. 5. For this reason, the equal partners of man and God are able to create, recognize and love themselves and the other again and again in a new and harmonious way, whereby the reading of the Bible also becomes an unceasing process of understanding and interpretation. 6. The dignity of God, of man and of nature is respected where they are allowed to be freely creative, in other words, creative, in accordance with their creative essence. 7. Through the realistic conception of God as a being invented by human beings, it is possible to solve some theological problems and disputes and to make a life in and with the fictitious world of the Bible playfully acceptable and sustainable in the Age of Enlightenment. The popular wish "May the Force be with you!" from the fictional world of the Star Wars films gives hope. 8. Some chapter headings: Being a fool and childlike as protection and opportunity/Doubt about doubts about faith/Paradise and eternal life are always already now/Why does God allow suffering?The problem of theodicy/Christian rules of the play of faith in daily life/When the fictional God is too brutal/"Chain reaction of good" - start of a new play/Love for enemies - start of a new play/Enabling charity and long-distance love - start of a new play/The right of man and nature to free creative activity/An enlightened preliminary remark to a Christian creed/Telling young people about faith and God/What could I say now to the desperate, sick or dying?/And if nothing works anymore?