'God'

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“The English word God continues the Old English God (guþ, gudis in Gothic, gud in modern Scandinavian, God in Dutch, and Gott in modern German), which is thought to derive from Proto-Germanic *ǥuđán…..

“The Proto-Germanic meaning of *ǥuđán and its etymology is uncertain. It is generally agreed that it derives from a Proto-Indo-European neuter passive perfect participle *ǵʰu-tó-m. This form within (late) Proto-Indo-European itself was possibly ambiguous, and thought to derive from a root *ǵʰeu̯- "to pour, libate" (Sanskrit huta, see hotṛ), or from a root *ǵʰau̯- (*ǵʰeu̯h2-) "to call, to invoke" (Sanskrit hūta). Sanskrit hutá = "having been sacrificed", from the verb root hu = "sacrifice", but a slight shift in translation gives the meaning "one to whom sacrifices are made."

“….the English word God, the German Gott, the Persian Khoda and the Hindustani Khuda are all derived from the same root as that which appears in Celtic Aeddon or Guydion, the Germanin Odin, Woden or Goutan…..”….International Congress of Americanists…. Morgan Peter Kavenaugh in The Origin of Language and Myths

“The name God was used to represent Greek Theos, Latin Deus in Bible translations, first in the Gothic translation of the New Testament by Ulfilas. For the etymology of deus, see *dyēus……Greek "θεός " (theos) means God in English. It is often connected with Greek "θέω" (theō), "run", and "θεωρέω" (theoreō), "to look at, to see, to observe”,….. Latin feriae "holidays", fanum "temple", and also Armenian di-k` "gods". Alternative suggestions (e.g. by De Saussure) connect *dhu̯es- "smoke, spirit", attested in Baltic and Germanic words for "spook," and ultimately cognate with Latin fumus "smoke." The earliest attested form of the word is the Mycenaean Greek te-o (plural te-o-i), written in Linear B syllabic script.

“Translations of the Arabic Allāh, Indic Ishvara and the African Maasai Engai…..Adonai YHWH a…. YHWH Elohim …κυριος ο θεος as "LORD God" (in the New Testament)

“Tibetan……lha, is the Tibetan word used to translate the Sanskrit deva, meaning “deity,” “god,” or “divine.” This is also the term used in the Shambhalian sense of natural hierarchy: lha, nyen, and lu. (If we were to be more daring in writing this word like it is actually pronounced, we might spell it hla!)”….http://nalandatranslation.org/offerings/choosing-the-right-word/lha-or-is-it-la/

the lha ….. deities of the sky

crown of the head—yul lha (yul lha; “country god”)
right shoulder—dra lha (dgra lha; “enemy god”)
right armpit—po lha (pho lha; “male god”)
left armpit—mo lha (mo lha; “female god”)
heart—sok lha (srog lha; “life-force god”)

“Lha is a sacred Tibetan word that means "superior body" or "energy body”,….

"According to Robin Kornman, “Trungpa Rinpoche began to reconstruct the original text after escaping Tibet, and it is this later work to which we refer. The first chapter describes the creation of the world by nine cosmic gods (shrid pa 'i lha) who appear in the form of native Tibetan dieties known as drala (Wylie: dgra bla), or war gods. These gods represent primal or originary aspects of the phenomenal world. For example, one of these lha stood for all kinds of light. Glancing in many directions, this diety created all of the lights existing in the world, including the sun, the moon, the light of the planets and stars, and the inward luminosity of consciousness itself. Another represented space and the sense of direction ... In Trungpa Rinpoche's epic these were directed by a ninth lha called Shiwa Okar ... a sort of absolute principle behind creation and the nature of reality. After these nine cosmic deities have created the world, [Shiwa Okar] goes to the things they have created and invests each one with an animistic spirit, a drala."….http://labelingthoughts.org/wiki/Shiwa_Okar

"There are many gods....They are always present everywhere.....the dieties of the indigenous traditions of Western Europe and The Americas especially were dismantled, suppressed, undermined, abused, forgotten...followers were not even allowed to mention them.....but they still have not been able to destroy them, even with the desecration of the entire planet..."..(Naropa Institute 1975.....Trungpa)

“Brahmā in Buddhism is the name for a type of exalted passionless deity (deva), of which there are several in Buddhist cosmology….The Buddha confined himself to what is empirically given….. This empiricism is based broadly on both ordinary sense experience and extrasensory perception enabled by high degrees of mental concentration”….. David J. Kalupahana, Buddhist philosophy: A Historical Analysis. Published by University of Hawaii Press, 1977, pages 23-24.

“People keep saying that there are no gods in Buddhism, but in actuality the Vedic gods have been part of Buddhism from the beginning. The earliest record we have of what the Buddha said and did is the Pali Canon. In the Samyutta Nikaya (Connected Discourses) there are large sections devoted just to conversations between the Buddha and the Vedic gods. In one, it is recounted how after his enlightenment the Buddha considered not teaching the Dharma (or Dhamma in Pali) as he was afraid no one would understand or want to give up their selfish craving. Brahma (the Vedic creator god) heard this and the following is from SN Chapter 6 story 1 in subchapter 1: …”Then Brahma Sahampati, having known with his own mind the reflection in the Blessed One's mind, thought: "Alas, the world is lost! Alas, the world is to perish, in that the mind of the Tathagata, the Arahant, the Perfectly Enlightened One, inclines to living at ease, not to teaching the Dhamma." Then just as quickly as a strong man might extend his drawn-in-arm or draw in his extend arm, Brahma Sahampati disappeared from the brahma world and reappeared before the Blessed One. He arranged his upper robe over one shoulder, knelt down with his right knee on the ground, raised his joined hands in reverential salute towards the Blessed One, and said to him: "Venerable sir, let the Blessed One teach the Dhamma; let the Fortunate One teach the Dhamma. There are beings with little dust in their eyes who are falling away because they do not hear the Dhamma. There will be those who will understand the Dhamma." (p. 232 of the Connected Discourses translated by Bhikkhu Bodhi)…..So the Vedic gods were not added in later to Buddhism or by Tibetan Bon or anything of the kind. They are very present even in the earliest form of the canon. Also, this is not the only place where god the creator appears in human form like this. Look in Genesis where God visits Abraham (chapter 18).”…..http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110315143702AAlImIl

“Deva (देव in Devanagari script) is the Sanskrit word for deity, its related feminine term is devi. In modern Hinduism, it can be loosely interpreted as any benevolent supernatural being. The devas in Hinduism, also called Suras, are often juxtaposed to the Asuras, their half brothers. Devas are also the maintainers of the realms as ordained by the Trimurti. They are often warring with their equally powerful counterparts, the Asuras….The Sanskrit deva- derives from Indo-Iranian *dev- which in turn descends from the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) word, *deiwos, originally an adjective meaning "celestial" or "shining", which is a PIE (not synchronic Sanskrit) vrddhi derivative from the root *diw meaning "to shine", especially as the day-lit sky. The feminine form of PIE *deiwos is PIE *deiwih2, which descends into Indic languages as devi, in that context meaning "female deity". There is also Diwali the "festival of lights”.”

“Ahura" was originally an adjective meaning ahuric, characterizing a specific Indo-Iranian entity named Asura. Although traces of this figure are still evident in the oldest texts of both India and Iran, in both cultures the word eventually appears as the epithet of other spirits…. Zoroaster proclaimed Ahura Mazda as the uncreated spirit, wholly wise, benevolent and good, as well as the creator and upholder of Arta ("truth”)…..The name may be attested on cuneiform tablets of Assyrian Assurbanipal, in the form Assara Mazaš (this would seem to reflect a form *Asura Mazdā prior to the Common Iranian development *s > h), though this interpretation is not uncontroversial.”…..Boyce, Mary (1975), History of Zoroastrianism, Vol. I, The early period, Leiden: Brill

“Sometimes when we practice, we are able to find ourselves in the state of meditation. Then we find there is no longer any duality, conflict or confusion. And if we look into ourselves when we are in that state, we discover that ego is non-existent. We manifest as our really natural self or buddha self, the 'selfless self which is always within us, and which is our inherent nature. This is what is spoken of time and again in all religions as the principle of goodness or godliness. Man is made in the image of God, as it says in Christianity; in Buddhism we say the Buddha nature exists in all.”…. Essential Advice on Meditation….Sogyal Rinpoche…..London 1978

“In the Nikaya literature ... the Buddha Gotama is portrayed not as an atheist who claims to be able to prove God's nonexistence, but rather as a skeptic with respect to other teachers' claims to be able to lead their disciples to the highest good.”….Hayes, Richard P., "Principled Atheism in the Buddhist Scholastic Tradition", Journal of Indian Philosophy, 16:1 (1988:Mar) pgs 5-6, 8

“Jehovah ….is a Latinization of the Hebrew יְהֹוָה, a vocalization of the Tetragrammaton יהוה (YHWH), the proper name of the God of Israel in the Hebrew Bible, which has al….Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יהוה‎), was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel and Judah. The name probably originated as an epithet of the god El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon… Yahweh functioned as the dynastic cult (the god of the royal house), the royal courts promoting him as the supreme god over all others in the pantheon, notably Baal, El, and Asherah (the last of whom may have been his consort).”

“Henotheism (Greek εἷς θεός heis theos "one god") is the belief in and worship of a single God while accepting the existence or possible existence of other deities that may also be worshipped….Scholars formulated theories that the Israelites were not always monotheistic, but went though a period of henotheism, the worship of one god while acknowledging the existence of others….Variations on the term have been "inclusive monotheism" and "monarchical polytheism", designed to differentiate differing forms of the phenomenon. Related terms are monolatrism and kathenotheism, which are typically understood as sub-types of henotheism. The latter term is an extension of "henotheism", from καθ' ἕνα θεόν (kath' hena theon) —"one god at a time".[2] Henotheism is similar but less exclusive than monolatry because a monolator worships only one god (denying that other gods are worthy of worship), while the henotheist may worship any within the pantheon, depending on circumstances, although they usually will worship only one throughout their life (barring some sort of conversion). In some belief systems, the choice of the supreme deity within a henotheistic framework may be determined by cultural, geographical, historical or political reasons.

First monotheistic religion…..” In the 14th century BC Atenism was Egypt's state religion for around 20 years, before subsequent rulers returned to the traditional gods and the Pharaohs associated with Atenism were erased from Egyptian records.”

First international monotheistic religion…..Zoroastrianism /ˌzɒroʊˈæstriənɪzəm/, also called Zarathustraism, Mazdaism and Magianism, is an ancient Iranian religion and a religious philosophy. It was once the state religion of the Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sasanian empires. Estimates of the current number of Zoroastrians worldwide vary between 145,000 and 2.6 million…..Zoroastrianism arose in the eastern region of the ancient Persian Empire, when the religious philosopher Zoroaster simplified the pantheon of early Iranian gods into two opposing forces: Ahura Mazda (Illuminating Wisdom) and Angra Mainyu (Destructive Spirit) in the 7th century BCE….Zoroaster's ideas led to a formal religion bearing his name by about the 6th century BCE and have influenced other later monotheistic religions including Judaism, Gnosticism, Christianity and Islam.

“Polytheism sounds like group marriage…..we prefer the term Naturalism.”

“Venerate me and make offerings”

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