One of the most universal of these natural misconceptions of God is to
consider him as something magic serving the ends of men.
It is not easy for us to grasp at first the full meaning of giving our
souls to God. The missionary and teacher of any creed is all too apt to
hawk God for what he will fetch; he is greedy for the poor triumph of
acquiescence; and so it comes about that many people who have been led
to believe themselves religious, are in reality still keeping back their
own souls and trying to use God for their own purposes. God is nothing
more for them as yet than a magnificent Fetish. They did not really want
him, but they have heard that he is potent stuff; their unripe souls
think to make use of him. They call upon his name, they do certain
things that are supposed to be peculiarly influential with him, such
as saying prayers and repeating gross praises of him, or reading in
a blind, industrious way that strange miscellany of Jewish and early
Christian literature, the Bible, and suchlike mental mortification,
or making the Sabbath dull and uncomfortable. In return for these
fetishistic propitiations God is supposed to interfere with the normal
course of causation in their favour. He becomes a celestial log-roller.
He remedies unfavourable accidents, cures petty ailments, contrives
unexpected gifts of medicine, money, or the like, he averts
bankruptcies, arranges profitable transactions, and does a thousand
such services for his little clique of faithful people. The pious are
represented as being constantly delighted by these little surprises,
these bouquets and chocolate boxes from the divinity. Or contrawise
he contrives spiteful turns for those who fail in their religious
attentions. He murders Sabbath-breaking children, or disorganises the
careful business schemes of the ungodly. He is represented as going
Sabbath-breakering on Sunday morning as a Staffordshire worker
goes ratting. Ordinary everyday Christianity is saturated with this
fetishistic conception of God. It may be disowned in THE HIBBERT
JOURNAL, but it is unblushingly advocated in the parish magazine. It is
an idea taken over by Christianity with the rest of the qualities of
the Hebrew God. It is natural enough in minds so self-centred that their
recognition of weakness and need brings with it no real self-surrender,
but it is entirely inconsistent with the modern conception of the true
God.
There has dropped upon the table as I write a modest periodical called
THE NORTHERN BRITISH ISRAEL REVIEW, illustrated with portraits of
various clergymen of the Church of England, and of ladies and gentlemen
who belong to the little school of thought which this magazine
represents; it is, I should judge, a sub-sect entirely within the
Established Church of England, that is to say within the Anglican
communion of the Trinitarian Christians. It contains among other papers
a very entertaining summary by a gentleman entitled--I cite the unusual
title-page of the periodical--“Landseer Mackenzie, Esq.,” of the views
of Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Obadiah upon the Kaiser William. They are
distinctly hostile views. Mr. Landseer Mackenzie discourses not only
upon these anticipatory condemnations but also upon the relations of the
weather to this war. He is convinced quite simply and honestly that God
has been persistently rigging the weather against the Germans. He points
out that the absence of mist on the North Sea was of great help to the
British in the autumn of 1914, and declares that it was the wet state of
the country that really held up the Germans in Flanders in the winter
of 1914-15. He ignores the part played by the weather in delaying the
relief of Kut-el-Amara, and he has not thought of the difficult question
why the Deity, having once decided upon intervention, did not, instead
of this comparatively trivial meteorological assistance, adopt the
more effective course of, for example, exploding or spoiling the German
stores of ammunition by some simple atomic miracle, or misdirecting
their gunfire by a sudden local modification of the laws of refraction
or gravitation.
Since these views of God come from Anglican vicarages I can only
conclude that this kind of belief is quite orthodox and permissible in
the established church, and that I am charging orthodox Christianity
here with nothing that has ever been officially repudiated. I find
indeed the essential assumptions of Mr. Landseer Mackenzie repeated in
endless official Christian utterances on the part of German and British
and Russian divines. The Bishop of Chelmsford, for example, has recently
ascribed our difficulties in the war to our impatience with long
sermons--among other similar causes. Such Christians are manifestly
convinced that God can be invoked by ritual--for example by special
days of national prayer or an increased observance of Sunday--or made
malignant by neglect or levity. It is almost fundamental in their
idea of him. The ordinary Mohammedan seems as confident of this magic
pettiness of God, and the belief of China in the magic propitiations and
resentments of “Heaven” is at least equally strong.
But the true God as those of the new religion know him is no such God
of luck and intervention. He is not to serve men’s ends or the ends of
nations or associations of men; he is careless of our ceremonies
and invocations. He does not lose his temper with our follies and
weaknesses. It is for us to serve Him. He captains us, he does not
coddle us. He has his own ends for which he needs us. . . .