Although God has never been the central focus of my inquiries, faith and belief certainly are. I hesitate to offer a definitive answer because I don't consider myself an authority on the subject. Yet, the concept of God frequently enters the picture as I explore the dynamics of faith and belief, so I'll attempt to explain my engagement with the idea from the perspective of my art research and exploration.
Param, it's not easy to confirm or deny the concept of God. God is, after all, one of the oldest and longest-surviving ideas in human history. Naturally, the body of knowledge that has evolved around this concept is immense. The idea of God has been approached from a wide variety of perspectives: community, faith, belief, spirituality, religion, politics, sociology, culture, history, genealogy, empiricism, aesthetics, and metaphysics. This diversity of exploration highlights God's profound influence on intellectual pursuits and its implications for society and politics.
Many ethical and moral principles, such as justice, fraternity, freedom, and liberty, are rooted in the idea of God. Even community and culture often arise from faith and belief systems centred around God. Interestingly, political ideologies that reject the concept of God still revolve around it as a central point of contention.
Language, art, and aesthetics are often seen as representations of deeper meanings, and they, too, borrow their structural systems from the structures of faith and belief in God. Even the empiricism of scientific consciousness, grounded in logic and evidence, has its roots in the epistemological developments surrounding faith and belief in God. The structures of political power and social hierarchies often trace their origins to religious institutions, with the concept of God at their foundation. The idea of value, manifesting in economic systems, similarly reflects the influence of spiritual and divine structures.
In both art and science, the metaphysical and physical triads—such as the relationship between art, artist, and artwork or observer, observed, and observation—can also be linked to the philosophical underpinnings of God. As I mentioned earlier, given the immense body of knowledge that has grown around this concept over the longest period in human history, it's no surprise that the footprints of God are visible throughout all aspects of human life.
For some, God embodies omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, eternity, immutability, and absolute transcendence. God is viewed as a creator, a protector, a saviour, and a source of love and compassion. For others, the concept of God represents structures of exploitation, irrationality, and the root of human catastrophes.
What's fascinating about the concept of God is that life goes on whether one believes or not. In contemporary society, faith in God has become a political framework, and individuals can politically choose to accept or reject this belief. Democratic constitutions, like India's, grant the right to reject God, while in other countries, denying God can be punishable under blasphemy laws. In a way, the protector is protected by constitutional principles.
When you look at temples, churches, mosques, religious towns, pilgrimage sites, religious artefacts, and related infrastructure, they collectively represent one of the largest economies in the world, sustaining trillions in wealth and supporting billions of people in life.
As an artist, faith and belief are central inquiries in my life, and the concept of God—whether or not I believe in it—remains inseparable from my exploration. Yet, when you witness people waging wars, committing atrocities, and perpetuating discrimination in the name of that same faith, you can't help but wonder, where is this God?
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