5 May 2016 QA 1

Was man created in the image of God or God created by man’s image?

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Well, I think it is both. God created man in his own image and man started creating God in his own image. There is nothing wrong. There is a term called ‘co-creation’.
Man has created God, it is not a crime. Many times we think that man created God, that means he doesn’t exist, this is not so. All the art forms, sculptures, imaginations, philosophy and even science, has all sprung up from man’s mind.

What do you mean by God? God is a principle, an energy which is creative, transformative. God is the generator, operator and destroyer. Doesn’t man do all these three things? Does he not generate, operate and destroy? So, where is the difference?

You think that God is something different from you; sitting somewhere up in the heaven to give you a little finger and when you try and catch Him, he runs away. This concept of God is what is troubling, and this is the concept that gave rise to communism and atheism. Or (the other concept is that) you think that God is in only one shape and one form. No! You can adore Him or Her in any shape and any form. God is the summum bonum of creation, the basic existence of all that is! It is the basis of all existence, in fact it is the existence itself.