Transcendence and Immanence

Now, because of the power of the world and the unknowability of God, we move into the realm of paradox. And this is where one comes to how God is understood in terms of God's creation. In the Western philosophical scheme there are two concepts: transcendence and immanence. Transcendence is the otherness of God. Immanence is the knowability of God, the presence of God. For the Christian, the immanence of God would be through Jesus Christ. It would be through Jesus Christ: that is how God became known to man. God so loved man that He became man — that idea; this is how the human being can know God. For the Hindu, the immanence is through the worship of forms, of idols.

How, then, is God immanent for the Muslims? Because if there is the utter otherness of God, or the unknowability of God, how then, as an individual, does one feel any closeness to God? If God is so exalted and so above the creation, how do we feel any intimacy with God? For the Muslim, the immanence of God and the transcendence of God are related to two fundamental concepts about God. One is raḥmah, mercy; and the other is ghaḍab, wrath — the opposite. Justice. The point can be taken from there; it could go on and on, and there are many, many examples. The first is the immanence of God, and the second is the transcendence of God.

It is interesting that the Qurʾān begins with Bismillāh:

Allah is a transcendent name of God. It is not an immanent name of God; it is a transcendent name. There is actually nothing we can associate with the name Allah, according to the Muslim. But then the next two names are al-Raḥmān, al-Raḥīm: the Merciful, the Compassionate. That is, out of the three names that we are given at the beginning of the Qurʾān, there are two relating to mercy and one relating to this transcendence, or otherness. This is consistent with the Islamic worldview, because the Qurʾān says: My mercy is over My wrath.^* The dominant quality that Allah is showing His creation is mercy, not wrath. But wrath is there.

This also relates to two very important concepts, which are termed fear and hope. Now, the Muslims, like the traditional Christians, hold: as above, so below. What Durkheim and everybody else did was turn it upside down: as below, so above. In other words, we are just projecting our world here onto the other world. Fear is related to the father. The father, for the child, in traditional worldviews — not so much in the American type of ideal now, but in traditional worldviews — the father is transcendent, the father is distant; the mother is immanent. The first thing that happens to a child is that it goes onto the breast. It is not to the father; it is to the mother. The nearness that the child experiences in the world is the mother, and the father is distant. The father is watching the act from a distance.