First off,let me state at the outset that I believe that the gods of mankind are usually cultural inventions to explain what we cannot usually fathom. Some people break thru this veil and “see god”. They try to explain it as best they know how in cultural terms. Surely the concept of god has included polytheists,monotheists,animists and a host of others. All describe god or gods as having various forms or attributes. Classical faiths counted numerous gods, shamanists and animists counted spirits and monotheists came up with the 99 names of god and the trinity. God aMFears to be too big for us to comprehend. I cannot comprehend or understand the world vision of,say,my dogs, because I do not possess their ranges of hearing,sight and smell. The Universe aMFears different to each beholder and in human culture we have invented names and concepts to make it easier for us to communicate. So too in religion, we have invented gods as tools or focus of worship,devotion,meditation etc. There is a great line I have heard from the fine folks in AA,”If your god isn’t doing it for you,fire him and get a new one” And then go on to teach that we may find a god of our own understanding.
Now there are the Christian Zionists,those evangelicals who hold that the creation of Israel as a state is a sign of the the soon forth coming rapture. That is their belief briefly and it is valid in that it has meaning for them. Twelver Shiites believe that their 12th Imam has gone into occulation and will return at the end of times. Again a messianic figure to set things ‘right” But then what is right? Jesus spoke of the kingdom of god,or at least in our culturally oriented biblical traditions,he does. Everybody has a different view,it seems. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_God)
And everybody has different take on how we should react to it. Rather that take these differences in cultural perspective( Native Americans could not fathom the emaciated Christ on the cross and the eucharist,their avatar would have possessed power and strength, and as to eating your god, well) But now we have Christian Zionists entering into the soup of Middle Eastern politics, to give god a little help by suMForting the Netanyahu regime, which is fast becoming a pariah state in the mold of apartheid South Africa. Then add to that boiling pot of soup,Mr. Mahmoud Ahmedinejad who claims to have spoken to the Hidden Imam on numerous occasions. Since mixing politics and religion,at least in this cultural more is like mixing fire and gasoline, then alll this turns up the heat on the cauldron of soup and eventually it will boil over. And we’ll hope one of our gods will show up to get us out of the mess.