Who is God? Why so many believe is God? How to explain God in Buddhism?

[Amitabha]

buddha shakyamuni mentioned that he is just a buddha of many buddhas because of vows based on libetating different beings or group of beings because of past lives affinity. the vow is to attain innate bodhicitta of all beings and buddhas. when buddha says buddhas, means that it can be either referring to form of living beings or buddha shakyamuni, medicine buddha etc, while bodhicitta is referring to its formless. these form and formless are inherently inseparable.

[Tammy]

The Wheel of Life can answer this very clearly.

Gods, not God, exist, they are one of the 6 realms.

They do die and reincarnate into any of the 6 realms depending on their karma, unless they practice and achieve liberation from samsara.

Therefore, Buddha is not God because Buddha is already out of the 6 realms.

There is no creator God, there is not only one single God, these are false theory made up by other religion because they cannot explain many things in the universe, so they attribute it to GOD, made up in their own mind.

Thank you for this post, I really like it as it is clear and concise. A very simple but powerful explanation with regards to Gods.

For Buddhists around the world, this explanation is perfect as they can relate to the wheel of life and the existence of 6 realms and reincarnation. However, for a Christian, this explanation suggests that their believe of God is wrong! Or that their God is a lesser being then what they believe his is!

So how do we help them to reconcile the two different views?

[yontenjamyang]

I remember one famous Theravadan monk once gave a Dharma talk and he said the God is Maha Brahma, the first and most powerful god of gods in this universe of ours. The universe came into beings via the big bang due to our karma but when God being the first to "arrive", told other gods he created the universe.

Quite a funny story but logical. Gods have pride mainly as their delusion.

[RedLantern]

The reality or validity of belief in god is based on man's understanding capacity and the maturity of the mind.
Many believe in God merely because they believe that there is someone to wash away their sins without suppressing their evil state of mind.
Buddhist are encourage to do good deed not for the sake of going to heaven.They are expected to do good in order to eradicate their selfishness and to experience peace and happiness.

[bambi]

When I was young, I was very interested in religions. I would go for Sunday school and mass with my grandma. Dad's side are staunch Christians. Then I'd go to the temples as I found the statues interesting and their traditions unique. But as I grew up, some things did not add up to being logical. Thank Buddha for the Internet and Google! I'd take time to search for subjects I don't understand and debate among myself. With so many beautiful sites now, especially this one, many people like me will have tremendous benefits and sharing knowledge.

[rossoneri]

When the Buddha was asked how the world started, he kept silent. In the religion of Buddhism we don’t have a first cause, instead we have a never ending circle of birth and death. In this world and in all worlds, there are many beginnings and ends. The model of life used in Buddhism has no starting place... It just keeps going and going.

Now having said that... If you’re a Buddhist it’s OK to believe God was the first cause... It really doesn't go against the teachings of the Buddha, his focus was on suffering... It's also OK to believe science has the answer… Like the big bang theory, etc... Some Buddhist’s don’t even care how it all started, and that’s fine too. Knowing how the world started is not going to end your suffering, it’s just going to give you more stuff to think about.

I hope you can see that God is not what Buddhism is about... Suffering is... And if you want to believe in God, I suppose it's OK. But, Buddhist's don't believe God can end suffering. Only the teaching's of the Buddha can help us end suffering through wisdom and the activity of compassion.

urbandharma.org

[biggyboy]

Many believe that God is the universal creator of all living beings but there's no one special God in Buddhism. In fact, there are many Gods in Buddhism and yet they are not creator.  We ourselves are the creator of our own existence in this world be it as human, gods, demi-gods, animals, ghosts and hell beings by the law of karma.  All of these realms are subject to change and evolution which are non permanent in nature.

If there is God, why is there the disparity, sorrow, calamities, suffering, differences in each and every being? Shouldn't there be happiness all round?  Well, it is not so as we all can see.  It is our own deeds that create both positive and negative results according to the law on cause and effect.