Divine Self-Realization: External Grace vs. Internal Divinity
The difference is that for a believer, the search for one’s own identity through God means turning to an external, transcendent source of grace that signifies personal transformation and a deep ontological union with the divine. The believer experiences his imperfection, becomes aware of an inner need for redemption and forgiveness, and by appealing to this external power, attains a fullness of life that is lacking in a merely self-contained existence. Thus, union with God implies that a person’s true “I” finds its fulfillment and healing in the complete measure of God’s mercy and love.In contrast, an atheist who finds “God” within himself regards the divine not as an external force that bestows grace, but as an attribute of one’s own nature. Here, the idea of God is a projection of the human essence—a reflection of the image and likeness inherent in humanity. In the atheist worldview, divinity is interpreted as something intrinsic to the inner “I,” a structure that comprises the mind, freedom, the awareness of values, and moral perfection, much like the qualities attributed by thinkers who asserted, “Was man created by God in His image and likeness, or did man create God in His own image and likeness” (source: link txt).Thus, the essence of the difference is that the believer, seeking himself in God, entrusts his transformation to an external power of grace and perceives his life as reaching its consummation in the Divine, whereas the atheist who finds “God” within himself believes that the human being inherently possesses qualities akin to the divine, and that this internal essence is the source of his “divinity.”Supporting citation(s):“In God, a person turns out to be immeasurably closer to himself than in all attempts to remain only within himself. Outside of God, his life was merely a pale reflection of the reality of his own being; now, in the life-giving element of God’s benevolence, his life is full of boundless ontological depth, leaving no room for a meaningless and languishing value-vacuum…” (source: link txt)“
Was man created by God in His image and likeness, or did man create God in His own image and likeness?In any case, man possesses an indomitable tendency to relate himself to the Absolute, to the ideal, to the ultimate truth, to the essence of being…” (source: link txt)