truce of God, in the Middle Ages, an attempt by the Catholic church to limit private warfare between feudal lords. It is related to the peace of God, which exempted clergy, women, children, and peasants from battle or attacks. The truce of God was proposed (A.D. 958) by Pope John XV and was first applied in 1027. It prohibited fighting from 9 P.M. Saturday to 3 A.M. Monday, which was soon extended to span Wednesday evening to Monday morning. Religious days were also included. That left only 80 days a year for fighting. The truce spread from France to Germany, Italy, Flanders, and Spain, and from 1123, it was backed by the threat of excommunication. The increasing power of kings (the "peace of kings") and the subsequent rise of strong national governments rendered the truce of God unnecessary and ineffective for enforcing internal peace. It lapsed in the 13th cent.

sun god: see sun worship.

peace of God: see truce of God.

act of God, in law, an accident caused by the operation of extraordinary natural force. The effect of ordinary natural causes (e.g., that rain will leak through a defective roof) may be foreseen and avoided by the exercise of human care; failure to take the necessary precautions constitutes negligence, and the party injured in the accident may be entitled to damages. An act of God, however, is so extraordinary and devoid of human agency that reasonable care would not avoid the consequences; hence, the injured party has no right to damages. Accidents caused by tornadoes, perils of the sea, extraordinary floods, and severe ice storms are usually considered acts of God, but fires are not so considered unless they are caused by lightning.

Lamb of God: see Agnus Dei.

God, divinity of the three great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as many other world religions. See also religion and articles on individual religions.

Names for God

In the Old Testament various names for God are used. YHWH is the most celebrated of these; the Hebrews considered the name ineffable and, in reading, substituted the name Adonai [my Lord]. The ineffable name, or tetragrammaton [Gr.,=four-letter form], is of unknown origin; the reconstruction Jehovah was based on a mistake, and the form Yahweh is not now regarded as reliable. The name Jah occurring in names such as Elijah is a form of YHWH. The most common name for God in the Old Testament is Elohim, a plural form, but used as a singular when speaking of God. The name El, not connected with Elohim, is also used, especially in proper names, e.g., Elijah. The name Shaddai, used with other words and in names (e.g., Zurishaddai), appears rarely. Of these names only Adonai has a satisfactory etymology. It is generally not possible to tell from English translations of the Bible what was the exact form of the name of God in the original. In Islam, the name of God is Allah.

Conceptions of God

The general conception of God may be said to be that of an infinite being (often a personality but not necessarily anthropomorphic) who is supremely good, who created the world, who knows all and can do all, who is transcendent over and immanent in the world, and who loves humanity. By the majority of Christians God is believed to have lived on earth in the flesh as Jesus (see Trinity). In the Hebrew Bible the concept of God is not a unified one. The attitude of believers to this apparent inconsistency has generally been that God, unchanging, revealed Himself more and more to Israel.

Scholars belonging to the rational schools of the 19th cent. developed a view of the Bible as primarily a history of Judaism that evolved naturally without the benefit of divine intervention in the world. They see a series of stages in which God was first held by the Jews as simply the head of a tribal pantheon, then gradually assumed all the attributes of God's fellow divinities, but was still worshiped more or less idolatrously. Gradually, according to these scholars, the Jews considered their God as more and more powerful until they believed God creator and ruler of all humans though preferring Israel as God's chosen people.

God's attributes of goodness, love, and mercy these critics consider as very late in this development. More recent scholars have refuted this latter position, seeing these very qualities in the God of the Exodus. Although the idea of God, through its long acceptance by Jews, Christians, and Muslims, has come to be associated with the concept of a good, infinite personality, in recent times the name has been extended to many principles of an utterly different sort; thus, a philosopher may consider the unifying concept in his philosophy (e.g., cosmic energy, mind, world soul, number) as God.

Arguments for God's Existence

There are several famous arguments for the existence of God. The argument from the First Cause maintains that since in the world every effect has its cause behind it (and every actuality its potentiality), the first effect (and first actuality) in the world must have had its cause (and potentiality), which was in itself both cause and effect (and potentiality and actuality), i.e., God. The cosmological argument maintains that since the world, and all that is in it, seems to have no necessary or absolute (nonrelative) existence, an independent existence (God) must be implied for the world as the explanation of its relations.

The teleological argument maintains that, since from a comprehensive view of nature and the world everything seems to exist according to a certain great plan, a planner (God) must be postulated. The ontological argument maintains that since the human conception of God is the highest conception humanly possible and since the highest conception humanly possible must have existence as one attribute, God must exist. Immanuel Kant believed that he refuted these arguments by showing that existence is no part of the content of an idea. This principle has become very important in contemporary philosophy, particularly in existentialism. The consensus among theologians is that the existence of God must in some way be accepted on faith.

Churches of God, General Conference, conservative evangelical Christian bodies, Arminian in faith (see Jacobus Arminius), with certain Baptist doctrines. The movement originated during revivals held in Harrisburg, Pa., by John Winebrenner, a minister in the German Reformed Church. In 1830 the first cooperative "eldership" was organized by the independent congregations of Winebrenner's founding; a General Eldership of the Churches of God in North America followed in 1845. In 1975 its name became Churches of God, General Conference. The church polity is presbyterial. The Bible is the sole rule of faith and practice. Additional congregations have spread westward into adjoining states; there are mission ministries among Native Americans in the Southwest, in Bangladesh, Haiti, and India. They have about 31,000 members (1997).

Barebone or Barbon, Praise-God, 1596?-1679, English lay preacher and leather merchant. Soon after 1630 he became leader of half of a Baptist congregation that had split over the issue of infant baptism. Barebone favored this practice and wrote a treatise arguing its legitimate scriptural basis. An effective preacher, he attracted large congregations to his house in Fleet Street and acquired a reputation for rabble rousing. He was referred to by his many detractors variously as a Brownist, Anabaptist, and Fifth Monarchy man, but his actual religious beliefs are unclear. In Apr., 1653, the army dissolved the Rump Parliament, and in July Oliver Cromwell and his provisional council assembled 140 "godly men" from amongst the nominees of the independent congregations. Barebone was London member in this Nominated Parliament, which was called in derision Barebone's Parliament. Actually his part in the proceedings was insignificant. The body was composed largely of religious reformers who initiated a series of measures regarded as radical by most of their compatriots. The Parliament met from July until December, when the moderate members willingly and the radical members under compulsion resigned their powers into Cromwell's hands. They had accomplished little. Barebone actively opposed the Restoration in 1660 and remained a staunch republican.

Barbon, Praise-God: see Barebone, Praise-God.

Assemblies of God, a large group of churches comprising the second largest Pentecostal organization in the United States, founded at Hot Springs, Ark., in Apr., 1914. In doctrine the Assemblies of God affirm the basic teachings of Pentecostalism (i.e., baptism with the Holy Spirit as evidenced through glossolalia and divine healing, and the daily presence of the charismatic gifts basic to the early church) and of fundamentalism, emphasizing the premillenarian belief in a return of Jesus and his saints to reign over a period of peace and righteousness. The U.S. membership, numbering nearly 2.5 million, is organized into over 10,750 local autonomous churches with a general council and a general presbytery formulating and administering policies, respectively. The churches actively engage in missionary work.

Veneration of the sun or its representation as a deity. It appears in several early cultures, notably in ancient Egypt, Indo-Europe, and Mesoamerica, where urban civilizations were combined with a strong ideology of sacred kingship, in which kings ruled by the power of the sun and claimed descent from it. The imagery of the sun as the ruler of both the upper and the lower world, which he visits daily, was prominent. Sun heroes and deities also figure in many mythologies, including Indo-Iranian, Greco-Roman, and Scandinavian. In late Roman history, sun worship was of such importance that it was later called “solar monotheism.” Seealso Amaterasu, Re, Shamash, Sol, Surya, Tonatiuh.

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Largest Pentecostal denomination in the U.S. It was formed in 1914 in Hot Springs, Ark., by the union of several small Pentecostal groups. The Assemblies of God emphasize the centrality of the Bible in Christian faith and worship. Instead of sacraments, the Assemblies have two ordinances, baptism by total immersion and the Lord's Supper. Personal sanctification is believed to happen gradually rather than instantaneously, and millennial doctrines dealing with Christ's Second Coming and the establishment of the Kingdom of God are of great importance. The Assemblies of God have been very active in mission work in the U.S. and overseas. Seealso millennialism, Pentecostalism.

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