The Universe Looking Back: God in All Things is a Thursday Journal episode exploring one of the deepest spiritual and philosophical questions: Is God separate from the universe, or present within all things?

In this episode of Traversing the Strange World, we reflect on Spinoza’s view of God and Nature, the Stoic idea of the Logos, Kabbalah and Hasidic mysticism, and the Hindu ideas of līlā and māyā. Together, these traditions point toward a powerful possibility: that reality is not dead matter, but something living, conscious, and filled with sacred depth.

We explore whether consciousness is more than a biological accident, whether the universe itself has an inward dimension, and whethe ...