Immanence

Immanence, from the Latin immanere, “to remain within”, describes the presence of the divine or ultimate within the world and within the self. An immanent God is not only above and beyond creation, but present in every part of it, sustaining it and dwelling in it.

Theistic traditions usually hold immanence together with transcendence. The Qurʾān says that God is nearer to a person than their jugular vein; the rabbis speak of the Shekhinah, God’s indwelling presence; Christian theology teaches that in God “we live and move and have our being”. Hasidism, the Upaniṣads and the Sikh Gurus all stress that the divine fills all things. The Dao, too, is present even in the lowliest things.

Where immanence is emphasized without transcendence, the result is pantheism, the identification of God with the world, a charge brought against Spinoza and against some mystics. Others prefer panentheism: all things are in God, but God is more than all things.