Like the syllable his descendants would create, Aum, god was an elemental vocable for all that he could see, touch, and not express. Probably originally the term meant something more along the lines of a nonsense syllable, something spat in frustration at trying to put into symbols all of what was, is being, and will be.

The cave people of middle Europe had among them many who had survived the long trek and over time become adapted to the verdant land with grim winters, but when the lone breakaway tribe left for the north, they encountered an unforgiving winter: if personified, it was sadistic. Bitter cold, deprivation of food and comfort, and death coming without warning were part of it as much as the nurturing warmth of fire and the unreserved beauty of the forest.

At this point, the concept of God became real, because they needed a reason to explain why there was both feast and famine, birth and death, warmth and cold, and how there could be a world of inner strength which sustained through harder times and encouraged joy at success. At that moment, they left behind the concept of the mother-ape, who from her perch in the trees guided the tribe to food, and began to see God in the snow; God in the change of seasons; God in the flight of an arrow toward prey.

The lone hunter lived in a cave and shivered through cold nights, fought hungry beasts prowling for anything warm to nourish themselves, and gathered what he could of wood for fire, moss for insulation, berries, roots and nuts for sustenance. He trusted in the world enough to expect spring after winter, and to know that the harvest season ended with the onslaught of brutal cold. Yet while it could kill him in an instant, it kept him alive, and time and again provided if he had the wit to take advantage.

For example, the bear that crossed his path two weeks ago, clearly exhausted and near the end of its days, then looked at him, clear-eyed, as the spear took flight. Its fat and meat fed them all, and he wore its hide against the cold; its great skull watched over the entrance to their cave, a symbol of ferocity and their ability to conquer it, as if a warning against all that would do harm there. God was in its eyes.

In the small stream that ran between two branches of the cave, miraculously not fouled like the water of the deeper cave ponds, there was God; it gave them drink when the ice storms were too intense to go outside. God was the small tree that despite the absence of heat, the lack of light and the rage of wind, had turquoise berries standing out against the snow, so at the end of a long hunger spell there was something, at least, to keep them going.

To keep going - to not give up, and lie down where the snow would soon cover him and the warmth that comes from cold near the end would carry him away. To get up every day and go into the tempest of the world to find firewood, food and water. To find a way to live with a woman, so that he might have children - he trusted that like the seasons, this keeping going would someday be a springtime for his people, for their effort at survival in this barren place.

God was in it all. And did God leave the world? God can be forgotten when there are no days of hunting in long shadows and ice to remind us of why we strive. We can fail to see God in the beauty of life continuing despite its harsh winters and hungry nights, and in how those excesses urge us to higher achievements. When we see life as great, God can be seen in the world, but if we lose respect and love for life as a whole, the night is endless dark with no spring.

Before there were words, there was thankfulness. The hunter pauses, and looks over the snow-covered valley, a giant expanse with smoke coming from a tiny cave at the far end. Small, but it is there, and in it is life. A new child with his bright eyes and strong eyebrows. Meat over smouldering wood. It is real, and it drives him forward, for the hunt, for the new day. Winter brings spring. Aum. Prey brings strength. Fire brings warmth. God is great. For existence I fight. Spring is coming; dawn is breaking. God is great.