Various Proofs for the Existence of God

Various Proofs for the Existence of God

Syed Rehan Ali Naqvi

SP17-BPH-042

COMSATS University, Islamabad.

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Abstract

Since the dawn of humanity, the question of the existence of God has perplexed philosophers,

theologians, and common person. Philosophers from ancient civilization e.g. Greeks, Romans,

and Babylonians have tried to answer this question in different forms and criticized the different

aspects of it. The arguments formulated to prove the existence of God is of four types:

Ontological, Casual, Designer Argument, Moral Argument. Philosophers and theologians used

these frameworks to provide a description of the existence of God. The arguments related to

essence are discussed under the banner of ontology, epistemology, and metaphysics. On the other

hand, the pragmatic explanation is given by moral arguments.

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Various Proofs of the Existence of God

The inquiry of the existence of God is the philosophical heritage of humanity. Plato,

Aristotle, Xenophanes, Thomas Aquinas, St. Anselm, Averroes, and Avicenna spent their whole

lives in answering the questions related to the God, His nature and pragmatic influence on the

category of human civilization. There are different methodologies to prove the existence of God

used by these philosophers. These methodologies are followed by logical propositions which

signify the importance of these arguments.

These arguments are divided into four categories:

1- Ontological Arguments

2- Casual Arguments

3- Designer Arguments

4- Moral Arguments

Ontological Arguments

Ontology is the study of the reality of being and existence. As the question of existence is

directly related to the existence of God, this branch of philosophy has wide discussions about the

existence of God. Why God exists? What is His nature? Is God infinite? Such type of questions

is fundamentally studied under ontology. In the pursuit of answering those questions, ontological

arguments for the existence of God were developed. The philosophers who put forward their

ontological models to prove the existence of God were Plato, St. Anselm and Thomas Aquinas.

These arguments are derived from deductive reasoning and suggest that God is logically

necessary being and the ultimate truth of the universe.

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Plato and Existence of God:

Plato was a Greek philosopher who lived between the fifth century BC. Plato discussed

various aspects of life, knowledge, and God in his philosophical journey. In particular, he

emphasized on the ontology and discovered his proof for the existence of God in one of his

dialogues in Symposium which can be described in the following manner:

1- Think about something which is naturally beautiful. One can think about beautiful

hills covered with green forest.

2- This beautiful scenery of forest has some features and shapes. These could be

triangles, polygons and other geometrical shapes.

3- Every physical object has some common geometrical shapes. These shapes merge to

make something beautiful. So, these common aspects are the essence of beauty.

4- Now, one can consider that there is some “Form” which is in principle is present in

every beautiful object.

5- Like this ultimate form of beauty, there are other forms as well. Like the form of

justice, a form of truth and so on.

6- There is an ultimate form of Goodness. One can never think the greater form of God

than this form. Such form of Goodness is God.

This is the way how ontological arguments form. They start from simple premises and

after series of proposition prove the conclusion in the form of the necessity of the

existence of God.
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Saint Anselm: Ontological Argument:

St. Anselm is the theologian of the 11th century. Like Plato, he made his own kind of

logical understanding of the existence of God. He tried to postulate his theoretical model in the

following way:

1- There exists a being such that no greater being exists than him.

2- Such being can exist both in mind and reality.

a. For universality, such being should exist both in mind and reality.

b. If it exists only in mind, then that being is not the greatest being individual

can think of.

3- Ultimately, there is being such that no greater being can exists than him both

in mind and reality.

Saint Anselm with his beautiful insight made this remarkable argument about the necessity of a

being which we call as a God. He used the somewhat same form of argument which Plato used

to generate proof of the existence of God.

Thomas Aquinas: Ontological Argument:

Thomas Aquinas was philosopher and theologian of the 13th century. His philosophical

interrogation is so remarkable that he is still relevant in the realm of philosophy of religion and

ontology. Thomas Aquinas used five ways to prove the existence of argument but in this section

of ontological proofs, we will stick to his ontological arguments only.

St. Aquinas put forward his theory which is also known as “Gradation of objects” with

the following premises:

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1- There is a hierarchy of objects from top to bottom: some better some worse.

2- The description of some quality or attribute exists in comparison with the

greatest in that quality and attribute. (Something is hotter than something hot)

3- The greatest in that category is the cause of that category.

4- There must also exist then a being which is the cause of all the attributes in the

beings and that is God.

This is not the only one formulation as proof of the existence of God given by Thomas

Aquinas. There are some other arguments as well. One of such argument is Possibility and

Necessity argument:

1- We observe that in the physical world around us, there are things which

come into being and go out of it. We call them as contingent things.

2- Presuppose that only contingent beings exist.

3- Contingent being never existed forever.

4- Ultimately, there was a time when nothing existed because all beings are

contingent and contingent beings can never exist forever.

5- At that time, when nothing existed, who put contingent beings to come

into existence?

6- There must be a being which is not contingent and that being is necessary

by itself. This being made every contingent being and put it into motion.

This being is God.

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These arguments provide the ontological foundation in proving the existence of God.

Some recent theologians, philosophers of religion, Muslim thinkers have redefined the logical

statements of these philosophies with the modern philosophical framework.

Casual Arguments

Casual arguments are implications of our physical reality. We experience that there is

always some cause of any effect, that is how we experience things and perceive time, and that

cause can be described through some physical laws and philosophy. This casual determinism is

used to explain the existence of God. One of the two most famous casual arguments were given

by the theologian Thomas Aquinas in his book Summa Theologica.

Thomas Aquinas: Prime Mover Argument

Thomas Aquinas, after conceiving the casual determinism in the natural process,

explained the existence of God as a prime mover of the universe. Evolution of his argument is

given below:

1- We experience through our senses that everything in motion.

2- Things get into motion by some other things.

3- Those objects are also in motion and they don’t give motion to themselves.

4- Therefore, this series of motion cannot extend to infinity.

5- There must be some first prime mover who makes everything in motion and

change.

6- That prime mover is God.

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Thomas Aquinas: Argument from Causes:

Thomas Aquinas even used the nature of causes to prove the existence of God. This type of

argument is known as the argument from efficient causes. The description of the argument is

given below:

1- We know that everything has a cause.

2- Every cause originates from other cause.

3- There is a series of causes exist in this world.

4- If some prior cause doesn’t exist, it’s effect also cease to exist.

5- This series must not extend to previous causes until ad infinitum.

6- There must be some first cause, which is necessary for its essence.

7- This first cause is known as God.

Designer Argument

In our universe, we observe that there are tremendous harmony and order between two

events, the motion of different celestial objects, the differential changes in weather, the existence

of an atmosphere on earth, the dynamics of cells, bizarre nature of the atomic world, the presence

of amazing patterns in flowers, and evolution of species. These things as contingent in their

essence are not able to give the order to themselves and create themselves out of nothing. There

must be a designer who made all these things and put them in order for thousands of years. This

absolute artistic eloquence of our natural phenomena demands some intelligent designer to do

design all these things around us. This argument is known as the designer argument.

Thomas Aquinas like all other arguments also worked out on his own designer argument.

The premises and conclusion of his understanding are the following:

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1- Beings and objects work towards some goal.

2- The physical objects themselves are not intelligent.

3- They must be put into motion by someone who is a necessarily intelligent

being. Like as some arrow which is unintelligent reaches its goal by direction

is given by intelligent archer.

4- That intelligent being is God.

Same as Aquinas, Ghazali and Kindi developed cosmological designer argument in the

realm of designer arguments. This argument is recently revived by theologian Willian Lane

Craig and called it “Kalam Cosmological Argument.” This is the strongest argument for the

existence of God. The statements and result of this argument are given below:

1- Everything that begins to exist must have some cause.

2- The universe began to exist.

3- The universe must have a cause.

4- That cause must be God.

5- God exists.

Moral Arguments

The last phase of our arguments is the moral argument which describes the pragmatism of

the existence of God. Human beings tend to have a basic nature and instinct. We have basic

ethical standards such as nobody should kill anybody, everyone should speak the truth and so on.

This basic human nature describes that someone has printed some absolute moral obligations in

them. This can be explained through these premises:

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1- There are fundamental moral obligations.

2- These obligations are universal.

3- This universality has no greater explanation than God.

4- God exists.

Human society survives in the presence of innate moral obligations. All the religious books and

prophets emphasized on dynamical integrity and practicality of the existence of God in the

construction of human civilization. If we discard the presence of God, there would be an abyss of

meaning and therefore nihilism. It will give people the freedom to do what they desire and

deconstruct the social order. Therefore, the existence of God provides solid ground for morality.

Conclusion

By four different types of logical models, the depiction of the logical necessity of the

existence of God can easily be understood. Ontological arguments provide the essential rational

proof for the existence of God while Casual and Designer arguments use empirical evidence to

formulate it. The amalgamation of all this evidence is logically sufficient to explain the nature

and existence of God. While the pragmatic explanation is provided through the moral necessity

of such being in the societal evolution and order.

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Bibliography

Aquinas, S. (1948). Summa Theologica. New York: Benziger Brother.

Bagget, D., & Walls, J. (2006). Good God: The Theistic Foundations of Morality. Oxford:

Oxford University Press.

Barnes, J. (1972). The Ontological Argument. London: Macmillan.

Charlesworth, M. (1965). Anselm's Proslogian. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hill, D. (2005). Divinity and Maximal Greatness. London: Routledge.

Swinburne, R. (1996). IS THERE A GOD? Oxford: Oxford University Press.

References

Adams, R. (1971). The Logical Structure of Anselm's Argument. Philosophical Review, 80, 28-

54.

Alston, W. (1960). The Ontological Argument Revisited. Philosophical Review, 69, 452-74.

Layman, C. S. (2002). God and the Moral Order. Faith and Philosophy, 19, 304-316.

Rescher, N. (1959). The Ontological Proof Revisited. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 37,

138-148.