Arguments For The Existence Of God

[Ms Tercy Lonan]

Arguments For The Existence Of God
St. Thomas Aquinas advances five proofs for the existence of God. The first is the argument
from motion, which holds that all motion presupposes the existence of something which is not itself
subject to motion. Motion implies a motionless ground. The motion that characterises the world
ought to be logically preceded by an unmoved Mover, an ultimate being who is not moved by
anything else, who ought to be the basis of the motion of all things. The second is the causal
argument that, as every effect has a cause, the causal chain would lead to an endless regress if a final
uncaused Cause is not posited. Without the admission of such a Cause, the very concept of
causality, which holds sway over the world, would lose its meaning. The final cause has, therefore,
no other cause outside itself, it is the final Form without matter in it. The third is the cosmological
argument which points out that all contingent events necessarily imply an eternal substance which
itself is not contingent. The very consciousness of finitude gives rise to the consciousness of the
infinite. The fourth is the henological argument, according to which the concept of more and less in
the things of this world signifies the existence of a maximum value whose manifestation in various
degrees creates in us and in things the idea of more or less of value. The various grades of relative
perfection and imperfection in the world indicate that there ought to be an absolute state whose
partial revelations here give meaning to these relative expressions. The fifth is the teleological
argument or the argument from design and adaptation, which infers the existence of God as the
supreme intelligence, on the basis of the purposive adaptation seen in Nature and the ordered design
for which it appears to be meant. The purpose that is discovered in Nature cannot be accounted for
otherwise than by admitting the presence of a supremely intelligent Creator, a wise Architect of the
universe. The different parts of the universe harmoniously fit in with one another’s purposes, and
adjust and adapt themselves for an end beyond themselves. All this shows that there ought to be a
purposive Agent who has brought about all this adaptation, system and order in creation. God,
according to St. Thomas Aquinas, is, therefore, One, the unmoved Mover, the causeless Cause, the
eternal Substance, the highest Perfection, supreme Intelligence, and the Maximum of being.

In his treatise on divine government, given in his Summa Theologica, St. Thomas says: “I
answer that certain ancient philosophers denied the government of the world, saying that all things
happened by chance. But such an opinion can be refuted as impossible in two ways. First, by the
observation of things themselves. For we observe that in Nature things happen always or nearly
always for the best; which would not be the case unless some sort of Providence directed Nature
towards good as an end. And this is to govern. Therefore, the unfailing order we observe in things is
the sign of their being governed. For instance, if we were to enter a well-ordered house, we would
gather from the order manifested in the house the notion of a governor, as Cicero says, quoting
Aristotle. Secondly, this is clear from a consideration of the divine goodness which, as we have said
above, is the cause of the production of things in being. For, as it belongs to the best to produce the
best, it is not fitting that the supreme goodness of God should produce things without giving them
their perfection. Now a thing’s ultimate perfection consists in the attainment of its end. Therefore, it
belongs to the divine goodness, as it brought things into being, so to lead them to their end. And this
is to govern.” “Hence, as the movement of the arrow towards a definite end shows clearly that it is
directed by someone with knowledge, so the unvarying course of natural things which are without
knowledge shows clearly that the world is governed by some Reason.”
St. Thomas argues that as the beginning of the universe is outside itself, the end of all things
in the universe should be a transcendent good which is not to be sought within the universe. The
highest good is the highest end of all beings. As the particular end of anything is a particular form of
good, so the universal end of all things ought to be the universal good, which can only be one. And
this good has to be identified with God, for it is the good of and for itself by virtue of its essence and
existence, whereas a particular good is good only by participation. Every form of good that is
conceivable in the universe is, according to Aquinas, a good only by sharing in a higher good. The
good of the whole world cannot be within itself, but ought to transcend it. Everything under the sun,
in the opinion of Aquinas, is generated and corrupted in accordance with the sun’s movement. A
certain amount of chance seems to characterise all that is mundane. And the very fact that an
element of chance is discovered in things here on earth proves that they are subject to a government
of a higher order. For, unless corruptible things were governed by a higher being, there would be no
order but only chaos, no definiteness but only indeterminacy everywhere. Things lacking
knowledge, naturally, get guided by a being endowed with knowledge. All activity in the universe
is intentional and purposive, directed by the supreme decree of God.
Swami Sivananda, accepting the famous arguments for the existence of God,-the
ontological, the cosmological and the theological,-would endorse the theological proofs of St.
Thomas Aquinas. The feeling of the ‘I’, according to him, is rooted in an existence which cannot be
doubted. The existence of the Self is existence in general, and is enjoyed by everyone. The Self of
everyone bears testimony to the existence of the Self which comprehends the entire universe. This
universal Self is God. Though one is encased in this finite body, one can think and feel: ‘I am
infinite’, through an irresistible urge which tends to direct all thought towards the achievement of
such being. Such an urge from within cannot possibly be, unless there is a reality to which it points.
“You always feel: ‘I exist.’ You can never deny your existence. Existence is Brahman, your own
inner immortal Self” “Though I amencased in this finite body, though I amimperfect and mortal on
account of egoism, I can think of the infinite, the perfect, the immortal being. This idea of the
infinite can arise only from an infinite being” (Wisdom Nectar, p. 188).

Swami Sivananda observes that the concept of the finite posits the infinite. “Everything is
changing in this world. There must be a substratum that is unchanging. We cannot think of a
changing thing without thinking of something which is unchanging. Forms are finite. You cannot
think of a finite object without thinking of something beyond.” This has similarity to the argument
for the existence of the infinite from the contingent nature of things. Further he adds: “There is
beauty, intelligence, luminosity, law, order, harmony, in spite of apparent disorder and disharmony.
There must be an omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent being who governs and controls this
vast universe” (Ibid. pp. 188-89). The world has the character of an effect, which is observable from
the vicissitudes it constantly undergoes, and the effect always attempts to find rest in its cause. The
human mind feels itself constrained to carry the causal argument to its logical limits and posit at one
end of the series a cause of all things in the world of time, though it is itself outside all temporal
events. Every visible cause has another higher cause which is more pervasive and enduring. God is
the name we give to the highest cause. “In this world of phenomena, there is a cause for everything.
The law of cause and effect operates. There is the cause, the father, for the effect which is the child.
There is the cause, the seed, for the effect which is the tree. There is the cause, the potter, for the
effect which is the pot.” “You see this world. There must be a cause for this world, which is an
effect. That causeless cause is God or the creator” (Ibid. p. 189).
Udayana, the great Naiyayika, offers the following orthodox proofs for the existence of
God:
1. The world of perception is of the nature of an effect, and every effect must have a cause.
We have to infer the cause of the world, as the world has a tendency to reduce itself to its elements.
The composite parts get disintegrated and return to their causes, and the ultimate cause of all
composite substances should be one that is above all effected things. And this cause must have a
direct knowledge of the material causes of the world. Such an intelligent being must be God.
2. The conjunction of the causal elements into effects requires an intelligent operator. The
combination of atoms into groups at the time of creation cannot but be the work of a purposive
conscious being. The atoms do not combine pell-mell or at random. There is to be seen the hand of a
wise organiser behind the systematic grouping of the ultimate atoms into dyads and molecules. That
final organiser is God.
3. We observe that the things of the universe are well-supported; its parts, like the planets
etc., are held together, so that they do not collapse. The holder of such different parts in balance, to
constitute a system, must be God Himself, for nothing that is in the universe can support the
universe.
4. The world is observed to dissolve itself into subtler causes. The dissolution of the effect
into its cause means that there is a source into which the effect returns. The ultimate source of the
universe, then, should be beyond the universe, and it is God.
5. No knowledge can come to us of the different things here, unless there is a source of this
knowledge. The origin of all knowledge should be omniscient, and, consequently, omnipotent.
Such a being is not to be seen in this universe, and so it must be outside it. This being is God.

6. The Vedas are held to be valid and authoritative from time immemorial. Such
authoritativeness of the Vedas as true and valid knowledge cannot be without an author behind
them, who ought to be an all-knower. This all-knower is God.
7. The Vedas cannot have any human author, because they deal with truths which no human
being knows. Hence the author of the Vedas ought to be a superhuman being, and this being is God.
8. A sentence, as it is known to us in the world, has a composer who joins the words together
and frames it. In like manner, the sentences of the Vedas consisting of words should have a
composer, and he cannot be anyone else than God.
9. The size of a dyad or a molecule depends on the number of the atoms that go to constitute
it. This requisite number of the atoms that go to form a particular compound could not have been
originally the object of the perception of any human being; so its contemplator must be God.
The Naiyayikas also add that the fruit of an individual’s actions does not always lie within
the reach of the individual who is the agent. There ought to be, therefore, a dispenser of the fruits of
actions, and this supreme dispenser is God.
The Yoga system of Patanjali considers God as the unsurpassed seed of omniscience. The
possibility of the omniscience and the necessity to admit a source for it leads to the positing of a
supreme Being who is unaffected by the changes characterised by affliction, action, fruition and the
tendencies in keeping with such fruition. The knowledge which the different individuals are
endowed with in this world is not of the same degree; there are grades in the manifestation of
knowledge. There is an ascending degree of knowledge, power and happiness in accordance with
the extent of the inclusiveness of the contents of knowledge. The greater the extent of the contents,
the wider is the knowledge. The various degrees of knowledge in the world suggest a maximum
ideal of knowledge, a state of omniscience which ought to be identified with eternal existence. Now
this state of omniscience that is compatible with eternity cannot be found in any limited individual,
for none here is seen to be all-wise. An omniscient being cannot be any individual, and he can be no
other than God. God enjoys the highest perfection, being endowed with the greatest magnitude of
knowledge and power. He alone can be omnipotent and be the Universal King.
The Nasadiya-Sukta of the Rig-Veda proclaims that at the beginning of things there was
Tamas, darkness pervading everywhere, and in the midst of this universal darkness the Light of the
One shone, all by itself. This glorious Intelligence is to be identified with the Self-born,
Svayambhu, having no cause outside it. This Self-born emerged from the primordial Tamas, by
means of its Tapas of untarnished knowledge, and projected this variegated world of individuals.
“Darkness there was; in the beginning all this was a sea without light; the germ that lay covered by
the husk, that One was born by the power of Tapas” (Rig-Veda, X. 129). The Rig-Veda extols the
Hiranyagarbha as the first God of beings. “Hiranyagarbha was present in the beginning; when born,
he was the sole lord of created beings; he upheld this earth and heaven,-to which God we offer
worship with oblation. (To Him) who is the giver of soul-force, the giver of strength, who is
contemplated by everything, whom even the gods obey, whose shadow is immortality as well as
death,-to which God we offer worship with oblation” (X. 121). “With eyes everywhere, with faces
everywhere, with hands everywhere, with feet everywhere, He traverses with His arms and with 

His swift-moving (feet), and exists as the One God, generating heaven and earth” (X. 81). “He who
is our parent, the creator, the ordainer, who knows our abodes and all beings, who is the name-giver
to the gods,-He is One; Him other beings come to inquire” (X. 82). The Purusha-Sukta refers to the
great Lord as encompassing everything. “Thousand-headed was the Purusha, thousand-eyed and
thousand-legged. He, covering the earth on all sides, stretched Himself beyond it by ten fingers’
length. All this is the Purusha alone, whatever was and whatever shall be...... One-fourth of Him all
beings are, three-fourth of Him is immortal in the heaven” (X. 90). The Absolute itself appears as
Isvara. “From Him Virat was born, and from Virat, again, Purusha.” Isvara is the body as well is the
soul of the world.
Following this great theme of the Veda, Manu, at the commencement of his code of law,
states: “In the beginning all this was covered over by darkness, unknowable, indefinable,
unarguable, indeterminable; the universe appeared to be in a state of sleep, as it were. Then, the
Self-originated Divine Being, Himself unmanifested, manifested this universe with its great
elements etc., by tearing the veil of this darkness and revealing the forms of His creative energy. He,
who is not to be beheld by the senses, who is subtle, the unmanifest, the everlasting, the
unthinkable, the very embodiment of all beings,-He, of Himself, rose above this primordial
darkness” (Manu-Smrit, I. 5-7). The Srimad Bhagavata records the spirit of this doctrine in the
words of the Lord Himself- “I alone was in the beginning of things, the one beyond the manifest as
well as the unmanifest, and there was nothing else. And I alone shall be at the end ofthings. I alone
am all this that is manifest; and whatever remains other than this, that also is I Myself alone” (II. ix.
32). The Lord speaks in the Bhagavad Gita: “I amthe Vedic rite, I the sacrifice, I the food offered to
the manes, I am the herbs and the medicines, I am the sacred formula and the hymn; I am the
clarified butter (offered in sacrifices); I am the consecrated fire, I the oblation. I am the Father of
this world, the Mother, Supporter, the Grandfather; I amthe object to be known, I the purifier (of all
things), the syllable OM, and also the sacred lore of the Rik, the Sama and the Yajus; the Goal, the
Sustainer, the Lord, the Witness, the Abode, the Refuge, the Friend, the Origin, the Dissolution, the
Basis, the Storehouse, the Imperishable Seed. I give heat, I sent forth rain, and also withhold it; I am
immortality and also death; I am being and also non-being, O Arjuna!” (IX. 16-19). Isvara is
described in the Gita as having manifested Himself here as the all-destroying Time.