Anshelm´s Proof of God´s Existence
The question about the existence of God or, more generally speaking, of a supernatural entity that steers the course of the world, is probably as old as humanity itself. Many great philosophers were concerned with this basic and yet so important question which remains to be a controversial issue to this day! In the following I will commit myself to the above-mentioned question by firstly reconstructing Anselm´s proof of God´s existence and secondly considering his position in the light of the critique put forward by Gaunilo, Aquinas and Kant.
St. Anselm (1033-1109) was an Italian philosopher and monk who later left his country to become Archbishop of Canterbury. As Anselm firmly believed in God, he wanted to prove God´s existence through use of logic and reason and thus set out to demonstrate it in his most popular book named “Proslogion” (1078) in which he proposed one argument that, centuries later, was termed Ontological Argument by Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). That crucial argument claimed to be an a priori proof of God´s existence in that it begins with premises, which themselves are independent of experience, and later continues in a solely logical manner to come to the conclusion that God exists after all! Since Anselm aimed to illustrate to the ‘fool` (in the Psalms who asserts he does not believe in God) that his position is in fact unstable, he composed the argument in a dialectical context. As mentioned before, Anselm wanted to find this one argument which was sufficient in itself to prove God´s existence, that God is the supreme good on whom everything and everyone depends, but who, the other way round, does not depend on anything but himself.
The ontological argument begins with a particular definition characterising God as necessary, infinite and perfect. More specificially, Anselm defines God as “something than which nothing greater can be thought.” Hence, Anselm reasons that even someone like the fool, who does not believe in God´s existence,
St. Anselm (1033-1109) was an Italian philosopher and monk who later left his country to become Archbishop of Canterbury. As Anselm firmly believed in God, he wanted to prove God´s existence through use of logic and reason and thus set out to demonstrate it in his most popular book named “Proslogion” (1078) in which he proposed one argument that, centuries later, was termed Ontological Argument by Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). That crucial argument claimed to be an a priori proof of God´s existence in that it begins with premises, which themselves are independent of experience, and later continues in a solely logical manner to come to the conclusion that God exists after all! Since Anselm aimed to illustrate to the ‘fool` (in the Psalms who asserts he does not believe in God) that his position is in fact unstable, he composed the argument in a dialectical context. As mentioned before, Anselm wanted to find this one argument which was sufficient in itself to prove God´s existence, that God is the supreme good on whom everything and everyone depends, but who, the other way round, does not depend on anything but himself.
The ontological argument begins with a particular definition characterising God as necessary, infinite and perfect. More specificially, Anselm defines God as “something than which nothing greater can be thought.” Hence, Anselm reasons that even someone like the fool, who does not believe in God´s existence,