Does God Exist - Essay Example

DOES GOD EXIST? The debate concerning god’s existence has been discussed a lot in human history. Philosophers have present arguments for and against god’s existence. Philosophically, arguments involve disciplines such as epistemology which refers to the nature and the scope of knowledge and also ontology which deals with the nature of being, existence and reality. Many arguments exist and can be categorized as metaphysical, logical, empirical or subjective. Plato and Aristotle are the most known philosophers who came up with discussions a about God. They made arguments which are today categorized as cosmological. Epicurus later formulated the problem of evil (Descartes, René, & Michael Moriarty, 2008). He argues that if God is omnipotent, omniscient and also omnibenevolent, why is it that there is evil? Other scholars like, St. Anselm, Averroes and Aquinas and Descartes have argued that existent of god was logically important for the evidence of senses to be meaningful. Immanuel Kant argued also for the existence of God, he deduced his support from the fact that existence of good implies God exists. Disagreements and Answers Argument for and against God in the modern culture are also evident. Scientists like Stephen Hawking and John Lennox. Feideists also acknowledge and believe for the existence of God. The Catholic Church maintains its knowledge in ‘’ natural light of human reason’’ Arguments for existence of God Empirical arguments Here there are 5 Aquinas ways. They are grounded on Aristotle Ontology. i. . Unmoved mover asters that from the way thing s move in the universe, there must have been an initial mover. ii. Argument on first cause: He argues that it is difficult for a being to start itself. This is because, this individual must exited before it caused itself. iii. Necessary being. It asserts that beings are contingent. This means that it is possible for them not to exist iv. Argument from degree: good things must have been called good in relation to some standard. v. Teleological argument: ordering can only be done to intelligent beings, meaning an intelligent being should exist to move the objects to their end: God Deductive arguments Here we talk of ontological argument formulated by philosophers like st. Anselm and Rene Descartes. In this case, Gods existence is self evident as follows: god is the greatest convincible being, it is also greater to exist that not existing and thus God exists Inductive arguments They draw their conclusions through inductive reasoning. It says that Gods existence is presented with a fairly large probability though not with absolute certainty (Foundations of beef, 1895). Other arguments include; arguments from reason, anthropoid argument, teleological argument. Hypothesis of intelligent design, argument from degree, and transcendental argument. Arguments from historical events especially at the exodus and when giving the Ten Commandments to the people of Israel, resurrection of Jesus. Mormonism talks about appearance of God to Joseph Smith and other people. Arguments from testimony For instance the majority argument argues the theism of people. It provides many different ways of prima facie on Gods existence. Those grounded on personal experiences especially on what happens from day to day makes many scholars to believe on Gods existence Hindu arguments: Hindus believe on creator god (Brahma). In the school of vedama, existence of God is the law of Karma, Brahma Sutras (iii, 2, 38 and 41). Those Against God Empirical arguments include; problem of evil, destiny of unevangelized and do not believe in Gods existence, arguments from bon believers, inconsistent revelations especially those of the Jewish Tanakh, Muslim Quran identifies contradictions in different scriptures of the Christian Bible about Gods existence. Deductive arguments the ultimate Boeing 747 gambit, the omnipotent paradox, the problem of hell, argument from free will and the anthropoid argument which asserts that if God was omnipotent, omnipresent and perfect morally, he could have created other moral beings and not imperfects humans. Hindu arguments assert that there is no philosophical area for a creationist God. Since existence of God (ishvara) cannot be proved, thus he cannot be admitted to exist. Being Persuasive The existence of God cannot be proved or disproved. The Bible says that we must accept by faith the fact that God exists: “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Even the Bible has quoted clearly that we shall have false prophets who will convince people that there is no God, but from thus context of the verse, i want to believe from my point of view that sincerely God exists. Disagreement If God does exist then why are women getting raped in all corners of the world? If God does exist then why are innocent people being killed all across the globe? These are questions that are extremely hard to answer and this also to some extent prove that God does not exist. There are gun and knife crimes all across the world, if God has power then why is God not intervening? This is again very debatable, those who believe in God would say that human beings have spoiled the society; can Jesus Christ come time and again and save the world? These activities have been going on for too long now and it is time for human beings to realize that they have caused damage beyond repair. It is time to repair that damage by stopping criminals from committing crimes and by punishing the criminals who have been repeat offenders, this is the need of the hour and it needs to be done right away otherwise it all looks doom and gloom. The crime rate has crossed every limit in the world, there are criminals roaming freely and attempting to commit even more crimes, why is God not able to stop these criminals? These are very debatable questions. A superpower in God must be able to stop this menace but this has hardly happened, God needs to play a more active role when it comes to making the world a better place to live in otherwise more and more people will become atheists and will start denying the existence of God. The temptation of evil can be overcome by following the right path of god. But the case becomes very complicated because when the devil tempts, the temptation becomes irresistible only one thing can help out a person in that case, that is prayer, whenever a person feels that he/she is going the wrong way immediately pray to god, god shows the right way and it is god and god alone who can rescue people from the clutches of the devil. The devil planned to trap Adam and Eve, Adam could not resist the temptation of the evil and ate the forbidden apple which ultimately changes his life for worse, similarly if people blindly follow the plans of the devil they will end up ruining their life and their life will be of utter waste. God had created human beings and has given us all a wonderful life to make the most of it and not to waste it as so many people are doing what God doesn’t want them to do and that is to waste their life. Evil weakens the ability of a human being to connect to god; the ultimate aim of evil forces is to expand their kingdom by misguiding as many people as possible. The evil is trying to compete with god and wants to prove its supremacy. But this is unlikely to happen no matter how hard the evil tries it can beat god because he is the creator of every positive thing in the world. “Because the Lord our God is omnipotent, we can confidently trust Him in all things and with all things. Omnipotence simply means "all powerful". This always has the meaning of uniqueness or exclusiveness. In other words, there is no power comparable to the one who is omnipotent. Omnipotence is an essential attribute of God and an attribute that belongs to God alone. It is the nature of God to be almighty. Anything less than an almighty, omnipotent God is no God at all. If God were not omnipotent, He could not be trusted.” (The Omnipotent God). When we say that god is omnipresent this means that we are surrendering our self to god and we acknowledge that he is present everywhere and he is watching our actions. When we take this into account a person who has acknowledged this fact is not expected to lead a life full of sins or misdeeds. The self realization should come from with- in that there can only be one god and he cannot be replaced, he is there at that level because he always makes the right decision and he never goes wrong in his decision making process, a man gets what he deserves and nothing more or nothing less than that. The omnipresence of god is a very vast concept projected differently by different religions but the sole aim of the religions which project this concept is to fear the god and to do great things in life like helping the poor and the needy, helping the underprivileged people, helping handicapped people and there so many good things which can be done in order to make sure that we make the full use of our life. “The power of God is seen in those commissions in the air and earth: thunders, lightning’s, storms, earthquakes, hurricanes. The great beasts of the earth speak of his power: the different types of dinosaurs that once roamed the earth, the whale also is a prodigious monument of Gods power, which is mentioned specifically in the creation account: "And God created great whales." Innumerable other creatures and acts can be mentioned to testify of Gods power, and yet all this exceeds our understanding. We are astonished. No mere man can conceive of Gods might; God himself alone comprehends it. Mans power is limited; his measuring rod is too short to acquire a proper idea of the incomprehensible omnipotence of God. Summary and Conclusion The problem about existence of God can be divided into axes. One is the theism and atheism positions. This two argue that God exists. The other axe is that of Gnosticism and agnosticism which positions of knowledge are. Apathies concerns are those ones which belief regarding practical importance on whether God exists. From the above discussion we find that there is evidence given which supports Gods existence in the universe. We can also not overrule various scholars and philosophers who are against Gods existence since they also present their own comments which might or might not be true, but nobody knows where the fact lies. References Descartes, René, and Michael Moriarty. (2008). Meditations on first philosophy: with selections from the Objections and replies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More