National Teachers College

Manila

Division of Graduate Studies and Research

Master of Arts in Social Science Education
SSED 705—Philosophy of History
First Semester, 2016-2017
Professor: Dr. Gregorio Sismondo

Essay on Existence of Supreme Being in History

Submitted by:

Eva R. Gusto
Introduction

Religion plays a very significant role in the life of man since time immemorial. This

belief is rest on the understanding that a supernatural force, a supreme being is behind everything

that happens in this world and somehow affects the life of everyone. The existence of this

supernatural force is beyond any human comprehension, and said to have served to be the very

boundary which separate man from the Supreme Being. However, many notable philosophers

have developed arguments for and against its very existence. The problem lies on how to prove

or disprove the existence of Supreme Being not only logically but rationally as well.

In this paper, the author will try to prove the existence of Supreme Being based on

historical and philosophical accounts. Is there really a Supreme Being? How do people through

times approved and disproved the existence of Supreme Being?

Discussion

Supreme Being is a term for God used by theologians and philosophers of many religious

faiths, including Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism and deism. It is also generally described

in symbolic terms that reflect the values most highly apprised in a specific historical situation.

Considering the complexities of any culture’s history, it is extraordinary that a comparative

discussion of the nature of supreme beings constantly returns to the same cluster of religious

ideas.

Supreme Beings are divinities whose nature reveals a unique quality of being—generally,

a transcendent spiritual power—in a culture’s religious system. Such divine beings figure in

many different religious systems, yet they manifest values and symbolic associations that display

remarkable similarities. Andrew Lang, the Scottish writer, calls this Supreme Being as the “High
God” who does not interfere in the day-to-day affairs of human being. The concept of God as

described by most theologians includes the attributes of omniscience (infinite knowledge),

omnipotence (unlimited power), omnipresence (present everywhere), divine simplicity, and as

having an eternal and necessary existence. Many theologians also describe God as being

omnibenevolent (perfectly good) and all loving.

In monotheism, God is conceived of as the Supreme Being and principal object of faith.

In theism, God is the creator and sustainers of the universe, while in deism, God is the creator but

not the sustainers of the universe. In pantheism, God is the universe itself. In atheism, God is not

believed to exist, while God is deemed knowable and unknowable within the context of

agnosticism.

God is most often held to be non-corporeal, and to be without any human biological sex,

yet the concept of God actively creating the universe has caused many religions to describe God

using masculine terminology, using terms as “Him” or “Father”. Furthermore, some religions

(such as Judaism) attribute only a purely grammatical “gender of God”.

Although essential elements of the power and structure of supreme beings may be

recognized and isolated for the sake of analytic discussions, it must be acknowledge that they

have appeared across human history in complex forms that differ greatly in specific composition

from one culture to another. Their manifestations are not limited to one or even several places on

the globe. Nor does geographic distribution entirely explain the process of the historical

development or diffusion of this religious idea. No matter how marginal to the history of

technological development a culture might appear to be, that culture’s complex notions of

Supreme Being give evidence of a lengthy and complicated history. There appear to be no social
or economic factors that determine, in cause-and- effect fashion, the compound of elements that

constitute the form through which Supreme Being reveals itself in a culture. After a lengthy

debate among scholars, little doubt remains that sophisticated theologies of Supreme Being

predate the introduction, through missionary or colonial influence, of theological ideas from

historical monotheisms.

Concepts of Supreme Being or God in philosophy are entwined with concepts of

God in religion. This is most obvious in figures like Augustine and Aquinas, who sought to bring

more rigor and consistency to concepts found in religion. Others like Leibniz and Hegel

interacted constructively and deeply with religious concepts. Even those like Hume and

Nietzsche, who criticized the concept of God, dealt with religious concepts. Aquinas for

instance, developed a theological system that synthesized Western Christian theology with the

philosophy of the ancient Greek thinker Aristotle particularly as it had been interpreted by

Aristotle’s later Islamic commentators. In his Summa Theologica, which he intended as a primer

for theology students, Aquinas devised five arguments for the existence of God (Five Ways) that

subsequently proved highly influential. His first three arguments—from motion, from causation,

and from contingency—are types of what is called the cosmological argument for divine

existence. Each begins with a general truth about natural phenomena and proceeds to the

existence of an ultimate creative source of the universe. In each case, Aquinas identifies this

source with God. The second of the Five Ways, the argument from causation, builds upon

Aristotle’s notion of an efficient cause, the entity or event responsible for a change in particular

thing. Aristotle gives as examples a person reaching a decision, a father begetting a child, and a

sculptor carving a statue. Because every efficient cause must itself have an efficient cause and

because there cannot be an infinite chain of efficient causes, there must be an immutable first
cause of all the changes that occur in the world, and this first cause is God. Aquinas third

demonstration of God’s existence is the argument from contingency, which he advances by

distinguishing between possible and necessary beings. Possible being are those capable of

existing and not existing. If a being is capable of not existing, then there is a time at which it

does not exist. If every being is possible, therefore, then there would be a time at which nothing

existed. But then there would be nothing in existence now, because no being can come into

existence except through a being that already exists. Therefore, there must be at least one

necessary being—a being that is not capable of not existing. Furthermore, every necessary being

is either necessary in itself or caused to be necessary by another necessary being. But just as

there cannot be an infinite chain of efficient causes, so there cannot be an infinite chain of

necessary beings whose necessity is caused by another necessary being. Rather, there must be a

being that is necessary in itself, and this being is God. Aquinas fourth argument is that from

degrees of perfection. All things exhibit greater or lesser degrees of perfection. There must

therefore exist a supreme perfection that all imperfect beings approach yet fall short. In

Aquinas‘s system, God is the paramount of perfection. Aquinas’s fifth and final way to

demonstrate God’s existence is an argument from final causes, or ends in nature. Again he drew

upon Aristotle, who held that each thing has its own natural purpose or end. Some things,

however—such as natural bodies—lack intelligence and are thus incapable of directing

themselves toward their ends. Therefore, they must be guide by some intelligent and

knowledgeable being, which is God.

St. Anselm thought that God’s existence follows necessarily from our conception of Him.

As long as we can think of God as a being so great that we can conceive of no greater being, we
cannot deny that God exists without involving ourselves in a hopeless contradiction. This

argument was later used by Descartes, Baruch Spinoza and Leibniz.

Another philosopher who contributed to the idea for the existence of God was Blaise

Pascal. Blaise Pascal was a French mathematician who put forward an argument that would

appeal to agnostics (An agnostic is someone who believes that it is impossible to prove God’s

existence.) His Argument goes something like this: God either exists or he does not. If we

believe in God and he exists, we will be rewarded with eternal bliss in heaven. If we believe in

God and he does not exist then at worst all we have forgone is a few sinful pleasures. If we do

not believe in God and he does exist we may enjoy a few sinful pleasures, but we may face

eternal damnation. If we do not believe in God and he does not exist then our sins will not be

punished. Would any rationally gambler think that the experience of a few sinful pleasures is

worth the risk of eternal damnation? In other words, it is “infinitely” rational to believe in God

than not to. If God exists, the “pay off” is so enormous and there is no loss if he does not.

Immanuel Kant on the other hand attempted to show how philosophy could prove the

existence of God. Unfortunately for him his previous work showed that we could not know

reality directly as thing-in itself. What is real in itself is beyond our experience. Even if God

exists, we cannot know God as he really is. For Kant the Christian could have faith in God, and

this faith would be consonant with reason and the categorical imperative. Given that human

beings have the autonomy to create moral values; it would not be irrational to believe in a God

who gives purpose to the moral realm. Soren Kierkegaard agreed with Kant that the existence of

God could not be proven with reason. However, Kierkegaard did not think that it was rational to

believe in God; rather one should have faith in God even if this seems to reason to be absurd. To
put it another way reason has no place in faith. God is beyond reason. Because of this idea of

Kierkegaard, he was regarded as the first existentialist.

Friedrich Hegel as mentioned earlier interacted constructively and deeply with religious

concepts but had a different idea about the concept of Supreme Being or God. Hegel thought that

the god of religion was an intuition of Absolute Spirit or Geist. Hegel’s Geist is not like the

transcendent (outside of our consciousness) God of traditional Christianity. For Hegel God is

immanent and when we have understood that history is the process of Geist coming to know

itself it appears that we are all part of Geist, or God.

While there were philosophers who supported and proved the existence of Supreme

Being, there were also several philosophers who presented arguments against the existence of

God. Some of these arguments find God’s existence incompatible with observed facts; some are

arguments that God does not exist because the concept of God is incoherent or confused. Others

are criticisms of the proof offered for God’s existence. In short, how can we say that God really

exist? Bishop George Berkeley’s “Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge”

has somehow answered this question. In this writing, he explained that things only exist either as

a result of their being perceived or by virtue of the fact that they are an entity doing the

perceiving. He stated esse est percipi a Latin for “To be is to be perceived” He argued that the

continued existence of things results from the perception of God, regardless of whether there are

humans around or not, and any order humans may see in nature is effectively just the

handwriting of God. This idea regarding the existence of God was further explained by Rene

Descartes. According to him, the existence of God is possible by the presence in our minds the

idea of an all perfect being. This idea of an all perfect being cannot be the product of the mind

since we are an imperfect being. Thus, God must put this idea of an all perfect being into our
minds (something innate) which does not have any mental existence. He also added that God is

the link between the rational world of the mind and the mechanical world of the intellect.

However, despite the arguments and “proofs” presented supporting the existence of God, there

were also philosophers who presented their own arguments against the existence of Supreme

Being. One of the most influential and powerful “proofs” that there is no God proceeds from

“The Problem from Evil”. This Argument claims that the following three statements cannot all

be true: (a) evil exists; (b) God is omnipotent; (c) God is all-loving. The argument is as follows:

 If God can prevent evil, but doesn’t, then He isn’t all-loving

 If God intends to prevent evil, but cannot, then he isn’t omnipotent

 If God both intends to prevent evil and is capable of doing so, then how can evil exist?

Another argument claims that the existence of an all-knowing God is incompatible with one

fact of freewill—that humans do make choices. If God is omniscient, He must know beforehand

exactly what a person will do in a given situation. In that case, a person is not in fact free to do

the alternative to what God knows he or she will do, and freewill must be an illusion. To take

this one step further, if one chooses to commit a sin, how can it then be said that one sinned

freely?

Another argument against God’s existence has something to do with problems with Divine

Justice. The doctrine of Divine Justice is also subject to criticism. First of all, it appears to

conflict with the idea that God is forgiving. A just God sees that each person gets what he or she

deserves; a forgiving God sees that some people’s sins go unpunished, that some people don’t

get what they deserve. Second, the Christian view of heaven and hell appear in many ways to be

unjust. Hell, for instance, appears inflict an infinitely great punishment upon those who are sent

there. How, though, can any finite sin deserve infinite punishment? Just punishments and
rewards are proportionate to the badness or goodness of the person that deserves them. Heaven

and Hell though, are all nothing, and so cannot be just.

Philosophers like Hume also provided powerful critiques of the main arguments for God’s

existence. Against the cosmological argument (Aquinas’ third argument) he argued that the idea

of a necessarily existing being is absurd. Hume stated, “Whatever we can conceive as existent,

we can also conceive as non-existent”. He also asked why the ultimate source of the universe

could not be the entire universe itself, eternal and uncaused, without a God.

Hume also criticized the argument from design (Aquinas’s fifth argument). In particular,

he emphasized that there is no legitimate way we can infer the properties of God as the creator of

the world from the qualities of His creation. For instance, Hume questioned how we can be sure

that the world was not created by a team; or, on the other hand, that our world is not a poor first

attempt “of an infant deity who afterwards abandoned it, ashamed of his lame performance”.

Some thinkers, including the anthropologist Ludwig Feuerbach and psychologist Sigmund Freud,

have argued that God and other religious beliefs are human inventions, created to fulfil various

psychological and emotional wants and needs. Marxists like Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and

the Russian anarchist and revolutionary Mikhail Bakunin have argued that belief in God and

religion are social functions, used by those in power to oppress and enslave the working classes.

For Feurbach and Marx religion is seen as the projection of the human essence onto an ideal:

God does not make man. Rather “God” is the invention of human consciousness. Marx also seen

that religion is part of an ideological view that encourages the oppressed to accept their fate. As

he says: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the sentiment of a heartless world, and

the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the

illusory happiness of men is a demand for their real happiness. The call to abandon their illusions
about their condition is a call to abandon a condition which requires illusions”. Jean Paul Sartre

also thinks it is impossible for God to exist. Sartre conceives and deals with the notion of God in

three ways. First, God qua Creator; second, God qua causa sui; and third, God qua Absolute

Third. By examining the three ways, it will be seen how the proof of the non-existence of God is

founded upon one major concept, man’s absolute freedom. Sartre is convinced that man’s

freedom cannot be reconciled with the existence of God. The problem of reconciling man’s

freedom and God’s omniscience has plagued philosophical thought for a long time. Sartre’s

solution to this problem is to say that God does not exist. Man’s freedom takes precedence over

God. “I am condemned to be free. This means that no limits to my freedom can be found except

freedom itself or, if you prefer, that we are not free to cease being free”. The primordiality of

man’s freedom is clearly stated in his book Being and Nothingness. His other arguments include:

a. If God existed then he would have created the world. But God is pure subjectivity, and

thus it is impossible for God to create an object that has objective status. “The tragedy of

absolute Creator, if he existed, would be the impossibility of getting out himself, for

whatever he created could be only himself”.

b. If God did create the world, and thus is continually creating the world, then this would

compromise man’s freedom. To create an object is to determine its nature. Thus, if man is

still part of God’s creation qua a continual process, the man is not free.

The so called classical “proofs” and arguments FOR and AGAINST the existence of

Supreme Being are always open to critical analysis until now. However, one cannot deny the fact

that both parties presented somehow a degree of truthfulness which left us to doubt even our own

belief as to whether God or the Supreme Being does really exist. Is there really a supreme being?
Conclusion

Questions about the existence of Supreme Being may lead us to the question of faith

over reason and reason over intelligence. Consequently, humans used this very same intelligence

to question the existence of Supreme Being. He used this intelligence to prove and disprove the

existence of God. But despite everything and all the arguments presented against the existence of

Supreme Being there is one thing we can all be sure of; that humans cannot have all the answers

to himself because at the end of the day, he is just human, a human with limitations not only

physically and emotionally but intellectually as well. In addition, most arguments relating to

“proofs” against the existence of God revolve around the notion and nature of God and that of

freewill. Yet the question is this; how can one disprove the existence of something he does not

believe to exist in the first place? For instance, how can you know something which does not

exist? If that thing does not exist, then how do you come to know it? Berkeley once said that it is

impossible for something to exist without being perceived. Just like God, though no one can see

him but somehow at some point in our life, we all came to that situation where we could not help

but wonder in everything around us, left us in awe in the mystery of our very existence. And that

alone, the writer believes, is the strongest proof and argument for the existence of Supreme

Being.
 Bibliography

A. Books

Cruz, Corazon L. “Philosophy of Man” (Third Edition). National Bookstore, 1995

Ramos, Christine Carmela R. “Introduction to Philosophy”. 2004

Lisson, Steven Cecil. “Sartre’s Conception of God”. MA: McMaster University, 1983

Emberson, Iain A. “Outline for the Four Classic Proofs for God’s Existence: How (if all)

can These be Useful in Contemporary Evangelism? 2009

B. Electronic Sources

https://www.google.com.ph/#q=related:www.iep.utm.edu/god-west/+god+western+concepts

http%3A%2F%2Fwww.encyclopedia.com%2Farticle-1G2-3424503003%2Fsupreme-

beings.html&usg=AFQjCNGR4oSOX-IQoAakPuAIImeFouzY1w&bvm=bv.135258522,d.dGo

https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Being

mb-soft.com/believe/text/argument.htm

https://www.academia.edu

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Being_Spirits_and_Ancestor_Worship&usg=AFQjCNEi7yc-

6nVVjmqdbJ_Qq1ZFlAjNEw&bvm=bv.135258522,d.dGo
Role of the Teacher
As a start, she should help students learn how to ask
questions.
In addition to inculcating an inquiring mind, the
teacher allows to a great extent flexibility in the
students’ ways of doing things.
Inquiry teaching extracts tremendous demands on the
teacher’s ability to plan learning activities that will
improve critical thinking, objectivity and rationality
among students.
Above all, the teacher herself should be fully aware of
her changed roles that of a guide, facilitator and
counselor rather than the usual authority who not
only determines the material to be learned but also
dictates how it should be learned