The Existence of God: Anselm

of Canterbury
• St Anslem of Canterbury (sometime between April 1033 and April
1034-1109) in his Proslogion (Discourse) first devised perhaps the
shortest and most elegant proof of God’s existence is called the
‘Ontological argument’.
• This arguments works entirely a priori ( a priori means that it does
not require any premise drawn from experience or observation of
the world).
• It focuses simply on the concept of being. As Anselm puts it ‘ that
than which nothing greater can be thought.‘ Now the question is
• Anselm considers two possibilities here: Either such a
being truly exists in the world or else He exists in the
mind of the believer.
• Now Anselm argues that to exist in reality is surely
greater than to exist only in someone’s mind. If God exists
only in the mind, then something greater can be thought,
which contradicts the original definition.
• Therefore, Anselm concludes, ‘that than which nothing
greater can be thought’ must necessarily exist not merely
in the understanding but in actual reality, which entails that
God not only exists in mind but also in reality.
• The argument has fascinated critics ever since.
 Criticism
• The Monk Gaunilo, a contemporary of Anselm,
objected that if we grant Anselm’s premise that it is
more excellent to exist in reality than to exist
merely in the mind, then we would be able to prove
(absurdly) that the mythical (i.e. not factual) lost
island of Oceane, supposed to be superior in
abundance of reaches to all other lands, must
indeed exist.
• It means that if the idea of a perfect being implies
its existence then the idea of a perfect island must
imply the existence of that island.
• Anselm’s proof also rejected by Thomas Aquinas.
He argued that if we know Gods essence, His
existence would become self-evident, for the two
are one. But no creature knows enough of God’s
essence to be able to deduce His existence.
• Immanuel Kant said that the mere idea of the
existence of a thing does not imply its real
existence. For example, the mere idea of 300
dollars in my mind cannot prove that there are
really 300 dollars in my pocket.
 Comments
• All that the ontological argument can prove is
that the idea of perfection implies the idea of
existence.
• In fact , perfection may be mentally predicated of
a subject, but existence is not a predicate .

• All judgments about existence are synthetic and

can not be derived a priori by an analysis of
concepts.