Saint Augustine And St. Augustine On The Existence Of God

986 Words2 Pages

From the early stages of of human civilization, Homo sapiens have strived to talked about the existence of God. In almost every era that has passed, humans have tried to explore the existence of God and even presented their own explanations to the concept of God. Some found the Sun to be God, while others try to find a “godly” part in other elements of nature; for example, tress, animals, and even stars. The question of the actually seen God is another argument that populates the debate of many philosophers. Religions, have infact played a critical role in establishing the existence of God. Keep in mind that different religions interpret the presence of God in a distinctive manner.
In this essay, we explore the views of Saint Augustine who lived in the Roman Empire. He served as a noticeable figure in the world of the philosophical discussion. The conversation expands the views of Saint Augustine about the existence of God. Further, it studies how St. Augustine shows “reason” as a tool to second his thoughts and ideologies about the very existence of God. This essay compares the opinions of Augustine with St. Thomas about the existence of God. In the end, a conclusion is presented which summarizes the discussion.

Discussion
Faith & Reason: St. Augustine
St. Augustine enlightened the existence of God by developing a comparison of nature’s animate and inanimate forms. He explained that animals and humans alike are both aform of nature. Having such a body and a soul. Humans, having rational minds makes them superior to other forms of nature. Even at the lowest level a form of nature can be seen which has existence but no life, like the water or stars. This form of nature has neither an understanding or a life; thus, being inferi...

... middle of paper ...

...sophers. Augustine constrained people to explore the evidence of existence by analyzing their perception of reason. While Thomas on the other hand presented a some that involves the scientific reasoning such as motion and gradation for explaining the existence of God. Thomas’s philosophy explains the concept from multiple dimensions; he concludes arguments and reasons using five distinctive approaches. Therefore, the philosophy of Thomas is a thorough one.

Conclusion
From the discussion above, the conclusion that the existence of God can possibly be proven and developed by logical reasoning. Proving can be done by pursuing answers to our everyday questions such as what can be bigger than our reason? Who manages our solar system to act like an animated body. Physical elements of nature support it even though there is no sort of physical evidence for the support.

Open Document