St.
Anselm (1033-1109) was a French cleric who eventually became the Archbishop of
Canterbury, was exiled, but returned to his post two years before his death. The
fact that he was canonized indicates that his views are considered acceptable
by the Catholic Church, and although he is known as a philosopher and a Doctor
of the Church, and all his biographers stress his originality as a thinker, his
philosophy is generally of little interest, even at its most original, where he
is basically building a bridge between Augustine and Aquinas. But one
aspect of it is of such importance that, by virtue of it alone, he requires a
separate entry here. This aspect is his historically famous ontological
argument for the existence of God, expounded in his treatise The
Proslogion (1078). Although this is a rather lengthy exercise, I see
nothing better than letting Anselm present it now in his own words:
“Be it mine to look up to thy light, even from afar, even from the
depths. Teach me to seek thee, and reveal thyself to me, when I seek thee,---
for I cannot seek thee, except thou teach me, nor find thee, except thou reveal
thyself. Let me seek thee in longing. Let me long for thee in seeking. Let me
find thee in love, and love thee in finding. Lord, I acknowledge and I thank
thee that thou hast created me in this thine image in order that I may be
mindful of thee, conceive of thee, and love thee; but that image has been so consumed
and wasted away by vices and obscured by the smoke of wrong-doing that it cannot
achieve that for which it was made except thou renew it and create it anew. I
do not endeavor, O Lord, to penetrate thy sublimity for in no wise do I compare
my understanding with that; but I long to understand in some degree thy truth
which my heart believes and loves. For, I do not seek to understand so that I
may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I understand,
that unless I believed, I should not understand.
And so, Lord, do thou who giveth understanding to faith, give me so
far as thou knowest it to be profitable to understand that thou art as we
believe, and that thou art that which we believe. And, indeed, we believe that
thou art a being than which nothing greater can be conceived. Or is there no such
nature, since the fool hath said in his heart, there is no God? (Psalms 14:1).
But at any rate this very fool, when he hears of this being of which I speak--
a being than which nothing greater can be conceived-- understands what he
hears, and what he understands is in his understanding; although he does not
understand it to exist. For, it is one thing for an object to be in the
understanding, and another thing to understand that the object exists. When a
painter first conceives of what he will afterwards perform, he has it in his
understanding, but he does not yet understand it to be, because he has not yet
performed it. But after he has made the painting, he both has it in his
understanding, and he understands that it exists, because he has made it.
Hence even the fool is convinced that something exists in the
understanding, at least, than which nothing greater can be conceived. For, when
he hears of this, he understands it. And whatever is understood, exists in
understanding. And, assuredly, that, than which nothing greater can be
conceived, cannot exist in the understanding alone: then it can be conceived to
exist in reality; which is greater.
Therefore, if that than which nothing greater can be conceived
exists in the understanding alone, the very being than which nothing greater
can be conceived is one than which nothing greater can be conceived. But
obviously this is impossible. Hence there can be no doubt that there exists a
being than which nothing greater can be conceived, and it exists both in the understanding
and in reality.
And it assuredly exists so truly, that it cannot be conceived not
to exist. For, it is possible to conceive of a being which cannot be conceived
not to exist; and this is greater than one which can be conceived not to exist.
Hence, if that, than which nothing greater can be conceived, can be conceived
not to exist, it is not that than which nothing greater can be conceived. But
this is an irreconcilable contradiction. There is then so truly a being than
which nothing greater can be conceived to exist that it can’t be conceived not
to exist, and this being thou art, O Lord, our God…
I thank thee, gracious Lord, because what I formerly believed by
thy bounty, I now so understand by thine illumination, that if I were unwilling
to believe that thou dost exist, I should not be able to understand this to be
true.”
…This
long and tedious passage is, however, exceptionally interesting, both because
it presents us with the famous ontological argument from the horse’s
mouth, and as it offers an in-depth glance into the mind of a Christian
theologian of the first magnitude, half-way between the Augustinian theology
and medieval scholasticism. It must be said that the argument itself was
rejected by the theologians of his time, as much as later by Thomas Aquinas,
and later still by a long list of theologians, all of whom were only too happy
to follow St. Thomas’ line. But the fate of this argument was much kinder among
the philosophers, who, apparently, admire people who speak nonsense with logical
consistency, like it was with Zeno Eleaticus and with quite a few others.
Dèscartes was in essentially the same vein as St. Anselm, with his own
ontological cogito ergo sum. Leibniz tried to improve it with the possibility
clause. Kant gave it legitimacy by venturing to refute it once and for all,
in which he did not succeed, as the argument reappeared very much alive in
Hegel, and later in F. H. Bradley’s dictum “What
may be and must be, is.” (Quoted from Russell.)
My
personal attitude towards all attempts to prove faith by reason has been
expressed on a number of such occasions, and in general. Needless to say, I
have no sympathy for St. Anselm’s ontological argument, but nor do I want to
ignore it altogether. In fact, the argument itself is a seminal event in the
history of philosophy (to a much greater extent than in the context of
theology), and, as such, it demands our serious and focused attention, which, I
hope, I have amply given it in this entry.
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