Arguments For God
These are the classical and contemporary arguments that God exists, arranged by the kind of evidence they rest on. Arguments from reason alone begin from the idea of God or from the preconditions of knowledge. Arguments from the world begin from what exists and how it is ordered. Arguments from value, mind, and experience begin from morality, consciousness, and religious experience. The cumulative case gathers the strands together.
Each argument has its own page, with the argument stated in form, its proponents and history, its references, and its standard objections, with links to the pages that answer it.
Start here: Cosmological Argument — Everything that begins to exist has a cause, and the universe began to exist, so the universe has a cause.
A priori — from reason alone
- Ontological Argument — God is the greatest conceivable being, and a being that exists is greater than one that does not, so God must exist.
A posteriori — from the world
- Cosmological Argument — Everything that begins to exist has a cause, and the universe began to exist, so the universe has a cause.
- Teleological / Design Argument — The order, complexity, and fine-tuning of the universe point to a designer rather than to chance alone.
From value, mind, and experience
- Moral Argument — Objective moral values and duties exist, and they are best explained by a moral lawgiver.
- Argument from Consciousness — Conscious, intentional minds are difficult to explain on a purely physical account of the world, and theism explains them better.
A priori — from reason alone
- Argument from Reason — The reliability of human reason, and the laws of logic themselves, point to a rational ground beyond the natural world.
From value, mind, and experience
- Argument from Religious Experience — Widespread and persistent religious experiences are best explained by a transcendent reality that people genuinely encounter.
- Argument from Miracles — Reports of miracles, above all the resurrection of Jesus, provide evidence that a supernatural power acts in the world.
- Aesthetic Argument — The experience of beauty and sublimity points beyond the natural world to a source of beauty itself.
Cumulative and prudential
- Cumulative Case / Pascal's Wager — No single argument may settle the question alone, but together the arguments form a cumulative case, and Pascal's Wager adds a prudential reason to believe.
A priori — from reason alone
- Transcendental Argument — Logic, science, and objective morality presuppose the Christian God, without whom they have no final ground.