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Home , Anselm of Canterbury, Boethius, Diocles (mathematician), Gaunilo of Marmoutiers, John Scotus Eriugena, Ontological argument

A CONTEXTUAL EXAMINATION OF

ST. ANSELM'S ONTOLOGICAL

MARTA E. LAYTON

Bachelor of Science in Mathematical Sciences

The University of North Carolina at Greensboro

May, 2005

submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree of

MASTER OF IN

at the

CLEVELAND UNIVERSITY

August, 2008

This thesis has been approved

for the Department of PHILOSOPHY

and the College of Graduate Studies by

______Thesis Chairperson, Dr. Nicholas Moutafakis

______Department & Date

______Dr. Martin Harvey

______Department & Date

______Dr. Diane Steinberg

______Department & Date

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In many regards a masters thesis is a solitary endeavor. However, this project would not have been possible without the assistance of many people. I am particularly thankful to my thesis advisor and committee chairperson, Dr. Nicholas Moutafakis, for the guidance and critique that helped me refine the presented here.

I also thank the members of my thesis committee, Dr. Diane Steinberg and Dr.

Martin Harvey, and many other faculty and students of the Cleveland State University

Department of Philosophy, whose willingness to discuss my ideas has been invaluable.

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A CONTEXTUAL EXANIMATION OF

ST. ANSELM'S

MARTA LAYTON

ABSTRACT

Many scholars, both in the history of philosophy and in contemporary , have criticized and defended St. Anselm's ontological argument. Much of the work on the has evaluated the argument of II1 and III using symbolic , and has either focused on presenting what the author thinks St. Anselm was saying in those chapters, or has critiqued the logic of the ontological argument's structure or of the plausibility of its premises. Few authors have looked at how St. Anselm's conception of

God in the later chapters of the Proslogion and in the Monologion affect the ontological argument. Fewer still have inspected the way St. Anselm would have been affected by historical events and by the work of earlier .

This thesis aims to examine the ontological argument of St. Anselm, both in terms of why St. Anselm chose to develop it as he did and whether it is logically valid and sound. I begin by exploring the historical events that would have influenced St.

Anselm's thought, such as the hierarchical of Benedictine and the power struggles between the and Franks in medieval . I will then turn to

St. Anselm's writings, looking at the theistic proofs he gives in both the Monologion and

1 Throughout this thesis I will use this notation to refer to the chapter number of the book discussed. It allows me to avoid less direct phrasing, such as "the second chapter of the Proslogion." iv

the Proslogion. In this way I will be able to identify the ontological argument that was advanced by St. Anselm.

Having identified the Anselmian ontological argument, I will then evaluate this argument's logical validity and . I will first consider what logical sources from antiquity St. Anselm would likely have had access to. This will allow me to establish the system of logic St. Anselm would have used in evaluating his argument. I will conclude this thesis by critiquing the challenges raised by Gaunilo, St. , and

Immanuel Kant to Anselm's argument. This approach makes it possible to evaluate St.

Anselm according to the logic he would have known when constructing his argument, and thereby to avoid anachronistic criticisms.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... iii

ABSTRACT ...... iv

CHAPTER

I. Introduction ...... 1

II. HISTORICAL INFLUENCES ON ST. ANSELM'S

ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT ………………………………… 4

Introduction ………………………………………………. 4

The Development of …………….. 6

Ecumenicism and the Ontological Argument ……………. 11

Toward a Definition of Power …………………………… 16

Conclusion ……………………………………………….. 23

III. ST. ANSELM'S PROOFS FOR THE OF IN

THE MONOLOGION ……………………………………………. 25

Introduction ………………………………………………. 25

Goodness and Greatness in the Monologion …………….. 26

Existence in the Monologion …………………………….. 29

Conclusion ……………………………………………….. 35

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IV. ST. ANSELM'S PROOFS FOR THE IN

THE PROSLOGION ……………………………………………… 36

Introduction ………………………………………………. 36

The Argument in Proslogion II …………………………... 37

One Argument or Two? …………………………………... 43

The Argument in Proslogion III ………………………….. 46

Conclusion ………………………………………………... 49

V. THE INFLUENCE OF CLASSICAL LOGIC ON THE

ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT …………………………………. 50

Introduction ……………………………………………….. 50

Logic Before …………………………………….. 51

Aristotelian Logic …………………………………………. 55

Definitions and First …………………………… 59

Stoic and Megarian Logic ………………………………… 63

Textual Transmission and Medieval Logic ………………. 66

Conclusion ………………………………………………. 69

VI. DEFENDING THE FOOL: CRITICISMS OF ST. ANSELM'S

ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT ………………………………… 72

Introduction ……………………………………………… 72

Historical Criticisms …………………………………….. 73

Gaunilo ………………………………………….. 73

St. Thomas Aquinas …………………………….. 78

Immanuel Kant …………………………………. 80

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The Validity of Proslogion II's Argument ……………….. 84

The Validity of Proslogion III's Argument ………………. 87

Conclusion ……………………………………………….. 93

VII. Conclusion ……………………………………………………….. 94

BIBLIOGRAPHY ……………………………………………………………….. 97

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CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Of the various for the existence of God, the ontological argument is one of the most influential to the history of later thought. Many of the medieval arguments for God's existence are not seriously considered viable by contemporary scholars, but the ontological argument is still heavily debated. At first glance, the argument seems too simple to survive scrutiny, and it appears that it merely asserts God's existence rather than proving it. However, when the ontological argument is examined more closely, we discover that it is fiendishly difficult to disprove.

St. Anselm presented the ontological argument in Proslogion II and III. He begins by defining God as "that than which greater can be conceived" and observes that, for the fool to deny God's existence and to understand what he is saying, he grant

God existence in the understanding. St. Anselm argues that God cannot exist only within the fool's understanding because it would be greater for God to exist beyond the

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understanding than to be limited to the fool's understanding. This draws on a metaphysical assertion that existence not limited to the understanding is greater than existence limited to the understanding – what a contemporary might describe as the that existence (as more than just a concept) is a greatness-enhancing .

The claim that existence is a predicate of any sort is very controversial in post-Kantian philosophy, but this problem does not seem to have troubled St. Anselm; neither St.

Anselm nor his contemporaries questioned this aspect of the ontological argument. This thesis will therefore focus on other challenges to the ontological argument that were more debated by philosophers in St. Anselm's own day, such as whether a being "than which nothing greater can be conceived" is itself conceivable, and whether the fool understands

God in the way the ontological argument requires.

The ontological argument was not St. Anselm's first attempt to prove God's existence. In his earlier work, The Monologion, St. Anselm offered a proof built on observations about the way different inherit their characteristics. If a being existed, St. Anselm argued, it either received its existence through another being or through itself. If its existence was inherited, then the being had existence of a lower sort than the being from which it inherited its existence. Moreover, there could be only one being through which all beings received their existence, and this being had existence of a higher type than any other being. St. Anselm also developed similar arguments for greatness and goodness, and observed that the being through which all other beings inherit these characteristics was the same being, which St. Anselm named God. Since all other beings receive their existence through God, and since a being could not pass on a characteristic that it did not itself possess, St. Anselm concluded that God must exist.

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Since St. Anselm considered this proof successful, it seems odd that he would publish a second proof for God's existence. St. Anselm explains his for offering this additional proof in the prologue of the Proslogion. He writes,

After I had published, at the solicitous entreaties of a certain brethren, a brief work [the Monologion] as an example of on the grounds of , in the of one who investigates, in a course of silent reasoning with himself, matters of which he is ignorant; considering that this book was knit together by the linking of many arguments, I began to ask myself whether there might be found a single argument which would require no other for its proof than itself alone.2

In the Monologion St. Anselm is writing in the person of someone investigating questions to which he does not already know the answer, and the Monologion is in many ways a narrative of self-discovery. The Proslogion, on the other hand, is structured as an argument and is addressed to an opponent: the "fool [who] has said in his heart, there is no God."3 At least on its face, is less a meditation and more a proof than is the

Monologion.

In the coming chapters I will examine the similarities and difference between these arguments more closely. To lay the necessary groundwork, this examination will begin with a brief look at some of the historical factors that led St. Anselm to develop the arguments in the way he did. I will then offer a more in-depth reading of the pertinent passages from the Monologion and Proslogion, and will conclude by evaluating several common criticisms made about the ontological argument.

2 Anselm, Proslogion Prologue. Text inside square brackets was added by the editor of the Medieval Sourcebook. 3Anselm, Proslogion II. Text inside square brackets was added by myself for clarity. 3

CHAPTER II

HISTORICAL INFLUENCES ON ST. ANSELM'S

ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

Introduction

The ontological argument is framed in the of a logical proof, specifically that of a proof by contradiction, and so it is easy to seize upon perceived logical faults or strengths and analyze St. Anselm's argument this way. This approach has been taken by classical philosophers as diverse as St. Thomas Aquinas4 and Immanuel Kant, 5 as well as more modern scholars such as ,6 Vincent Spade,7 and A. Truncellito.8

However, if the investigations of the ontological argument focus on the argument's soundness and validity (or lack thereof), to the point that it ignores the historical context in which the argument was written, St. Anselm's readers will do him a great disservice.

4 Theologica 1aQ2 5 c.f. Critique of Pure , p. A592-A602. 6 c.f. God and Other Minds. 7 c.f. "Anselm and Ambiguity" 8 c.f. "Anselm's Equivocation" 4

Before turning to a more textual interpretation and evaluation of the ontological argument, I will first examine several historical and social factors that may have influenced how St. Anselm chose to his argument. This chapter will look at three key historical developments that might have affected how St. Anselm framed his ontological argument: the shift from hermitic to communal monasticism in France and

Germany; the persecution of Arian Christians, Roman Catholics, and religious minorities by the Franks and Visigoths; and the Franks' struggle to legitimize their rule over the

French people. All of these factors had an influence on the development of St. Anselm's ontological argument.

Many attempts to describe how general events contribute to an individual's philosophical work are speculative endeavors. The same historical event may affect different individuals in very different ways, or may affect one individual significantly and another hardly at all. Few of St. Anselm's communications have survived to modern times, and so it is difficult to say with authority what historical events most affected St.

Anselm and in what way. Someone hoping to understand Anselm's ontological argument in this way must proceed with caution, but he need not become a complete skeptic. We do know a deal about St. Anselm's biography, and his and place in history would probably have influenced him in fairly predictable ways. The careful scholar can identify several events that would have likely affected how he presented his proof's for

God's existence – perhaps not with certainty that they impacted St. Anselm the way that is speculated, but with a fair degree of confidence.

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The Development of Christian Monasticism

St. Anthony the Great (c. 251-356) is generally recognized as the father of Christian monasticism. He was not the first Christian , but he was the first to attract a following that developed into a monastic order; his extreme asceticism led others to imitate his style of solitary living. According to the vita written by St. Athanasius about him, he lived for twenty years in the desert in an abandoned fort, refusing all human contact. Over time several of the pilgrims who journeyed to the fort adopted his hermitic life, living in the caves near him, though for several years St. Anthony refused to meet with them. Eventually (c. 305) he left his fort and worked with the who had come to live near him, both instructing them on spiritual matters and improving the organization of this primitive monastic order.

However, the organization of St. Anthony's followers was very different from the monastic orders that developed in in the . St. Anthony's followers were primarily hermitic monks. It is true that they organized a loose community, but this was primarily to divide necessary labors in a way that benefited all of the monks. A monk could bake bread for his fellow monks nearly as easily as he could bake it for himself, and by taking turns at this task, the monks would not need to devote as much time to some non-spiritual concerns. It is true that some of the desert monastic communities9 were more communal than St. Anthony's was, but these more communal monastic orders were exceptional rather than the general rule of the early Egyptian monks. Medieval

9 For one such example, consider the community founded c. 315 by Pachomius at Tabernissi. Here work was done in small groups rather than individually and where the monks met weekly for worship services. 6

European monks, on the other hand, lived in a much more communal fashion. They met daily for worship and often ate their meals together.

This more communal nature is due to several factors. First, the Egyptian desert monks lived in a time when it was relatively safe to live as a . In the fourth century, the was still capable of providing unified legal protection for its citizens.

This allowed monks to live in isolation, relatively free from fear of being attacked by criminals. The desert also provided some protection; it was difficult to travel into the desert wilderness, so monks were less likely to face attacks from those who did not live in the area. The climate, too, made a hermitic lifestyle more appropriate. If a monk lived near a water source and had shelter from the heat, and if he had access to a little food, he need not be afraid of dying from exposure or starvation. In northern Europe, on the other hand, the climate was less accommodating. The winters in this region were much colder than they were around the Mediterranean, which necessitated that the monks live somewhere that could be affectively heated. This encouraged monks to live in constructed buildings rather than in caves. They also needed warm clothes and boots, which would occasionally need to be repaired or replaced. A monk in France could not live alone for decades at a time, as St. Anthony had. Moreover, without a desert or the

Roman Empire's stability to provide protection, European monks were less safe from attack; they needed to live in a community more than St. Anthony's followers had.

This shift from hermitic to communal monasticism also decreased the focus on asceticism that had been present in early monasticism. The early hermitic monks would eat little, and what they did eat would be simple dishes. They left their families and homes for a harsh life in the wilderness and eschewed human contact, often for years at a

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time. This rough life only attracted monks who were extremely devoted to the spiritual life hermitic monasticism encouraged. Communal monasticism, on the other hand, was not as strenuous a way of life. These monks lived in buildings rather than in caves. They had good clothing and interacted with other men. The life of a monk in a communal order was still less pleasant than the life he would have lived outside a monastic order, but it was also not as hard as the life lived by the early desert monks.

The challenges faced by the early communal monks were addressed by the

Benedictines. St. (c. 480-547), who founded this order, was himself a hermitic monk, but he also recognized that some Christians might benefit from a monastic life without necessarily being called to a hermitic life. Even St. Benedict himself lived a less absolute hermitage than St. Anthony had; while he lived in a cave for several decades without regular interaction with other men, this cave was on the outskirts of rather than in the middle of the desert, and he did occasionally receive visitors.

He also organized his followers into communal monastic orders nearly as soon as he began to attract a following. In 529 he founded the at , where he and his followers left cave-dwellings for more elaborate buildings. To guard them against excess, St. Benedict wrote a well-circulated Rule, governing areas as diverse as when the brothers should meet, what they should eat and wear, and what type of behavior needed correction. This rule provided a standard against which an order could be evaluated, and the were instrumental in reforming Christian monasticism throughout northern Europe.

More pertinent to the ontological argument, the Rule of St. Benedict provides a good deal of about the type of life St. Anselm would likely have lived. At the

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time St. Anselm joined the monastery at Bec, it was a relatively young monastery and had not yet become as entangled in regional as older tended to be.

The monks at Bec were still committed to the Benedictine , and so their leader most likely lived a life in compliance with the Rule. In addition, , the under whom St. Anselm joined the monastery, started a renowned school at Bec that attracted scholars from across Europe.10 The monastery would have attracted many able and intelligent men. The fact that St. Anselm was chosen as Lanfranc's successor, first as and later as abbot, suggests that St. Anselm was well-regarded according to the standards of that community.

So what does the Rule of St. Benedict tell us about St. Anselm? St. Anselm, like any Benedictine monk, would have divided his day between communal prayer service

(4.5 hours per day), private study (3-5 hours per day), and some practical labor (6-7 hours per day). For an educated monk, this last portion could have involved academic work, such as copying manuscripts or writing treatises. He would have had specific times of the day during which he was expected to study and write, and this time would have been broken up by communal prayers and meals at regular intervals. From these facts, we can reasonably deduce the amount of time that St. Anselm would have devoted to each of his treatises (since we know when they were published and how many hours per day he could devote to academic endeavors), and also what other types of work he would have been doing when he was not working on his treatises. St. Anselm's day would have been very different from (for example) ', who spent much of his time engaging the

Athenians in , or Kant's, who worked as a private tutor and university professor.

10 Birt's "Lanfranc." 9

The portion of his day devoted to private study would not have been spent exclusively on the study of Christian Scripture. St. Anselm was a monk and so would have studied 's holy texts, both by himself and with other monks, but

Benedictine monasticism recognized the importance of studying works other than the

Bible, even those written outside the . Many Benedictine libraries, most notably 's library at Vivarium, included treatises by both Christian and non-

Christian authors as well as holy texts11 Previté-Orton observed about Cassiodorus, "But for him and the learned turn he gave to Benedictine labors it is possible that no classic, save , would have reached us complete."12 The holy texts were still the primary study of the Benedictine monks, but Cassiodorus and other Benedictines recognized the of secular learning. Through the libraries created by Benedictine monks, St. Anselm would have access to many works from antiquity.

The final aspect of the Rule that deserves comment in connection with the ontological argument is the Rule's treatment of speech. Many monks, especially hermitic monks, took a vow of silence that lasted for years. The Rule of St. Benedict did not prohibit speech altogether; it did encourage moderation, but profitable or necessary speech"13 was not discouraged. In addition, the Rule urged the monastery to gather for communal discussions to address issues important to the whole community. The decision of the abbot was absolute, but he was supposed to listen to the opinions of other monks where this would be helpful. St. Anselm would have learned how to present and defend his position eloquently in these communal gatherings. Yet his style of argument would

11 The monastery at Bec was affiliated with the great Benedictine monastery Cluny, and so St. Anselm would have had greater exposure to resources (both living and written) at other Clunaic monasteries than he would have if he had lived at an independent monastery. 12 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 286-287. 13 The Rule of St. Benedict, Ch. 6, qtd. Alston "The Rule of St. Benedict" 10

have been tempered by the need for only "profitable or necessary speech." This is evident in the ontological argument, which proceeds from premise to conclusion with little diversion.14

In the Proslogion St. Anselm speaks of how he often turned his thoughts to the possibility of finding a single proof for God's existence, and having specific hours when he was expected to think about religious in solitude would encourage this type of thought. However, the communal nature of living in a Cluny-affiliated Benedictine monastery also had its affect, giving him access to academic resources.15 The unique blend of hermitic and communal monasticism present in eleventh-century France contributed to the ontological argument, and by understanding these movements we can better understand why St. Anselm formulated his argument in the way that he did.

Ecumenicism and the Ontological Argument

The history of Christian monasticism, and in particular of the Benedictine order, reveals a good deal about the academic environment in which St. Anselm developed the ontological argument. Broader historical events also contributed to how he chose to frame his argument, and by studying them it is possible to theorize why he formulated the ontological argument in the way that he did.

14 This same emphasis on simple, clear statements is evident in the scholastic form of argument. While St. Anselm's arguments were not written in the scholastic form, his need to clearly state his opponent's position and his own reasons for objecting to it is an important precursor of . 15 I will consider precisely what resources St. Anselm might have had access to in a later chapter. 11

In the centuries between the fall of the Roman Empire and St. Anselm's own lifetime, France experienced several regime changes. Tensions between Arian and

Catholic Christians led to persecutions of both groups as well as religious minorities like the . Pagans in Germany, particularly the Saxons, were oppressed by in large part because they refused to convert to Christianity. In light of this history of religious strife, it is perhaps significant that the ontological argument does not appeal to

Scriptural authority,16 nor does it require any theological belief specific to any of the groups that populated post-Roman France. All that is required to be convinced by the ontological argument is that a person define God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived," which Arians, Catholics, and Jews should all be able to do.

The major Christian denominations in France during the post-Roman period were the Catholics17 and the Arians. These groups differed from each other primarily in how they saw relating to : Catholics accepted a trinitarian formulation of the Godhead, whereas Arians insisted that Christ co-existed with God the Father but was not part of the same being. For Christians under the Roman and Eastern

Orthodox churches, this issue was answered definitely in 325 A.D. by the Council of

Nicaea, which described Christ as "Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made." 18 In 381

A.D. this position was further enforced by an edict published by the Byzantine emperor,

16 It is true that St. Anselm quotes 14:1 when he says at the beginning of Proslogion II: "the fool has said in his heart, There is no God." However, the argument would proceed in the same way if St. Anselm observed that many men deny there is a God. Anselm may quote the psalmist, but he does not rely on the authority of Christian Scripture to prove his argument. 17 I use the word "Catholic" to refer to Christian , which at this point in history would include the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. When referring to just those Christians under the Roman , I will use "Roman Catholic." 18 The Latin text, as recorded in the Missale Romanum, reads "Deum de Deo, lumen de lúmine, Deum uerum de Deo uero. Genitum, non factum, consubstantialem patri per quem omnia facta sunt." 12

requiring all his citizens to accept the Nicaean under penalty of death. Though there were pockets of resistance, these two acts ensured that trinitarianism became the dominant form of Christianity in the Mediterranean world.

In France and Germany, however, Arian Christianity survived. The influential missionary Ulfilas taught it among the tribes of Germany, and many Arian refugees left the lands that had once been the Roman Empire in favor of northern Europe, where the

Catholic churches were less influential. When the Visigoths first converted to Christianity they became Arians, and several of those viciously persecuted the Catholic

Christians living in their . This was far from a policy, and in the early days after the fall of the Roman Empire the old Roman citizens often filled administrative roles in the Visigoth kingdom; many kings, however, made it illegal to practice Catholic

Christianity, and it was not uncommon for Catholic to be executed under those regimes.

The situation grew worse in the sixth and seventh century, for two primary reasons. First, as time passed, the Visigoths learned to administer their kingdom without needing Roman assistance, and there was less of an obvious divide in talents between the

Gallo-Romans and the native Visigoths. As the Gallo-Romans19 became less needed than they once had to administer the kingdom, the ruling Visigoths had less incentives to treat them well. When the Frankish Clovis attacked the northern borders of the Visigoth territory, many Catholic Gallo-Romans did not resist him, preferring the rule of a pagan king to the treatment they had received under the Arian Visigoths.

Perhaps more significantly, around this time the Visigoths began fighting a civil war between Arian and Catholic factions. Leovigild (ruled 569-586) was an Arian, but

19 That is, descendants of old Roman families living in France. 13

his son Hermenegild married a Catholic Frankish princess and eventually converted to

Catholicism himself. Hermenegild also rebelled politically, seizing control of the area around Seville while his father was still king. In response, Leovigild held a synod at

Toledo, offering easier terms of conversations to Catholics, but when few accepted his terms Leovigild resorted to banishment, execution and confiscation of the Catholic lords' land. He recaptured Seville after a two-year siege, and Hermenegild was executed for refusing to convert to . However, Hermenegild's conversation encouraged the growth of Catholicism among the Visigoths, and later Visigoth kings could no longer suppress Catholicism so severely. The next king, Recared, converted to Catholicism while king, and in 589 he made Catholicism the official of the Visigoths.

Recared was not able to establish a lasting dynasty, his only son being killed in battle against the Arian leader Witteric. He was instead succeeded by Sisebut (612-621), a renowned warrior who was only distantly related to the royal line. Sisebut initiated a fierce persecution of the Jews, which Previté-Orton argues was made possible by the increased intolerance toward religious sects.20 At this point, the Visigoths had engaged in a civil war with a religious component for several generations, where the Christian sect losing power was forced to convert to the other sect's or risk loss of and power, and even execution. This sectarian violence was influenced by Byzantine edicts from the fourth century A.D., requiring that all Christians accept the Nicaean

Creed on penalty of death. For centuries, Christians had been attempting to define what theological position orthodox Christians needed to adhere to. Christians had also been trying to convert both non-Christians and heterodox Christians to whatever they considered the orthodox .

20 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 146. 14

It is not surprising that Sisebut would use force against non-Christian groups once the civil war between Arians and Catholics was resolved, or that St. Anselm would have sought a less coercive means of convincing rational men of differing religious beliefs than his own that God must exist. The attempt to convert Catholics, Arians, and non-

Christians to the "true theology" had been unpleasant and violent – and it had not worked.

Because of their civil wars over religion in Spain, the Visigoths had less resources to devote to the protection of France, and more and more of France fell under the rule of the

(then-pagan) Franks. When Charlemagne attempted to Christianize the German people in the ninth century, he faced fierce opposition; as for Spain, the majority of the Iberian peninsula was ruled by Muslim Moors from the decline of the Visigoths until the

Reconquista in 1236.21 By St. Anselm's day, Christians exercised considerably less power in the regions that had previously been under their control than they had at the height of the Visigoths' reign.

The ontological argument does not require that the fool be a Christian to be convinced that God exists, much less that he be a trinitarian or an Arian Christian. All that is required is that he believe God to be greater than any other conceivable being.

Whatever the fool about the relationship between Christ and the Godhead, he should believe that the Godhead satisfied this criteria. The ontological argument should even be convincing to non-Christians, so long as they are monotheists. In this way St.

Anselm crafted an argument that, if it proved God's existence, should work equally well

21 It is beyond my scope (and not directly relevant to St. Anselm's work) to describe in detail how rule of Spain passed from the Christian Visigoths to the Muslim Moors; for a more thorough treatment see the tenth chapter of The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History and the articles "Cordova" and "Andalusia" in the . The pertinent point for my current project is that, by St. Anselm's time, Christians no longer ruled Spain, despite the Visigoths' efforts to convert Spaniards by force to orthodox Christianity. 15

to prove the existence of a trinitarian, Arian, or non-Christian conception of God. This allowed St. Anselm to sidestep the religious strife that had dominated much of his country's history.

Toward a Definition of Power

In the ontological argument, St. Anselm defines God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived," and he sees a contradiction if this type of God does not have existence outside the understanding. Although he does not try (at least at this point in his writing22) to define exactly what greatness might mean for God, he may have been influenced by the power struggles in his country's recent history. Specifically, St. Anselm would most likely have known about the Frankish kings' struggle to become a legitimate power in

France, and about Charlemagne's abuse of power against the Saxons in Germany.

When the Franks gained control over the French territory previously governed by the Visigoths, it was often as liberators. At the time the Visigoth rulers were still Arian

Christians, and many of their kings were hostile toward Catholic Christians. When the

Frankish king Clovis attacked northern Gaul in 507 A.D., he was not resisted by the

Catholic Visigoths.23 Many of the Franks were still pagans, though Clovis had himself married a Catholic princess and converted to Catholic Christianity a decade earlier. This set Clovis apart from the other pagan kings of western Europe of his time, who converted to Arianism when they converted to Christianity. Catholic Christians under the Visigoths

22 St. Anselm examines God's in more detail in the Monologion chapters 1-4, and in his reply to Gaunilo, chapters 1-2 and 7. 23 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 143-144. 16

may have felt safer from persecution under a Catholic king than they did under an Arian king. If this was the case, the Frankish kings would have rightly been concerned by

Recared's conversion to Catholic Christianity. Since the Visigoths themselves were now ruled by a Catholic king, why should the Catholic Christians of Gaul prefer Frankish rule to Visigoth rule?

The kingship of the Visigoths had not always been inherited by a close relative of the royal line (most notably Sisebut, a distant relative of the king who had been chosen primarily for his renown as a warrior) so the Visigoths could not claim an ancient and unbroken dynasty, but the institution of the Visigoth kingship had survived for several centuries. The Franks, on the other hand, now ruled the people of France because their power allowed them to do so, but there was no guarantee their power would persevere.

They had been accepted as liberators by some of the Catholic Christians oppressed by the

Arian Visigoth kings; now that the Visigoth kings were themselves Catholic, those people no longer had to cling to the Franks to avoid persecution. The Franks needed something to legitimize their rule in France.

The Frankish kings found this legitimacy through the Catholic . As Previté-

Orton writes, "The Church and the Papacy could give Pepin the and authority he required, the glamour he needed."24 Pepin was not the Frankish king but was instead the mayor of the palace, a peculiarly Frankish official who regulated the royal tribunal and was in charge of the providing for the king's household. This was a socially important position because the mayor of the palace often controlled which of the many people present at court actually could speak with the king. In this way it was similar to the Roman patricians, who also had great control over what nobility could approach the

24 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 298. 17

emperor. However, unlike the patricians, in most cases the mayor of the palace did not actually govern; the king himself retained the actual power to rule, and the mayor would at most advise him, not govern in his stead.

Pepin's situation, though, was more similar to the Roman patricians than was the case for most Frankish mayors of the palace. His king, Childeric III, had been chosen as king of the Franks after the kingship had been vacant for several years. During that time the Franks were governed by Pepin and his son Carloman. Even after his coronation,

Childeric III left much of the actual ruling to Pepin. In 751, Pepin tried to legitimize his rule of the Franks. He sent envoys to Pope Zacharias to ask whether the kingship should go to someone of the royal lineage or to the person who actually did the governing. This was not, strictly speaking, a question of political possibility but rather of ; Pepin was asking the highest moral authority available to him whether it would be right to overthrow the king. The pope's answer, however, was the preferred one: Zacharias replied that the kingship should be given to the one who actually governed. Childeric III was soon after deposed and entered a monastery, and Pepin was elected king of the church.25

This answer had an even further-reaching impact than allowing Pepin to assume the . When the pope said that kingship should be given to those men who actually ruled, not necessarily those of royal lineage, he provided a moral basis from which the

Franks could argue that they were the legitimate rulers of France. While the Visigoths might have ruled that region in the past, they no longer had sufficient power to enable them to continue to do so; the Franks did have that power, and so had a right to the kingship of that people.

25 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 298. 18

The Franks further legitimized their rule in the time of Pepin's grandson

Charlemagne, on Christmas Day 800. While Charlemagne was kneeling as part of the

Christmas mass, the pope Leo III placed a golden crown on Charlemagne's head. Leo III then performed the customary "adoration" ceremony that the pope had once done to recognize a new emperor of the Roman Empire, and the Roman nobles chanted the traditional Laudes: "To Charles, , crowned by God, the great and -bringing

Emperor of the Romans, life and victory."26 Charlemagne's eldest son, Charles the

Younger, was later crowned in the same fashion.

This ceremony was significant in two regards. By crowning Charlemagne's son as well as Charlemagne himself, Leo III recognized the ; he named not just Charlemagne but also his descendants as the defender of the Church. Charlemagne's coronation also established him as more than just king of the Franks and military ally of the pope. When Leo III performed the adoration ceremony, he gave Charlemagne the same kind of papal that the Roman emperors had received. This made the

Frankish kingship at least as legitimate a power as the Visigoth kingship had been; arguably, the Frankish kings had more legitimacy. As Previté-Orton writes,

"[Charlemagne] was the new David, the Lord's Anointed, chosen to guide the Christian people in on earth."27

The Franks were careful to obtain Byzantine recognition before accepting this new position. Charlemagne was not trying to replace the Byzantine emperor; he hoped to recreate the political situation after Theodosius's death, when the Roman Empire was split into eastern and western halves and each was governed by its own emperor. He did

26 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 315. 27 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 316. 19

not allow his youngest son Lewis to be crowned as emperor until the Byzantine Emperor

Michael recognized Charlemagne's own imperial claim. In this way he respected the

Byzantine emperor's claim as sole ruler of the eastern Roman Empire.

St. Anselm would have known about both the coronation of Charlemagne as emperor and the deposition of Childeric III. These two incidents illustrated the need for balance between authority based on the ability to rule and legitimacy based on moral right and historical precedent. St. Anselm's hierarchical conception of God in the

Monologion and his definition-based conception in the Proslogion reflected both of these considerations.

St. Anselm's conception of God was probably influenced by Charlemagne's efforts to establish the Franks as the legitimate authority of people who had previously been governed by the Visigoths. God is greater than anything conceivable, and so must be the most able to rule. This means that St. Anselm's God was the truly legitimate ruler of the entire universe. However, St. Anselm's God would not only be all-powerful, but would use his power in a proper way. St. Anselm also was aware of how absolute royal power could be abused, and so for God to be truly the greatest conceivable being He should avoid abusing His greatness.

Charlemagne was brutal in his attempts to subdue the Saxons, the last independent heathen tribe in inner Germany. Charlemagne's desire to subdue them was at least partly motivated by a desire to convert them to Christianity. This was not his only motive, as the Saxons had attacked the Franks in the past and a free Saxony was a danger to the Frankish kingdom, but St. Anselm could have believed that Charlemagne's motives were proper. He destroyed the column of Irminsul, which in the Saxons' mythology

20

symbolized the tree that supported the world, and so his war against the Saxons did have a strong religious component.

However pure his motives, Charlemagne's war tactics were harsh. In 778-781, while Charlemagne was in Spain quashing a rebellion, fighting erupted in Saxony. In response, the Franks enforced conversion of all the pagans. The Saxon lands were seized and divided into counties, which were given to submissive Saxon lords. This led to a rise in tensions between the Saxons and Franks, resulting in the massacre at Suntle. When

Charlemagne marched with a Frankish army against the Slavic Serbs, he went with a contingent of Saxon warriors sent by the submissive Saxon lords. The Saxon rebel leader

Widukind encouraged the Saxons marching with the Franks to rebel, and the Franks were butchered by their own soldiers in the Suntle hills, just below the Weser river.

Charlemagne reacted to this by marching again on Saxony, causing Widukind to flee to

Denmark. Charlemagne slaughtered 4,500 captured rebels at Verden, which in turn sparked further resistance.

Charlemagne put down this last wave of battle in three campaigns from 783 to

785. Even Widukind eventually submitted to in 785. After Widukind's baptism,

Charlemagne encouraged conversion on pain of death. Heathen religious practices were also subject to the death penalty, as were attacks on Christian . The Franks imported their own political institutions into Saxony, along with Frankish officials, and established Catholic dioceses throughout the region. These harsh measures led to a final revolt in 795, after which Charlemagne began to deport part of the Saxon population into other areas, giving their lands to Franks. After 804, when the last remnant of Saxony beyond the Elbe was defeated, several of these penalties were made less severe. By this

21

point, Charlemagne's goal had been accomplished and the last independent tribe of

Germany had been made an integral part of the Frankish kingdom. However, many of

Charlemagne's earlier measures against the Saxons were regarded as excessively violent, in particular the killing of the 4,500 captured Saxons at Verden.28 St. Anselm, being aware of these abuses of power even in the king who had been crowned as emperor, would have seen the need for some limits on the king's power.

St. Anselm found an answer to this problem when he examined the question of how God could be both just and merciful. St. Anselm wrote,

For, in sparing the wicked, you are as just, according to your nature, but not according to ours, as you are compassionate, according to our nature, and not according to yours; seeing that, as in saving us, whom it would be just for you to destroy, you are compassionate, not because you feel an affection, but because we feel the effect; so you are just, not because you requite us as we deserve, but because you do that which you as the supremely good Being.29

God, as the being than which nothing greater can be conceived, contains every , including both and mercy. He is able to act in the greatest possible way by acting in accordance with His nature. If it were possible for God to act in some way not in accordance with His nature, then it would be less great for him to act in that way than in accordance with His nature. Charlemagne, who does not have that same perfection, must act in accordance with what is right, not with that which he wants to do. Because the king's judgment, like that of all humans, was imperfect, his use of this power would be imperfect as well. He could judge an action to be right, but if his judgment was incorrect, that action would still be the wrong thing to do in that circumstance. Charlemagne's

28 Previté-Orton's The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 1, p. 306-307. 29 St. Anselm, Proslogion X 22

massacre of the Saxons, motivated as it was by good , showed St. Anselm that human power was always limited by its understanding of some standard external to the people exercising the power. Only God could be absolutely great because only God need only act according to his nature.

Conclusion

St. Anselm would have been affected by several historical developments of the preceding centuries. The Visigoths' civil wars between Arian and Catholic Christians, and the accompanying persecutions of different religious groups, would have shown St. Anselm that coercion did not convince people that a certain theology was correct. This would have shown him the value of a logically valid proof that did not require his reader to accept his theological position beyond very basic premises. The history of the Franks also provided St. Anselm with important lessons. Childeric III's deposition and

Charlemagne's coronation, combined with Charlemagne's severity in severing the Saxons, would have influenced how St. Anselm viewed the concept of power.

The history of Christian monasticism gives a different type of insight into why St.

Anselm crafted the ontological argument the way he did. Studying Benedictine monasticism and in particular the Rule of St. Benedict makes it possible to reconstruct how St. Anselm would have likely spent his day. In this way, the careful scholar can imagine how working at certain tasks for certain proscribed intervals would have affected

23

his thought process, and the way in which he formulated the ontological argument. By investigating the way in which St. Anselm lived as well as important historical events in the preceding centuries, we can understand the ontological argument better than if only its logical structure and the plausibility of its premises was examined.

24

CHAPTER III

ST. ANSELM'S PROOFS FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

IN THE MONOLOGION

Introduction

In the Monologion, St. Anselm presents an argument for God's existence based on a hierarchy of beings. This argument is different from the ontological argument presented in the Proslogion in several key aspects, though several points do remain constant.

This chapter will trace how St. Anselm builds up his conception of God in the

Monologion and how he defends this being's existence. The next chapter will examine how the description of God raised in the Monologion led to St. Anselm's famous definition of God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived" in Proslogion II.

It will also look at how the differences in these definitions of God led St. Anselm to use different forms of argument in the Monologion and the Proslogion.

25

Goodness and Greatness in the Monologion

St. Anselm begins the Monologion by considering the case of the man who

has no of the existence of one Nature which is highest of all existing beings, which is also sufficient to itself in its eternal blessedness, and which confers upon and effects in all other beings, through its omnipotent goodness, the very fact of their existence, and the fact that in any way their existence is good."30

St. Anselm further observes that "all desire to enjoy only those things which they suppose to be good,"31 and so the man must at some point consider the case of something which he does not desire except for the reason that he considers them to be good. If the man considers what he believes to be good, he will find such an extensive group of good beings that he must ask himself how they obtain their goodness? Does their goodness come to all good beings through one supremely-good being, or do some of the good beings he observe receive their goodness through one good being and others through another good being?

St. Anselm observes that there are many things which are considered good, and furthermore that those things are considered equally good while in other cases one is thought more good than another. For this to be the case, objects must be ranked in regard to their goodness. This requires that all good objects possess some quality, and that different good objects possess this quality in different degrees.

30 Anselm, Monologion I 31 Anselm, Monologion I 26

St. Anselm argues that this is the case because they received their goodness through another good object. This position is reminiscent of the Platonic that beings receive their essential characteristic through the forms. However St. Anselm arrives at this position, it seems a reasonable stance in light of medieval logic. Either an object receives its goodness through itself or from something other than itself. If a being received its goodness from itself, St. Anselm could question why all good objects have the same quality. How likely is it that all good objects possess the same type of goodness

(so that they are comparable), if they did not receive their goodness from the same sort?

It seems most probable that good objects receive their goodness from the same source.

This means that all but one good object must receive their goodness from some source other than themselves.

To better understand how good beings are comparable, St. Anselm examines the different ways in which the word "good" is used. He writes,

Apparently it is by of one quality, that a horse is called good, because he is strong, and by virtue of another, that he is called good, because he is swift. For, though he seems to be called good by virtue of his swiftness, yet swiftness and strength do not appear to be the same thing.32

However, these same qualities can be found in beings which are not considered good, such as a robber. It is not the horse's swiftness or his strength that makes him good, but rather because of its utility:

Just as a strong, swift robber is bad, because he is harmful, so a strong, swift horse is good, because he is useful. And, indeed, nothing is ordinarily regarded as good,

32 Anselm, Monologion I. 27

except either for some utility – as, for instance, safety is called good [...] – or for some honorable character – as for instance, is reckoned to be good.33

As St. Anselm previously observed, anything that is good – that is, is either useful or honorable – receives its goodness through some supremely-good being. Unlike swiftness and strength, which can occur in good beings as well as non-good beings, honor and usefulness are found only in good beings.

Since beauty is comparable to safety with regard to its goodness, both qualities must receive their goodness from a common source. If they receive their goodness from two separate good beings, both of those beings must have in turn received their goodness through an even more supremely-good being. Otherwise, if safety and beauty did not ultimately receive their goodness through the same being they would not be comparable.

Therefore, there must be some being from which all good beings receive their goodness.

Since this supremely-good being would have the characteristics that manifest as honor and usefulness in other good beings, it would also be good – yet this supremely-good being would be good through itself, not through some being other than itself.

Furthermore, this must be the only good being that is good through itself; otherwise those other good-through-themselves beings would not be comparable to beings that receive their goodness through the good-through-itself being through which safety and beauty receive their goodness.

33 Anselm, Monologion I. 28

Existence in the Monologion

Having examined how beings inherit goodness and greatness, St. Anselm applies the same reasoning to the question of existence. There are many beings that exist. Since beings can be grouped based on whether they exist or do not exist, there must be a quality of existence that every existent being possesses, and every non-existent being lacks. At least in the context of the Monologion, existence seems to be a binary characteristic: one either exists or does not exist. In the Proslogion, St. Anselm will write about different modes of existence, such as existence-within-the-understanding, contingent existence, and necessary existence. However, even if we interpret the Monologion as failing to draw a between all types of existence, St. Anselm can still describe all beings as either existent or non-existent. Two beings are equal in their existence if they both exist or both do not exist; they are unequal if one exists and the other does not. This establishes a comparability with regard to existence similar to the comparability St. Anselm described with regard to goodness and greatness. There must be a property of existence.

St. Anselm further observes:

Whatever is, apparently exists through something that is one and the same. For everything that is, exists either through something, or through nothing. But nothing exists through nothing. For it is altogether inconceivable that anything should not exist by virtue of something.34

Having established that every existent being exists through something, St. Anselm then considers the question of whether every being receives the property of existence through the same something, or whether some existing beings exist through one being and others

34 Anselm, Monologion III. 29

through another being. Consider first the case of existent beings existing through different beings. St. Anselm recognizes three possible ways that this could happen.

If there are more than one [things through which existent beings exist], either these are themselves to be referred to some one being, through which they exist, or they exist separately, each through itself, or they exist mutually through one another.35

If these beings receive their existence from some higher-order being, that being that gives them their existence is the ultimate source of all beings' existence, through an argument similar to the one St. Anselm used when examining beings with the characteristic of good.

If, instead, this group of existence-giving beings receives their existence only from themselves,

There is, at any rate, some power of property of existing through self (existendi per se), by which they are able to exist through itself. But, there can be no doubt that, in that case, they exist through this very power, which is one.36

Put another way, since each of these beings exist through themselves, they have a certain power in common which gives all of them existence. This power is the ultimate source of existence, and all existent beings – including that group of beings previously thought to be self-existing – receive existence through the power of existing through the self – what

St. Anselm calls existendi per se. Moreover, since the many beings we initially thought to exist through their own selves instead exist through this power, it is an illusion to think

35 Anselm, Monologion III. 36 Anselm, Monologion III. 30

that they do not exist through themselves. This case collapses into the first possibility St.

Anselm considered.

A third possibility is dismissed more swiftly. He writes,

It is an irrational conception that anything should exist through a being on which it confers existence. For not even beings of a relative nature exist thus mutually, the one through the other.37

St. Anselm then gives the example of a servant and a master. These labels are used relative to each other: a servant is not properly a servant unless he is subservient to a master, and similar a master is not properly a master unless he has dominion over a servant. Yet this reasoning cannot be extended to the question of existence. If being A depends upon being B for its existence, A cannot exist until B first exists. But similarly, if B depends upon A for its existence, B cannot exist until A first exists. Neither can exist before the other, and so neither can provide support for the other to exist. St. Anselm's objection to this scenario seems sound.

Provided that the three scenarios examined by St. Anselm are the only possible ways a being could receive its existence through another, St. Anselm seems justified in claiming that a beings cannot receive their existence through each other. This leaves only one possibility. St. Anselm writes,

Since altogether excludes the supposition that there are more beings than one, through which all things exist, that being, through which all exist, must be one.38

37 Anselm, Monologion III. 38 Anselm, Monologion III. 31

The argument from this point proceeds analogously to the argument for a supremely- good being through which all good beings receive their goodness. Since all existent beings receive their existence through this one being, the being through which they receive their existence must itself exist. Moreover, it must receive its existence through itself. St. Anselm writes,

Whatever exists through another is less than that, through which all things are, and which alone exists through itself. Therefore, that which exists through itself exists in the greatest degree of all things.39

He then observes that this self-existing being must be the same being as the supremely good and supremely great beings of earlier chapters. He writes,

That which is greatest of all, and through which exists whatever is good or great, and, in short, whatever has any existence – that must be supremely good, and supremely great, and the highest of all existing beings.40

Clearly, St. Anselm connects God with the being he has identified as containing goodness, greatness, and existence in the highest degrees.

The last key point of St. Anselm's argument for God's existence in the

Monologion that is relevant to the Proslogion's ontological argument is St. Anselm's treatment of the hierarchy of in Monologion IV. He observes that different beings have different natures, and that "the horse is superior in its nature to wood, and man more excellent than the horse."41 So St. Anselm establishes a hierarchy of beings based on the

39 Anselm, Monologion III. 40 Anselm, Monologion III. 41 Anselm, Monologion IV. 32

relative superiority or inferiority of their natures. However, St. Anselm further argues that this hierarchy must have a limit. He writes,

Although it cannot be denied that some natures are superior to others, nevertheless reason convinces us that some nature is so preeminent among these, that it has no superior. For, if the distinction of degrees is infinite, so that there is among them no degree, than which no higher can be found, our course of reasoning reaches this conclusion: that the multitude of natures themselves is not limited by any bounds. But only an absurdly foolish man can fail to regard such a conclusion as absurdly foolish.42

St. Anselm seems to think that the absurdity of this position is self-evident. Some philosophers would not be so generous in their appraisal.

The situation St. Anselm describes brings to mind the epistemological problem of infinite regression. In order to justify our belief that a certain fact is knowledge, we must appeal to the truth of other facts. It could then reasonably be asked how it is known that those facts are true, forcing the knower to cite yet more facts, which could be challenged in just the same way. This problem leads some skeptics to claim that knowledge is impossible, and it does not seem unreasonable that someone would take a similar position with St. Anselm's claim. The fact that we cannot have an infinite hierarchy of natures does not show that one being has a nature "than which no higher can be found"; rather, it shows a flaw in St. Anselm's reasoning.

In any event, he does not offer a reason why a hierarchy without limit would be foolish. Instead, St. Anselm moves on to the question of whether there must be only one object that is superior to all other beings. Is it possible that there could be multiple distinct objects, each with natures of the same order of greatness, none of which are

42 Anselm, Monologion IV. 33

inferior to any being?43 This, though, creates a problem similar to the issue of some beings receiving their goodness through one being and others through another. St.

Anselm writes,

If they are more than one and equal, since they cannot be equal through any diverse causes, but only through some cause which is one and the same, that one cause, through which they are equally so great, either is itself what they are, that is, the very of these natures; or else it is another than what they are.44

St. Anselm further argues that if the one cause is "itself what they are," the two beings must be in essence the same, so the distinction between the two beings is not real. On the other hand, if these two beings are "another than what they are," the being through which they receive their natures must have a superior nature than the nature possessed by the beings in question. The beings may in fact be distinct, but in this case their status as the most superior being in the hierarchy is an illusion. St. Anselm writes,

We conclude, then, that there is some nature which is one and single, and which is so superior to others that it is inferior to none. But that which is such is the greatest and best of all existing beings. Hence, there is a certain nature which is the highest of all existing beings. This, however, it cannot be, unless it is what it is through itself, and all existing beings are what they are through it.45

St. Anselm believes that there is a single being who is the greatest of all existing beings in several ways (most good, most great, most superior nature, etc.) In later chapters of the

Monologion, St. Anselm comes to call this being God.

43 In this case of multiple individuals with maximally superior natures, in order for an individual to qualify as a member of this top tier of natures, they could not be inferior to any other individual besides themselves – including other individuals that meet the same definition. If there are two individuals with maximally superior natures, neither can be inferior to the other or to any other individual. 44 Anselm, Monologion IV. 45 Anselm, Monologion IV. 34

Conclusion

In the early chapters of the Monologion, St. Anselm builds up a conception of God as the being who possesses characteristics also seen in other beings, but in a greater measure than we see in any other being. Existence is a predicate that St. Anselm believes produces a hierarchy of beings, and so if beings receive their goodness and greatness from a single being, they also receive their existence from a single being. Just as that being had to possess goodness and greatness to pass it on to other beings, He also must possess existence if the beings that receive existence through Him are to exist.

St. Anselm's logic faces a problem when he discards too quickly the possibility of an infinite hierarchy of natures. He does not see this as a problem with his theory but rather with the option he is considering at the time. Contemporary philosophers may be less willing to reject infinite hierarchies46 and so might be less willing to accept the

Monologion's claim that a hierarchy must have a highest-ranking memory. St. Anselm, however, does not appear to have been bothered by this issue.

The next chapter will present the Proslogion's argument, and also look at the differences in the forms of the arguments in these two works. This approach will address the question of whether the form of the ontological argument is preferable to that in the

Monologion, or whether St. Anselm was motivated by some other factor.

46 For instance, appears to accept a hierarchy of senses in On Sense and Reference. 35

CHAPTER IV

ST. ANSELM'S PROOFS FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

IN THE PROSLOGION

Introduction

In the Monologion, St. Anselm developed a proof that God was the source of all goodness, greatness, and existence in other beings, and so much exist himself. Given the hierarchical nature of the monastic world in which he lived, it is perhaps not surprising that St. Anselm developed a proof based on an ordered universe with God at its apex.

However, this proof did have its disadvantages. For instance, the Monologion proof defined God as more superlative than any other being with regard to some characteristic; this made God the most excellent of all conceived beings rather than the most excellent of all conceivable ones. In the Proslogion St. Anselm makes the stronger statement that

God is "that than which nothing greater can be conceived."47 This definition requires that

God not only be the greatest of a set of existent beings, but also be the greatest being even when compared to those beings that could possibly exist but don't. This means that,

47 Anselm, Proslogion II. 36

since God is the greatest of all conceivable beings, there is nothing that could possibly be done, which God cannot do.

Since he defines God in this way, St. Anselm must change the way he tries to prove God's existence. It is not enough for him to show that God is greater than every other being; St. Anselm must show how this greatness requires that God exist, and exist as something other than an object in the fool's understanding. This requires a much more theoretical proof than St. Anselm developed in the Monologion.

The Argument in Proslogion II

The ontological argument presented in Proslogion II consists of two phases. St. Anselm first deduces that God exists in the understanding of even those who would deny His existence. St. Anselm then offers a proof showing that God cannot exist only in the understanding. St. Anselm believes that these two arguments, taken together, show that God exists as more than a concept in the fool's understanding.

St. Anselm begins by defining God as "a being than which nothing greater can be conceived."48 Having established what is meant when the term God is used, he introduces the Biblical fool of Psalm 14:1, who "has said in his heart, there is no God."49 St. Anselm writes of this man,

48 Anselm, Proslogion II 49 Anselm, Proslogion II. 37

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.50

The fool, when he speaks of God, certainly thinks he is making a meaningful statement.

In order for this to be the case, the fool must accept the theist's claim that the concept of

"a being than which nothing greater can be conceived" is at least logically coherent.

This gives God existence in the fool's understanding. St. Anselm writes,

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. 51

This passage may initially seem contradictory. St. Anselm asserts that the fool, by understanding what he hears when God is spoken of, has God in his understanding. If

God is in the understanding, how can St. Anselm speak of God in the understanding except to say that He exists in the understanding? This point is made clearer later in the chapter. St. Anselm writes,

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 the understanding.52

When St. Anselm says that the fool "does not understand [God] to exist," he must be speaking about existence in something beyond the understanding. God has existence in

50 Anselm, Proslogion II 51 Anselm, Proslogion II 52 Anselm, Proslogion II 38

the understanding, even in the understanding of one who would deny him any other type of existence.

This, however, creates a difficulty for the fool, which St. Anselm examines in the second portion of the ontological argument. He writes,

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 the understanding. 53

Since the fool understands the concept of God well enough to use the term used to represent this concept in a coherent fashion, the fool must understand what is meant by

God. St. Anselm asserts that this means that the fool grants the concept of God existence in his understanding. St. Anselm previously defined God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived." For the fool to say anything meaningful about God, he must admit that a being "than which nothing greater can be conceived" exists in his understanding.

From this point the ontological argument proceeds as a reductio ad absurdum proof. In this style of argument, the author assumes some statement (which I will call the premise to be contradicted) and shows that two contradictory statements can be derived from the premise. If the premise to be contradicted is true, then any statement derived from it and other true statements must also be true. However, the two contradictory statements cannot both be true. Therefore, the original premise to be contradicted must not have been true.

St. Anselm presents this portion of the ontological argument by writing,

53 Anselm, Proslogion II 39

And assuredly that, than which nothing greater can be conceived, cannot exist in the understanding alone. For, suppose it exists in the understanding alone: then it can be conceived to exist in ; 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 a greater can be conceived. But obviously this is impossible. 54

In this passage, the premise to be contradicted is "[That than which nothing greater can be conceived] exists in the understanding alone." St. Anselm observes that, if this premise is true, it would be possible to conceive of an individual equivalent to God in every respect, but with the added characteristic that that being exists outside the understanding. Let this being be denoted by the symbol G0. Both God and G0 exist in the understanding, but only G0 would exist beyond the understanding. Since it is better to exist beyond the understanding than not to exist beyond the understanding, G0 would be greater than God. This would mean that it is possible to conceive of a being greater than

God; that is, G0. In the form of the proof by contradiction, this is the first statement that will lead to a contradiction.

To derive the second statement that will lead to a contradiction, St. Anselm returns to his original premise to be contradicted. He assumed that "[That than which nothing greater can be conceived] exists in the understanding alone." This claim means that, for all beings, if that being is conceivable and is not God, God is greater than that being. However, this statement is contradicted by the existence of G0, which is conceivable and distinct from God, but is also thought to be greater than God. The initial premise to be contradicted leads to two contradictory statements, and so that initial

54 Anselm, Proslogion II 40

premise cannot be true. It therefore cannot be the case that God only exists in the understanding.

Having shown that God cannot exist only in the understanding, 55 St. Anselm is left with two possibilities: either God does not exist at all, or God had existence that extends beyond the understanding. If God did not exist even in the understanding, this would be consistent with the conclusion of the reductio ad absurdum portion of the ontological argument. However, the fool speaks of God when he says "There is no God," and St. Anselm interprets this to mean that God must exist at least in his understanding.

God must therefore exist, not only in the understanding, but in some other way as well.

In this version of the ontological argument, St. Anselm does not explain precisely what this existence would entail. It seems unlikely that St. Anselm envisions a sort of physical existence, where God occupies a place in space and time, since this would be limited. In this respect, offers a useful model. He writes,

The sun not only provides visible things with the power to be seen but also with the coming to be, growth, and nourishment, although it is not itself coming to be. [...] You should also say that not only do the objects of knowledge owe their being known to the good, but their being is also due to it, although the good is not being, but superior to it in rank and power. 56

In this famous passage, Plato gives the example of the good, which does not enter into being (and so would not face the limits of corporeality), but still has a marked effect on those things that do have being. The Platonic good does not depend on those objects of

55 This portion of the ontological argument relies on the controversial claim that it is greater to exist than not to exist. I do not blindly accept St. Anselm's position on this and will discuss it in more detail in the next chapter. When I say that St. Anselm has shown that God cannot exist outside the understanding, I do not mean that this claim is correct; rather, I only observe that St. Anselm takes this to be the conclusion of his reductio ad absurdum argument. 56 The , line 509b. 41

knowledge for its existence. To the contrary, those objects of knowledge depend upon the good for their existence. It may be the case that the good would not be known if there was no one to know it, but the good would still exist even if no one existed to know it.

St. Anselm might accept that God has a similar kind of existence. It is clear from the Monologion that he believes God has an effect on other beings. For instance, it is through God that all existent beings receive their existence. However, God does not need to exist in the same sense that a rock, a dog, or even a human does. God can exist in a way altogether superior to our corporeal existence. Lesser beings could receive their existence from Him, but He need not enter into existence in the same way that they exist, just as in Plato's things receive their being through the good although the good does not itself possess being.

Whatever way St. Anselm would define this existence outside the understanding, it is clear that he believes God must have it – not because this is St. Anselm's belief, but because the concept of God as St. Anselm has defined it requires something more than existence within the understanding. When the fool speaks of God, he assents to God's existence with the understanding; and it is God's nature that He must exist in some other way as well.

42

One Argument or Two?

Historically, when philosophers have spoken of St. Anselm's ontological argument, they usually have referred to the argument put forth in Proslogion II. For instance, St. Thomas

Aquinas asserts, in his critique of the ontological argument, that those who do not believe in God deny that there is a being than which nothing greater can be conceived. Immanuel

Kant also famously observed that existence is not a predicate. In both cases, these philosophers addressed their counterarguments to a proof based on simple existence – that is, the version of the ontological argument presented in Proslogion II.

Norman Malcolm outlines a second ontological argument in his classic article

"Anselm's Ontological Arguments." He argues that the argument St. Anselm presents in

Proslogion II is not logically sound because it rests on a false premise, namely that existence increases God's greatness. He further asserts, however, that St. Anselm presents a second version of the ontological argument in Proslogion III. This second argument utilizes the concept of necessary existence rather than simple existence, and so (Malcolm argues) it is not subject to Kant's criticism.

To understand the force of this distinction, it is necessary to consider what I have referred to as "simple existence" in more depth. In Proslogion II, St. Anselm observes that the fool grants God existence in his understanding when he uses the term. He further argues that a being than which nothing greater cannot be conceived cannot only exist in the understanding, because it is greater to exist beyond the understanding than in the understanding alone. Kant criticized this , writing,

43

By whatever and by however many predicates we may thing a thing – even if we completely determine it – we do not make the least addition to the thing when we further declare that the thing is. 57

St. Anselm uses exist in a rather general way in Proslogion II; he does not draw an explicit difference between the type of existence that God has and the type of existence possessed by other beings. Kant similarly speaks of existence in general as not being . However, Malcolm sees a difference between God's existence and that of other beings. He writes,

Previously I rejected existence as a perfection. Anselm is maintaining in the remarks last quoted [from Proslogion III], not that existence is a perfection, but that the logical impossibility of nonexistence is a perfection. in other words, necessary existence is a perfection.58

In Proslogion II St. Anselm argued that God must have existence beyond the understanding, and Kant and other critics have pointed out that existence in general does not increase any being's greatness.

It is tempting to treat Proslogion II and III as establishing two distinct ontological arguments. If this was St. Anselm's intent, then it might be possible to dismiss Proslogion

II's argument in light of Kant's criticism while still maintaining that Proslogion III's argument is valid. However, the form of Proslogion III does not support such an interpretation.59 As was previously noted, Proslogion III parallels certain aspects of

Proslogion II, but there are many necessary elements of Proslogion II not to be found in

57 The , p. A505, as quoted in Malcolm's "Anselm's Ontological Arguments," p. 44. 58 "Anselm's Ontological Arguments," p. 46. 59 I am not arguing that it is impossible to formulate an ontological argument using Proslogion III that is distinct from the Proslogion II argument generally attributed to St. Anselm. Instead, I mean that St. Anselm himself did not intend Proslogion III to present a wholly new argument. 44

Proslogion III. For instance, St. Anselm never defines how he uses the term God in

Proslogion III. It seems, therefore, that St. Anselm thinks the argument in Proslogion III inherits several features from the argument in Proslogion II. If St. Anselm viewed these arguments as distinct proofs for God's existence, he would have provided all the features needed for the second proof within Proslogion III.

This question of how Proslogion III should be interpreted is one that has been heavily debated in the many responses to Malcolm's article. Malcolm treats Proslogion

III as though it presents a new ontological argument, but he does admit that "There is no evidence that [Anselm] thought of himself as offering two different proofs."60

Penelhum61 and Raziel Abelson62 agree with Malcolm on this point. On the other hand,

Charles Hartshorne63 argues that St. Anselm intended Proslogion II and III to contain two distinct arguments, and D. P. Henry64 thinks that St. Anselm is trying to accomplish something quite different in Proslogion III. R. Robert Basham observes that some writers

(notably D. P. Henry) have interpreted Proslogion III not as an argument for God's existence but rather as a "demonstration" that the kind of existence which God (already proved to exist in Proslogion II) has is necessary existence." 65

As for Henry's claim that Proslogion III is not intended as an argument at all but rather an exposition of God's nature, this seems unlikely given the many ways that

Proslogion III resembles Proslogion II. Proslogion III follows the same reductio ad absurdum seen in Proslogion II, ending with the conclusion that "To you alone,

60 Malcolm, "Anselm's Ontological Arguments" p. 45. 61 See "On the Second Ontological Argument" in The Philosophical Review, Vol. 70, No. 1, pp. 85-92. 62 See "Not Necessarily," in The Philosophical Review, Vol. 70, No. 1, pp. 67-84. 63 See The Logic of Perfection, especially pp. 335-340. 64 See The Logic of Anselm, pp. 144-147. 65 From "The 'Second Version' of Anselm's Ontological Argument," p. 665. 45

therefore, it belongs to exist more truly than all other beings." This chapter does tell us more about the type of existence St. Anselm wishes to attribute to God than was evident in Proslogion II, but the primary form of the chapter is that of an argument (albeit an incomplete one) rather than that of an exposition.

This does not mean that modern scholars like Malcolm who defend a modal version of the ontological argument are wrong to do so. Such efforts may even rightfully be described as ontological arguments, for they do rely heavily on the of the term "God." However, it is misleading to label these interpretations as St. Anselm's ontological argument. For St. Anselm, certain types of existence were greater than other types of existence, and he would not have separated the argument of Proslogion III from the one put forth in Proslogion II.

The Argument in Proslogion III

St. Anselm begins the third chapter of the Proslogion by refining the ontological argument presented in the previous chapter. He writes,

And [God] 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. 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. 66

66 Anselm, Proslogion III 46

He does not define God, nor does he establish that God exists in anyone's understanding.

It seems that St. Anselm intends us to use the definition and argument he provided in

Proslogion II to establish these points. The crucial change here is that God's greatness assures that He cannot be conceived not to exist, whereas in the previous chapter God's greatness assured that it was impossible for Him to exist only in the understanding.

Having observed that necessary existence is greater than contingent existence, St.

Anselm sets up a reductio ad absurdum proof similar to the argument given in

Proslogion II. He supposes that it is possible to conceive of God so that He does not exist. There would then be a conceivable being with every attribute of God, but who also necessarily exists; I will call this being G1. Since necessary existence is greater than contingent existence, G1 must be greater than God; yet this is impossible, just as it was impossible for G0 to be greater than God in Proslogion II. Therefore, the initial premise to be contradicted, that it is conceivable for God not to exist, must be false since it results in a contradiction. It must not be the case that God has an existence that is not logically necessary. This leaves two possibilities: either God does not exist, or God has an existence that is not non-necessary.

St. Anselm established in Proslogion II that God exists at least in the understanding, because when the fool asserts that God doesn't exist, he understands what is meant by the term "God." In this case, it cannot be true that God does not exist. But what of existence within the understanding and existence beyond the understanding?

Does the ontological argument of Proslogion III prove that God necessarily exists beyond the understanding, or is it consistent with this argument for God to necessarily exist within the understanding?

47

All other attributes being equal, a being whose existence within the understanding was logically necessary would be greater than a being whose existence within the understanding was only contingent. If God had necessary existence within the understanding but had no existence beyond the understanding, this would seem consistent with Proslogion III's requirement that God not have non-necessary existence. However, it is difficult to imagine how a being could necessarily exist within (and only within) the understanding. So long as the fool only has contingent existence himself, it is possible to conceive of God not having existence in the fool's understanding – namely, if the fool ceased to exist. If every being who has a conception of God in his understanding was to cease to exist, then God would have no existence in their understanding, necessary or otherwise. Therefore, if St. Anselm is correct and God must have necessary existence, it is hard to see how this existence could be limited to the understanding.

This question, whether necessary existence within the understanding is possible, is only pertinent if Proslogion III is considered as containing an argument distinct from

Proslogion II. If instead we interpret the ontological argument of Proslogion II as being further refined in Proslogion III, God cannot have necessary existence limited to the understanding. This is because in Proslogion II St. Anselm concluded that "[God] exists both in the understanding and in reality."67 According to this interpretation, God must exist in the understanding, so the only point left to consider is whether this existence is logically necessary or contingent. St. Anselm concludes in Proslogion III that God could not be conceived to exist in any way than the way in which He does exist – and that existence is in reality, not simply within the understanding.

67 Anselm, Proslogion II 48

Conclusion

In the early chapters of the Monologion, St. Anselm begins his examination of the concept of God by looking at several distinct beings and classes of beings that are comparable with respect to some property. He identified that there was a single being through which all other beings receive that quality, and moreover that the being possessing the greatest amount of a certain quality was the same for several qualities, namely goodness, greatness, and existence.

In the Proslogion, St. Anselm abstracted these observations to show that God was not simply (for instance) the most good being compared to all other beings. Instead, God is greater than any other conceivable being, and if God has a quality, He has that quality in a greater amount than any conceivable being could have it. This allows us to attribute to God the "omni characteristics" (e.g., omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipotent), rather than simply describing God is the being with the most of any of those characteristics, as would have been the case for the Monologion's conception of God. This new definition of

God also allows St. Anselm to show that, if existence enhances God's greatness and if it does not give rise to a logical contradiction when considered with God's other characteristics, then God must exist.

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CHAPTER V

THE INFLUENCE OF CLASSICAL LOGIC

ON THE ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

Introduction

When St. Anselm presented his ontological argument in the second and third chapters of the Proslogion, he applied several logical principles to the concept of God that were current in his day but may seem erroneous to modern readers, especially those influenced by the rigors of . In this chapter I will examine the principles of classical (and in particular Aristotelian) logic on which the ontological argument rests, and so provide a way to evaluate it within the bounds of the logic St. Anselm would have known.

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Logic Before Aristotle

The birth of logic was first inspired by developments in . Originally, mathematics and geometry especially was developed as a practical discipline, with formulas developed empirically through the repeated need to calculate volume and length before actually carrying out some task. The construction of the Great Pyramids at Giza, for example, led the Egyptians to develop formulas for calculating the volume of truncated pyramids of given dimensions.

The Greeks changed the discipline substantially by investigating geometry as an a priori science, developing and critiquing theorems not based on physical examples of the shapes but on a more theoretical mathematics.68 The purpose of this approach was not to calculate the dimensions needed to enclose a certain area of land or store a certain volume of grain (though the principles discovered could have practical applications), but rather to provide general ways to evaluate the truth or falsity of a mathematical statement.

The first complete text on geometry to survive until modern times, the Elements, was published by the Greek man in the second century B.C. Even earlier proofs have been preserved in both the works of Plato and Aristotle;69 the Pythagorean

Archytas also wrote on the proper use of definitions in proofs.70 It seems safe to assume, therefore, that and philosophers before the time of Plato grappled with the question of what constituted a good proof.

68 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, pp. 2-3. 69 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 5; the Kneales do not cite a specific work by Plato or Aristotle but instead reference T.L. Heath's book Mathematics in Aristotle 70 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 6. 51

The is in fact a fairly late invention. Its first use in the modern sense was by Alexander of Aphrodisias in the third century A.D. Of course the study of logic predates the invention of the term. Through most of the classical period, the study we would now describe as logic was referred to as the , which was derived from the

Greek word dialegesthai ("to discuss") and referred to a type of argument found in metaphysical discussions in pre-Platonic times. In Plato's writing, dialegesthai came to be applied to a premise put forward by a disputant, which Plato then showed led to unpalatable consequences. Kneale gives as an example of a dialectical premise the three definitions of knowledge proposed by in the dialogue by the same name,71 but many of his have arguments of a similar form.

Since the development of logic was inspired by the evaluation of geometric proofs, these early logicians would naturally pay the most careful attention to topics that directly concerned mathematicians. Geometry is concerned more with classes of objects than with individual objects, and so these first logicians focused mostly on rules that applied to groups. Moreover, since mathematicians often begin with definitions and result in theorems that are known to be true, logic also paid special attention to these types of propositions.

Classical logic's focus on the nature of definitional statement is certainly helpful to the ontological argument, which begins with a definition of God and then analyzes it until (so St. Anselm believes) God's existence beyond the understanding is proven. The first concern, however, seems less beneficial to the ontological argument. Classical logic's focus on classes of individuals is at odds with the ontological argument's attempts to state something about precisely one individual, "that than which nothing greater can be

71 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 7. 52

conceived." However, in many ways St. Anselm's definition of God resembles a class more than it does an individual. St. Anselm does not point to some being thought to be

God by some religion godhead and assert that that being is God. Such an assertion would mean that God would have all the characteristics of that being – not simply the necessary characteristics that define the concept under consideration but also any coincidental features. This is different from what St. Anselm actually does. In the Monologion, for instance, St. Anselm observes that if more than one being existed through itself, then the power to exist through oneself would become the being through which all things exist,72 a being which St. Anselm later identifies as God. God can therefore be identified as a class, because (though this class can contain at most one being), any being could conceivably be contained in this God-class. For this reason, the advances made by classical logic concerning classes of objects could still benefit the ontological argument.

Some concerns of modern logic would of a priority for classical logic. For instance, one problem addressed by Gottlob Frege was how to evaluate functions with invalid arguments. The statement "x>3" yields a true or false result when x is a number, but is nonsensical when x is something other than a number. Frege felt the need to define functions for every possible argument, but the interpretation of conditionals developed by

Diodorus (described below) allows some conditionals to not have a truth function. St.

Anselm, being familiar with classical logic but not the symbolic logic developed in the last few centuries, would define the universe of discourse in a way more in keeping with classical logic.

St. Anselm would also not be aware of the Frege-Russel theory of naming and quantification. Under this theory of quantification, the statement "There is a God" would

72 Anselm, Monologion III 53

be properly symbolized as "( x) Gx," where Gx is the predicate meaning "x is God."

According to this theory, when someone says there is a God, he means that there exists something that satisfies the description he wishes to give for God. Furthermore, any name is taken to be shorthand for a general description of that being; there should be some expression of a form. If this were true, then any claim about an individual would require an existential assumption. For instance, when Oppy tries to symbolize the statement

'Aristotle is intelligent' using the Frege-Russel system, he symbolizes it as

( x)( y) [((Py & PPy & TAGy) y=x) & Ix]

In this symbolization, Py, PPy, and TAGy represent the qualities attributable to y by virtue of being Aristotle – that he is a philosopher, a pupil of Plato, and a teacher of

Aristotle. This symbolization requires that there be a way of describing Plato so that any individual satisfying all of these predicates would be Plato. If this were the case then the ontological argument might face a problem because the symbolization of any statement such as "God is omnipotent" would already assume that God existed.73 However, it is unreasonable to expect St. Anselm to have taken such arguments into account. Oppy considers these points as an aid to understanding Kant's position that existence is not a real predicate, but observes even there that an understanding of Kant based on Fregian-

73 Oppy notes several problems with this view, most notably Kripke's objection that most names are not used just as shorthand for some list of . I am not pursuing these objections in depth because I am attempting to show that this issue, like many others regarding symbolization of existence claims, comes out of an attempt to predicate individuals rather than classes. For a more thorough discussion of these issues, see Oppy pp. 36-37. 54

Russellian logic is anachronistic;74 this argument would be even more anachronistic when applied to a medieval figure such as St. Anselm.

This is not to suggest that classical logicians were wholly ignorant of questions about individual objects. However, the role geometry played in motivating logical development would have led classical logicians to focus more on the class and less on the individual. St. Anselm's ontological argument reflects this approach to proof.

Aristotelian Logic

Most of what is now termed Aristotelian logic was not actually developed by Aristotle, at least not in the form that we now have it. After his death in the third century, his various writings on the dialectic were edited and compiled by his students into the treatise that became known as the . While the term logic was not introduced until several centuries after Aristotle's death, the scope of this division of philosophy was largely defined by the topics that were addressed in this book.75

The Organon consists of six parts. The classifies different types of predicates into ten groups: substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, situation, state, action, and passion. Of the six parts of the Organon, this is the most difficult part to understand why it was included in the Organon, since the other five parts deal primarily with the analysis and refutation of arguments, while the Categories is more metaphysical.

74 Oppy, Ontological Arguments and Belief in God p. 33. 75 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 23. 55

However they came to be included, the most pertinent question to my present study is how they would have affected the ontological argument. The Categories' inclusion in the

Organon ensued that scholars from antiquity onward who studied the Organon would be exposed to the metaphysical questions raised by Aristotle in this writing. This treatise's inclusion in a predominantly logical system encouraged students of the Organon to apply logical methodology to questions about topics that were not directly related to the geometry that had initially spurred logic's development.

The Categories would have been one of the few treatises from the Organon that was likely available to St. Anselm. Kneale and Kneale write that "['s] Latin versions of the Categories and the were indeed the only texts of

Aristotle generally available to philosophers of the early medieval period."76 Even if St.

Anselm did not have access to the rest of the Organon, the Categories' inclusion in a work primarily devoted to logic would have encouraged him and other medieval philosophers to think metaphysical questions could be investigated through use of logic.

Thus when St. Anselm defined God in a certain way and illustrated how this definition logically required that God exist as more than just an object of the understanding, his contemporaries were less predisposed to object that logic should not be applied to a metaphysical being like God or that God defied definition. The Categories' inclusion in the Organon made it more plausible for a philosopher like St. Anselm to apply

Aristotelian logic to an entity such as God.

An important objection could be raised to this point, and so must be considered.

Some medieval philosophers, notably , objected to the idea that God

76 Kneale and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 189. 56

could be defined in positive terms. As notes,77 in the

John Scotus Eriugena describes God as "superdeus deitas," which Moran translates as

"more-than-divine ." Eriugena also describes God's other characteristics using this super prefix. If Eriugena viewed God as something that was beyond positive description, is it reasonable to be certain that St. Anselm described God as definitely as he seems to do?

The answer in the neo-Platonist Pseudo-Dionysius's influence over Eriugena.

Though Pseudo-Dionysius lived and wrote in the sixth century, his works were not widely circulated in the West until 827, when the Byzantine emperor the

Stammerer gave them to the Holy .78 Dionysius's work would most likely not have been available to St. Anselm, and philosophers more influenced by Aristotle than Pseudo-Dionysius's neo- would probably have accepted St. Anselm's position that God could be defined, or at least described well enough to make positive assertions about His existence.

In the Topics Aristotle turned to the study of dialectical reasoning, which Kneale and Kneale claim that Aristotle used to mean reasoning starting from opinions that are only generally accepted, as opposed to the more demonstrative reasoning found in analysis of geometry, which began from necessarily true premises. St. Anselm's ontological argument is of this type, since its premise that existence beyond the understanding is greater than existence limited to the understanding is only generally accepted, not necessarily true. While the Topics was most likely not available to St.

Anselm in its entirety, it may have affected other thinkers in and the early

77 Moran, "The of Pseudo-Dionysius," "John Scotus Eriugena" 78 Moran, "The Translation of Pseudo-Dionysius," "John Scotus Eriugena" 57

medieval period by encouraging them to apply reasoned arguments to subjects not as obviously rational as mathematics.79 This would have made it easier for St. Anselm to insist that theological questions such as God's existence should be subject to rational investigation.

In an appendix to this work, De Sophisticis Elenchis, Aristotle critiques several sophistic arguments. While the content of this book is not directly relevant to St.

Anselm's ontological argument, it does show how Aristotelian logic could be used to evaluate and answer counterarguments. This gives us a way to judge St. Anselm's reply to Gaunilo's On Behalf of the Fool.80 If the standards for judging whether an answer to criticism was successful were different in St. Anselm's time than they are today, the De

Sophisticis Elenchis provides a valuable insight into what one ancient philosopher thought about the matter. The standards undoubtedly changed from Aristotle's times to

St. Anselm's, but the development of symbolic and have resulted in more rapid changes to logic in the 900 years since St. Anselm has lived than in the 1,400 years that passed between Aristotle and St. Anselm. St. Anselm may well have had more in common with Aristotle on this subject than he would have with a contemporary philosopher whose approach would be shaped by the rigors of analytic philosophy.

De Interpretatione examines which statements are contradictory to each other and in what ways. Aristotle probably considered this issue because of the practical necessity raised by the dialectical reasoning of the Topics. It is often easier to see what the opposite of a mathematical statement would be than it is to see the opposite of a more general

79 For example, many of the Stoic recognize contradictions in everyday situations, such as the man who says he is lying. 80 Gaunilo's argument against the ontological argument, as well as St. Anselm's reply, will be addressed in the next chapter. 58

statement. De Interpretatione would have been useful to St. Anselm, as the reductio ad absurdum portion of his argument requires him to interpret the statement that it is not the case that God exists merely in the understanding.

The two final parts of the Organon, the and Posterior Analytics were not widely available in St. Anselm's time. These two books dealt with analysis of arguments by their forms, and contained the famous Aristotelian .

However, as the ontological argument deals with the existence of a single being,81

"some" and "all" statements do not come into play, and so this lack of exposure was less of a handicap for St. Anselm than it might have been.

Definitions and First Principles

In the ontological argument, St. Anselm begins by defining God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived." He then proceeds to make observations about any being that fulfills this definition, eventually concluding that any being that satisfies the definition of God must exist outside the knower's understanding. This form seems similar to Aristotle's , which Aristotle defines as "discourse in which, certain things being stated, something other than what is stated follows of necessity from their being

81 As was described above, St. Anselm's conception of God seems to describe the single being who is greater than every other conceivable being (or, in the terms of the Monologion, is the source of all greatness, goodness, and existence). However, even granting that God is less similar to an individual than He is to a class consisting of a single (unspecified) object, it still is redundant to speak of some or all. "Some God is just" or "All are just" would have the same truth value as the statement "God is just," whoever God might be. 59

so."82 It may therefore be useful to examine what Aristotle wrote about the proper structure of definitions and syllogisms; if St. Anselm was aware of those comments,83 they could provide a useful tool for evaluating the ontological argument.

For Aristotle, syllogisms produce a specific type of knowledge. As Aristotle writes,

We suppose ourselves to possess unqualified scientific knowledge of a thing, as opposed to knowing it in the accidental way in which the sophist knows, when we think that we know the cause of that fact and of no other, and, further, that the fact could not be other than it is.84

This type of knowledge nicely parallels what St. Anselm is attempting to accomplish in the ontological argument. The ontological argument is addressed to "the fool [who] has said in his heart, There is no God," but convincing the fool is not St. Anselm's only purpose in writing the ontological argument. St. Anselm to find "a single argument which would require no other for its proof than itself alone; and alone would suffice to demonstrate that God truly exists."85 The aim of the ontological argument, therefore, is not to create a new proposition where one did not previously exist, but to provide a demonstration for something already believed.

Aristotle also specifies what sort of premises are appropriate starting points for a that yields scientific knowledge. He writes,

82 Aristotle, Prior Analytics I.2 83 This is an important question, as the Prior Analytics and Posterior Analytics were not widely circulated in western Europe during St. Anselm's day. I will address it in more detail in the section "Textual Transmission and Medieval Logic," later in this chapter. 84 Aristotle, Posterior Analytics I.2 85 Anselm, Proslogion Preface. 60

The premisses of demonstrated knowledge must be true, primary, immediate, better known than and prior to the conclusion, which is further related to them as effect to cause. Unless these conditions are satisfied, the basic will not be 'appropriate' to the conclusion. Syllogism there may be without these conditions, but such syllogism, not being productive of scientific knowledge, will not be demonstration.86

The question can then be asked whether the ontological argument is based on premises that satisfy these requirements. In a previous chapter I identified several premises of the ontological argument in Proslogion II and III, the two most important being

1. God is "that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

2. It is better to exist so certainly that it could not exist, than for it to exist

contingently.87

The first of these premises is a definition, which in later philosophy was often taken to be true by virtue of being a definition. Robin Smith writes the following about Aristotle's view of definitions:

What a definition expresses is "the what-it-is-to-be" (to ti ên einai). Roman translators, vexed by this odd Greek phrase, devised a word for it, essentia, from which our "essence" descends. So, an Aristotelian definition is an account of the essence of something.88

Since a definition is the essence of the being that is defined, it seems reasonable to assume that it is true. It also would be "better known than and prior to the conclusion," at

86 Aristotle, Posterior Analytics I.2 87 As was noted in chapter III of this thesis, the second premise is formulated in this way in Anselm, Proslogion III. In Proslogion II the second premise would be "It is better to exist outside the understanding than to exist only in the understanding." 88 Robin Smith, "Definitions and ," "Aristotle's Logic." 61

least in the case of the ontological argument. The ontological argument's conclusion claims to assert an attribute of God (namely that He exists), and an attribute of a being cannot be spoken of until its essential nature is known.

But is a definition necessarily primary and immediate? This question requires an understanding of what Aristotle meant when he speaks of "primary" and "immediate." He writes on this subject,

In saying that the premisses of demonstrated knowledge must be primary, I mean that they must be the 'appropriate' basic truths, for I identify primary premiss and basic truth. A 'basic truth' in a demonstration is an immediate proposition. An immediate proposition is one which has no other proposition prior to it.89

When Aristotle gives a definition of a of beings, he first gives their more general group (their genus), and then specifies the essential quality that differentiates that species from their genus. For instance, Aristotle might define man as "Man is an animal that can reason." The ontological argument's definition of God could similarly be restated as "God is a conceivable being that is greater than any other conceivable being." This definition cannot be understood without also understanding the genus ("conceivable beings"), and so may not seem immediate. However, there is a difference between understanding the meaning of the terms used in a definition, and needing additional propositions to demonstrate its truth. A definition such as the ontological argument's definition of God does not require demonstration by some other principle, and so it is immediate and primary.

89 Aristotle, Posterior Analytics I.2 62

What of the ontological argument's second premise? This premise is much more questionable, and many Anselmian critics90 have argued that it is not even true. However, consider how St. Anselm uses the premise in the ontological argument. He does not attempt to justify his assertion that necessary existence is greater than existence only in the understanding; he simply accepts it. St. Anselm must believe it is true, or he would not use it as a premise in his argument. This premise is better known than the conclusion that God exists outside the understanding because St. Anselm could surmise the principle of his premise by considering sensible objects, whereas he could not observe God.

Whether or not this premise is in fact primary and immediate, St. Anselm believes it is because he does not try to illustrate this fact using other propositions. Therefore, whatever criticisms St. Anselm's critics might have of this premise, St. Anselm at least uses it in a sense appropriate to Aristotle's theory of deduction, and the conclusion (if it is true) would be of the more precise scientific type of knowledge that St. Anselm was trying to reach.

Stoic and Megarian Logic

The Stoics and Megarians were philosophical schools in classical Greece that formed around the work of Zeno the Eleatic. Zeno examined several paradoxes. Usually he assumed some proposition p and observed that both q and not-q followed from it, concluding that it was impossible that p was true. This approach involved the use of

90 Most notably Immanuel Kant in his assertion that existence is not a real predicate. 63

conditionals, and so it is not surprising that discussion of conditional statements occurred quite often in the Megarian and Stoic schools. While Aristotle also developed a modal logic, this study received a greater emphasis under the Megarians and Stoics because of the way the work of Zeno the Eleatic required his students to consider conditional statements.

Diodorus Cronus provided the most original Stoic account of modality. Boethius wrote of him,

Diodorus defines the possible as that which either is or will be (quod aut est aut erit), the impossible as that which being false, will not be true (quod cum falsum sit, non erit verum), the necessary as that which, being true, will not be false (quod cum verum sit, non erit falsum), and the non-necessary as that which either is already or will be false. (aut jam est aut erit falsum)."91

Kneale and Kneale further observe that, according to Diodorus's position, the necessity or contingency of a statement can change as time passes. They give the example that the statement "There was a French " is necessary now, but that before 1789 it was only possible."92

Philo Judaeus developed a theory that addresses the soundness of conditional arguments. He maintained that a conditional argument was sound if and only if it did not begin with a truth and end with a falsehood. (Kneale and Kneale term this "the truth- functional definition of 'if... then...'."93) This definition has a weakness, however, because any conditional beginning with a falsehood would be true. Diodorus improved this definition by defining a sound conditional as one where it was impossible that the

91 Quoted in Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 117, from Commentarii in Librum Aristotelis Περι 'Ερμηνειας, Secunda Editio, ed. Meiser p. 234. 92 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 118. 93 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 129-130. 64

antecedent be true and the consequent be false. If the antecedent happened to be false at some point in time, this is not enough for the conditional to be sound under Diodorus's view.

Yet it seems wrong to say that if a conditional begins with a statement that is false, then it is unsound. In situations where the antecedent of the conditional is never true, Diodorus says that the conditional has no application, rather than that it is unsound.

This results in a curious lack of bivalence which is usually expected of logical statements, but it does seem to be the most accurate description of conditionals out of those developed by the Stoics.

This work is applicable to the reductio ad absurdum portion of St. Anselm's ontological argument. St. Anselm begins with the dialectic94 premise that God does not necessarily exist outside of the understanding and proceeds to show that this leads to the contradictory conclusions that (1) God is the being than which nothing greater can be conceived, and (2) it is possible to conceive of a being greater than God.95 Conclusion (2) provides a counterexample to conclusion (1), allowing St. Anselm to construct an argument of the same form used by Zeno the Eleatic, with p being "God does not necessarily exist outside the understanding" and q being "God is the being than which nothing greater can be conceived." Moreover, because the argument as it is extended in

Proslogion III deals with necessary existence rather than simple existence,96 the Stoic treatment of modalities provides a helpful tool in understanding precisely what St.

94 I use this term here in the Platonic sense, i.e. a premise the philosopher will use to make clear an unsavory logical consequence of a certain position. 95 Namely, the being with every attribute possessed by God who also exists outside of the understanding. 96 There is some controversy in the criticism of St. Anselm's ontological argument over whether St. Anselm proposed two distinct arguments in the second and third chapters of the Proslogion, or whether a single argument is contained in these two chapters. I choose to follow the second interpretation, but if someone interprets the Proslogion as containing two ontological arguments this point still applies to the second of those arguments. 65

Anselm meant by this statement. Through the use of , it is possible to understand St. Anselm's use of modalities without resorting to the modal logic systems developed in modern times, and most likely helped St. Anselm formulate the argument to begin with.

However, just because an idea was developed before St. Anselm does not mean he would have had access to it. I will now look at how Aristotelian and Stoic logic were transmitted, to see how much of these traditions would have likely been available in

Western Europe during St. Anselm's lifetime.

Textual Transmission and Medieval Logic

Stoic logic would probably have been more widely known in the period of late antiquity than Aristotle's logic was. Aristotle died in the fourth century B.C., and his thinking was not very influential among the Athenian schools by the second century B.C.97 The Stoic school, on the other hand, was still active through the second century A.D. Marcus

Aurelius, the Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, did not die until 180 A.D., and

Apuleius and Galen produced manuals

However, while the Stoics had an influence on classical philosophy much longer than Aristotle did, their work was not as well preserved. Kneale and Kneale write,

97 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 177. 66

Unfortunately, all we know about Stoic logic is to be found in fragments preserved by writers of other schools, some of them hostile; but on many points these fragments confirm each other, and we can reconstruct the main features, though there must be some conjecture about the connexions and of the items.98

One of the most thorough treatments of Stoic philosophy is by Sextus Empiricus, a cynic who wrote in the third century A.D. He presented many Stoic in order to refute them, and his treatment is at least thorough and intelligible. It is unclear, though, how clearly this reflects what the Stoics actually taught.99 Laertes, a historian who lived sometime between 200 and 500 A.D., also gave an account of Stoic philosophy and logic in his life of Zeno the Eleatic. Diogenes is often an unreliable source, and though he relied heavily on a handbook prepared by of Magnesia in the first century B.C., he may not have faithfully reported the Stoic positions on philosophical issues. Taken together, the work of Sextus and Diogenes are the primary sources of information about

Stoic logic that survived from antiquity, and each has its limitations.

Aristotle's work was the subject of more extensive scholarship. included both Aristotelian and Stoic logic in his handbook from the second century A.D., De

Philosophia Rationali sive Peri Hermeneias. Alexander of Aphrodisias wrote commentaries on Aristotle's work, and though his writings were probably not widely available in the West by St. Anselm's time, they were used by several writers as source materials, including Boethius's writings, which were more widely available. Aristotle is also the subject of St. Augustine's work Categoriae Decem ex Aristotele ecerptae. This treatise was a description of several Latin commentaries on Aristotle, and because

Augustine was so widely read throughout , this gave Aristotle a wider

98 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, p. 116. 99 Kneale's and Kneale's The Development of Logic, pp. 116-117. 67

influence in the early medieval period than he otherwise would have had. Moreover, because Augustine was a Christian, his use of Aristotle legitimized the study of him, helping to counter the reluctance many Christian philosophers in late antiquity and the early medieval period had of utilizing a pagan writer.

Most significantly, several of Aristotle's works were translated into Latin by

Boethius. Boethius was a Christian living in the fifth and sixth century A.D. He served as to , a ruler of the Ostrogoths who also exercised significant influence over the Visigoths (as of their child-king) and the Franks (as husband to the king's sister). Through Theodoric's influence, Boethius's writings and were archived in libraries across western Europe. He wrote his own works on logic, , theology, and arithmetic, but it is his compilations of Greek handbooks and commentaries that proved most influential on . His Latin translations of the Categories and De Interpretatione were the only texts of Aristotle widely available in the . He also translated Prior Analytics, the Topics, and De

Sophisticis Elenchis, but these texts were not as widely circulated, and it is less certain whether St. Anselm would have had access to them directly.

However, just because St. Anselm did not read the Prior Analytics and Posterior

Analytics, this does not mean that he would have been completely uninfluenced by these works. Aristotle's logical approach would have influenced those who came after him, to whom St. Anselm may have better access. To give one example, the neo-Platonist

Porphyry wrote the in the third century, which summarizes Aristotle's logical system. The Isagoge was translated into Latin by Boethius and was studied as a logical textbook throughout the early Middle Ages. It was circulated along with Boethius's

68

translations of the Categories and De Interpretatione. Even if St. Anselm did not have access to the Prior Analytics and Posterior Analytics themselves (as seems likely), he probably would have read the Isagoge and so would have been familiar with many of the concepts in the Analytics through 's work.

Conclusion

How are we to interpret the ontological argument in light of classical philosophy? St.

Anselm would have been exposed to many important concepts from both Aristotelian and

Stoic logic. Aristotle's work on definitions and the proper relation between premises and conclusions in a logical syllogism provides a useful commentary when examining St.

Anselm's of premises in the ontological argument. Knowledge of stoic logic also allows for a more nuanced understanding of the ontological argument. After St. Anselm observes that it is greater for God to exist beyond the understanding than to exist only in the understanding (or, as he does in Proslogion III, for God to exist so certainly that he cannot not exist), the rest of the ontological argument takes the form of a proof by contradiction. This style of proof was very familiar to the Stoics, since many of Zeno's paradoxes utilized a similar form. St. Anselm's knowledge of the nature of conditional statements would have been influenced by them.

69

It is important, though, not to assume that St. Anselm was creating a strictly logical proof when he wrote the ontological argument. In the prologue to the Proslogion,

St. Anselm states his aim for that book. He writes,

Thinking, therefore, that what I rejoiced to have found, would, if put in writing, be welcome to some readers, of this very matter, and of some others, I have written the following treatise, in the person of one who strives to lift his mind to the of God, and seeks to understand what he believes.

Though he refers to the ontological argument as a demonstration, St. Anselm here presents his arguments for God's existence as , not as proofs. It is perhaps significant that St. Anselm originally wished to title the Monologion and Proslogion as

An Example of Meditation on the Grounds of Faith and Faith Seeking Understanding.100

St. Anselm's purpose becomes clearer in the first chapter of the Proslogion.

Marilyn McCord writes about that first chapter,

Anselm draws the complacent reader in with an invitation to turn aside and seek God's face, only quickly to expose his/her radical ignorance of how to do it. A long meditation on the consequences of 's fall drives home the depth of this disability; anxiety mounts to climactic desperation, pours forth the 's humble request for Divine Assistance to achieve the lower aim of understanding God "a little bit." Thus chastened, the soul is properly postured to approach God along intellectual avenues.101

For all its , the ontological argument is mystical as well. It cannot be thoroughly logically analyzed and, if found to be insufficient on that basis, dismissed; the proof offered in Proslogion II and III is a rather rough attempt to capture something that is not fully subject to analysis.

100 St. Anselm, Proslogion Prologue. 101 Adams, "Romancing the Good," p. 102. 70

This is not to underestimate the importance of Aristotle's and the Stoics' study of the nature of logic. When St. Anselm turns to those "intellectual avenues," he relies heavily on what he knew of the nature of definitions and demonstration, which he would have learned through Boethius and Porphyry. Later, when he constructed his proof by contradiction, he depends on the Stoics' conditionals. Understanding these concepts may not fully capture the ontological argument, but the logic of antiquity is still a useful tool that helps us to better understand the argument St. Anselm was attempting to make.

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CHAPTER VI

DEFENDING THE FOOL: COMMON CRITICISMS OF

ST. ANSELM'S ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

Introduction

St. Anselm's ontological argument has a simplicity that has made it surprisingly difficult to disprove. Starting with a definition and the assertion that the person who says "God does not exist" implicitly admits that the term "God" can be used meaningfully, St.

Anselm goes on to argue that this God must exist in some way beyond the fool's understanding. Yet for all its simplicity, St. Anselm has found new critics in every age since he first laid out his proof in the eleventh century, as well as defenders ready to argue for the ontological argument. Alvin Plantinga writes on the subject,

To the unsophisticated, Anselm's argument is (at first sight at least) remarkably unconvincing, if not downright irritating; it smacks too much of word magic. And yet almost every major philosopher from the time has had his say about it. [...]

72

Although the argument certainly looks at first sight as if it ought to be unsound, it is profoundly difficult to say what exactly is wrong with it. 102

The ontological argument is clearly addressed to a highly rational audience. There are no appeals to the audience's , or even references to the ordinary world of everyday . It is not subject criticisms that sense- is unreliable, and so has avoided becoming merely a matter of historical , as has been the fate of many other medieval arguments for God's existence. Its soundness and validity is debated even in contemporary literature; it may not inspire the vulgar man to religious belief, as Plantinga observed, but the metaphysical and logical properties of the argument are still important subjects of philosophical debate.

This chapter will explore several historical objections to the ontological argument.

It will then turn to the question of whether the form of the argument presented in

Proslogion II and III are valid. In this way we will better understand the strengths and weaknesses of the argument presented by St. Anselm.

Historical Criticisms

Gaunilo

The first philosopher to offer a substantive criticism of the ontological argument was

Gaunilo of Marmoutiers. Gaunilo published the treatise On Behalf of the Fool, in which he defends the fool of Psalm 14:1 against the ontological argument. He was a

102 God and Other Minds, "The Ontological Argument I", pp 26-27 73

contemporary of St. Anselm's, and On Behalf of the Fool was published during St.

Anselm's lifetime, allowing St. Anselm to reply to this work in the Apologetic. In

Addition, since Gaunilo lived around the same time as St. Anselm and was a Benedictine monk like St. Anselm was, he would have been familiar with the intellectual standards of

St. Anselm's day. More recent critics of St. Anselm have the benefit of philosophical advancements since the eleventh century, but Gaunilo has a more intimate understanding of the world in which St. Anselm lived and worked than any more contemporary scholar would have.

Gaunilo is most famous for his counterexample to the ontological argument, the

Lost Island. He wrote,

It is said that somewhere in the ocean is an island. [...] This island has an inestimable wealth of all manner of riches and delicacies in greater abundance than is told of the Islands of the Blest; and that having no owner or inhabitant, it is more excellent than all other countries, which are inhabited by mankind. 103

This description of the lost island has many similarities to St. Anselm's conception of

God, but it may initially remind the reader more of the God of the Monologion than of the

Proslogion. Gaunilo seems to say that the lost island is greater than all other existent lands, just as St. Anselm says that God possesses goodness, greatness, and existence in greater measure than any other being.

However, the inclusion of the "Islands of the Blest" suggests a similarity with the

God of the Proslogion. The Islands of the Blessed were a cluster of islands in to which the of great heroes were sent after their death. 104 Many men of

103 On Behalf of the Fool, Chapter 6. 104 "Islands of the Blessed," The Dictionary of Phrase and Fable 74

antiquity thought this represented an actual place, so much so that identified the Canary Islands as the Islands of the Blessed, 105 but a Christian monk like

Gaunilo certainly would have recognized the Islands of the Blessed as a fictional location. Gaunilo, therefore, is not simply saying that the lost island is greater than all existing islands, but that it is greater than non-existent ones as well. As the Islands of the

Blessed occupied much the same function in Greek mythology that does in

Christian theology, it seems reasonable that Gaunilo identifies the Islands of the Blessed with the greatest island he can imagine, existent or otherwise. His definition of the lost island therefore parallels St. Anselm's definition of God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

Gaunilo further writes,

Now if some one should tell me that there is such an island, I should easily understand his words, in which there is no difficulty. But suppose he went on to say, as if by a logical : "You can no longer doubt that this island exists somewhere, since you have no doubt that it is in your understanding. And since it is more excellent not to be in the understanding alone, [...] for this reason it must exist." [...] I should believe that he was jesting, or I know not which I ought to regard as the greater fool: myself, supposing that I should allow this proof; or him, if he should suppose that he had established with any certainty the existence of the island. 106

The proof Gaunilo ridicules here resembles the form of St. Anselm's ontological argument. Gaunilo first establishes the lost island's existence in the understanding, then argues that it is "more excellent not to be in the understanding alone," and finally concludes that the lost island must therefore exist.

105 "Canary Islands," Concise Dictionary of World Place-Names 106 Gaunilo, On Behalf of the Fool 75

There is, however, one significant difference between the ontological argument and Gaunilo's lost island counterexample. Robert Adams summarizes this distinction nicely. He writes,

The principal departure here from the pattern of the Proslogion 2 argument is that whereas Anselm spoke of a being whose greatness could not possibly be surpassed, Gaunilo speaks only of an island to which no country is in fact superior. Because of this difference, it is not necessary to use the concept of a magnitude in formulating the lost-island argument. 107

Earlier I stated that the lost island resembles St. Anselm's conception of God in the

Proslogion than the conception in the Monologion because of the lost island's superiority to the Islands of the Blessed. It is true that Gaunilo describes the lost island as greater than a mythological island, quite possibly the greatest island he has imagined. However, this does not truly parallel St. Anselm's description of God as the greatest imaginable being, though it is similar. St. Anselm may reasonably reject the soundness of the lost island argument while maintaining that of his own ontological argument.

The lost island argument does have a valid form, and it is difficult to reject its premises once St. Anselm's assumptions about the nature of existence are accepted.

Adams describes five characteristics of existent objections that St. Anselm must ascribe to for the ontological argument to prove God's existence, the third of which allows

Gaunilo to establish the lost island's existence in the understanding. Adams writes,

107 Robert Adams, p. 36. 76

A thing which exists in the understanding truly possesses all the properties which are contained or implied in its concept or definition. If we form a consistent description or conception of something, then whether or not it exists in reality, there is something (which at least exists in the understanding) which truly has all the properties which are included or implied in the description or conception.108

Adams later suggests that this characteristic be modified in such a way that it will allow

God to exist in the understanding yet keep the lost island from having this existence. He draws a distinction between the two concepts because existence is a necessary characteristic of God but a contingent characteristic of the lost island. Adams writes,

The application of this assumption is to be restricted to descriptions which are meant to be understood as containing only properties which belong necessarily to their common subject. A description which is understood to contain properties which belong contingently to their subject need not be assumed to be satisfied by anything, real or unreal.109,110

St. Anselm argues that God's existence is a necessary consequence of a definition which does not stipulate his existence. Let us modify the characteristic under discussion that it reads something like this:

If we form a consistent description or conception of something, there is something (which at least exists in the understanding) which truly has all the properties which are necessarily included or implied in the description or conception.111

In this case, the God who exists in the understanding must also have the property of not only existing beyond the understanding, while Gaunilo's lost island does not need to exist

108 Adams, p. 33. 109 Adams, p. 38. 110 This modification would also answer Caterus's objections to Descartes, so that an "existing unicorn" could not be defined into existence. 111 Adapted from Adams p. 38; emphasized text added. 77

even in the understanding. Interpreted in this way, Gaunilo's lost island need not be interpreted as a counterexample at all.

St. Thomas Aquinas

St. Thomas objected to St. Anselm's ontological argument. Whereas Gaunilo tries to show that the ontological argument's structure can be used to prove things whose existence St. Anselm should be reluctant to accept, St. Thomas Aquinas questions one of

St. Anselm's premises. Specifically, St. Thomas Aquinas asks whether God's existence in the fool's understanding is of the nature required by the ontological argument. St. Thomas

Aquinas writes,

Granted that everyone understands that by this word 'God' is signified something than which nothing greater can be conceived, nevertheless, it does not therefore follow that he understands that what the word signifies actually exists, but only that it exists mentally.112

St. Anselm's assertion that God is "that than which nothing greater can be conceived" is a definition and so should be acceptable to everyone. However, the claim that such a being exists in the fool's understanding (what I describe below as being logically possible) is less obviously true. It is not clear that the Biblical fool asserts what St. Anselm seems to claim he asserts when he says that God does not exist. St. Anselm claims that when a

112 St. Thomas Aquinas's , qtd. Oppy p. 122. 78

person understands a concept, that being exists as a mental object in the person's understanding, but St. Thomas Aquinas questions this claim.

This distinction may become clearer if we consider an example. Suppose two people understand the concept of a round square in different ways. Say that Dick understands what would be meant of a round circle, that is, an object that in the normal two-dimensional space used by Euclidean geometricians contains exactly four straight sides that meet at right but where each point on each of those sides is the same distance from the center as any other point on any of the sides. Dick need not believe such an object was logically possible; he merely understands what someone who speaks of a round square means by the term. Also, say that Jane actually believed such a thing could possibly exist, though she could not produce an example of such a shape in the world beyond her mind. In this case Dick's understanding would be of an entirely different sort than Jane's.

The ontological argument relies on the fool's understanding of God for its validity, yet it does not make clear what kind of understanding the fool has of God. As

Brian Davies writes,

It does not follow that the Fool is wrong to deny that God is in re just because he is prepared to accept someone's insistence that the word "God" means "something than which nothing greater can be thought." The Fool could always say: "I am happy to allow that 'God' means 'something than which nothing greater can be thought.' But on that basis alone I do not have to agree that there really is something (God) than which nothing greater can be thought. 113

113 From the article "St. Anselm and the Ontological Argument" in The Cambridge Companion to St. Anselm. 79

If the fool understands God the way Jane understands the round square, there may be a true contradiction between the fool's belief that God exists in the understanding and yet does not exist in the world outside the understanding. However, if the fool only understands God in the way that Dick understands the concept of the round square, the contradiction is less obvious. It seems that the ontological argument would only be convincing for someone who understands God in the way Jane understands the round square. As St. Thomas Aquinas reasonably observes, the person who doubts God's existence may not have this type of understanding.

However, St. Thomas Aquinas's criticism only speaks to the truth or falsity of one of St. Anselm's premises. The fool, if he is to be convinced by the ontological argument, must believe that there is a possible being than which no greater can be conceived. The ontological argument should still convince such a person of God's existence beyond the understanding, and if someone is not convinced, it is because he believes a premise to be false, not because the argument itself is invalid.

Immanuel Kant

The final historical challenge to the ontological argument that I wish to consider114 concerns the question of whether existence increases a being's greatness. This issue was raised by Immanuel Kant in The Critique of Pure Reason. Kant writes,

114 Oppy observes (p. 29) that Kant's criticism is likely directed against Descartes's presentation of the ontological argument in Meditations V. However, these same criticisms are often raised against the 80

'Being' is obviously not a real predicate; that is, it is not a concept of something which could be added to the concept of a thing. It is merely the positing of a thing, or of certain determinations, as existing in themselves. Logically, it is merely the copula of a . The proposition 'God is omnipotent' contains two concepts, each of which has its object – God and omnipotence. The small word 'is' adds no new predicate, but only serves to posit the predicate in its relation to the subject. 115

This passage tries to draw a distinction between the predicates that belong to our conception of an object, and the predicates that belong to the object in itself. 116 If God is thought of as being omnipotent, omniscient, and so on, then these are characteristics that an object must possess in order to satisfy the concept of God. However, Kant argues that the attribute of existence could not be added to even the most complete conception of

God. Moreover, if by existence we mean existence beyond the understanding, existence cannot be limited to a concept limited to the understanding. Existence, at least of the type

St. Anselm is trying to prove, seems to be a relation between a concept and something beyond the understanding, not a part of the concept itself.

Yet it is not clear why this should keep existence from being a real predicate.

Oppy writes,

ontological argument as well. For instance, Plantinga presents the Anselmian ontological argument in God and Other Minds and then proceeds to consider Kant's criticisms of the ontological argument. Moreover, I cannot see how any of the differences between the Anselmian and Cartesian ontological arguments make Descartes more susceptible to Kant's criticisms than Anselm would be. 115 This passage is the translation quoted by Oppy on p. 32 of Ontological Arguments and Belief in God. While Oppy does not give the precise reference for the material I have quoted, it is part of a longer passage which Oppy identifies as being from A598-A600 of The Critique of Pure Reason. 116 holds a similar view, as expressed on pp. 35-37 of Ontological Arguments and Belief in God. 81

Suppose that C is the complete concept of C*, where C* is an existing object. Can it be the case that one of the properties that C attributes to any object that falls under it is the property of falling under C? Surely not. For, when we add the property of falling under C to the concept C, we have specified a new concept, C', say – that is, we have specified a concept that is distinct from C. [...] A defender of the claim that existence is a real predicate can reasonably object that it is simply question begging to suppose that the property of falling under K must be added to K in order to contain a new concept in which there is an attribute of existence.117

It is true that, if existence is viewed as something external to the concept of a thing, then it is problematic to add existence to that concept. However, the reasons given by Kant do not show why it is problematic for existence to already be a part of that concept.

What of the larger question of whether God's existence increases His greatness?

Kant is correct that existence cannot be added to a complete conception of God, but this is not what St. Anselm is attempting to do in the ontological argument. Rather, St.

Anselm is ranking the greatness of two different beings, the theist's conception, in which

God exists beyond the understanding, and the fool's conception, in which God's existence is limited to the understanding. If the theist's conception of God is greater, then the fool's conception of God would be incoherent, and so the fool would either have to accept a different conception of God or reject God's coherency outright. If St. Anselm is correct in his claim that existence beyond the understanding is greater than existence limited to the understanding. However, St. Anselm's claim seems questionable even if we allow that existence is a real predicate.

It could be argued that existence is not always preferable to non-existence. In cases such as the terminal illness of a patient, some people may desire to terminate their existence. It may even be the case that such a desire is rational. However, if such a desire

117 Oppy, pp. 36-37. 82

is rational, then the desire to no longer exist arises out of a lack of some good quality. St.

Anselm would insist that God cannot lack any greatness, and so God could never rationally desire not to exist. The ontological argument does not need to be interpreted as making a universal claim that existence is better than non-existence for all beings. 118

Therefore, even if it is true that existence is not always greater than non-existence, the ontological argument only requires that it be greater for God.

Moreover, the ontological argument does not argue that existence is greater than non-existence. Instead, it argues that certain modes of existence are greater than other modes of existence. Even in Proslogion II, the reductio ad absurdum portion of the argument compares a being that exists only in the understanding to a being that has some type of existence outside the understanding. St. Anselm argues that it is greater to exist beyond the understanding than to exist only in the understanding. He does not specify why one mode of existence is greater than another, but it is easy to see why St. Anselm might have viewed existence outside the understanding as a greatness. Since God is omnibenevolent and omnipotent it is in His nature to do good things; and if He exists outside an individual's mind then He can actually enact these good things He desires to do. It would benefit every being other than God119 for God to have this capability, and so it seems like a greatness for God to exist outside the understanding.

Kant's critique of the ontological argument is often cited as reasons for why it should be dismissed. If this criticism is valid, and if it must be interpreted as claiming that

118 See Adams p. 30. It should be noted that, while the ontological argument only requires that existence beyond the understanding is greater than existence limited to the understanding for God, Gaunilo argues that existence of the lost island in actuality is greater than existence in the understanding and St. Anselm does not object to this point. 119 Some philosophers see God as the sum total of all things, so there is nothing that is not God. However, St. Anselm speaks of God in the Monologion as the being through which all other beings receive their goodness, existence, etc., implicitly accepting that there are other beings besides God. 83

existence does not increase God's greatness, then it would indeed present a serious challenge to the ontological argument However, the reasons given by Kant in defense of the idea that existence cannot be a real predicate primarily address the question of whether existence can be added to a complete concept. This does not address the question of whether a concept that already contains existence would be greater than a concept that did not contain existence, the two concepts being equal in every other regard.

Even if Kant is correct that existence is not a real predicate, there are still several obstacles to overcome before Kantians can declare the ontological argument defeated. It must still be shown that this critique is true not just of concepts in general but of the concept of God in particular. Moreover, those who would defend Kant's critique must show that being a "real predicate" is the only way a quality could possibly increase a concept's being. Kant's critique is a promising line of thought for those who wish to challenge the ontological argument, but further work is required before it will prove the ontological argument unsound.

The Validity of Proslogion II's Argument

The ontological argument presented in Proslogion II requires that the fool accept three premises: that the concept of a being "than which nothing greater can be conceived" is logically possible; that some modes of existence are greater than other modes of existence; and that it is logically possible that a being with every characteristic possessed

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by God also possesses the greatest mode of existence is conceivable. These premises being accepted, the argument does appear to have a valid form.

St. Anselm begins the ontological argument with the statement that God is "that than which nothing greater can be conceived." Since this is a definition, it is a priori true that the word God is used this way within the context of the ontological argument. This does not guarantee that anything actually satisfies this definition, but it should not be contentious that the expression "God" can be used interchangeably with the expression

"that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

St. Anselm's other beginning premise, that God exists in the fool's understanding, is more controversial. What does St. Anselm mean when he says God exists in the understanding? Later in the argument, St. Anselm will assert that it is conceivable to think of an individual with every characteristic of God, who also exists beyond the understanding. If the concept of God is not logically consistent then it is impossible for such a being to exist. Therefore, an individual with every characteristic of God, plus existence beyond the understanding (if God does not already possess this characteristic), is only conceivable if the concept of God is a logical possibility. The ontological argument would only be convincing to a fool who understands God to exist in his understanding, not to someone who merely understands how St. Anselm uses the term. In any case, the question of whether God exists in the fool's understanding concerns a premise, not the ontological argument's underlying logical structure.

Having established that God exists in the fool's understanding, St. Anselm proceeds into a reductio ad absurdum argument. He supposes that God does not exist outside the understanding and observes that there would then be a conceivable being who

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had every characteristic of God as well as existence beyond the understanding. He whose that, if this was true, it would lead to a contradiction because a being greater than God would be conceivable, and God is greater than any conceivable being by definition.

Therefore, it cannot be the case that God does not exist outside the understanding. God must either not exist or have a mode of existence other than existence in the understanding. God must exist because, by the fool's statement that "there is no God,"

God exists in the understanding; so He must exist beyond the understanding.

This argument has a valid form, but it does come close to begging the point St.

Anselm is attempting to prove. The goal of the ontological argument (at least so far as it is presented in this chapter) is to prove that God exists outside the understanding. In the reductio ad absurdum portion of this argument, St. Anselm argues that there is a conceivable being who possesses every greatness of God's, but who also exists beyond the understanding. This argument stipulates that there is a conceivable being that satisfies

St. Anselm's definition of God that also exists. By admitting the conceivability of this being, the person considering the ontological argument grants this being existence in the understanding. If the being truly possesses every greatness St. Anselm would attribute to

God, it seems that this being must also have a mode of existence greater than existence in the understanding, by St. Anselm's own reasoning. It is hard to see how St. Anselm's stipulation that there is a conceivable being who possesses every attribute possessed by

God and also exists outside the understanding does not assume the very point the ontological argument aims to establish. In any event, many atheists may want to deny that existence is compatible with some of God's attributes, and the ontological argument would not convince such skeptics.

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The Validity and Soundness of Proslogion III's Argument

As I discussed in the previous chapter, contemporary scholars of St. Anselm's work are divided about how to treat Proslogion III, with most of the literature viewing this chapter either as presenting a distinct argument from the ontological argument in Proslogion II or as expanding the argument presented in that chapter. I will first consider the validity of

Proslogion III as an argument in its own right, and will then look at how the argument's validity changes if Proslogion III is read as an expansion of Proslogion II.

The argument in Proslogion III does not restate the previous chapter's definition of God or the argument that God exists in the fool's understanding, but the argument does not make sense without these elements. The only way that Proslogion III can present a valid argument is if these elements of Proslogion II are also assumed to apply to

Proslogion III. God still must be "that than which nothing greater can be conceived," and this God must still exist in the fool's understanding.

It is at this point that the ontological argument of Proslogion III diverges from what St. Anselm presented in Proslogion II. St. Anselm creates another reductio ad absurdum argument, this time supposing that God's existence is not logically necessary.

He asserts that logically-necessary existence is greater than existence that is not logically necessary, and that it is logically possible that a being with every characteristic possessed by God should also have necessary existence. This creates a contradiction, and so it

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cannot be the case that God's existence is not logically necessary. He is left with two possibilities: either God does not exist, or God's existence is logically necessary. Since the fool has already given God existence in the understanding, it cannot be the case that

God does not exist. St. Anselm concludes that God's existence must be logically necessary.

The ontological argument of Proslogion III, considered as a separate argument from the argument in Proslogion II, has the same form as the argument in the prior chapter. Some portions of the argument are actually inherited from Proslogion II; other portions have the same structure, with only the premises change. Therefore, the ontological argument of Proslogion III has the same validity as the argument of

Proslogion II.

However, it is debatable whether Proslogion III, taken as an argument independent of Proslogion II, proves what St. Anselm wishes for it to prove. At the end of the reductio ad absurdum portion of Proslogion III, St. Anselm shows that it cannot be the case that God's existence is not logically necessary. God exists at least in the understanding, so God must have some type of existence that is logically necessary. This does not, however, show what type of existence is logically necessary, whether God exists within the understanding alone or in actuality as well.

In the previous chapter I argued that God's existence could not be both limited to the fool's understanding and logically necessary because of the contingent nature of the fool's understanding: in this case it would be possible to conceive of God not existing, by conceiving that the fool did not exist. I still maintain the truth of this position, so long as the fool's existence is actually contingent. But what would happen if there was a being

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who necessarily existed but was not "that than which nothing greater can be conceived"?

If God existed in this being's understanding, and not beyond this being's understanding, then this might satisfy the reductio ad absurdum portion of Proslogion III. In this situation God would exist so surely that He could not : God would exist "so truly, that it cannot be conceived not to exist,"120 yet he would not exist beyond the fool's understanding.

If Proslogion III is interpreted as an argument distinct from Proslogion II, it requires additional premises to show that God exists beyond the fool's understanding – namely, that it is not possible for God to have necessary existence within the fool's understanding.121 However, if Proslogion III is interpreted as an extension of the ontological argument in Proslogion II, the argument does prove that God exists beyond the understanding. The reductio ad absurdum portion of Proslogion IIII's argument ensures that God cannot exist in a way that it would be conceivable for Him not to exist.

This leaves three possibilities – non-existence, necessary existence within (and limited to) the understanding, and necessary existence beyond the understanding.122 Non-existence may be eliminated because the fool gives God existence in his understanding. The question then becomes whether God must exist necessarily only within the understanding, or whether He exists necessarily beyond the understanding as well. It was

120 Anselm, Proslogion III 121 It could be argued that the purpose of Proslogion III's argument is not to prove God's existence in reality, but to prove the logical necessity of God's existence. However, in the prologue of the Proslogion St. Anselm states the purpose of this work: to find "a single argument which would require no other for its proof than itself alone; and alone would suffice to demonstrate that God truly exists." If Proslogion III does not prove that God truly exists, the argument of Proslogion III (interpreted as a single argument independent of other portions of the Proslogion), then this chapter does not fulfil St. Anselm's purpose for the Proslogion. It is therefore problematic for scholars like to reject the argument of Proslogion II and accept the argument of Proslogion III instead; without Proslogion II, Proslogion III does not prove that God "truly exists." 122 Non-existence is considered here, because if God did not exist, His existence could not be conceived not to exist – He would have no Existence to violate St. Anselm's principle. 89

shown in Proslogion II that God cannot exist only in the understanding. Therefore, the ontological argument presented in Proslogion II and III provides a valid proof for God's necessary existence beyond the understanding.

Is the argument in Proslogion II and III more sound than the argument in

Proslogion II alone? Since the definition of God and St. Anselm's argument for God's existence in the understanding is not restated in Proslogion III, the objections to that portion of the argument apply just as well to the combined argument of Proslogion II and

III as they did to Proslogion alone. The primary change between Proslogion II and

Proslogion III is in the premise to be contradicted in the reductio ad absurdum portion of the proof. Here St. Anselm supposes that God's existence is not logically necessary (in his words, "it assuredly exists so truly, that it cannot be conceived not to exist"). This causes him to assert that logically necessary existence is greater than existence that is not logically necessary, and leads to the conclusion that God must have logically necessary existence. These changes affect the various premises of the argument, and so a person must accept them if he is to be convinced that God's existence is logically necessary.

Proslogion III relies on the new premise that it is greater for existence to be logically necessary than for it not to be logically necessary. Just as in Proslogion II, this premise does not require the fool to believe that existence is greater than non-existence, but rather that one type of existence is greater than another. However, with the difference between existence in the understanding and existence beyond the understanding, the latter type of existence provided a clear benefit, at least for beings other than God. It is not so obvious why necessary existence should be greater than existence that is not logically necessary.

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Norman Malcolm tries to justify this premise by appealing to the distinction between and duration. He writes,

I think, however, that from the supposition that it could happen that God did not exist it would follow that, if he existed, He would have more duration and not eternity. It would make sense to ask, "How long has He existed?," "Will He still exist next week?," "He was in existence yesterday but how about today?," and so on. It seems absurd to make God the subject of such questions. 123

Malcolm may be correct that it is nonsensical to ask such questions of God. Clearly, those who believe in God believe that He will continue to exist in the future and that He has always existed in the past. However, Penelhum makes the point that it is possible for theists to believe through faith that God exists eternally, without having a logical basis for why this must be the case. 124 Even if their belief is correct, this does not make God's existence logically necessary. It could simply be the case that God has contingently existed throughout the past and will continue to contingently exist throughout the future.

Certainly it is better for the believer to not doubt God's continued existence, but this does not guarantee that God exists as a matter of logical necessity.

Malcolm also appeals to the principle of dependence to defend St. Anselm's premise that that necessary existence is greater than contingent existence. He presents the analogy of a housewife who owns sturdy dishes rather than fragile dishes. He writes,

If a housewife has a set of extremely fragile dishes, then as dishes they are inferior to those of another set like them in all respects except that they are not fragile. Those of the first set are dependent for their continued existence on gentle handling. 125

123 "Anselm's Ontological Arguments," p. 48. 124 "On the Second Ontological Argument," p. 90. 125 "Anselm's Ontological Arguments," p. 47. 91

However, durability is not a good attribute for all objects in all circumstances. It is true that fragility and dependence usually have a negative connotation, and durability and independence a positive connotation. However, Abelson126 argues that durability is only a positive attribute for the housewife; for the manufacture of these dishes, fragility would be the preferable quality because it would ensure that the housewife would buy additional sets of dishes. If God's lack of dependence on another being is supposed to increase his greatness, it seems that his lack of dependence on another being for his existence would need to be universally good, not just good from a certain perspective.

It does seem likely that St. Anselm had dependence and independence in mind when he spoke of logically-necessary existence increasing God's greatness more than other types of existence. In the Monologion St. Anselm wrote that all beings receive their existence through a single being, and that this being is God. He also identifies this source of all existence with the maximally-great being, which suggests he sees a connection between greatness and not being dependent on another for existence. This connection seems reasonable within the medieval mindset; for St. Anselm, it would likely seem like a greatness to be the source of some attribute for all other beings, and so if God's existence was not logically necessary, God would be less great at least in this regard than the being on whom He was dependant for His existence. For the modern reader to be convinced by the argument, he would also need to accept this position that necessary existence is greater than other modes of existence.

Taken as a separate argument, the ontological argument of Proslogion III allows modern defenders of St. Anselm such as Malcolm to accept Kant's criticism and still

126 "Not Necessarily," p. 75. 92

maintain their belief in God's existence. It does, however, raise important questions about why necessary existence is greater than other modes of existence, and so seems to pose as many questions as it answers.

Conclusion

The ontological argument still requires that the fool accept several premises to be convinced that the ontological argument's conclusion is true. He must understand God in a way that gives God existence in his understanding, and he must accept that some mode of existence other than simply contingent existence in the understanding is possible.

Many skeptics may not view God in this way, and for them the ontological argument will be unconvincing, even if the content of Proslogion III is allowed to augment St. Anselm's argument in Proslogion II. However, taking the two chapters together shows that necessary existence is greater than contingent existence, at least within the understanding, without the need to refer to more dubious metaphysical assertions about the nature of existence. By examining the ontological argument in this way, the modern scholar may see more clearly how St. Anselm expected to move the fool from acceptance of the possibility of God to belief that God actually existed.

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CHAPTER VII

CONCLUSION

The ontological argument, as presented by St. Anselm in Proslogion II and III, consists of less than 650 words. On its surface it seems to present a tidy argument for God's existence that should be easy enough to state and evaluate. However, it is fiendishly difficult to accomplish that. As Alvin Plantinga said,

To the unsophisticated, Anselm's argument is (at first sight at least) remarkably unconvincing, if not downright irritating; it smacks too much of word magic. And yet almost every major philosophy from the time of Anselm to the present has had his say about it.127

The simple fact that the ontological argument is still the subject of scholarly discourse nearly a millennium after St. Anselm first put it forward suggests that it is more nuanced than it might seem to be at first glance.

127 Plantinga, God and Other Minds, p. 26. 94

The ontological argument is the second of two theistic proofs developed by St.

Anselm. In the Monologion he characterized God as the being through which all other beings receive (among other things) their existence. He reasoned that since beings are comparable with respect to existence that they must all have received their existence through some common source. Since this common source could not give to other beings what it did not possess, this being (which St. Anselm identifies with God) must itself exist; in fact, this being must possess existence in a higher degree than any other being does. St. Anselm identifies that this same being is the source of all goodness and greatness, so God is the being that possesses existence, goodness, and greatness of a higher measure than is possessed by any other being.

In the Proslogion, St. Anselm redefines God so that He does not simply possess certain qualities in a higher degree than is possessed by other beings; he possesses them in such a high degree that it is impossible to conceive of anything possessing those qualities in a greater degree. He is "that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

This changes the structure of the argument, so that it is no longer enough for St. Anselm to compare God to other beings; he must engage in a theoretical argument showing that the very concept of God so defined guarantees His existence in more than just the fool's understanding.

These two proofs show the influence of the historical world into which St.

Anselm was born. Even in its beginning Benedictine monasticism had been highly hierarchical, consisting of small cells of monks under the authority of one superior who in turn was answerable to St. Benedict. In St. Anselm's day, the Benedictine orders often formed complex networks of daughter monasteries supervised by the more ancient

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monasteries that founded them. This organization encouraged St. Anselm to see the world around him as exhibiting a natural order. The Monologion's argument for God's existence places God as the head of this order, and in fact makes Him the cause of this order, allowing beings to be grouped and ranked according to goodness, greatness, and mode of existence.

The need for a legitimate power exhibited in the struggles between the Visigoths and Franks likewise led St. Anselm to conceive of God Whose greatness is defined by

His very nature. St. Anselm would have been well aware of how Pepin and Charlemagne had turned to the Roman to grant their dynasty legitimacy. He also would have known of Charlemagne's savage treatment of the Saxons who refused to convert to Christianity, and would have seen the need for greatness to be an essential part of the ruler's character so it would not be subject to such abuses. This led him to define

God in terms of greatness as he did in the Proslogion. Both the secular and the religious history that affected St. Anselm played a crucial role in determining how St. Anselm chose to define God, and so affected the form of St. Anselm's proof.

Placing St. Anselm in his historical context also helps the modern philosopher considering the ontological argument to avoid an anachronistic evaluation of the ontological argument. By considering the logical sources from antiquity that were available to St. Anselm along with the way he responded to his contemporary critics such as Gaunilo, it is possible to evaluate the ontological argument's logical validity and soundness according to the standards that were known when it was crafted. This approach reveals more than whether or not St. Anselm's argument was sound; it gives valuable insight into an important moment in the history of western thought.

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