Logical proofs of God’s existence seem to be easy enough to find, but clear bridges between His existence and the fact that He is Love seem less easy to come by. Yet, such a bridge can be established succinctly. And so, let’s have a look…
The first thing to note is that I gave a fuller treatment of this argument in my book God is Love. This will be a somewhat abridged version of the argument.
And so, how can we know, logically, that God is Love?
The simple answer is that God must be Love because God must exist and because Creation exists. If God is not Love, it is illogical that Creation would exist because God would have no motive force to create.
Who is God?
The necessary, perfect, infinite, personal being; the Creator.
What is Creation?
Creation includes all things which exist that are not God; Heaven, Earth/The Universe and all such finite, limited beings which are not Him. They are, by definition, created by God because only God can serve as the ultimate, necessary source and foundation of their existence.
Now, the first part of the argument is that we know that God must exist.
The simple, logical proof of God’s existence is (basically) this:
1. A necessary being must exist because there must be an ontological foundation to all possible kinds of existence.
2. This necessary being must limitless, infinite, eternal and share all of the same attributes that we attribute to a Creator God.
3. Finally, such a being must also be personal because, being personal, it must have a Will and be a cause of it’s own motive force (if not, it action would be dictated by something external, which would render such a being limited and contingent).
(A version of this argument was presented on my YouTube Channel)
Hence, a necessary being who is personal, limitless, infinite, eternal and personal must exist. i.e. God must exist.
The second part of the argument is that Creation exists. The proof of this is immediate: we exist. The world exists. Neither us nor the world are limitless, perfect, eternal, etc. We are not God. Yet we exist. Therefore, if we are not God, we are part of Creation. Therefore, Creation exists.
Now, we can prove that God is Love.
The next point is that, if Creation exists, there must have been some reason; some motive-force that led God to Create. This motive force (and all His activity) must arise from the nature of God and Who He Is.
In relation to Creation and the choice to Create, we can consider 3 possibilities:
1. God is Love,
2. God is Hatred,
3. God is Apathetic.
What is Love?
To be motivated by the desire for what is good for something.
What is Hatred?
To be motivated by the desire for what is evil for something.
What is Apathy?
To be neither motivated by love nor hatred.
You might posit that there could be some mixture of these three attributes but we have to conclude that this is impossible because whatever God is, He is necessarily, perfectly, and eternally. In His eternity, God is not somehow eternally wise, yet also stupid. He is not eternally omnipotent yet powerless. He is unchanging and permanently Himself and therefore cannot exist as a melange of incompatible attributes. To be definitely and eternally Love is incompatible with being eternal Hatred or Apathy. Therefore, God must be one of these three.
And so, Creation exists. In light of this fact, can God be apathy?
This makes no sense because we have to understand that nothing external beyond itself is necessary to a perfect, infinite being. God doesn’t need anything… He is perfectly self-sufficient without defect. And so, the question would eternally linger: if such a God were perfectly self-sufficient, yet had no motive force towards goodness or evil, why would it do anything? Creation would be an entirely neutral act which would be neither good, nor evil for Creation, but it would also be neither good nor evil for God. Not being good for anyone, including Himself, why would He choose to create? There is no reason. Hence, if Creation exists, a God of apathy is illogical.
What, then, of a God of hatred?
Some particularly cynical atheists and agnostics may well posit a malevolent, sadistic god that creates only to torture, punish and torment his creation. They may see the suffering of mortal life as some evidence for this, but if we consider the logic properly, we will see that this idea must be void.
Firstly, consider that a god of hatred would be perfect and eternal hatred. Even prior to creation, hatred would define the very nature of his being. From all eternity he would hate the only thing possible to hate: himself. This by itself seems to be impossible, for the very existence of such a god would be an automatic torment to himself. It leads us to posit a god that would be more likely to commit suicide than to create. Even if we posit an act of creation so that he could torment his creatures, we still have to ask: who is creation for? If we therefore say that he created to hate his creatures just to serve himself, we are still positing a god who did something good for himself, as if he loved himself enough to create creatures who he could take pleasure in tormenting. Yet, again… a god of hatred hates everything, including himself. He even hates existence qua existence. Hence, creation itself – the giving of more existence – would only be a more hateful reflection to him of that same hateful nature that he is. For him, it would be cosmic nails on cosmic chalkboards, all the way down… and the whole prospect of creation seems utterly and definitively absurd. And so, no. It is purely illogical to posit a god of hatred.
Therefore, it is only the final option: a God of Love that can possibly explain Creation.
Only a God of Love has the motive force to do good and provide good. Firstly, such a God Loves Himself, even in a generous, altruistic sense. He Loves everything about Himself, including existence, Wisdom, Beauty, and the very Love which defines His nature. True enough, this God, being God, has no need for anything beyond Himself, but Love provides motive-force for Him to want the good for things beyond Himself for the very sake of that goodness; for His Creatures and their own sake… only Love explains that great pouring-outwards that Creation must entail; of existence given by a being that does not need to give it.
Therefore, God exists, Creation exists, and in light of these two facts, it must be true that God is Love.
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