The other day, I was in the garden attending to the plants. My attention was called to look at the fungus on the leaves. What we actual saw was dark spots that indicate the presence of fungus. It brought me back to the study I had been doing on a more complex question – God’s existence and proof for such an existence.
Though we are incapable of viewing the microscopic fungi with naked eye, we still can recognize its existence because of what it does to the leaves of a plant.
One song came to my mind, which I memorized in elementary school for a play at school.
Who Has Seen the Wind?
by Christina Rossetti
Who has seen the wind?
Neither I nor you: But when the leaves hang trembling, The wind is passing through.
Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I: But when the trees bow down their heads, The wind is passing by.
Just because we cannot see the wind, we cannot deny its existence.
For a trained mind, both fungi and the wind are visible because they were taught by a teacher to recognize them. Same concept can be extended to the presence of God and finding a teacher and scripture to recognize God’s presence and grace.
Here I like to make a reference to Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica) 1225 – 1274 AD. He discussed five points to confirm the existence of God. This is my commentary and my understanding. Please refer to the authors original works for further reading.
Reason 1) Everything around us changes over time. Changes are induced by some external force that changes the potential energy states. If there is no external force, then there is no change.
For example, the balls on a billiards table do not move by themselves. Ball A must hit Ball B before B moves and hits Ball C inducing movement to C. If John Doe did not hit ball A then there is no movement in A, B or C. In this example John Doe is responsible for this movement.
Now on a dark night, go outside and look at milky way in the sky, distance between one end of milky way to the other end is 100,000 light years. When light leaves the farthest object on the right, it takes 100,000 years to reach the other end. In between there are various objects with different energy levels and movements. Some force has started all these objects with their movements.
That first mover is God who was not moved by anything else.
Reason 2) First Efficient Cause
For any thing to be created there are four causes. (Aristotle’s Metaphysics) – Formal Cause, Material Cause, Efficient Cause and Final Cause. These four causes are required to create any object.
Let us start with an example of making a dining table. First someone must plan for an object that helps people sit comfortably while eating their meals. That plan includes the height, width, number of legs, top plank and other details. This is formal cause. Next decide on the material to be used – Oak, Teak, Metal etc. This is material cause. Now we can pile logs together, however they won’t assemble themselves into a table. We need a carpenter to do the work to make the table. That is efficient cause. The final cause is a nice table to sit and enjoy dinner.
Thus, everything around us can be analyzed in a recursive manner to identify the four causes for their existence. Some of them can get into infinite recursion like the chicken and egg. Besides these infinite recursions, we do not have the capability to imagine and analyze the real causes for all object in the universe. However, this much is true, for every object there is an efficient cause (Example: carpenter for the table).
One other thing we know is that an efficient cause cannot create itself. At the end of infinite regressions, there has to be a first efficient cause that created universe.
Such first efficient cause is that God for whom there is no other efficient cause.
Reason 3) Now let us examine the material cause. Nothing can come from nothing. If nothing exists in the beginning, then nothing can come from that. There are many things we see, so there must be a source for each things. Just like all pots have clay, there must be one necessarily material from which all other beings came to existence. We can take it back to infinite regression and arrive at a first material which has no prior material from which it is derived.
Such first material is God – everything everywhere, here on earth, in the galaxy and on Mars everything came from that primal material God.
Reason 4) I will go to the fifth reason given by Thomas Aquinas before explaining his fourth reason.
Natural order. What we see all natural bodies operating in accordance with some plan. Sun always comes from east every day. Moon follows 14-day cycles. Earth rotates around the Sun in a predefined manner. These are just a few objects compared to all the objects in Universe. Though we do not understand the complete order, which is beyond science and human imagination, we could agree such an ordered universal behavior of objects do not happen by a chance, it happens for a specific purpose. There is something intelligence that arranges all natural things according to a plan. This complicated formal plan was defined by God.
Point 4 defined God as formal cause, 1 and 2 defines God as efficient cause and 3 defines God is the material cause for this universe.
Reason 5) Now I will elaborate Thomas Aquinas fourth reason.
For those who study and contemplate, God manifests in superlatives. Sweetest smell from a rose bush, in the kindest behavior of a person jumping the raging river to rescue another person, in the generous behavior of a person sharing water with a fellow passenger in the middle of desert sand dunes, in the destructive powerful wind of a hurricane, in raging rivers, in thunder bolts, in ravaging fires. These are some of God’s superlatives. There exists something that is the truest, best, most knowable, greatest, noblest, and purest. Though actions of God we can not understand, we can observe the power of God’s action.
Evidence of God is everywhere for the perceptive.
Now that we know the existence of God, let us get back to my backyard garden….
Though I cannot see the fungi, I can see what it is doing to the leaves. Though I never understand why God created fungi (it is not my place to ask), I could feel it’s effect. May be Fungi is required to break all material back to fundamental elements at some point, I am unhappy they are practicing their skill on my plant in the backyard. Hope my plant can practice its survival skills to overcome this battle. Either the fungi wins or my plant, whatever is the result, I accept it as a God’s will.
——————————————————————————————————————————–
Giri's Collection 