i. The Argument and Ontology
For a long while, the argument was not called “ ontological.” Saint Anselm and Descartes both present it as “my argument.” 1 Leibniz speaks only of an “ argument frequently discussed by the scholastics not long since and renewed by Descartes.” 2 Kant, who from time to time actually continues to call it a “ Cartesian argument,” 3 was proba
bly the first to characterize it as an “ontological argument” (ontolo- gischer Beweis
).4
Why did it take so long for the argument to be called ontological? At the very least, this delay shows (though without explaining why) that the argument could very well have done without becoming “ontological,” since it was able to emerge and develop without the qualifier. But could the argument of Anselm and Des
cartes have been made without the concept of ontology itself? From a purely historical standpoint, this question becomes even more important, since it took six centuries after Anselm for the term on
tology to appear— even though Goclenius, Fontialis, Timpler, and Clauberg were making use of the word at the time of Descartes.5 Hence, the argument could for a time be used in demonstrations without the support of ontologia: This is a fact attested by the history of ideas.
However, although this point illustrates a chronological gap be
tween the appearance of the argument and its explicit qualification as “ ontological,” it does not resolve the purely theoretical question as to whether the argument could be functional and eventually
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elusive outside of any implicit or explicit ontology, whatever it might be. In other words: Does the argument absolutely, without exception or qualification, depend on the question of the Being of being, and thus the history of metaphysics, in the manner in which Heidegger used these two phrases? Or should we, on the contrary, envisage that the argument can be, or could have been, used successfully entirely outside the metaphysical domain, or without appearing in the horizon of the question of Being? This alternative hypothesis would lead to the question of whether or not the “ Cartesian” argument must always be the equivalent of an “ ontological argument” — in short, if it should always be understood as a (privileged) element of what could be called the ontotheological constitution of metaphysics. But since in philosophy only the question of right matters, it follows that a result stemming purely from historical scholarship cannot provide a satis
factory answer to our question. In order to sketch a possible answer, one would have to analyze conceptually what Kant calls the “ ontolog
ical argument.” This analysis should proceed in three stages: (a) de
termining the characteristics that Kant attributes to this concept of
“ ontological argument” ; (b) verifying whether, and how, some of the thinkers from the metaphysical tradition announce or sanction the characteristics of the “ ontological argument” ; (c) deciding whether or not some of its figures— in particular, those conferred on it by Anselm and Descartes, who do not use the qualifier “ ontological” — are exceptions to these characteristics.
2. The Ontological Interpretation
When Kant invents and uses the term “ ontological argument” — thus, when he interprets ontologically the argument that until then had been called “ Cartesian” — he provides a precise definition for it:
This argument amounts to “ arguing completely a priori, from mere concepts, to the existence of a supreme cause” ; in other words, it establishes the “ existence of a highest essence from concepts.” 6 The argument thus becomes ontological when it reaches the existence of a being that from then on is privileged by pure concepts. However, a difficulty appears immediately: If the argument is worthy of the qualifier “ ontological” simply because it concludes existence by means of concepts, then all the other proofs of the existence of God in rational theology are also worthy of this title, for do they not also reach the conclusion of existence? In fact, Kant here means some- *
thing else entirely: The argument becomes “ ontological” because it concludes the existence of a privileged being simply on the basis of the concept of its essence— by virtue of the “ concept of a highest essence,” the “ concept of the all-realest essence.” 7 The term ontologi
cal here does not underline the basic fact of reaching Being as exis
tence, but rather the extraordinary fact of reaching it a priori from Being taken as a pure essence— in short, of covering the entire range of the multiple meanings of Being, yet without leaving its unique meaning as essence. More precisely, the term ontological qualifies rea
soning that passes from a mode of Being (essence) to another (exis
tence), although simply by means of the concept of an essence—
albeit the truest of them all. The argument thus becomes ontological only insofar as it aims at existence (and the other proofs) on the basis of two truly exceptional conditions: (i) starting from a pure concept, without recourse to experience; (2) starting from the pure concept of an essence. By identifying the two ultimate characteristics of the
“ ontological argument,” Kant in fact simply and judiciously ratifies decisions that were already made by his predecessors and that many of his successors will eventually maintain.
A proof of the existence of God becomes an “ ontological argu
ment” only when it rests first upon a concept of God. This require
ment was clearly assumed by Descartes. The a priori demonstration of the existence of God in Meditation V starts explicitly from a cogi- tatio de Deo; this thought claims to be a genuine idea (“bring forth the idea of God from the treasure house of my mind,” AT VII, 67, 11. 2 1-23)— that is to say, an idea that is no more and no less available and accessible to the mind than any mathematical idea (“ which I find within me just as surely as the idea of any shape or number,” AT VII, 65, 11. 22-23). The idea of God thus belongs to the class of innate ideas, of which it represents a very peculiar, though not unique, example: We are still dealing here with “true ideas which are innate in me, of which the first and most important is the idea of God” (AT VII, 68, 11. 8-10). Common epistemic requirements bear so strongly on this idea of God that Descartes, in spite of his insistence on preserving divine incomprehensibility, eventually admits a Dei conceptus, “ concept of God” (Meditations, A T VII, 167, line 1); a divinae naturae conceptus, “a concept of the divine nature”
(AT VII, 151, 1. 6); or a conceptus entis summe perfecti, “ concept of a supremely perfect being” (AT VII, 166, 1. 18). A decisive step has been taken: From now on the argument will rest on the presupposi
is THE ARGUMENT ONTOLOGICAL? 1 4 1
tion that a concept of the divine essence is accessible to the mind.
The definition that it claims to represent the logical rank that we give it is now almost irrelevant; what matters is the very assumption that a concept, whatever it may be, could reach the essence of God. All the subsequent debates, whether concerning the determination of this essence (Leibniz, Malebranche, Spinoza) or the transition of the con
cept from essence to existence (Kant, Hegel, Schelling), will presup
pose a certain concept of God— in short, that this concept can in general account for God and assign Him an essence.
With the presupposition of this concept, the first characteristic of the ontological argument has been defined. We may now proceed toward the second characteristic, and ask what is the essence of God presented by this concept. But, even though the characteristic of the concept had sprung up all at once with Descartes, several additional stages would be needed to characterize the divine essence.
(a) Descartes contents himself with a definition of God as supreme being or supremely perfect being: “ think of God (that is a supremely perfect being \_ens summe perfectum\)” “the first and supreme being [ens primum et summum],” “ supreme being, or God \summe ens sive Deus].” s This (conceptual) determination of the essence of God maintains a gap between essence and existence, which is designated and filled by the notion of perfection: God thus does not yet exist immediately as a result of his concept, but through the mediation of a supreme perfection, which encompasses, among other particular perfections, that of existing. The argument thus is not yet absolutely ontological, and Descartes very logically does not consider it to be so. In order to actually think the direct inclusion of existence in (the concept of) its essence— in order to actually think God as “that whose essence involves existence,” and thus formally to deduce from each other the two terms that Spinoza simply confuses,9 one has to take another step.
(b) Malebranche manages to take that step by following and re
peating the argument of Meditation V, although no longer simply from the concept of “ God or an infinitely perfect being,” but through the absolute identification of the essence with Being (in all its mean
ings) in the divine concept: “ the idea of God, or of Being in general, of Being without restrictions, of infinite Being” 10 is in radical opposi
tion to the idea (or concept) of a given Being, insofar as the essence can be identified with the whole Being in God only, such that essence still reaches itself when it reaches its existence starting from itself.
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It will be helpful here to examine in more detail the fundamental ambiguity of what Malebranche means by the term Being (être), for the opposition of “Being in general” to “ this being” or even to “ these beings” may be understood to mean two very different things, or rather, may lead to two very dissimilar differences. On the one hand, an ontic difference between an absolutely being being (ÔVTCDÇ o v )
facing finite, time-bound, and derivative beings; on the other hand, a quasi-ontological difference between all beings and Being itself, which is universally abstract. Malebranche never tackles this ambigu
ity, however patent it may be. But what is left un thought here calls for further thinking, for if one admits that any metaphysical construct must characteristically leave the ontological difference unthought within itself, Malebranche could thus possibly reveal himself to be, by virtue of his shortcoming, a genuine metaphysician. For our pur
poses, what is unthought here does not modify the decisive first result that has now been reached: By positing that “Being without restric
tions, in a word BEING, there is the idea of God,” 11 Malebranche abolishes any and all mediation between God’s essence and his exis
tence by reestablishing— although in a manner that remains vague—
the Thomistic identity between divine essence and Being (in action).
God is (exists) as an immediate consequence of his essence, which consists only of Being; thus, the Cartesian argument becomes for the first time, by right if not by title, genuinely ontological.
(c) However, Leibniz was the first to sanction the perfectly onto
logical character of the argument by identifying divine essence not only with the concept of Being in general, but quite clearly with the concept of the necessary Being: “the existence of the Necessary Be
ing, in whom essence includes existence, or in whom being possible suffices for being actual.” 12 Malebranche’s formulation (and the Cartesian argument even less) did not make clear the shift from es
sence to existence within the concept of Being itself. Leibniz estab
lishes this shift by positing the equivalence of possibility and neces
sity, which is possible only in the concept of God. Far from being added on to possibility as from the outside, necessity springs from it intrinsically, as its intimate requirement: “If the necessary Being is possible, it exists. For necessary Being and Being through one’s own essence are simply one and the same thing.” 13 In order for the argument to become entirely ontological, the concept of divine es
sence must coincide with the necessary Being, since only the neces
sary Being exists, if we assume the minimal condition of its possibil
IS THE ARGUMENT ONTOLOGICAL? 1 4 3
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ity. If the concept already encompasses the necessary Being, then and only then its very possibility as a noncontradictory concept produces, without a sufficient external reason, necessarily effective existence.
This last formulation thus finally confers full ontological rank on the argument. Kant and Schelling, for instance, will understand the argu
ment on the basis of its Leibnizian formulation, though in order to critique it: God exists by virtue of his concept of necessary existence, provided that this concept is possible. Let us note, however, that Descartes himself had anticipated this development: In a very peda
gogical commentary on his a priori proof he reformulates in the hori
zon of possibility and necessity the argument that was initially made on the basis of perfection: “Possible or contingent existence is con
tained in the concept of a limited thing, whereas necessary and perfect existence is contained in the concept of a supremely perfect being.” 14 At any rate, the Cartesian argument eventually reaches an ontological status only to the extent that the concept of the essence of God im
plies that the necessary existence necessarily exists, or as Schelling wrote: “ God is not only the necessary being, but he is necessarily the necessary being; this is a meaningful difference.” 15
These three stages on the road to an ontological interpretation of the argument still call for a fourth one. To review them, we have only to follow Hegel, who was the first to see that the two characteristics of the argument— to proceed from a concept of the divine essence and to identify the divine essence with (necessary) Being itself— do not constitute two independent and parallel demands, but rather eventu
ally merge with one another. According to Hegel, Anselm, just like Descartes after him, does not present in his argument a demonstra
tion that can be said to belong to rational theology. On the other hand, Anselm reaches on this occasion the essential speculative truth,
“ the unity of thinking and Being [die Einheit des Denkens und Seins].” 16 The— now ontological— argument discovers, in the partic
ular case of God, what the cogito had already foreseen— namely, that thinking, as thought and independently of its factual representational content, passes from itself to Being, provided that it may reach specu- latively the truth of the concept. The argument was actually antici
pating the truth of science as a whole— that is to say, the metaphysi
cal truth par excellence— although in an unsatisfying and almost' sophistic way, since it was held back in simple representations. In the particular case of God, Anselm— and Descartes after him— had foreseen no less than the move from the concept in general, according
IS THE ARGUMENT ONTOLOGICAL?
145
to its intrinsic requirement, to effectivity, as it is thought in itself and for itself by the accomplished science of logic.17 God does not come into existence so much through his concept— of a necessary and absolute Being— but rather through the concept itself, free from any and all determinacy. The ontological argument concerns and de
fines first of all the concept as such, rather than God. To be sure, it can and must characterize God in particular, but even this results from the fact that God is not a concept, but the concept par excel
lence, the concept personified. In his own way, Schelling will develop the same thesis: We should not proceed from the concept of God to his existence, but according to the order of positive philosophy; “ set out from the concept of pure undubitable existing and, inversely, prove the divinity of undubitable existing.” 18 The concept of the ex
isting (I’existant) takes the rank of an absolute "prius, without speci
fying the existence of God. It is only in a second movement that God’s divinity will follow from the concept of the existing. The onto
logical argument, now brought back to its full speculative dignity, becomes not only the prime metaphysical proof of the existence of God, but also the dissolution of the essence of God in the concept, where metaphysics is accomplished. The argument becomes fully on
tological only with the replacement (Aufhebung) of God by the con
cept— what came to be called, shortly after Hegel and Schelling, the
“ death of God.”
3. Beyond the Concept
We may now pose our second question. In order for what Anselm called “my argument” to merit the title of “ontological argument,”
it must conform to the requirements that have just been established by metaphysics: (1) it must reach existence starting from a concept | of the divine essence; (2) it must interpret this essence as the un-:
restricted and universal Being in general. Did Anselm admit these I two presuppositions?
Let us proceed with the first one: Does the Anselmian argument rest on a concept of the divine essence? The answer is an absolute no, for several related reasons:
(a) The starting point for the argument explicitly depends on faith:
“ faith seeking understanding” and “ an example of the reason belong
ing to faith” inaugurate the approach common to the Proslogion and the Monologion, respectively, which consists in rendering rational
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CHAPTER SEVEN(rather than simply explaining) what faith submits in advance to thought. Moreover, more than simply ensuring for rationality a given that it may eventually repossess and appropriate for itself, faith guides rationality in its speculative itinerary: “For I do not seek to under
stand in order to believe but I believe in order to understand. For I believe even this: that I shall not understand unless I believe” (Proslo- gion, 1, 100,18-19). Intelligence proceeds from faith, since rationality consists precisely in recognizing the permanent precondition of intel
ligence: Faith then rises to the second power and believes even that
“one shall not understand unless one believes.” Insofar as it predates the subsequent opposition between philosophy and theology, this re
lation between faith and reason inverts in advance the dialectic by means of which Hegel establishes their respective metaphysical fig
ures: For Anselm, the concept does not replace faith as the simple content of a representation free from speculative elaboration (so that religion would have to disappear in order to become thinkable); the role of faith, on the contrary, is to provide the concept with its rule, in addition to its content.19
(b) The concluding point of the argument also explicitly escapes the concept, since it is a question of reaching he who remains in an
“inaccessible light” (1 Timothy 6:16). The fact that God dwells in an inaccessible light defines not only the initial goal of the argument (Proslogion, I, 98ff.) but its conclusion as well (Proslogion, XVI, 112, i8ff.): Knowledge does not abolish inaccessibility; on the contrary, its aim is to establish the fact that inaccessibility is definitively unsur
passable. Thus, wedged between the presupposition of faith and di
vine inaccessibility, the argument is unable to presuppose a concept of divine essence, or to hope for one. In actuality, the argument never
vine inaccessibility, the argument is unable to presuppose a concept of divine essence, or to hope for one. In actuality, the argument never