What is God? Who is God? Why do some people conclude that a God exists? Saint Thomas Aquinas goes from the fact that there must be a first efficient cause to the conclusion that God is that cause. Why must Aquinas make the extraordinary jump from there being a cause, to assuming that this cause must be God? Would it not be just as plausible to make matter the first cause? Matter is the substance that any physical object is composed of. Matter is closed and finite, with no beginning or end. The best explanation to the existence of God, is that God does not exist as a first efficient cause. The argument for God, as presented by Aquinas, is to show that the existence of the world and everything in it can only be explained if there is a God who is the first cause. The argument states that it is impossible for any being to be the efficient cause of itself because then it would have to bring itself into being, and to bring itself into being, it would have to exist before it existed. If a being exists, it is because some being prior to it, was it’s cause. Therefore, if no first cause exists, neither will any other being exist. Therefore, there is a first efficient cause--God. This argument assumes that a first cause is needed to explain the existence of anything. Aquinas also assumes this first cause to be God. How can anyone rationally conclude that there is a God from the simple statement that a first cause is necessary? Therefore, a first cause does not prove God, it only assumes that there is a God, at best. Could one not put matter in the place of God in Aquinas’ argument and still assume there is a first efficient cause? The theory that matter “is”, is just as plausible as the theory that God “is”. Matter is closed and finite in extent, with no beginning or end. Putting Matter in the place of God in the end of the argument given by Aquinas, is just as plausible. In fact, matter is an easier concept t...
