Imagine you are an explorer who took a spaceship to another planet to visit human-like creatures. Once you land on the planet, you meet your guide. He tells you that your spaceship landed on Sphinga, the planet’s borderless country. You are confused and ask your guide if there are any other countries on the planet. He laughs and replies, “Yes, there are two.” You retort, “Well, how do you know when you’re in another country if there’s nothing to differentiate them?” Your guide sighs and says, “Yeah, we have the same problem. There are no borders and the features of one country are the same as the other.” You finally end the discussion by saying, “You should have just made them into one country then, because that is what it looks like to me.”
You both continue your journey to meet a group of officials for lunch. During the meal one of the officials praises the kings of the country. Upon hearing this, you politely ask, “You mean, there is more than one king?” The official replies, “Yes, we have two kings.” You seem perplexed and ask how the country can function with two kings. “How do you have harmony in your laws, and order in your society?” The official replies, “Well, they always agree. Their wills are one.” You cannot hold yourself back and you respond, “Well, you do not really have two kings, then. Because they are acting in accordance with one will.”
This story contains three of the five arguments I will present for the fact that there can only be one God. The first part of the story summarises an argument that I call ‘conceptual differentiation’. It postulates that in order for multiplicity to exist, there must be some concepts that differentiate one thing from another. For example, if I said that there are two bananas on the table, you would be able to verify that statement by observing them. The reason you can see two bananas is because there exist concepts that differentiate them; for example, their size, shape, and location on the table. However, if there was nothing to differentiate them you could not distinguish between them. Similarly, since this book so far has argued that there is a necessary uncreated creator who is powerful, knowing, All-Aware and transcendent, then to claim that there are two would require a concept that differentiates them. But in order for the Creator to be a creator, He must have these attributes, so saying there are two without one being different from another is basically saying that there is only one creator. If whatever is true of one creator is true of another, then we have just defined one creator and not two.
The second part of the story summarises both the argument from exclusion and the argument from definition. The argument from exclusion maintains that there can only be one Divine will. If there were two creators and one wanted to create a tree, only three options would be possible. The first is that they both cancel each other out; this is not a rational possibility since creation exists, and if they cancelled each other out, there would be no creation at all. The second is that one creator overpowers the other by ensuring his tree is created. The third option is that they both agree to create the same tree in the same way. Both of these options imply that there is only one will, and one will in the context of our discussions means one creator.
The argument from definition asserts that there cannot be more than one creator. If there were more than one creator the cosmos would not display the harmony that it does. As well presenting arguments for a creator, this book has also warranted the traditional conception of God. Since the traditional conception refers to God has having an imposing will that cannot be limited by anything external to Him, then it logically follows there cannot be two unlimited Divine wills.
This essay will elaborate on these arguments and present another two to show that this creator must be one:
- The argument from exclusion;
- Conceptual differentiation;
- Occam’s razor;
- The argument from definition;
- The argument from revelation.
