How do we know there is 1 God?

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How do we know there is only 1 God and not many? How are we 100% sure?

Please don’t use Bible references in your response.

Thank you,
coolduude
 
coolduude said:
How do we know there is only 1 God and not many? How are we 100% sure?

Please don’t use Bible references in your response.

Thank you,
coolduude
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Philosophically there are the 5 proofs that St Aquinas uses, there is also the (so-called) Ontological Argument by St Anselm of Canterbury.

I do not have my copy of the Summa at hand so I do not know the actual numbers of the arguments but I will give you the two most convincing to me. Also St Aquinas taught that we could know of God’s existence and that He is one though reason alone.

The two arguments that work best for me is that of the Unmoved Mover and the Uncreated Creator, now I may be mistaken and these could be, in essence, the same argument.

The Unmoved Mover says that everything is in motion and to be in motion there must me something that starts that motion. We can not continue to go back ad infinitum because we know that the universe had a start so the thing to start the universe in motion must not be in motion itself so it is the Unmoved Mover, or God.

The same sort of argument goes for the Uncreated Creator just replace movement with creation.

The Ontological Argument by St Anselm of Canterbury which is my favorite of all goes like this.
  1. God is something of which nothing greater can be thought.
  2. God may exist in the understanding.
  3. To exist in reality and in the understanding is greater than to exist in the understanding alone.
  4. Therefore, God exists in reality.
This is found in the Proslogion.

Hope this helps, I am sure you will get much more.
 
Is it really cool to ask a question and at the same time say what answers you will not accept?
 
Logic…
Logically there can only be one everlasting god, if there were more, one would have had to create the others (I know this is not a very good reply, but just think about it logically)
 
Nobody knows, people believe. Belief does not equal knowledge.

Nobody, not matter what they believe, knows there is a god.
 
I would turn the question back on you and ask you what reasons you have to think there are more than one? Use any source you want.
 
We only know b/c He revealed it to us through Scripture, and through His nation, Israel.

He backed it up with signs and wonders galore.

His prophecies came to pass.

Miracles abound in His name.

His precepts are good and true, not destructive.

How obvious does it have to get?
 
AlbertBall said:
Yeah, thats because they don’t understand the difference between belief and knowledge.
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:thumbsup:Ah, yes I love that argument:thumbsup:, when someone disagrees with you it is because they do not understand/are ignorant, rather than them just having a different understanding than you do.
 
Taking strictly a personal experience on this one as testimony, when I pray, it is to ONE God, and this ONE God is the only one that has ever responded, if there were more, they would have made themselves known to me, clearly they have not because there are none other.
 
prodigalson12 said:
Taking strictly a personal experience on this one as testimony, when I pray, it is to ONE God, and this ONE God is the only one that has ever responded, if there were more, they would have made themselves known to me, clearly they have not because there are none other.
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And what makes you think that Zeus has the even the slightest interest in responding to you? Try sacrificing a few animals and see what happens. And Thor said he was going to reply but is having trouble with his email.
 
cerad said:
And what makes you think that Zeus has the even the slightest interest in responding to you? Try sacrificing a few animals and see what happens. And Thor said he was going to reply but is having trouble with his email.
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:thumbsup:Another argument I love:thumbsup:, mock those whom you disagree with.
 
cerad said:
And what makes you think that Zeus has the even the slightest interest in responding to you? Try sacrificing a few animals and see what happens. And Thor said he was going to reply but is having trouble with his email.
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I’ll try sacrificing a few atheists and see how God responds to that one instead…
 
That there can only be one God is a philosophical necessity:
  • There can only be one “Supreme Being” (hence the word “supreme”).
  • If there were more than one being (say, two), there would be only two possibilities:
    1. either they would be distinguishable from one another (meaning that one would have to be greater or “more supreme” than the other), or
    2. they would be indistinguishable from one another (and would therefore simply be the same being).
    3. Therefore, there must be one Supreme Being, whom we call God.
    Gaudium de veritate,

    Cruciform
    +T+
 
GrahamAPhone said:
Logic…
Logically there can only be one everlasting god, if there were more, one would have had to create the others (I know this is not a very good reply, but just think about it logically)
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This is correct. It is by logic and definition.

God == Who/Whatever absolutely determines what can or cannot be.

If there are 2 entities determining things independently, then “God” is the entity represented by the combination of those 2. So no matter how you “cut” it, God is still the “one” that is above all others.
 
cerad said:
How was my my answer mocking? Zeus has more important thing to attend to than finding lost keys.
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Well, it was a poke at you, just as your’s was at me. If I were to tell you my mother is near and dear to me, that she has done all of these wonderful things for me, does she not exist just because you don’t know here? Honestly, this is the point being made here, how can I get you to believe she is who she is if the only proof you will accept is flying her down to meet you? You are doing the same thing with us and our relationship with God. Just because you have none doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist.
 
coolduude said:
How do we know there is only 1 God and not many? How are we 100% sure?

Please don’t use Bible references in your response.

Thank you,
coolduude
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Thats why its called faith if there was 100 percent proof of God everybody will believe.
 
CatholicGuy22 said:
Thats why its called faith if there was 100 percent proof of God everybody will believe.
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A good point indeed. But my question is ‘how do we know there is 1 (one) God and not many, like the Romans and Greeks believed in?’

I do think some of the other posts are very good 🙂 (thank you).

To answer one posters question- I started this thread because I was thinking today and I thought ‘how do we know for sure that there is only 1 True God and not a whole bunch of them?’ I couldn’t really prove it to myself so I posted here.

ByzCatholic- I asked for no Bible references because I’m playing ‘devils advocate’ and excluding religious proofs. I guess you can say I’m looking at it from the point of someone who believes in a God, but doesn’t know if there is strictly 1 (one) or of there are many. Hope that clears things up.
 
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