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Best books on the existence of God - Short List

When I started out writing my list of books on the existence of God, I initially intended only to write a list of the best, or at least most significant, books on the existence of God. I failed. The list just got longer and longer. This was good, actually, because I ended up finding many books I would otherwise have missed. Nevertheless, I feel that a short list is required, for those who would regard my list as too intimidating. So a short list has been compiled below.

Books arguing for the existence of God:

Historically Significant Texts

1. Aristotle's Physics (Book VIII, 4-6), and Metaphysics (Book XII, 1-6),

2. Plotinus' The Enneads (Book VI),

3. Avicenna's The Book of Healing (Book VIII),

4. Al-Ghazahli's The Incoherence of the Philosophers,

5. Averroes' The Exposition of the Methods of Proof and The Incoherence of the Incoherence,

6. Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed,

7. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Contra Gentiles (Book I) and Summa Theologiae (Part I),

8. John Duns Scotus' A Treatise on God as First Principle,

9. Marsilio Ficino's Platonic Theology,

10. Francisco Suarez' Metaphysical Disputations, Sections 28-29,

11. Gottfried Leibniz's Monadology and Theodicy.

12. Samuel Clarke's A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God,

13. Moses Mendelssohn's Morning Hours, or Lectures on God's Existence.

Recent Texts
 
1. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange's The One God and God: His Existence and Nature,

2. Etienne Gilson's God and Philosophy, The Christian Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas and The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy,

3. Alvin Plantinga's God, Freedom & Evil and Where the Conflict Really Lies: Science, Religion & Naturalism,

4. William Lane Craig's The Kalam Cosmological Argument and The Cosmological Argument from Plato the Leibniz,


5. Barry Miller's From Existence to God: A Contemporary Philosophical Argument and A Most Unlikely God: A Philosophical Inquiry into the Nature of God,

6. Stephen T. Davis' God, Reason & Theistic Proofs and Logic & the Nature of God,

7. Norman Kretzmann's The Metaphysics of Theism: Aquinas's Natural Theology in the Summa Contra Gentiles I.

8. Richard Swinburne's The Coherence of Theism and The Existence of God, 2nd Edition,

9. William Lane Craig & J.P. Moreland's (eds.) The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology,

10. David Bentley Hart's The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss,

11. Edward Feser's Five Proofs of the Existence of God. 

Works critical of theistic arguments written by theists:

1. Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, Critique of Practical Reason and Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason.

Books sceptical of or arguing against the existence of God:

Historically Significant Texts

1. Baron D'Holbach's The System of Nature,

2. Denis Diderot's The Skeptic's Walk,

3. David Hume's The Natural History of Religion and Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion,

4. Ludwig Feuerbach's The Essence of Christianity, 

5. John Stuart Mill's Three Essays on Religion: Nature, the Utility of Religion, Theism,

6. George John Romanes' A Candid Examination of Theism,

7. Fredrich Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra, Beyond Good and Evil, Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist. 

Recent Texts

1. J. L. Mackie's The Miracle of Theism,

2. Michael Martin's Atheism: A Philosophical Justification,

3. Jordan Howard Sobel's Logic and Theism,

4. Graham Oppy's Arguing About Gods and Ontological Arguments and Belief in God,

5. Antony Flew's God and Philosophy and The Presumption of Atheism

6. Anthony Kenny's The Five Ways: St. Thomas Aquinas' Proofs of the Existence of God and The God of the Philosophers,

7. Michael Ruse's Atheism: What Everyone Needs to Know.

Other works of significance:

1.  Baruch Spinoza's Tractatus Theologico-Politicus.

It is important to note that, with all of these authors, knowing the background epistemological and metaphysical ideas that drove their arguments is critical to understanding their arguments. So, for example, it is essential that you understand the metaphysics of Aquinas if you are to assess his arguments properly. So, you might want to read his Commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics or On Being and Essence before you study his theistic arguments. It would also be advisable to familiarize yourself with some of the ideas that influenced his metaphysics, theology and other topics. Also, reading later commentators on Aquinas, such as Hans Meyer's The Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas (large volume) or Reinald Garrigou-Lagrange's Reality: A Synthesis of Thomistic Thought would be advisable, considering the fact that many of Aquinas' views will be unfamiliar to contemporary readers. Similarly, reading Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding will give the reader better understanding of Hume's broader philosophy and the ideas that influence some of his arguments in his Dialogues, in particular, his views on causation. Aristotle's views on causation are also significant to his arguments, as well as the arguments of Avicenna, Aquinas and Scotus.

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