Abstract

Exemplifying a tradition in which philosophy describes itself as faith seeking understanding, John Duns Scotus’ De Primo Principio attempts to make the existence of God intelligible to natural reason. In this work, Scotus bases his argument for the existence of God upon his understanding of essentially ordered causes. Within the framework of essential order, Scotus locates God in His relation to creatures as their necessary, first efficient, and ultimate final cause. He develops this project relying on the view that the universe is one essentially ordered, metaphysical hierarchy. Causality is understood as a relationship according to dependence and relative perfection between the essentially ordered parts of this hierarchy, within which being as being is ordered from the highest cause to the lowest effect. Essential order is thus the foundation upon which Scotus metaphysically accounts for God as the cause of causes