Beethoven: Therefore, God

A frequent non-sequitur in debates about religion is the argument from beauty. It’s hard to construct the logic behind it, because, basically, there isn’t any. Its proponents rank it as some kind of necessary a priori self-evident truth about the nature of the universe. Without the jargon, this means they see it as so obvious as to not require any chain of reasoning establishing the logical links between the existence of beauty and the existence of a deity.

In a book once lent to me by a minister by Timothy Keller entitled The Reason For God, which I do not have to hand (nor do I recommend) I remember the author trying to convince us that we should not expect proofs of God’s existence, but merely “clues” that suggest his presence in the universe. Leaving this common and revealing caveat aside, Keller quotes Leonard Bernstein’s use of the word ‘heaven’ to describe the music of Beethoven. Last night, I even donned my classical music aficionado hat and headed off to see Daniel Barenboim perform and conduct my favourite piece of classical music – Beethoven’s 4th Piano Concerto. And the performance was, I admit, ‘heavenly’. .

Admittedly struggling to find a logical pathway from beauty to God, I shall turn to that marvel of 21st century idealism, Wikipedia, and its article on the argument from beauty. It seems a fairly written piece, and I’ll quote from it its outline of the ‘argument’:

1. There are compelling reasons for considering beauty to exist in a way that transcends its material manifestations.

2. According to materialism, nothing exists in a way that transcends its material manifestations.

3. According to classical theism, beauty is a quality of God and therefore exists in a way that transcends its material manifestation.

 4. Therefore, to the extent that premise (1) is accepted, theism is more plausible than materialism.


Points 2, 3 and 4 are relatively un-controversial, so discussion focuses on the premise (1).

And to once more prove this argument is not simply constructed by various atheist internet bloggers just to be swiftly demolished, the article quotes at length well-known scholar Richard Swinburne. He says “If we confine ourselves to the argument from the beauty of the inanimate and plant worlds, the argument surely works."

The Wikipedia formulation seems to be reasonable. Arguments of this form always state essentially the same thing: that beauty cannot be explained by naturalism, therefore it must be divinely inspired. To use Daniel Dennett’s terminology, this is a classic ‘skyhook’. The term ‘skyhook’ is a useful and interesting one put forward by the philosopher. He posits two kinds of explanations; ‘cranes’ are explanations built upon foundations of what we already know or can observe. ‘Skyhooks’ posit greater complexity in order to explain complex things.

Why we find beauty in the world is an interesting question, but one that will surely be answered by a suitable crane. Indeed, we can explain many types of beauty using evolution. Those that aren’t a direct result of our evolutionary history, likely still can be explained with reference to it. Our large mammalian brains are incredibly powerful tools capable of experiencing a wide range of, very human, phenomena.

According to the argument in question, beauty is a direct result of God’s existence, since His nature is beautiful. But surely, if He exists, all things that are the case are His doing? Thus, we might posit the ‘Argument from Ugliness’ as an antidote to the argument from beauty. It is just as likely that ugliness “transcends its material manifestations” as beauty does. If we need an explanation for why things are beautiful and say it is because God’s nature is one of beauty, why not say God is ugly in order to explain ugly things? If you accept the argument from beauty, there is no good reason to reject the argument from ugliness. Both arguments are, of course, ridiculous.

It was during the last movement of the Beethoven concerto that Keller’s book came to mind. It struck me how easy it must be to a mind already predisposed to religious belief, to see beauty as something divinely ordained. Music is often held in such high regard in this sense because it ‘transcends humanity’. But I find Beethoven so beautiful precisely for the opposite reason. His majesty lies in his embrace of humanity – he pushes its creative faculties to the limit, in the processes fulfilling a noble aspect of what it means to be a human being. Beauty is a strictly human concept. That thought, in itself, is beautiful. God, once more, finds Himself surplus to requirement.