First Cause: Ipsum Esse Subsistens Aeternum - Rethinking God in a Scientific Age exposes the deep metaphysical fracture at the center of modern thought and reconstructs a unified philosophical framework capable of repairing it. For centuries, debates over the a priori have divided philosophy into rival camps-rationalist versus empiricist, analytic versus continental-yet the true origin of this divide, and its far-reaching consequences for metaphysics, science, and theology, has remained obscured. This book brings that hidden rupture to light and offers a coherent path beyond it.
The central thesis is uncompromising: early modern philosophy severed intelligibility from experience, generating the crisis that shaped the last three hundred years of thought. Once being, causality, necessity, and essence were disconnected from their grounding in reality itself, Hume's skepticism became unavoidable, Kant's limits on knowledge became permanent, and classical metaphysics was pushed to the margins. First Cause dismantles this inherited framework and rebuilds a synthetic a priori rooted in the intelligibility of being. Drawing together Aristotelian principles, Thomistic metaphysics, contemporary modal logic, analytic philosophy, and insights from the natural sciences, the book offers a renewed account in which causality, necessity, and essence become rationally necessary features of a unified metaphysical system.
What distinguishes this work is its integration of classical theism with modern analytic precision. It recovers a robust account of ipsum esse subsistens-the self-subsistent act of being-and demonstrates that the intelligibility of the world, whether scientific, philosophical, or experiential, presupposes a necessary, eternal, incorporeal First Cause. God is not treated as an optional explanatory add-on but as the metaphysical ground that makes reason, causality, and coherent explanation possible. In this framework, the very possibility of understanding anything at all points beyond contingent reality to a transcendent source of existence.
At a time when modern philosophy faces fragmentation, skepticism, and conceptual exhaustion, First Cause offers a way forward. It reunites metaphysics with reason, restores the classical tradition to philosophical relevance, and provides a clear alternative to naturalism by showing that reality is structured, intelligible, and grounded in necessity rather than accident. The result is a system that speaks simultaneously to ancient insights and contemporary scientific thought.
Ideal for philosophers, theologians, scientists, graduate students, and thoughtful readers seeking clarity about existence, causality, and the foundations of intelligibility, this book invites the reader to reconsider the nature of reality and the rational inevitability of a First Cause. It restores metaphysics to its rightful place and opens a renewed path toward understanding why anything exists at all.
About the Author :
A. J. Rowan is a philosopher trained in ancient, medieval, early modern, and analytic thought, with advanced degrees in philosophy, theology, and classical languages. His work focuses on classical metaphysics, the philosophy of science, modal logic, and the interplay between reason, being, and intelligibility. Drawing on the classical philosophical traditions while engaging contemporary analytic debates, Rowan develops systematic accounts of causality, necessity, and the metaphysical structure of reality. He has taught courses in philosophy and religion at the university level and has written extensively on the foundations of metaphysical realism, the principles of explanation, and the relation between science and classical theism. The First Cause is part of a larger project of recovering a unified metaphysical framework capable of speaking with clarity and rigor in a scientific age.
Review :
"A lucid and compelling restatement of classical metaphysics for a scientific age-rigorous, original, and philosophically challenging."
"The First Cause brings remarkable clarity to debates about contingency, necessity, and the intelligibility of reality. A major contribution to contemporary metaphysics."
"An ambitious and elegantly argued synthesis of classical thought and modern philosophy. It restores metaphysics to its proper depth and seriousness."
"A rare work: deeply scholarly yet accessible. It illuminates why the question of a First Cause remains central to reason itself."
"A powerful defense of classical theism grounded in logic, metaphysics, and careful analysis-highly recommended for philosophers and theologians alike."
