📖 Biblical Definition
The Bible never describes God as an abstract "ground of being." Scripture reveals God as a personal, speaking, acting, covenant-making Being who identifies Himself by name — "I AM WHO I AM." God is not the philosophical substrate of existence; He is the living God who created the heavens and the earth, who calls Abraham by name, who wrestles with Jacob, who speaks from the burning bush. The biblical God is not beneath being — He is above it, beyond it, and the sovereign Lord over it. He is not an impersonal force or the depth of reality; He is the Father who sends His Son, the Son who dies for sinners, and the Spirit who regenerates the dead. Any theology that replaces the personal God of Scripture with an abstraction has departed from Christianity entirely.
📜 Webster 1828 Definition
Not a term in Webster 1828. The concept is a 20th-century theological invention.
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Webster's 1828 dictionary contains no entry for "ground of being" because the concept did not exist in Christian theology until the 20th century. Webster would have recognized God as a personal Being — the Creator, Sustainer, and Judge of all things — not as an abstract philosophical principle underlying existence.
📖 Key Scripture
• Exodus 3:14 — "God said to Moses, 'I AM WHO I AM.' And he said, 'Say this to the people of Israel: I AM has sent me to you.'"
• Acts 17:28 — "In him we live and move and have our being."
• Colossians 1:17 — "He is before all things, and in him all things hold together."
• Hebrews 1:3 — "He upholds the universe by the word of his power."
⚠️ Modern Corruption
The "ground of being" replaces the personal God of Scripture with a philosophical abstraction.
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Paul Tillich's "ground of being" theology is one of the most destructive heresies of the modern era because it sounds profoundly spiritual while systematically dismantling every essential Christian doctrine. If God is not a personal being but merely the ground of being, then He cannot speak, cannot love, cannot judge, cannot save. There is no incarnation, no atonement, no resurrection — only existential encounter with the depth of reality. This is pantheism dressed in Christian vocabulary. Progressive theologians love this language because it allows them to use the word "God" while meaning something entirely different from what Scripture reveals. When someone says "God is the ground of being," they have already abandoned the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Usage
• "God is not the 'ground of being' — He is the living God who speaks, acts, and saves."
• "Tillich's theology allows people to say 'God' while meaning something entirely unbiblical — an impersonal depth of existence rather than the personal Creator."