ABSTRACT
This chapter establishes that there are passages in which Tillich conceives of ontology as a sort of philosophical theology. The author cites some of the evidence for Tillich's subscription to the view that the ontologist has available a means of ascertaining the nature of God without any appeal to revelation. The chapter examines Tillich's criticisms of the traditional theistic proofs in order to determine whether his break with 'natural theology' is as decisive as it would be if he were content to use the method of correlation. But equally, it there is such a thing as immediate awareness or God, and if Tillich is prepared to assert that the God disclosed in this awareness is 'being-itself', it is not at all clear that his own procedure as a philosophical theologian differs as radically as he claims from the procedure of the 'natural theologian'.
