This simple statement – I am – is in fact a fantastic existential foundation. Though it is made of only two words, it still embraces everything possible. The first half of the phrase is I – the fundamental principle of the subject, and the second half is am – the fundamental principle of existence.
But can we find any proof of existence? Can existence be proven? We might say that empirical experience is proof enough, but experiences are often deceptive. Then perhaps the proof is self-consciousness, the existence of a self-consciousness that tries to make sense of its own existence and can surely establish at least that it exists? Or let us take revelation:
– … in the beginning all this (the universe) existed as Being, alone, without a second of its kind. (Chandogya Upanishad 6.2.1.)
Let us ask a few questions. Who is speaking? Who utters this proposition? Who is the first speaker, whose is the voice? In any case it must be spoken by a subject, by someone, but it does matter who is speaking. If man says it, that is simple subjectivity. And man can say a great many things: Ego sum – I am; Nihili sum – I am a good-for-nothing; Nullus sum – I am nothing. He may be bolder still: Cogito ergo sum – I think, therefore I am; or, nowadays: Dubito ergo sum – I doubt, therefore I am. If we reverse the line of thought: Sum ergo cogito – I am, therefore I think, and more than that: Sum, ergo sum – I am, therefore I am! And if we also bring in man's ultimate notion of the goal: Cogito ergo beatus sum – I am, therefore I am happy…
If God says this sentence, we can speak of a transcendent subjectivity. Then this statement is the monologue of the divine existence-principle: I am, existence is. Now, the study of existents is, according to Aristotle, the inescapable task of philosophy. If this remark comes from the absolute source, it calls for a positive, metaphysical and transcendent ontology: the hypersubjective real reality is the starting point, the personal origin of the universe. Everything depends on it for its existence.
I am the origin of the spiritual and the material world, everything flows forth from me. (Bhagavad Gita 10.8.)
The biblical statements point to this as well: I am who I am… (Ex 3.14) – that is, I am existence; and I am the Way, the Truth and the Life… (Jn 14.6), a proposition that, beyond existence, also identifies the functions more precisely.
After the question Who? the next question rightly arises: Where? Where is the speaker: above, below, without, within? Perhaps he is everywhere, and yet we look for him in a particular place: in temples, in religion, in theology, in nature, in the heart…
In My unmanifest form I pervade this entire universe. All beings are in Me, but I am not in them. And yet not all that is created rests in Me. Behold My mystic power! Though I am the sustainer of all living beings and am present everywhere, yet I Myself am the original source of creation. (Bhagavad Gita 9.4–5.)
The question When? is just as relevant: when am I? Was, is, will be – these are not merely phases of material time, but actual, transcendent eternal existence! All that is past and all that is to come is likewise the Existent, who alone exists before, during and after the cycle of creation.
As for the question How?, only God's self-reflection can answer it…