Summa I, Q. 28, Art. 2: Relation and the Divine Essence, Why We Think About God, and Perfection Divided Among Creatures

Orientation #

He begins directly with the second article, noting that as Boethius supplied the first two objections of the first article, Augustine supplies them here; he mentions “we saw in the first article” that relations are really in God (prev. lecture). He ends: “we should stop there… halfway through question 28,” and says “we’ll talk about this when we do” the divine names/the “one name”. The previous class treated q.28 a.1 (real relations in God) and the next treats a.3 (whether the relations are really distinct from one another).

The class, in order #

1. The three objections (“not everything that is said in God is said secundum substantiam”) #

Point: the objections all press the same worry, that relation and essence must differ.

1. Augustine, De Trin. V (the book on relations): not everything said in God is said secundum substantiam; some is said ad aliquid, as Pater ad Filium; so relation is not the essence. He flags: “a subtle distinction there that’s being overlooked” — as often, the mistaken man has missed a distinction.
2. Augustine, De Trin. VII: everything said relatively is also something apart from the relation (a man who is a master, a man who is a servant). So besides the relations in God there must be something else, which can only be the essence; so essence differs from relation. He notes the reply will turn on distinction of reason vs real distinction: “a very subtle thing.”
3. Aristotle, Predicamenta (the Categories; he notes Albert’s De Praedicabilibus covers Porphyry’s Isagoge — genus, species, difference, property, accident — and the Predicamenta covers substance, quantity, quality, relation): the being of the relative is to have itself to another; if relation were the essence, the essence’s being would be towards another, repugnant to God’s being, which is most absolute and subsisting by itself. Aside: “That’s me tough. Tough love, you know, teacher.”

2. Sed contra (“everything which is not the divine essence is a creature”) #

1. Whatever is not the divine essence is a creature; relation really belongs to God; so if relation were not the essence it would be a creature, and the adoration of latria (the precise Latin for the Greek word: adoration owed to God alone) should not be shown to it.
2. The Preface (his text: the preface, “and the first and second and third and fourth”): ut in personis proprietas et in maiestate aequalitas adoretur — we should not adore the subsisting relations if they are not really there.

3. Body: Gilbert and the nine genera of accident (“in each of the nine genera of accident”) #

Point: Gilbert Porretanus erred (recalled at the Council of, he settles on, Reims), saying the relations in God are “assisting,” extrinsic, attached. Recap of Aristotle’s ten categories: substance (what a thing is), quantity (how much/how many, its size), quality (how it is, its disposition), relation (what it is towards another) — these signify something in the thing, absolutely or towards another; the last six say something of you by reason of something outside you (where, when, position, acting, being acted on, and the peculiarly human one, to be clothed/shod/helmeted). Thomas speaks of the nine genera of accident. Two things to consider in each accident:

• (a) what belongs to it as accident, common to all: to exist in a subject. Aristotle draws this before the ten: what exists in another in a subject vs what exists by itself — the dog vs the dog’s health, size, shape (the dog may be in a place, but not in a subject). “The being of an accident is to be in another.”
• (b) the proper definition of the genus. For quantity and quality this too is taken by comparison to the subject (quantity: the measure of substance; quality: the disposition of substance). For relation the proper definition is taken by comparison to something outside. So even created relations, considered as relations, are “assisting,” not intrinsically affixed. Example: large and small — a large party in his house is a small crowd at the Super Bowl; large/small say nothing about how many, but something towards another. Considered as an accident, though, relation exists in a subject with accidental being. Gilbert considered relation only the first way.

4. Accidental being becomes substantial in God: “in” and “have” (“there’s no accidents in God”) #

Point: whatever has accidental being in creatures has substantial being when transferred to God. Reason: recalled from the question on the simplicity of God — God is pure act; an accident in God would be something in God that is not God (as my health is in my body and is not my body), and God would stand to it as ability to act. So whatever is in God is his essence, substance, nature. Digression on the words in and have: Aristotle in Metaphysics V (“fifth book of Wisdom”) says have has as many meanings as in, and Physics IV (“fourth book of Natural Hearing”) gives eight meanings of in; each meaning of in has a corresponding have. Knowledge is in you, your mind has knowledge; health is in your body, your body has health; your body has a shape, the shape is in your body. In creatures haver and had, container and contained, are distinct — this goes back to matter and form, the first thing we learn: matter has form, form is in matter, the proper object of our mind. In God the distinction of haver and had is only in reason, because we start from creatures; whatever God has is God, whatever is in God is God. So of the three persons or relations really in God: are they really distinct from God? — as with the knowledge God is said to have.

5. Digression: why think about God at all? (“does thinking about God make you a saint”) #

Point: theology stands in a double relation to faith, and both are legitimate.

• His answer to his own question: no, thinking about God does not make you a saint or holy; a student: “intellect moves us toward affection” — “part of it.”
• Two definitions of theology: (1) Augustine, quoted by Thomas in ST I q.1 a.2 sed contra from De Trin. XIV: the science by which the most saving faith is engendered, nourished, defended, strengthened; (2) attributed to Anselm, fides quaerens intellectum, though it goes back to Augustine (“I’m the sort of man who wants to understand what I believe”). Neither definition can omit faith.
• Augustine: heresy is necessary for theology to develop — a heretic denies an article, a father defends it, and in defending comes to understand better; defence is the first impetus (Sabellius).
• The two definitions differ: in (1) theology is for the sake of belief (missionary, nourish your flock, defend against “crazy attacks,” strengthen); in (2) you seek to go beyond faith to understanding, showing the harmony of belief with reason, which naturally wants to understand what it believes. Pythagorean theorem: there one can fully understand what one believed; here one never can, until seeing God face to face — this is a “consolation” meanwhile. Hilary (in his work on the Trinity, quoted by Thomas, probably later in this treatise): I know I will never fully understand, but I make progress. Paul’s definition of faith: the substance of things hoped for. 1 John: to see him as he is; the beatific vision is not for the sake of faith, faith is for the vision.
• How can theology be both for faith and on the way to vision? Thomas’s prologue to the De Hebdomadibus quotes a Sapiential book, “run into your house and play with your thoughts,” and gives a twofold likeness to play: enjoyable, and to some extent for its own sake. Aristotle, Ethics X: happiness is not play. Something can be desirable for its own sake and yet for the sake of something else: medicine taken only for health, but if it tasted good you’d enjoy it too (his childhood cinnamon-candy medicine, awful once sucked through). So one thinks about God because it is enjoyable and for its own sake, an anticipation of vision — “I think about God because I can’t think of anything better to think about”; he thinks about other things (relations of reason) so as to think better about God — and also to engender, nourish, defend and strengthen faith. “Hallowed be thy name” (Sanctificetur) does not make you holy but asks it; the Psalms say seek always the face of God, and understanding is a kind of seeing.
• If “the Mohammedans take over” one must defend that there is one God though Father, Son and Spirit are God. His Saudi student objected to Shakespeare calling reason god-like; he answered from Dionysius, Divine Names ch. 4: no likeness of creature to God without a greater unlikeness. Break.

6. Body, conclusion (“the relation is the same as that essence secundum rem”) #

Point: in so far as relation in creatures has accidental being in a subject, a relation really existing in God has the being of the divine essence, wholly the same with it; but in so far as it is said towards something, it signifies no habitudo towards the essence but towards its opposite. So relation is the essence secundum rem and differs only in definition/way of understanding, since relation implies a respect to its opposite not implied in “essence”; the being of relation in God is not other than the being of the essence. Student: it is hard to see how there can be distinct persons. Answer: compared to the divine substance the relation is the same thing; compared to the Son, the Father is distinct — the relative is one kind of opposite, as Aristotle said. “That is a very subtle thing… but you got to see that.”

7. Reply to the first objection (“only two predicaments in God”) #

Augustine’s words do not say fatherhood is not the essence according to its being, but that it is not predicated by way of substance, as existing in that of which it is said, but as having itself towards another. Hence only two predicaments in God: the other predicaments imply a relation to their subject both according to their being and according to the notion of their genus (size is in a thing and is the measure of it; quality is in substance and is its disposition). Nothing in God can have any relation to that in which it is except identity, because of God’s highest simplicity (Dionysius: God is altogether simple; the closer you come to God the simpler you become). His restatement:

1. My fatherhood exists in me, is really distinct from me, and makes me towards my children.
2. In God relation cannot be really distinct from God (else God not altogether simple), but it really is towards another, so it is really distinct from that towards which it is (else not really a relation).
3. “How can something be one thing and yet three things? Because thing doesn’t mean one thing.” — “Put that in your pipe and smoke it for a while.” Parallel: knowledge is really in God, so not really distinct from God; but since it is really knowledge, God really knows. John 1:1: the Word was towards God (God standing for the Father) — so really distinct from the Father; the Word was God — so in no way distinct from God. Aside: he thinks these things through in bed at night when he cannot sleep, “the most quiet time.”

8. Reply to the second objection (“also something absolute”) #

“Absolute” in Thomas is not the contemporary sense but the opposite of towards another — in itself, to itself. Both in creatures and in God the relative involves something absolute, tamen aliter. In the creature, what is apart from the relative name is another thing (aliud): my being a man really differs from my being a father, which is added — so not every man is a father. In God it is one and the same thing, only not perfectly expressed by the name of relation. Comparison: God knows and loves, and is the same thing as his knowledge, but “God” does not perfectly express them. Thomas recalls the divine names: the divine substance contains more than any name signifies; so no other thing apart from the relation secundum rem, only according to the definition of the name. Creature contrast: Aristotle’s relations founded on quantity (double/half, taller/shorter) or quality (likeness) — the founding quantity or quality is another thing from the relation; my size is not my being taller than you. The prophet: “in that day there will be one name” — when we see God as he is; in this life we know God from creatures, and what is one and simple in God is multiplied in creatures. His usual circle: the centre is the beginning of all the lines, their ends are the diverse perfections in creatures; my perfection in understanding is not my perfection in loving, but in God one thing corresponds to both. So relation-names and substance-names each fail to express the other. Per modum substantiae vs per modum relationis, shown in John 1:1: “the Word was towards God” says what the Word is towards (the Father); “the Word was God” says what the Word is.

9. Reply to the third objection (“the perfection of all genera”) #

If the divine perfection contained nothing more than the relative name signifies, his being would be imperfect, as had towards another — just as if it contained no more than “wisdom” signifies he would not be subsisting. But the divine essence exceeds any name and comprehends the perfections of all genera (said above). Aristotle, Metaphysics V, on perfect: three meanings as said of creatures, then perfect simply/universally (lacking in nothing, as Boethius also said — Aristotle here speaking of God’s perfection) vs perfect in its kind. Creaturely perfection is always of one kind: perfect health is not perfection in understanding, loving, or strength — his friend Jim, ex-golden-glove boxer: “I’m strong but not healthy.” Homer the perfect poet, Mozart the perfect musician, Aristotle perhaps the perfect philosopher, but none “perfect, period.” God: “I will show you every good” — Thomas: “that is myself,” every good in a simple way. So “father” or “son,” like “understanding” and “loving,” brings out something in God without saying all God is. Asides: Homer’s blindness — Demodocus in the Odyssey sings the fall of Troy, perhaps a self-portrait; the poet, like the lover (“love is blind”), works from imagination; Shakespeare’s Agincourt vs Churchill’s. Perfections divided between men and women: men excel in understanding (the great minds), women in loving; Aristotle, Ethics on friendship — more in loving than being loved, the woman who gives her baby to a wet-nurse (Thomas notes he takes the example from a woman); Vietnam boat children; Sherman adopted by Ewing, his Catholic wife, Jesuit son; the FBI handwriting case where the father admitted the son’s guilt and the mother refused; Francis de Sales’ treatise on love drawing on women saints; monastic saying that a sick monk should not miss his mother; going home when sick.

His words #

• secundum substantiam / ad aliquid — said according to substance vs towards something (Augustine’s words, “the right words”)
• Predicamenta — Aristotle’s Categories; De Praedicabilibus — Porphyry’s Isagoge material in Albert
• latria — the adoration owed to God alone, translating the Greek
• assisting / extrinsic / attached — Gilbert’s view of the relations; also true of created relations qua relation
• nine genera of accident — the categories other than substance
• “the fifth book of Wisdom” [ed.: Metaphysics V]; “Natural Hearing” [ed.: Physics]
• ability — as opposed to act [ed.: potency]
• haver and had — his pairing for have/in
• fides quaerens intellectum — belief seeking understanding
• habitudo — a having-itself-towards
• secundum rem — really, in the thing, vs according to the ratio (definition, way of understanding)
• absolute — not towards another; “to itself,” in itself, by itself
• tamen aliter — “yet otherwise,” how the absolute is found in God vs creature
• aliud — another thing
• per modum substantiae — signifying what a thing is, vs signifying towards another
• perfect simply vs perfect in its kind (Aristotle); universally perfect — God

Texts #

Read in class:

• Thomas Aquinas, ST I q.28 a.2: objections 1-3, sed contra, body, replies 1-3 (read and translated throughout)
• John 1:1 (twice, applied to the Word towards God / the Word was God) Mentioned:
• Augustine, De Trinitate V and VII (sources of obj. 1-2); De Trinitate XIV (via ST I q.1 a.2 sed contra)
• Aristotle, Categories; Physics IV (eight meanings of in); Metaphysics V (have; perfect); Ethics X (play); Ethics on friendship, loving vs being loved
• Preface of the Trinity (in personis proprietas…)
• Council of Reims (Gilbert Porretanus)
• ST I, question on the simplicity of God; the divine names (inferred: ST I q.13)
• Thomas, prologue to commentary on De Hebdomadibus, quoting a Sapiential book
• Hilary on the Trinity; Paul on faith as substance of things hoped for; 1 John, to see him as he is; the Psalms, seek always his face; the prophet, “one name”; God to Moses, “I will show you every good”
• Dionysius, Divine Names ch. 4; Dionysius on God as altogether simple
• Porphyry, Isagoge; Albert the Great, De Praedicabilibus
• Homer, Odyssey (Demodocus); Shakespeare, Henry V; Churchill; Francis de Sales, treatise on love

His questions #

• Is there a real distinction in God between the haver and what is in it? Only a distinction of reason, because we start from creatures where they differ; whatever is in God is God.
• Does thinking about God make you a saint? No; a student adds that intellect moves us toward affection — “part of it.”
• Is belief for the sake of theology, or theology for the sake of belief? On Augustine’s definition theology is for the sake of belief; on fides quaerens intellectum one seeks to understand what one believes — both hold.
• Is the beatific vision for the sake of faith? No; faith is for the vision.
• Can something be for its own sake and still be for the sake of something else? Yes — delicious medicine; so with thinking about God.
• How can something be one thing and yet three things? “Because thing doesn’t mean one thing”: same as the substance, distinct from its opposite.
• What is the difference between “the Word was towards God” and “the Word was God”? The first says what the Word is towards (the Father), the second what the Word is: relation vs substance.
• Is Homer perfect, period? No — a perfect poet; creaturely perfection is always of one kind, God alone is universally perfect.