Christ, the Angels, and the Limits of His Soul's Power: Omnipotence and Changing Creatures (ST III, Q.12 a.4; Q.13 aa.1–2)

Orientation #

He is finishing the article on whether Christ received knowledge from the angels, then turns to the treatise on the coassumpta — grace, knowledge, power — and takes up power (q. 13), reminding the class of that threefold division. He says the defects Christ assumed “will be said below.” The previous class treated q. 12 on Christ’s acquired (experiential) knowledge.

The class, in order #

1. Objections: was Christ taught by angels? (“the angel appeared to Christ from heaven”) #

Three objections that Christ got knowledge from angels: (1) Luke 22 — an angel appeared comforting/strengthening him, and confortatio comes about through the exhorting words of a teacher, per Job 4 (“you have strengthened weak hands… confirmed the vacillating with your speeches”); (2) Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy ch. 4 — Jesus obediently subject to the formations of the Father through the angels, i.e. subject to the ordination of divine law by which men are taught through angels; (3) as the human body in the natural order is subject to celestial bodies (Christ suffered heat in summer and cold in winter), so the human mind to angelic minds. Sed contra: Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy ch. 7 — the highest angels question Jesus himself and learn from him the knowledge of his divine operation for us, and he teaches them without any intermediary; but teaching and being taught are not the same.

2. The body of the article: the soul on the horizon (“a middle between the spiritual substances and bodily things”) #

The human soul is a middle — he adds that the Arab philosophers say man is “on the horizon” between the material and immaterial world — hence perfectible in two ways: by knowledge taken from sensible things, and by knowledge poured in from the enlightenment of spiritual substances. Both were perfect in Christ. For the first (experiential knowledge) no angelic light is required; the light of the agent intellect suffices — and Christ’s was a most excellent gift. For the second (infused knowledge) he received immediately from God, not from angels: as above the common way of creatures his soul was united to the Word in unity of person, so above the common mode of men he was filled with knowledge and grace immediately by the Word, no angels in between — the angels themselves receive from the inflowing of the Word the knowledge of things in their beginnings (Augustine, On Genesis to the Letter II).

3. Replies to the three (“not by way of instruction”) #

1. The angel’s comforting was not instruction but a showing of what was proper to human nature. Bede on Luke: a testimony of both natures — the angels ministered to him and he is said to be comforted; the Creator does not need the creature’s help, but having been made man, as for our sake he was sad, so for our sake he is comforted, that faith in his incarnation be confirmed. (Aside: so we may tell our guardian angel we are sad or worn out — “you must be amused at us.”)
2. Dionysius means Christ was subject to angelic formations not by reason of himself but of what was done about his incarnation and during his infans age — the angel announcing to Joseph the flight into Egypt and the return to Judea. (Aside: an infant is one not able to speak, so he did not tell Joseph himself.)
3. The Son of God assumed a passible body, so his body was suitably subject to the impression of celestial bodies; his soul was not subject to the impression of celestial spirits.

Student question: did Thomas hold that celestial bodies influence men directly? Answer: they act on the body directly, not on mind or will directly, but indirectly through the body’s condition. Examples: New York ambulance crews’ lore that a summer full moon brings out the lunatics — “that’s what lunatic means” — with the proposed theory that the moon moves the body’s chemistry as it moves the tides (he does not vouch for it); Ptolemy on the planets’ influences. Asked about Thomas’s commentary on the Meteorology: that is about intermediary things (lightning and the like), whereas the De Caelo et Mundo is about the heavenly bodies. Aside: Thomas was said to fear lightning because his sister had been killed by it; then his mother’s Missouri farmer whose mule was struck down by lightning, recovered, and ever after refused that spot — sense memory; a student’s cat that touched a hot burner and never went near the stove again. “The burnt paw teaches best.”

4. Setting up q. 13 (“about this four things are asked”) #

The coassumpta were divided into three: grace, knowledge, power. Now power, in four articles: omnipotence simply; omnipotence with respect to bodily creatures; with respect to his own body; with respect to carrying out his own will. Only the first two are read in class.

5. q. 13, a. 1 objections: omnipotence of Christ’s soul (“the power which the Son of God had naturally”) #

1. Ambrose on Luke: the power the Son of God had naturally, the man received in time — chiefly according to the soul, the more potent part of man; so Christ’s soul took on omnipotence in time.
2. God’s power is infinite as his knowledge is; but Christ’s soul knew all things God knows (he qualifies: not everything God knows, but all that God knows by the scientia visionis); therefore it had all power.
3. Christ’s soul had all the treasures of knowledge; some sciences are practical; therefore he had practical knowledge of what he knew, i.e. knew how to make it — so he could do all things. Sed contra: what is proper to God cannot belong to a creature; omnipotence is proper to God (Exodus 15: “This is my God… Omnipotent is his name”), and the Creed gives it prominence — “I believe in God the Father Almighty.” Aside: in the communion prayer Thomas addresses the Father and names omnipotence, fitting because the Father is the beginning as power is a beginning.

6. The body of a. 1: power follows nature (“the active power of each thing follows upon its nature”) #

The union was in the person with the distinction of natures remaining, each retaining what is proper to it. Active power follows upon form, the principle of acting; form is either the nature itself (simple things) or what constitutes and completes the nature (things composed of matter and form). So active power follows nature. Omnipotence therefore follows consequentially upon the divine nature, because that nature is ipsum esse, being itself, “uncircumscribed” — “a line drawn around it” (Dionysius, Divine Names ch. 5); hence God has active power with respect to everything that can have the notion of being, and that is omnipotence. Every other thing has active power extending as far as the perfection of its nature — “just as the hot to heating.” Christ’s soul is a part of human nature; therefore it cannot have omnipotence simply. On the limit: God cannot make a square circle, because that is against the notion of being — nor the schoolyard “a stone so big he can’t lift it,” which is a contradiction, “that’s to make nothing, and nothing is impossible with God” (credited to Ralph McInerny); this is no lessening of his power. Aside: in the Catena Aurea some Fathers read Christ’s “I am” as saying he is God, against scriptural scholars who take it as the Greek idiom for “it is I.”

7. Reply 1: what is said of the man by reason of the person (“just as not by another deity”) #

The man receives in time the omnipotence the Son had from eternity through the union of the person — not by another omnipotence than the Son of God’s, just as not by another deity. Because there is one person of God and man, what belongs to the person by reason of one nature is said of the other: “God died for us,” “this man is Creator of the world” — but he did not create by reason of his human nature, nor die by reason of his divine.

8. Reply 2: why knowing all is not doing all (“whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver”) #

He notes with amusement that “the man who exemplifies brevity” gives a long reply.

• A first answer of “some”: active power follows the nature and the action goes forth from the agent, whereas knowledge can be had through received likenesses, not only through the knower’s essence. This answer he says is not sufficient, because just as one can know by a likeness received from another, one can act by a form received from another — water or iron heats by heat received from fire. (Aside: his teacher Kasurik — “you can tell a man’s understanding by the examples he chooses.”)
• So a further consideration: what is received from a superior nature into a lower is had in the mode of the inferior — “whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver,” as heat is not in water in the same perfection and power as in fire (“you can still scald yourself, but not quite as hot”); likewise all of us receive Thomas’s teaching in this class, some more fully than others. Christ’s soul being lower than the divine nature, the likenesses are not received in it with the same perfection and power. Hence his knowledge as man is lower than the divine knowledge as to the mode of knowing, and as to number: he does not know all God can make, which God knows by the knowledge of simple understanding, though he does know all present, past and future that God knows by the knowledge of vision. Likewise the infused likenesses do not equal the divine power in acting. The crux: no thing requires infinite power in order to be known, though the mode of knowing may be of infinite power; but some things cannot be done except by infinite power — creation. So Christ’s soul, a creature of limited power, can know all things but not in every way, and cannot do all things; among other things it cannot create. Aside: books “to be read and chewed” (the New Hudson Shakespeare quoting Bacon) — so with Thomas; Socrates’ “feast of reason”; wisdom is sapida scientia, savoury knowledge, as wine must be savoured, not drunk like Whitbread; Romeo’s “come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide” — unsavoury meaning foolish.

9. Reply 3: speculative and practical (“more to light and illuminate than only to shine”) #

Christ’s soul had both practical and speculative knowledge, but not practical knowledge of everything he knew speculatively. Speculative knowledge requires only the conformity or likening of knower to thing known; practical knowledge requires forms in the understanding that are able to make. It is more to have a form and impress it on another than merely to have it — “more to light and illuminate than only to shine.” So Christ’s soul had speculative knowledge of creating, knowing the way God created, but not practical knowledge of it, since his knowledge was not productive of creation. Student question: is this the definition of speculative knowledge? Answer: no, he is only touching on the distinction; they are first distinguished by their ends — speculative for understanding, practical for making or doing. Attached asides on the useless hearer (Aristotle, Ethics): one who lacks experience or has no wish to live by reason is like the man who hears medical advice to lose weight and exercise and will not do it; Aristotle was the son of an excellent physician. His friend Jim, told to stop smoking after a collapsed lung, refused — a useless hearer. Father Abbott’s hospital visit (“Father, if I need you I’ll let you know”) and mental patients who have read more psychology than their doctors but never apply it to themselves; Portia in The Merchant of Venice on the same. “Mary hath chosen the better part… it shall not be taken away” — the looking knowledge is not taken away, while practical knowledge (building, cooking, sewing), though more necessary here, will have no use in the next life; so the student’s joke that we should do the practical now and the speculative later is exactly backwards. Footnote at the end of the article (Cajetan, “perhaps”): the author here corrects his way of speaking in Sentences III, d. 14, last article, ad 2, where he called practical a knowledge here proved not practical, because not factiva.

10. q. 13, a. 2 objections: omnipotence over the change of creatures (“all power in heaven and on earth”) #

1. Matthew 28:18 — “all power is given to me in heaven and on earth”; heaven and earth means every creature (as in Genesis 1:1). (“That sounds pretty convincing to me — of course, maybe I should consider more carefully.”)
2. Christ’s soul is more perfect than any creature, and every creature can be moved by another: Augustine, On the Trinity III — grosser bodies ruled by subtler and more powerful ones, all bodies ruled by the rational spirit of life, the sinful rational spirit by the just; and Christ’s soul even moved the supreme spirits by enlightening them (Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy ch. 7).
3. He had most fully the grace of miracles, and every change of creature can pertain to it, since even the celestial bodies are miraculously changed from their order, as Dionysius proves in the Epistle to Polycarp — which, he suspects, concerns the darkness at the crucifixion [he is not sure]. Sed contra: to change creatures belongs to him to whom it belongs to conserve them, and that is God alone — Hebrews 1:3, “he carries all things by the word of his power.”

11. The body of a. 2: two distinctions (“You got those distinctions down your head”) #

First, on the side of the change of creatures, threefold: natural, from its own agent in the order of nature; miraculous, from a supernatural agent above the accustomed course, as raising the dead; and reduction of the creature to nothing. Second, on the side of Christ’s soul, twofold: according to its own nature and power, natural or gratuitous; and as instrument of the Word personally joined to it.

• By its own nature and power it can produce the effects suitable to a soul — governing the body, disposing human acts — and, through the fullness of grace and knowledge, enlightening all rational creatures in the way suitable to a rational creature.
• As instrument of the Word it has instrumental power for all those miraculous changes orderable to the end of the Incarnation, in heaven or on earth.
• Annihilation corresponds to creation from nothing: as God alone creates, he alone can reduce to nothing, since he alone conserves in being. Therefore Christ’s soul does not have omnipotence with respect to the change of creatures. He restates it as a threefold division: some things not in its power at all, some as instrument of the Word, some by its proper nature. He notes Dionysius’ word for the power had as instrument of the divinity, running the two words together — “Theandric.”

12. Replies of a. 2 (“then things are said to come about when they are made known”) #

1. Jerome: power is given to him who a little before was crucified and buried and afterwards rose — to Christ as man, and said to be given by reason of the union, through which as man he is omnipotent. Remigius: it was known to the angels before the resurrection, made known to all men after — and things are said to come about when they are made known; so his divinity, hidden to men till then, is what was manifested. (He wonders aloud whether Remigius is about the eighth century, a monk, quoted in the Catena.)
2. Every creature can be changed by another creature except the highest angel — who can nevertheless be enlightened by Christ’s soul. But not every change possible in a creature can come from a creature; some can come from God alone. Whatever changes creatures can effect, Christ’s soul can effect as instrument of the Word — not by its own nature and power, since some of these pertain to the soul neither in the order of nature nor in the order of grace.
3. As said in the Second Part, the grace of miracles (gratia gratis data) is given to a saint’s soul not as his own power but that miracles come about by divine power. It was given most excellently to Christ’s soul: he not only worked miracles but transferred the grace to others — Matthew 10, calling the twelve, he gave them power over unclean spirits to cast them out and to cure every sickness and weakness, i.e. languor of body and infirmities of soul.

His words #

• confortatio — comforting or strengthening; the angel’s act in Luke 22, not instruction.
• “on the horizon” — the Arab philosophers’ image of the soul as middle between material and immaterial.
• experiential knowledge — knowledge taken from sensible things, needing only the agent intellect’s light [ed.: acquired knowledge].
• infused knowledge — poured in, received immediately from God.
• infans / “speechless age” — one not able to speak.
• coassumpta — things taken on along with body and soul: grace, knowledge, power.
• scientia visionis / knowledge of vision — of all present, past and future; against knowledge of simple understanding, of all God can make.
• ipsum esse, “uncircumscribed” — he glosses as “a line drawn around it,” i.e. no line drawn around it.
• “the hot to heating” — example of power extending as far as the nature’s perfection.
• factiva — productive; practical knowledge requires forms able to make.
• “more to light and illuminate than only to shine” — practical against speculative.
• sapida scientia — savoury knowledge, i.e. wisdom.
• “useless hearer” — Aristotle’s unsuitable hearer of ethics.
• gratia gratis data — the grace of miracles, given not as one’s own power.
• “Theandric” — Dionysius’ word running man and God together, for power as instrument of the divinity.

Texts #

Read in class

• Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 12, a. 4 (whether Christ received knowledge from angels) — objections, body, replies
• Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 13, prologue and a. 1 (omnipotence of Christ’s soul simply)
• Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 13, a. 2 (omnipotence over the change of creatures)
• Editorial footnote from Cajetan on a. 1, citing Aquinas, Sentences III, d. 14, last article, ad 2

Mentioned

• Luke 22 (angel comforting); Job 4; Matthew 28:18; Matthew 10; Genesis 1:1; Exodus 15; Hebrews 1:3; Luke 10 on Mary and Martha (inferred)
• Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy chs. 4 and 7; Divine Names ch. 5; Epistle to Polycarp
• Augustine, On Genesis to the Letter II; On the Trinity III
• Bede on Luke; Jerome; Remigius (via the Catena Aurea); Ambrose on Luke
• Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics I (the unsuitable hearer) (inferred); Aristotle, Meteorology and De Caelo et Mundo with Thomas’s commentaries
• Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet; The Merchant of Venice; Bacon on books, via the New Hudson Shakespeare

His questions #

• Did Christ receive knowledge from the angels? No: his experiential knowledge needed only the agent intellect, his infused knowledge came immediately from the Word, as the angels’ own does.
• Did Thomas hold that celestial bodies influence men directly? They act directly on the body, and only indirectly on mind and will through the body.
• Did the soul of Christ have omnipotence simply? No: active power follows nature, omnipotence follows the divine nature as ipsum esse; his soul is part of human nature.
• Can God make a square circle, or a stone he cannot lift? No, but this is no lessening of power, since it is a contradiction — “that’s to make nothing.”
• If his soul knew all God knows, why not do all God does? Because what is received is received in the mode of the receiver; and while nothing requires infinite power to be known, some things (creation) require infinite power to be done.
• Did he have practical knowledge of everything he knew speculatively? No — he knew speculatively how God creates, but had no knowledge productive of creation.
• Is that the definition of speculative knowledge? No; the two are first distinguished by their ends, understanding versus making or doing.
• Did the soul of Christ have omnipotence over the change of creatures? No: by its own nature it governs the body and enlightens rational creatures; as instrument of the Word it can work miracles ordered to the Incarnation’s end; annihilation belongs to God alone.
• What is Dionysius’ Epistle to Polycarp about? Probably the darkness at the crucifixion — left uncertain.
• When did Remigius live? About the eighth century, a monk — left as a guess.