Christ's Descent into Hell I: The Whole Christ in Hell, How Long He Stayed, and the Freeing of the Holy Fathers (with Asides on the Names of God and the Highest Good)

Orientation #

He opens straight into the third article (“strange question here, right? Was the whole Christ in hell?”), refers back to his own earlier remark that the resurrection is the reward of the death and the ascension the reward of the descent, and at the end says “another one before we do that” — leaving the next article to follow. The neighbouring classes treat the same descent material in the Summa and in the Commentary on the Sentences.

The class, in order #

1. Whether the whole Christ was in hell — the objections (“Was the whole Christ in hell”) #

Three objections, read as given:

1. The body is a part of Christ; the body was not in hell; so not the whole Christ.
2. “Nothing whose parts are separated from each other can be called a whole” — he calls this “a nice fundamental thought.” Body and soul were separated in death, so Christ could not be there as a whole.
3. That whole is in a place outside which nothing of it is; but the body was in the sepulchre and the divinity everywhere. Sed contra, Augustine (Sermon on the Creed): the whole Son before the Father, whole in heaven, in earth, in the virginal womb, on the cross, in hell, in paradise “in which he introduced the thief.” He anticipates the answer himself: perhaps the whole person is there but not the whole human nature. Aside: did the thief get to heaven before the prophets downstairs?

2. The body of the article: masculine and neuter (“the masculine genus refers to the hypostasis”) #

The grammatical point from the First Part: the masculine gender signifies the hypostasis or person, the neuter the nature — which is why one may say the Son is not aliud (another thing) than the Father. In Christ’s death neither soul nor body was separated from the person of the Son. Therefore in the triduum the whole Christ was in the sepulchre (the whole person, through the body united to it), whole in hell (by reason of the soul united to it), and whole everywhere by reason of the divine nature. “The master has spoken.”

3. Replies to the three objections (“whole in each place, but not wholly”) #

1. The body in the tomb is a part not of the uncreated person but of the assumed nature; so its absence from hell does not exclude the whole Christ’s being there. He adds: in one sense the whole was not there — the whole human nature was not. Compare: Thomas will say Peter is not in heaven, not a complete person there.
2. Soul and body united constitute the wholeness of human nature, not of the divine person; death unties them, the whole Christ (the whole person — “Christ is the name of the person”) remains, the human nature in its totality does not.
3. The person was whole in each place but not wholly, because in no place was he limited or “had a line drawn around him”; nor can all places together comprehend his immensity — rather he comprehends all things. The “nothing of it outside” rule holds of bodies circumscribed in place, not of God. Augustine again: not at diverse times or places, but always everywhere the whole.

4. Digression: the Roman Sentences and the highest good (“whether there’s a summum bonum”) #

He reports reading a Roman Sentences commentary attributed to Thomas (“which I think is probably by him. Not convinced it is”), available in the Navarre edition, before returning to his “favourite book, the Summa Contra Gentiles.”

• On the summum bonum: three reasons, “two from Aristotle, one from Augustine” — but the Augustinian one turns out to be Aristotle’s too.
• The reasons, as he recalls them: (a) from the Metaphysics, the order of the parts of a whole to each other is on account of their order to the whole’s purpose (seat and back of a chair for sitting; parts of an army for the leader and victory); the end is better than what is for the end; the universe is an ordered whole, so God, the good for which it is ordered, is the highest good. (b) From “the second book of Wisdom” [Metaphysics II], there is a first end, hence the end of everything else, hence the chief good. (c) From Augustine, the imperfect arises from the perfect — which goes back to Aristotle’s act being simply prior to ability [ed.: potency]; so the first cause is pure act and the supreme good.
• He notes the difference of order: in the Contra Gentiles Thomas proceeds God is good → goodness itself → nothing bad in God → the good of every good → the highest good; in the Sentences it starts “from scratch,” not in the order of teaching.

5. Digression: what a name is taken from vs. what it signifies (“that from which the name is taken”) #

On whether “God” is the most proper name: the authority of I am who am (Augustine) and of Dionysius, for whom “good” is fundamental since the Divine Names begins with it. Thomas’s distinction: in every name, distinguish that from which the name is taken and that to which it is applied — sometimes the same, often not.

• Lapis (“hurts the foot,” admittedly poor etymology): what the name is taken from is not what “stone” signifies.
• “White”: what it is taken from and what it signifies are exactly the same.
• Damascene derives theos from theaomai, to see/consider, or from directing things — but that is only what the name is taken from; what it is applied to is the divine nature. So: in respect of what it is taken from, “good” or “I am who am” is more proper; in respect of what it signifies, “God” is the proper name, signifying the divine nature. He connects this to grammar and logic being alike in being about signs. Related: one may say “God” of Father, Son and Holy Spirit but not that there are three gods; yet one may say tres habentes the divine nature, because that signifies adjectivally. To be God and to have the divine nature are the same thing, but differ in mode of signifying — substantive versus adjective. “You got to be very careful.” He also notes Thomas’s articles on whether theology may proceed from what the saints say (yes, but probably, not with scripture’s authority) and from the philosophers: grace does not destroy nature, so what a philosopher truly demonstrates may be used, judged in harmony with reason. “You don’t see that what Aristotle said is true because it’s so useful in theology. But the reverse: it’s useful in theology because it’s so true.” Asides: his voice giving out (“You want your money back?”); colleagues teaching two-and-a-half-hour late classes with a cold.

6. Article 4: did Christ delay in hell? — objections (“Christ did not contract a long delay”) #

1. He descended to free men, and that was done at once, “it is easy in the sight of God to ennoble the poor one.”
2. Augustine, Sermon on the Passion: at the Lord’s command, without any delay, all the stones and iron bars were broken; “Open up the gates” is said in the person of the angels. He descended to break the doors of hell, so he stayed no time.
3. Luke 23: “This day you will be with me in paradise” — so that same day Christ was in paradise, not in body (in the sepulchre), therefore in soul; hence no delay in hell. Sed contra, Acts 2: God raised him up, untying the sorrows of hell, because it was impossible for him to be held by it — so he remained until the hour of the resurrection. Aside: Haydn’s Seven Last Words, in several forms including a string quartet, a beautiful meditation on each word from the cross. Aside: “You didn’t learn this question in your catechism, did you?”

7. The body of article 4 and its replies (“his soul might be brought out at the same time”) #

As Christ wished to undertake our punishments, placing his body in the tomb, so he wished his soul to descend to hell; his body lay a whole day and two nights to prove the truth of his death, and his soul stayed in hell just as long, so that soul and body should be brought out at the same time. He recalls Thomas’s own remark that the resurrection is the reward of the death and the ascension of the descent, which suggests taking the descent in three articles (emptying himself, taking the form of a slave — Philippians; then death; then hell) and the ascent likewise (resurrection, ascension, second coming). Replies:

1. He freed the saints not by leading them out at once but by enlightening them in hell itself luce gloriae — which, he tells a student, means the beatific vision; we distinguish light of glory from light of faith, grace from glory, glory being gratia consummata.
2. The doors and bars are the impediments by which the fathers were kept in on account of the first parent’s guilt; these Christ broke at once by the power of his passion, but he willed to remain for the stated reason.
3. “Paradise” there is not the bodily terrestrial paradise but the spiritual paradise of those enjoying the divine glory; the thief descended with Christ to hell in place, so as to be with Christ, but his reward of paradise was there because he enjoyed Christ’s divinity as the other saints did. Digression on simul: Aristotle’s Categories has a chapter on before and after and then on simul/hama, together, defined by negating before and after — as equal in the tenth book of Wisdom is known by negating more and less. So even of the Father and the Son we say they are together by negating all the chief senses of “before.” Student exchange: did the fathers lose the beatific vision when they were brought up? — No; body and soul of Christ left together, and the fathers went up to heaven; those in purgatory are the ones who do not yet see God. Asides: “I wish people wouldn’t think of me as being primarily a logician”; he is not the fanatic Monsignor Dionne was; Warren Ray’s quip that eight years of logic means you never had these men in philosophy; like spending a year on bare grammar before reading anything hard in a language.

8. Article 5: did Christ free the holy fathers? — objections (“did not free the holy fathers”) #

1. Augustine, Letter to Evodius: to the just in Abraham’s bosom Christ is not found to have conferred anything, since from them he never departed according to the beatifying presence of his divinity. But he would have conferred much had he freed them.
2. No one is detained in hell except on account of sin; the fathers had been justified in life by faith in Christ; so they needed no liberation.
3. Cause removed, effect removed: the cause of descending to hell is sin, removed by the passion. Sed contra, Augustine, Sermon on the Passion: he broke the gate of hell and the iron bars and absolved all the just held there, bound by original sin.

9. The body of article 5 (“liberated not only from sin but from the guilt”) #

Christ in hell worked in the power of his passion, which freed the race not only from sin but from the guilt of punishment. Men are bound to punishment in two ways: for actual sin committed in one’s own person, and for the sin of the whole nature descending from the first parent (Romans 5), whose punishment is bodily death and exclusion from the life of glory (Genesis: God ejected man from paradise after sin, death having been threatened beforehand). Christ absolved the saints from this second guilt, by which they were excluded from seeing God through his essence, in which man’s perfect beatitude consists. Texts: Zechariah, “you in the blood of your testament have brought out the bound from the lake in which there was no water”; Colossians 2, despoiling the principalities and powers — taking Isaac, Jacob and the other just ones out of the kingdom of darkness, as the gloss explains.

10. Replies of article 5 (“blessed in hope, not yet perfectly in reality”) #

1. Augustine is speaking against those who think the old just were subject to the pains of hell: how could Abraham, in whose bosom the pious pauper was received, be in those torments? They were not suffering the pains but were deprived of seeing God face to face until Christ had died. Augustine’s “he would yet bestow upon them” is to be understood of attaining glory, and consequently of loosing the sorrow they had from the delay of glory — of which hope they had great joy.
   • Illustration: Shakespeare’s “Parting is such sweet sorrow” (Romeo and Juliet) — an apparent contradiction, resolved because the sorrow of separating is a sign of how much they love, and they are consoled by knowing it; here likewise one is consoled by hope of seeing God as he is. He notes even souls in purgatory are somewhat consoled by this, and a fortiori the prophets, though Thomas still speaks of dolor — “so there is something kind of mixed there.”
   • John: “Abraham your father exulted that he might see my day.”
   • They were blessed in hope, not yet perfectly blessed in reality — as Aristotle’s promising boy is called happy though he cannot yet have a man’s happiness until his mind is developed.
2. The fathers were freed while alive, by faith in Christ, from all sin original and actual and from the guilt of punishment for actual sins, but not from the guilt of punishment of original sin excluding them from glory, the price of redemption not yet being paid. Parallel with the baptized now: freed from guilt of actual sins and from original guilt as regards exclusion from glory, yet still bound to bodily death, renewed in spirit but not yet in flesh — Romans 8, “the body is dead on account of sin, but the spirit lives on account of justification.”
3. As soon as Christ died his soul descended and showed the fruit of his passion to the saints detained there, though they did not go forth while Christ remained; his presence pertained to the accumulation of their glory. Aside (during the digression on hope): his neighbour’s little girl running up onto the back deck at breakfast, her father coming after her, and the fingerprints on the windows.

His words #

• “The master has spoken” — his sign-off on Thomas’s respondeo.
• Whole vs. wholly — whole in each place (the entire person) but not wholly (not circumscribed, nothing of it outside).
• Masculine / neuter genus — masculine signifies the hypostasis or person, neuter the nature.
• “That from which the name is taken” / “that to which it is applied” — the two aspects of every name (lapis, white, theos).
• Tres habentes — “three having the divine nature,” said adjectivally, unlike “three gods.”
• Summum bonum — “highest good.”
• Ability — [ed.: potency], in “act is before ability.”
• Luce gloriae illustrando — enlightening by the light of glory, i.e. the beatific vision.
• Gratia consummata — glory as grace completed.
• Second book of Wisdom / tenth book of Wisdom — [ed.: Metaphysics II and X].
• Simul / hama — together, known by negating before and after.
• “Piling up of glory,” “accumulation of glory” — his renderings of the effect of Christ’s presence on the detained saints.
• Guilt of punishment — the reatus poenae distinguished from sin itself.

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 52, a. 3 (objections, sed contra, body, replies)
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 52, a. 4 (in full)
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 52, a. 5 (in full)
• Augustine, Sermon on the Symbol/Creed; Sermon on the Passion; Letter to Evodius — as quoted within the articles
• Luke 23; Acts 2; Romans 5 and 8; Genesis 2–3; Zechariah; Colossians 2 with the gloss; John (Abraham exulted) — as cited within the articles

Mentioned

• The “Roman Sentences” commentary attributed to Thomas (Navarre edition), on the summum bonum, the name “God,” and proceeding in theology from saints and philosophers
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles (his “favourite book”), order of the treatment of God’s goodness
• Aristotle, Metaphysics (order of parts to end; first end; equal known by negation); Categories ch. 12–13 (inferred) on before/after and simul; the “promising boy” on happiness
• John Damascene on the derivation of theos; Dionysius, On the Divine Names
• Haydn, The Seven Last Words; Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
• Philippians (he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave)

His questions #

• Was the whole Christ in hell? — Yes, the whole person, by reason of the soul united to it; but not the whole human nature.
• Can something be called a whole when its parts are separated? — Not as regards human nature; but the wholeness of the divine person does not depend on the union of soul and body.
• Did the thief get into heaven before the prophets downstairs? — The thief descended with Christ to hell in place; his “paradise” was enjoying Christ’s divinity, as the other saints did.
• Why did Christ remain in hell the whole triduum instead of leaving at once? — So that his soul should be brought out of hell at the same time as his body from the sepulchre, the two days and nights proving the truth of his death.
• Does luce gloriae illustrando mean the beatific vision? — Yes; glory is grace completed, distinguished from the light of faith.
• Did the fathers lose the beatific vision when Christ rose? — No; they went up to heaven. Those still deprived are the souls in purgatory.
• Why were the fathers detained at all, if faith had justified them? — Because of the guilt of punishment of original sin, excluding from glory, the price of redemption not yet paid.
• What then did Christ confer on them, if (per Augustine) they were not suffering? — Not release from pains they did not have, but attainment of glory, and so release from the sorrow of its delay.
• How can sorrow be sweet (“parting is such sweet sorrow”)? — The sorrow of parting is a sign of great love, and one is consoled by knowing it; so here one is consoled by hope.