Prima Pars
108. Summa I, Q.29 a.3: Should the Name 'Person' Be Used of God? (Boethius, Hypostasis, and Where Names Come From)
Class of 2008-01-10
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/108-summa-i-q-29-a-3-should-the-name-person-be-used-of-god-boethius/

[0:00] Let's say our little prayer. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. God, enlighten our minds, guardian angels strengthen the lights of our minds, order illumine images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor. Amen. And help us to understand all truth. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Amen.

[0:29] Now, as you know, the treatise on the Trinity is divided into what three parts, according to the order of teaching as Thomas says, and that's because the divine persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, are distinguished by relations of origin, of origin or procession, one person from another, and therefore he divides the treatise on the Trinity into consideration of those three things. So we had a question on procession, right, where you learn that there is a proceeding or going forward that remains within God, right, and that one of these going forwards is generation, and there's another more mysterious going forward that doesn't really have a name, but its name is not generation, huh?

[1:23] Okay. And then in the present, we had a question on the what relations, right? Okay. And now we've come to the what 15 questions, 15 of the 17 questions in total are on the persons, right? And those 15 questions are divided into what two parts, huh? And one is a kind of absolute consideration of the persons, the first 10 questions, and then the last five questions will be a comparative consideration of the persons.

[2:00] Huh? We'll find out whether they're equal or not, etc. Okay. Now the first 10 questions is also divided into what two parts, right? And we had four questions on the persons in general, and this will be followed by six questions on the persons in particular, right? There will be one question, I think, on the Father, two questions on the Son, and three on the what Holy Spirit, right?

[2:32] Good Pythagorean way of looking at things. Okay. Now this first question, as you know, was divided into four articles. You look back at the proemium there to 29.

[2:47] But if you look at the four questions, huh? You can see it obviously falls into three parts, huh? Because the first question, the one we're in right now, is the meaning of the name person, right?

[3:02] And then the second, and third article questions kind of go together because the second question is the number of persons, and the third one is those things that follow upon the number of persons. And then the fourth article is like a third part, which those things that belong to what a knowledge of persons, right? Okay. So you're going to find out first of all what a person is, right, in general, and in God, what does it mean to speak of a person?

[3:31] And then he's going to talk about the number of persons and what follows upon the number of them, and then something about our knowledge of persons. Okay. So it really falls into three, but he divides it into four sub-dividing these segments. Now we looked at the first two articles before my vacation, the clarification of those he prefaced it, and notice the first two articles were really about what person in general, right?

[4:04] The definition of person going back to Boethius's great definition, and then the comparison of person to things that are close to it, right? Distinguishing that. And now the last two ones kind of the second part, right? And the first one, of course, is whether the name of person belongs at all in divine things. And then what does it mean there? What does it signify there, right? Okay.

[4:30] So obviously these four fall into two parts, right? The general consideration of person, and then talking about person in divine things. So let's look now at the third article of question 29. Whether the name of person should be placed in divine things.

[4:49] To the third he says, one proceeds thus. It seems that the name of person ought not to be laid down in divine things. For Dionysius, who is a very great authority in the Middle Ages, who is thought to be the Dionysius, maybe converted by Paul in the Areopagus.

[5:12] So kind of you're getting out of some horse's mouth, and you get it from Dionysius, right? And I think Gregory the Great brought Dionysius back from Constantinople and made him somewhat known at that time. For Dionysius says in the beginning of the divine names, in general, it is not what one should not dare to say something, right, or to think something about the what supersubstantial divinity divinity, apart from those things which are what divinely expressed for us from the what sacred writings.

[5:52] But the name of person is not expressed for us in sacred scripture, either the New or the Old Testament. Therefore, the name of person should not be used in divine things. I

[6:16] suppose Thomas would say that although the name person is not what used there, what is signified by the name person is found there, right. Okay. A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet as.

[6:32] Moreover, Boethius says in the book about the two names that the name of person seems to be drawn from those persons which are presented or which represent men in comedies and what tragedies. I guess it's the mask or something. For the person is said from what personando, I guess, includes the idea of what sound there, right? It helped to didn't have microphones in those days, so it helped to magnify the voice.

[7:05] Because by its what concavity, right? That the sound might be put forth, more right. The Greeks called these persons prosopa from the fact that they're placed in the face, right, or before the eyes, and they hide the thing. So it made it somewhat easier for the actor; I didn't have to put all these facial expressions, just the tone of voice, right?

[7:33] But this cannot belong in divine things, except perhaps what by metaphor, right? Therefore, the name person is not said of God except metaphor. Now, this is more an argument taken from what the word is taken from, right, rather than its meaning, right? Of course, we've seen things like this even before. I did the word perfect. Remember, perfect comes from the word factum, made, right? How can God be perfect when He's not made?

[8:01] Although it's taken from that, it signifies the actuality, right, that a thing has after it's been made, right, not really necessarily in making. So a name can be taken from something other than what

[8:19] it means. Yeah. So necessary to distinguish those two. Moreover, every person is in hypostasis, right? But the name hypostasis does not seem to belong to God, huh? For according to Boethius, it signifies that which is subject to accidents. So it's a little bit like the word substance too, right? Which means to stand under, right? Well, nothing really stands under anything else in God. So how can you speak of substance?

[8:58] And Saint Jerome, though one less than Saint Jerome says. That in the name hypostasis, poison, right? Is hidden under the what? Honey, huh? I think this goes back to the fact, as we've seen before, that the etymologically speaking, hypostasis is the same in Latin as in Greek, what? or in English rather Latin, better. Substantia, right? People under and stands, huh? But unlike the Greek, huh? The Latin word substantia also means what?

[9:34] The nature of a thing, what it is. And hypostasis in Greek doesn't mean that, right? So if you translate hypostasis by substance, and you say there are three hypostases in the God, then you say there are three substances, and that might indicate that there are three what? Natures, and this of course would be heretical, right? And so there's something, there's some poison hidden under that. Therefore, this name "person" is should not be said of God.

[10:11] There's a problem in translation. I'll show you how man is tied to words, though. Aristotle says in the book on Sophistical Refutations that the most common mistake is for mixing up the senses of a word, and it gives us problems in theology, obviously, as well as in philosophy.

[10:32] Moreover, from whoever is removed, the definition also the what defined. But the definition of person laid down above does not seem to belong to God.

[10:48] First, because reason—I remember how reason is put into the definition—because reason implies discursive knowledge, which does not belong to God, as has been shown above, right, in the treatise on the operations of God, right? God does not know things discursively, right? But that's the very definition of reason. I can see in Shakespeare's definition of reason, it's ability for large discourse, right, looking before and after, and discourse names in one meaning simply going from one thing to another, right?

[11:22] But that God doesn't do, right? And then the other sense of discourse is coming to know what you don't know through what you do know, right? But neither one of these is true about God. There's no motion in God, and He doesn't know one thing or come to know one thing through knowing another. All things are open and naked, his eyes, as Scripture says, at once. It

[11:48] kind of confirms what the way the great Shakespeare defines reason, and thus God cannot be said to be of a rational nature, right? Now Thomas will just kind of pass it over and say, "Well, he's using rational here for intellectual nature." So it's not going to be a picking way to answer the great Boethius' definition. Also, because God cannot be said to be a what individual substance—that's the other part of the definition—because the beginning of individuation is matter.

[12:28] That's only true in material things. So it's because your flesh and blood and bones is not my flesh and blood and bones, right? That we're different individuals, and God doesn't have that. God's immaterial,

[12:47] and again, the word "substantia, like" to stand under, right, is taken from its standing under what accidents, right? Nor does he stand under accident, so that he can be called a what? Substance, right? Therefore, the name of person ought not to be attributed to God, right? Now, if all you ever heard was these four objections, you didn't know if they were objections that Thomas was going to answer.

[13:14] Pretty convincing, right? You know, what I would have thought, right? Hearing these objections, right? I'd be totally on the false side, right? But against all this is what is said in the symbol. Symbolon means what? Yeah, It actually means thrown together, the Greek word, etymologically, right? But the the creeds are called symbols sometimes, only because things are thrown together, put together. And one of them is called the Athanasian Creed, huh?

[13:50] Which is very important creed, huh? And it may not have been composed in its present form by Athanasius, but goes back to his his teaching, right? And some things in the Athanasian Creed they're explicit there; they're not in the other creeds. But if you get in official documents of the church, you'll find the Athanasian Creed is up there authority, right? Put up there with the Nicene, Constantinople Creed, and the Apostles' Creed, and so on.

[14:16] So that's a pretty great authority, the Athanasian Creed. There, that creed too, that we have the statement that there's no before and after in God, huh? There's no sense as God the Father before the Son, Basically, as it may seem, right?

[14:36] But they're not together, right? So if we don't know that creed, you might look at it sometime. I remember right there. I think that creed has got the of the division too of the things to believe. The Trinity,

[14:55] the divinity, humanity. Yeah, yes, yeah. See, in the Nicene Constantinople Creed, all the articles of faith are divided according to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So certain other articles are attached, like you know, creation to the Father, right, or you know, sanctification of the Holy Spirit, right. But in the Athanasian Creed, I guess in the Creed of the Fourth Council, you have the divinity of God or of Christ, and then humanity, and that's a division used more in theology, right?

[15:31] So in the prima pars, you get things referring to the divinity of God and so on, the Trinity, and then you get the incarnation in the third part, two different parts, huh? And in the the compendium of theology of Thomas, you have that same thing. You have the divinity of Christ and then the humanity of Christ, huh? Correspond roughly to the prima pars and the tertia pars, huh?

[16:02] So you can divide articles of faith into two or three, right? This is part of the purpose's principle, right? Yeah. You divide into two or three, or or both, for the most part at least, right?

[16:15] When you divide into more than three, usually have to combine or divide and subdivide to see that, right? Now Thomas's response here reminds me a lot of, you know, way John Paul II is always talking about the importance of person. But Thomas gives more clearly the exact reason for that, right? I answer it should be said that person signifies that which is most perfect in the whole of what nature.

[16:50] To wit, something subsisting, okay, in a rational nature, right? Now something subsisting means what, as opposed to an accident, right? Something that exists by itself, right? Not in another, right? And those things that exist by themselves and not another are superior to those things that exist only another, right? And among all natures, the rational nature, meaning the nature that understands, right, is higher, right? So the plants are higher than the stones, but the animals whose sense are higher than the what plants and the nature that understands are even higher, right?

[17:36] Whence, since everything that is a perfection ought to be attributed to God, in that his what essence or nature contains in itself every what perfection, it is suitable that this name person be said of God. That's a very beautiful what middle term, right? So the what is the middle term between person and God, right? Well, because person signifies what is most perfect, right? Something subsisting in a what understanding nature, right?

[18:14] And whatever pertains to what perfection should be attributed to God, maybe in a higher way, even right? It's attributed to creatures, but you borrow any name, right? From God, from creatures, it's got to be a name signifying perfection, right? And this seems to signify something most perfect, huh? So it's most suitable that this name be carried over, huh? That's beautiful the way Thomas gives the reason, right?

[18:40] Not over in the same way in which it is said of creatures, right? But always in a more excellent way, right? So you can never note as as the fourth letter in the Council says a likeness of the creature to God without the same time. A greater unlikeness, huh? So everything that's perfect or signifies the perfection of the creature is found in God, but in a more excellent way than we understand or can express, right?

[19:09] Just as the other names, which are imposed from creatures by us, are attributed to God, this has been shown above in the what thirteenth question, which talked about the names when we treated about the divine names. So that was the twelfth and the 13th, actually, question. The 12th question is: How we know God, and then name God. the 13th question. So you convinced now that the name of a person should be used in talking about God?

[19:42] Yeah. Every time we read an article, Thomas had to change my mind. I know. In some of that, I've used an article, Thomas. You know, not these ones, but this other article. I'll give the students, you know, on a paper just the. Objections right? and let them stew with those for a while, and the next day I'll come back and give them the next page. You know, another two lazy or stupid to look up the text and solve it.

[20:13] You don't give them the whole thing, you know, huh? I suppose you know when Thomas was teaching. of course, the students didn't have a text in front of them. They couldn't look down and and then a text like this, you know, they printed bold. You know, the the answer to the question, right? He's trying to get the answer without thinking about it. They look at the bold there and skip the whole reason part.

[20:35] But when the students were kind of making their own book as they go along, in fact, teachers then they're in suspense here at this point until they get to the next part's going to dictate it. But it's funny as some of these English books we have. I don't know. There's a bunch from someone who's like after each question, yes, no.

[20:59] Skip that first part. Doesn't mean to me that. Those are the answers to the test. Come here's an impression of God? Yes. I'm going to say something

[21:21] here. All this business about catechisms, you know. I says there's nothing wrong with the answers. I said the Baltimore Catechism. We didn't understand them too well, you know, but at least you kind of knew them by heart. And later on, if you study theology, you know, you remember those things and start to understand them better, right? Now they don't even give you the answers. Doesn't they understand it, man?

[21:37] There's a mass there, and one of the little grandchildren, Sophia, wisdom there. Little brother. God, that's playing to the altar. To the first, therefore, it should be said. This is the one now that says, "What this name of person is not found in the Old or New Testament, right? " To the first, therefore, it should be said that although the name of person is not found in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be said about God, right?

[22:20] Nevertheless, that which the name signifies, right, is found in many ways in Sacred Scripture, asserted about God, and these two things: that He is most of all, right, per se ens, right,

[22:41] and that means what something a being by itself, right, to itself, and He is most perfectly understanding, right. There's many references to that. So the two things involved there in the person, per se ens et perfectissime intelligence, the two parts of the definition that are later on. In the fourth objection, right?

[23:07] Those are both attributed to God in Scripture. So the meaning of the word "person." There, yeah. If, however, it is necessary to say about God only those things by voice which Sacred Scripture treats of God, it would follow that never in another what language could someone speak about God except in that in which was what handed over the Scriptures of the Old or the New Testament. huh?

[23:39] If we prayed to God, we couldn't say "Our Father." We'd have to say "Pater Noster and." Maybe go back to the not even that, go back to Greek and and back to the Aramaic, right? Then they see in the original there the Aramaic that was kind of a a verse form there. Our Father. You know how Thomas's prayer? You know the one, the Adorote Devote. Well, sometimes they call it the rhythmus as tomate right?

[24:08] There's a certain rhythm there. You know, it seems to be trochee, right? For most part. Which Shakespeare uses for solemn things, unusual creatures, you know, as opposed to the what iambic, which we fall into in daily speech without realizing it sometimes.

[24:40] Now he says to finding new names, signifying the ancient faith about God, right? The necessity of disputing with heretics, Christus, huh? Okay. Nor should this newness, huh, be avoided, since it is not what profane, worldly, as something that is discordant from the sense of what Scripture.

[25:13] For the Apostle, meaning Saint Paul, Antonomasia teaches, profane newnesses of voices should be what Avoided. huh? I want to say that there's transsignification, but not transubstantiation in the Eucharist, right? This is a profane newness of voice, huh?

[25:37] I assume transubstantiation—that word there—which the Church has adopted. I don't guess probably in Scripture either. Christ talks about the Eucharist, doesn't talk about transubstantiation by by name, right?

[25:54] It does indicate there is a change of substance there. Now the second objection. Is talking about the what is taken from that from which the name is taken right rather than what it signifies huh? That's a different objection. To the second, it should be said that although this name person does not belong to God as regards that from which the name is what imposed right. I notice that word incidentally impositum right.

[26:31] Literally etymologically it means what placed upon right. Okay. So Thomas will speak of the impositio nominis right, the placing of a name upon something. We sometimes in English say put a label upon something right. So we imagine the name being placed upon the thing right. But Thomas will often distinguish between that from which the name is taken and that to which it is what applied right. So Thomas always gives us perhaps a false etymology the word lapis right.

[27:06] It hurts the foot laedit pedem or something like that. That's not what it means. That's what it's taken from right. So it gets your attention from that.

[27:20] I'm often pointing out with the word philosophy right. Does philosophy mean the love of wisdom? I think the meaning of philosopher is love of wisdom right. But Aristotle and Plato too. They don't use the word philosophy to name the love of wisdom right. But to name the knowledge that the love of wisdom pursues. So love of wisdom is not the meaning of the word philosophy at least for Aristotle.

[27:58] But it's that from which the name is taken right. So a lot of people you know make this kind of confusion right between that from which the name is taken and what that from which it is applied right. The meaning and the etymology don't have to be the same thing.

[28:24] There may be a connection between them but you have to know the meaning of the word to see what the connection is. So Thomas is making this point. It's a common point in Thomas right. Like we mentioned the word perfect. Okay.

[28:43] So he says the name of person does not belong to God as regards that from which the name is placed upon something right. That from which the name is taken. But nevertheless that to which signifying it is placed. Most of all belongs to God, right? Because in comedies and tragedies are presented somewhat famous men, right? This name person is imposed to signify someone having dignity, as dignity of the person that, or the father John Paul II especially like to talk about.

[29:24] Whence we are accustomed to call persons in the churches those who have some dignity, An account of which some define person, right, saying that it is an hypostasis, right, which means individual substance by a property distinguished that pertains to what dignity, right? It's individual substance that has dignity, right?

[29:53] And because it is of the great dignity to subsist in a rational nature, therefore every individual. Of a rational nature is called a person. This has been said. But the dignity or worth of the divine nature exceeds every dignity everywhere. And according to this, most of all to God belongs the name person, right? Okay. In Shakespeare, you know, in footnotes all the times you have references in Shakespeare to the seven worthies.

[30:29] You know, the name these famous guys some of you know, from fiction and so on right? They're called the worthies, right? So compared to God, you could say I'm worthless. So God, most of all, is is is worth, huh? So most of all, does the name of person belong to God as far as what it signifies, not that from which it is taken, right? He's kind of turning the table on this guy, right?

[30:56] Yeah. He's saying first of all, you're talking about that which the name is taken, right? And you gotta look at that to which is applied. You look at that, then you see most of all belongs to God, and least of us to to us worthless people, right?

[31:17] Now we have a similar problem with the name hypostasis, which is the third objection, right? The third should be said that the name hypostasis, which etymologically means to stand under, right, does not belong to God as regards that from which the name is what imposed, huh? Since he does not stand under what accidents, huh?

[31:47] But it belongs to that to which, right, the name is imposed, to signifying a thing what subsisting, right? We talked a little bit subsistence there in the previous article, if you remember, right? And that names more what that something exists by itself and not in another, right? That belongs most of all to God. Now, what about this authority from the great Saint Jerome? Jerome says that under this name is hidden what poison?

[32:20] Huh? It's awfully strong, right? Because before the meaning or the signification of this name was plene nota, fully known, right? Among the Latins, heretics deceived through this name those simple, right?

[32:41] That they might confess that there are many what essences or many what natures in God, right? Just as they confess many what hypostases. So there was poison hidden under the name, right? That's what he was hinting to. On account of the fact that the name substance. Which corresponds in Greek, which corresponds in Greek, the name hypostasis, etymologically the same, right? Sub and hypo and stasis and stand, right?

[33:15] Is commonly taken among us for what? Yes. Yeah. The nature of the thing, substance of thing, what it is. Okay. And incidentally, what English word etymologically is the same as substantia and hypostasis? Understand. Mm-hmm. That's just an excellence of the English word to understand, right? To understand could mean to what? To know what stands under the accidents, right? But to know the substance of things in the sense of what they are.

[33:53] It's a proper object of reason to know what something is. It's very revealing, in other words, that English word understanding and the Latin substantia have the same what? Yeah. Because only understanding knows substance, right? The senses know only accidents. The senses know nothing more fundamental than quantity. And that's a problem with Descartes, right? Where he identifies the quantity or extension of a thing with its very what substance, right?

[34:32] And this runs through the modern philosophers a lot, right? You know, you know, I quoted that thing that Bertrand Russell says, you know, the accidents of Mister Smith have no more need of a substance to exist than the earth has need of an elephant to rest upon.

[34:52] If they were true, then we shouldn't call the accidents which is meant accidents, they're substances. What do you mean by substances, right? It's interesting when you study wisdom there, first in the sense of first philosophy, right? Aristotle in the fourth book of wisdom shows that wisdom is about being as being, and then he shows that being is said in many ways, and that the first meaning is really substance, and the other meanings all go back to substance, and then he concludes that wisdom is chiefly about what being in the sense of substance, huh?

[35:34] What shows a connection between understanding and the subject here, huh? Beautiful, beautiful English word, huh? I think the English word to understand is a better word than the Greek word nous huh? It's more revealing, the word, huh? And even better in some ways than the Latin word intelligere, which means more to read within. Similarity between those two meanings. And I mentioned before how Shakespeare punned upon the, you know, my keen understanding.

[36:05] Can't you understand me? You know, the pun upon those things, but you know, making us very attentive to the etymology of the word "understand."

[36:16] And you say it very much when you talk about understanding words, right? Understanding. What does it mean to understand a word? It means to know what stands under the word, right?

[36:33] So I hear somebody speaking in Russian or some other language like that, Chinese. in fact, in the airplane they're saying Chinese. I mean, you know, they make an announcement, then they announce it in English, and they announce it in. I must be Chinese or Japanese. One of those things. I hear the sounds as well, but I don't understand what they're saying. I don't know what stands under these sounds.

[36:57] Understand. Yeah, that's a problem too. Yeah, basically, I don't know what stands under it. That also goes back to the idea "impositio nominis," right? Yeah. So, look at the etymology of words. The word "understanding" fits "impositio" better than the Latin word "intelligere," which has the idea "intus" to be within, not to get what's under.

[37:36] So that's into the third reply to the third objection, right? For because this name of substance, which corresponds to which corresponds in Greek the name of hypostasis, is commonly accepted among us for the essence of the nature of the thing. But in Greek hypostasis would never be used to name what the nature of the thing, what it is. So when the Greeks say three hypostasis, they're not, there's no occasion to be deceived to their saying that there are three natures, right?

[38:09] When we say there are three substances there, there are three persons, and a person is a substantia, and there's a possibility of misunderstanding this, right?

[38:22] Now the fourth objection, Thomas says. To the fourth, it should be said that God can be said to be of a rational nature, according as reason does not imply discourse, but using it in a what? More general way, right? Something for intellectual what? Nature.

[38:43] So he's kind of stretching a little bit the, rationalis there, right? But he's saying that a he doesn't mean by rational there in the strict sense, right? The ability for discourse, but in general, intellectual what nature, right?

[39:03] And that, you know, doesn't shouldn't be taken simply as ad hoc defense of of its master, their Boethius. But um you find even Aristotle, and will sometimes follow in speech, the Congress speaking, where we accept, let's say, even imagining and what thinking, right? So when you ask me, who's gonna win the election. I'd say, I imagine so and so, but right. And I don't reimagine this. Maybe I do.

[39:35] That's all you want to do That's a bad dream. Yeah, But, I'm not too sure, you know. Say think, right? But you know, we looked at I think one time, and we did we had the the you know the fifth of Shakespeare, right? Where he's talking sometimes about filling out with your imagination what's being represented on stage, right? There's 2 or three guys whacking sticks on the thing and gotta imagine a whole, you know, battle going on, right?

[40:04] They sometimes speak of filling yourself with your thoughts, right? So, thinking, imagining are kind of what use sometimes one for the other, right? Aristotle speaks of sensible matter and understandable matter, right? But using understandable there more to mean what imaginable matter. Okay, that's much more of a stretch of the word in the use of it than between rational ratio and what intellectus, right? Between reason and understanding, right?

[40:40] Okay, if you want to take reason, reason in the in the strict sense, then you couldn't say person of God, could you? Okay. But no, so you could take the word reason and what keep part of the meaning of it, right? Now when Shakespeare defines reason as ability for large discourse looking before and after right Looking large discourse, looking before and after, right? Looking has got the idea of understanding, right?

[41:13] So I could keep the idea of understanding and drop out the idea discourse, right? You can make the word equivocal by reason, right? And Thomas has taken the liberty of making it here. Okay, That's what communitarian sense means, right? You drop something that's private to the first meaning something that's common there, right? in some sense you could say reason is is an ability to understand, isn't it?

[41:43] Not a very good one. But you could say if I have reason, I have I have an ability to understand. Sounds reasonable. Is it understandable too? I hope.

[42:02] Okay. Now, individual does not belong to God in in this way. Insofar as the principle of individuation is matter, right? But only according as it implies what incommunicability right? Okay. I'll hold on to that because at the end he's going to quote Richard of Saint Victor, right?

[42:31] Okay. So we'll come back to that. Substance belongs to God according as it signifies what existere per se, right? Not insofar as it's what standing under, right? But no, even the substance of a dog or a cat, right? Exists per se, right? Okay. Doesn't exist in another, like an accident, right? And that's the idea of substance when applied to what, to God, right?

[43:14] Some people, however, say that the definition given above by Boethius, right, is not a definition of person, according as we speak of what, persons in God, right? On account of which, Richard of Saint Victor, huh? He's the one that's famous about Abbey, I guess, huh? Saint Victor. There's a Hugo of Saint Victor, right? My name is actually Hugo, by the way. I was christened Hugo Duane, right?

[43:42] And they got switched around, caught me Duane Hugo. So my, when I went for the social security, of course, my baptismal certificate says Hugo Duane, of course I'm applying the name of Duane Hugo, but there's no problem. It's it's very common that that switching of names, right? My mother was baptized Mary Gertrude, but then I call her Gertrude, so it happens, you know. My confirmation name is Victor, so I feel close to these guys.

[44:10] My brother's named Richard, so a lot of names come with these guys. On account of which, Richard of Saint Victor, wishing to correct this definition, says that person, according as he said of God, is of the divine nature and incommunicable what, existence, right? I don't think Thomas necessarily says you have to do what Richard of Saint Victor is doing, right? But it helps you to understand the definition in a way that makes it applicable to God, right?

[44:40] So individual is not said of God in the definition of person, but it signifies that the matter of the Father is unique from that of the Son. I mean, maybe the Mormons believe this. I don't know, what they believe,

[44:57] but it is being something incommunicable, right? When when he uses that, existere per se, is this correct? Yeah. Why would he use that verb? You just say esse, or is there some special reason at all? Well, existere per se means through itself or by itself, right? As opposed to existing in another, the way an accident does, huh? Sure. I'm worried about. I'm wondering about existere, because as when I'm doing it, I'm thinking back of when we had before on the first when he talks about per se ends.

[45:36] Yeah. He didn't say per se existence. Okay, I don't think I would make. Wait, do you about that though? Yeah, sure. Yeah. Because in the sense that you say ends per se, you're saying, a res cui convenit existere per se, a thing to which it belongs to exist per se, right? That was part of the definition of of substance here.

[46:08] Not giving the whole definition of it, right? As if you were to say a substance means a thing that exists per se, okay? So exist per se is not so much like the genus, but like the difference there, meaning of it, that completes the definition of it. Okay. There's not in

[46:46] so far as substance signifies something that substare, right? To stand under, right? Not in so far as substance is something that is said to stand under the accidents. That's not why the word substance belongs to to God, right? Okay. Are

[47:23] you satisfied? You satisfied? It's it's sort of beyond me, but it's fine that what's what's good enough is just that you said so. Yeah, yeah.

[47:37] He's emphasizing what you might call the difference there, right? Substance, right? You say by substance, don't you mean a thing that stands under accidents?

[47:52] What to stand under accidents is God, yeah. Okay. But if by substance you mean a thing that exists by itself, right? Then to be a substance belongs most of all to God, right? They say. So he's emphasizing not the word thing, which you could say be the meaning of substance, right? But what completes the meaning of substance, right? And if you say what completes the meaning of substance is to stand under accidents, then you couldn't apply the word substance to God, right?

[48:23] But if to complete the meaning of substance you mean a thing that exists, right, by itself, then this belongs most of all to God, right? Because he could exist without all the things that they can exist without him, right? He exists most of all by himself, right?