Prima Pars
117. Notions in God: Abstract and Concrete Names for the Divine Persons (ST I q.32 a.2)
Class of 2008-02-07
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/117-notions-in-god-abstract-and-concrete-names-for-the-divine/

[0:00] To the three articles on what notions, yeah. Most people don't know about notions too much, right? They heard about persons, but they don't have the notions.

[0:15] To the second, one proceeds thus: It seems that one ought not to place notions in divine things. For Dionysius says in the first chapter of the Divine Names that one should not dare to say something about God apart from those things which have been expressed for us from the sacred writings.

[0:39] But about the notions, there's no mention made in the writings or sayings of the sacred Scripture. Therefore, one ought not to lay down notions in what divine things.

[0:57] Moreover, whatever is laid down in divine things either pertains to the unity of the essence or to the Trinity of persons. We've seen this either or before, right? Huh? Okay. But the notions do not pertain to the unity of the essence, nor to the Trinity of the persons.

[1:18] Of the notions, for of the notions are neither predicated those things which pertain to the essence. For we do not say that the what the fatherhood is wise or creates, right? Nor those things which are the person. For we do not say that fatherhood what the sonhood generates and sonhood is generated. Therefore, there ought not to be laid down notions in divine things.

[1:54] Moreover, in simple things one should not lay down some abstract things, which are the what beginnings of knowing them, because they are known by themselves. But the divine persons are most simple. Therefore, one ought not to lay down in divine persons notions whereby they are what known.

[2:21] But against all this is what John Damascene says: that the difference of the what hypostases, those of the persons, and we we recognize or know in three properties, right? The paternal, the filial, and the processional. Right. Therefore, there ought to be laid down properties and notions in divine things.

[2:51] So you heard about notions before? The notions before? I answer: It should be said that Praepositinus right? I give his date here in my book. Here is around 210. Right, noting the simplicity of the persons. Right, said that one should not lay down certain properties and notions in divine things.

[3:21] And if they are found someplace, one should expound the abstract for the concrete. Just as we are accustomed to say, "I ask your benignity," right? His holiness, right? Is he holiness or is he holy? Well, you know, that's way of speaking, right? But he says he's holy. So, also in divine things, paternity is understood God the Father, right?

[3:51] Okay, this goes back to what we saw before. This question about you use both concrete and abstract names in God, and Thomas says, "Well, both of them have the defect, right? But we can't avoid using them, right? We have to negate their imperfections."

[4:07] But as has been shown above, it is not prejudicial to the divine simplicity that in divine things we use both what concrete names and abstract names, right?

[4:23] Because, according as we understand, thus we what name things, right? So we speak about God as we, however imperfectly, understand him, right? Okay. Now, what is there about our way of understanding that means we have to use these imperfect names?

[4:45] Well, our understanding cannot arrive at the what divine simplicity according as it is to be considered in itself. We don't know God as He is. That's for the beatific vision. And therefore, according to its own way, it grasps what divine things and names them, right?

[5:12] That is, according as they are found in sensible things from which we take our knowledge, right? Okay? Now notice this doesn't make the mind necessarily false, because the way of knowing doesn't have to be the way things are, right? That the falsehood comes in when you say that the way of knowing is the way things are, right? Okay. Right. We talked about that simple question of philosophy.

[5:43] In which, meaning insensible things, right? To signify simple forms, we use abstract names, right? To signify subsistent things, we use what concrete names, huh? Whence divine things, as has been said above. We signify by reason of their simplicity through abstract names, but by reason of their subsistence and complement or completion, we signify them through what concrete names, right? So we say both that God is good, right, and God is His own goodness, right?

[6:28] We can't avoid that, right? Now it is necessary that not only essential names be signified in the abstract and in the concrete. We saw this back in the treatise on names, huh? Chapter, question, what thirteen was it? As when we say the godhood, the divine nature, right, and God,

[6:57] or wisdom and wise, right, but also we have to do this with the persons, the personal names, as we speak of what the fatherhood and the father, right? Okay.

[7:16] To which two things especially force us, right? First, and the objections of the heretics, huh? For when we confess the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit to be one God and three persons, right? When we are asked by what are they one God and by what are they three persons? Just as it is answered that they are one by the essence or by the divine nature, so it is necessary what some abstract names by which we respond that persons are distinguished, huh?

[8:00] So we say the Father is distinguished from the Son by his fatherhood, and the Son from the Father by his sonhood, right? And these properties or notions signified in the abstract as fatherhood and sonhood, right? And therefore the essence signifies in the divine things as what, and the person as who, and the property as by what. Quid, quis quo? So that's one reason, right, to answer the objections of heretics.

[8:47] By what? That's part of the reason why we had to use the word person, too. Remember. Secondly, because one person is found in divine things to refer to what two persons. To wit, the person of the Father, to the person of the Son, and the person of the what Holy Spirit, but not, however, by one relation,

[9:18] because thus it would follow also that the Son and the Holy Spirit are referred by one the same relation to the Father, and thus, since only relation in divine things multiplies the Trinity, as the great Boethius said, right, it would follow that the Son and the Holy Spirit were not what two persons, huh?

[9:45] Nor can it be said, as Praepositinus said, that just as God in one way has himself to creatures, but the creatures diversely have themselves to Him, so the Father by one relation is referred to the The Son and to the Holy Spirit, but those two, right, by two relations, refer to the Father, because the specific meaning of a relation, right, consists in this that it has itself to another, right.

[10:18] It is necessary to say that two relations are not diverse in species if from their opposite only one relation corresponds to them, right? It is necessary, therefore, for there to be another species of relation of the what of Lord and Father, for example, right? According to the diversity of sonhood and slavery, right? Now all creatures under one species of relation are referred to the Father as his creatures, huh?

[10:57] But the Son and the Holy Spirit are not referred by relations of one meaning to the Father because one is generated by the Father, the other is breathed by the Father, right? Once it is not similar. And furthermore, in God does not require a real relation to what creatures, huh?

[11:22] But relations of reason in God to multiply them is not what inappropriate. But in the Father, it is necessary that there be a real relation by which is referred to the Son and the Holy Spirit. Whence, according to two relations of the Father and the Holy Spirit, to which they are referred to the Father, is necessary to understand two relations in the Father by which is referred to those two.

[11:55] Whence there is not one person of the Father. Whence, since there is not except one person of the Father, is necessary that one signifies apart the relations in the abstract, which are called the properties and the notions, right? So it's by one that is referred to the Son, and by another one that is referred to the what?

[12:21] Yeah, yeah. So can I have one relation to my my wife and my daughter? So they're related to me differently, right? Can I have one relation to these two?

[12:33] No. So if they're not related to me in the same way, I have to have two relations in me to my wife and my daughter. So to one I'm a husband, to the other I'm a father, right? So he's saying God the Father's got to have two relations, right? That's why you need the that's another reason why you need the abstract, right? Because by one of them he's referred to the Son, and by the other one to the what Holy Spirit.

[13:11] So, well, to kind of understand why did these notions, right? But part is because of the insistence the heretics, right? But what does he distinguish from them? right? Is the second reason similar to the first in the sense of having a need of something by which to distinguish the relation? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because one person, the Father, is related to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, but by different relations, right?

[13:44] So you got to have the by, which is the Latin was co, right? Okay. Is that where Gilbert de la Porrée was wrong? Is that what? Yeah, yeah, Thomas is saying that. Yeah. Yeah, because he was he was not admitting the the necessity of using both abstract and concrete names in talking about God, right? What does Christ say in the Gospel there? God alone is what good, right?

[14:12] So you got to say that God is good, right? But good grammatically means what has goodness, right? You say, well, is there a distinction between the have and the had? Like has goodness seems to indicate. Say that God is not the goodness that He has. Like I'm not the charity that I have. I'm not the health that I have. No, no, no. God is His goodness. So I've got to use the word goodness, didn't God?

[14:39] Say, if I just said that God is goodness, they'd say, well, then God is that by which things are good. But I'm not admitting that God Himself is good.

[14:50] Just like my health is that by which I'm healthy, but is my health healthy too? Yes, sir. So I'm forced to use both, right? But but both names are what reason recognizes as being inadequate to express God, right?

[15:12] But you can't get away from our way of what knowing, huh? When knowing God. In our way of naming God or speaking of God, corresponds more immediately to our way of knowing God, huh?

[15:33] But when you try to get to God in Himself, then you have to have to distinguish between the defects in our way of knowing Him and the way He is.

[15:46] God wise, yeah, but way more excellent than Aristotle was wise, really. Even Thomas, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Now the first objection is saying, "Well, there is talk about notions in Scripture. We've seen this kind of objection before. The word 'person' was not in Scripture, right? Okay. To the first, therefore, it should be said that although about the notions there is not mention made in Sacred Scripture, there is nevertheless mention about the persons in whom are understood the notions as the abstract in the what concrete, right?

[16:34] So you know, just like you could say, if God is said to be good, right, then there must be goodness in God, right? So what the Scripture doesn't say that there is goodness in God, just says He's good. Well,

[16:49] it's what understood, right, in saying He's good that He He has goodness, right, that there is goodness in Him, right? Do we say in Scripture that God loves you, buddy?

[17:07] Now the second objection is saying, "Well, do these notions signify the the persons or do they signify the the essence? right? Assuming your problem about everything. Well, now this is a very important thing for seeing the relations of things. To the second, it should be said that the notions signifying divine things, not as what things in God, right? As you'll find out, there are going to be five what notions, right?

[17:37] Now you're talking about five things in God, no, but as reasons by which the persons are what known. Although these notions or relations are really what in God, right? Huh? But they don't signify what things in God, right? Huh? That's kind of a hard thing to see, right?

[18:08] Remember how we said before that there were what four relations in God, but only three persons, right? Yeah. Now we're going to see there's five notions, but yeah, yeah, yeah. Now this is my Pythagorean Theorem what you heard me say before. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Five, four, three. Okay. It's a funny piece of chucky, but well,

[18:40] Valentine's Day's coming up. Don't plan it too well; you'll be more than just you in the world knowing it. That that's the first numbers of the

[18:52] Theorem, right? Because two, three, four wouldn't be the Pythagorean theorem, would they? A triangle. So you first see this five, four, three in the study of the soul, right? Because in the study of the soul, Aristotle distinguishes five genera of powers. And the vegetative powers, right? The sense powers, the appetitive powers, intellectual powers, the locomotive powers, right? But then he speaks of four grades of life. The lowest grade of life is the plants, right?

[19:34] Then there are the animals that seem to differ though from the plants because they don't move around from place to place, but they're fixed to the floor of the ocean, so on. And then there are the animals that move around from one place to another. And then finally, have been four grades, right? With the souls are known by the powers, and there's five genera of powers. Why are there only four grades of what life, right? Well, because one of the generative powers, the appetitive powers, follow upon having sense or having what reason, right?

[20:09] The emotions upon having senses, and the will upon having reason. So they don't constitute in a separate grade, right? So the lowest grade of life has the vegetative powers only. The next grade of life has, in addition to vegetative powers, the sense powers, right? The next highest grade has the vegetative powers, the sense powers, and the locomotive powers, right? Okay. And then the highest has, in addition to those, the intellectual power, right?

[20:40] But with intellectual powers come the will, so that doesn't give you a separate grade, right? And with sensation come the emotions. Okay. So you don't have a separate grade because of that. So one of the generative powers doesn't give rise to a separate life. It goes along with them, right? So that's why five generative powers give you only four grades of life. The inner style speaks of three souls, right?

[21:05] Well, because the soul, as you might kind of suspect from the word itself, seems to indicate something that is starting to rise above what the merely material, right? And life is the first soul, right, the living soul. And then you get to the sensing soul. You get this kind of materiality that sense knowing involves. And then you get to the understanding soul, as Shakespeare calls it. Then you have an even greater transcendence over matter, right, where you have the soul and so on.

[21:43] But the locomotive powers are kind of what, not giving you a another grade above matter, right? You see. So five times four equals three, right? Well, it's going to be like that here. There's going to be five notions,

[22:03] but only four what relations, right? And only what three persons. What kind of the reason for this reduction, right? Well, one of the notions will be fatherhood, right? Another notion will be sonhood, right? Another one will be breathing, let's say, huh? And another one will be procession, right, for one of the names of the Holy Spirit. But then this innascibilitas, they say, huh? This having no no beginning, right?

[22:46] Is the fifth notion that's used to know the Father, right? And he's not from anyone else, right? That's not really a relation, right? Except by kind of reduction, right? So the five notions come down to four relations, right? And then one of the relations is common to the father and the son, right? Because they both breathe the Holy Spirit. So they don't give another person there, but just give three persons.

[23:17] So we got to think about that, right? But the man who studied this five four three, he's going to see the five four three, and he's got to realize the. Why you keep on losing, losing one, right? By five notions, only corresponds to four relations, and four relations only to three persons. huh? But that'll come up We'll get in there.

[23:46] And therefore, those things which have an order to some essential act or personal act cannot be said of the notions, because it's this is repugnant to the what when which it signify, right? Okay, how do they signify? Well, take the Latin. rationes right. As certain rationes are thoughts, you might say, right? By which the what persons are known, right? So one thought which I know the father is that he's not from anyone.

[24:17] And that pertains to some of the dignity of the what father, right? He's not from anyone, right? Why Thomas would not really want to admit as a notion that the Holy Spirit has no one from him, because that doesn't pertain to his dignity, right? Okay.

[24:42] Another notion we have about the father is his what fatherhood, right? By his related to the son, and another is what is breathing, right? By his related to the Holy Spirit. Okay, but the son is made known partly by his being the son, right? And also by his breathing the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is known simply by his proceeding, his being breathed. I want to fit that word in there.

[25:14] Okay. Hence, we are not able to say that the fatherhood what generates or creates, right? Or that the fatherhood is wise or what understanding, right?

[25:29] But the essential names that do not have an order to some act, but remove the conditions of the creatures of the creature from God, can be said of the notions, huh? For we can say that the fatherhood is eternal or immense, right? Or something of this sort, huh? And likewise, on account of the identity of the thing, we are able to what

[25:55] take the personal substantive names and essentials and predicate them the notions. For we can see that the fatherhood is really God, right? And the fatherhood is the father. But do we want to say that the fatherhood generates? It seems to be contrary to the way they, they signify, right?

[26:26] Now the third argument is about the, not having abstract names and simple things, instead distinguished by themselves. To the third, it should be said that although the persons are simple, nevertheless, without prejudging, without prejudice to the what simplicity of them, the what proper thoughts of these persons can be signified in the abstract, as has been said in the body of the article.

[27:00] That's because of our way of what, knowing, right? So we're dealing with the change there. You know, we say, well, when the healthy become sick, right? Or the sick become healthy? Does health become sickness?

[27:33] Well, then, does health become sickly? And I become sick. Does my health become sickly? That'd be like a kind of contradiction, right? And do the healthy really become sick?

[27:55] Because Heraclitus has taken the way we speak. We see the healthy become sick. And what has become me comes to be. So can the healthy come to be sick?

[28:09] If you come to be something, then you are that. So if the healthy come to be sick, then the healthy are sick. And Heraclitus says we've got to say this because otherwise the healthy would always be healthy. There'd be no change in the world, right? And Parmenides says no, no, no, no, no. Healthy can never be sick. Therefore, there is no change in the world.

[28:33] So Heraclitus, in order to save change in the world, admits that the healthy are sick and sick are healthy. But if the healthy really were sick and the sick were healthy, if they're the same thing, then there'd be no change. So he doesn't, you know, he admits something impossible. In order to save change, he doesn't end up saving change.

[28:59] But at the same time, Parmenides is absurd in saying that there's no change in the world. So Aristotle comes along and he says, well, there must be a way of understanding change that doesn't involve a contradiction, because we know that change exists, but we know something cannot be its opposite, right? So Aristotle unties the apparent contradiction in all change by saying there's a third thing in change, right?

[29:33] And that's the subject of the two contraries, right? And so, besides the health and the sickness, there must be something like the body, right? Which is neither health or sickness, right? But it's a subject in which health is in at one time and sickness at another time, right? But not at the same time, right? Or you can say that when you say the healthy becomes sick, the word healthy Is a confused notion of what's there, right?

[30:05] There's something there that has health, but the haver and the had are not the same, right? And so we start to distinguish between the health and what has the health, right?

[30:19] Then when you come to talk about God, we're stuck with that way of thinking, and so if we say God is wise, we've got to say that God what has wisdom, right? But then you say, "Now is that really true about God, right? "

[30:37] Because God is altogether simple, right? So God must really be the same thing as his what, and that's why he can never be foolish, or he's the same thing as his goodness, right? And therefore he can never become bad, right? But the good man can become bad because his goodness is not the man, but he has goodness, right? But he can lose what he has and acquire the opposite, vice or something.

[31:14] So you know, it's a very simple thing, but kind of very profound thing, right? Can we really talk about God without using both abstract and concrete names, right? Well, Tom and Tom. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[31:34] So is God, you know, what does St. Paul call Christ the wisdom of God, The power of God, yeah. Well, is that way of speaking incorrect?

[31:51] But wisdom wisdom signifies that by which the wise are wise, right? So God must have that which the wise are wise, if he's wise himself, right? But he's simple, right? So how could he be other than what he has?

[32:14] So Thomas will often say that what that God is what he has seems kind of strange, right? But then we're trying to to make up for the defect in our way of knowing, huh? But the fact that either way of speaking is has a defect shows that we don't know God as he is, right?

[32:41] But these two ways of speaking do they make our mind false? Well, if you say the way we knows must be the way things are, otherwise you're false, then it would be false, right?

[32:57] But is my mind false when it says God is wise, and then another time you say God is wisdom itself. Yeah, because we we don't

[33:18] attribute the defect in our way of speaking to God, huh? When we say God has wisdom, we don't attribute to God the composition in our way of thinking. There

[33:39] seems to imply that the haver and the had are two things, right? But when we say that God is wisdom itself, we don't deny that God is wise.

[33:55] So as Aristotle said, you know, the the falsehood would come in in saying that the way God is is the way we know him. You

[34:08] see, and that isn't true, is it? To be about be presently, he would have to be about six billion different ways because everyone has a little different. Yeah, but but there are ways in which we can speak falsely about God, right? You see, if I say God is composed, God is put together, you know, for the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit, or something like that.

[34:37] These are parts of God. Then then my mind is false, right? Then I'm mistaken. So there are ways of speaking about God which are false.

[34:53] Yeah. So the falsehood comes in if you if you attribute our way of knowing God to the way he is, right? So that's kind of a profound thing Aristotle saw, you know. But you have to carry it out here. We're now going to run out of time I guess huh But time. I guess, huh? But whether there are five notions, we'll talk about that next week, huh?

[35:31] Let's let them say.