Prima Secundae
183. Aquinas on Ignorance as a Cause of Sin (Summa I-II, Q. 76): Is Ignorance a Sin, Does It Excuse, Does It Diminish?
Class of 2014-10-24
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/183-aquinas-on-ignorance-as-a-cause-of-sin-summa-i-ii-q-76-is/

[0:00] In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the, Holy Spirit, Amen. Thank you, God. Thank you, Guardian Angels. Thank you, Thomas Aquinas. Deo gratias. Guardian Angel, strengthen the lights of our minds, or illumine our images and arouse us to consider more quickly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, help us to understand all that you have written. Name of the Father, the Son, Holy Spirit, Amen.

[0:31] Think about myself in comparison to you know, Thomas or Aristotle or something like that, and you know what the Fourth Lateran Council says, right? You can never see a likeness between creatures and God without a greater unlikeness, huh? So, to the extent that we're like God, we're good, right? And the more we are like God, the better we are, right? But always the unlikeness is greater. That right?

[1:00] I say, am I like Aristotle? Am I like Thomas? Well, a little bit per quid, you know. There's always a greater unlikeness, huh? And you know, my teacher Kisarek, you know, said compared to Aristotle, he says, "I have the brain of an engelworm," he said. Just saying the more I like you know, the more I like you.

[1:24] So we'd seen last time, I guess, the first article just right in question seventy-six. With ignorance can be a cause of sin, right? So ignorance is a cause of many things. Albert the Great says that the ignorance of logic, right, was a cause of error in the early Greeks, right. So when Thomas, when Aristotle takes up Eleatics in the first book of the Physics, right, you can see that he does no logic, right, huh?

[1:54] I mean, take an argument like this, huh? Every mother is a woman. It's true, right? No man is a mother, right? Therefore, no man is a what? Yeah. Is that is that a good argument? The premises are both true, right? Every mother is a woman. That's true. And no man is a mother. Therefore, no man is a what? Is that good? Is it good? Yeah. No, as I say, every dog is an animal.

[2:31] No cat is a dog. Same form, right? Therefore, no cat is a what? Animal would follow if the other one followed, right, huh? See. But because you know you realize that there's some connection between the fact that a man is not a mother, a man is not a mother, right? I'm not a woman, right? But the argument is not. Yeah. So, ignorance of logic is a cause of error, right?

[3:00] Aristotle is usually given the title of the father of logic. I'm always surprised when I read the modern philosophers. You know, they don't talk about the various kinds of mistakes that you have in the book on Sophistic Refutations. Like Thomas, when he's pointing out, you know, mistakes, he often identifies the kind of mistake it is, right? And you know, even if you know the kinds of mistakes, you can still make this kind of mistake, huh?

[3:26] But a fortiori, if you don't know it, right? So the ignorance is a cause of error in what sense of a cause is ignorance a cause of error?

[3:48] Well, remember the distinction Thomas made, huh? I think it was in the first first objection, right? Non ens is not able to be a cause per se, right? But it can be a cause per accidens as the remotio prohibentis, and what prevents removes what prevents it. So ignorance of logic, right, or ignorance of the kinds of errors and so on, is a cause per accidens of your mistakes, right?

[4:23] It removes an impediment to making your mistakes, right? So you can go around use the distinctions that Thomas points out here and and understand what our friend Albert the Great is saying, right? So.

[4:42] Okay. Now, whether ignorance can be a sin. The second one goes for thus. It seems that ignorance is not a sin. And he quotes his famous definition, which goes back, I guess, to Augustine, right? That sin is something said or done or desired against the law of God. But ignorance does not imply some act, neither interior nor exterior. It's really a negation, right? Therefore, ignorance is not a sin.

[5:21] Well, the argument is good. You got to adopt what Augustine said. One of the two, right? It seems. More of a sin is what? More direct cause

[5:38] of grace than knowledge. Yeah. But the lack of grace is not a sin. But more a certain punishment falling upon what sin, right? Therefore, ignorance is not a privation of knowledge. Therefore, ignorance, which is a privation of knowledge, is not a sin, right? Okay.

[6:10] It's interesting argument. Moreover, if ignorance is a sin, this is not except in so far as it is something voluntary. But if ignorance is a sin in so far as it is voluntary, it seems that the sin in the act of the will consists more than in the what ignorance. Therefore, ignorance will not be a sin, but more something fouling upon what. Yeah.

[6:49] Anybody else? Sorry, I suppose. Is ignorance voluntary? I choose. I choose to be ignorant. Don't confuse me with the facts, as they say. Moreover, every sin is taken away through penance, huh?

[7:24] Nor does some sin, going away, right, huh? Remain in guilt in act, except only what original sin. Guilt is removed Yeah. But ignorance is not taken away through what? Penance. But it still remains in act, huh? All guilt being removed through what penance, huh? Therefore, ignorance is not a sin, except perhaps what original sin. Sin a different sense. Yeah.

[8:13] Moreover, if ignorance is a sin, so long as sin remains in a man, so much in act he sins. But he continually remains what ignorance remains in the one who is ignorant. Therefore, the one ignorant continually sins, which is clearly false, because thus ignorance would be most grave, right? And it's not the most grave In the line of sins. Therefore, ignorance is not a sin, huh? Can he really confuse the issue, right?

[8:46] That's the old teacher, Kassarik said, huh? Isn't the teacher confuse the issue. Can't take out the grain of salt, obviously, but. there's a certain way in which he does. Yeah. yeah. I fear the issue. against this is that nothing merits pain or punishment except what sin. But ignorance does merit punishment, according to that of the first epistle to the Corinthians. If someone what is ignorant, he will be what ignored.

[9:31] Therefore, ignorance is a what sin. Okay, Thomas begins by seeing a certain distinction here, right? I answer: It should be said that ignorance in this differs from what Nescience yeah None knowledge That nescience says the simple. Negation of what knowledge, right?

[10:07] Whence to whoever is lacking some knowledge of things can be said to not know them, right? According to which way Dionysius says that in the angels, that's meaning of the good ones, right? He lays down some nescience, right, that the higher angels illuminate, right, they enlighten them. But ignorance implies a lack of knowledge, right? When there is lacking to someone the knowledge of those things which he is naturally apt to what to know, huh?

[10:54] Now those things someone is held to what to know, should know. Those without the knowledge of which he cannot what exercise a what suitable act, right?

[11:12] Whence all are held to know commonly those things which are of what faith, the creed, and the universal precepts of the what law. So in the catechetical instructions, you have the catechism, I mean the commandments, right, huh? The commandments of love and so on.

[11:37] But individuals, you might say, are what to know those things which pertain to their what status or their office, right, huh? So you can get married, you got to know what you're supposed to be a thing. I don't know if they give very good instruction in these things, but

[12:01] some things there are which that although one is naturally able to know, right, nevertheless is not held to know, right, as the theorems of geometry, right, and particular contingent things, except in what some cases.

[12:24] It is manifest, however, that whoever neglects to have or to do that which he is what obligated to have or to what do sins by the sin of what Omission. omission, right?

[12:40] Whence an account of negligence, right? The ignorance of those things which someone is held to know is a what sin, huh? Now it's not imputed to a man to negligence. If he doesn't know those things, which is not able to what know. Whence of these ignorance is called what unconquerable, huh, invincible? Because by study they cannot is not able to be what overcome, right?

[13:17] An account of this such ignorance, ignorance, since it is not voluntary, right, in that it is not in the power our power to repel it, right, is not a what sin. From which it is clear that no invincible ignorance is a sin, right? But a invincible or comparable ignorance is a sin, huh? If it be of those things which someone is held to what know, but not if it be of those things which someone is not required to what to know.

[13:57] So he sees two cases, right? Invincible ignorance is not a sin, and your ignorance is something you're not held to know, right? So who won the game yesterday? What was the score? Shame on you!

[14:12] Confess it, sin, Father, Father. I didn't know who won the game. Refers to the New England Patriots. Who was the enemy yesterday? We don't know.

[14:26] I always say, if you ask me about tree surgery, I'd be stumped. Now, in reply to the first objection, he's saying that you understand the what negation, right? Reduce it to that. To the first, therefore, it should be said that has been said above. These were the earlier articles we had. That when is said dictum vel factum, vel contributum, said or or done or what desired, one should also understand the what negations, according as omission has the notion of a sin.

[15:13] And thus negligence, according as what ignorance is a sin, is contained under the force definition of sin, Insofar as is omitted something that one ought to have said or done or what Desire it. To what. For acquiring due knowledge, whatever knowledge is spoken. Okay. So that's what he's explaining, right? For you to understand that definition.

[15:45] So Augustine needs Thomas to explain him. Or at least we do I always tell people, you know, my rule of thumb is, you know, Aristotle means what Thomas says he means.

[16:06] Pretty good guide, pretty good guide that way, Thomas. The one man who's fully equipped to understand Aristotle. Remember, we we had a text every brother Mark and I. Albert couldn't make sense out of it, you know. So he brought it to Kasurik, right? And sat down. at his desk there, you know, in his office, and he looked at it for some time, and then he got up, you know, and hung his hat and closed on.

[16:37] He said, "I can see why you had difficulty with that," and he walked out. That's all he said. He's a nice guy in the department, the only guy I really learned anything from, you know, and you know he said, "Go, go read this, Thomas. Tell me to go read it and so on."

[17:10] To the second, it should be said that the lack of grace, the guy was saying, is not a sin, right? Although in itself is not a sin,

[17:21] nevertheless, by reason of negligence in preparing oneself for grace, can have the what ratio sin, just as ignorance. But nevertheless, as regards this, it is dissimilar because a man is able to acquire some science, right, through his own acts, but grace is not acquired from our acts, but from the gift of what God.

[17:55] To third, he says, huh, that just as in the sin of transgression, sin does not consist in the what alone, but also in the act that has been what will, which is commanded by will. So in the sin of omission, not only is the act of the will a sin, but also the omission, in so far as it is in some way what voluntary, yeah. And in this way, the negligence of knowing or inconsideration is a what sin.

[18:37] That's the term that Francis used. Something like voluntary inconsideration, or yeah, you're voluntarily distracting yourself from knowing what you should know, or inadvertent. Only this voluntary inadvertence is what he calls. Yeah. As I've been, you know, many times, kind of angry about this, that Obama, you know, I'd say. I've been tempted to say to the pastor, you know, is confession available for those who voted for Obama?

[19:05] I mean, is forgiveness? Because the only thing they didn't do was to know what they should have known, you know. It's, it's just. People I talk to, you know, simple, you know, people who voted for Obama, they're not a little bit ashamed of it, you know, to say the least.

[19:43] What are Kasturik talking about? He's talking to this guy, and the guy says, "I don't think God's going to punch me for not going to church on Sunday." Kasturig said, I think he's got it wrong, you know." I just, you know, this kind of voluntary ignorance. Yeah That was the priest This is from Ralph McInerny one of his novels priest comes in, somebody's been shot, he's dead on the floor, or he's almost dead.

[20:15] or whatever So the priest kind of starts to say the prayers, anoint the guy. Some bystander, oh Father, he didn't believe in God, and the priest said he does now.

[20:30] I was talking to a woman there at the pro-life dinner, you know. I was talking about how, I like, to couple, you know, terrorists with abortionists, you know. And she says, "You're going to make people very angry at you." She says Sure Speaking of willful ignorance, too, there are a few political discussions that I've had in the past in New York, where people would actually, during a civil conversation, when I started talking about things they didn't want to hear, which were factual, they actually literally put their hands to their ears Yeah.

[21:03] and started going, "yeah, yeah, yeah, " so they couldn't hear. Beautiful thing. Yeah. Yeah. These are really That's a- it was a one of Prita taught us years ago. He had a complicated expression, but he called it metaphysical refusal. Yeah. Don't like reality. Don't give it to me. I want an illusion. Well, Kasurik told me about going to one of these philosophical kind of conventions, you know, and then the discussion period, gets a guy who's contradicting himself, right?

[21:37] And so Kasurik says, "You just contradicted yourself, you know." And I'm like, "What are you going to do about it?" And he said, "Well, that's a contradiction I've learned to live with," he says. As Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass, he says, "I contradict myself very well. I contradict myself for I contain multitudes." No, it's more like you contain legion. That's more like. One of the submitters there, young, was trying to try to write a

[22:06] novel. The name was My Name Is Legion, you know. To the fifth, it should be said that, as in other sins of omission, only in that time does a man sin in act, in which he is what obligated by a what affirmative precept, huh? Thus, also about the sin of ignorance, huh? For he is not continually the one who's ignorant, what sins in in act, right, huh?

[22:52] But only when the time for acquiring science, which he should have, when he's which he is held, right? But isn't that time, right, huh?

[23:08] Okay. Yeah. Now let's see if we can get some excuses here. Third article. The third one precedes thus. It seems that ignorance entirely excuses from sin,

[23:30] because as Augustine says, every sin is voluntary. But ignorance causes the involuntary, right? Therefore, ignorance wholly excuses for sin. That's comforting. I don't want to try to excuse people for voting for Obama, so I want to hold them responsible for it.

[24:03] Moreover, that which someone does outside of or apart from his intention, right? He does what peradventure, huh? But intention cannot be about that which is unknown. Therefore, what man does through ignorance, huh? He has himself peradventure, huh? In human acts, huh? But what is peradventure does not give the what species the kind of thing it is. Nothing, therefore, that is done through ignorance, ought to be judged a what sin or virtuous in human acts.

[24:47] I'll send these to Casper. Moreover, man is the subject of virtue and sin in so far as he what partakes of reason. But ignorance excludes knowledge through which reason is perfected. Therefore, ignorance wholly excuses from sin. Let's stop there.

[25:18] But Against this is what the great Augustine says, huh? One of the four great doctors of the Western Church, I guess. Augustine and who? Gregory. Who else? Ambrose. Ambrose. Yeah, then suddenly they add Dill too, you know, to make five, you know.

[25:39] Yeah. Isn't it the four There's four around the chair. Saint Peter's, Bernini's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, four of them. The John Paul II, Saint John Paul II, it's got a nice encyclical on Augustine. You know how important he is to the Church, right? But if you look at just a number of instances from Augustine in the catechism of the Catholic Church, right, Or the number of times he's quoted right in Thomas.

[26:12] How, you can see how central he is, huh? I tend to think that Augustine and Augustine and Thomas are the two greatest minds in the church that we've had.

[26:26] Who would you put equal to those two? You know, I don't know. But against this is what Augustine says in the book on free judgment, huh? That some things done through ignorance are rightly what reproved, yeah.

[26:54] But only those things are rightly improbant, if we translate that. Disproved, yeah. Which are sins, right? Therefore, some things done through ignorance are in fact sins. Therefore, ignorance does not entirely excuse from sin, right?

[27:18] Now Thomas begins by saying that ignorance, from itself, right, has that it makes the act which it causes to be what? Yeah. For it has already been said that ignorance is said to cause an act which the opposed knowledge would what prevent, huh? And such an act, if the knowledge were present, would be contrary to the will, which implies the name of what? Knowledge. Yeah. If, however, the knowledge which is deprived through ignorance does not prevent, would not prevent the act on account of the what inclination, the will in it.

[28:07] The ignorance of this knowledge would not make the man involuntary, but not willing, right? As is said in the third book of the Ethics.

[28:22] And such ignorance, which is not the cause of the act of sin, because it does not what cause the involuntary, does not excuse from what sin.

[28:37] And the same argument is about any ignorance not causing but fouling upon or coming along with the act of sin. But ignorance which is the cause of the act, because it causes the involuntary, of itself has that excuses from what sin? In that the voluntary is of the notion of sin, huh?

[29:07] But sometimes it does not wholly excuse from sin. But that sometimes it does not totally excuse from sin can happen from two things, huh? What are those things? In one way, on the side of the what? Something itself. Yeah.

[29:30] In so far as ignorance excuses from sin, in so far as it what ignores that something is what? Sin. Is a sin. It can happen, however, that someone ignores some circumstance of sin, which, if he knew, would what draw him back from sinning, whether that circumstance makes for the notion of sin or not. And nevertheless, there remains in his knowledge something to which he knows it to be a what act of sin.

[30:10] As example, if someone striking someone knows him to be a man, which suffices for the ratio of what sin. He does not, however, know him to be his father, which is a circumstance constituting a new species of sin, huh?

[30:34] Or perhaps he does not know that the one what? Something itself. Yeah. Would strike back at him, which, if he knew, he would not strike. That's most of it. Which does not pertain to the ratio of sin, huh?

[30:55] Whence, although such a one, on account of ignorance, sins, it does not, however, totally excuse him sin, because there remains what the knowledge of sin, huh?

[31:10] Another way this can happen on the part of the ignorance itself, because the ignorance itself is voluntary. Either directly, as when someone studiously wishes to what not do something that he might more what freely sin, huh?

[31:32] Or indirectly, just as when someone, on account of what labor, or on account of other occupations, neglects to learn that which would with dra retract himself from sin. Such negligence makes what the ignorance to be voluntary in sin, so long as it is of those things which someone is held to know and is able to know. And such ignorance does not wholly excuse him sin.

[32:09] If, however, it be such ignorance that is altogether involuntary, either because it is invincible, right? Or because it is of that which someone is not bound to know, such ignorance altogether excuses from what sin.

[32:35] So, the first it should be said that not every ignorance causes the involuntary; whence not every ignorance totally excuses from what sin. The second should be said that, in so far as there remains in the one ignorant right something of the voluntary, so much remains the intention of what sin. And according to this, it would not be prachidens the what sin. So these voters intended to be ignorant.

[33:20] It was kind of interesting, you know, when they talk about the the way the the press, you know, built them up, and they didn't really tell you much about the man at all, so that they could not make a what considered judgment, right?

[33:41] It does voluntarily keeping them, yeah, keeping other people ignorant, right? Last few Democratic presidential candidates, their academic records were sealed before their, you know, the campaign season. So where they were portrayed by the media as being ultra brainiacs, the reality was that the party was embarrassed about their academic performance, and so it sealed all their academic records. It'd be one thing if they just said they sealed the records and said, "Well, you know, he passed his tests."

[34:18] But no, they had to do. They had to go to the opposite extreme. No, he's one of the most great men ever in the history of the world. Really, we have a Gore call, for example, instead of just a Gore.

[34:33] Gore call. A lot of the bills in the state house, you know, they keep the public ignorance to who voted for what. Yeah, and they'll say, "Can't." Can't say if they knew, they'd strike back. They wouldn't do it.

[34:55] To the third, it should be said: such ignorance, if there's be such ignorance that it totally excuses or excludes, I should say, the use of reason. It altogether excuses from what sin, huh? As is clear in the mad and the without mind, right?

[35:19] But not over always is is ignorance causing sin, such, and therefore it is not always what. total excuse for sin From sin, yeah. I was thinking of the phrase there the other day. He said somebody's out of his mind. What does that mean? You're out of your mind.

[35:46] Somehow that part, that part for reason. You're mad. You're crazy, right? Okay. But the meanings of the word "out," right, correspond to the meanings of the word "what." So, what sense of "in" is this sense of "out" opposed to, right?

[36:09] You're out of your mind, huh? What? What sense is in? Yeah, seven senses. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Seven senses. You know, I've got you in my power, right? And somebody says, "Out of my hands," you know. That's kind of the negation of that, right? When you say you're out of your mind, you're no longer in the power of your mind, right? No longer being ruled by your mind.

[36:41] Your mind has ceased to function, so to speak, right? That's kind of interesting. The expression "out of you're out of your mind." People don't often think that they're easy. Yeah, yeah.

[37:01] That's what I think of this. Cardinal Casper that's I think terribly, I think he's out of his mind Because I wouldn't want to suppose what he'd be What what kind of culpability you'd have if he's in his right mind? saying the things he said. Yeah.

[37:23] Yeah. I was applying to these judges, you know, who who have same sex marriage, you know, think that you're you're violating somebody's civil rights or something because they don't can't get married because a number of the states passed something against you know marriage between a man and woman, and then they suspended all that from the judges, you know. And the Supreme Court just confirmed all those suspensions, yeah, which is really outrageous considering that one of the justices, it seems, the Chief Justice, went along with it.

[37:54] Second, big disappointment. Out of their mind. I told last time I decided for Obamacare. I said, "Punch him in the stomach." Little corporal punch. Corporal punch. Did I talk about last time there how how in Apocalypse there you got the words "I am the Alpha and the Omega." Talk about that last time. You know, if I if I read carefully enough, seems to me I think it's in the very first chapter almost of Apocalypse that God says, "I am the Alpha and the Omega right Period, right?

[38:49] And then in the next to the last chapter, as 22 or what it is, he says, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last." And then the last chapter, he says all three: "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last." And the beginning and the end, right? Well, I think that's interesting, huh? When you say I am the alpha and omega, that's almost speaking figuratively, huh?

[39:19] But then he gives us kind of the more open meaning, right? I am the first and the last, and I am the beginning and the end, right? Well, going back to what we saw in Shakespeare's definition of reason

[39:37] in Aristotle, Shakespeare, the culminating thing in the definition of reason is it looks before and after, right? Now what's interesting is that Aristotle twice distinguishes the senses of before.

[39:56] In one place is in the Categories, chapter twelve, right? The second place he does it is in the fifth book of Wisdom, right? That's unusual that he should twice distinguish the chief senses of what before, right?

[40:18] Now what is the? I don't know any other way he does this with, right? Now of course, as you learn the Categories, the first meaning of before is in time.

[40:35] Now in the fourth book of Physics, when he talks about place, he distinguishes the eight chief senses of in, and appropriate place to do it because the first meaning of in is what? Yeah, he's taking up place in book four. Book four of the Physics is about place and about time, right? But why doesn't he give the meanings of before and he takes up time since that's the first meaning of before and after?

[41:06] Just as the first meaning of in is place, right? Why is it more appropriate, so to speak, to distinguish the senses of before and after in logic, right? And in the fifth book of Wisdom, why rather than in the what

[41:25] fourth book of the Physics? Maybe it's so tied up with reason. Yeah, because logic is named from reason, right? Rational science, rational philosophy, they're called, right? It's the part directing reason, huh? And wisdom is the highest perfection of reason, huh? So the real connection between those two, right? And Thomas himself, when he wants to divide human knowledge of reason by the order it considers, right? He quotes Aristotle's great description of the wise man, which ends up with the words belongs to the wise man to order things.

[42:11] And he says the reason for that is because wisdom is the highest perfection of reason, and it's proper to reason to to know order, right? So that shows a connection between wisdom and and reason, right? And between logic and and wisdom, right? And so it's appropriate in these two, you should talk about before and what after is follows from that, right? Okay. Um.

[42:42] Now, what is the difference between these two considerations, right? Well, in the in the twelfth chapter of Categories, he considers the senses of before and he orders them right by themselves, right? But in the fifth book of Wisdom, he distinguishes the senses of before by the common meaning of beginning, which begins the fifth book, right? And so the common meaning of beginning that he gives at the end of the first reading there, is the beginning is whence first something is or comes to be or is known.

[43:28] And then he repeats that when he takes up before. He distinguishes before according to those three. Okay. You say well, it's appropriate for the wise men to consider everything in terms of the beginning of things, right? Because his first philosophy is about the first things and so on.

[43:48] But you can see the connection Aristotle sees between beginning and what before and after, right? And the same beginning connection you could see between end, right, which is very closely related to to beginning. Now end is not to beginning exactly like out to in and after to before, but there's some similarity, right, in those meanings.

[44:18] And I was talking about the word point last time, I think. If you want an example, the first sense of beginning, the point is the beginning of the line. That's that's a classical example, right? But you speak of the end points, right?

[44:37] And even the English word point is sometimes used for the one of the latter senses of end, which is purpose, right? So I was saying, you know, life is pointless, you know, has no purpose, right? Or sometimes we say to somebody it's pointless, you know, you're not getting anywhere, you know, not reaching any goal, right? And so you see the connection there in Aristotle between beginning and end and what before and after, right?

[45:11] When they have the same thing in the apocalypse, right? It says I am the alpha and the omega, and then later on I am the alpha and the omega, the first and the last. But first and last are defined by what? Before and after. What's first is before all the rest, right? What's last is the last one in the class. and you're after all the rest. And then what?

[45:35] The alpha, I mean, and the Arche, the beginning, and the what? End. So they're very much associated together, right? Even though they're different, you know, beginning and end have got separate distinctions and senses from before, right? But Aristotle has tied them together in the fifth book of wisdom. And you have them in the apocalypse, right? That's really kind of amazing to see there the harmony between the apocalypse and Aristotle, you know.

[46:03] I mean, Aristotle, it is striking though. It is very, very striking. I know in the tabernacle in our church there in Saint Mary's, you can see the Alpha and the Omega there. You see that in some tabernacles, some. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, it's very, it's very common, I guess. Yeah, yeah. I don't know when it started, you know, but it's beautiful, you know, beautiful. It started. Now in English, that would be what I am the A and the and the Z, right?

[46:36] But in the Greek, I am the Alpha and Omega, right? And Thomas talks about the crucifix there, you know. I guess they put the words up, the King of the Jews, in three languages, right? And they're kind of very significant those three languages: Latin and Greek and Hebrew, right? So up to Article Four here. Not time for a break yet. I don't think. Well, finish this question at least.

[47:11] Here in Article Four, yet we seems that it's similar. For ignorance diminishes sin. Okay, it doesn't excuse totally. We've we've had that. To the fourth, one proceeds thus: It seems that ignorance does not diminish sin.

[47:39] Oh, come on, give us a little bit, huh? That which is common to all sins does not diminish sin, huh? But ignorance is common in every sin, for the philosopher says in the third book of the Ethics that every bad man is what ignorant, huh? How what a good smart guy this Aristotle was, huh?

[48:05] In the other work, he was in the Eudemian Ethics of Aristotle. There he speaks of how God originates our thinking and willing. You know, it's really kind of amazing that he saw that. It's kind of the the unmoved mover, you know, in in the spiritual acts as well as in the bodily motion that he did in the physics. Right? It's really really amazing.

[48:33] And Thomas is always pointing out how Aristotle, both in the De Anima and in the Metaphysics. He criticized Empedocles, you know, for saying that we know something God doesn't know. But Empedocles, you know, said that there is no what hate in God, therefore he doesn't know hate. He had a good reason, isn't it? And Aristotle said, "That's ridiculous, you know, that we would know something God doesn't know."

[49:02] Smart guy, Aristotle. Therefore, ignorance does not diminish sin. It's found in every sin. huh? Because every sin is diminished. Moreover, a sin added to a sin makes it a a worse sin, huh? A greater sin. But ignorance itself is a sin, as has been said. Therefore, it doesn't diminish sin; it increases it. Huh? Reminds you of the Greek law, you know, if you get something crazy because you got drunk and went and did it, got punished twice: once for the bad act you did, and the other for getting drunk.

[49:43] There's two sins, right? You punished it double, right? If I got drunk and went too fast or out of my lane, I'd be punished for driving carelessly, right? But also for being drunk, huh? This is like that, right? You get a double punishment. Saint Augustine says that about excusing your sin, meaning you're justifying your sin. This is you're guilty of the sin, but you're more guilty because you justified your sin.

[50:15] Yeah. Moreover, it doesn't pertain to the same thing to aggravate and diminish the sin, huh? But ignorance makes the sin what more heavy? Ignoring what the big dignity of God, right?

[50:43] You most gravely sins if you ignore that, huh? Therefore, ignorance does not diminish what sin. Moreover, if some ignorance diminishes sin, this will most of all seem to be about that which totally takes away the use of reason. I blacked out.

[51:06] But this ignorance does not diminish sin, but more increases, huh? For the philosopher says in the third book of the ethics. There, that's what I'm talking about. That the man who is inebriated merits twofold, huh? it must be beatings or something Yeah, maledictions, huh? Okay, two things he's guilty of. So I go over the speed there when I'm not. I'm sober. It's not as bad as if I go over the speed when I'm drunk.

[51:36] I'll be punished twice. Therefore, ignorance does not what diminish sin, huh? But whatever is against the notion of remission of sin, whatever is reason for the remission of sin alleviates the sin. But ignorances of this sort, for he said in the first epistle to Timothy. Now, this is a great witness now of Saint Paul himself. I I achieved mercy, because I

[52:14] persecuted the church. They were scared stiff on him when they first he was first converted, right? They thought, oh no, this is he's not one of us. He's pretty bad, huh? He wasn't he? When they were stoning. what's his name? the first guy? Yeah, he was there, wasn't he? Holding. Consenting Right so definitely he consented

[52:39] Okay, therefore ignorance diminishes or alleviates sin, right? And it should be said that since because every sin is voluntary, right? To that extent, ignorance is able to diminish sin. In so far as it diminishes the voluntary character, huh? If, however, it does not diminish the voluntary, in no way does it diminish the what sin.

[53:15] Now it is manifest, however, that the ignorance which totally excuses from sin, because it totally takes away what the voluntary, does not diminish sin, but altogether takes it away, right? But the ignorance which is not a cause of sin, but has itself going along with the sin, neither diminishes the sin nor what increases it. That, therefore, ignorance which is able to diminish sin, which is a cause of sin, and nevertheless does not totally what An excuse from sin.

[54:06] It happens sometimes that such ignorance directly and per se is what Voluntary. as when someone by his own what spontaneity knows something that he might more what freely sin,

[54:26] and such ignorance would seem to increase the voluntary in the in the sin, because from the intensity of the will to sinning comes about that someone does not that someone wishes to undergo, right, the damnable thing of ignorance, right, on account of the liberty of what sinning.

[54:53] Sometimes, however, the ignorance which is a cause of sin is not directly voluntarily voluntary, but indirectly and or per accidens, as when some does not wish to work at study, huh, to labor in a study, from which it follows him to be what ignorant, huh, or when someone wants to drink wine immoderately, that's me, from which it follows him to what be inebriated and to lack discretion, huh.

[55:31] And so, and such ignorance diminishes the voluntary, huh, and consequently what sin, huh. When someone does not something is not known to be a sin, it cannot be that the will what is directly and per se born towards the sin, but per accidens, right. Whence there is there less what contempt, and consequently less what sin.

[56:14] So some ignorance can diminish sin, right? But some ignorance can increase it, right? To talk that to the pastor too about the confession for the people avoided profile.

[56:35] Some of you may have sinned in ignorance, but this ignorance is chosen. Yes we have to examine our motives because we're talking To the first, therefore, should be said that the ignorance by which, according to which, everyone bad is ignorant, right? Is not the what Cause of sin. But something fouling the cause, to wit, to the passion or habit inclining in what sin?

[57:21] So when David pursued Bathsheba, right? That was what passio, I assume, Yeah. which made him ignorant at the moment, right? That this was adultery.

[57:41] Then after it became habitual. He had to get rid of the man too, the husband. So the man, when he when he commits the sin, his mind is saying this should be done. Therefore, there's not a sin. So he's ignorant of it being a sin, right? Yeah, it's something consequence upon his passion or habit, huh?

[58:15] Yeah. So, but Mozart's opera Don Giovanni, Don Giovanni's got the habit, right? Yeah. He loves them all, but especially the young beginner, right? It's in the the opera, but didn't seem that bad to him, right? Gloria Imani

[58:39] does, he says. We're drinking his dinner there. Okay. I guess sometimes Mozart would would uh make the last act of the scene when he goes down to hell, right? Huh? At the end of the opera. But then there's another part afterwards where the characters, you know, you know, I'm glad I'm, and they're all getting a little better now, you know, lives, you know. It's a beautiful, beautiful thing, though, huh?

[59:07] Beautiful thing. Great, great opera. Cooky guy has something interesting about Don Juan and about Faust, you know. And he said that they're both characters that only appear in Christian times, huh?

[59:29] It's kind of you know of a complete giving over to to one more spiritual vice, one more you know carnal vice, but it's something that is kind of like a whole rejection of Christianity, right? To find fully in the pagan, right? Huh? Yeah. You have to. It's like you have to be a Christian to be sacrilegious. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think there's some some subtle deviation.

[59:56] I'm just reason. Did you already have even in Greek drama a symbol like Faust? Who makes a deal, you know, to get this special? Knowledge and power, yeah. Where do you have a libertine? You know, it's complete as Don Don Juan, right? Militre, you know, the catalog of his conquests, you know, one thousand three in Spain. Catalog is a catalog, right there, you know. One reason is perhaps because none of the pagans had a concept of really a rational deity.

[1:00:36] Even in Islam, Allah, isn't bound by reason either. So the whole concept of God being reason is very. important I think that's interesting. what Kierkegaard said there, you know. De Koninck said, "you know, Kierkegaard is closer to us. You know, these other modern philosophers, because uh, he's more a believer, you know."

[1:01:16] Okay. To second should be said that sin added to sin makes what more sins. It does not, however, make always more sin, greater sin. Who's

[1:01:38] saying that? You know, give the kid. You want five dollars? You get a five-dollar bill. You want four ones. Because they always take the four ones, right? Because more money, right? I was saying this the other day. My father was trying to teach me this. He had a quarter and three pennies. He said, "Who has more money? I do. I got three. You got one." Yeah. It's a common sense.

[1:02:09] Because forte, perhaps, right? They do not come together in the same sin, but they are what many sins, right? And it can happen that if the first diminishes the second, that both together do not have such gravity as one sin only, right? Just as homicide is a more what, grave sin, done by a what, sober man, than it comes from a what, drunk man, huh? Although here there are two sins, huh?

[1:02:43] So you got to watch out. That altogether logical that we are punishing people more, right? But they wanted to, you know, discourage people getting drunk too, you know.

[1:02:55] Because, ebriety More diminishes Yeah, more reason. Of the ratio of this following sin, then it's what gravity, right? The gravity of drinking, being drunk. Okay. Now, to the third, it should be said. This is going back to Ambrose now. Is another great doctor. To the third, it should be said that the word of Ambrose can be understood about ignorance simply affected, huh? Not real, or can be understood in the genus of the sin of ingratitude, in which the highest grade is that man what does not recognize what benefits, or can be understood about the ignorance of infidelity, which subverts the foundation of the spiritual building.

[1:04:01] Huh? So. Guess you need Thomas to explain Ambrose to him. To the fourth, what about this? To the fourth, it should be said that the drunk merits two what maledictiones two we have mutationes What's mutatio The drunken man deserves a double punishment. I think it has to do with beating, but I'm not sure. Maledictio that means you're saying bad of him, right? Yeah, but maybe your edition has a different word.

[1:04:42] No, it says mutationes So this one says maledictiones. On account of two sins that he commits, right? To which drunkenness and another sin that follows on it being drunk, right? But nevertheless, the drunkenness, by reason of the ignorance joined to it, right, diminishes the following what sin, and perhaps more than is the what gravity of the drunkenness itself, right? This has been said.

[1:05:18] Or it can be said that that word is induced according to the ordering of Pittacus, right? The legislator. Was Pittacus one of the seven wise men? I forget. in Greece, I think so yeah. Who laid down that?

[1:05:35] If the drunk, the drunk, if they struck people, right, would be or fully punished, right? Huh? Not regarding what? Ignorance. Yeah. Which the drunk ought more to have, but because utility, because more injured being drunk than sober. yeah. As is clear through the philosopher in the second book of the Politics. huh? Watch out when you're drinking your wine. I guess so. I guess so. I had I had a VIP thing on last night, you know.

[1:06:11] They gave me rosé and so so I went in the VIP room, you know, because the speaker's going to be there before dinner and so on. And went up to the bar there and took out my you know twenty dollars and got a couple of wines from Rose and I. And oh no, it's on the house, you know. By the way, you know, that VIP, I mean VIP room, right?

[1:06:33] So I mean, I could drink a lot, you know. Designated driver. Yeah. Socrates was describing being at a wedding reception, you know, years ago, right? And I guess the band is hired to play to a certain time, right? And then, then it's you know they kick off, right? Everybody's having such a good time that the that the uh, father of the bride, whoever it was uh, asked them if they would you know play for another hour and he you know increase their their thing.

[1:07:15] But that was a mistake because the extra hour people got so drunk that the the fights started to break out between the two families and so on. He says so. Never extend the you know. if they're going to stop playing the band at ten o'clock. Let them stop and go home, you know.

[1:07:36] So should we take a little break now because we. We have to begin without you.