Tertia Pars
21. Can a Human Being Be God? Nature and Person, and Christ's Habitual Grace (ST III, q.7, a.1)
Class of 2009-01-15
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/13-tertia-pars/021-can-a-human-being-be-god-nature-and-person-and-christs-habitual/

[0:00] The Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit. Amen. God our enlightenment, guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, who illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelic Doctor. Amen. Help us to understand what you've written. Father and the Son, Holy Spirit. Amen. Let's start here with a little item here from the January New Catholic, Catholic World report. A little item here down from Australia there, where they got a a rebel parish.

[0:35] In August, Archbishop John Battersby of Brisbane, Australia, warned the leaders of Saint Mary's Parish that they risk separating themselves from the Catholic Church by their unorthodox teaching and liturgical practices.

[0:52] Now, in a second stern warning, the Archbishop has said that he will begin a formal process to address the situation if the parish does not respond to his concerns by December first. The formal process could lead to excommunication. So there's a defiant pastor there, Father Peter Kennedy, right? Oh. But I'm interested in, for our purposes here, is this other, someone unorthodox priest, right? Who may be recanting some of his errors, but his book is being sold to the prisoners, right?

[1:23] Oh. And there's a little quote here, huh? From Father Dresser's book, Father Dresser asserted that the idea of Christ's divinity, quote, not only does violence to my own intelligence, such as it was,

[1:42] but must be a sticking point for millions of people trying to make some kind of sense of the Christian religion. He stated simply, this is the prime interest in this part here. No human being can ever be God, and Jesus was a human being. As simple as that. Now, notice, huh? When Thomas is in the commentary in Boethius' de Trinitate," right? He says you can use philosophy in theology in three ways.

[2:21] You can use it for the praeambula of the faith, those things that can be known by natural reason as well as by faith, and you can use it for certain likenesses, huh? Like you might use the image of the Trinity in our soul, right, to help understand a bit the Trinity, even though you know these likenesses will always be, you know, deficient, right? And then third, you can use philosophy to answer objections to the what?

[2:48] Mysteries. Yeah. Okay. Now here you got an objection in the form of a what? Syllogism, right? So let's just put his Father Dresser's syllogism on the board here, right?

[3:00] No human being. Can be God. Jesus Christ is a human being. Terrible, just simple as that, right? Okay. I know I showed in the first figure the syllogism, right? But the middle term is in between the two extremes, huh? Now, when you examine an argument like this, there's two examinations you make, huh? That's where Aristotle wrote two books: the Prior Analytics and the Posterior Analytics, huh? You take it apart formally to see does the conclusion what follow from the premises, and then you come back and see are the premises good or not, right?

[3:50] Okay. And just like when you add or subtract, right, you get the wrong number because you didn't add correctly or subtract correctly, or because there's something wrong with one of the numbers you had, right? Okay. So when you use philosophy to defend the faith, your first book you see is the formal right? Now, formalities when Aristotle's doing formalities in the first book of Natural Hearing, the first book of the so-called Physics, his conclusions don't follow from his premises.

[4:23] There's something wrong with his premises too. So, but either one is enough to what make the argument bad, right? Now, is the form of this argument defective or not? Defective or defective? Defective. Defective. Oh. it seems like a proper syllogism. Yeah, the form is perfect, right? See, no human being can be God, right? If you lay that down, and that Jesus Christ is human being, it follows necessarily that Jesus Christ is not what God.

[4:57] God. Okay. So the defect in this argument is going to have to be in the matter, right? Okay. Now, there's two premises. Is any defect in this minor premise? Yes. There could be. You say it's false to say Jesus Christ is human being. No, I guess not. You seem to watch this guy.

[5:27] I sent his name into the camera. By human being, you mean human person? What? By human being, you mean human person? No, I think human being means it means a man, right? A man. An animal that has reason, right? Okay. So the minor premise is okay, right? So the problem here is with the what major premise, right?

[5:53] Now, if you meant by human being a human person, right, then would the statement be true? Yeah, yeah. That no human person can be God, right? Okay. A human being doesn't mean the same thing as human person, right? Human being is one who has human nature. Okay. Now, you could say that no human being, because of his nature, is God. That is because of his nature as what?

[6:31] Yeah. No human being, from having human nature, is God. Okay. That still is not enough to defend this because you're not saying it specifically, right? Okay.

[6:45] So now you come into philosophy, right? See, Aristotle distinguished between the individual substance, what we might call the hypostasis, if you want to use that term, and the what nature, right? This is the fundamental distinction he makes in regard to the word substance. Now, let's start from what's more known to us, in you and me, right? Now, human nature in me, or even my human nature, if you wish.

[7:20] Human nature is that by which one is a what human being, okay? A man, right, right? Okay. Now, by human nature, am I a geometer?

[7:57] No. Is it everybody who has human nature would be a what? Geometer. By human nature, am I a what? Logician. You might say that because I have human nature, I'm capable of learning geometry from Euclid. I'm capable of learning logic from Aristotle, maybe a little bit by myself, not very far. But nevertheless, it's not by human nature that I am a logician or a geometer. Not alone that by human nature I am white, huh?

[8:33] Okay. Or I'm healthy if I am. Okay. So human nature includes only that by which I am a man, human being. So, but I'm not only human being. I'm also geometer, logician, and I'm white too, and I'm somewhat healthy. Okay.

[8:59] So am I the same as the human nature that I have? No, because then I wouldn't be in addition to being a human being, be a logician, a geometer, be white, and be healthy, and so on, right? Okay, so my personality, if you will, right, my being a person who has many things besides human nature, right, is not the same thing as my human nature that I have.

[9:30] Okay, so there you see a little bit of distinction, Aristotle makes, between the individual substance, whatever we're going to call it, hypostasis, right, or in the case of one of a rational nature, we call it a person, right, and the nature that you have, right.

[9:49] So, how is it that Jesus Christ can be what God, God right? Something? other than human nature Yeah, yeah. But how can the same person be a man and be God, right?

[10:11] Well, unless there's some distinction there between the nature of the person, you couldn't have that, son. Now let's go back to my deficient likeness here, right? Remember the example here, right? If you take the end of this line, right, huh? Okay. And then you draw another line to that, right?

[10:37] So that point that was the end of this line here is now the end of what? This line here. So the divine person, and more precisely the Son of God, right, huh? The Word of God, right? That person draws, right, or God draws, right? Human nature, right? Partly from the Virgin, right? Partly they created what soul, right? But draws it, right? To the already existing person, which is himself, right?

[11:12] Okay. And then he has human nature, right? And so he's both God now and what? Man. You see that, right? But Father Dresser doesn't see that, right? I suppose a Mohammedan, right, would you know say, well, Mohammed is, you know, there's no God but Allah, but Mohammed is his prophet. But Mohammedan would never say that Mohammed is God, right, huh? And maybe they regard, you know, they would share Father Dresser, right, the idea or the premise, right, that no human being can be what?

[11:47] God. Okay. You see how he's solving that by reason of seeing the distinction between what? Human personality and human nature, right? And what the Word of God pulled to himself was what? Human nature, right? And that makes him to be a human being. Because what has human nature is human being. Because the human nature is that by which a man is a man. Okay.

[12:26] That's kind of the result of that, the answer, together, huh? Okay. That's appropriate to bring it up, right? Okay. Now, just a second thing here now, which is not a deed of Father Dressler here anymore, but

[12:43] just about the way we speak of these things, huh? I was thinking in Bill last night, there, That God never changes, right? That's really hard to understand. How does He do so many things? How does He accomplish so many things? And there are changes, right, huh? Okay. But anyway, not going to go into that. That's our consideration. The substance of that, right? We take that as a beginning, right?

[13:11] God never changes, right? And then Saint John's Gospel says, "What the the Word was made flesh," right? Okay. Now, let's not get involved in the problem of synecdoche, right? He could have said, "and the Word was made a what, a man," right? But notice those words we use was made.

[13:39] Wood was made a chair, right? And did the wood undergo a change when it was made a chair? Okay. But God never changes. So how can Saint John says the Word was made flesh? It was made a man. It seems to be saying that there is a change going on here, right? Okay.

[14:09] I was taking another way of saying this. Suppose someone asked you this now, in all seriousness. Do you believe that God became man? What would you answer? Yeah. Now, of course, God is standing there for the Word of God, right? But we've seen that you know something can stand for it in that way, right? Okay. When you say the Word was toward God, God stands for what?

[14:41] The Father, right? But when you say God became man, right? Now, I often teach the first book. I used to do it all the time, every year, every semester. First book of natural hearing, first book of the physics. I am always talking about this becoming that, right, and so on. And becoming is means almost the same thing as what change, right? Okay. So when I became even a a, I become healthy, right?

[15:11] That's a change. If I was sick, or if I become sick, that is a change, right? If I become a geometer, that's a change, right? If I become a magician, that's a change, right?

[15:27] Well, then isn't God changing when he becomes a man? When when the the Word seems to suggest that. And if it doesn't mean that, if he doesn't change, why do you say he becomes a man, right? When he can't change, right? He can't become something he wasn't before, right? That's a change, isn't it?

[15:55] So now, go back to my simple example again, right? Let's call the end point here. I'll give it a name, X, right? Okay. The X is the end of that line, right? We'll call the line A, right? Okay. I suppose I draw another line, which we'll call B, right?

[16:31] To that same point. Okay. Would you say? Would you say that X has now become the end of line B? Yeah. But has there been any change at all in? X Well it's becoming? It's become the end point of line B. Yeah. I mean, has there been any change? Is it?

[16:59] Because line B has been drawn to X, right? If anything, the line is being extended to that point, right? And therefore, it's true to say that point X has become the end of line B, right?

[17:19] But it really hasn't changed, has it? That point. It was there before, right? Yeah. That's a little, but a very deficient likeness, right? Of the fact that, well, when you say that the Word of God or God became man, it's not by any change in what Himself or His personality, but something has been drawn and terminated at that person, right? Okay. A little bit like this, right?

[17:52] Could you say X has a change in relation or something? It's gained another relation. We could say so, yeah, yeah. I mean, it didn't seem a real change within it, right?

[18:07] Now, let me give another deficient likeness here, from again from philosophy, though. Sometimes a a son becomes what grows taller than his father, right? This happened a lot with immigrants, right? When the son had a better diet or something, you know. But in the course of things, a son often gets taller than his mother, and sometimes even taller than his what father, right? Okay. Of course, when the son is born, and for a number of years, right, the father is what taller than the son, right?

[18:48] Okay. But as the son grows, eventually, it, might come about that the father is now has become what shorter than the what son, right? So here, using the word "become," you would say he's become shorter than the son. But is it due to some change in the father that he's become shorter? Is he shrunken? And they say he's doing this. That's not too noticeably, right? Okay.

[19:20] So the son, the father has become shorter than the son. because of the change in the son. The son has grown, right? Do you see that? So this is again a little likeness here, right? The father is truly said to become shorter than the son, but this doesn't signify any change in the father. As such, right? It's a change really in the what? Yeah. So when Aristotle is distinguishing the kinds of change, he doesn't have any change in the category of towards something, a relation, right?

[19:58] But he has change in quantity, like. Growth and change in quality, like alteration, and change in where, like change of place, and so on, right? So, about these very perfect likenesses, and you know, being adapted here, something is said to become something without really what changing. In this example, and in the other example I gave you, right?

[20:41] You now we're up to question seven, and let's look at the proemium here again here. Let's refresh ourselves. Now, Thomas has began the consideration of the co-assumpta as he calls it, right? The things assumed with, this body and soul, right? By the son in human nature, and he divides us into what two parts of consideration. First, those things that pertain or belong to the perfection of, yeah, the perfections that he co-assumed, right, or assumed with.

[21:19] And secondly, about those things which pertain to his what defect, right? Okay. As you should know, it's going to be pertaining to his what suffering body, right? Or okay, not to some defect of knowledge in him or all these crazy things they say nowadays. Okay, about the first, he divides it into three, right? First, about the grace of Christ, right? Secondly, about his knowledge, right? And third, about his what power, right?

[22:01] So he's adding one thing that Saint John says, right? Full of grace and truth. He's got a third thing there, the power, right? Okay. Now, the first of those three things,

[22:15] Thomas explains why he's not going to divide this into three but into two, right? Now, about the grace of Christ, there's a twofold consideration. First, about his grace as he is an individual, singular man. Secondly, about his grace as he is the head of the what church, huh? Now, the third grace, the grace of union, has already been spoken of, right?

[22:43] Now, about the first thirteen things are what asked, right? Of course, you can't possibly understand the distinction of thirteen, right? Okay. But notice, there is a distinction of the grace of the person that we make sometimes between Latin, they call it gratia gratum faciens, right, or sanctifying grace, right, and gratia gratis data. And the first group of questions, or first group of articles, are dealing more with this what Sanctifying grace, yeah, gratia gratis and gratum faciens, and because the virtues and gifts and so on are tied up with this.

[23:40] And then in the seventh article as you can see huh? there's other kinds of graces in what, yeah, and prophecy would be something particular under that, right, okay.

[23:55] So you could divide the first what eight articles, right, into two, right, the part dealing with the sanctifying grace, and the part dealing with gratis data, right? okay. And then the third part would be about the what the excellence of the grace of Christ, right, and we can subdivide those pretty easily, but

[24:24] where there's a fullness of grace in them, right. That's the question we ask. Now we we also say about Mary, Hail Mary, full of grace, right? What does the fullness of grace mean in Christ, during Mary, and so on? And whether such a fullness is proper to Christ, or they go together those two, right? Whether this is infinite, this grace, whether it can be increased,

[24:53] and then the last article is kind of standing by itself, right? Okay. Okay, so first, let's look at the articles again, a little bit Here's the titles of them. Whether in the soul of Christ there is some habitual what grace,

[25:17] whether in Christ there are virtues, son, because the virtues that follow upon having grace, son, and then descends in particular to faith and to hope, but not to charity, right? Since there's not really a problem about having charity, right? Because charity remains even in the next world, But faith, huh? faith? See, and how about hope? Well, we'll see. Does he already have the beatific vision? No, qualification.

[25:51] And then the gifts of the Holy Spirit, right, to distinguish against the virtues, son, second part assuming they have been distinguished, and in particular about the gift of what fear, huh? So it's places where there's special difficulty, right? Virtues of hope and what faith and this fear of the Lord, right? He's afraid of himself, right? Or what can he do

[26:22] Okay, so let's start to look now at the first article. To the first one goes forward. Thus, it seems that in the soul, taken on by the Word, right? Notice he uses the word soul there, right? Look at the soul, Christ. It seems there was not habitual grace,

[26:47] for grace is a certain partaking of the divine nature in a rational creature, according to this very famous text to the second letter of Peter, right? Through whom, right, great and precious promises are given to us, that we might be what partakers of the divine nature. That's kind of a definition of what this grace is. Partaking,

[27:16] I think, essentially God, but partaking, huh? But Christ is not God by participation, but according to truth, He is God. Therefore, in Him there was no what habitual grace.

[27:35] Of course, He's not God by human nature, is He? Even Father Dresser was right about that. We just learned from the heretic himself. Moreover, grace is necessary for man that he might do well, right? Operate well, according to that of one Corinthians chapter 15. I have labored more abundantly than all. Saint Paul says, Not however I, but the grace of God with me, huh?

[28:10] And also for this that man what achieve eternal life, according to that of Romans chapter 6, by the grace of God eternal life. But to Christ, from the fact that He was the what, from this alone that He was a natural son of God, there is owed the inheritance of what eternal life.

[28:41] And from the fact that He was the Word, to whom all things were done, there was present to Him the ability of what doing all good things, huh? Therefore, not according to human nature did He need another grace, except the grace of the what union to the Word itself, huh?

[29:09] Moreover, that which acts by way of an instrument, I mean the man of instrument or tool, does not need a habit for its own operations. But the habit is what founded in the principal agent. So does the hammer need a what habit, right, in order to be used well by me?

[29:36] But the human nature in Christ was as an instrument of His what divinity, huh? As Damascene says in the third book. It's also in the Athanasian Creed, huh? It's

[29:55] likeness. Therefore, in Christ. It is not necessary that there be somewhat habitual grace, but against this is what is said in Isaiah eleven verse 2. There rested upon him the spirit of the what Lord, which is said to be in man

[30:22] through habitual grace, as has been said in the first part. Therefore, in Christ there was habitual grace. So, what do you guys think? He already proved it in the first part. So,

[30:41] okay. The answer, it should be said, Thomas says, it is necessary to place in Christ habitual grace, and for three what reasons? Huh. First, on account of the union of his soul to the what Word of God, because the more something receptive is near to the cause flowing in these things, the more it partakes of its influence.

[31:19] But the pouring in of grace is from what God, according to that of Psalm eighty-three, the Lord gives grace and what glory? Grace in this life and glory in the next. Huh. Well, glory sometimes said to be gratia consummata. Huh.

[31:47] And therefore, most of all, was it suitable that his soul would receive in flowing in of divine grace? God is the source of what grace? Huh. You couldn't be closer to God than to be united to Him in the same what person. So he must receive most of all the flowing in of grace into his soul, right? Far more than any other what saint, even.

[32:23] What is what is Dionne's article there? Grace of what Mary is of the hypostatic order, but given her proximity to what Christ, right? And therefore to God, we expect her to receive a greater influx of grace than any other saint. Huh.

[32:44] Secondly, on account of the nobility of his soul, whose operations, huh, is necessary to attain most what nearly. You know, talk about was about his book there. Yeah.

[33:11] And some people say it's to be understood as prayer, right? The way it's punctuated. Pope Pius XII though he should be most close, to attain to God through what knowledge and what love, and this is talking now about knowledge and love that's in his what human nature, not in his divine nature, right?

[33:38] And so that he might attain to God in his very what human nature, most nearly, right, near anybody else, is necessary that what human nature be elevated by grace, huh?

[33:58] It's a very good argument, isn't it? And third, an account of the relation of Christ Himself to the human grace, huh? For Christ, insofar as He is man, is the mediator of God and men, as is said in the first epistle to Timothy. And therefore, it's necessary that he have grace, also what pouring over into others, according to that of John one sixteen, of his fullness we have all received, grace for what grace.

[34:42] Saw that in Shakespeare the day grace for grace, too. That's kind of strange. Very, very interesting things there in Shakespeare. I don't know where he gets these things, but

[34:58] okay. So Thomas often gives three reasons. Even they could give more, but three is enough, huh? But this is pretty thorough, I think. Have nothing more to give as a reason, right?

[35:24] I was telling you, I was going back looking over the treatise on the goodness of God in my favorite book, the Summa Contra Gentiles. And as I mentioned before, there are five chapters that he has devoted to this, and altogether there's twenty two arguments, partly the authoritative arguments, but philosophical arguments is twenty two of them. So he has four arguments to show that God is good, five to show that He's goodness itself, six to show that He can't be bad, anything bad can happen, three arguments to show that He's the good of every good, and four that He's the sumum bonum, right?

[36:01] So I'm going to go back and look at the. Question there on the goodness of God in the Summa Theologiae. I said, oh, you know, only has a little bit of what he's got in it. My favorite book, you know. It just whets your appetite? Yeah, yeah, yeah, It treats the Gentiles But the Summa, you know, the Summa Contra Theologiae is more appropriate to a beginner, right?

[36:26] Giving you milk as Thomas says, huh? Get in there. Okay. Now, the first objection seemed what he's essentially God, right? Whereas you need this partaking, right? But that's not doing justice to the fact that there are two natures here, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that Christ is true God in His person and divine nature, right? But since with the unity of person there remains a distinction of what natures, huh?

[37:02] This is clear from the things said above. The soul of Christ, huh, is not through what it is through its essence, right? Divine, right? Whence is necessary that it become divine by partaking, which is according to grace, because grace is a partaking of the divine nature. That's beautifully solved, right?

[37:37] Don't appreciate the fact that there are two natures here, right? And one of the natures is essentially the divine nature, yes, but the other is not. So it's not going to be divine at all unless it partakes the divinity. And it partakes the divinity, the divine nature. That's only by grace. Gracious. Excuse me, could I put a thing? This grace, huh? Towards

[38:08] Thomas, one of his prayers there, he asked for more grace, and then that God would reward it the grace rather than him. Kind of funny the way he speaks there sometimes. Interesting. God, when He crowns the saints, He crowns the work of His own hands. Yeah. Not just because He made the nature, but because of the grace.

[38:32] So can you pray to God, asking Him to move you to love Him as you should love Him? Because when God moves your will, it's not contrary to your will being free.

[38:51] When He moves your will, He's not forcing it, huh? Okay, now the second objection was saying about we need grace for eternal life, right, and to inherit this and so on.

[39:14] But being the natural son of God, he always owed this, right? To second, it should be said: to Christ, according as he is a natural son of God, there is owed the eternal what inheritance, which is the uncreated, beatitude, right?

[39:39] Through the uncreated act of knowledge and love of God, huh? The same by which the Father what knows and what loves himself. Now, in the in my favorite book, there at the end of the first. First book of the Summa Contra Gentiles, he shows the beatitude of God in His divine nature. Because presupposing you know the Nicomachean Ethics, where you have a certain understanding of what beatitude is, huh?

[40:16] But, he shows that God is blessed and how His blessedness excels everybody else's beatitude. But that act by which God in Himself, right, knows and loves Himself, that act the soul is not capable of.

[40:40] A soul cannot know and love God as much as God knows and loves Himself. God is infinitely knowable and lovable, and so we can never know God as much as He is knowable, and we can never love God as much as He is lovable, right? We can never praise Him as much as He is worthy of being praised, and we can never thank Him as much as He's deserving of being thanked.

[41:17] Of course, the young people say, "Don't you get a little tired of thanking God in heaven? " No, no, you never go. Does God get bored being changeless? Yeah, they can't. You need some kind of limitation upon God.

[41:47] Which act the soul is not capable of, on account of the difference of the nature, right? Whence it is necessary that he attain to God through the created act of what enjoying God, which is not able to be except through what grace.

[42:12] As Aristotle points out in the third book about the soul, the natural object of our mind is of what it is, a something sensed or imagined, and so something that cannot be sensed or imagined like God, we only know Him perfectly so far as it can be known through the things we do sense and imagine. So we need grace in order to be raised up to what knowing God as He is.

[42:45] Likewise, as far as good action is concerned, likewise, in so far as He is the Word of God, right, He has the ability of doing all good things, huh?

[42:59] By divine operation, but because besides a human operation it is necessary to lay down a certain what human operation in Christ is necessary in Him for there to be habitual grace, by whom this operation in Him would be what perfect.

[43:27] Now the third objection is not distinguishing or seeing a distinction between a what inanimate instrument like the hammer in my example, right, and a what. Yeah.

[43:42] To the third, it should be said that the humanity of Christ is a instrument of his divinity, not as a what inanimate instrument, which in no way acts but is only acted upon, used, but as an instrument animated by a rational soul, which thus acts that it is also what. Yeah. And therefore, for the suitability of the action, is necessary that he have what habitual grace.

[44:24] So you're all convinced now that there's going to be habitual grace, Christ. Now, whether there are virtues in Christ.