Tertia Pars
29. The Knowledge of Christ I: Why Christ Has Human Knowledge and the Beatific Vision (ST III, q.9, aa.1-2)
Class of 2009-02-12
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/13-tertia-pars/029-the-knowledge-of-christ-i-why-christ-has-human-knowledge/

[0:00] In the Name of the Father of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. God our enlightenment, guardian angels strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images and arouse us to consider more quickly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, Pray for us and help us to understand all that you've written, Father. So after question nine, now he's going to take up the knowledge of Christ.

[0:32] Then we're to consider about the knowledge of Christ, huh? And about this, two things are to be considered. First, what knowledge did Christ have? What kind of knowledge did he have? And apparently, there is going to be more than one kind of knowledge that he has. And secondly, huh?

[0:57] About each one of these, what? Knowledge is kind of knowledge. Yeah. Okay. So this is about the knowledge in general. So about the first four things are asked. First, whether Christ had some knowledge besides the knowledge he had as God.

[1:21] Secondly, whether he had the knowledge which the blessed have, huh? Or those who have grasped the end, the comprehensores. Third, whether he had a what?

[1:42] Innate knowledge, right? Or one that was poured into him, huh? And third, whether he had some acquired knowledge, huh? Would be come through experience and so on.

[2:02] So the first article: whether in Christ there was some knowledge besides the divine. To the first, then, one goes forward. Thus, it seems that in Christ there was not any knowledge besides his divine knowledge, because knowledge is necessary for this, that through it some things are known. Oh, that's pretty hard to deny. But Christ, through the divine knowledge, knew all things, huh? And therefore, it was superfluous.

[2:44] It'd be superfluous for there to be in him some other knowledge, huh? I suppose you could ask the question about the blessed, right? If they see God face to face and know all these things in seeing Him, why would they still have? My Euclidean geometry, so in my head, still be there.

[3:09] Moreover, a lesser light is what blocked out, so to speak, through a greater light. But just like the light of the stars isn't seen during the day because of the greater light of the sun, but every created knowledge is compared to the uncreated knowledge of God as a lesser light, very lesser light, to a greater light. Therefore, in Christ, there did not what shine forth any other knowledge than the what divine.

[3:44] Moreover, this is the third objection now: the union of human nature to the divine was made in the person, as is clear from the things said above. But there is placed in Christ, according to some, a certain knowledge of the union, by which, to wit, Christ, to those things which pertain to the Incarnation, those things which pertain to the Incarnation, he knew more fully right than anyone else.

[4:19] Since, therefore, the personal union contains two natures, it would seem that in Christ are not two knowledges, but only one knowledge pertaining to both natures. That's a little hard to see. That's the force of that argument. I suppose that "scientia

[4:47] unionis" means that what tied up with the hypostatic union is only one person there, so there's only one knowledge. Okay. But against this is what the great Ambrose says, one of the four major doctors or four or five doctors of the Western Church, in the book about the Incarnation, that God in the flesh took on the perfection of human nature. He took on the what? No. Yeah, sense of man, but not a what inflated sense of flesh.

[5:25] Is that what we got? Therefore, to the sense of man pertains created knowledge. Therefore, in him there was some other knowledge besides the what divine.

[5:43] He says, "I answer: It should be said that it is clear from the things said before that the Son of God took on a what complete human nature. That is not a body only." But also a what soul? Because some heretics who said that the divinity was in place of the soul, but no, then he would not take on a complete human nature, not a human nature at all, really.

[6:11] Nor only a sensing soul, right? Which some said that you know they modified the divinity, saying well he had a sensing soul, but his understanding was only in his divinity. But then again, he would not be a man, right? He'd be a beast still. But he took on a what rational, a reasonable soul, right?

[6:34] Assuming that or taking that for granted, and therefore it's necessary that he would have, because of that, created knowledge, and this on account of three reasons. And the first he says is for the sake of the perfection of his soul, for the soul considered by itself, right, is in ability in potency to knowing what understandable things. For

[7:11] sometimes we actually understand, sometimes we understand only in what ability, right? So originally we're in ability, and therefore Aristotle in the third book about the soul compares it to a what tabula table, just paper in a sense, in which nothing has yet been what written in the beginning, and nevertheless it is possible to write in it, on account of the possible understanding, in which, as he says there in the third book on the soul, all things can what.

[7:48] When Aristotle is done, he gets through talking about the senses and reason or the understanding in the third book, then he comes back to the soul and says that the soul is in some way all things, and because by sensing and understanding you take in the natures of other things and the qualities of other things. And I was reading in the forty-sixth chapter this morning of the Summa Contra Gentiles, which is the beginning of the third part of the second book, forty-six chapter, and he's talking about how for the perfection of the universe you need intellectual creatures like you and me and the angels, and he gives you know six different reasons for this, but the sixth reason he says that in things well ordered,

[8:38] right, the relation of the first to the second is like that of the second to the what third, or maybe vice versa, second is to the third like the first to the second. It's kind of interesting that Aristotle should say that the highest thing in the material world, the human soul, right, is in some way all things. That's like God, right? And God, in a much more perfect way, is all things, right?

[9:04] So God is to the whole creation like all things, right? And our soul is to the rest of the material world in some way as what all things. Interesting proportion there.

[9:27] So Aristotle defines reason first of all as a capability, right? And that's something an ability, right? Well, the what is an ability but not an act is what imperfect, right? So he says, what is an ability is imperfect unless it be reduced to act.

[9:50] But it would not be suitable that the Son of God took on what an imperfect human nature, but a Perfect one, right? Why? Because by means of this human nature he took on, he was going to what bring the whole human race to perfection, huh? Well, it's the perfect that brings the imperfect to perfection, is not? Okay, the imperfect. And therefore, it is necessary that the soul of Christ was perfect to some knowledge, which was its own what perfection.

[10:32] And therefore, it is necessary in Christ that there be some knowledge apart from the divine knowledge. Otherwise, the soul of Christ would be more imperfect than all the souls of other men. I'm convinced by that, argument, huh? He's going to give us two more, huh?

[10:57] Moreover, since each thing is for the sake of its own what operation, as is said in the second book about the what universe is actually the title of Aristotle's work, but they call it in Latin De Caelo et Mundo Mundo, right? But the word Caelo, which is used to translate the Greek word, the Greek word can mean the heavens or can mean the whole universe. So Aristotle's work was actually entitled in Greek about the universe, but it got translated about the heavens, and so it's not just about the heavens; it's about the earth too.

[11:31] So, so they call that work. That's the second book in natural philosophy, huh? After the books of natural here. What did Aristotle mean by that? Said each thing is because of its operation. Yeah, no, it's the the the eyes for the sake of seeing, right? Oh, yeah, intent. Yeah, it's operation, right? And the abilities for the sake of acting, ability to play the piano for the sake of playing the piano, and so

[12:04] so that's the end or purpose, right? You see, on account of the sake of. Therefore, Christ would have a understanding soul in vain, right, frustra, if he did not understand something by it, huh? And this pertains to what created knowledge, huh?

[12:32] Third, he says, huh? Because some created knowledge belongs to the nature of the human soul, to wit, that to which we naturally know the first what beginnings. Ah, for we take here in a large sense, right, knowledge for any knowledge of the what human soul. That's why I was translating Scientia, not by science, but by by knowledge.

[13:05] So some things that our reason naturally knows or naturally comes to know, and these are the what called the axioms in philosophy sometimes, like the whole is more than a part, right?

[13:19] That nothing is a beginning of itself. So, so nothing of what is natural was what lacking in Christ, done, because he took the whole human nature, as has been said above, and therefore in the sixth what synod

[13:42] was condemned the position of those denying that in Christ there were two what knowledges or two what wisdoms, right? Yeah, that's that's nice, huh? Those nice two arguments, huh? Beautiful, right?

[14:03] I couldn't say it better myself. I agree. The first argument, I'm not sure I understand. He means by he wouldn't be right for him to assume imperfect human nature. if the human nature he assumed didn't have any knowledge in it, like when we get our human nature. Yeah. We don't have any knowledge. No, no, but Christ is going to perfect us in knowledge and in grace, right?

[14:36] So therefore, it pertain to him to have what both knowledge and grace in his human nature, so he could what his human nature could be a tool, right, of his divinity for perfecting us in grace and in knowledge. Okay, so he is saying that he had perfect knowledge from the beginning. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But my point is, he wouldn't have an imperfect human nature. A human nature born without knowledge is not an imperfect human nature, right?

[15:06] That's the way human nature. Yeah, well, you'll come to talk later on when he breaks down the various kinds. He's also going to have a knowledge, I think, that he acquires in the course of time, right? Which would be a completely human knowledge, right? Huh? Okay. Because the the beatific vision, right, is something his human soul has, right, and that's not the knowledge that he has in his divinity of himself, right?

[15:35] And he's going to have also a kind of infused knowledge, like the angels have, right? He's also going to have the human, right? Right. Okay. But from the very beginning of his of his of his

[15:51] incarnation, right? Huh? He's the source for us of all these things, huh? So Thomas will say, I mean, Saint John will say, right? We saw him as the only begotten Son of God, right? Full of grace and truth, as if one necessarily what follows upon the other, right? So, whenever any human being goes from potency to act in the realm of knowledge, Christ is causing it. Well, we'll see what he says about that in particular by how he does this, right?

[16:25] But he is the source of the higher knowledge for us, huh? Supernatural knowledge, like faith. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Who would be the source of natural knowledge? Well, as God, he is. Yeah, he's the light who enlightens every man who comes into this world, right? And sometimes I take that as being said first of all the natural light of reason, but because not everybody is enlightened by by the light of faith.

[16:52] But you might say that's being said of the Word in His divinity, right? Okay, but He's going to, you know, He says He came to teach us, right, and so on. Also, in terms of that distinction between natural light, which is where He gives us by His divinity, and the supernatural light of faith, because our Lord says elsewhere in the same Gospel of John, "The light came into the world, and men preferred darkness."

[17:19] That's a different light than the light of divinity. Okay. Yeah, I just think you know we have brother here who was influenced by a certain philosopher, William Henry James. Yeah.

[17:35] Um, who argued so? It seems to me that the first argument is an argument from fitness, right? It's he's not. It's it's a it's convenient. It's fitting. Yeah, but even more than that, though, is the idea that the perfect is what perfects other things, right? So, if Christ is going to perfect other things, then he has a perfection whereby he can do that. Yeah, because he he had another argument from fitness, saying, but isn't there a certain fitness in Christ not having been born with perfect knowledge, so that he could be like us in all things except sin?

[18:11] That must be. Yeah, we got to be careful about that. I mean, because you don't want to attribute to Christ, you know, the imperfection of us in terms of temptation where we can fall and so on. Right, but but it isn't an imperfection to be born without knowledge. It's not a human imperfection. Well, you can say no. You can say, nevertheless, our mind is imperfect. I mean, it's not that it's not a a privation in the strict sense, right?

[18:35] A privation is not having what you are able to have and should have, and so on. So, like Thomas is always saying, I don't know if this is true about dogs, but the dog can't see until the ninth day. Because the eyes don't. Yeah, something like that. And Thomas said, "But you don't call the dog blind in those first nine days in the strictest sense of of blind because.

[18:56] He's not apt to have sight in those first nine days, right? But if he gets beyond that, he still can't see. Well, then you'd say maybe he's blind or some deficiency, right? Okay. Or you know, our newborn little baby boy, he can't generate. You know, you see, he's impotent. You know, now you wouldn't say it in the sense of a privation or a lack, right? Because he's not apt to be able to do this until a certain age, right?

[19:24] Okay. But nevertheless, there's there's an imperfection in the mind, right? Of the child is born, right? It's like a blank tablet upon which nothing has been written. So, so, so even that kind of imperfection wouldn't be fitting for Christ to have taken on himself. You know, that that seems to be like this idea of a dog that can't. Yeah, you got to realize that that when when Christ takes on human nature, yeah, he's taking it on as a tool of his divinity, right?

[19:56] Yeah. To perfect us in grace and knowledge and so on. And therefore, from the very beginning, it is taking on this human nature, this tool. It should be what perfect, perfect for for doing that, right? That's interesting. Yeah. And he did, you know, at the age of twelve, he went to the temple. Enlightened these guys, and he could have done so earlier. He could have gotten there at the age of six.

[20:20] But some could argue his intellect was so perfect that he acquired vast knowledge in a very short space of time. You know, I'm just, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm trying to be able. Well, well, let's well let's leave it leave it up in the air for a moment because he's going to distinguish three kinds of, you know, and what you say may be true about one of those kinds, right?

[20:43] Okay. Yeah, with the with the with the knowledge he acquires, I don't know if I'm understanding this because I read this morning. It seems to me he's acquiring knowledge he already has. So that's he's going from. Well, it's like the first objection? you know, I mean, as God, he has knowledge; he doesn't have his man. No, but even, his human acquired knowledge. He's acquiring knowledge that he already has as a human.

[21:08] That's going to be a different kind of knowledge, right? But the infused knowledge isn't the same. In other words, he's not. He doesn't know the same thing by different modes. You can see that. You see, when I get the division, if I do, if I'm in in seeing God as He is, I will see the truth of the Pythagorean theorem. Did you know that?

[21:32] And everything, in other words, everything that I naturally want to know. In seeing God as He is, just the main joy would be seeing God as He is, right? But in seeing God as He is, I also see in seeing God as He is everything that I naturally want to know all at once. Okay. Now, why cease to know the demonstration of Euclid at the end of Book One of Euclid?

[22:02] No, but that'll be a different one, right? Different knowledge, right? See, and and actually, I'll see that last theorem and its human proof better, right? Huh? Now, Thomas, you know, Thomas, when he's talking about how human knowledge can remain with this more divine knowledge later on, he makes a comparison there to dialectic and demonstration, right? And he compares how dialectic is a way to to knowledge, but once you arrive at a certain knowledge of the thing, demonstration, and so on, that doesn't destroy the dialectic, right?

[22:44] And Thomas says you can come back and and do the dialectic even better. And it always strikes strikes me when these two great teachers we have from the Greeks, Plato and Aristotle, right? In Plato's dialogues, he seemed to have a representation. Of dialectic in a mind that's on the way to knowing the truth, huh? When you find the dialectic that Aristotle has in most of his books, right?

[23:12] It's the dialectic of a man who may have come through dialectic to see the truth, right? But who's now seen the truth in a kind of certain way, and has come back and what ordered that, right, huh? Okay. And sometimes they say about good teaching, huh? Good teaching should imitate discovery, right? In other words, the teacher is taking you through those things by which the man who discovered this in the first place did discover it, huh?

[23:44] But maybe there's some dead ends that you don't drag the student through, right, huh? And you realize there's only some, you know, steps that actually led to, you know, you see. And these other crazy ideas you had one morning or other, you know, you never even thought of that, you know. So, so the dialectic you find Aristotle is much better ordered than in Plato, right? And it goes right, you know, directly, you know, towards the truth, huh?

[24:13] I'm kind of amazed too sometimes as a student of Aristotle, knowing his works, you know, you know, better read than I know the works of Plato, but as I read Plato there, I find oh, here's something that Aristotle may have got this already from from Plato, right? Here's something else, but it doesn't have the order it has in Aristotle. And it's all kind of jumbled up in Plato, right?

[24:39] And Aristotle, he'll take this, let's you do come first, then the second, this third. Oh yeah, now I see, huh? You see. And I know myself there. I sometimes was influenced by Plato, you know, his representation in the Meno there were,

[25:01] and not Meno, the, Euthyphro where Euthyphro defines the pious as what pleases the gods, right? And Socrates says, well, is it pious because it pleases the gods, or does it please the gods because it is pious?

[25:20] And well, then I saw this is the kind of question that Aristotle must have asked himself with the first definition of the good. The good is what all want, huh? And is it good because you want it, or do you want because it is good, right? And you have to answer that question to understand the good. huh? See, but Plato doesn't put those two together, right?

[25:48] And in another dialogue, you know, he's he's talking about something, and he goes off and talks about happiness in a very beautiful way. He talks about happiness there, references something. Aristotle pulls it out and puts it right in place, so the the lesser knowledge or the imperfectity, the dialectic, is not eliminated by the what's perfected, and so my human knowledge, right?

[26:17] I'll be able to carry a tune probably in heaven, right? The way I can now. See, I know there's something wrong there, but my my humming, you know, I'm always getting melodies off, and my wife informs me of his various mistakes I'm making. But

[26:36] I'll I'll be perfecting those things, those lesser things, right? Even in heaven, now. Okay, let's look at Thomas as he applies the first objection.

[26:52] The first, therefore, it should be said that Christ knows all things through His divine knowledge by a what? Uncreated operation, which is the very substance of God. When we studied, if you recall, the knowledge of God, we saw that for God to be and to know are the same thing.

[27:17] For the to understand of God, the act of understanding is his very what substance, huh? Otherwise, he'd be in potency to that; he wouldn't be pure act, and so on. But notice, as Thomas says, as is proved in the twelfth book of Metaphysics (wisdom) twelfth book after the books of natural philosophy natural philosophy, Aristotle saw that, right?

[27:43] He's talking about God being alive. He said, "This is what God is: is life itself, right? " He says, "So he sees that. "

[27:51] I've often thought, you know, that if Aristotle had read the Bible, he would have been struck by Christ saying, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. "

[28:03] Oh yeah, that makes sense. This guy's really God. Since this act is the very substance of God, right? This act cannot be that of the what? Soul, the human soul of Christ, huh? Since it is of a what? Another nature. If, therefore, there was not in the soul of Christ some other knowledge besides the divine, he would know nothing. Is that why he said up here that otherwise he would be more imperfect than the souls of all other men?

[28:38] Yeah, he would know nothing. yeah, His soul and mind. And thus it would be assumed in vain, huh? Since a thing is for the sake of its what? Operation, right?

[28:55] Now the second objection here the two lights the two lights. To the second, it should be said that if two lights are taken of the same order, one what, to the other. as the light of the sun obscures the light of the candle, right? Of which both are taken in the order of what? What is illuminating? But if one is taken as what greater in the order of illuminating, and one is less in order of the illumined, the lesser light is not what darkened, darkened by the greater, but is more what increased, just as the light of the air through the light of the what sun.

[29:43] And in this way, the light of the knowledge is not obscured, but is what made more clear in the soul of Christ through the light of the divine knowledge, which is a light, the true light, enlightening every man coming into this. What? World

[30:20] So that's a little bit. The objection is a little bit metaphorical, right? Thomas is saying, "Hey, the light of the sun, right, doesn't make the air darker. It illumines the air, right? "

[30:46] Now the third objection. Yeah. To the third, should be said that from the side of the things united, meaning the two natures, huh? There is placed a knowledge in Christ, both as regards his divine nature and as regards his what human nature, right?

[31:17] Thus, that through the union, nevertheless, right, by which there is the same what hypostasis of God and of man, that which is attributed to what God, that which is of God is attributed to man, right, and that which is of man is attributed to God, as has been said above. But from the side of the what union, one cannot place in Christ what Knowledge. some knowledge, right?

[31:50] Because the knowledge pertains to the nature. For the union, that union is to the personal being, but knowledge does not belong to the person except by reason of some what nature. Nature.

[32:20] So, do you hear and understand? Yes, sir. Do you hear and understand? I'm not sure that I can answer the objection of the person saying that there's a fittingness. I mean, I, um,

[32:40] yeah, I guess I don't know. His his whole his main argument is that Christ needs. I mean, given his place in the universe and the fact that he's going to be the source for enlightening anybody supernaturally, that he needs something. But also perfection of the soul, right? Is it appropriate that God should assume something imperfect, right? In terms, at least, of knowledge, right?

[33:15] Again, it seems to me to have to not have knowledge isn't imperfect in human nature. It's the way human nature is. That's the imperfection that man is born with, though. That's what you are saying, right? That's what that what you. would you in that sense. It's not an imperfection. It's I mean, there is what you perfectly born human baby doesn't have knowledge. that's the Yeah, I was saying it's not a lack in the strict sense, right?

[33:43] It's not not having something you should have when you should have it, right? But still, to have the ability to know but not actually know is to be in an imperfect what state, yeah. Okay. You are talking sort of about the fact of

[34:01] what's immature, but when you say perfectly born, what you are doing perfectly, you kind of say, "Well, meaning things like this is no lack; he's got two eyes, two hands, two legs." It's able to know, but but now ableness is not perfect compared to.

[34:20] It doesn't. But our souls, when we're born, quote normal, we do have original sin, which probably obscures any kind of perfection in the soul to begin with. And if that wasn't true, no, no, original sin doesn't affect our knowledge in that way. I think Adam was given a knowledge. But he had infused knowledge. That was infused knowledge. Yeah, Adam. Adam was. I don't know that his children would have been born with that.

[34:48] Yeah, I don't think Adam. Adam would have simply gotten all his knowledge in time, right? He was born, right? Because he's going to be the s he's going to be the teacher in the sense of mankind, right? The same kind of position Christ is. Yeah, yeah, less so, but but something like that, right? So it's not kind of surprising that Thomas would see Christ as, you know, having this knowledge when he sees the same thing as being true in a way of Adam, right?

[35:12] Yeah. So is it is it error that Father Robert's talking about that argument? The fact that the person making that error is is trying to make Christ too much like just the regular Joe, whatever. Yeah, kind of human weakness there. I think that's one reason I think also is he's confusing the kinds of knowledge that if he doesn't have sense knowledge, therefore he doesn't have perfect knowledge.

[35:41] It doesn't. It doesn't rule out the fact that Christ could acquire knowledge from its experience. That's what when we learned it from Saint Bonaventure, he said the fact that he his experience was not like ours in every way, because we go from not knowing something to knowing something; he goes from knowing it in one way to knowing it in another way. Right. So he could still acquire knowledge from his experience, but he already knew it more perfectly—either infused or blessed knowledge or divine knowledge.

[36:07] Right. Notice the order in which Thomas is going to go here in these next three articles. Yeah. He's going to start off with the, you know, the division and come down finally to the, to the knowledge that some people want to limit him to. Yeah.

[36:24] I just suppose that the, the, the problem this brother was having was he's he's saying that then he really wasn't like us in all things except sin. He he was he was a superhuman. He wasn't, which I don't have a problem with myself honestly. Yeah. Yeah. It isn't doesn't destroy human nature to be born with knowledge. You still have human nature even if you have the fullness of knowledge when you.

[36:48] But um, he the problem he was saying, but then he's not like us in all things. He's not imperfect in all. That's the problem. He's not imperfect. Oh darn. Yeah. Right. That's the force of the argument. Yeah. And of course, he's not like us and had original sin, right? And he doesn't have his emotions in this turmoil. Yeah. The reading the reading in in Mass this morning was was the one about you know Adam and Eve and, sin and so on, and then the discovering that they're naked and so on, you know.

[37:22] But the the priest was kind of fumbling around a little bit with it, I thought. But it's the idea that that they discover that their emotions are not in control of their reason anymore, and they're not quite masters of themselves anymore, right? Now, to the second one goes forward. Thus,

[37:44] it seems that in Christ there was not the knowledge of the blessed or the comprehended, those who have gotten to him. For the knowledge of the blessed is by partaking of the divine light, according to that of Psalm 35. In your light we shall see light, now. But Christ did not have the divine light, as it were, partaken, but the divinity itself he had in himself, substantially what?

[38:20] According to that of Colossians 2, in him and dwelled the whole fullness of divinity bodily, right? I've got to say that properly, right? Doesn't mean the body had the whole divinity, right? Therefore, in him there was not the knowledge of the what blessed, now. In fact, he had that knowledge essentially, or maybe in his human, his divine nature he did, but in his human nature.

[38:51] Moreover, the knowledge of the blessed makes them blessed, according to that of John chapter 17 verse 3. This is eternal life, that they might know you, the true God, and him whom you have sent, Jesus Christ.

[39:10] Incidentally, when Thomas talks about faith, right, he'll quote the definition of faith in Hebrews, right? And the first part of the definition is the substance of things hoped for, right? What you hope for is eternal life, right? So it's a certain foundation of eternal life. Well, eternal life consists in these two things here, and so Thomas says well, then faith has two parts, right? About the divinity of Christ and the humanity of Christ.

[39:39] So it goes back to this text here. But that man was blessed from the fact that he was united to God in person, according to that of Psalm 64. Blessed whom you have chosen and taken on. Therefore, why not not to place in him the what knowledge of the what blessed, now?

[40:05] But would he be blessed as man if he was united in person but didn't have the vision? He would be, but he wouldn't know it.

[40:20] Well, Well that fast. Moreover, a twofold knowledge belongs to man. One by his nature, and another which is above his nature. But the knowledge of the blessed, which consists in the divine vision, is not according to nature of man, but above his nature. In Christ, however, there was another supernatural knowledge, much stronger and higher. To it, the divine knowledge. Therefore, it is not necessary in Christ for there to be the knowledge of the what blessed, huh?

[41:06] That could be enough for him to be blessed as God, but not as what man, huh? When happiness is enough. But against this, huh? The knowledge of the blessed consists in the vision or knowledge of God. But he fully knew God, even according as he was what man. According to that of John chapter eight, I know him, and what I deserve his word. Therefore, in Christ there was the knowledge of the blessed.

[41:48] Thomas answers that that which is inability is reduced to act by that which is what in act So ability for act can't give itself the act it doesn't have. It doesn't have to have what it doesn't have to give itself what it doesn't have. So it must get act from something already in act. This is the way that Aristotle reasons in the ninth book of Wisdom, that the beginning of things must not be matter, which is most in ability, but something which is most in act, which is pure act, huh?

[42:33] Because of this here, so Aristotle says that in the thing that goes from ability to act, it's an ability before it's an act, right? But it goes from ability to act because something already in act. So simpliciter right? He's Latin word. Simply, act is before ability, and therefore the universe as a whole, the beginning of all things is pure act. And so those who think that ability comes first and matter, therefore, is beginning of all things, right?

[43:09] Are making the second kind of mistake outside of speech, the mistake of mixing up what is so simply, and not so simply, huh? That runs through that mistake runs through, you know, the philosophers, huh? I mean, Feuerbach says that man's mind is infinite. What is infinite in some way, but not simply? And so he's making the mistake of saying what is so in some way. Is what?

[43:37] Simple Yeah. But Meno is making that same mistake when he says you can't investigate what you don't know. You don't know what you're looking for. So he's saying that because you don't know it, simply, right? You can't know it in some what, in some way, right? Okay.

[44:06] Okay. So you stay in this principle. For it's necessary to be, for it's necessary for that to be hot, through which other things are what, heated, huh, or warmed. Now man is in ability to the knowledge of the blessed, which consists in the vision of God, and to that he is ordered as to an end.

[44:31] Now the rational creature is capable of that blessed knowledge, in so far as he is made to the what, image of God, huh? Now to this end of beatitude, men are reduced, or led back to the humanity of Christ, huh? According to that of Hebrews second verse ten, it behooved him, on account of whom are all things, and to which are all things, who would what, lead many sons to glory, the author of their salvation to consummate it through his what, Passion death, huh?

[45:14] And therefore it is necessary that that knowledge, the knowledge what, consisting in the vision of God, would belong most excellently to that man, huh? Because always the cause is necessarily more what, potent than the cause, right? So with both of these, key has been this understanding of Christ as head, then. Yeah. And that he is the cause, right? He's saying, huh? He's the cause of this perfection in others, right?

[45:53] So that he himself should most of all have this perfection if he's going to cause this perfection in the rest of us. Yeah. You must you must have certain perfection of humility too. to be that way, huh? I was just thinking of that because I guess that shows you how fitting it was that the question eight was about Christ as the head. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[46:34] Was talking with Warren Murray the other day about, you know, are you supposed to imitate Christ or imitate the saints? Huh? Well, I think you know what Saint Paul says. You know, be imitators of me as I am of Christ, right? But you might imitate a saint as what closer to you, and you're imitating him in so far as in some way like Christ, but he doesn't have the the full perfection of Christ, right?

[46:58] So it's kind of a tricky thing, but but I think you know the saints, you know, the church is teaching the saints are held up to us as models to what to imitate, right? So you don't want to say that you know that's either or, but you realize that in imitating this saint who's maybe closer to you by reason of your your occupation and life or something, right, or your your position,

[47:24] you're imitating him or her in so far as they are in some way imitating what Christ. You don't take them as being perfect, right? You know, Christ says in the Sermon on the Mount, "There be perfect, even as your heavenly fathers perfect." Well,

[47:45] That's, that's kind of you know the the the tension there between Plato and Aristotle, because Plato says that the perfect is the what the measure of the imperfect, right? And and Aristotle would agree with that, right? But a measure has to be known to be able to measure other things. So,

[48:19] is the measure what one should do? As in politics, let's say, take that example. where Aristotle was talking about these things a bit, or or even in ethics. Is the measure, you know, God or is it this virtuous man that you know?

[48:40] Well, we need you know an image that is what close to us. You know, the young manager that took up after my father died. You know, he said, "Well, it gets a difficulty, "What would the old man have done?" You know, so he's imitating. You know, not going to a business manager imitate Christ to see what decision he should make, huh? So you often see, you know, the the in each art or whatever it might be, each thing the the younger man imitating the older man, right?

[49:14] So a young doctor or intern is going to imitate the what experienced doctor, and young baseball players are imitating, you know. So as a baseball player, become perfect by imitating Christ. Well,

[49:33] you know, you don't have any example really, of Christ's athletic ability, except walking in the water, baby. Okay. So we're down to the reply to the objections now. Okay. To the first, therefore, should be said that the divine nature is joined to the human nature of Christ in the person, right? secundum personam persona, and they're not joined according to their what the nature or essence.

[50:23] But with the unity of person, there remains the what distinction of natures, huh? And therefore, the soul of Christ, which is a part of human nature.

[50:39] Through some partaking, partaken light, from the divine nature, is what perfect for the blessed, blessed knowledge by which God is seen through what essence, son. So he seems to be saying there that

[51:03] God was essentially a knowledge of God, right? Okay, that can't be what Christ has in his human nature, right? So it must be a partaking knowledge, right? Okay. The second objection here. The guy's saying that he's implicit because he's united to God in person.

[51:43] To second, it should be said, from that union, right, that man was blessed by an uncreated blessedness. Just as from that union, that man was what God,

[52:01] but in addition to the uncreated blessedness, it was necessary in the human nature of Christ to be a certain created blessedness, to which his soul was constituted in the ultimate end of human nature. So it became

[52:30] ridiculous for the soul of Christ not to be blessed, huh? And trying to lead us to being blessed, right? But he gave up for us. Give a lot gave up a lot for us, but not that.

[52:46] That's part of the problem with so many of these is that they want the kenosis, the emptying, to include that, get rid of that. This is from outside, but it's kind of, I mean, Pius XII had condemned it. I think it was Pius XII. Yeah, it was. It's a it's a long standing problem. They say the self emptying was everything. Yeah. Now the

[53:12] third objection. To get this higher blessedness. To third, it should be said that the vision or now or blessed knowledge is in some way above the nature of the rational soul. In what sense is that? Insofar as that, by his own power, he's not able to arrive at this, son.

[53:40] In another way, it is by his nature, huh? Insofar as through his nature he is capable of it, right? Insofar as he is made to the image of God. But the uncreated knowledge is in all ways above the what?

[54:00] Nature and human soul. Yeah. I guess objections saying that he has knowledge above the human knowledge. So, is it need a knowledge above the human knowledge if he already has one? Well, this is not above the human knowledge in the way in which the divine nature is above it, huh? Yeah. Okay.

[54:21] So, should we do an article before our break, or should take our break? Take a break. Take a break.