Tertia Pars
68. De Malo on Punishment and Sin; Summa III q.30 a.3: Why the Angel Appeared to Mary in Bodily Vision
Class of 2010-01-07
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/13-tertia-pars/068-de-malo-on-punishment-and-sin-summa-iii-q-30-a-3-why-the/

[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. God our enlightenment. guardian angels strengthen the lights of our minds, order to illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, Pray for us. And help us to understand all that you've written. Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

[0:30] Amen. I bet you guys weren't celebrating Saint Raymond of Penafort today. Saint John the Baptist. With praises of John the Baptist, because yesterday we celebrated Epiphany as the baptism of the Lord. Yeah. It's a feast of praise of John the Baptist I think it was Saint Raymond of Penafort who asked Thomas to, you know, write the book for the Dominicans down there in Spain and so on.

[0:51] So he's the occasion, you know, for my favorite book, huh? Summa Contra Gentiles, so have to bear in mind, so you're in Penafort today, huh?

[1:06] Well, it kind of you know the danger here, of likeness of proportion, right, huh? Okay. And so he says, when the objection says, good act is to the what? Reward of heaven, right, huh?

[1:27] And a bad act, of course, is to the punishment of hell, right? If you're bad in any ways, but the wisdom would say. Now he says, which is better, the good act or the reward?

[1:47] Yeah, the reward is better, right? Well, if punishment is to the bad act as the reward is to the good act. Then punishment should be what? Worse. Worse than the bad act, but is that so? See, this is this over here is culpa, right? So that's one of the arguments on the other side, right? That the punishment is worse, huh? How would you solve that? You know, it seems kind of reasonable, right?

[2:14] Well, the reward seems that it might might be something of a final cause. Yeah. The good act, whereas the bad act is more like an effective cause. Yeah. He says the reward is, in some sense, the end of the good act, right? So if the good act is for the sake of the reward, right? The end is better than what is for the sake of it, right?

[2:35] But the bad act is not for the sake of punishment. Rather, the punishment is to what? Correct the bad act, right? So Thomas kind of turns the. thing, you know? And

[2:56] now, which is worse? See, Uh, mortal sin. to make this a little more, explicit, Or the loss of the vision, you know? Say, which you say is worse? Based on what was said, before it would seem, it would seem that mortal sin is worse than loss of vision. But

[3:26] now, why is that so, right? Why is mortal sin removing a what greater good than this loss of the vision? Why is that so, right?

[3:49] Maybe because it's it's I compare it just with my imagination. I say, well, the mortal sin is the turning away from the vision, whereas that's the consequence if you turn away from it with sin towards something else, then that's just the consequence you lose. the vision. That's, but I don't know if I can. Yeah. Well, Thomas points out that mortal sin is really opposed to the love of God, right?

[4:15] In himself, huh? Or the loss of the vision is the loss of my good, my my enjoyment of God, right? Now that's a great good for me, my enjoyment of God. But is that comparable or equal to the goodness of God in Himself?

[4:39] So it's kind of interesting what Thomas is putting out there about charity, right? Insofar as it's the love of God, right? It's the love of God in Himself, right? It's a little bit like you know, like in the at least in the version of the Act of Contrition you know, I'm heartily sorry and so on. Because. I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell, right?

[5:02] Most of all because they offend Thee my God, who art all good, right? They're referring to what God is in Himself, right? It's opposed, therefore, in some sense, to the goodness of God Himself, which is a much greater good than my enjoyment of Him, greater good as that might be, right? Look how beautiful the way Thomas develops that text.

[5:24] This is from. This is in the fifth article of the first question of the De Malo, right? Jack Storch tells students it's the greatest treatise on evil. If you want to really understand evil? You're going to be disappointed if you're going to get there. You know, You're going to hear all about these sins of the flesh or something? you know. But uh, but the first, you know, question is more general.

[5:52] You know about what what the bad is, and that the bad is found in something good, though, right? And the good is the accidental cause of the bad, and so on. Then he has these last two articles, which are on the distinction between pena and culpa, right, and which is worse, right, the fifth article, right. So it's a beautiful way he develops that. He's quoting, is it?

[6:24] I think, I think it's Gregory's quoting there, where he says, you know, objection is saying, hey, people fear the punishment, right, as if they regard it worse than than sin, right. And he says, well, that's what the bad people are like. The good people run away from this more than from what that, right? And so, as Aristotle says, the virtuous man is the measure of good and bad, right?

[6:51] So you got to judge it not by what the bad man thinks is worse, right? What the good man thinks is worse, huh? And so, beautiful way he develops the things there.

[7:10] Okay. We left off Did you do Article 3 yet here in question thirty. To the third, one goes forward. Thus, it seems that the angel announcing ought not to appear to the virgin by bodily vision,

[7:40] and that means, I guess, by the senses, right? For more worthy is the understandable vision than the bodily one, as Augustine says in the twelfth book about Genesis to the letter. That says he applied it to Jerome who said he'd been too sloppy in his commentary. This is the commentary on Genesis to the letter, right? Right down to the very.

[8:11] And especially more what suitable to the angel himself, right? For by an intellectual or understandable vision, the angel is seen in his own what substance, but in a bodily vision, he is seen in the bodily figure assumed by him.

[8:39] But just as to announcing the divine conception, is appropriate that it comes by what the highest. message So it seems that it should be the highest genus of what vision, huh? Therefore, it seems that the angel announcing should appear to the virgin by intellectual vision, huh?

[9:09] Moreover, an imaginary vision, huh, seems to be more noble than a bodily vision, external senses. Just as imagination is a higher power than the what senses, but the angel appeared to Joseph in what sleep, according to imaginary vision, as is clear in Matthew one twenty

[9:36] and two thirteen nineteen. Therefore, it seems also that he ought to appear to the blessed virgin by an imaginary vision, vision, and not a bodily vision.

[9:50] Moreover, the bodily vision of a spiritual substance stupefies those seeing it, right? Whence also is sung about the virgin in this song there, huh? This is in my notebook. It says here, and for the what feast of Annunciation, of the Blessed Virgin response to Mattins, yeah. And that the Virgin what? Like terrified or something? Yeah.

[10:25] Of the light. Yeah. But it would be better, and that her mind be preserved from such a what disturbance, huh? Therefore, it was not suitable that this announcing come about the bodily vision, huh? So you all convinced of that, huh? Okay. But against this is what Augustine says in a certain sermon, huh? He brings in the Blessed Virgin speaking thus, huh? There came to me the archangel Gabriel, huh?

[11:04] Shining in face, right? Brilliant in her vestments, huh? Walking in, marvelous in the way of coming in, huh? My wife and I have got one picture, of Annunciation there, you know, one of the, you know, in the bedroom there, you know, very very nice one. I gave a talk one time, Annunciation, I brought it in, they're having fun, you know, I was giving the lecture. Taught us a few words about how the painters had treated the Annunciation.

[11:41] You always have a symbol of virginity there, you know, the flowers and so. Do you know who it's by? Do you think we can see it from your art book or something? Yeah, it's it's one of the Flemish, you know, paintings. But anyway, I'll bring it here someday.

[12:05] I answer: It should be said that the angel announcing appeared to the Mother of God by bodily vision, right? That's he's saying the fact, right? That's what in fact he did. Okay. But now this is belief seeking understanding, right, huh? So now Thomas is going to seek to understand why this is suitable, right? At whole convenience for it, huh? This was suitable. This comes together. Convenience, huh?

[12:38] First, as regards what was to be what announced, huh? Because the angel came to announce the incarnation of the invisible God, huh? Whence it was also suitable for the declaration of such a thing, or this thing, that an invisible creature, which an angel is, would take on a form in which he would appear visibly, Secondly, Since also all the apparitions of the Old Testament are ordered to this appearance, huh?

[13:19] By which the Son of God appeared in the flesh. Secondly, it was fitting to the dignity of the Mother of God. Now, this is the one to whom you are announcing, right? Is distinguished from what you are announcing in the first argument. Who, not only in her mind, but also in her bodily womb, would receive the Son of God.

[13:56] Blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And therefore, not only what her mind, but her bodily senses were to be what refreshed by the angelic vision. That's interesting, huh?

[14:19] And third, it was suitable to the certitude of what was to be announced. For those things which are subject to the eyes, we apprehend more certainly than those things which are what imagined.

[14:37] Whence Chrysostom says upon Matthew that the angel, not in sleep, rather visibly, stood before the virgin. For because she was to take a what very great relation, right, from the angel, it was necessary or was suitable before such an event of such a thing, right, by a what? Yeah.

[15:16] That's the nature of man, right? Be more certain, nobody consents. What about the first objection? Isn't it true that intellectual vision is more? To the first, therefore, it should be said that the understandable vision is potior, right?

[15:39] More potent than the imaginary vision or the bodily vision, if it be what alone. But as Augustine himself says, that is a more excellent prophecy, huh? Which has at the same time an intellectual and an imaginary vision than that which has one of them only.

[16:08] The Blessed Virgin not only perceived a bodily vision, right, but also there was a what. Intellectual illumination. When such an apparition was more what noble. Who was the king there in the Old Testament who had the the dream about the seven? The Pharaoh. Yeah, yeah. So he had he had the the imaginary thing, right? And then the prophet comes in, right? And and he explains what they mean, right?

[16:42] So the intellectual vision is is better, right? So Mary had that too, but the one who has both, yeah. Now it would have been more noble if the angel, by a what intellectual vision, it should have seen him in his very what substance, huh? But this does not what undergo the status of man the. viator, huh? On the road, did he see an angel? What?

[17:25] It's got as Dionysius says, everything's got to be what? Fitted yeah. Yeah. On the second objection, what about an imaginary vision? To the second, should be said that imagination is a higher power than the exterior sense. But because the beginning of human knowledge is the sense, right?

[17:55] In it consists most of all what? Certitude. He gives a reason for that, huh? Because always is necessary that the beginnings of knowledge are more what? Certain, huh? And thus Joseph, to whom the angel appeared in sleep, did not have so excellent an apparition as did the what? Blessed virgin, huh? Now you've heard me sometimes define judgment, huh?

[18:29] Give me the definition of judgment. The separation of the true from the false by some beginning in our knowledge. So since the senses are the very beginning of our knowledge, right? It gives a certain certitude to the judgment, right? To go back to the very beginning of our knowledge, huh?

[19:02] Okay. What about this third objection about? This is quite a shock to have this angel appear to you, right? To the third, it should be said that, as Ambrose says upon Luke, huh? We are what? Disturbed, huh?

[19:32] And we are what? Alienated from our what? Affection. When we are what? Bound, yeah, by the uh occurrence or intervention of some superior power, right, huh? And this not only happens in a bodily vision, but also in an imaginary vision, huh? Whence Genesis 15, it is said, when the sun what? Set. Sleep came over Abraham, right? And a great bore, right? And a great darkness invaded him right huh darkness invaded him, right, huh?

[20:20] For such a disturbance of man, not only what is harmful to man, is not so what is not so much harmful to man that one ought to what forego

[20:38] the angelic division, right? Now how can this be? Well, Thomas is going to give a couple of reasons here. First, because from this same thing that man is raised up above himself,

[21:00] this pertains to his what dignity, right? For the lower part is debilitated, right, or weakened, from which the foresaid disturbance comes about, right? Just as natural heat coming to the inside, the outside, what? Yeah,

[21:24] that's that's the what white fear. They say when you're when you're embarrassed, you see, then it's not your body, but but people are saying about you, right? And then your blood rushes out, you know, you know, to the outside of your body to to fight against the exterior thing, right? But when your your body is being threatened with danger, right? Then you turn white because your blood is going back to your heart, you know, to concentrate there to preserve your life.

[21:53] Let's speak of the white fear and the Shakespeare plays upon that in the in the sonnets, right? He has the two kinds of fears because he compared it to the red and the white flowers on the sonnets. Very subtle, Shakespeare. That guy.

[22:10] Should have been a philosopher. He was a bit right. Yeah, yeah. I compare Shakespeare to to Plato, right? They're kind of unique people in the sense that they they had both of them some poetic gift and some philosophical gift, right? And it's kind of unusual, huh? To have that

[22:35] they don't go together. Plato and and Shakespeare, yeah. I mean, Plato, I would say, is a philosopher, but with some poetic gifts, as you can see in the dialogues. Yeah. And that's why the poets prefer Plato to Aristotle because he's kind of poet himself, right? And there's a legend, you know, that Plato was going to be first a poet, right? And then he met Socrates and changed his life, right?

[23:03] And why Socrates? I mean, why Shakespeare is a playwright, but with some philosophical gifts, you know? So they're kind of unusual those two guys, huh? Quite unusual. Totally. Sort of like a poet

[23:27] Well, Benedict has that. He's he's very gifted with music. Yeah. He likes the arts and words and so forth. Yeah. He's very poetic. It's maybe his play or platonic leaning. That's what he thought. And that's interesting.

[23:51] Yeah, I ran across a text there, Thomas there, where Thomas is quoting Augustine or referring to Saint Augustine. Says you know that Augustine tried to follow Plato as far as he could in compatibility with the Catholic faith, right? So you kind of see that that influence of Plato upon Augustine. Okay.

[24:22] That follows through with his own commentary too. It seems to be like he compared his writings to Saint Thomas. Commentary is that more poetic? But then again, it's quite a bit. Yeah. Is that more beautiful than his hymns? No, I was reading the. Have you read the encyclical of Pius the Twelfth, Doctor Mellifluus No, Bernard, Saint Bernard. Yeah, yeah. That's very interesting. And you know he's in some sense more poetic than Saint Thomas is the way he writes.

[24:59] It's kind of beautiful the way they describe. I was reading this little thing on the Blessed Virgin. These four sermons on the Blessed Virgin, and they're really kind of interesting. I started reading the introduction, just seeing things they're saying about it, and uh, when they refer to this encyclical of Pius XII, So you can look it up on on. Yeah. Actually, you go to Pius XII, they're under the the encyclicals under Pius XII, they're listed in kind of Latin alphabetic order, right?

[25:27] So you can look down. You know. I think it's Mellifluus Doctor or something like that. The title given to him, but but that that name is interesting, right? Yeah. That's what we refer to the poet huh Mm hmm And always for sh. Shakespeare's honey words, you know, honey, honey, his sugared sonnets and so on, you know. If I these references to these things, and that's what I have

[25:51] to call the philosopher, you know. Now this first argument that Thomas gives here, haven't you heard this described? You know, people like, you know, like Saint Teresa of Avila and so on, when they go into this kind of ecstasy, right, the lower part of them, their body and so on, is almost what weakened, right? Because but the higher part is what raised up, right, and gets off the ground too, right, but.

[26:23] That goes with the game, right? Of being raised up into something very high. Thomas, someone's like you're leaving your body, huh? Before it's very, would say Paul has his vision, right? It's carried up to the third heaven, right? Which Thomas understands as the heaven of the what first hierarchy, right? There's the seraphim and so on, right? He's really seeing in a passing way God and so on, but he doesn't know where he's in his body anymore, right?

[26:53] So your body's kind weakened by this. Second, because as Origen says, huh? You're always quoting at our chair, right there. Uh, it's kind of interesting, you know, huh? Because uh

[27:13] You can stop walk yeah, I mean a lot of times you know people who make A serious mistake there, and about the faith, you know, we we think we're all going to dismiss them, you know, not be that guy anymore. You know, when you come across that, actually, kind of put aside, you see a guy what's they see something mistake, you know, but. I think about Benedict's one on Origin.

[27:33] He's really, he's like, he says, "I encourage you to to read this great teacher. " He sees them as the for the scripture. Yeah. Yeah.

[27:45] But it is really strong. It's really strong. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I mean, reading. You know, again, Thomas' commentary exposition of the Gospel of Saint John, right? Of course, the people refers to most are Augustine and and Chrysostom, right? Yeah. But then, Origen is probably third that he mentions, You know, when he's giving interpretations, you know, and sometimes you know, Augustine understands it this way, and and Chrysostom says this, and sometimes it'd be an Origen, you know, and so it's.

[28:13] It's curious too, because when he gets to Tertullian, he's more he's more cautionary, and he says, "When I look at Tertullian, always remember that the how how cautious the the theologian has to be, and you know, he says it's always a sobering the humility the, the the one who uses his mind must have humility. He makes that sort of... He loves his folks origin because he saw it was fueled by the yeah his love of scripture was his love of Christ, and he had that

[28:48] yeah. So it's kind of interesting. It's two two two cat pieces. I think you did on Origin. Maybe even three. Second, because as Origin says upon Luke, the angel appearing, knowing this to be human nature, right? Huh. First, what calms down? You might say the disturbance of the man, huh? Okay. Whence both to Zachary and to Mary, after the what Turbationem, the disturbance, he says ne timeas right now.

[29:26] A little bit like John Paul the second, right after this Polish guy got the pope. Have no fear. Polish guy there in the in the package store, you know, and somebody came in you at the time. He says the elected pope. I mean, a Polish guy pope, of course. He thought they were pulling his leg, you know. He couldn't believe that one of his own, you know.

[29:55] One of our Maronite priests, his father is Polish, yeah, but mother's Lebanese. So we got all kinds of phone calls from the Maronite clergy when John Paul was elected, congratulating him. Yeah. He says, "You wait, there'll be a Maronite patriarch who's Polish next. "

[30:14] That's when they made up that. I know when he died, I thought that Pratsinger was going to be elected because the only guy who could be elected at that time, you know. But but but if this one dies, I don't know who would be elected. It would be. But you never know. Comes out of the shadows. Whence

[30:45] both to Zachary and to Mary, right? After the disturbance, he says, "ne timeas, do not fear," right? And on account of this, as is read in the life of Anthony, it is not difficult the discretion of good and bad spirits, huh? For if after fear there succeeds a joy, huh?

[31:09] My spirit rejoices in God, my savior, right, Gaudium, right? From God or from the Lord, we know the aid to have come, right? Because the security of the present soul is an indication of the Majesty, right? But if the fear that was brought about remains, it's the enemy who is seen.

[31:35] Now that disturbance of the Virgin was suitable to the virginal, what? verecundia. Because as Ambrose says upon Luke, to trepidare is a virgin's right, To be, fearful, and to be nervous at the approach of all men, and to the breath, of men, yeah. But some say, huh,

[32:12] that since the Blessed Virgin was accustomed to the visions of angels, she was not disturbed at the vision of the angel. This is kind of interesting. Doesn't name who these people are, but

[32:24] my text. Oh, he yeah, he gives maybe swords in the katana. Yeah, yeah, but doesn't name who they might be. She was not disturbed by the vision of the angel, but she was an admiration of those things which were said to her by the angel. Now notice, huh? The term admiratio, right, as opposed to stupefaction, right? Oh. Because admiration is the beginning of philosophy, you know, wonder, is the beginning of learning, and stupefaction is kind of a what impediment, yeah, stupefied, you know, you can't proceed at all.

[33:07] And why does she have this wonder? Because she did not think great things of herself, huh? That's her humility. Whence the evangelist does not say that she was disturbed in the vision of the angel, but in his speech. It's interesting. So, I'd like to talk to the Virgin about that. I think he has it in his commentary and asked you about Joseph had a higher vision of the Blessed Virgin, because she had this bodily vision.

[33:42] He had this sort of vision of dreams. So, like, why didn't why was that appropriate? And somewhere in there, he treats of it. He says because the marvel that was announced to the virgin had no precedent whatsoever, and she needed a great surge of the sense, she had no other index to go by. Whereas Joseph already had the sensible vision of his wife who was pregnant. but he knew he wasn't the father.

[34:06] He knew that she was still pure and holy. So he needed something a higher type of vision. He didn't need the index of the senses anymore because he had it there. But that wasn't so much visual, just a sensible thing.

[34:21] I assume the text in Thomas there in John is a little bit off, but you know why was John the disciple whom Christ loved, not the one he loved, but the one who kind of by tendency why didn't love him in particular?

[34:40] When when this text of Thomas says there, he gives three reasons, right? And one, of course, is is the purity of John, right? Virginity of John, And secondly, the excellence of his mind, right? Which went to the highest things, and then the fervor of his what love for Christ. It gives us kind of three reasons. Kind of interesting. Okay.