23. God's Immutability and Real Relations in the Incarnation

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

God’s Immutability and the Incarnation #

• God’s unchanging substance is established early in both the Summa Theologiae and Summa Congenitiae
• In the Incarnation, there is no change made in the divine nature itself
• The human nature is drawn into unity with the divine Person
• The distinction between secundum rem (according to reality) and secundum rationem (according to reason) is crucial: the union is real in the human nature but only rational in the divine

Real Relations vs. Relations of Reason #

• Real relations are grounded in the actual nature of things
• Relations of reason exist only through the mind’s comparison of things
• Example: When we say God is our Creator, this is a real relation in us (creatures truly depend on God) but only a relation of reason in God (God doesn’t change by creating)
• The relation is a “one-way street”: creatures are really related to God; God is only rationally related to creatures

The Foundation of Relations #

• Real relations require a foundation in the thing itself
• Relations are founded either on quantity (e.g., equality, being taller) or on action/passion (e.g., father-son, teacher-student)
• The foundation must be real for the relation to be real
• The unity of a relation is determined by the unity of its cause/foundation, not by the multiplicity of its terms

Relations Founded on Quantity #

• Being taller or shorter than someone is a real relation grounded in the real quantity of height
• One person’s height (one real quantity) grounds their being taller than many different people (one real relation, not many)
• Example: A man of the same height as two different men has one relation of equality, not two, because the foundation (his height) is one
• The relation is very real: it affects how other beings interact with us (Berquist’s cat example—if he were mouse-sized, the cat would treat him differently)

Relations Founded on Action/Passion #

• Paternity/filiation are founded on the real action of generation
• One man teaching many students establishes one real relation of teaching (founded on one science/knowledge)
• One man has one real relation of sonship to both father and mother, founded on one nativity/generation
• If there are diverse causes of different species, there can be multiple real relations: a man teaching grammar to some students and logic to others has two real relations of teaching

The Weakness of Relation as a Category #

• Relation is unique among the ten Aristotelian categories because relatives secundum esse have no being in themselves
• Unlike quantity or quality, which place something in a subject, relation only signifies “toward something”
• Relations exist “in transit towards another” rather than remaining in a subject
• This explains why some philosophers thought all relations were merely mental constructs
• However, real relations do exist through their causes

The Asymmetry of Relations #

• Not all relations are symmetric or reciprocal
• Knowledge presents an asymmetry: the knower is really related to the known thing, but the known thing is not really related back to the knower (only by reason)
• Reason: Knowledge exists in the knower as an immaterial reception of form; the thing known doesn’t change by being known
• Love, by contrast, is reciprocal: both lover and loved have real relations because both have something real (desire in the lover, goodness in the loved thing)
• In love, the lover’s heart goes out to the thing itself; in knowledge, the thing comes into the knower

Key Arguments #

Why Relations Are Real Despite Their Weakness #

• A relation has being through its cause/foundation
• When the cause is real (quantity, action, divine substance), the relation is real
• The relation depends on the cause but is not thereby merely mental
• Being taller than someone is real because height (quantity) is real
• Paternity is real because generation (action) is real

The Unity of Relations According to Their Cause #

• One cause = one relation, even when there are many terms
• One man’s height grounds his being equal to many men (one relation)
• One teacher’s knowledge grounds teaching of many students (one relation)
• One generation grounds paternity to both father and mother (one relation)
• This prevents infinite accidents from accumulating in one subject

Why God’s Relations to Creatures Are Not Real in God #

• Creatures truly depend on God, so the relation “creature to God” is real in creatures
• God doesn’t change by creating; creation adds nothing to the divine substance
• Therefore, “God is Creator” is only a relation of reason in God
• The ratio (rational foundation) is not false because it rests on something real in creatures (their dependence on God)
• This exemplifies Aristotle’s principle that some things are relatives not because they themselves are referred, but because others are referred to them

Divine Relations in the Trinity #

• Relations of God spoken extemporally (in time) are relations of reason
• Eternal relations (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) are real relations
• They must be real because there is a real order and distinction among the persons
• In God’s substance, there is a certain order that constitutes these relations
• The relations are identical with the divine substance itself (unlike creatures, where relations are accidents)

Important Definitions #

Real Relation #

A relation that has a foundation in the nature of things themselves, existing outside the mind. Grounded in either quantity or action/passion.

Relation of Reason (relatio rationis) #

A relation that exists only in the mind’s act of comparing things; it has no foundation in the things themselves. Example: right and left in a column, before and after in past events.

Foundation (fundamentum) of a Relation #

The real feature or cause in a thing that grounds the relation. For equality: quantity (height). For paternity: generation (action).

Secundum rem #

According to reality; what actually exists in the nature of things.

Secundum rationem #

According to reason; what exists only through the mind’s consideration or comparison.

Examples & Illustrations #

Height and Being Taller #

• A man’s height is a real quantity in him
• His being taller than others is a real relation founded on this quantity
• If he is the same height as two different men, he has one real relation of equality (not two), because his height is one
• If he grows taller than two shorter men and one of them grows to match his height, the relation changes (no longer taller than that one), but the cause (his height) may not have changed

The Cat and the Mouse (Berquist’s Personal Example) #

• He observed his daughter’s cat playing with a caught mouse
• He reflected: if he were the size of the mouse, the cat would treat him very differently
• His actual size is much larger than the cat’s size
• This size difference is something very real, not merely a mental comparison
• It genuinely affects how others would interact with him

Knowledge and the Knowable #

• A scientist truly knows an atom
• The scientist is really related to the atom (knowledge exists in the scientist’s mind)
• The atom is not really changed or related back to the scientist’s knowledge
• The form of the thing exists in the atom naturally; it exists in the scientist’s mind immaterially
• This asymmetry shows that not all relations are reciprocal

Creator and Creature #

• Creatures truly depend on God for existence (real relation in creatures)
• God doesn’t change by creating creatures (no real relation in God)
• Yet we can truly say “God is Creator” because the ratio is founded on something real: creatures’ actual dependence on God
• This exemplifies how a relation can be real on one side only

Father, Son, and One Nativity #

• One man is the son of both his father and his mother
• He has one real relation of sonship, not two (unlike having two relations if he were taught two different subjects by the same teacher)
• The foundation is one: his single nativity/generation from both parents
• This demonstrates that the unity of a relation follows from the unity of its cause, not the multiplicity of its terms

Teaching Grammar and Logic #

• If one man teaches grammar to some students and logic to others (or the same student)
• He has two different real relations of teaching
• Why two? Because the causes are different in species (grammar and logic are different sciences)
• The specificity of the cause determines the specificity of the relation

Questions Addressed #

How can the Incarnation involve no change in God? #

Answer: The union of divine and human natures is real in the human nature (the human nature is truly united to the divine Person) but only rational in the divine nature. In God, the relation is not a real accident added to the divine substance; it exists only through reason. God remains absolutely unchanged.

Is being taller than someone a real relation? #

Answer: Yes, because it is founded on a real quantity (height). The reality of the relation depends on the reality of its cause (quantity). This is demonstrated in practice: a significant size difference genuinely affects how creatures interact.

Can one real relation have many terms? #

Answer: Yes, when the cause is one. One man’s height grounds his being equal to many different men (one real relation to many terms). One teacher’s science grounds teaching many students (one real relation). The unity of the cause ensures the unity of the relation, preventing infinite accidents.

Why is the relation from creature to God real, but not from God to creature? #

Answer: The creature truly depends on God for existence; this dependence is something real in the creature. God, being unchanging and infinite, doesn’t depend on or change through creating creatures. The relation is real in creatures; in God, it is only a relation of reason (the mind considering the creature’s dependence on God).

How are the Father and Son related in the Trinity? #

Answer: By real relations founded on generation and procession (divine action/passion in an analogical sense, not temporal action). These are eternal relations, not temporal ones. Unlike creatures’ relations to God, the Trinity’s internal relations are real in both persons involved. The relations are identical with the divine substance itself.

Why is knowledge not reciprocal but love can be? #

Answer: Knowledge is asymmetric because it exists in the knower as an immaterial form; the thing known doesn’t acquire the knowledge relation (it doesn’t change by being known). Love is reciprocal because it goes out from the lover to the thing itself; the loved thing has something real (goodness) that grounds the lover’s relation, and the lover has something real (desire/will directed to the beloved) that grounds the beloved’s relation back.

Notable Quotes #

“The fact that I’m quite a bit taller than the cat, this is something very real. She might be thinking about it, though.” (On the reality of relations founded in quantity)

“It’s easier to jump into the water, the ocean, than to get the ocean inside you.” (On the difference between love, which goes out to the thing itself, and knowledge, which brings the thing into the knower)

“Relations are very hard to understand… The difficulty in understanding can be in the thing itself you’re trying to understand, because it hardly is, or it can be in you because of the weakness of your mind. In relation, you get hit at both ends.” (On why relations are philosophically difficult)

“It’s a one-way street.” (On God’s relation to creatures being real in creatures but only rational in God)