159. Knowledge of Immaterial Substances and God

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Fundamental Problem: What is More Understandable vs. More Understandable to Us #

• The distinction: Things that are most understandable in themselves may be least understandable to us
• Aristotle’s principle: What excels sensible things is not grasped by sense, not only because they corrupt sensory organs, but because they are not proportioned to our sensory powers
• Analogy: Just as ultrasonic frequencies are not proportioned to human hearing (though dogs can hear them), immaterial substances are not proportioned to our understanding in our present state
• The cause illuminates the effect but is less known to us; we often know effects while remaining uncertain about causes
• We know things more when they are confused and vague than when they are distinct and precise

Knowledge and Proportion of Knower to Known #

• Required: A proportion of the object to the knowing power, as of the active to the passive, and of perfection to the perfectible
• Immaterial substances are not proportioned to our understanding according to our present state of existence
• Therefore they cannot be understood by us, though this does not mean they are not understood by themselves or by each other

Arguments Against Understanding Immaterial Substances #

First Objection (from Augustine/Dionysius): Material things can lead us to contemplate immaterial substances

• Response: We can be led to some imperfect knowledge, but not knowledge of what immaterial substances are in themselves; only knowledge that they are and what they are not, and something by way of likeness to our own mind

Second Objection: Science and definitions exist about immaterial substances; therefore they can be understood by us (citing John Damascene on angels)

• Response: We treat immaterial substances in sciences primarily through negation—by removing properties of material bodies. Example: Aristotle knew celestial bodies by negating the corruptibility of lower bodies. Immaterial substances are known negatively, as the very word “immaterial” indicates—through removal (negatio) of material properties
• We also know them by way of relation to material things: God as “unmoved mover” (mover = relation to material things; unmoved = negation)

Third Objection: Our soul is an immaterial substance and understands itself through its own act; therefore other immaterial substances can be understood through their effects

• Response: Our soul understands itself through its own understanding (act), which shows its power and nature. However, neither through this nor through other effects found in material things can we know fully the power and nature of immaterial substances, because material effects do not equal the powers of immaterial substances
• A fortiori this is true of God: Romans 1:20 speaks of knowing God’s virtus (power) and nature through creatures, but this does not equal His whole power, and therefore does not give adequate knowledge of His substance

Fourth Objection: The Avempachean position—we can arrive at understanding immaterial substances through understanding material substances

• By progressively abstracting the quidditas (what-it-is) from matter, if that quidditas contains something of matter, we abstract again; eventually arriving at a quidditas altogether without matter
• Thomas’s Response: This would work only if immaterial substances were the forms and species of material things (as Platonists held). But since immaterial substances have an entirely different definition from the quidditas of material things, no amount of abstraction from material quiddities will arrive at the immaterial substance itself
• Therefore: We cannot perfectly understand immaterial substances through material substances

The Question of Knowledge Through Material Things #

Can we achieve any knowledge of immaterial things through material things?

• In an imperfect way, yes, we can ascend to some knowledge of immaterial things
• However, we cannot ascend to perfect knowledge because there is no sufficient comparison of material things to immaterial things
• The likenesses taken from material things are much unlike the immaterial things themselves
• Dionysius himself acknowledges this: immaterial things can be understood only perhaps by way of likeness, but these likenesses are not exact

Knowledge of Angels vs. Knowledge of God #

Created immaterial substances (angels):

• They come together with material substances in a logical genus (we have a common notion: things that exist not in another, i.e., substances)
• They do NOT come together in a natural genus because the fundamental definition of potency/ability/matter differs between them
• Therefore: Through likenesses of material things, something affirmatively can be known about angels by common notion, though not according to their particular kind of thing (their quidditas)

God:

• God does NOT come together with material things in either a natural or logical genus
• God is in no way in a genus (a fundamental doctrine about God)
• Therefore: Through likenesses of material things, nothing affirmative can be known about God in this way
• We can only know God negatively and through His causal relation to creatures

The Medieval Opinion About God as First Known #

Common Medieval View: God must be the first thing known to us because:

• That in which all other things are known, and by which we judge about other things, must be first known (as light is to the eye; first principles to understanding)
• All things are known in the light of the first truth
• Augustine: By the first truth, by eternal truth, we judge all things
• Therefore, God is that which is first known by us

Thomas’s Response - The Crucial Distinction:

• First known: The material thing whose quidditas we first understand from sensible images (this is what we know first in reality)
• That by which all things are known: The divine light (or natural understanding as participation in divine light)
• These are in different orders
• God is not the first thing known but rather the first cause of our power of knowing
• Just as light is not the first thing seen but that by which other things are seen, so God is not the first thing understood but that by which understanding understands
• Our natural light of understanding is nothing other than a certain impressio (impression) of the first truth
• In the light of the first truth we understand and judge all things insofar as our light of understanding (natural or the light of faith) is an impression of the first truth
• But because the light itself is not what is understood but that by which something is understood, God is even less the first understood by our understanding

Natural Understanding vs. Reasoned Out Understanding #

Key Distinction:

• Reasoning (discursive thinking) is to understanding as motion is to rest
• Reasoning involves going from one thing to another; understanding is a kind of rest
• Most of our understanding results from reasoning; we must think something out before we finally understand it
• This Thomas calls reasoned out understanding (episteme in Greek from the verb meaning “to come to a halt”)

Natural Understanding (nous in Greek, intellectus in Latin):

• The understanding before reasoning
• If there were no understanding before reasoning, there would be nothing to reason from
• All our knowledge goes back to this natural understanding
• This natural understanding participates in a way in the divine understanding
• Examples of natural understanding: First principles known by themselves (Law of Identity, “nothing can be and not be”; “the whole is greater than the part”; “nothing is before itself”)
• These are statements known to themselves by all men

The Role of Natural Understanding in Knowledge #

• All understanding goes back to natural understanding
• We naturally judge everything else by natural understanding
• This is how to correctly interpret Augustine’s statement about judging by the first truth: it refers to our natural understanding, which is a participatio (participation) in divine understanding
• Augustine does not make the distinction precisely; pious medieval readers took his words to mean we are directly seeing God in Himself, but this is incorrect
• The truth is that we have a likeness of divine understanding in our natural understanding, not a direct vision of God Himself before the Beatific Vision

Key Arguments #

Argument from Proportion #

1. Knowledge requires proportion of object to knowing power
2. Immaterial substances are not proportioned to our embodied understanding
3. Therefore, immaterial substances cannot be understood by us in this life
4. Material effects do not reveal the full power of immaterial substances
5. Therefore, we cannot know immaterial substances perfectly through their material effects

Argument from the Nature of Our Knowledge #

1. Our understanding naturally abstracts from sensible images and imagination
2. Immaterial substances have no sensible images (“there is no picture of your guardian angel”)
3. We cannot know by abstraction from images what has no images
4. Therefore, immaterial substances cannot be known by us through abstraction

Argument from Negation and Analogy (How We Actually Know Immaterial Things) #

1. We know immaterial substances through negation (removing material properties)
2. We know them through relation to material things (as causes of effects)
3. These modes give us imperfect, partial knowledge
4. For God, even this is limited because God is in no genus

Argument for Limited Angelic Knowledge #

1. Angels share a logical genus with material substances (both are substances not existing in another)
2. But they do not share a natural genus (their fundamental definition differs)
3. Therefore, we can know something affirmative about angels through common notions
4. But we cannot know their particular quidditas (what they are in themselves)

Important Definitions #

Quidditas (What-it-is/Essence) #

• The particular nature or essence of a thing
• The fundamental definition of what makes a thing what it is
• We cannot know the quidditas of immaterial substances through material things

Impressio (Impression) #

• How divine light relates to our natural understanding
• Our natural understanding is an impressio of the first truth
• Not a direct vision but a participation through impression

Negatio (Negation) #

• The primary way we come to know immaterial substances
• We know what they are NOT rather than what they are
• Example: “Immaterial” itself is a negation (not material)

Logical Genus vs. Natural Genus #

• Logical genus: A common conceptual category (both angels and material things are “substances”)
• Natural genus: A shared fundamental nature; things in the same natural genus share the same definition of being and potentiality
• Angels and material things share logical but not natural genus
• God shares neither with creatures

Participatio (Participation) #

• How creatures relate to God regarding knowledge
• Our natural understanding participates in divine understanding
• This is not a direct seeing of God but a likeness of His understanding

Examples & Illustrations #

Ultrasonic Hearing #

• Dogs can hear ultrasonic frequencies that humans cannot
• Not because the frequencies are unreal or don’t exist
• But because they are not proportioned to human hearing capacity
• Similarly: Immaterial substances exist and are understandable in themselves, but not proportioned to our present understanding

Cause and Effect in Knowledge #

• We often know the effect before knowing the cause
• The cause is more illuminating but less known to us
• We are often sure about the effect but uncertain about the cause
• The effect is fully knowable only in the light of the cause
• Example: We see smoke (effect) and are sure about it, but may be uncertain about the fire (cause) that produces it

Confused vs. Distinct Knowledge #

• A wooden chair: We know it vaguely as a wooden chair
• But what kind of wood? We don’t know
• What we know with greatest certainty (wooden chair) is the least precise knowledge
• What is more known (the precise species and origin of the wood) is less known to us

Wine Tasting #

• One can taste dry red wine with confidence
• But identify it as specifically Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley, 1985? Much more difficult
• What is more precisely known is less known to us; what is more vaguely known is more certainly known

Geometry and Divine Light #

• Augustine’s example: Geometry is not in vain just because a cat cannot understand it
• Similarly, immaterial substances are not in vain if not understood by us; they are understood by themselves and by each other
• The claim that something must be understood by us or it is purposeless conflates different orders of knowledge

Guardian Angels and Wonder #

• When a soul sees its guardian angel after death, the angel’s excellence and beauty will be so overwhelming that the soul might think, “This must be God!”
• The angel must correct: “No, I am not God; you are beholding a created substance”
• This illustrates the infinite distance even between angels and God, and how even the lowest created intellectual substance far exceeds our material experience
• Reference to Shakespeare’s The Tempest: Miranda’s wonder at seeing men other than her father—“O brave new world, that has such creatures in it!” (from Miranda’s name meaning wonder/marvel)

The Separated Soul After Death #

• After death, the soul will be living entirely in the immaterial world (before reuniting with the body)
• This is profoundly strange: all one’s life in the material world, then existence purely in the immaterial
• When the body is regained, it will be entirely subordinate to the soul
• This represents a completely different mode of existence ahead

Questions Addressed #

Can we know anything about immaterial substances? #

• Partial Answer: Yes, in an imperfect way. Through material things, we can know that immaterial substances are, what they are not (through negation), and something by way of analogy and relation to material things.
• But: We cannot know what they are in themselves (their particular quidditas)

Why does Thomas distinguish between what is more understandable in itself and what is more understandable to us? #

• Because understanding requires proportion between knower and known
• Material things are less understandable in themselves but more understandable to us because we have natural access to them through sensation
• This explains why we cannot directly understand God or angels despite their greater intelligibility in themselves

Is God the first thing known by us? #

• No: God is the first cause of our knowing and the light by which we know, but not the first thing known
• The first thing we know is the quidditas of material things abstracted from sensible images
• God is that by which we understand, not what we first understand

How should we interpret Augustine’s claim that we judge all things by the first truth? #

• Augustine speaks imprecisely compared to Thomas
• The truth is: We judge all things through our natural understanding, which is a participation in divine understanding
• This is not a direct vision of God Himself in this life
• We possess a likeness of divine understanding, not the divine understanding itself

Why can we know something affirmative about angels but nothing affirmative about God? #

• Angels share a logical genus with material things (both are substances not existing in another)
• God shares no genus with creatures (God is not in any genus)
• Therefore we can use common notions to know something about angels
• But we can know nothing affirmative about God, only negative knowledge and knowledge through causation

Notable Quotes #

“If you want to have a picture of your guardian angel, there is no such thing.”

• Illustrates why immaterial substances cannot be known through images as material things are

“Brave new world, that has such creatures in it!”

• Shakespeare’s The Tempest, referenced to capture the wonder and overwhelming superiority of even created immaterial substances

“This is a short that is great in his power.”

• On Aristotle’s use of brevis (short)—brevity is the soul of wit; what is small in size can be great in power

“The invisible things of God are understood through the things which have been made.”

• Romans 1:20, cited by the Church (Vatican I) as proof that we can have knowledge of God through creatures, though not of His essence