Prima Pars
Lecture 88: God's Will of Sign and Its Distinction from Divine Will

Transcript
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Okay, whether the will of God is of bad things, everything good that comes to be God wills, but for bad things to come about is what? Good. For Augustine says in the Enchiridion, although those things which are bad insofar as they are bad are not good, right? Nevertheless, that there be not only good things, but also that there be bad things is good. Therefore, God wills bad things, huh? I know, I got a gust in there, huh? Moreover, Dionysius says in the fourth chapter about the divine names, that the bad, right, confers to the what? What? Contributes to the perfection of the what? Universe, huh? And Augustine says in the Enchiridion, huh? From all things consists the admirable beauty of the universe, huh? In which even that which is said to be bad is well, what? Order, right? And placed in its place, it more eminently commends the what? Good. So that they are more pleasing and more, what? Praiseworthy when they are compared to the what? Bad. But God wishes everything that pertains to the perfection and the beauty of the universe, huh? Because this is what God most of all wills and creatures. Therefore, God wills bad things, huh? Remind me again, you know, what the poet does in the play, right? If you had all good people, you wouldn't have just a great play, right? The next guy wasn't black, but he wasn't black. Yeah, yeah. And would you appreciate beautiful things if there were not other things? Of course, Heraclitus was always saying, you know, it's not good for men to have all that they want. It's not. It's hunger that makes food good and all these other things. But there are some goods that couldn't be. There couldn't be the patience of the martyrs without the cruelty of the persecutors and so on. And Augustine says that theology developed because of heresy, right? So you can see during the Tristic period how some heretic denies an article of the faith and sometimes tries to defend it, right? His error by scripture or by, you know, something that sounds good in philosophy. And so in order to defend that article, you had to answer the objections and you came to a greater understanding because of this, huh? That's interesting. Paul, right? It's necessary to put these divisions and to set them up right now. Yeah, yeah. Those who are proved. Okay. Moreover, bad things to come about and not come about are contradictorily opposed. But God does not will that bad things do not come to be, right? Because since some bad things do come about, the will of God would not always be, what? Fulfilled. Therefore, God wills bad things to come about. There must be some distinctions about the... Yeah, yeah, yeah. He made here. But again, this is what Augustine says, the book on the 83 question. That's quite a book in this. By no wise man, huh? Does a man become worse, right? But God is more outstanding than any wise man. Much less, by God as an author, then, does someone become worse, right? For by that author, when it is said, it is said by that one, what? Willing. Therefore, not willingly does God make a man, what? Or God, by willing, does not make a man worse. But it stands that by any evil or anything bad, something becomes worse. Therefore, God does not wish bad things, huh? I answer it should be said, that since the ratio, definition of the good, is the notion of the desirable, right? So what did Aristotle says, that from the beginning of the Nicomachean Ethics, huh? The good is what all the want. Yeah. So it's kind of deductively there. We talked about that a long time ago, didn't we? Yeah, we had the dialectic about it and so on. But the bad is what? Opposed to the good. But it is impossible that something bad, as such, right, be desired, huh? Neither by a natural desire, nor by the animal desire, huh? The passions. Nor by the intellectual desire, which is the will. But something bad is desired, what? Perachidens, huh? Okay. Insofar as it follows upon something, what? Good, huh? Now the distinction between the perisea and the perachidens, in a way, is even before the distinction of simply and sequin and quit, right? And this appears in every desire. For the natural agent does not intend lack or corruption, but it intends a form to which is joined the lack of another form, and the generation of one, which is the corruption of another, right? So when the carpenter takes the wood, does he intend to what? To destroy the shape that's in the wood? No. He intends to give it the shape of a chair or a table or something, which, what, involves the, what, elimination of the previous shape it had, huh? That's kind of prejudice, right? He's not intending that as such. He's intending the chair or the table. Okay. For the Leo, the lion, right, in killing the, what? The what? The deer, the deer, serve him, yeah. Intends food, to which is joined the killing of the, what? Animal. Likewise, the fornicator, this is an example now for moral matter, right? The fornicator intends pleasure, to which is joined the deformity of guilt. Now, the bad, which is joined to something good, is the lack of another good, right? Never, therefore, is the bad desired, except not even prejudice. Unless the good to which is joined the bad, right, is more desired than the good, which is, what? Deprived through the bad, huh? But God, what? Wills no good more than his own, what? Goodness. But he wills, nevertheless, some good more than some other good, right? Whence the bad of, what? Guilt, did you say? Which deprives the order to the divine good, God in no way, what? Wills, huh? But the bad of a natural defect, right? Or the bad of punishment he wills, right? By willing some good, to which is joined such a, what? Bad. Just as in willing justice, he wishes, what? Punishment. Pain. And in willing the order of nature to be observed, he wishes some things to be naturally, what? Corrupted, yeah. So does God, in that sense, will the suffering of the damned, would you say? But does he will the suffering of the damned in the way he wills his justice, our justice? So does God, in that sense, will the suffering of the damned in the way he wills his justice, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system, our justice system. Because he wills the justice, what? For itself. Yeah, yeah. But that cannot be without the suffering of the damned. He doesn't will the suffering or the pain. Yeah, such, yeah. He doesn't will the death of the deer. But he wills the, what? The dinner of the lion, as such, right? He doesn't will the death of the martyrs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Now, I reply to the first objection ground from Augustine there, right? Although those things which are, what? That, insofar as the bad, Augustine said, are not good. Nevertheless, that not only the good, but also the to-be-bad things is good. Okay. To the first, therefore, it should be said that some say... You might have a note here, down to Hugo, the Saint-Victor. Some say that although God does not will bad things, he wills, nevertheless, bad things to be or to come about. Because although bad things are not good, nevertheless, it is good that bad things be or come to be. Which, they say, therefore, because those things which in themselves are bad, right, are ordered to some good. Which order they believe to be implied in this that is said for bad things to be or to come about. But this is not rightly said, Thomas says, because the bad is not ordered to the good per se, as such, but per accident. For it is outside the intention of the one sitting, that from this there follows some good. Just as it is outside the intention of the tyrants, that from their persecutions will stand out, be clarified, be patients of the martyrs, right? And the same thing you say about the heretics, right, it's not from their heresy that they intend to build up the understanding of the faith, right? But that is the effect of it. And therefore, it is not able to be said that such an order to the good is implied through this that it is said that it is good for the bad to be or to come about. Because nothing is judged according to that which belongs to it per accident, but according to that which belongs to it per se. This runs through, huh? Conic used to say he could give you the whole history of monophilosophy by neglecting the distinction between the per se and the prodigy ends and give you a method of inventing as many philosophies as you want, all of which would be false, right? And Karl Marx says that man is perfected by making, huh? Is that true per se? Because making is a perfecting of the, what? The made, per se. It's per action, again, that it's a perfecting of the, what? Maker, right? It's insofar as he doesn't know how to make. And therefore, he's not a maker, right? It's certainly not insofar as he's learning how to make by making that he's a maker, right? Because insofar as he's learning how to make, he's not really yet a maker. And the same thing about the teacher, huh? Does teaching perfect the teacher or the student? Yeah. But every teacher might tell you that, oh, gee, whiz, I learn something when I teach. Yeah. But insofar as the teacher is learning what he's teaching, he's not a, what? Yeah. Because insofar as he's learning, he doesn't know. I want to assume he's not a teacher because he doesn't know what he's teaching. It's accidental. It's very accidental to the teacher. They don't know what he's teaching. He's not a teacher at all. It's accidental to the teacher that you don't know what you're teaching. You're not a teacher at all. You don't know what you're teaching. How many of your colleagues down the years were manifestations of that? You're esteemed. Pretty kind of just to say, when I was at Laval, you know, he'd been teaching the physics of Aristotle, right, since the 1935s. And he said he still sees something new every time he does this, right? In the same way, you know, I find that with a great book like that now. In that sense, these books have to be read and re-read, huh? That's even true about a great work of fiction, right? You know, like C.S. Lewis says, what do you do if someone says, oh yeah, I've read Homer, I've read Shakespeare now. What else is there to read? Now, the second one, the objection here from Dionysius, right? About the beauty universe requires the bad. To the second, it should be said that the bad does not work for the perfection and beauty universe except progeny. Once this, the Dionysius says, that the bad is, what, conferring to the perfection, the universe, he concludes leading in as if to something, what, unbefitting, right? As if he's arguing to, what, in absurdity, right? It follows from this, huh? Kind of surprising he says that, huh? Now, to the third, mala, fieria, and non fieris, and contradictory opposita, but God does not wish bad things to not come about, because then his will would be frustrated, right? They do come about. To the third, it should be said that although bad things to come about and bad things not to come about are opposed contradictorily, nevertheless, to will bad things to come about, and to will bad things not to become, are not opposed, what, contradictorily, since both are, what, affirmative? God, therefore, neither wills that bad things come to be, nor does he will bad things to not come to be, but he wills to permit bad things to come about, right? And this is what? Good, right, huh? Okay. So God, does he want me to sin? Does he will for me to sin? Well, that would obviously be bad, right? But does he will that I do not sin? If God's will is that I should never sin, but then I would sin, right? Maybe that's true about Christ, huh? That's human nature, right? So, he wills to allow me to sin, right? But why does he will to allow that sin, right? Because obviously he has to take away free will and so on, right? Okay. So, he may allow sin and evils because of greater goods, right? Okay. So, let's see. Up to Article 10 next time, huh? Yeah, we were really flying through. Yeah, but if you understood anything, that's another question. Son of 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 correctly. St. Thomas Aquinas, Angelic Doctor, and help us to understand what you have written. Amen. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen. So in question 19, article 10 today. To the 10th one proceeds thus. Thus, it seems that God does not have free judgment. That's kind of interesting. Instead of saying, what, free choice, in Latin you have liberum arbitrium, which means free, what, judgment actually. And when you go back to our freedom, it's really based on the fact that our reason can, what, judge things in infinity different ways. And so it goes back to liberum arbitrium, that you have freedom in the will. Okay. To this, Jerome says in his homily about the prodigal son, that God alone is the one in whom no sin falls, nor is able to fall. But the others, who are of liberi arbitri, are able to bend in either side, to good or to bad. So there, Jerome seems to be denying, you know, that God has free will and saying it belongs to the rest of us, right? Okay. Moreover, free judgment is a faculty of reason and will by which the good and the bad is chosen. But God does not wish anything bad, as has been said. Therefore, free judgment is not in God. He can't judge the bad to be good or the good to be bad. So sin doesn't have free judgment, right? But against this is what Ambrose says in the book on faith, that the Holy Spirit divides to each one as he wills. That is, and then you have the liberi voluntatis, for the free judgment of the will, not by the, what, service of necessity. Now Thomas, in the body of the article says, and this goes back to what we saw before, that God necessarily wills himself, right? His own goodness. But he wills us, if he does, as what means to his own goodness, huh? And since his own goodness, you know, he depends upon us, he's free to will us or not, huh? He says, I answer, it should be said that free will or free judgment we have with respect to those things which we do not necessarily will, to those things we don't will by a natural instinct. Like, for example, I naturally will to be, what, happy, right? And I can't will to be miserable. Well, we sometimes say that you want to be miserable. For there is no free judgment or free will, it doesn't pertain to free will, that we want to be or we will to be, what, happy, right? But it belongs to a natural, what, instinct. Whence also other animals which are moved to doing something by natural instinct are not said to be moved by free judgment. They don't have this free judgment that we have. Since, therefore, a God of necessity wills his own goodness, and we saw that in the previous article, earlier article, but other things he does not will for necessity, as has been shown above, with respect to those things which he does not will for necessity, he has free judgment or free choice, we could say, right? So he chose us in himself before he created the world. And so you should thank him for that choice he made that you should be. It wasn't because you were more willing to be, you weren't willing at all, or because you more deserved to be than he's countless on you that could have been, but he freely chose you. Thank you. I guess, you know, I remember one time studying the word thanks and the word thinking, I guess they are related, etymologically, so if you think you'll be thankful for it, I mean, it kind of goes together, one of those connections you have in English. English is kind of good in some ways, you know. It's like the English word, like them. When we take up love, one of the causes of liking or loving is likeness. So I could say, I like you because you're like me. And then you see the two senses of that, right? Or the English word, when you take up wanting, this is something we'll come back to. There's no wanting in God, strictly speaking, because want implies that you don't have what you want. And in English, the word want is sometimes used to mean not desire, but you're lacking, huh? Like in Shakespeare's decision, by a beast that wants discourse of reason would have mourned longer in Hamlet, right? What does the word wants mean there? Not that the beast wants the discourse of reason. Yeah, but because he lacks the discourse of reason. And therefore, that two meanings of the word want in English are connected. You desire something that you lack. You want something that you're wanting at. See? And the same way it's like this. To some extent, you know, think and thank for it, I guess every day. If I remember correctly. Just to make that connection, to think and thank explicitly, I don't think they're explaining it. Mm-hmm. Well, years ago, I was kind of interested and I was kind of checking up and it's a logical thing. It's not just a coincidence that they're related to the two words in their origin. So sometimes, English has a particular, you know, likeness or goodness. Go back to the first book of the actual hearing, the physics there. Matter is said to desire, what? Form, right? But the lack of form doesn't desire form. When you say matter wants form, you're implying that matter also is what? Lacking in form. It's very excellent, those words. Monsignor Dianne used to say, sometimes the word in one language is better than in another language for the same thing, you know. And so sometimes you have to choose, you know, the language that has the good word. Now, to the first, this is the reply to the objection drawn from the authority of the great Saint Jerome, one of the, what is he, one of the four great doctors of the East-Western Church? In Latin, it's Hieronymus. That's the way it looks like. To the first, it should be said that Jerome seems to exclude from God Librium Arbitrium, not simply, but only as regards, what? The possibility of being deflected to sin. Okay. To the second one, it should be said that the evil of guilt is said by turning away from the divine goodness through which God wills all things as has been shown above. It is manifest that it is impossible for him to wish, The evil of guilt, huh? But nevertheless, he has himself two opposites, Insofar as he is able to will this to be or not to be. So God could will that you are or that you not be, right? So you should be thankful that it's what he willed. Just as we, not in sitting, are able to will to sit and to will not to sit, huh? Or not will to sit. Okay. So that's nothing particularly new because it goes back to what we saw about necessity, right? And what things God wills of necessity and what things he doesn't, right? So he necessarily wills his own goodness and he wills other things only in willing his own goodness, huh? But these other things are not necessary for God's goodness and therefore he has, what, freedom with respect to choosing you to be or not to be in the whole creation, right? So that's what he wants So that's what he wants So that's what he wants So that's what he wants So that's what he wants to be or not to be or not to be Okay, now, we come to the last two articles, which are dealing with whatever this means, the will of the sign. And in the first article, he's asking whether you should speak in such a way at all, right? And then the second one, having determined that you're good, he divides the will of the sign. Okay, now, maybe the best way to lead into this is to take, like he does in the body of the first article, take the Our Father, right, which we're all familiar with, and the third petition in the Our Father is, Thy will be done, right? Now, what does the word will mean there? Does it mean the divine will that we've been talking about up to this point? Can God's will be done by us? God's will is God, right? And God is unchangeable, unmakeable, you know, immovable, right? So it's not God's will that's going to be done. So what is that way of speaking then? No, no. If God's will be done, what does that mean? It means to what? To do what is good, huh? Okay. It means to do what God wills that you do, right? Okay. So it's not God's will that is being done, but what God wills that is being done. And that is called will. And Thomas says that's kind of like speaking metaphorically. Okay. It's a sign of his will, right? Even when our Lord says in the garden there, not my will, but thine be done, right? What does that mean? Is the will itself of God going to be done, put done to it, with it? No. But what God wills, Christ wants to will, right? It does will, right? Okay. So you do have to have some kind of distinction there, right? Between using the word will to mean the will of God, and then to mean something other than the will of God, which is in some way an object, maybe the divine will, and is in some way a sign of that what? Will. Yeah. Would that be analogous to the distinguishing between our own faculty of will and us, and the object that we will? Yeah. Yeah. But see, we may speak the way about a human being, too, right? To do my will, right? To do your parents' will. But you're not really doing your parents' will. You're doing what they will. But we speak of it this way, don't we? Okay. To the eleventh one proceeds thus. Thus, it seems that one ought not to distinguish in God the will of the sign, right? Okay. Now, you know, Thomas is going to take the opposite side, right? He always argues against this. This is the first. For as the will of God is the cause of things, so is the knowledge of God. But there are not assigned any signs on the side of the divine knowledge. Therefore, neither ought there to be assigned any signs on the side of the divine, what? Will. Second argument. Moreover, every sign that does not agree with that which is assigned is false. If, therefore, the signs which are assigned about the divine will do not conform to the divine will, they are false. If, however, they accord with it, they are superfluously assigned. Well, not to be assigned, therefore, or designated some signs about his will. But now the objection. But against this is that the will of God is one, since it is the very divine essence, as we saw before. But sometimes it is signified in plural. As it is said in Psalm 110, Great are the works of the Lord, exquisite in all their wills. Therefore, it is necessary that sometimes a sign of the will be taken for the will. Okay. Now Thomas says, I answer it should be said that in God some things are said properly and some things according to a metaphor, as is clear from the things said before. That's why it was important that he had the tenth article, was it, where the metaphors are appropriate in Scripture. Sure. Now, stop rumbling on the word metaphor there. What is the etymology of the word metaphor? Fora is keri and meta is over, right? And actually it has exactly the same etymology as the word translation. Now we've taken over the word metaphor from Greek and the word translation from Latin, right? Now, though they have exactly the same etymology in there for the kind of equivalent English, we use the word translation not for carrying over the word, but carrying over the meaning. So I take homo and I translate it by man, right? I don't carry the word homo over into English, but I give a word that has the same meaning, right? Well, in the case of metaphor, you actually carry over the word, right? So you say, you rat, okay? Or sweet, huh? Okay? So I say the girl is sweet, but we say God is sweet, huh? Taste and see how sweet this is. So sweet there, which first name is something to taste, right? Is carried over to what? Yeah, yeah. So the meaning is not carried over. It doesn't mean the same thing when you say God is sweet. He's not really, I can be sweet, right? But you carry the word over, right? And there's some connection between the two. In the case of metaphor, it's usually by likeness, huh? But you can also carry a word over by some result or effect of it, huh? And so sometimes God is said to be angry, right? Now, is there any anger in God, properly speaking? Okay, no. But the man who's angry punishes somebody, right? And so when God punishes someone, he's metaphorically said to be angry with them, right? Okay. So, so he says, when, however, some passions, some emotions, right? Human emotions are taken metaphorically instead of God, huh? To the divine predication. This comes about by a likeness of effects. Whence that which is a sign of such a passion in us, right? And God, by the name of that passion, is metaphorically signified. As with us, huh? Those who are angry are accustomed to punish. Whence that punishing is a sign of what? Anger. And on account of this, this punishing is signified by the name of anger, which is then attributed to what? God, huh? Likewise, that which is a custom in us to be a sign of will is sometimes metaphorically in God said to be what? Will. Just as when someone commands something, right? It is a sign that he wants that to come about, huh? Whence the divine precept is sometimes metaphorically called the will of God. And as in the prayer, huh? This is from the what? The Sermon on the Mount, huh? The Our Father appears in which Gospels, but not in Mark or John, right? And it's more complete in Matthew than in Luke, because in Luke there's five petitions, but in Matthew you get all the seven petitions that are memorized as a child. But it appears actually in the Sermon on the Mount, which is in chapters something like four, five, and six there in Matthew. Okay. But there's this distance between will and anger, right? Because anger is never said properly in God, since in its chief meaning is included a passion, an emotion, an undergoing. But will is sometimes said properly of God, right? And therefore in God one distinguishes it between the will properly and metaphorically said. The will properly said is called the will of Bene Placitea, what pleases one. But the will metaphorically is said is a, what? The Voluntas Signi, the will of the sign. In that the sign of the will is called the, what? The will, okay? That's a little unusual way of speaking, but apparently you find it in Scripture and you find it in the Church Fathers and Thomas takes it up here. Now the first objection is saying, why don't we speak this way of God's knowledge because that's also a cause of things. He says, to the first therefore it should be said that knowledge is not a cause of those things which come to be except through the will. Now why is it that the knowledge can't cause anything without the will? Why can't there just be a natural result of knowledge? You know, but there's a reason that we gave before in terms of how reason and will, how knowledge and love are in regard to opposites. Yeah? And tied up with that is that there's the same knowledge of what? Opposites, right? Because knowledge is perfected in the knower. And knowing one opposite helps you know the other. So when I teach ethics, my knowing what virtue is helps me to know what vice is. And even knowing vice in a sense helps you know what virtue is, right? Or like in King Lear, right? King Lear has three daughters, right? And two are what? Bad. God, I roll, and Rigon. And one is what? Good. Bordelia, right? And so the goodness of Bordelia stands out all the more by contrast with the evil of Rigon and Gunnar, right? And vice versa. The same way the father in there has got two sons and one is good and one is bad, right? One turns against his father and one is quite faithful, right? So one opposite helps you to see the other opposite better, like black and white. And, but is it the same love of opposites? No. So that's an amazing thing, right? Knowledge of virtue helps you to know what vice is. And you can't really know one without knowing the other. But the love of one impedes the love of the other one. So the love of virtue prevents you from loving vice. And loving vice prevents you from loving virtue, yeah. So knowledge as such is open to good and bad. And I told you about that student when I was first teaching in California. And he said, what? You guys shouldn't be teaching ethics, right? And I said, why not? Well, he says it's the same knowledge of good and bad. So student learns about the bad as well as about the good. He learns how to be bad as well as how to be good for you guys. And since they're inclined to be bad, they're making them worse. But that was the most reasonable objection to teaching ethics that I had ever heard, see? Although you could say, you know, that the goodness of virtue will shine all of the more by saying the badness of vice, right? So since knowledge enables you to do the good or the bad, to do opposites, huh? You can't do something automatically from knowledge because then you'd be doing opposites at the same time. So what you do one rather than the other depends upon what? The will, see? And the will determines one rather than the other and excludes the other, right? So he's going back to that difference there, right? Knowledge is not a cause of those things which come about except through the will. For we do not make the things we know unless we will to do so. And therefore a sign taken from the effect is not attributed to knowledge as it's attributed to the will. Knowledge extends to both, right? And the will determines it to one. And so when that one is produced, it's a sign of the will rather than a knowledge, right? Okay. Okay, the second objection is talking about the sign conforming to the will. And if it does, it's superfluous. If it doesn't, it's false. To the second, it should be said that the signs of the will are called divine wills, not because they are signs that, what, God wills, but because those things which in us are customarily signs of willing, are called in God the, what, divine wills. Just as punishment is not a sign that in God there is anger, but punishment from the fact that in us it's a sign of anger, and God is called, what? Yeah, that's kind of a subtle thing he's got there. In article 12, he's going to divide this, once he's established in general, now that they can speak this way. So he says, to the 12th, one proceeds thus. It seems unsuitably.