Prima Pars
Lecture 105: God's Omnipotence and the Nature of Possibility

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So that's the second article, right? Now the third article would seem to follow upon that, right? If God's power is infinite, then it's not limited, then he's omnipotent, huh? And that comes up somewhere in the Creed, doesn't it? I believe in God the Father Almighty. What does this mean, right? To the third one proceeds thus. It seems that God is not omnipotent, for to be moved and to undergo is something of all things, huh? But God can't do this, huh? He can't be moved, huh? He can't undergo something, for he is immobile, unchangeable, right? Therefore he's not, what? Omnipotent, huh? Of course, that is overlooking the distinction we saw in the first article, right? Between the active power and the, what, passive power, right? When you're saying God is omnipotent, you don't mean by the passive power, right? But only by the active power. Moreover, to sin is to do something. But God is not able to sin. Nor to deny himself, huh? As is said by St. Paul in the second epistle to Timothy, second chapter. Therefore God is not, what? Omnipotent, huh? Moreover, about God, it is said, huh? That he manifests since, what? Special apartment. Yes. Therefore, the furthest, you might say, right? That divine power extends to, is to what? To pity? To be merciful? But there is something greater than to what? Yeah. Which is to create another world, huh? Or something of this sort, huh? Therefore God is not omnipotent, huh? Kind of strange argument, huh? I don't think I'm going to call it that. Moreover, on that of 1 Corinthians, chapter 1, God has made, what? The wisdom of this world stupid, huh? The gloss says, God shows the wisdom of this world to be stupid by showing that to be possible, which that worldly wisdom, right, judges to be impossible. Whence it seems that something should not be judged possible or impossible, according to lower causes, as the wisdom of this world judges, right? Like the Greeks would laugh at the idea of resurrection, and so on, huh? But by the divine power it should be judged, huh? If therefore God is omnipotent, all things are what? Possible. Nothing therefore is impossible. But the impossible being taken away, and the necessary is taken away. For that is necessary to be, that is impossible not to be. Nothing therefore is necessary in things if God is omnipotent. But this is impossible. Therefore God is not omnipotent, huh? But again, this is what is said in the Gospel of St. Luke, chapter 1, verse 37. There will not be impossible before God every word, huh? I'll also explain it later on, huh? He didn't use it, though. Would he ever, would he ever do that? Yeah, he uses the creed sometimes, you know. In fact, he even comments on it sometimes. What's that? Even comments on the creed. Yeah, I know that. Yeah. But he especially likes to use Scripture, especially. Okay. I answer it should be said that commonly all confess, right, by faith, that God is omnipotent, right? But it seems difficult to assign the, what, definition of the meaning of omnipotence. For it is doubtful, in doubt, what is comprehended under this distribution when it is said all things are possible for God, right? But if someone considers correctly, since power or ability is said for things that are possible, when God is said to be able to do all things, nothing is rightly understood, then he's able to do all things that are what? Possible. And on account of this, he is said to be omnipotent. But now this is one of these words that is equivocal. But possible is said in two ways, according to the philosopher in the fifth book of wisdom, after books of natural philosophy. And the whole fifth book of wisdom, the whole fifth book of metaphysics, is explaining what? The meanings of these words, right, that are used, especially in wisdom, right, and in the axioms, the statements known to themselves by all men. And to some extent, everywhere, because they're the most common ones, and so Thomas has a commentary on that fifth book. So anyway, this is taken from that. The word possible is said in two ways. In one way, with regard to some what? Power. Some ability. Just as what is subject to human power is said to be possible for man, right? Some days you say it's impossible. It's not within my power. Now it's not able to be said that God is said to be omnipotent because he's able to do all those things which are possible to the created nature because the divine power extends to more things. Well, that can't be the meaning of it. If, however, it be said that God is omnipotent because he's able to do all things which are possible to his power, there will be a circle in the manifestation of the power. But this would not be to say anything other than the cosmipotent because he's able to do all things he's able to do. It doesn't explain much, is it? Isn't that true? Okay? So how's Thomas getting out of this? Well, there's another meaning of possible. It remains, therefore, that God is said to be omnipotent because he's able to do all things that are possible absolutely, which is another way of saying what? Possible. Now what is that? What's the sort of meaning? For something is said to be possible or impossible absolutely from the relation of the, what, terms. Subject and the predicate. Possible because the predicate is not repugnant to the subject as Socrates to sit. Impossible absolutely because the predicate is repugnant to the subject as for man to be an ass. Yeah, yeah. It takes you to go out. Look at that, right? Midsummer Night's Dream and what you do about nothing, right? I was going to go explain it by this second sense. It's kind of excluded the first sense but I want us to have you explain what the second sense is, how this helps to understand what you mean by God being omnipotent. It should be considered, however, that since every agent makes what is like itself. Now why is that? We can see this. Inductively, you can see inductively that an agent makes something like itself, right? This is a clear course in the case of, you know, dogs producing dogs and oak tree producing not dandelions, but oak trees and so on. At first sight, it's not clear what the carpenter making the house, but he's making the house like the house he's made in his head first, right? He's acting through his mind, so it's like, not his nature, but like what's in his mind. I never heard. So you can see it inductively, right? Well, what is the reason why the agent makes something like itself? It goes back to its distinction between act and ability. Ability now takes me in the passive sense. And what is it that's communicable to another? Act or ability? Act, yeah. And so every agent acts insofar as it's an act, and it communicates something of its actuality. Therefore, it's got to make something like itself. That's the reason, sir. This is a very common principle. We're talking about a cause as such there, not an accidental cause. We should have considered that, since each agent makes or does something like itself, to each act of power that corresponds, as possible, its own object, according to the definition of that act in which that act of power is founded. Just as the power of eating things, right, refers as to its proper object, to what is eatable. But the divine being upon which the definition of the divine power is founded is an infinite being, not limited to any genus of being, but having beforehand in itself the perfection of being as a whole. Whence whatever is able to have the notion of being is contained under the absolute things that are possible, with respect to which God is said to be omnipotent. He's a cause of being as being. But nothing is opposed to the notion of being except nothing. This, therefore, is repugnant to the notion or the definition of absolutely possible, which is, what, subject to the divine power. Whatever it is that implies itself to be and not to be together, that's supposed to be. And this is not subject to, what, omnipotence. Not on account of any defect of the divine power, but because it cannot have the notion of something makeable or possible. So whatever things do not imply, therefore, a contradiction, are contained under those things that are possible, with respect to which God is said to be, what, omnipotent. He's saying God can do everything that doesn't involve a contradiction, something both being and not being. But those things which imply a contradiction are not contained under the divine omnipotence because they can't have the, what, definition of something possible. Whence it is suitably said that those things do not come about, that God is not able to, what, make them. Nor is this against the word of the angels. Now this is going to explain that text in the said contract, right? Which it says it would not be impossible before God, um ne verbum, right? Okay. Nor is this against the word of the angels saying, it will not be impossible before God every word. For that which implies a contradiction cannot be a, what? Because no understanding can conceive it. Now when I was a little boy, I used to try to put you in a difficult spot by saying, could God make a stone so big he couldn't lift it? You've heard of these words, right? And they seemed to have you because if you said, yes, then there's something God can't do, maybe lift the stone that he made. If you say, no, God can't make a stone so big he can't lift it, then there's something God can't do, he can't make such a stone. Well, the average little kid didn't know how to answer that. But what is the proper answer to that? Can God make me stone so big he can't lift it? That implies a contradiction, huh? That's like saying, can God, on the blackboard here now, right, while we're watching, you know how he wrote on the thing with the Nebuchadnezzar was, could God draw a square circle? Because that involves a, what, contradiction, right? And is there a thought of a square circle? I can use the word square circle, right? But can someone understand what a square circle is? You can say, well, it's a circle, it's a square, but can you really put those two together in your head and understand them, huh? No, you can put the words together, right? But there's no such thing as a square circle, right? It's not a, it can't be. So he's saying God's omnipotence extends to everything that, what, does not involve contradiction, right? Everything can have the notion of being, right? And that's because he's being itself, right? And so it's causality extends to everything that has the character of being. But if something, has something opposed to being, then God's omnipotence does not extend to that, right? But that's not really going to be a diminution of his ability, right? That's what it says there. It's more, more appropriate to say that they are not able to be than that God is not able to be. Yeah. The first objection was the easiest, right? God can't, what, be pushed around, huh? God can't be hurt, right? Okay. To the first, therefore, it should be said that God is said to be omnipotent by active ability, huh? Not by a, what, passive power, right? Like we mentioned before, I've used the word power here now, but in English, the word power is kind of stuck in the first meaning of potencia or dunibis, in the active sense, right? But if you take the word ability, right, and you say God is able to do all things, right? It's only able in the active sense, not able in the sense of what? God can be able to get hungry, right? He's not able to get tired, not able to walk, huh? He's not in bad shape because of this. Whence is not being able to be moved or to undergo, right? To suffer. He's not repugnant to his, what, omnipotence, huh? That distinction in Aristotle, first made, is altogether essential to understanding the omnipotence of God. Now, the second objection to sin is to do something, right? But God cannot sin, huh? So, the second should be said that to sin is to what? Fall away from the perfect action. Whence to be able to sin is to be able to fail in acting, huh? Which is repugnant to omnipotence, huh? And on account of this, God cannot sin who is what? Omnipotent, right? So, can God be mistaken? This is an act of power, and I'm able to think, right? I mean, it is. That one, she, and she's informed of it. But to be mistaken is to be able to, what? Fail, right? That's really not a lack of power in God that he can't be mistaken. It'd be a lack of power if he could be mistaken, right? It'd be a lack of power in him if he could sin, right, huh? Okay. Sometimes there's a little footnote here because of the text of Aristotle and so on. Although the philosopher says in the fourth book of the places that God is able, both God and the good man, right, the studiosis, are able to do bad things, right? But how is that to be understood what Aristotle's saying there? But this is understood either under the condition who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place who's in the first place The antecedent is impossible, as if we were to say that God is able to do bad things if he wanted to, okay? Now, as you know, an if-then statement, it can be true even if the antecedent is what? If I am a dog, then I am four-footed, right? That's true. So if God wanted to do something bad, he could do something bad. For nothing prevents a conditional, an if-then statement, right? To be true, whose antecedent, whose if part, right? And consequent then part, is impossible. Just as it said, if man is an ass, he has four feet, huh? Or it should be understood that God is able to do some things which now seem to be what? Bad. Which nevertheless, if he did them, would be what? But, good. That's not the way to explain this, right? Or he could say that Aristotle, and this is Thomas, or the Ovenpoint Saladon, which is Aristotle. In logic, for example, he often uses an example from his contemporaries even though he doesn't agree with it. Or he speaks according to the common opinion of the Gentiles, who said that men were transformed or transferred to the gods, as Jove and, what, Mercury, right? In the very beginning of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle is saying the different arts and sciences are different ends, right? And among his examples, he gives that the end of the household science is well. And Thomas says, well, in the first book of Politics, he shows that the end of the household science is not well. Why does he say it here, right? Because that was the common opinion, right? Because he's just taken what people say as a way of kind of doing the idea across to them. So, it's kind of an unusual way, Aristotle, right? But that's it, and he may speak according to the opinions of his predecessor. I've seen that in the physics, yeah, I was reading the other day there. He's speaking according to the opinion of Plato, right? And sometimes he'll say, we, Platonists, did not yet have time to disagree with it. Platonists. Is it to say he's not always clear when he does that sometimes? No, no, he does it very clearly. Oh, okay. You see, that before he determines the truth himself, right, he may speak, right? It's not essential what he's doing, according to the opinion of his predecessors. It's kind of striking, you know, in the third book of the physics, he shows that there's not infinite interior world, right? Assuming just what his predecessors thought about matter. But then he gets to the book on the universe, where he's thinking about the sun, the moon, the stars, and he thought they were a different kind of matter than down here. Then he resumes the whole question again, goes on the second time, and then gives what he thinks according to his own position. That's kind of a subtle thing, but Thomas notes it on. I've got some other commentators who may have noticed before him, too, but it's kind of unusual for a man to do that. I know myself sometimes in class, you know, I use an opinion from modern science, which I may not accept, you know. But the students accept because they'll kind of get across the idea. To illustrate something, I'm not trying to prove anything by it, but to illustrate it, right? You know, I'll say if hydrogen can be without water, but water cannot be without hydrogen, if it was H2O, then water is before hydrogen in being, right? Yeah. I don't care whether that's true or not, you know. No, my opinion is, chemist's opinion is, what is H2O, right? I don't know. What is H2O mean? Now, the third one was this argument taken from God's taking, what? Pity of things, huh? To getting them, parchen du et miserando. How do they translate parchen du in your text? Sparing them? Sparing and tereusia. Now, he says the power of God is shown most of, it should be said to the third objection, that the power of God is shown most of all in sparing, right, not punishing, and having mercy, because through this is shown that God has the, what? Highest power. Or that he freely dismisses our, what? Sins. For it belongs to one who is not, what? Under a superior law, right? I mean, excuse me, the one who is under a superior law. It is not, what? He's not free to, what? That's one way to speak of this, right? Or because by sparing men and taking mercy in them, he leads them to partaking of an infinite good, I mean, himself, who is the last effect of the divine power. Or because, as has been said above, the effect of the divine mercy is the foundation of all the divine works, right? For nothing is owed to anybody except an account of that which is given, what, to him by God, with no debt at all to him. But in this is most of all shown the divine power, and it pertains to him the first, what, institution of all goods, huh? So it's touching upon the fact that God is nothing, what, presupposing the side of the creature to his cause of health to him. So you satisfied with those answers, sir, Thomas? You know, what's the greatest thing God has made? Jesus. Yeah, the incarnation, yeah. And that's holy what? Does human nature deserve to be united to the divine person? Unmarried. Holy unmarried. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of part of the thing he's bringing out here, huh? Okay, now the next question, the fourth question. We'll fall off here, right? To the fourth, it should be said that Possibile Absolutum, right? The second sense of possibility of distinction in the body of the article is said neither according to superior causes, nor according to inferior causes, but by itself, right? So you're saying that God, that Socrates can be sitting, right? That's possible. You're talking about now it's possible for Socrates or God to have him sitting? He's saying that there's no contradiction in sitting belonging to Socrates. Yeah. We say, a man can be white. What does that mean? Are you thinking now of by this gene or by God? Or do you mean that there's no contradiction in white belonging to man? Yeah. That's the absolute necessity, right? But the possible, which is said according to some ability or power, is named possible according to the, what? The approximate cause, huh? Whence those things which are immediately apt to come about by God alone, as creation, justification of the sinner, right? And things of this sort, are said to be possible according to a superior cause. But those things which are apt to come about through lower causes are said to be possible according to the lower causes. For according to the condition of the approximate cause, effects have contingency or necessity, as has been said above. But in this, the wisdom of the world is regarded as stupid, that those things which are impossible in nature that those things which are supposed to be possible in nature, that those things which are supposed to be possible in nature, that those things which are supposed to be possible in nature, that those things which are supposed to be possible in nature, It judges also to be impossible to God. And thus it is clear that the omnipotence of God does not exclude impossibility and necessity from things. What's the Sadducees are the ones who denied the resurrection? Christ says in the Gospel, there you err, knowing neither what? The power of God. Yeah, but that part, knowing not the power of God, you know, is what he's referring to here, right? Because they're judging it, because it's impossible to nature, that it's also impossible to what? To God. And this is apparently what the Greeks do, too. You know, the Greeks would be laughing at St. Paul, somebody, but the Christian's talking about resurrection, right? It's like today, well, we can't make something from nothing, therefore God can't make something. Well, I know I can't make a square circle, but God can. Now, this article, the fourth article is a little more particular, right? It's descending now to a particular thing. Not the square circle, but, whether God can make the past not to have been, right? Thomas is going to say what? Yeah, it's going to involve a contradiction, right? To the fourth one proceeds thus. Thus, it seems that God is able to make what was past not to have been. Because what is impossible, per se, is more impossible than what is impossible for actually us. But God is able to make that which is impossible, per se, as a blind man to, what, to illuminate the blind man, or to raise the dead, right? Therefore, even more, God can make that which is impossible for actually us. But the past to not have been is impossible for actually us. For it happens that Socrates is not to have run to be impossible from this that it was past, right? Therefore, God can make that the past thing was not thee, huh? Very subtle. Pardon me, huh? I was mentioning that the first, there's just ten questions in the, the question was disputatio di potencia, right? And each question's got, you know, ten, so many articles. And the first article, the first question of the ten questions corresponds to this, sir. There's an article in there about this, too. It's the very same question. Moreover, God is able to, what? Whatever God is able to do, he can do, since his power is never, what? Diminished. But God was able to do before God, before Socrates ran, right? That he would not run, huh? Therefore, after his run, God can make it that he did not run. Moreover, charity is a greater virtue than virginity. But God can repair charity that is lost. Therefore, virginity. Therefore, he's able to make that that which was corrupt was not corrupted, huh? But that's what Jerome, huh? So it's just the reverse of this. That God is able to do all, Well, God, who is able to do all things, he cannot do and make a, what? Corrupt thing to be incorrupt. Yeah. Therefore, for the same reason, he cannot make something past and nothing. I suppose this is people who are no longer virgins, and they suddenly discovered the great merit of being a virgin. And now they wanted to see if God could do something about this. But God can't do anything about it. I answer it should be said, that has been said above, Under the omnipotence of God does not fall anything that implies a, what? Contradiction. But for past things not to have been, implies a, what? Contradiction, right? For just as it would imply a contradiction to say that Socrates sits and does not sit, right? So also to say that he sat and did not sit. For to say that he sat is to say that it was, what? In the past, huh? But to say that he did not sit is to say that it was not. Whence for the past things not to have been does not come under the divine power. Thomas solves it very simply by saying it involves contradiction. And this is what Augustine says against, what? Faust, huh? So you have a lot of these works of Augustine that are contra, contra, contra, right? That's why that text we looked at, you know, from the Second Vatican Council, you know, said that you should read Scripture first and then you should read the Church Fathers, you know, and what they did to elaborate this or that, what? Article of the faith. But then to read Thomas Aquinas to see the order among these different things. So it's kind of an ad hoc character to some extent of the development of theology in the, what, Church Fathers, right? Because this heretic denied this article of the faith, so we're going to defend this article of the faith against this heretic, and we're going to write a contra, so-and-so. And you get all these kind of piecemeal, you might say, and then when the Middle Ages just start to bring this all together, right, and kind of these great summas, right, although there's some anticipation of those summas in the early. Oh, this too, but not as developed, you know. Or even in the sentence of the Lombard, right? Not as perfect as Thomas the Summa, but there's a kind of attempt to bring all this together in an orderly way. Whoever thus says, if God is omnipotent, right, he can make that those things which were, were not made, right? Let's see, he's saying this, that if God is omnipotent, he can make those things which are true, for the very reason that they are true, to be false. And the philosopher says, in the sixth book of the Ethics, that this alone God is deprived of, and that he can make ungenerated those things which were made, right? Well, it's kind of nice, he's got the argument, and then he's got the authority of Augustine, and the authority of the philosopher, which brings together the three greatest minds. It's interesting that the philosopher saw that, he's somebody's, he kind of said, Aristotle is somebody's. To the first, therefore, it should be said, that although the past things do not have been as impossible for Archegens, if one considers that which is past, namely the writing of Socrates, nevertheless, if one considers the past under the notion of the past, it not to have been is impossible, not only per se, but absolutely implying contradiction. So if I ran yesterday, I'd have to run yesterday, but if you consider the fact that I did run yesterday, that's part of my past, now I can live with it. I could not have run yesterday. And thus it is more impossible. right? Then for the dead to rise. It's more possible, in other words, for the dead to rise than for me not to run yesterday. Because that does not imply a, what? Contradiction. What is said to be impossible according to some power, namely, what? Nature, right? So that doesn't involve necessarily a contradiction. For such impossible things are subject to the divine, what? Power. Okay, the second objection, whatever God was able to do, he's able to do, because his power cannot be diminished, right? So the objection says. But God was able to do before Socrates ran that he did not run. Therefore, after his run, God could make that he did not run. To the second, it should be said that God, as regards the perfection of the divine power, can do all things. But that some things are not subject to his power is because they, what? Fall away from the notion of something possible. Thus, if one that pays attention to the unchangeableness of the divine power, whatever God was able to do, he's able to do. But some things before, right? Yeah, one time, had the notion of something possible when they were, what? Yeah. But now they, what? Fail from the notion of possible when they have been done. And thus, God has said to not be able to do them because they cannot come well. There was a writing on the wall saying, not a third objection here, but virginity here. That God is able to take away all corruption of mind and body from the corrupted woman, right? But this, he is not able to, what? Remove from it, that she was not corrupted, huh? Just as from some sinner, he's not able to take away the fact that he, what? And that he, what? Well, he can restore the charity. He can restore it. He can't take away the fact that you lost it. So then it's just implying that he can even restore bodily virginity, but he can't make you not lost it. Yeah, yeah. Do you know what I'm saying today? He can, if you lose charity or lose virginity, whether it's a corruption of body or soul, he can restore it as though, as though you hadn't lost it, but he can't make it, he can't make it that you didn't lose it. So if I, if I commit a sin, I lose charity. God can restore charity to my soul, but he can't make it that I didn't sin. I'm still a sinner. Break your nose.