Prima Pars
Lecture 124: Why Three Persons in God, Not Four or More?

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To the second one proceeds thus, it seems that in God there are more persons than three, right? Now, the main reason to think this is because what's said in the first objection here. For the plurality of persons in God is according to the plurality of what? Relative properties, huh? This has been said. But as we saw back earlier, there are four relations in God, right? To wit, fatherhood, sonhood, common breathing, right? And for want of a better name, common name, he proceeded to the Holy Spirit, right? Of course, we need the name of the procession, but he's giving it out to the tribulation, right? Therefore, there are four persons in God, right? That's a nice straight argument, right? Now, the second objection. Moreover, nature does not differ more from the will in God than nature from the understanding. But in divine things, other is the person who goes forward by way of the will as love, right? And another that goes forward by way of nature as what? Son. Therefore, also, there's another one which goes forward by way of intellect as the what? Word. And other is the one who proceeds by way of what? Nature as a son, right? And thus, it would follow that there are not only, what, three persons in God, right? Yeah? That's really, you know, profound objection there, right? Because when you call one of these persons a son, you say he proceeds by per modem natura, right? And then verbum, per modem intellectus, and then per modem voluntatis, the Holy Spirit, right? So you've got three persons proceeding from another rather than just two, right? And the other four. Now, the third objection, the first two objections are very important. The third objection is not quite as touching it. Moreover, in created things, what is more excellent has many, what, intrinsic operations, just as man or with other animals has also to understand and to will, right? So, I grow like a plant, I reproduce like a plant, I nourish myself like a plant, I sense like the animals, but in addition, I have to understand and to will, right? So you have more operations than the higher one. But God infinitely exceeds all creatures. Therefore, not only is there a person proceeding by way of will and by way of understanding, but infinity out of other ways. Therefore, there are infinite persons in God. Seems like everything would be God then, so. There would be infinity of operations in God, right? The fifth objection. Whoever from the infinite goodness of the Father, it is that he communicates himself infinitely by producing a divine person, right? But also in the Holy Spirit, there's an infinite goodness, huh? Therefore, the Holy Spirit should also produce a divine person and that one and another one and so on forever. That's an interesting objection, huh? Moreover, everything that is contained under a determined number is measured, huh? For a number is a certain measure. Number is a multitude measured by the ones, and so on. But the divine persons are what? Immense. Which means immeasurable. That's in the Creed of Athanasius again, right? It's in the fourth, five, I don't know. Immensus. Immensus pater, immensus filios, immensus spiritus sanctus. Therefore, it should not be contained under the number three, right? It's limiting God, right? That's a nice objection, huh? Now, in this said contour there, there's a question about whether that text is authentic or not. I don't know whether it's added, you know. Now I think they tend to say it's not, you know. Anyway. But again, this is what is said in the first epistle of John, that there are three who give witness in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit. And asking what three we answer, as Augustine says, three persons, right? Therefore, there are three persons only in God. Now, Tom's going to take a longer time to reply to this, right? The answer should be said that according to the things that have been sent before, it's necessary to lay down that there are only three persons in what? For it's been shown that there are many, that the many persons are what? Many relations that are what? Subsistent. Really distinct from each other. But a real distinction between or among divine relations is only by reason of a, what? Relative opposition. Therefore, it's necessary that two opposed relations pertain to, what? Two persons. but if there are some relations that are not opposed, right? It's necessary for them to pertain to the same person. So, fatherhood and sonhood, since they are opposed relations, right? They necessarily pertain to, what? Yeah. For fatherhood, subsisting, is the person of the, what? Father. And the sonhood, subsisting, that relation subsisting, is the person of the, what? Son. That goes back to the idea that it's a relation and something subsisting in the divine nature, right? Now, the, what? Other two relations have opposition to neither of these, right? But they are, what? Opposed to each other. It is impossible, therefore, that both belong to, what? One person. It is necessary, therefore, that either one of them belongs to both of the four said persons, or one to one and the other to the other, right? It is not ever possible that procession, which is the name he gives for that, one of those relations, belongs to the father and the son, or to what? Yeah. Because thus it would follow that procession of the understanding, which is the generation of divine things, according as is taken fatherhood and sonhood, would proceed from the procession of love, right? According to which is taken, what? If the person generating and generated proceeded from the one breathing, right? Which is against what has been sent before, right? Because you have to know to love, right? So loving proceeds from knowing rather than you. It remains, therefore, that breathing belongs, to both the person of the father and the person of the son as having no relative opposition to them, right? Neither to the fatherhood nor to the sonhood. So there's no opposition of relation between fatherhood and breathing or between sonhood and what? Breathing, right? And consequently, it's necessary that procession, which is the being breathed, okay, belong to another person, right? Which is called the person of the Holy Spirit, who proceeds by way of love as has been had above. It remains, therefore, that there are only three persons in God, to wit, the father and the son and the what? Now, Thomas later on, you know, there's this probably have but there. Orthodox and so on about the addition there to the creed, right? Yeah, yeah. And Thomas will argue that if the Holy Spirit didn't proceed from the Son, then there would not be a real distinction between them, right? And then you'd have, you know, the Father would be what? You'd have Fatherhood and Spirazio, right? And the Son would have both of the other two, right? And therefore there'd be a distinction between the Father and the Son but no third person, right? So there has to be a relation that belongs to both the Father and the Son whereby both of them are distinguished from the, what? Really distinguished from the Holy Spirit, right? Okay? But that relation that's common to the Father and the Son which is not, as he says, a relation that's peculiar to one of them or the other, but to both. And distinguishes them from the Holy Spirit but that doesn't make a, what? Fourth person that belongs to both the Father and the Son having opposition to them. But the Holy Spirit having opposition to that relation must be a third person. Is that clear as mud then? Okay. Okay. So you kind of understand and better as you go further in you know, to see that the Holy Spirit has to proceed from the Son to be really distinct from them, right? But the relation by which the Father and the Son are distinct from the Holy Spirit is common to, what? Both of them, right? They're both in that sense one beginning of the Holy Spirit. And he comes back and explains it a little more in the reply to the first objection which is the one that says there's four relations why aren't there four persons, right? To the first therefore it should be said that although there are four relations in God nevertheless one of them to wit, breathing, right? Is not separated from the person of the Father and the Son but it belongs to what? Both of them. And thus, although it is relation nevertheless it is not said to be a, what? Property as it were, huh? Proprietas because it does not belong to only, what? One person, right? Nor is it a personal relation that is one constituting person, right? But these three relations fatherhood, sonhood and procession, right? Are called personal properties as it were constituting persons, son. For fatherhood is a person of the father and sonhood the person of the son and procession the person of the Holy Spirit proceeding, right? But sparatio, right? Is the same as the father and the son, right? There's no real distinction between sparatio and the father and the son, right? But there's a real distinction between sparatio and the Holy Spirit called chesio, right? For one of that name, huh? And therefore there's a real distinction between the Holy Spirit and the father and the son. There's no real distinction between the father and sparatio and the son and sparatio. So St. Thomas, you know, at other places you'll see some of the streets later on. But if the Holy Spirit did not proceed from the son there would be no real distinction between them. Because the only basis for real distinction is the opposition of relations and relations of origin, right? So if the son was not also the origin of the Holy Spirit if the Holy Spirit did not proceed from the son they would not be opposed by the relations of origin and therefore they would not be two, what? Distinct persons, huh? And it's not enough as Thomas argued to say that one proceeds per modem intellectus and other per modem volandatis because the understanding of the will are not really distincting God, huh? So you have to have a real distinction of relations, huh? That's a very subtle thing, huh? Now the second objection is a very interesting one. Why don't you have a third procession there which would give rise to a third person, right? Why should the son who has a name indicates proceeds per modem naturae and the verbum which proceeds per modem intellectus why should they be the same person and not distinct persons just as the one who proceeds per modem intellectus and per modem volandatis are not the same person, right? You see that? And the objection is saying, well isn't nature nature is not more distinct let's say from the will than it is from the understanding, right? And Thomas is going to explain the likeness there. To the second it should be said that that which goes forward per modem intellectus as the word proceeds by reason of what? Likeness. Just as also that which proceeds by way of nature proceeds what? By way of what? Likeness, huh? Okay. Now, to go back is not more known to us, huh? Notice how we speak of what? Our own thought as being what? Concept, right? So there's certain likeness there between what proceeds, right? In our intellect, right? And what we see by way of nature, right? And so Shetra sometimes has in the songs to it, you know, these are my children, right? His thoughts are his children, right? And the poets, you know, speak of their favorite child, right? And Dickens speaks of his father's a favorite child. I have a favorite, you know, you know, thing. So they both proceed by way of likeness, right? Why, what proceeds by way of love does not proceed by way of what? A likeness, huh? That's why the one who proceeds per moment of Ture would be the same as the one who proceeds per moment of what? Intellectus, huh? Because they both proceed by way of what? Likeness. And because in God, to understand and to be are the same, right? And therefore, as has been said above, the going forward of the divine word is also the generation per modem what? Ture. But love as such does not go forward as a likeness of that from which it proceeds. And therefore, the going forward of love cannot be called what? Generation divine thing. He touched upon that before when he's saying that what is these processions in God, right? We had a question on that. And one is called a generation, right? And then there's this other procession which is the Holy Spirit and that can't be called generation because it doesn't proceed as a what? Likeness. You can see this with the likeness there between reason and imagination, right? And when I imagine something that proceeds in me, I form an image of that thing, right? And of course, the word image is something in the Latin word for a likeness, yeah. And when I think about something, I form a what? A likeness of that, okay? So, what proceeds as imagined or thought of proceeds as a likeness of the thing imagined or the thing thought of, right? And therefore, if the understanding and the nature are the same thing, what proceeds would be the same thing, right? Okay? But in us, my nature and my understanding are not the same thing, and therefore what proceeds by way of nature and by way of intellect are not the same. So my thoughts are not my children, okay? But if for me to be and to understand the same thing, then my thought would be my child, right? But what proceeds per modem voluntatis by way of the will as love doesn't proceed as a what? A likeness, huh? Now, when I like something, it's made an impression upon my heart, right? Not that a likeness of that thing has been put in my heart, right? And therefore, it's kind of an impulse in me to pursue that thing that has made an impression upon my heart. So, the result there is that there's kind of inclination in my heart towards that object, rather than a what? A likeness of it. And therefore, love goes out to the object itself, right? It's essential to it, huh? It's not essential to knowing or imagining that you go out to the thing. You might imagine something horrible, right? You see? But what's essential to imagining or thinking about something is that a likeness of that thing proceeds within your imagination or within your, what? Mind, huh? Even if I think about something that might be a tragedy, like murder, but there's a likeness of murder in my thought of murder, right? And that's why we can say the definition of the thing, right? This is murder, huh? But that's not the way love proceeds, right? Love proceeds by way of an impression that the object is made upon the heart, right? That produces an inclination towards that object in itself, huh? So love is, gives you an impulse to pursue that object, huh? Not to have a likeness inside you, part of that object, huh? But he points out, of course, but in God, because, because the divine love is what? The same thing as the divine substance. Then the one who proceeds by way of love is also of the same nature. But this is not insofar as it's love, but insofar as it's divine love. That's a very, you think, but a lot, I mean. Thomas goes back to a lot of places now, but it's very interesting to see, right? That the one who proceeds by way of nature and by way of understanding in God are the same, right? But the one who proceeds by way of love, by way of the will, is a different person, right? But the key thing to see is that the way of proceeding by way of nature and by way of understanding is also, is in both cases, by way of likeness, right? The only reason why they're not the same in us is because our understanding and our nature are not the same. But in God, the understanding and nature are the same, so what proceeds by way of likeness is more than the same, huh? But there's no one who doesn't proceed by way of likeness. It's like the others, not because it proceeds by way of likeness, but because it's divine. What's divine is God, right? So he's a very mysterious person now, the Holy Spirit, huh? I remember Brother Hagrid when I was young, you know, the little misalad, I mean, not misalad, it was a prayer book of the Holy Spirit, did you ever see that? It was a prayer book devoted to all things of the Holy Spirit in it. And the guy, the priest who had done it, had done it because he thought the Holy Spirit was kind of neglected, right? But there's something about that, right? You know, it always struck me, you know, the Holy Spirit is no more mysterious, right? I understand. I mean, a sign of that is the fact that there aren't names for the procession of the Holy Spirit, right? And not so much either name for the relation, huh? So that's a sign that it's less known, huh? Now the third objection, huh, is one that Aristotle often solves, huh? To the third, it should be said that man, since he is more perfect than the other animals, has more intrinsic operations than other animals. Why? Because his perfection is per modem composiziones, huh? That's not the way the angels are, right? Whence in the angels, who are more perfect and more simple, there are fewer intrinsic operations, huh? Than in man, because in them there is not to imagine to sense, right? But whatever we know by imagining or sensing, the angel knows by one and the same understanding. But in God, secundum rem, now, right? There is not except one operation, which is his very essence, his substance. And what way there are two processions has been shown above, huh? So Aristotle talks about that, right? He makes a bit of a comparison there in the books of natural science, you know, that there are, some men can have perfect health without any medicine, or others can get perfect health, but they have to do all kinds of things to do. Others can get only in perfect health, they don't do much, but it's all the best I can get. So you have these differences, right, huh? And that little guy there is per modem composiziones, huh? And sometimes we see this, right? You know, Aristotle is arguing, you know, that a tragedy, say, or a comedy or an epic is better than, let's say, a sonic, right? So everybody would think that Shakespeare's plays, like Hamlet or Macbeth or Deloitte and so on, are greater than a sonic, right? Okay. But a tragedy or comedy of Shakespeare is much more, yeah, than a classic, yeah. So, but his perfection is a per modem composiziones and contains much more than a sonic, right? But when Aristotle is comparing tragedy and epic, right, then he argues that tragedy is superior as a literary form to epic, huh? They both, you know, produce fear and pity, but tragedy does it in a much shorter time, you know, so it's more powerful, right? And so the tragedy is actually superior to, yeah, but it's simpler, right, than the epic, but the epic is superior to the, what, yeah, yeah, so it's kind of subtle, right? You know, and you can see this in human art there, the practical arts. Now, the first computers, you know, they fill the whole room or something, you know, and then they get smaller and smaller, but more and more, what, powerful, right, you see? And then you have something like the idea that the smaller can be more perfect, huh? So a guy was describing the first radios, you know, and they fill the whole room, and they're trying to listen to the national political invention, and it got hard to hear the speakers, you know, and I'm not going to worry about it, and you don't see it like this, and I think you make a law, by the way, because it's against using these things when you're driving. Oh, yeah. And make an absolute law for kids, I don't know, 17, or younger, or something, they just, like that, they can use them at all when they're driving. Well, in some ways, then it'd be kind of like, yeah, yeah. But you know what St. Peter Avalanche said, you know, God is always going to get a simple, and the closer one gets to God, the simpler one becomes. There's something simple about, you know, Mother Teresa or somebody, you know, compared to Hillary Clinton or somebody. It makes you angry. Yeah, yeah. But this distinction, you know, Aristotle makes it, you know, himself, you know, at times I'm going to refer to it here, but basically he refers to Aristotle's distinction, right? There are some in us who can attain perfect health with very few things. Others can attain to that perfect health, but they have to go through many steps. Others can only attain to an inferior health. They don't do anything to do it. And there's something like that, right? I think. Many examples of that. There's, Thomas can understand these things much more quickly than you or I can, right? And we can get to a more perfect understanding of going through a whole bunch of steps, right? Then there are some people who couldn't arrive at that very superficial understanding of these things, right? But they go through the first steps that we do to get a deeper understanding of these things. So our perfection there is per movement. Compositions, right? They have something like that in the actual world, right? Because some have a perfect thing with very few means, necessarily have it very perfect. Others can get some perfection with a great deal of steps. Others can't get this great of perfection at all. And that lesser perfection that they are capable of, it requires very few things. So in the natural world, man requires more things than the cat does. And the cat requires more things maybe than the tree does. And the tree requires more things than the stone. But each is more perfect than what it becomes. It's the only thing. But in the angels, it's just the reverse. But you see that in human minds. Now as in grade school, you'd have the mathematical thing presented, and then you had something you had to do. And then there was another section called extra practice for those who need it. Well, some guys would get the idea right away, you know, with just a few things. And they understand it better than this other guy who does all the extra things. He still doesn't understand it. It's true. So, a third objection is something that comes up other places. They say you cannot, thank you for the wine, by the way. But they say you can never completely animalize wine, right? It's just too complicated. Okay, now the fourth objection was saying, well, doesn't the Holy Spirit receive from the goodness of the Father and the Holy Spirit? Doesn't he have something to contribute? To the fourth, it should be said that that reason or argument would proceed if the Holy Spirit had another goodness in number from the goodness of the Father, right? It would be necessary that just as the Father, through his goodness, produces a divine person, so the Holy Spirit, right? By his goodness, huh? Okay, goodness that was not numerically the same. But one and the same is the goodness of the Father and the Holy Spirit. Nor is there any distinction between them except by the relations of persons. Hence, goodness belongs to the Holy Spirit, as it were, had from another. To the Father, as the one from whom it is communicated to another. But the opposition of relation does not permit that with the relation of the Holy Spirit, there be a relation of a beginning with respect to a divine person. Because he himself proceeds from the other persons which are able to be in what? Divine things. And that's something you've got to think about for a while. See, does the Father have a goodness that the Holy Spirit doesn't have? But he has that goodness with the relation that the Holy Spirit doesn't have, right? He has the same goodness, right, that the Holy Spirit has, or vice versa. But he has that goodness with the relation that the Holy Spirit doesn't have, right? Or that the Holy Spirit is not, right? Okay? This doesn't make him better, right? No. So the Holy Spirit has that goodness as from another, right? Right? The Father has that goodness as from another. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Plot in drama, right? Now this is different from the Trinity because in drama there's a before and after, right? But you say before another, after. Now those are exhaustive divisions. Before another and not before another, right? That's one of the other, right? So we do a little boxing, right? Before another and not before another. Vertical. Okay? And then we'll flip over here, after and not. Now when you crisscross those two, you get how many? Four. Now what part of a plot is before another and after another? That's what we call the middle. What is before another, but not after another? We call it the beginning, right? What is after another, but not before another? And what is neither before another nor after another? I can't even have that. We'd have an invitation. It would fit in, right? So there can only be three parts to a plot, right? That's all it can be. And so, Aristotle says, Homer taught the other Greeks how to write a good plot. It should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. So he didn't take everything that happened to Odysseus, right? Everything that happened to Achilles, right? But he took a course of action that had a beginning, a middle, and an end. That's what he did in the Iliad and the Odyssey. And therefore he taught all the other Greeks how to make a plot. Now, what way is a Trinity like this, right? Well, as Athanasius, in the Athanasian Creed, says, there's no before and after in God, right? But there is, as Augustine says, the order of nature. We see these ones, right? So, it's going to be like this, then. From another and not from. We have those two possibilities, right? And another from. Possibility, right? Now, if one is from another and has another from one, what person in the Blessed Trinity is as? The Son. If one has another from oneself, but one oneself is not from another, what person is as? The Father, no. If he is from another, but does not have another from him, what person in the Holy Trinity is? 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He neither proceeds from someone who therefore is distinct from, right? Nor does he have someone proceeding from him that therefore would be distinct from, right? Because the only way you can distinguish these persons is by relations of proceeding, right? So if you don't proceed from anybody and no one proceeds from you, you have no relation with anybody else. And if you have no distinction, for anybody else, therefore you can't constitute another, what? Person. So there's nobody here. There's only three possible persons there, right? And so the Father has, what? Goodness, right? Not from another, but another has from him, right? The Son has goodness from another. Another one has goodness from him. The Holy Spirit has goodness from another that no one else, right? Except us creatures. He doesn't have goodness from him, right? So because he has, they all have the same goodness, though, right? But one has it only from another, right? The other one, what? Only has others that have it from him. And one has, yeah, hope, right? So because of those relations, right, the Holy Spirit can't have, what? A son, or someone who sees him as God, right? The only position that can be from the Holy Spirit would be to the outside of them, right? So it's incompatible with that relation, right? Yeah. But that doesn't make an inferiority to them, right? Because he has the same goodness that they have, but he has it from them, right? And the son has the same goodness on the father that he gives to the, what? To the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Did I clarify it? Is there a name for that? Just like the character of the... No, no, no. You can say that the father has the goodness, which is God, right? And that same goodness the son has and that same goodness the Holy Spirit has. In fact, each of them is that goodness, right? Okay. But you say the father has that goodness with this relation, right? And the son with this other relation, right? And the Holy Spirit has another relation, right? Okay. So because the Holy Spirit has that goodness from another and doesn't have it as, what? Proceeding from him, right? And then he doesn't have... He doesn't give rise to another person even though he has the same goodness that the father has, right? But he doesn't have it as the same relation. He has that goodness only from another, right? The father has that same goodness but not from another. He has that goodness to communicate to another, right? The son has... Both. Both, yeah. Yeah. But there's no fourth possibility, right? So as I compare it to the... You know, to the... Aristotle's discussion of the plot, right? Because it's similar. But they call it the ordo naturae, right? You know? Not the order of one being before... Not the order in the strict sense then in the common sense. But... That one is from another, right? Okay? But one is not before another, right? It's a very subtle thing, right? So Thomas in the sense is saying that, huh? The opposition of relation at the end of that fourth one does not permit, right? The opposition of relation, he's saying. That with the relation of the Holy Spirit there'd be also a relation that would be began with respect to the divine person. Because he proceeds from the other persons that can be in God, right? Okay? So he has the divine nature or the divine goodness from another. That's what he had. Yeah. Yeah. Otherwise he'd be another father. Or another son. But it's not possible because he has an opposition to both of them. Because he agreed. Yeah. What kind of opposition and would he be a relative opposition? Yeah. Yeah. No, that's the way Thomas in Ukrainian to the whole tweet is he says, because the divine persons are distinguished by relations of origin or proceeding, right? Yes. Secundum ordinum doctuni he says, according to the order of teaching, we must first consider procession, which he did in the first question, then the relationship in the second question, and then the persons, which he does in the main 15 questions. Perfectly ordered, right? You won't see that order in Augustine, right? You'll find, you know, the parts of it around, right? But, you know, in a sense, that's true a bit to the Bible, right? You know? Because if you take up a question in the Bible there, you may pull texts out of a few or four different books, you know? So it's not put together in one book, you know, everything that's relevant, huh? And, you know, in the Gospel of St. John, there are many passages that talk about the Father and the Son but don't talk about the Holy Spirit and the other passages talk about the Holy Spirit and you have to bring them together to get the complete picture, you know? Well, Augustine says in between there, right? He's more brought things together. But even Peter Lombard there, you know, is bringing together things from different places in Augustine, right? That's why, you know, if you look at what Vatican II says there about the study of Thomas, right, you know, it speaks of what? Two things are penetrating the mysteries of faith as much as possible. They should follow Thomas as a teacher. That's very strong. Some people say that they downgraded Thomas. They didn't know. That's extremely strong. But also it speaks about seeing them, what, in their connection and order, right? Well, when it talks about the Church Fathers, it talks more about, you know, this or that mystery, right, what they contributed to understanding of this or that mystery, kind of an ad hoc thing, you know. When you get to Middle Ages then you have this, these sumas, you know, where you take up the whole and you see everything and converse in order to everything else. Now, the fifth objection is a little bit like the objection we had before about Owen Park, right? Because the fifth objection is saying, hey, you can't limit God, three, huh? You know how the Hindus and so on, you know, you know, they see they have these very fertile gods, you know, and goddesses too, I guess, you know, but they're always having offspring, you know, and they're going on and on and on. He says, determine number if one takes numerous simplex, and that's the abstract number, right, huh? Which is only in the, what, taking of the understanding, right? It's measured by one, right? So our style defines number as a multitude measured by it. If, however, we take the number of things, now, this is the numbered number, right? But the number of things in the divine persons, huh? Notice he speaks of numerous rarer, right? Now, you might say, you know, you gotta be careful with the word thing, because thing usually refers to what a thing is, right? But there is a number of things, because relation is a thing in some sense of the word. If one takes the number of things in the divine persons, thus, who does not belong, the notion of measured, huh? Now, why is that? For something like the reason we gave you four. Because there is the same, what? Magnitude of the three persons. So, it's not that the Father and the Son have more than the Father alone, or the Father and the Son have more than the Holy Spirit, right? The same thing, strictly speaking, is not measured, what? By itself, right? So you measure number by one, one is not a number, right? one is not a one is not a one is not a one is not a