Prima Pars
Lecture 130: Divine Notions and the Trinity

Transcript
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And this is clear to each of the ones if you go through them. For the infinite goodness of God is manifested even in the production of what? Preachers. Because it takes an infinite power to produce something from nothing. Nor is it necessary if by an infinite, what? Goodness, he communicates that something infinite proceeds from God. But according to its own way, it receives a divine goodness. Similarity, when it is said that without some company, some fellowship, one cannot have a joyful possession of some good, right? This has place when in one person is not found, what? Perfect goodness, right? Once he needs for a full goodness of joy the good of another associated with him. But that's not true about God, right? It's like the people who say that God had to create the world because he'd be lonely without the world. Likewise, the similitude of our understanding does not sufficiently prove something about God on account of the fact that intellect is not found univocally in God and in us, right? And hence it is that Augustine says upon John that through belief one comes to knowledge and not the reverse. That's good, well said, in a nice, concise way. Someone might say, you know, well, when I think about something, I form a thought of it, right? Therefore, God thinks he must have a thought too, right? Yeah. Some possibility of that, right? You know? But the divine, you know, thinking and our thinking are really exactly the same, right? For me, what's true about my thinking is not exactly true about God's thinking, right? Now, the third objection was, why does God bother revealing something to us that excels our reason, right? Thomas says, to the third it should be said that a knowledge of the divine persons was necessary for us in two ways, huh? In one way to what? Having the right opinion, you might say, about the creation of things. For from this that we say that God made all things by his what? Word. We exclude the error of those laying down that God produced things from the necessity of what? Nature. Even people like Avicenna and so on into that position, right? And what? Spinoza, right? Yes and yeah. So that's a common thing, right? And to this, that we lay down in him the procession of love, right? It shows that God did not what? Produced creatures as an account of some need, huh? But an account of the love of his own what? Goodness, right? Whence Moses, after he said, Genesis 1, in the beginning God created heaven and earth, he subjoins, God said, let there be light to the manifestation of the divine what word? And afterwards he says, God saw light that it was what? Good. To showing the approval of the divine what? Love as to the goodness of the thing. And similarly in other words. That's the first reason Thomas gives, right? But then he says, in another way, and principalios, which means what? Yeah, the more chief reason for it is. To write the what? Opining about the salvation of the human race, huh? Which is perfected by the incarnate son and through the gift of the what? Yeah. So you might say that, logically speaking, in a sense, the Trinity is presupposed to the incarnation, right? Because in the definition of the incarnation is that the word, the second person of us, the Trinity, became man. So the way, understanding the Trinity is before an understanding of what? Yeah. Even though when we first, what? are introduced to these things, we start with the human nature of Christ, right? It's interesting, huh? Because in, someone just sent me a translation to look over it recently. The name of the book in the translation is, Who Do Men Say That I Am? Okay? It's kind of interesting, huh? It's a French priest who wrote the book, but anyway, this is going back to Peter's confession of faith, right? And what does Peter say? Yeah. The son of the living God, right? So he starts with the human nature of Christ because it's human nature that's anointed, right? And then he ascends to the divine, right? Okay? That's one order, right? An order, quados, let's say, towards us. But then you get to the last gospel, which you, you're quite sure you get up to. Then you begin with the beginning was the word and the word was toward God and the word was God. That's all, you go with the Trinity, right? And then later on it's, and the word was made flesh. So the order is just the reverse, huh? So, because man is an animal and uses senses, right? You begin with the sensible, but you're led by the sensible to what is what? Yeah, yeah. Like in the song, let the words of my mouth and the thought of my heart find favor before you. You know, the words first, right? Then that's not the ultimate thing, right? When you define these things, right, you really have to understand the Trinity before you can understand the, what? Yeah, yeah. But, you know, as a little child, you begin with the human nature of Christ, right? And you take him to the crib and these sort of things, huh? One of my little, one of my sons is a little boy there, you know, he thought the priest there was this Christ there up on the altar, right? Oh, no, no, he's like, well, the way he is Christ, but, altar pistols, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's flattery, isn't it? Very sobering. But, so, where we begin, you say. I don't think six people are so proud. But, when your reason tries to understand what it is that you believe, right? And we say theology is belief, you know, seeking understanding, understanding, right? Then, in a way, you have to understand the Trinity before you can understand the Incarnation. and then you have the order there of St. John in the beginning of the Gospel, right? Okay. Yeah, yeah. But then, you know, at the end of the Gospel there, almost the next last chapter there, it says, these things are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. So, it makes almost identical procession, profession, I should say, of faith that Peter gave, except that he is the noun, Jesus, because he's not sticking to the man, you know? Right? Why Peter is replying to Christ, right? So, he says, you are the Christ, right? But, and then he has the same order that Peter has, right? Because what's nice there about the end of John's Gospel is you see kind of the union of Peter and John, right? The older man who's out running by the younger man going to the tomb and so on, but they're being together and John, or Peter asking, what about this guy? You know, is he going to be put on the cross too or what? So, take a little break here and then we'll go on to... to the three articles on, what, notions here. Most people don't know about notions too much, right? They heard about persons, but they don't have the notions. To the second one proceeds thus, it seems that one ought to place notions in divine things. For Dionysius says in the first chapter of the divine names that one should not dare to say something about God apart from those things which have been expressed for us from the, what, sacred writings, huh? But about the notions, there's no mention made in the writings or sayings of the sacred scripture. Therefore, one ought not to lay down notions in what? Divine things, huh? Moreover, whatever is laid down in divine things either pertains to the unity of the essence or to the trinity of persons. We've seen this either or before, right, huh? Okay. But the notions do not pertain to the unity of the essence nor to the trinity of the persons, huh? Of the notions, for of the notions are neither predicated those things which pertain to the essence. For we do not say that the, what, the fatherhood is wise or creates, right? Nor those things which are the person. For we do not say that fatherhood, what, the sonhood generates and sonhood is generated. Therefore, there ought not to be laid down notions in divine things. Moreover, in simple things, one should not lay down some abstract things, huh? Which are the, what, beginnings of knowing them because they are known by themselves, huh? But the divine persons are most simple. Therefore, one ought not to lay down in divine persons, notions whereby they are, what, known, huh? But against all this is what John Damascene says, huh? That the difference of the, what, hypostasis, those are the persons, and we recognize or know in three properties, right? The paternal, the filial, and the processional, right? Therefore, there ought to be laid down properties and notions in divine things, huh? So, you ever heard about notions before? The notions before? I answer, it should be said that, pray positinos, right? I give his date here in my book here is around 210, right? Noting the simplicity of the persons, right? Said that one should not lay down certain properties and notions in divine things, huh? And if they are found someplace, one should expound the abstract for the concrete, huh? Just as we are accustomed to say, I ask your benignity, right? His holiness, right? Is he holiness or is he holy? Well, you know, that's the way of speaking, right? But he says he's holy. So also in divine things, paternity is understood, God the Father, right? Okay, and this goes back to what we saw before, this question about you use both concrete and abstract names in God. And Thomas says, well, both of them have a defect, right? Well, we can't avoid using them, right? We have to negate their imperfections, huh? But as has been shown above, it is not prejudicial to the divine simplicity that in divine things we use both, what? Concrete names and abstract names, right? Okay, because according as we understand, thus we, what? Name things, right? So we speak about God as we, however imperfect, understand Him, right? Okay. Now what is there about our way of understanding that means we have to use these imperfect names, huh? Well, our understanding cannot arrive at the, what, divine simplicity according as it is to be considered in itself. We don't know God as He is. That's for the beauty of vision. And therefore, according to its own way, it grasps what? Divine things and names them, right? That is, according as they are found in sensible things from which we take our knowledge, right? Now notice, this doesn't make the mind necessarily false because the way of knowing doesn't have to be the way things are, right? That the falsehood comes in when you say that the way of knowing is the way things are, right? Okay. Right? We talked about that simple question of philosophy. In which, meaning insensible things, right? To signify in simple forms, we use abstract names, right? To signify subsistent things, we use what? Concrete names, huh? Hence, divine things, as has been said above, we signify by reason of their simplicity through abstract names. But by reason of their subsistence and complement or completion, we signify them through what? Concrete names, right? So we say both that God is good, right? And God is His own goodness, right? We can't avoid that, right? Now, it is necessary that not only essential names be signified in the abstract and in the concrete, huh? We saw this back in the treatise on names, huh? Chapter, question, what 13 was it? As when we say the Godhood, the divine nature, right? And God. Or wisdom and wise, right? But also, we have to do this with the persons, personal names. As we speak of what? The fatherhood and the father, right? To which two things especially force us, right? First, the objections of the heretics, huh? For when we confess the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit to be one God and three persons, right? When we are asked, by what are they one God and by what are they three persons, just as it is answered that they are one by the essence or by the divine nature, so it is necessary, what? Some abstract names by which we respond that persons are distinguished, huh? So we say the father is distinguished from the son by his fatherhood and the son from the father by his sonhood, right? And these properties or notions signified in the abstract as fatherhood and sonhood, right? And therefore, the essence signifies in the divine things as what and the person as who and the property as by what? Quid quis quo. So that's one reason, right? To answer the objections of the heretics, by what, huh? That's part of the reason why we had to use the word person, too, remember? Secondly, because one person is found in divine things to refer to what? Two persons. To wit, the person of the Father to the person of the Son and the person of the what? Holy Spirit. But not, however, by one relation. Because thus it would follow also that the Son and the Holy Spirit are referred by one and the same relation to the Father. And thus, since only relation in divine things multiplies the Trinity, as the great Poetia said, right? It would follow that the Son and the Holy Spirit were not to what? Two persons, huh? Nor can it be said, as Praepositinus said, that just as God in one way has himself to creatures, but the creatures diversely have themselves to him, so the Father by one relation is referred to the... the Son and to the Holy Spirit, but those two, right, by two relations, they refer to the Father. Because the specific meaning of a relation, right, consists in this, that it has itself to another, right? It's necessary to say that two relations are not diverse in species, if from their opposite, only one relation corresponds to them, right? It's necessary, therefore, for there to be another species of relation of the, what, of Lord and Father, for example, right? According to the diversity of sonhood and slavery, right? Now, all creatures under one species of relation are referred to the Father as his creatures, huh? But the Son and the Holy Spirit are not referred by relations of one meaning to the Father. Because one is generated by the Father, the other is breathed by the Father, right? Once it is not similar. And furthermore, in God, it is not required a real relation to, what, creatures, huh? But relations of reason in God, to multiply them, is not, what, inappropriate. But in the Father, it's necessary that there be a real relation by which is referred to the Son and the Holy Spirit. Whence, according to two relations of the Father and the Holy Spirit, to which they are referred to the Father, is necessary to understand two relations in the Father by which is referred to those two. Okay? Whence there is not one person of the Father, right? Whence, since there is not except one person of the Father, right? Is necessary, okay? That one signifies a part, the relations in the abstract, which are called the properties and the notions, right? So it's by one that is referred to the Son and by another one is referred to the what? Yeah, yeah. So can I have one relation to my wife and my daughter? They're related to me differently, right? Can I have one relation to these two? No. So they're not related to me in the same way. I have to have two relations in me to my wife and my daughter. So to the one I'm a husband, to the other I'm a father, right? So you're saying, God, the Father's got to have two relations, right? That's why you need the, that's not the reason why you need the abstract, right? Because by one of them is referred to the Son and by the other one to the Holy Spirit, right? So, well, to kind of understand why you need these notions, right? But part is because of the insistence of the heretics, right? But what does he distinguish from them, right? Is the second reason similar to the first in the sense that you have a need of something by which to distinguish the relation? Yeah, yeah. Because one person, the Father, is related to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, but by different relations, right? So you've got to have the by, which is, that was cool, right? Okay. Is that where Craig Positinus was wrong? Is that what? Yeah, yeah. Tom's saying that, yeah. Because he was not admitting the necessity of using both abstract and concrete names and talking about God, right? What does Christ say in the Gospel there? God alone is what? Good, right, huh? So you've got to say that God is good, right? But good grammatically means what? Has goodness, right? You say, well, is there a distinction between the have and the had, like has goodness seems to indicate? Saying that God is not the goodness that he has? Like I'm not the geometry that I have or I'm not the health that I have? No, no, no. God is his goodness. So I've got to use the word goodness then. God, huh? See? If I just said that God is goodness, I'd say, well, then God is that by which things are good. But I'm not admitting that God himself is good. Just like my health is that by which I'm healthy. But is my health healthy too? Is it? So I'm forced to use both, right? But both names are, what, reason recognizes as being inadequate to express God, right? But you can't get away from our way of what? Knowing, huh? Knowing God. And our way of naming God, or speaking of God, corresponds more immediately to our way of knowing God, huh? See? But when you try to get to God in himself, then you have to distinguish between the defects in our way of knowing him and the way he is, huh? God-wise, yeah, but way more excellent. And Aristotle was wise. Really? Even Thomas, yes. Now the first objection of saying, well, there are this talk about notions in Scripture. We've seen this kind of objection before, the word person was not in Scripture, right? Okay. To the first, therefore, it should be said that although about the notions there is not mention made in Second Scripture, there is nevertheless mention about the persons in whom are understood the notions as the abstract in the, what? Concrete. Concrete, right? So, you know, just like you could say, if God is said to be good, right, then there must be goodness in God, right? So, well, the Scripture doesn't say that there's goodness in God, it just says he's good. Well, you know, it's what? Understood, right? And saying he's good, that he has goodness, right? He has goodness in God. Now the second objection was saying, well, do these notions signify the persons or do they signify the essence, right? You're seeing your problem about everything. Well, now this is a very important thing for seeing how it's related to those things. To the second, it should be said that the notions signifying divine things not as, what? Things in God, right? You'll find out there are going to be five, what? Notions, right? Are you talking about five things in God? No. But as reasons by which the persons are, what? No. Although these notions or relations are really, what? In God, right, huh? But they don't signify, what? Things in God, right, huh? That's kind of a hard thing to see, right? Remember how he said before that there were, what, four relations in God, but only three persons, right? Yeah. Now we're going to see there's five notions, but yeah, yeah. This is my Pythagorean Theorem, what you heard me say before. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Five, four, three. See how game that is? It's a fun piece of chocolate you could take. Well, Valentine's Day's coming. Don't explain it too well. You won't be doing more than just you and the world knowing it. That's the first numbers of Pythagorean Theorem, right? Because two, three, four wouldn't be Pythagorean Theorem, would they? Or Triangle, right? So, you first see this five, four, three in the study of the soul, right? Because in the study of the soul, Aristarchal distinguishes five genera of powers, huh? You have the vegetative powers, right? The sense powers, the repetitive powers, intellectual powers, the locomotive powers, right? But then he speaks of four grades of life, huh? The lowest grade of life is the plants, right? Then there are the animals that seem to differ, though, from the plants because they don't move around from place to place but they're fixed to the floor of the ocean, and so on. And then there are the animals that move around from one place to another and then finally have them, four grades, right? If the souls are known by the powers, and there's five genera of powers, why are there only four grades of, what, life, right? Mm-hmm. Well, because one of the generative powers, the appetitive powers, follow upon having sense or having what? Reason, right? Emotions upon having senses and the will upon having reason. So they don't constitute in a separate grade, right? So the lowest grade of life has vegetative powers only. The next grade of life has, in addition to the vegetative powers, the sense powers, right? The next highest grade has the vegetative powers, the sense powers, and the locomotive powers, right? Okay? And then the highest has, in addition to those, the intellectual power, right? But with intellectual powers come the will, so that doesn't give you a separate grade, right? And with sensation come the emotions, okay? So you don't have a separate grade because of that. So one of the generative powers doesn't give rise to a separate life. It goes along with them, right? So that's why five generative powers give you only four grades of life. The inner style speaks of three souls, right? Well, because the soul, as you might kind of suspect in the word itself, seems to indicate something that is starting to rise above what? The merely material, right? And life is the first soul, right? The living soul. And then you get to the sensing soul. You get this kind of materiality that sense-knowing involves. And then you get to the understanding soul, as Shakespeare calls it. Then you have an even greater transcendence, or for matter, right? Where you have the soul, and so on. But locomotive powers are kind of what? That's giving you another grade above matter, right? You see? So, five equals four, because three, right? Well, it's going to be like that here. There's going to be five notions, but only four, what? Relations, right? And only, what? Three persons. Well, I guess the reason for this reduction, right? Well, one of the notions will be fatherhood, right? Another notion will be sonhood, right? Another one will be breathing, let's say, and another one will be procession, right? To full on a better day, the Holy Spirit. But then this inatiobilitas, they say, this having no beginning, right? It's a fifth notion that's used to know the father, right? And it's not from anyone else, right? Well, it's not really a relation, right? Except by kind of a reduction, right? So, the five notions come down to four relations, right? And then one of the relations is common to the father and the son, right? They both read the Holy Spirit. So, they don't give another person there, but you just get three persons. So, you've got to think about that, right? But, you know, the man who's studying this 5, 4, 3, he's going to say another 5, 4, 3, and he's got to realize the, well, why you keep on losing one, right? Why five notions only corresponds to four relations, and four relations only to three persons, huh? But that'll come up. We'll get in there. And therefore, those things which have an order to some essential act or personal act cannot be said of the notions, because it's, this is repugnant to the, what? Which they signify, right? Okay? How do they signify? Well, take the logic. With rationes, right? As certain rationes are thoughts, you might say, right? By which the, what? Persons are known, right? So, one thought which I know the Father is that he's not from anyone. And that pertains to some of the dignity of the, what? Father, right? He's not from anyone, right? Why, Thomas would not really want to admit as a notion that the Holy Spirit has no one from him, because that doesn't pertain to his dignity, right? Okay? But another notion we have about the Father is his, what? Fatherhood, right? Or by his identity to the Son. And another is, what? Is breathing, right? Or by his identity to the Holy Spirit. Where the Son is made known partly by his being the Son, right? And also by his breathing the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is known simply by his proceeding, his being breathed. You want to get that word? Whence we are not able to say that the Fatherhood, what? Generates or creates, right? Or that the Fatherhood is wise or, what? Understanding, right? But the essential names that do not have an order to some act, but remove the conditions of the creatures, of the creature from God, can be said of the notions, huh? For we can say that the Fatherhood is eternal or immense, right? Or something of this sort, huh? And likewise, an account of the identity of the thing, we are able to, what? Take the personal, substantive names, huh? And essentials, and predicate them in oceans. For we can say that the Fatherhood is really God, right? And the Fatherhood is the Father, huh? Okay? But you want to say that the Fatherhood generates. It seems to be contrary to the way they signify, right? Now, the third argument is about the not having abstract names and simple things, huh? They're distinguished by themselves. To the third, it should be said that although the persons are simple, nevertheless, without prejudging, without prejudice to the, what, simplicity of them, the, what, proper thoughts of these persons can be signified in the abstract, as has been said in the body of the article. Well, that's because of our way of what? Knowing, right? So, we're dealing with the change there, you know, and you say, well, when the healthy becomes sick, right? When the sick become healthy, does health become sickness? Well, then, does health become sickly? When I become sick, does my health become sickly? That'd be like a kind of contradiction, right? And do the healthy really become sick? Because Heraclitus has taken the way we speak, we see the healthy become sick. And what has become me? Comes to be. So, can the healthy come to be sick? If you come to be something, then you are that. So, if the healthy come to be sick, then the healthy are sick. And Heraclitus says, well, you've got to say this, because otherwise, the healthy would always be healthy. There'd be no change in the world, right? And Paramanides says, no, no, no, no. Healthy can never be sick. Therefore, there is no change in the world. So, Heraclitus, in order to save change in the world, admits that the healthy are sick and the sick are healthy. But, if the healthy really were sick and the sick were healthy, if they were the same thing, then there'd be no change. So, he admits something impossible in order to save change, he doesn't end up saving change. But, at the same time, Paramanides is absurd in saying that there's no change in the world. So, Aristotle comes along and he says, well, there must be a way of understanding change that doesn't involve a contradiction. Because we know that change exists, but we know something can not be its opposite, right? So, Aristotle unties the apparent contradiction in all change by saying there's a third thing in change, right? And that's the subject of the two contraries, right? And so, besides the health and the sickness, there must be something like the body, right? Which is neither health or sickness, right? But it's the subject in which health is in at one time and sickness at another time, right? But not at the same time, right? Or you can say that when you say the health becomes sick, the word healthy The word healthy... The word healthy... The word healthy... The word healthy... The word healthy... is a confused notion of what's there, right? There's something there that has health. But the haver and the had are not the same, right? And so we start to distinguish between the health and what has the health, right? Then when you come to talk about God, we're stuck with that way of thinking. And so if we say God is wise, we've got to say that God, what, has wisdom, right? But then you say, now, is that really true about God, right? Because God's ought to get it simple, right? So God must really be the same thing as his what? And that's why he can never be foolish. Or he's the same thing as his goodness, right? And therefore he can never become bad, right? But the good man can become bad because his goodness is not the man. But he has goodness, right? But he can lose what he has and acquire the opposite vice or something. So, you know, it's a very simple thing, but kind of very profound thing, right? Can we really talk about God without using both abstract and concrete names, right? We talked a ton about him. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So is God, you know, what does St. Paul call Christ the wisdom of God? The power of God, yeah. Well, is that way of speaking incorrect? But wisdom signifies that by which the wise are wise, right? So God must have that which the wise are wise if he's wise himself, right? But he's simple, right? So how could he be other than what he has? So Thomas will often say that God is what he has. Seems kind of strange, right? But then we're trying to make up for the defect in our way of knowing, yeah? But the fact that either way of speaking has a defect shows that we don't really know God as he is, right? But these two ways of speaking, do they make our mind false? Well, if you say the way we know must be the way things are, otherwise you're false. Then it would be false, right? But is my mind false when it says God is wise? And then another time you say God is wisdom itself? Because we don't attribute the defect in our way of speaking to God, huh? So when you say God has wisdom, we don't attribute to God the composition in our way of thinking there. It seems to imply that the haver and the had are two things, right? But when we say that God is wisdom itself, we don't deny that God is wise. So as Aristotle said there, you know, the falsehood would come in in saying that the way God is is the way we know him. Yes, sir. And that isn't true, is it? Yeah, but there are ways in which we can speak falsely about God, right? If I say God is composed, God is put together, you know, for the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, something like that. These are parts of God, then my mind is false, right? Then I'm mistaken. So there are ways of speaking about God which are false. Yeah. So the falsehood comes in if you attribute our way of knowing God to the way he is, right? So that's kind of a profound thing that Aristotle saw, you know, but you have to carry it out here. We don't have a time right, I guess, huh? But whether there are five notions, we'll talk about that next week, huh? It was a nice day.