Apr 04 2008
The Perfection of God (A Simple Summa)
What follows is from St Thomas Aquinas’ Compendium of the Summa Theologica. It treats in simplified form the three articles of question four of the Prima Pars (first part) of the Summa Theologica. Those articles can be read HERE. One may also wish to read the succinct treatment in the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES. Chapter 28.
The ancient philosophers did not attribute that which is Best and highest to the First Principle, because they considered only the imperfect material principle. god is Perfect, because He is the First Efficient Principle, supreme in Actuality, and, therefore, supremely Perfect. In Him are the perfections of all things, for whatever perfection exists in the effects must be found in the efficient cause, and thus they exist in God in a more eminent manner than is the case in creatures. For God is His own very Existence of Himself, and hence it must be that He contains all perfection of being, for perfection is identified with being. The creature is like to God, because God is the Efficient Cause of all, and every agent does a work like unto itself in proportion to its actuality. If an agent is one in species with its effect, there is likeness between them in species, as man generates a man; and if they are not one in species, there is likeness, but not in species, as those things which are generated by the sun’s heat are like to the sun in some degree, but they do not receive the form of the sun in specific likeness, but only in generic likeness. If there is an Agent outside of Genus, the effect has a more remote likeness to it; for the likeness is not based either on genus or species, but only on analogy, inasmuch as both have being. In this way creatures are like to God, the First Natural Principle of all.
From A COMPANION TO THE SUMMA by Walter Farrell:
Perfection
One of the greatest concentrations of perfection the world has seen was to be found in that small house of Nazareth when Gabriel saluted the Immaculate Virgin; yet even in this sublime company there was the spectre of imperfection, which is limitation, that haunts all creation. The angel had the potentialities of successive thought that all eternity would not exhaust; the virgin had the undeveloped potentialities of mind and heart that are the task as well as the glory of human nature; both had the imperfection inherent in the limited character of their respective nature, for the angelic no less than the human nature has its boundaries fixed. The most intimate glimpse of the limitless perfection of God given to man on this earth is to be had in the picture of the Madonna with the divine child in her arms; for there is all the perfection of human nature along with its inevitable limitation, but there also is the unfathomable abyss of the boundless source of all perfection.
There is simply no place for imperfection in God. In Him there are no potentialities to be realized, as all potentialities must be realized, by something other than themselves. He is absolutely independent because He is first; all others depend on this first cause Who cannot depend on any other without ceasing to be first. More than that, He has in Himself the perfections of everything else that ever has, ever will, indeed, that ever could exist. Unless He be their cause they cannot be; He cannot be the cause of perfections that are not in some way already His.
Virtually, Formally and Eminently
When we come down to detail, the argument for the utter perfection of God seems to involve insuperable difficulties. If we try to picture God as a combination of the ferocity of a wolf and the pathetic friendliness of a dachshund, the beauty of youth and the serenity of age, the grandeur of a sunset and the peace of night we shall drive ourselves insane. But why should we try this sort of thing in our thought of the divinity when we are so careful to avoid it in our thought of the created universe? We know that a father contains within himself all the perfections of the human nature of his son and in exactly the same way; if we had to put this in a technical phrase, any journeyman philosopher could tell us that these perfections were possessed formally. We are quite sure an acorn contains the perfections of an oak; but we do not try to picture the oak’s huge trunk and stubborn leaves as packed into the tiny confines of an acorn. We know these perfections do not exist in the acorn in the same way as in the oak; they are had, not formally, but virtually, radically, in the acorn. We do not hesitate to attribute the perfections of a poem to its author; but we do not make the absurd mistake of expecting the poet’s mind to get musty, yellow with age, or covered with dust on a library shelf. It is not the poet that leaps out of the frightened child’s mouth in elocution class. In this case the poet possesses the perfections of his poem but in a completely superior manner, eminently.
It is in this last fashion, eminently, that the perfections of all creation are found in God; He is the cause of them all, they exist in Him, not virtually, not identically, but eminently. The conclusion that all reality is godlike is quite true. What we see in the world of existence, of beauty, of goodness, of grace and all the rest is had from God Who is overflowing with perfection. These creatures share, participate in the perfection of God. This was a truth close to the heart of Francis of Assisi and Martin de Porres, a truth that made all irrational creation and the whole world of men a lover’s note to be read slowly, tenderly, repeatedly, to be treasured caressingly until the writer in person made plain all the beauties that could not be squeezed between the lines. It is right that the strength of a storm at sea, the innocence of a child, the calm of a country twilight should stir us to the depths of our being for these are shadows of divinity passing by.
It might be well to note here, for accuracy’s sake, that we speak of divine attributes in a double sense, often without realizing the distinction. Thus when we state these attributes positively, such as simplicity and perfection, we are speaking only by way of analogy; that is, we do not mean to attribute these things to God in exactly the same way in which they belong to men but in an infinitely superior manner. On the other hand, when we state them negatively, insisting, for example, that God is incomposite and devoid of all imperfection, we are talking literally, univocally, and expect our words to be taken without qualification.
