The Divine Lamp

Chapter 11

Refutation Of The Foregoing Opinion And Solution Of The Aforesaid Arguments.

St Thomas is here responding to the arguement presented in the last chapter.

The foregoing opinion arose from their being accustomed from the beginning to hear and call upon the name of God.  Now custom, especially if it date from  our childhood, acquires the force of nature, the result being that the mind holds those things with which it was imbued from childhood as firmly as though they were self-evident.  It is also a result of failing to distinguish between what is self-evident simply, and that which is self-evident to us.  For it is simply self-evident that God is, because the selfsame thing which God is, is His existence.  But since we are unable to conceive mentally the selfsame thing which is God, that thing remains unknown in regard to us.  Thus it is self-evident simply that every whole is greater than its parts, but to the one who fails to conceive mentally the meaning of a whole, it must needs be unknown.  Hence it is that those things which are most evident of all are to the intellect what the sun is to the eye of an owl, as stated in Metaphysics ii.

Nor does it follow, as the first argument alleged, that as soon as the meaning of the word God is understood, it is known that God is.  First, because it is not known to all, even to those who grant that there is a God, that God is that thing than which no greater can be thought of, since many of the ancients asserted that this world is God.  Nor can any such conclusion be gathered from the significations which Damascene assigns to this word God (De Fid. Orth. Bk. 1, Ch 1. See quote below).  Secondly because, granted that everyone understands this word God to signify something than which a greater cannot be thought of, it does not follow that something than which a greater cannot be thought of exists in reality.  For we must needs allege a thing in the same way as we allege the signification of its name.  Now from the fact that we conceive mentally that which the word God is intended to convey, it does not follow that God is otherwise than in the mind.  Wherefore neither will it follow that the thing than which a greater cannot be thought of is otherwise than in the mind.  And thence it does not follow that there exists in reality something than which a greater cannot be thought of .  Hence this is no argument against those who assert that there is no God, since whatever be granted to exist, whether in reality or in the mind, there is nothing to prevent a person from thinking of something greater, unless he grants that there is in reality something than which a greater cannot be thought of.

Again it does not follow, as the second argument pretended, that if it is possible to think God is not, it is possible to think of something greater than God.  For that it be possible to think that He is not, is not on account of the imperfection of His being or the uncertainty thereof, since in itself His being is supremely manifest, but is the result of the weakness of our mind which is able to see Him, not in Himself but in His effects, so that it is led by reasoning to know that He is.

Wherefore the third argument also is solved.  For just as it is self-evident to us that a whole is greater than its parts, so is it most evident to those who see the very  essence of God that God exists, since His essence is His existence.  But because we are unable to see His essence, we come to know His existence not in Himself but in His effects.

The solution to the fourth argument is also clear.  For man know God naturally in the same way he desires Him naturally.  Now a man desires Him naturally in so far as he naturally desires happiness, which is a likeness of the divine goodness.  Hence it does not follow that God considered in Himself is naturally known to man, but that His likeness is.  Wherefore man must needs come by reasoning to know God in the likeness to Him which he discovers in God’s effects.

It is also easy to reply to the fifth argument.  For God is that in which all things are known, not so that other things be unknown except He be known, as happens in self-evident principles, but because all knowledge is caused in us by His outpouring.

St John Damascene:

No one hath seen God at any time; the Only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him(1). The Deity, therefore, is ineffable and incomprehensible. For no one knoweth the Father, save the Son, nor the Son, save the Father(2). And the Holy Spirit, too, so knows the things of God as the spirit of the man knows the things that are in him(3). Moreover, after the first and blessed nature no one, not of men only, but even of supramundane powers, and the Cherubim, I say, and Seraphim themselves, has ever known God, save he to whom He revealed Himself.

God, however, did not leave us in absolute ignorance. For the knowledge of God’s existence has been implanted by Him in all by nature. This creation, too, and its maintenance, and its government, proclaim the majesty of the Divine nature(4). Moreover, by the Law and the Prophets(5) in former times and afterwards by His Only-begotten Son, our Lord and God and Saviour Jesus Christ, He disclosed to us the knowledge of Himself as that was possible for us. All things, therefore, that have been delivered to us by Law and Prophets and Apostles and Evangelists we receive, and know, and honour(6), seeking for nothing beyond these. For God, being good, is the cause of all good, subject neither to envy nor to any passion(7). For envy is far removed from the Divine nature, which is both passionless and only good. As knowing all things, therefore, and providing for what is profitable for each, He revealed that which it was to our profit to know; but what we were unable(8) to bear He kept secret. With these things let us be satisfied, and let us abide by them, not removing everlasting boundaries, nor overpassing the divine tradition(9).

For more on this topic:

See Chapter two of THE ONE GOD: A Commentary On The First Part Of St Thomas’ Theological Summa, by Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange

Trackback URI | Comments RSS