www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Joint Declaration - JPII and Bartholomew I about the Filioque?

The funny thing about words is that the same word can be used in different ways. In order to make the point stick, you need to demonstrate that John in fact uses the term the way the scholastics and Augustine did, which I don�t think can be done. John in a number of other places indicates quite clearly that the simplicity of the divine power is also truly plural. What simplicity means for him is not a complete identity but a complete presence or interpenetration. This is not the operative meaning in Augustine or the majority of the Scholastics, Thomas Aquinas being a chief example.


If the distinction is not a judgment of the mind, then you should use the term attribute more carefully since that is what it refers to, at least among Thomists generally. It relates to the act of creatures predicating qualities in a diverse way to a completely singular and unitary object, namely God.

Moreover, your answer regarding the effect being multiple leaves my point about a fundamentally Platonic metaphysic untouched and specifically an opposition between unity and plurality, or the one and the many. The same goes for the notion of creaturely essences as a limit to activity. One wonders what makes such a view Christian.

Here you make the most common error in understanding the classical meaning of "simplicity" that extends from St. Gregory Nazianzan to Thomas Aquinas. I will not take it beyond that because the schoolmen and reformed theologians go on to construct their own meanings which are not in question here at the moment.

The divine simplicity of the Fathers and of St. Thomas Aquinas set simplicity in contrast to composite rather than, as you and many other modern critics of Aquinas, setting simplicity in contrast to complex.

In Aquinas, and in the Fathers, the Trinity is complex but the Trinity is not composite.

I hope that you do as others have strongly suggested here and present Thomistic understandings from received Thomistic sources. Not all people who claim to teach Thomism are correct. There are a received body of concepts, definitions, ideas, logic, and texts and then the rest of it.

You'll have to dig deeper than you have for your criticism.

Mary

Mary,

As not all who claim to present Orthodoxy are correct either.

You have failed to show the contours of the bridge you say exists between the Fathers and Aquinas on this score.

I'm not criticizing, but would genuinely be interested in reading a more comprehensive presentation for either yourself or Ghosty on this score.

It would get to the heart of an important issue here.

Alex

Given the complexity of the conversation and the various understandings of concepts and ideas and texts, I see no reason to rush any of this. The only thing a broad general statement is going to inspire is a broad general rebuttal. This strategy never does seem to arrive at any common understanding.

I'd rather pick our way through and try to find common agreement on definitions, and then go back, once certain things can be agreed upon, and see where we are then. This is how I will approach this topic, at any rate.

Mary

Dear Mary,

Fair enough - looking forward to the discussion.

Alex

Mary is quite right. This means we have to go back and look at original texts.

Acolyte makes a similar point, and what he says also means we needs to go back to original texts.


Perhaps, simplicity and presence or interpenetration are not opposed to one another, ie, it is not "either or", but "both and."



With respect to original texts, I'll start with a text from Aquinas which I think sheds some light on this discussion. It is about God's perfections. He relies on another theologian, Dionysius. (Sorry for the length, but it is important. I have highlighted some of the text.


In one sense God's perfections show how incomprehensible He really is. How, for example, do Justice and Mercy both exist in Him?

Acolyte: As Im and Mary have pointed out, simplicity is not opposed to complexity in God according to Aquinas, and Aquinas is drawing from Pseuodo-Dionysis, yet another Eastern figure. You again refer to St. Augustine, but I think you're lending far too much weight to him with regards to St. Thomas' work, especially in the case of Divine Simplicity. Aquinas studied the Eastern Fathers extensively, and drew most of his understanding on these matters from them (especially St. John of Damascus and Pseudo-Dionysis). If you mean to say that St. John of Damascus does not believe that the Divine Energy is completely united and simple in the sense of being non-composite, I'll have to ask for more support for your position.

That being said, of course St. John of Damascus also refers to distinct "attributes" within God, plurality as you called it. Incidently, so does St. Thomas Aquinas whenever he's talking about Divine characteristics and powers. The simplicity of God is not Him being this undifferentiated mass from which all things are drawn and then formed as distinct (which would be what Aquinas calls "prime matter"), but from the fact that all "qualities" are contained in God AS God, not merely as attributes at all in the way we think of them. Their very perfection (as Aquinas uses the term) implies their fullness as themselves, and not as mere potential awaiting activation in a creature. It's just that they are not distinct in such a way as to make them seperate.

The difference here between God and creatures is that God, being "I Am that Am", is what He is wholly, and is not composed of various parts. While the perfection of Love is true and real, it's not different from Justice in God in such a way that we can say they are seperate; in us, on the other hand, we can speak of them as seperate qualities because they are truly seperate in us. In this we reach the barrier of human understanding, and can really only discuss shadows since we don't have experience of such non-compositeness as God. We can't, however, make "non-composite" mean that these perfections aren't true perfections in God, we can only take it to mean that such perfections are One in God in a manner that is beyond composite beings such as creatures.

These perfections become truly seperate and are "compiled" in creatures according to various recipes called natures, whereas in God they are united in Being. In us, loving is seperate from willing, and seperate from anger, though we can draw certain parallels and connections; in God these things aren't seperate, but are one Divine act containing all perfections, and received by creatures according to our receptiveness. That we can say love is seperate from anger is because one nature is fit to receive one and not the other (vessels of honor, and vessels of dishonor, to use St. Paul's terminology).

I believe this is precisely what St. John of Damascus is saying when he compares the simple rays of the sun being received in diverse ways according to the natures of the receivers. This is also what I mean when I say that the Divine Energies become distinct in us, not because of their lack of perfection within God, but because of the lack of perfect receptivity in us. Indeed, if they were not perfect in themselves within God, we would not be able to receive them as seperate at all.

Peace and God bless!

Elijamaria,

I disagree. Here is why I disagree. Thomas doesn�t speak in terms of complexity. In denying all composition in God he denies all �real� plurality, which is why he even states that the divine relations (aka persons) are identical to the divine essence.

Secondly, it is a common mistake to read a common notion of essence and simplicity between the Cappadocians and the Scholastics. This is a fairly common anachronism among western scholars who tend to filter the Cappadocians through the lens of Augustine�s late Platonism. Gregory, among others, make it clear that the divine names do not denote the essence in any way and not just in a mode contrary to the mode of signification as does Thomas. (Carabine, The Unknown God: Negative Theology in the Platonic Tradition:Plato to Eriugena, Louvain)

Consequently, there is no common notion of simplicity between the respective parties. Thomas and other scholastics view plurality and unity as opposed because they are working within a dialectical model where distinction is opposition, this is why the persons are distinguished by relations of oppposition. This is why the persons are relations and the essence is not. This is not the case I think with the Cappadocians or say Maximus.

Here is the reason why. In order to distinguish dialectically we need to be predicating in relation to things that be. But God is not being/energia/esse ad intra. Thomas� reading depends on a received mistranslation of Dionysius via Albert of hyperousia as superessential being. But hyperousia for Dionysius is not any kind of being for it is not being in any sense whatsoever. Consequently a dialectical system of simple essences and plural modes is simply not possible from the get go.

As far as sources go, my professional area of specialization is metaphysics and medieval metaphysics. That doesn�t imply that I am correct. But it does imply a better than off chance that I am employing primary source material and representative sources.


IM,

On simplicity, I think it would be better to look at Thomas� previous and direct statements in Prima pars 1, question 3, articles 1-8.


Ghosty,

I agree that God is incomprehensible, but I don�t think we have the same notion of incomprehensibility in mind. Let me contrast. For Thomas, for a convienient example, God is incomprehensible because all of the predicates that we assign to God are derived from composite objects and therefore imperfectly denote him, even though they do so sufficiently that they denotation fulfills the relevant truth conditions. It is because God is simple such that all of the predicates assigned to him (attributes) exist in him as identical to each other and identical to the divine essence in an exhaustive manner that God is incomprehensible. They �be� supremely.

By contrast such a view is not possible for the Cappadocians. They view the divine names as truly denoting God, but not and never his essence, not even analogically. This is because the essence of God does not �be.� God is beyond esse or activity. So it is not that God is incomprehensible because he be�s supremely, but because he doesn�t be at all.

As I noted above, while Aquinas uses Dionysius it doesn�t follow that he is using or understanding him correctly. I�d argue that most Dionysian scholars agree that the Scholastics, including Aquinas, misunderstanding him, in part based on mistranslations into Latin as well as conceptual limitations of Augustinianism that simply cannot accommodate Dionysian concepts.

Thomas is a good Augustinian. Augustine is the main lens through which he understands these issues. One has only to look at his discussion of divine simplicity in question 3 which harkens back to De Trinitate where Augustine explicates his Platonic view of God as a simple essence. So no, I am not lending any weight to Augustine that Thomas, not to mention practically every other Schoolman, doesn�t do himself.

Aquinas is no dummy and it is true that he read a good amount of Orthodox Fathers, but he also labored to read them in a consistent way within the Augustinian tradition. So, noting that he cites Dionysius doesn�t imply that he is repeating Dionysius� views. You need to demonstrate this and not assume it.

As for simplicity per se, I agree that for St. John the plurality of the energies doesn�t compromise divine unity, but I�d also say that it is a metaphysically real plurality and not an exhaustive identity relation that Aquinas has in mind per quality attributions. I�d also be careful in terms of St. John�s comments relying on an English translation at crucial junctures. For example does being mean ousia or energia? Sometimes English translators translate both as �being� but the Greek meaning is quite distinct. The same goes for the term �attributes� which I don�t think St. John had in mind the Platonic and Scholastic gloss and usage.

So noting that they both talk about a distinction between attributes does no argumentative work, since for Aquinas, those powers are really only one thing, whereas for St. John, I don�t think they are. I agree that Aquinas doesn�t view God as a kind of prime matter via Aristotle and Plotinus, but I never said that he did either, so that seems irrelevant. The Thomistic view is that all of the things that we predicate about God are actually one thing, God. The difference is in our judgment and not in God. I don�t think that is St. John�s view and I am absolutely certain it isn�t say Maximus the Confessors view.

For Maximus and later Palamas, the energies are real potential or powers that come to act via personal employment. Some of these powers have no beginning in usage and no end. Some have a beginning but no end. Some no beginning but an end. Consequently the doctrine of actus purus is rejected and incompatible with this view for it allows no distinct potentia in terms of 2nd potentiality or first actuality in God.









To lay out the Thomistic view that the perfections of God are distinct in us but identical in God is just to support my original point, that we are dealing here with a Platonic or Hellenistic system that dialectically situates the One over the Many in terms of causal deficiency. Effects are distinguished from their causes in terms of a loss of causal potency. Hence this claim is left untouched.

Consequently, on my view the many energies are really distinct both in God and us so that there is no dialectical opposition between God and creation. God is both non-being (ousia) and being (energia), God is both one and many. So the distinction of energies is real and not epistemic or due to causal differentiation as a result of a loss of causal potency. Needless to say, I don�t think you can find your view in St. John. This doesn�t mean that you can�t find passages that you think support your view. Aquinas did, but Aquinas was wrong.

Maximus for example is sufficiently clear that the divine powers are really distinct and are not distinct with a pragmatic, epistemic or causal differentiation since they are rooted in the divine essence, they lack nothing. Consequently, I think you are reading a scholastic system back into St. John, which is why the scholarship on St. John doesn�t take such a view to be present in him.

Acolyte: It would be very nice if you could post some citations of the works of St. Gregory Palamas and St. Maximos, so we could actually discuss them and evaluate them. As it is we have nothing to work with on your side, and I'm afraid that merely citing your credentials doesn't add much meat to the conversation

Your reference to Question 3 of Prima Pars doesn't do much, because I've read the whole Prima Pars, and under the direction of Dominicans for that particular question, and I've not seen the conclusion that you seem to be implying from it. Concerning God's simplicity, all that question deals with is composition as Mary pointed out, and in dealing with creatures he explicitely deals with complexity (again in Mary's terms) because he discusses the exemplary forms of all species as they exist in the Divine Knowledge. In this case I think you'll have to do more than point us to the question where Aquinas specifically rules out composition, as while that question contradicts the assertions of some Byzantine theologians (and, in my opinion, quite rightly), it doesn't negate the complexity of the Divine Essence in terms of a multitude of forms, both with actual external subjects, and those existing in the Divine Mind alone.

Peace and God bless!

Why that is a strange statement about "I am Who am." And of course, if in fact He isn't, ie, "he doesn't be at all", then one can not know anything about Him because finally words, which are created things, have no connection to the uncreated. Thus one cannot attach any real meaning whatsoever to statements such as "the divine names truly denote God, but not and never his essence, not even analogically."

Now perhaps you are correct in such a "view" of God. However, you cannot demonstrate that you are correct. It remains a mere assertion, because God is so far 'beyond' being that He isn't.

So please, because I once lived in Missouri, show me some texts that the Capadocians hold what you say they hold. But I suspect that I am asking for the impossible.

lm

Indeed. I've seen plenty of texts that indicate that they believed that God was beyond our understanding of being, but that goes without saying in Thomistic theology (though it IS said by St. Thomas nonetheless, because he's absurdly comprehensive in covering any possible dispute).

God is so totally beyond what we understand as "being" that we can only speak negatively and analogically of His Being, and this can be demonstrated by the most basic theological proofs. I think it goes too far to say that God is "non-being", however, except insofar as He's not like "our being", but even that fact is because WE are "non-being" by comparison, not because God is "non-being".

As you said, it's a very strange thing to say of "I Am that Am" that He's non-being. If anything, that self-identification of God should call into question our own "beingness"; after all, if God's personal self-identification is "I Am", then what are WE? That even Christ used this as His self-identification shows us that the Name is not meant as an Old Testament accomodation to human understanding, but a profound self-revelation of God.

Peace and God bless!

Gregory of Nyssa against Eunomius, Bk II

Mary,

My views are based upon the conciliar and dogmatic text known as the Synodikon of Orthodoxy, and it is not a "speculative" document.

May God bless you,
Todd

For those who want to understand why Orthodoxy holds that God is beyond being, I recommend reading the article by Dr. Eric Perl entitled, "St. Gregory Palamas and the Metaphysics of Creation."

Click the link in order to read section two of that article: St. Gregory Palamas and the Metaphysics of Creation [geocities.com]

The question of course is, "What do you mean that God is beyond being?" When He says, "I AM WHO AM," it seems He is saying that HE IS BEING. As Ghosty pointed out, he is unlike any being we know, inlcuding ourselves, so much so that we cannot comprehend Him, ie, we can't get our arms or intellect around him.

An Orthodox friend just recently pointed this out to me:

In Letter 235 (to St. Amphilochius of Iconium), Basil says the following:


(my emphasis)