Thomist theory of grace and predestination

[Non Nobis]

...
1.  God is pure act, and this is the only reality pertaining to Him; every distinction we make (e.g. between His Justice, Mercy, etc.) is purely notional.
2.  His pure act is identical to His existence which is identical to His essence.
3.  God's existence is necessary.
4.  God's creation of X is identical to pure act which is identical to His existence.
5.  Therefore God's creation of X is necessary.

You deny 4. because 5. is contrary to revelation (and also to reason), but 4. is implied by 1., 2., and 3.  You have to deny 1. in order to deny 4. and 5.  If you don't deny 1., you can't take refuge in "mystery".  This is a contradiction.
...

1. God is pure act.
2. God is identical to His existence and to His essence
3. God's existence is necessary.

But God (and so His existence or essence) is not identical to (God, X). God = pure act, not the entirety of act, or the entirety of reality after creation. Creation brings about X, and so (God, X), a new total reality, and any relations between God and X.  God creating and the initial existence of X occur simultaneously (God, X), and this act of creating is not itself God or pure act.  God remains pure act, the same reality in Himself, and X is not necessary.  I.e. 4 is false (and not implied by 1-3), and 5 is false.

[Quaremerepulisti]

But God (and so His existence or essence) is not identical to (God, X).

Indeed not.  The relevant question is whether God is identical to (God, Creation of X).

Here's the dilemma for Thomists: they must make creation of X either identical to God or identical to X.  If creation of X is identical to God, then X is necessary.  If creation of X is identical to X, then X is self-creating.

God = pure act, not the entirety of act, or the entirety of reality after creation.

Indeed not.  The relevant question is whether pure act is the entirety of reality pertaining to God.  If so, then "Divine creation of X" either makes X necessary or is incoherent.

Creation brings about X...

And what is creation of X????  Thomists really have no coherent answer... it's a "mystery".

I.e. 4 is false (and not implied by 1-3), and 5 is false.

No, 4 is implied by 1-3.

[Non Nobis]

...

QMR, you disagree with Thomists and with Perry Robinson, but I'm not sure how you would unpack your OWN understanding.

...
And what is creation of X????  Thomists really have no coherent answer... it's a "mystery".

You don't "owe" it to me, and "you asked first", but what is YOUR answer (or thinking)?

How does any relation "come about"?

The relevant question is whether pure act is the entirety of reality pertaining to God.

I would say creation "pertains to God"; He causes it and it is caused by Him.  None of this involves a difference in His "pure act" (essence/existence). OK, I see you are asking does "creating" pertain to God; I don't see why it can't "pertain" to Him without implying a difference in His essence.

Explain your answer or thinking, other than saying the Thomists got it wrong.  What is God's causing creation of X, i.e. creating X?

[Quaremerepulisti]

OK, I see you are asking does "creating" pertain to God; I don't see why it can't "pertain" to Him without implying a difference in His essence.

Explain your answer or thinking, other than saying the Thomists got it wrong.  What is God's causing creation of X, i.e. creating X?

First, the problem in Thomism.  The only kind of non-necessary descriptor of a thing (that describes something about the thing that could be otherwise,  e.g. my hair is brown) is an accident.  But God is simple and can have no accidents: what He "has", He is; or what is true about Him is what He is.  (Strictly speaking, God is not just; He is justice itself by nature.)  Therefore "Creator of X" cannot be a non-necessary descriptor of God (if God is creator of X He is creator of X by nature).  Yet that is exactly what must be the case if creation of X is not necessary.

The solution is to realize that creaturely existence is only analogous to, and not univocal with, God's existence.  God is not "pure act" as far as the term "act" is applied to creatures.  He is not a being which happens to exist, even if such existence is necessary; He is Being itself.  Therefore there can be true and non-necessary descriptors of Him which are not accidents, such as "creator of X".

[Non Nobis]

OK, I see you are asking does "creating" pertain to God; I don't see why it can't "pertain" to Him without implying a difference in His essence.

Explain your answer or thinking, other than saying the Thomists got it wrong.  What is God's causing creation of X, i.e. creating X?

First, the problem in Thomism.  The only kind of non-necessary descriptor of a thing (that describes something about the thing that could be otherwise,  e.g. my hair is brown) is an accident.  But God is simple and can have no accidents: what He "has", He is; or what is true about Him is what He is.  (Strictly speaking, God is not just; He is justice itself by nature.)  Therefore "Creator of X" cannot be a non-necessary descriptor of God (if God is creator of X He is creator of X by nature).  Yet that is exactly what must be the case if creation of X is not necessary.

The solution is to realize that creaturely existence is only analogous to, and not univocal with, God's existence.  God is not "pure act" as far as the term "act" is applied to creatures.  He is not a being which happens to exist, even if such existence is necessary; He is Being itself.  Therefore there can be true and non-necessary descriptors of Him which are not accidents, such as "creator of X".

But St. Thomas Aquinas also says that being is said of God analogously:

http://dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles1.htm
CONTRA GENTILES
BOOK ONE: GOD
Chapter 32
THAT NOTHING IS PREDICATED UNIVOCALLY OF GOD AND OTHER THINGS
...
[7] For God is called being as being entity itself, and He is called good as being goodness itself. But in other beings predications are made by participation, as Socrates is said to be a man, not because he is humanity itself, but because he possesses humanity. It is impossible, therefore, that anything be predicated univocally of God and other things.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1013.htm
Summa Theologica
Question 13. The names of God
Article 5. Whether what is said of God and of creatures is univocally predicated of them?
...
I answer that, Univocal predication is impossible between God and creatures. The reason of this is that every effect which is not an adequate result of the power of the efficient cause, receives the similitude of the agent not in its full degree, but in a measure that falls short, so that what is divided and multiplied in the effects resides in the agent simply, and in the same manner; as for example the sun by exercise of its one power produces manifold and various forms in all inferior things. In the same way, as said in the preceding article, all perfections existing in creatures divided and multiplied, pre-exist in God unitedly. Thus when any term expressing perfection is applied to a creature, it signifies that perfection distinct in idea from other perfections; as, for instance, by the term "wise" applied to man, we signify some perfection distinct from a man's essence, and distinct from his power and existence, and from all similar things; whereas when we apply to it God, we do not mean to signify anything distinct from His essence, or power, or existence. Thus also this term "wise" applied to man in some degree circumscribes and comprehends the thing signified; whereas this is not the case when it is applied to God; but it leaves the thing signified as incomprehended, and as exceeding the signification of the name. Hence it is evident that this term "wise" is not applied in the same way to God and to man. The same rule applies to other terms. Hence no name is predicated univocally of God and of creatures.

Neither, on the other hand, are names applied to God and creatures in a purely equivocal sense, as some have said. Because if that were so, it follows that from creatures nothing could be known or demonstrated about God at all; for the reasoning would always be exposed to the fallacy of equivocation. Such a view is against the philosophers, who proved many things about God, and also against what the Apostle says: "The invisible things of God are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made" (Romans 1:20). Therefore it must be said that these names are said of God and creatures in an analogous sense, i.e. according to proportion.

Do you think Thomists disagree with St. Thomas?

[Quaremerepulisti]

But St. Thomas Aquinas also says that being is said of God analogously:

...


Do you think Thomists disagree with St. Thomas?

Yes, at least implicitly.  Not only as regards being, but also causation and willing.  Once they would realize that attributes of human being, causation and willing do not apply to God, the "mystery" of grace and predestination would be solved without calling "mystery" contradiction.

[An aspiring Thomist]

But St. Thomas Aquinas also says that being is said of God analogously:

...


Do you think Thomists disagree with St. Thomas?

Yes, at least implicitly.  Not only as regards being, but also causation and willing.  Once they would realize that attributes of human being, causation and willing do not apply to God, the "mystery" of grace and predestination would be solved without calling "mystery" contradiction.

If Quare is right, I think the bigger problem is not that Thomists would hold views that implicitly contradict St. Thomas but rather St. Thomas himself would have held contradictory views, at least implicitly.

[Quaremerepulisti]

If Quare is right, I think the bigger problem is not that Thomists would hold views that implicitly contradict St. Thomas but rather St. Thomas himself would have held contradictory views, at least implicitly.

His views certainly evolved from the Summa Contra Gentiles to the Summa Theologica.

[LouisIX]

On the properly theological side of things, perhaps it would be fruitful to make a distinction between systematic error and real mystery. Time to dig out the Scheeben volumes, no?

On the other hand, maybe it's not clear what kind of reason we're looking for when we ask, say, why Bob but not Rob was saved. Necessary, but unfortunate reasons? That seems difficult. Contingent reasons? Also difficult. Some mixture of the two? Hard to say. Certainly there are reasons for the difference between Bob and Rob. But can there be an infinite regress of reasons? I'm not sure how there could be. Maybe, for such things, one would have to see the primary Reason which such things back up to in order to grasp the intelligibility of the secondary, subordinate reasons in a satisfying way. Otherwise, again, what kind of secondary, subordinate reason would be satisfactory? There is an open door here in appealing to analogy (here are "satisfying" solutions for various problems, and they have components X, Y, Z, for which we are trying to find analogates in this controversy surrounding predestination).

(In the interest of full disclosure, I am not convinced there has been a satisfactory synthesis on this issue. I hesitate to accept the Bannezian Thomist position. I find undiluted Molinism questionable on metaphysical grounds, but probably a more sophisticated Congruism is more attractive. The Eclecticism of the Sorbonne is probably the most practically balanced, but synthesizes its principles quite poorly. I am unsure quite yet about Maritain, or Most, if we are just considering what the relatively best system would be.) Our situation might be something like this : rather than pointing out the contradictions in rival systems, or boasting of the good points of one's own system, the best strategy is to determine which bullets are the right ones to bite -- or, conversely, which truths should be accepted with priority over the others. What kind of priority should be adopted? What kind of distinction, even in principle, would help us out? What kind of bullets might we have to bite to get to that distinction? Etc. These kinds of questions seem necessary, for they appeal to norms floating above the problematic issues. ("Meta-problematic norms," as I call them to myself.) In such a way, the correct solution, if it comes along, would be recognized, and already accommodated for. Even if it doesn't, there is an attempt to get at the relatively best position. Again, some things might seem contradictory, but are not methodological artifacts or systematic errors; they just are real mysteries. The difficulty is in determining where there really is contradiction, but if it can be determined -- well then, we have found a healthy surplus of principles to at least point us in the right direction.

Not that I'm as well researched as you folks. I haven't even read Lonergan yet. But that is a first pass at summing up the situation.

$0.02

Here's the thing: apart from hard-core Molinism, every attempt to deal with this issue ends up falling into the theoretical question of "Why Bob but not Rob" which is simply to say no more and no less than that every theory in one way or another posits the principle of predilection.

As such, the idea that Banez is the only one who requires us to (at least as wayfarers) appeal ultimately to a divine wisdom and will which transcend human thought is folly. Whether it is Scheeben, Maritain, the Congruists, etc. If God can make it such that this man rather than another is saved, but not all men are saved, how is the divine goodness preserved.

I understand the objections to Banez on various grounds (metaphysical, as is the case with Lonergan; Molina's concerns regarding human freedom) but the majority of the objections to Banez can and ought to be ultimately posed to everyone else because they are equally valid elsewhere.

[LouisIX]

I feel that what you're asking for is a bit of an impossibility. I cannot give you a fully apprehensive understanding of what it precisely means for the divine mover to be able to will entirely ad extra because it is impossible for human beings to conceive of actus purus. We make all sorts of claims about the divine perfections that must be the case even if we cannot fully apprehend them. Let's not forget that theology is not philosophy. The proper object requires the haze of mystery.

However, to anticipate your first objection, this does not mean that what is stated is false or that we are cloaking contradictions in mystery. Our knowledge of God is apophatic given the divine transcendence. If I were to ask you precisely how God is both three and one you would be unable to answer in absolute precision.

So, you're going to take refuge in mystery and apophaticism when asked a basic, fundamental question about the natural order such as how motion happens - this is properly a philosophical, not a theological question.

No, I've already answered the questions regarding motion, and St. Thomas is quite explicit in his commentaries on both the Physics and the Metaphysics. But given the divine transcendence, we can't simply apply human metaphysical realities to the divine perfections.

You say, "because God is first mover in the chain leading to X being reduced from potency to act" but not only can you not give a "fully apprehensive" understanding of what this means, you can't give any understanding.  Thomism is an abject failure if it cannot answer such a simple question, and we should go East, where they love mystery and apophaticism and despise Western "rationalism".  Your analogy to Divine perfection is not well-taken.  When we say "God is Justice" or "God is Mercy" we have at least an analogical understanding of what these mean, even if we do not fully comprehend how God can be both Justice and Mercy at the same time.  The key difference is that Divine perfections regard what God is (ontologically) whereas God as mover of X does not, which leads to the following problem regarding distinctions.

That I can give you no understanding is your own claim and is certainly something which I reject. I've already stated that for the general Dominican tradition that premotion means a motion in the moved. So the motion proceeds forth from the immutable divine will (from which it gains its infallible and yet contingent character) but the motion is quite distinct from the will which imparts it. Given that God is actus purus, there is no shift from potentially moving to actually moving, from being potentially mobile to actually mobile. As such, there is no change in the divine will even between two potential effects of that will.

That which creates a distinction between me willing X and me not willing X is within me as a potential mover. That doesn't accurately describe the very different (analogous, but different) movement of the divine will.

I understand that you have objections here, but it's unnecessary to state that I haven't said a thing about operation. I've said a lot. I agree with Lonergan (but only in regard to divine volition), who is quite specific on this issue: for God, the difference between God willing or not willing X is entirely external not unlike how St. Thomas seems to see, for example, the predicamental of location as entirely external. To exist in a location is sometimes called an accidental characteristic but it's more properly an accident of that which exists outside of the subject than a quality of the subject.

At the very least, I would hope that you'd recognize that this is saying something, even if you disagree with it.

There is a real distinction between a just God and an unjust (hypothetical) God; the latter is not God.
There is only a notional distinction between God's Mercy and Justice.  They are in reality one and the same thing; the difference is only in what we are perceiving.

There cannot be a real distinction between a God who moves X and a God who does not move X.  God has no accidents, and X is not necessarily moved; God does not move X necessarily.
There cannot be merely a notional distinction between a God who moves X and a God who does not move X.  That would imply moving X and not moving X are the same thing, which would imply X being moved and X not being moved are the same thing, which is nonsense.

So there must be some other type of distinction, and I submit it is the distinction of relation - a category of reality which is beyond ontology (potency and act).

And I think that this is an interesting theory. I'd like to hear more about it. However, from the outside, my claim is that a third reality isn't needed given that motion from a divine who is actus purus is entirely external.

Moreover, the only other possibility is that God is in some way reliant upon creation. In some way, God's transcendence is mitigated by the fact that anything other than God exists. What I don't understand is how you don't recognize that to admit this much (by positing a Cambridge property within God, or however you wish to solve the issue) strikes a fatal blow to classical theism itself.

God is not ontologically reliant upon creation, but His relation (NOT a "real (ontological) relation" as Thomists understand it) to His creation is reliant upon it.  If you deny this, then classical theism contains a contradiction.  If "classical theism" as typically stated contains an internal contradiction (or a contradiction with Divine revelation), then of course a fatal blow will be struck no matter how you slice it.

1.  God is pure act, and this is the only reality pertaining to Him; every distinction we make (e.g. between His Justice, Mercy, etc.) is purely notional.
2.  His pure act is identical to His existence which is identical to His essence.
3.  God's existence is necessary.
4.  God's creation of X is identical to pure act which is identical to His existence.
5.  Therefore God's creation of X is necessary.

You deny 4. because 5. is contrary to revelation (and also to reason), but 4. is implied by 1., 2., and 3.  You have to deny 1. in order to deny 4. and 5.  If you don't deny 1., you can't take refuge in "mystery".  This is a contradiction.

I deny four not just because of five but most primarily because it fails to recognize the great difference between the modes of human and divine willing. In other words, the divine will is not identical with that which it wills.

What you're positing is that it suffices to call a motion violent if its primary principle is external. It's unclear as to why that is the case. Violence implies a transgression of the volition of the acting agent, but what we're talking about is precisely the actuation of choice within the agent.

1. It'd be great if you responded to that actual argumentation.

Your argument is logically fallacious.  There is a denial of the antecedent fallacy, where since violence -> transgression of volition, you conclude no violence -> no transgression of volition.

Thus, I deny your hidden assumption in the above, where the key thing is whether a will is subjected to "violence" or not.  You're simply redefining "volition of the acting agent" as "lack of violent motion from an external principle".  Therefore, tautologically, if an external mover's motion isn't violent, volition of the acting agent is preserved.

No, I'm addressing the most common objection which does indeed state that the problem with Banez is that he posits a violent motion. If you don't hold to that objection then that is great. Please give me the benefit of the doubt rather than assuming I'm simply moving into tautology. Part of the difficulty of discussing things with you is that you're evasive, taking shots without grounding them in a principle about which we can talk. As such, I'm sometimes left guessing as to the source of your criticism.

For example, you have still yet to actually explain the third sort of relation (that exists between God and creation) that I've been asking you about for seemingly months.

The true criterion is whether the external mover's motion is deterministic, not whether it is "violent" (whatever that means).

You know that I agree with you on this because we've spent a lot of time in the past discussing the difference between absolute and suppositional necessity and how both St. Thomas and Banez understand them. This is why it's frustrating when you accuse me of tautology. Perhaps you're just entirely forgetting things I've said in the recent past?

2. It'd also be great if you addressed the major objection to your criticisms, i.e. the problem of creation.

That objection makes my criticisms that much stronger, since they pertain not only to motion, but also to creation.

And yet you've not yet actually posited much of anything.

[LouisIX]

OK, I see you are asking does "creating" pertain to God; I don't see why it can't "pertain" to Him without implying a difference in His essence.

Explain your answer or thinking, other than saying the Thomists got it wrong.  What is God's causing creation of X, i.e. creating X?

First, the problem in Thomism.  The only kind of non-necessary descriptor of a thing (that describes something about the thing that could be otherwise,  e.g. my hair is brown) is an accident.  But God is simple and can have no accidents: what He "has", He is; or what is true about Him is what He is.  (Strictly speaking, God is not just; He is justice itself by nature.)  Therefore "Creator of X" cannot be a non-necessary descriptor of God (if God is creator of X He is creator of X by nature).  Yet that is exactly what must be the case if creation of X is not necessary.

The solution is to realize that creaturely existence is only analogous to, and not univocal with, God's existence.  God is not "pure act" as far as the term "act" is applied to creatures.  He is not a being which happens to exist, even if such existence is necessary; He is Being itself.  Therefore there can be true and non-necessary descriptors of Him which are not accidents, such as "creator of X".

I honestly don't see a single lick of what you say in this second paragraph which St. Thomas or the general commentatorial tradition would disagree with. You act like they're condemning Scriptural titles or something. Do you think that Banez never referred to God as "Father" in prayer or something?

Regarding your first paragraph, let me ask you point blank: is creation necessary? Is it a necessary descriptor of God? If so, what is meant by 'necessary' in this second sense?

[LouisIX]

Yes, at least implicitly.  Not only as regards being, but also causation and willing. Once they would realize that attributes of human being, causation and willing do not apply to God, the "mystery" of grace and predestination would be solved without calling "mystery" contradiction.

It's funny because this is entirely the basis for my critique of the little bit of your own theory which you've shared.

[LouisIX]

If Quare is right, I think the bigger problem is not that Thomists would hold views that implicitly contradict St. Thomas but rather St. Thomas himself would have held contradictory views, at least implicitly.

His views certainly evolved from the Summa Contra Gentiles to the Summa Theologica.

Prove it. His views evolved from the Scriptum on the Sentences to the ScG or De Veritate given that he began to see grace as a motion in the patient rather than as a moral cause, but the principles which he employs regarding motion and the divine providence are precisely congruent (and the basis for) with the conclusions that he draws in throughout the ST.

[John Lamb]

Zoom out if you can't read to the end of the line.























https://tinyurl.com/lwm3u3g


I want to draw attention especially to this: In my view, it is unreasonable to suppose that Aquinas is guilty of a large, explicit, obvious, and uncomplicated contradiction.

This is my gripe with the way Quare handles himself in his anti-Thomist zeal. Quare, you get upset when amateurs question the results of material scientists, but then you seem to want to have Aquinas and centuries of commentators involved in covering up such a glaring error, that an amateur like Perry Robinson could see what said experts could not see for centuries.
Which do you think is more likely: that Aquinas and all his scholastic and neo-scholastic commentators, which have received the Church's special approbation, have made such a drastic blunder in a central point in theology - or that you and Perry Robinson misunderstand their doctrine?

[John Lamb]

But God (and so His existence or essence) is not identical to (God, X).

Indeed not.  The relevant question is whether God is identical to (God, Creation of X).

Here's the dilemma for Thomists: they must make creation of X either identical to God or identical to X.  If creation of X is identical to God, then X is necessary.

Only with necessity of supposition, not absolute necessity; because it is possible to suppose that God had chosen not-X rather than X. There are things which God has by the absolute (logical and metaphysical) necessity of His being God (Pure Act), and there are things that God (physically) has only because He has freely willed them from all eternity. God freely wills X through His essence, without X in any way determining His essence. So indeed, X is necessary, but without in any way limiting God's liberty, as its necessity comes only through God's choosing it. Pure Act is still Pure Act, without any change in Himself, whether He creates the visible world or not. This is what Thomists mean when they say that God willing / creating X is no accident in God. As for how God can physically will X, Y, Z, etc., without this causing a change in God - St. Thomas quotes St. Dionysius that in God is: "the material immaterially, the divisible indivisibly, and the many unitedly,"; God wills all X, Y, Z, etc., not through many separate acts but through willing Himself in one simple act.