Commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologiae

In the title, synonyms, that is, terms having entirely the same signification: so that it is the same thing to say God is wise and God is good, etc.

II. In the body, it answers the question with a single negative conclusion, thus: Names of this kind attributed to God are not synonyms.

It is proved in two ways: first, according to those two lines of argument refuted in art. 2; second, in accordance with the position we follow. The first proof is: the rationes of these names are diverse, according to diverse things denied or caused, among them; therefore they are not synonyms.

The second proof is: our intellect knows God from creatures; therefore our conceptions of God are proportionate to the perfections that proceed from God into creatures; therefore they are various and multiple, and yet corresponding to the one utterly simple God; therefore the rationes of names of this kind attributed to God are diverse; therefore such names are not synonyms. – The antecedent, together with the first consequence, is evident. The second, however, is proved by the force of proportion: for just as the same God, simply and utterly one, is represented in real being (esse reale) by many perfections, so too is he represented in intentional being (esse intentionale); which is to say, by many conceptions. The third is proved thus: because the conception itself is the ratio of the name. The last is self-evident.

III. Concerning that proposition assumed to prove the third consequence, namely the ratio signified by a name is the conception of the intellect about the thing signified, there is doubt. First, because in IV Metaphysics, text. comm. XXVIII¹, it is said that the ratio signified by a name is a definition; but it is evident that a definition is not a conception, since it is identified with what is defined. Second, because the ratio of a name belongs to second intentions, whereas the concept belongs to first intentions.

To this it is briefly said that ratio, among philosophers and theologians, in the matter at hand, can be taken in two ways, namely formally or denominatively; just as white is taken formally for whiteness, and denominatively for the thing that is white. If it is taken formally, it is thus a name of a second intention and signifies a certain relation. If denominatively, it signifies a conception and a definition, but in different ways. For a mental conception is called the ratio of a name because it is that by which the name is referred to its significate outside the soul; a definition, however, because it is that by which the meaning of the name is explicated. In the present text, moreover, it is clear that ratio is taken denominatively for a mental conception. And it was said to be signified by the name because it is signified proximately; the definition, however, is the ratio signified by the name ultimately. – And thus the solution of the objections is clear.

IV. Note here that the question of the present letter is not about things, but about names. And therefore, although the present question could perhaps have been decided from the diversity of objective formal reasons, as the Scotists do, by mixing in a matter concerning things, namely, the distinction of the divine attributes; yet the divine genius of the Author, since he learned from I Periherm.² that names are signs of the passions which are in the soul, most formally shows the diversity of signification in names from the diversity of the conceptions of the soul signified, without mixing in other difficulties concerning things. For with this decision both parts of the contradiction stand in the matter of the attributes. Wherefore, lest so great a divinity of the work be defiled, there is not to be treated here of that distinction of attributes; but let it be a special question.

V. In response to the second, note that in the many concepts two things are contained, namely their conformity to the object and their plurality. If it is asked, therefore: To the many concepts we have of a thing, say God, what corresponds in reality? one must answer that to the concepts themselves there corresponds a single thing, imitable or representable in many ways; but to the plurality of those concepts there corresponds no plurality in the object itself, but rather its eminence, by virtue of which it has that it contains in a unified way what another apprehends in a divided way. Hence to argue from the distinction of concepts to the distinction of the object is to argue from the distinction of effects to the distinction of the cause—which is plainly absurd, since the unity of a cause stands together with a multitude of effects, as is evident. And for this reason both points are touched upon in the text, when it says that to them there corresponds one being (ens) simply, represented in many ways.

VI. In response to the third, note that the proposition God is one in reality and many according to reason can be understood in two ways. In one way, as being multiple by reason subjectively, that is, that it is the subject of several concepts: and this is false, since there is a single concept in the divine intellect by which God understands himself and all things at once. In another way, objectively, that is, that it is the object of several concepts, whether actually or virtually: and thus it is true, and to the point. So that God is said to be multiple according to reason, that is, he is the object verifying actually or virtually several conceptions of him.

VII. In the same reply, note that the root of the aforesaid ³ proposition, on God’s side, is His eminent unity; but on the side of our intellect, it is its proportion to sensible things. And the meaning is that the cause of such and so great a plurality of notions concerning God, which are signified by names, is the great remoteness of our intellect from that highest unity, so that it understands in so inarticulate a way, according as the imitations of the divine are diversified in things outside. For just as outside, justice is one thing, wisdom another, etc., so also in our intellect; and this, as will become clear below ⁴, is because it is the lowest intellect. – And note that he did not say: because the intellect receives from things; but he said: because the intellect apprehends in such a manifold way, just as things represent in a manifold way. Hence, if our intellect did not receive knowledge from things, as happened in Adam, the very same thing would nonetheless follow, from the fact that the intellect is proportioned to things, as is said in the letter.

VIII. From this root, however, you who look to others can easily derive the root of the plurality of rationes concerning God. For if so great a plurality arises from the supreme unity of the object with respect to an intellect so remote, a lesser plurality will arise from that same object with respect to an intellect nearer; but there will be no plurality with respect to what is nearest. And since it is established that the nearest intellect is not one that is in any way distinguished from what is understood, only the divine intellect remains, with respect to which, from that supreme unity, no plurality of concepts arises. The root, therefore—speaking absolutely and universally, and not merely with respect to us—of why God is multiple by way of ratio is His perfect unity and the finitude of created intellects. – We have said this here because it follows from this text: not because it pertains to this question, which concerns the Names, and consequently only those things that depend on us.