Commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologiae

The title is clear by way of exemplar: namely Lord, Savior and Creator, etc.

In the body he does five things: first, he sets forth the responsive conclusion to the question; second, he closes off the broad way of proving the conclusion¹; third, there: Veruntamen, he undertakes the true way²; fourth, there: Cum igitur Deus, he proves the conclusion³; fifth, there: non propter aliquam, he excludes a tacit objection⁴.

II. As to the first point, the responsive conclusion to the question is affirmative and particular, namely: Certain names importing a relation to creatures are said of God from time.

III. As to the second point, know that this conclusion seems to have some difficulty because nothing new can come to God: and therefore, if names of this kind do not posit some real thing in God, there will be no difficulty; but if they posit a real thing, it would be otherwise. And since the text intends to prove the conclusion by this middle term, namely that they posit in God only a relation of reason; therefore the broadest way that immediately led to this, namely that no relation is a thing of nature, being erroneous, was at once excluded. And this is the first point.

This error is recited by Averroes, XII Metaphysics, comm. 19, and it is refuted as follows. Natural things have an order and natural relation to one another: therefore. The consequence is evident. And the antecedent (besides the evidence it has from XII Metaphysics⁵, comm. 52, where the order of the universe is said to be its good) is assumed as self-evident. – Here it would be asked whether there are real relations. But since we would exceed the limits of our purpose, let this be a special question.

IV. As to the third point, the proper way to investigate the middle term of the conclusion to be drawn is to see when a relation is a thing of nature, and when it is not; and whence it has that it is a thing of nature, and whence that it is not but only of reason. Entering upon this way, then, the argument proceeds as follows. A relation requires two extremes: therefore it can be found to be a thing of nature or of reason in three ways. Namely, either on the side of both extremes it will be a thing of reason; or on the side of both extremes it will be a thing of nature; or on the one side a thing of nature, and on the other a thing of reason.

The antecedent is clear. The consequent, however, is proved. The extremes vary in three ways: namely, that between certain things there is a relation only by reason; or in each there is some thing from which the one regards the other; or one regards the other not of the same kind. – The assumption, as to the first part, is declared from what is contained under those three modes of relatives: namely, those regarding the same, and non-beings, and those according to second intentions. Where note that in the first grade the intellect makes the extremes non-beings, but still extremes, when it distinguishes one into two: in the second, however, the intellect makes one extreme both a being and an extreme. – As to the second part, it is declared from the two genera of relatives contained under it: namely, those following upon quantity, and upon action and passion, as is clear in Book V Metaphysics. – As to the third, it is declared similarly from two, namely sense or knowledge etc., and right in relation to column: and it is confirmed by the authority of Aristotle.

V. Here many things are said against which objections are raised by others: for instance, that between being (ens) and non-being there is no real relation; and that between the mover and the movable there is a real relation; and that knowledge has a real relation to the knowable. But since these things are said here per accidens, therefore special questions will be made concerning them.

VI. Nevertheless, one very difficult doubt must not be passed over concerning those words of the text, in which it is said that the relations of reason in the other extreme, for instance the knowable and the sensible, are inasmuch as the intellect apprehends them as the terms of opposed relations, for instance of knowledge and sense. Now the doubt is twofold: first concerning the sense of the text, then concerning the thing itself. Concerning the sense, whether he intends that the correlative is required in order that the extreme be understood under the aspect of the term of the relative itself; for example, whether the relation of lordship is required in order that God be understood as Lord of the creature, inasmuch as the creature is His servant: or rather whether he intends that the correlative accompanies the understanding of the other extreme under the aspect of term; so that the relation of lordship accompanies God, apprehended as term. But it matters greatly whether he intends it in this way or in that. For in the first way, the correlative is posited as belonging to the intrinsic essence of the term, indeed the correlative is posited as the term itself: but in the second way, the correlative is posited as following upon the essence of the term. And consequently, in the first sense it is posited that the term of a relative must be a relative: but in the second, that it is an absolute being. And therefore there arises from this a difficult question: Whether the term of a relative, as such, is an absolute being or a relative one.

VII. And since this question is necessary here, and untouched, except by Scotus, by whom it seems to be badly defined, therefore it must be treated. Scotus, then, in I, distinction XXX, question I, moving, as I think, from the words of this text, so that he might carp in his usual manner, proves in several ways that the term of a relative, insofar as it is a term, is an absolute thing. And on this account, there is no need to posit a correlative to terminate the other relative, neither according to the thing nor according to reason. And he proves this fourfold.

First thus. Per se, the difference between relatives of the third mode and the others is that the others are mutual, whereas those of the third mode are not mutual. Therefore in relatives of the third mode, the terminus is an absolute thing. – The antecedent is clear from Book V of the Metaphysics, the chapter on that which is toward something⁶. The consequence, however, is self-evident: since it is not a correlative, and is a terminus, therefore the thing that terminates is an absolute thing.

Second thus. Act defines potency, and not conversely: therefore act, as term, is an absolute thing. – The antecedent is clear from Book IX of the Metaphysics⁷ The consequence is proved as follows. Act defines potency as it terminates the relation of potency to itself: and it defines it because it is prior to potency: therefore, as term, it is prior to potency. But, as correlative, it is not prior to potency: because correlatives define one another mutually, as Porphyry says⁸. Therefore, as correlative, it is not a term. Therefore it is so as an absolute thing.

Thirdly thus. A relative, as such, is defined by its correlative term: therefore the term is prior to the relative: therefore the term is not itself the correlative. – The antecedent is evident. The first consequence holds from Book VII⁹ and Book IX Metaphysics¹⁰: for there the priority of substance with respect to accident, and here of act with respect to potency, is had from this, that they define those things. But the second consequence is evident: because otherwise there would be a circle in prior and posterior according to definition; which is impossible.

Fourth, thus. In relations of the third mode, one extreme has no relation except while it is actually considered: and it terminates the relation of the other extreme to itself, with no intellect considering it, indeed even while it does not exist: therefore it terminates by reason of something absolute, and not by reason of a relation co-thought along with it.

These are Scotus's motives, subtle enough. And he thought them effective, so much so that he asserts their conclusion to be true.

VIII. But in order that it may be known how far this opinion is from the truth, we must begin with the text of Book V of the Metaphysics Metaph.¹¹ on which it grounded itself. For it erred twice over in that text. First, because he supposes that that text is to be understood of the extremes, or foundations, of relatives: so that Aristotle wished to say that certain extremes are called relative because of the relations they have to one another, while others are so called because of a relation existing in one extreme only. That this is against the sense, indeed the very words, of Aristotle is evident as follows. Aristotle there¹² explicitly says he is making a distinction among those things which are relative in themselves. But it is clear that the foundations of relations are not relative except accidentally, as is expressly stated there¹³. Therefore that text is not understood of things denominated relatively, but of the relatives themselves, that is, of things said ad aliquid. Nor can that text be saved in any other way.

Second he errs in the difference he assigns. For in that text it is not said that some things are mutual relatives and others are not, as Scotus dreamed; rather, the difference is assigned in the cause or reason of being ordered toward something else. Thus the text affirms that even relatives of the third mode are, on both sides, ordered toward something else; but it places the difference in this: that in relatives of the first and second modes, the reason why they are ordered toward something else is that each is this very thing, namely to be ordered toward another; whereas in relatives of the third mode, on the side of one extreme, the reason why it is ordered toward something else is not this very thing, namely to be ordered toward another, but rather that another is ordered toward it¹⁴. Where it is plainly evident that the whole difference consists in the reason of being (esse) ordered toward something else, and not in being mutual or non-mutual.

IX. And since that text is the foundation of the theologians writing speculatively on the matter of this article, therefore, for greater clarity, it must be examined, as follows. That text implies two contradictories: therefore. – The antecedent is made manifest. The text speaks of those things that are in themselves relative, and denies of some of them that this very thing which is, is ordered toward another: therefore it denies the definition of the thing defined, or what is equivalent, on the subjective side, of what is defined per se. The antecedent is clear for both parts in that text ¹⁵. For he says: the knowable and the sensible, and other things of this kind, are per se relative; and that they are not said to be relative because they themselves are toward another, but because other things are said to be toward them. The consequence is clear from the definition of the relative, given by Aristotle himself in the Categories¹⁶. And since this contradiction is manifest, it seems it must be said¹⁷ that Aristotle speaks of the relative according to its foundations, when he says: they themselves are not toward another, but other things are toward them.

X. And this paralogism, as I think, retained in mind, deceived all who have erred in this text. For its solution, know that, because the metaphysician treats of relatives as they are per se parts of being, that is, as they are real beings, therefore this distinction is to be understood of relatives insofar as they are real beings: and not of them taken as they abstract from real being, that is, insofar as they signify ad, without regard to their esse, just as they are defined in the Categories (and for this reason this distinction is omitted there). Among relatives therefore per se, the distinction is posited with respect to the real esse which they posit (not which they suppose), in this: that some relatives are such that they are real beings because they themselves are in the nature of things such beings as are ordered to another; but others are not real beings because they themselves are in the nature of things ordered to another, but for this reason alone can be numbered among real things, because other real things are said of them. So that the distinction consists in this: among the per se relatives, some are real relatives by intrinsic denomination or predication; but others by extrinsic denomination; for by the relative reality of another, they too are reckoned among real relatives. And according to this sense agrees the common saying, namely, that from this text it is held that not all relatives are mutual with respect to reality.

Nor is it an obstacle if it be objected that the text makes no mention of real esse. For it is presupposed that the text speaks of such esse, from the fact that it belongs to the metaphysician to treat of things insofar as they are parts of real being; and consequently, of relations insofar as they are toward another in reality, and not insofar as they are understood as toward another.

And from this it is clear that there is no contradiction¹⁸. For the definition is not denied of the thing defined; rather, it is intimated that that definition belongs to that which is toward another, whether it be a real being or a being of reason. Nor is it denied of that which is toward another; rather, it is denied by some that such a thing exists in the nature of things as being toward another—yet this is compatible with its being formally, in virtue of this very thing that they are, toward another, as their definition requires. The argument therefore equivocates. – It is therefore singular to beings related in the third mode that one is in reality toward another precisely because the other is toward it.

XI. From these points, however, the answer to the question is easily evident, as far as relatives of the third mode are concerned. But so that a universal doctrine may be had, know that by the term terminus, in this context, is understood that to which the relative is said, and which must be posited in the definition of the relative: for Scotus himself concedes that these two things belong to the terminus. Then thus. If being (ens) as such were the terminus of a relative, it would follow first that, since in the definition of ad aliquid it is said: "those things are said ad aliquid of which the very fact that they are involves being toward something else," the word aliud would stand for an absolute thing: and thus the double, in its very being (esse), would not be toward something else, that is, toward the half; nor would the slave be toward the master, nor the father toward the son, etc. But from the Praedicamenta¹⁹ and its expositors it is established that this is false: for all say that the word aliud stands for the terminus, and in assigning it they give the correlative. Indeed the text expressly says²⁰ that the master is not said to be ad aliquid as something existing in the slave, except toward him under the aspect of slave. And Averroes says there that always that to which a relative is said must be in the category of Relation. – It would follow second that in the definition of some creature God would necessarily fall under his own proper absolute aspect. And since this is impossible, it would follow that some natural creature would remain naturally unknowable. The consequence is clear regarding passive creation, regarding the relation of the universe to God as ultimate end, etc. – It would follow third that the relative would require in its definition, on the side of the terminus, two things: namely, the correlative, and an absolute being (ens). And since from the Praedicamenta²¹ it is clear that the correlative is required as that to which the relative is said, there is no reason why that absolute being should be required. – It would follow fourth that in the divine Persons relations ad intra could not be preserved unless the Persons were posited as really distinguished in absolute beings (entia). The consequence holds: because a real relative requires a terminus really distinct from itself; therefore if the terminus of divine paternity is an absolute thing (res absoluta), then some absolute thing in the divinity is really distinguished from the Father.

It must therefore be said with the Peripatetics and the other philosophers, as far as I recall having seen, that the term of a relative and its correlative are the same: indeed, to terminate a relative is in the very account of each correlative.

XII. And to the first objection of Scotus²² the reply is already clear: for the terminus of the relative of the third mode is its correlative. And this is expressly stated in that text of Book V of the Metaphysics, where it is said there²³ of the terminus that it is of something in itself, and that something else is said of it: for this can be verified only of a correlative; therefore. But how it is also verified of the same that it is not said of another has already been shown²⁴.

To the second objection it is said that a falsehood is presupposed, namely, that the discussion there concerns act as terminating the relation of potency. For there Aristotle treats of the nature of potency and of the nature of act according to the transcendent relations by which potency essentially regards act, and such an act regards potency. And Aristotle holds that because potency cannot be understood without act, whereas act can both be understood and be without potency, as is evident in the case of pure act, therefore act is prior to potency. The objection thus proceeds from a bad understanding of the meaning of that text. — Although it may be said that relatives of this kind, one of which signifies act and the other potency, are not well assigned: and therefore they are neither simultaneous in nature nor do they define one another, etc., as Averroes said in his commentary on the Categories²⁵

To the third objection, strictly speaking, the antecedent must be denied: because, as Albert the Great taught²⁶, a relative is not defined by a term, but with reference to a term; for it does not have its esse by a term, in whatever genus of cause, but with reference to a term. The consequence, moreover, is altogether false: because the definer can be simultaneous in nature and in intellect with the thing defined. - As to the authorities of Aristotle, it is said that they hold because they speak of matter, in which there is an order between the definer and the thing defined. For wherever there must be an order between the definer and the thing defined, there the consequence holds, therefore the definer is prior; but where there is no order, priority cannot be inferred. Now among correlatives there is no order, but they are altogether simultaneous, as is clear in the Postpraedicamenta²⁷. Therefore. - And note that this objection militates against its own author, by arguing thus. Whatever may be said of the term, it is certain that in mutual relatives one is definitive of the other, and conversely: therefore prior and posterior according to definition, etc. The consequence is well known. The antecedent, however, is Porphyry's²⁸, here alleged by Scotus on his own behalf. Therefore.

Finally, as to the last objection, which frightens beginners, the solution is clear from the words of Aristotle²⁹. The antecedent is indeed denied: for in relatives of the third mode, both extremes have relation simultaneously, but dissimilarly; because one is a relative by reason of the relation that is in it toward the other, while the other is a relative by reason of the real relation of the former to itself, the relative. Nor must any other existence of this correlative be required than the existence of its counterpart: for from it, by extrinsic denomination, it too is said to be. For this is what is singular in relatives of the third mode: that a real relative is said to be toward a term that is not real formally, but only by extrinsic denomination; yet that term is real fundamentally, or with respect to its substratum or that which is denominated.

XIII. From these points, moreover, the answer is clear to the doubt raised concerning the literal sense of this text ³⁰. For since it is established that God terminates servitude only as Lord formally, because "Lord" Dominus is the proper term of the servant, it is evident that the intention of the literal sense is that the correlative must be co-understood in something, if that thing is to be understood under the aspect of a term.

Nor do the words of St. Thomas in Qu. de Potentia Dei, qu. VII, art. 10, ad 4, stand against this, where he says that to terminate the order of created servitude, which is contained within the notion of lordship, belongs to God; and he means that it belongs to God according to reality, as is clear from the argument to which he is replying. This, I say, does not stand against it, because it is understood of terminating fundamentally: for this belongs to God according to reality, just as the power of coercing subjects. And that this is what he means is made manifest from the fact that, with respect to the order toward subjects, he denies that it belongs to God: since neither formally nor fundamentally does God have that by which He could be ordered toward subjects.

XIV. As to the fourth point³¹, the conclusion proposed is proved as follows. God is outside the whole order of the universe, in such a way that creatures are ordered toward him, and not conversely: therefore creatures are really referred to God, whereas in God there is no relation to creatures except one of reason. Therefore nothing prevents certain names importing a relation from being said of God from time to time (ex tempore).

The antecedent is clear. The first consequence follows from that maxim laid down in the preceding part, namely: whenever the extremes are not of one order, and one is referred to the other, in the remainder there is no relation except of reason. Therefore, if God is outside the order, etc. The second consequence, however, is clear as self-evident.

XV. Against the argument adduced in the text for this conclusion, Scotus presses his objection in two ways in the place cited above³². First, he says, that argument begs the question. For, since God is manifestly prior to the creature, and therefore has some order as prior to posterior, to assume that there is no order in him is nothing other than to assume that God has no real order toward the creature; but this was what had to be proved. — Second, it sins, he says, according to the fallacy of the Consequent. For the negation of order does not entail the negation of relation in common, since it is not a negation of relations of equality. And yet the text, from the negation of order, denies every real relation.

Aureolus also, as you have in the XXX Distinction of the First Book³³ in Capreolus, presses against this argument. But since he assumes either motives already resolved expressly by St. Thomas, or assumes something other than this argument in its place, I judged it should be omitted.

XVI. To Scotus's objections, then, it is answered that we are laboring in equivocation. For the text speaks not of order formally, which is a relation, but of order fundamentally: so that to be of the same order formally is nothing other than to be of the same account with respect to the cause of the relation; and not to be of the same order is to be of another account. Thus only between those things is there a real relation on both sides in which there is one and the same cause for referring one thing to another. But this occurs in many ways: because in relatives of the first mode, namely those pertaining to quantity, there is specific identity in the cause; but in relatives of the second mode, namely those pertaining to action and passion, there is a quasi-specific or formal identity, since on both sides the cause is a proper perfection, though in the patient as possessed and in the agent as preserved, as Averroes taught concerning the intelligences in Book XII Metaphysics, commentary 36. But in relatives of the third mode, namely those pertaining to measure and measured, in one extreme there is no cause of its own referability to the other: and therefore it is said to be of another order with respect to the cause of the relation.

Hence it is clear that it does not beg the question. For it is not the same thing to say that in God there is no cause insofar as He is referred to a creature, although in the creature there is a cause of referring it to God, and to say that in God there is no real order to creatures: rather, the former is the cause of the latter. And therefore this argument proceeds from cause to effect. — Nor does it err with respect to what follows. Because it speaks not of order formally, but fundamentally, which must also exist even in relations of parity: for two white things of the same kind are, both simply and in respect of this, that they cause toward each other relations, of the same kind; but this is to be of the same order³⁴.

XVII. As to the fifth point³⁵, note that the intended conclusion could be impeded by two things. First, by the formal signification itself of these names, namely, if they signified in God some thing of nature: for no thing of nature can be posited in God in a temporal manner. Second, by the foundation of that reason. For given that Lord does not posit above God a relation of reason, and on this account temporality is not prohibited; yet if that relation of reason could not denominate temporally except on account of some change in the thing denominated itself, it would be necessary to say that no name of this kind can be said of God from some point in time: since in God no change is possible, but He is altogether immobile, as was said in q. IX. Therefore, since the text had already excluded the impediment arising from the formal signification; so that it might bring forward the confirmed proof of the conclusion, it excluded the impediment according to the second ground, tacitly responding to the aforementioned objection, when it said that God is said from some point in time to be Lord, for example, not on account of any change in Himself, but in the creature. And it proves this by means of a similar case.

XVIII. In reply to the fourth, note keenly that a correlative of the third mode, such as the knowable, or in the present case Lord, and the like, can be judged to be according to two genera of being: first, in the genus of being simply; second, in the genus of being in a certain respect, that is, of a being of reason. If we speak of them according to esse simply, then they are for no other reason than because their counterparts, which are terminated at them formally, are in the nature of things: so that for their esse outside the soul this is sufficient; for they are contained under this weakest mode of being. And thus to be Lord posits nothing in God, with every intellect set aside, except to terminate formally the relation of servant, which God in himself terminates subjectively, that is, as it were as the subject of the formal term. But it does indeed posit, or presuppose, something in the creature, namely the relation of servitude to God as subject, etc. Nor does this very terminating formally the relation of servitude posit anything more than the esse of the thing terminated itself: although it posits that in another way. And according to this, God is Lord anew, and without any intellect, by the sole servitude of the creature: because to be Lord posits no esse in the nature of things, except the esse of its opposite. Nor is it unfitting, in the matter of relatives, for one of the opposites to be because the other is, as Aristotle taught³⁶. And the reason is that relative opposites differ from the other opposites in this, that they posit one another simultaneously, nor is one constituted in the destruction of the other, as St. Thomas taught³⁷. — But if you should object that in the matter of relatives denomination does not take place from an extrinsic, as is determined in II Contra Gent., chap. XIII: I reply that this is true formally, but not really. For God is not called Lord from servitude formally, but from the relation of dominion, which is as it were inhering in him. But nevertheless God is called Lord, and really Lord, from the reality of servitude: because to be Lord posits no esse, except that the term is of a real servitude. And thus this denomination is formally from what is intrinsic, and really from what is extrinsic.

But if we speak of them according to esse rationis, then the esse of Lord posits in God a relation of reason. And thus it is said, and truly, that God is called Lord from lordship, which is a relation of reason. Not that there are here two relations of lordship, one outside the soul and one of reason: but because that relation of lordship, which is said to be an ens in so weak a manner, has been judged by the doctors in two ways. Sometimes according to its proper esse: and thus it was called a relation and an ens rationis only, because it has no proper esse except through reason. Sometimes according to an alien esse, namely that of its opposite, from which it somehow merits the name of ens: and thus it was called an ens, and was counted among the parts of being in V Metaphysics³⁸, because something else is said in relation to it. And because in this way it posits no esse in what is denominated, but only in what terminates it, therefore it is always and simply said of these that they posit no esse in what is denominated, for instance in God or in the knowable, except an esse of reason, which pertains to their proper esse. And note well that it is not said that they posit no esse at all, but that they posit no esse in what is denominated: for they posit esse in the terminating opposite, which suffices for their esse outside the mind.

XIX. And if you have perceived this distinction and know how to apply it, you will verify the diverse sayings of the doctors: for instance, that these relations are not beings outside the soul (for this is true according to proper being); and that they are, because they are opposed (for this is true according to alien being). And you will see that St. Thomas touched upon both in this response; Augustine too, in Book V On the Trinity, the last chapter. - You will also note that, out of compassion for novices, the Author made more use of these relations according to being of reason than according to that diminution of being not easily intelligible. - From these things it is also clear how, with no intellect considering it, God can be called formally Lord, and how only fundamentally, etc.: by distinguishing the proper or alien being of it. - And from this you have Scotus's defect, in I, dist. XXX, qu. I, believing that God is called Lord from the relation alone which is in the creature. For he posits a formal effect, namely being Lord, without a formal cause, namely the relation of lordship: which is not intelligible.