De Deo uno

FRANZELIN, thes. 40; KLEUTGEN, nr. 487-492; DE SAN, nr. 162-164; 167; BILLOT, thes. 23, Scholion; PESCH, prop. 42; VAN DER MEERSCH, nr. 374-380.

262. The division of God's knowledge into knowledge of simple intelligence and of vision is ancient (1 q. 14 a. 9): God contemplates by knowledge of vision the things that are, were, or will be in actuality; the things that are in the power of God or of a creature, but will never be (possibles as such), he knows by knowledge of simple intelligence. “This is said because the things that are seen among us have a distinct being outside the one who sees them” (S. Th., l. c.). This division is based on the differing actuality of the objects.

263. More recent is the division into natural or necessary knowledge and free (contingent) knowledge, which is based on the differing necessity of the objects. By necessary knowledge God knows those things that are determinately true by the nature of the matter, independently of any free will: the divine being and possibles. By free knowledge he knows those things that are not determinately true by the nature of the matter, but depend on the free divine will, which wills them to exist in actuality (actual things outside God).

These two divisions do not simply coincide, so that one could say exclusively that knowledge of vision is free and necessary knowledge is knowledge of simple intelligence. For with respect to the divine being, God's knowledge is both knowledge of vision and necessary; with respect to actual, non-divine terms, however, knowledge of vision is free knowledge.

264. Conditionally future free things are neither necessary by the nature of the matter, like possibles, nor dependent on a free determination of the divine will in the way that actual things outside God are. Rather, under one aspect—that is, insofar as they precede such a divine decree—they would be counted among the objects of necessary knowledge; and under another—that is, insofar as they are not necessarily true by the nature of the matter—they would be counted among the objects of free knowledge. They are intermediate between those objects. Hence knowledge with respect to conditionally future free things is rightly called middle knowledge¹.

265. The term middle knowledge was introduced by MOLINA, who distinguishes God's knowledge as follows: “We must distinguish three kinds of knowledge in God, unless we wish to err dangerously in reconciling the freedom of our will and the contingency of things with divine foreknowledge. One is purely natural, and therefore could in no way be different in God. By it he knows all that divine power extends to, either immediately or through the intervention of secondary causes, both with respect to the natures of individual things and their necessary combinations, and also with respect to contingent things—not that they would or would not be future in a determinate way, but that they could indifferently be or not be, which necessarily belongs to them, and therefore also falls under God's natural knowledge. Another is purely free, by which God, after a free act of his will, without any hypothesis or condition, knows absolutely and determinately from among all contingent combinations which ones would in fact be future, and which would not. Finally, there is a third, middle knowledge, by which from the most profound and inscrutable comprehension of each free will in its essence he has seen what it would do by its innate freedom if it were placed in this or that, or even in infinitely many, orders of things, although it could, if it wished, actually do the opposite” (Concordia, q. 14 a. 13 Disp. 52; ed. Oniae - Matriti 1953, 339 s.).

266. Middle knowledge is therefore understood most directly as intermediate between natural and free knowledge; in a similar way, however, it can be conceived as intermediate between knowledge of vision and of simple intelligence, because its object—conditionally future free things—on the one hand never are, were, or will be, and hence are not the object of knowledge of vision; on the other hand, they are not mere possibles, because it is one thing for a person to be able to act freely in this or that way under certain conditions, and another for the person determinately to be going to act in this way and not the other under these conditions, though he could act otherwise.

BILLUART, Tractatus de Deo, diss. 6 a. 5 ob. 3: “It cannot be said through which knowledge God knows these conditional future things. He does not know them through knowledge of simple intelligence, because this concerns only mere possibles and necessary things; nor through knowledge of vision, because this concerns only the things that are, were, or will be, which are actually present in eternity, and this does not apply to conditional future things. Yet according to the holy Fathers and all theologians except the Molinists, there is no other knowledge in God than knowledge of simple intelligence and of vision. Therefore.

“I answer. The Thomists are divided on this point. Some say that God knows conditional future things through knowledge of vision, and to the contrary argument they distinguish: Knowledge of vision concerns only things that will be and are actually present in eternity, insofar as it is formally vision, I concede; insofar as it is free and approving, I deny. For in this respect it is directed toward all free and contingent objects, whatever they may be.

“Others say that God knows them through knowledge of simple intelligence, because just as there are two kinds of knowledge of vision in God—one natural and necessary, namely the vision of the divine essence, and the other free, namely the intuitive vision of creatures—so there are two kinds of knowledge of simple intelligence: one natural and necessary, which concerns mere possibles, and the other free, which concerns conditional future things. And when it is objected that St. Thomas and the theologians call knowledge of simple intelligence necessary, they answer that it is called this because it is chiefly occupied with mere possibles, which God knows naturally and necessarily.

“Choose whichever of these two opinions you prefer; it is a question of terminology. For whether you say that it is knowledge of simple intelligence or of vision, it is all the same, provided you do not say that it is independent of God's actual decree, as the Molinists imagine middle knowledge.”

267. Third, divine knowledge is divided into speculative and practical knowledge (1 q. 14 a. 16): speculative insofar as it is theoretical knowledge of truth, practical insofar as it is knowledge of things to be done for the end of action, directing the will and lighting its way. Knowledge of simple intelligence can be speculative and practical; nor is it difficult to understand how, as a kind of art, it can be practical and thus influence the efficient causality of things. Knowledge of vision, however, which already presupposes an absolute divine decree concerning the thing’s existence, is per se speculative; nevertheless it can be “not in the manner of art but in the manner of providence, mediately practical.” “For although in God there is not one volition on account of another, since there is one supremely simple act by which he wills all that he wills, nevertheless the things God wills are mutually dependent, and he wills one to be on account of another. Hence the vision of the existence of one thing can, in our way of conceiving, light the way for divine counsels directed toward willing another thing, and in this sense be a guide in acting”². But note: in this way the vision of object A is not practical with respect to that object, but with respect to another, for example B; and in this way it is mediately practical.

268. Fourth, divine knowledge is divided into knowledge of approval and disapproval, according as it is knowledge of good things that please God or of evil things that displease him; this distinction therefore derives from the different way the divine will is related to the known objects. “This knowledge can either precede or follow the origin of things. It precedes it: ‘Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you,’ that is, I chose you to consecrate you; for it follows: ‘And before you came out of the womb, I sanctified you’³. It follows it: ‘And God saw all the things he had made, and they were very good’⁴ ... Knowledge that approves, insofar as it precedes the origin of things, does not differ from practical knowledge⁵; insofar as it follows the origin of things, it is vision⁶ together with an act of the will⁷”⁸. Therefore not all knowledge of approval is practical knowledge, although practical knowledge, which has a will conjoined to it that the thing come to be, is necessarily knowledge of approval. Hence knowledge of approval is sometimes primarily understood as practical knowledge (1 q. 14 a. 8). One must therefore attend to how the terms are understood⁹.

As was already indicated above (nr. 252), knowledge of disapproval, because it denies benevolent knowledge, is called ignorance.