Scholastica commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologicae

SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE.

The Conclusion is negative. And as is clear from the testimony adduced in the argument On the contrary, and from what was said above in q. 9, it is certain according to faith.

COMMENTARY.

IN this article there is a doubt concerning its conclusion. It is proved false. First, from the solution to the third of this article, in which it is said that God does not now know some enunciation which He knew before, e.g. He does not now know this enunciation, Adam is, which He nevertheless knew when Adam was in the world: therefore the knowledge of God is variable. And it is confirmed; for just as God now knows some enuntiable which before was not, so He knows something enunciated which He did not know before: therefore the knowledge of God, in every respect, is variable. The antecedent is proved. Just as this enuntiable, Peter writes, is now false, and before was true: so the thing itself on the part of reality before existed and now does not exist: therefore before it was known by God, and now it is not known, just as the enuntiable itself.

Secondly. With God's knowledge of the future Antichrist standing, Antichrist will contingently be, speaking simply; therefore it can be posited in being that Antichrist not be in future time. For, with a possible posited in being, no unfitting consequence follows. Again, with it posited in being that Antichrist not be in future time, the knowledge which God has of the future Antichrist is varied; therefore the knowledge of God is simply variable.

Thirdly. That the knowledge of God be variable, so that God can now not know what He knew before, posits no real imperfection in the knowledge of God: therefore nothing unfitting follows from its being variable. The antecedent is proved: from the sole fact that the knowledge of God is changed as regards the respect of reason which it bespeaks to creatures, it will be varied, speaking simply: but a change of the divine knowledge which takes place precisely according to a respect of reason infers no real imperfection or change in that knowledge, since it is a change only according to a respect of reason: therefore. The minor is proved. The knowledge of God, especially the knowledge of vision, is extended to creatures only through a respect of reason to them: therefore it will not be changed simply if it lose that respect of reason. Someone will say that if the knowledge of vision is changed as regards the respect of reason to creatures, a real change will follow in the divine will, by which He willed from eternity to produce creatures in time. For the knowledge of vision, in our way of understanding, depends on the determination of the divine will concerning things to be produced in time. Against this solution it is argued: for the same argument is made about the will which we made about the knowledge of vision. Since the divine will, from the fact that it is extended to creatures, willing to produce them in time, has no other real perfection than it would have if it had not willed to produce them, but has only a respect of reason to them: therefore the divine will, from the sole fact of losing the respect of reason to creatures, could be changed from willing to not willing to produce them.

For a solution it is to be noted that change includes two extremes, so that the thing which is changed passes from one extreme to the other. From which it follows that for the knowledge of God to be mutable, it was necessary that God could not know what He knew before, or the converse; and it is not enough that, speaking simply and in the divided sense, God can know by the knowledge of vision something which He does not know. Since the divine knowledge, from the fact that it is the purest act, cannot pass from one extreme to the other: therefore it is simply immutable and invariable.

To the arguments to the opposite it is answered. To the first and its confirmation it is answered with Cajetan in this article that St. Thomas in it only assigns the difference between enuntiables and things enunciated, and for that reason grants that God can now know some enuntiable which He did not know before, which He altogether denies of the thing enunciated, since one and the same enuntiable can be designated which before was false and now is true. And thus now it is knowable, and before was not knowable. But one and the same thing enunciated cannot be designated existing in the nature of things which is now knowable and before was not, e.g. this proposition, Antichrist is, is now false, and the very same, with Antichrist born and persisting, will be true, and consequently the very same persisting is now not knowable, and, with Antichrist born, will be knowable. But Antichrist is now not knowable, since he is not in the nature of things; but afterwards he will be knowable, when he exists in the world. Wherefore just as he will be changed from non-knowable to knowable, so he will be changed from non-existing to existing. This difference alone, then, does St. Thomas intend to assign in the solution to the third. But it is to be observed that whether the discourse be of enuntiables or of things enunciated, in no way is it to be granted that God now knows something which He did not know before, or the converse, in the measure of His eternity. Since in eternity God knows all things according to every mode in which they are knowable, and what is not knowable, from eternity God knows that it is not knowable, e.g. from eternity God knows this proposition, Antichrist is, to be false for this present time, and that it will be true in future time, with Antichrist born. But the sentence of St. Thomas asserting that God now knows some enuntiable which He did not know before is to be explained through the order to the measure of our time. Thus that proposition is not knowable for this time, yet is knowable for future time.

To the second it is answered that Antichrist in the composite sense, as we said in art. 13, will necessarily be. And indeed, although with a possible posited in being, if taken solitarily, no unfitting consequence follows, yet as it is composed with another, a great unfitting consequence can follow if it be posited in being, e.g. that this proposition, Peter writes, taken apart, be posited in being, no unfitting consequence follows: yet there will be a great unfitting consequence if we suppose its contradictory, Peter does not write, to be true. So in the present case, that this proposition, Antichrist will not be, taken apart, be posited in being, there is no unfitting consequence; but in composing it with God's foreknowledge of the future Antichrist, there would be a great unfitting consequence if it were posited in being. For it is impossible in the composite sense.

To the third, Ferrara, in 1 Contra Gentes, c. 83, speaking of the divine volition of creatures, says that if this volition be changed as regards the respect of reason, of necessity it will also be varied as regards its real entity. And his reason in substance is this. Since the respects of reason which accompany the purely immanent operations of the divine intellect or will cannot cease unless their proximate foundation, which is the real entity of the immanent operation, be changed. What has been said of the volition of creatures can also be said of the knowledge of vision.

But against this solution it is argued. The real entity of the volition of creatures in God is not other than the entity of the volition by which God wills His goodness and essence; but this entity cannot be the proximate foundation of the respect of reason to creatures: therefore the respect of reason to creatures is not founded in the real entity of the volition of creatures, and consequently for a change of the respect of reason a change of the real entity is not necessarily presupposed. The minor is proved; a relation, whether real or of reason, necessarily follows upon its proximate foundation; but the respect of reason to creatures does not necessarily follow upon the real entity of the divine volition, for otherwise God would necessarily love creatures to be produced in time: therefore. With the solution of Ferrariensis passed over, then, I say that just as the ideal respects, in the end, do not follow upon the operation of the divine intellect, but in a certain way come to be through the comparison by which the divine intellect compares the Divine Essence to creatures themselves: so respects of this sort to creatures do not properly follow upon the operations of intellect and will; but in a certain way come to be from those operations themselves, insofar as they are extended to creatures. Thus they are not properly founded in the real entity of those operations themselves. This, then, supposed, which must be explained more fully in q. 19, art. 2, to the 5th argument, it is answered that a change of the knowledge and volition of creatures, formally indeed, consists only in a change of the respect of reason to creatures. But nevertheless this change is altogether repugnant to the divine knowledge and the divine will: since it necessarily presupposes either a change of the divine substance or, what is more evident, a change of the divine practical judgment, e.g. if God now willed not to produce Antichrist, whom nevertheless He willed from eternity to produce; this change of the divine will would proceed from the fact that God now judges it to be good and fitting that Antichrist not be; which judgment God did not have from eternity, but rather the opposite; and thus God from eternity would not be perfectly wise. Read St. Thomas throughout below, q. 19, art. 8, in the body. And concerning this whole article 15, see St. Thomas himself, q. 2 De Veritate, art. 15.