Summa summae S. Thomae sive compendium theologiae

St. Thomas, q. 12.

I say 1°. God, as he is in himself, cannot be seen by a bodily eye, even if glorified¹. This is against Master Bona Spes and his disciples, the Calced Carmelite Fathers.

Proof 1° from the Fathers. Origen, contra Celsum, says: « Celsus therefore falsely charges us, saying that we hope to see God with bodily eyes. » And he adds that the mind alone sees God. St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Cathec. 9: « God indeed cannot be discerned with the eyes of the flesh; for the incorporeal cannot fall under bodily eyes. » St. Athanasius, in St. Augustine, Epist. 147², says that God, « according to the property of his deity, is altogether invisible..., except insofar as he can be known by mind and spirit. » St. Ambrose, in the same, ibid., c. 6, n. 18, as will be cited below. St. Jerome, in the same, ibid., c. 23, n. 53, asserts the same thing, and proves it « because an incorporeal thing is not seen with bodily eyes. »

As for St. Augustine, about whom the difficulty is greatest, that he constantly held our opinion is shown by many proofs. In Epist. 92³, ad Italicam, he says, n. 3: « This [namely, God] the eye of the body can neither see now, nor will be able to see then; » which he proves with many arguments, and he calls the opposite opinion folly and madness in Epist. 147, or the book de videndo Deo, after he had confirmed the same opinion in the former, and in this letter, from the Scriptures, from Sts. Ambrose, Jerome, and Athanasius cited, he concludes thus in the words of Ambrose: « God is not seen in a place, nor is he sought with bodily eyes; » and he adds: « But I confess that this is also my own opinion. » In Psalm. XLI, after the beginning: « God indeed cannot be seen except with the mind. » And elsewhere, many times. Finally, St. Fulgentius, his disciple, to whom the mind of the Holy Doctor was better understood than it is to certain more recent writers, in his answer to the third Quaest. of Ferrandus, testifies that this was the opinion of his master, and subscribes to it in these words: « God the Spirit is not seen with bodily eyes; » and: « God promises the vision of himself not to the eyes of the body, but to those of the soul. »

Proof 2° by reason. God is a spirit. But it is absolutely impossible for a spirit to be seen by a bodily eye. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. It is impossible for any power to be carried outside the range of its adequate and extensive object, otherwise it would be adequate and extensive, as is supposed, and it would not be, because beyond that the power would supernaturally extend itself. But a spirit is not contained within the range of the adequate and extensive object of the bodily eye. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. The adequate object of the bodily eye, like that of every material power, is something corporeal and material, namely color for the eye, sound for the ear, odor for the sense of smell, etc.: which is clear both from the common sense of mankind, and from the definition of these powers; for sight is commonly defined as the power perceptive of lucid color; hearing, the power perceptive of sound; and so of the rest. Therefore.

It is confirmed. God is further removed, in the nature of an object, from sensible objects, than one sensible thing is from another sensible thing, e.g., than color is from sound. But it is absolutely impossible for the eye alone to hear, and the ear to see color, otherwise there would no longer be two distinct senses, but the eye would be the ear, and the ear the eye. Therefore, a fortiori, it cannot be that God is seen by a bodily eye.

Proof 3° from incongruity. If God could supernaturally be seen by the bodily eye of man, he could likewise be seen supernaturally by the eye of a brute animal, say an ox or a dog; for the sensitive powers of brute animals are of the same, indeed sometimes of greater, perfection than the sensitive powers of man. But the consequent seems absurd, as will be declared more fully below. Therefore.

The disciples of Bona Spes, together with their master, answer that all this proves that the bodily eye cannot see God by a bodily vision, but not that it cannot see him by a spiritual vision united to it. But on the contrary: 1° The Fathers cited in the first proof say that God cannot be seen except by the mind alone. 2° Vision is a vital action: as an action it must necessarily be from an agent, for the concept of action is formally the concept of an outgoing; as vital it must necessarily be from something moving itself from within, for it is by this that we distinguish living things from non-living things, that living things move themselves from within, whereas dead things do not. Therefore it is impossible for a bodily eye to see by a spiritual vision united to it. 3° Spiritual vision is an act of understanding, but it cannot happen that a bodily eye should understand; because that which is not intellective in first act can no more understand in second act than a stone or a piece of wood. Finally, from this it would likewise follow that the eye of a brute animal could see God by a spiritual vision united to it, and be blessed.

I suppose that the created intellect cannot, by the powers of nature alone, see God as he is in himself. So it was defined in the Council of Vienne under Clement V, in the year 1311, against the Beghards and Beguines. The Clementine Ad nostrum, on Heretics, l. V, tit. 3, is cited¹. For if by the powers of nature alone we cannot elicit acts of faith, hope, and charity, because they are supernatural, as was defined in various councils against the Pelagians, much less the intuitive vision of God, which is more supernatural, since this is the end, those are the means. Hence in Romans, VI, 23, it is said: The grace of God is life everlasting; but life everlasting is the very vision of God.

I say: The intellect, supernaturally aided, can see God as he is in himself². This is against the Palamites and the Armenians, and against them it was thus defined by the Council of Florence in the Decree of Union given to the Armenians, in which it is said that purified souls « are received into heaven at once, and clearly behold God himself, three and one, as he is. » Benedict XII had defined the same, in Extravag. Benedictus Deus.

It is established from Scripture. I John, III, 2: When he shall appear, we shall be like to him, because we shall see him as he is. And I Corinthians, XIII, 12: We see now through a glass in a dark manner, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I am known.

The holy Fathers lend support throughout, especially Chrysostom, concerning whom there is a difficulty. In Homily 69, to the people, he says that the blessed behold the King himself, « Not through an entrance, not through faith, but face to face. » The same, in Epistle 5, to Theodore after his fall, cap. 7, expounding those words of St. Peter, Matthew, XVII, 4: It is good for us to be here, says: « What will be said when the very truth of things is present? When, the royal palace having been opened, it will be permitted to behold the King himself, no longer in a dark manner, nor through a glass, but face to face? » Likewise elsewhere.

It is proved by a reason founded on the principles of faith³. Man can supernaturally attain his beatitude, to which he is raised up by the grace of God. Now the intuitive vision of God constitutes the essence of beatitude, according to the Thomists, or at least is necessarily required for it, according to all, in keeping with that saying of John, XVII, 3: This is life everlasting: that they may know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. Therefore.

I suppose that a mere man, by the ordinary law, cannot in this mortal life see God as he is in himself¹, according to that verse of Exod., XXXIII, 20: Man shall not see me, and live. The reason is that the natural knowledge of man as a wayfarer is only of sensible and material things, or at least through species drawn from sensible things. But by such knowledge God cannot be seen as he is in himself, since he is neither sensible nor material, nor is he seen through a species, as we shall say below.

I say: Man as a wayfarer, living in the flesh, but not using the senses of the flesh, can, by the extraordinary power of God, and beyond the common order of things, be raised up to the clear vision of his essence, and it is probable that this was granted to Moses and Paul².

The first part is common and certain; for although the intellect, in this state, depends on the senses in its knowledge, this dependence is nevertheless not so necessary to it that it cannot be released from it by the extraordinary power of God, since it is of the same intrinsic power in the body as separated from the body, in which state it does not depend on the senses — and this is established as a fact in the soul of Christ, who was at once a wayfarer and a comprehensor.

The second part is from Augustine, Epist. 147³, to Paulina, de videndo Deo, ch. 3, and bk. XII in Genesim ad litteram, ch. 27, and of the places of the Author cited in the margin, among which are numbered Ambrose, Basil, and others, against several other holy Fathers.

It is proved from Scripture, 1° concerning Moses, Num., XII, 2, when Mary and Aaron, having spoken against the Lord, said: Hath the Lord spoken by Moses only? hath he not also spoken to us in like manner? But God, wishing to show that Moses, above the rest, had been endowed with the singular privilege of seeing him, says to them, ibid., 6-8: Hear my words. If there be among you a prophet of the Lord, I will appear to him in a vision, or I will speak to him in a dream. But it is not so with my servant Moses;... for I speak to him mouth to mouth, and plainly, and not by riddles and figures doth he see the Lord.

On this passage, then, with SS. Augustine and Thomas we chiefly insist, and not on others, e.g., Exodi, XXXIII, 11, where it is said that Moses saw God face to face, because we know that this and similar passages about Moses, as also about the other Prophets, of whom the same thing is related, are understood by the Fathers of a certain eminent knowledge of God and familiarity with him⁴. But this cited passage can nowhere be understood in this way, or in any other sense foreign to ours. For unless you understand it of clear vision, Moses would already have seen God by riddles and figures, and so you would not save the sense of Scripture, which says that Moses saw God, not by riddles and figures.

2° Concerning St. Paul. The Apostle himself, II ad Cor., XII, 2-4, says thus of himself: I know a man in Christ, fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I know not, or out of the body, I know not: God knoweth), caught up in this way even to the third heaven. And I know such a man, that he was caught up into paradise, and heard secret words which it is not lawful for a man to speak.

These unspeakable things, says St. Thomas⁵, are those which pertain to the vision of the blessed, which exceeds the state of the way, according to that verse of Isaiae, LXIV, 4: Eye hath not seen, O God, besides thee, what things thou hast prepared for them that wait for thee. And surely, if St. Paul had not seen the divine essence, the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation, but had known them only through faith, could he have uttered them?

From these things, therefore, I argue thus.

Those things which depend on the free will of God can become known to us from no other source than sacred Scripture, through which the divine will is manifested to us. But the sacred Scriptures, as is evident, taken in their natural and literal sense, openly hand down that Moses and Paul saw God, and this involves no repugnance or incongruity, since all concede that it is possible. Therefore.

It is confirmed by a fitting reason of SS. Augustine and Thomas⁶. As Moses was the first teacher of the Jews, so Paul was the first teacher of the Gentiles. It was fitting, therefore, that they should see the divine essence, and be eyewitnesses of the mysteries, so that they might the better and more solidly teach these things to the Jews and the Gentiles.

Whatever can be objected from Scripture and the Fathers must be understood according to the ordinary law of God, or of comprehensive vision.

Note 1°: Our cognition comes about insofar as the knowing power draws things to itself, joining them to itself; and because things, on account of their materiality, cannot entitatively enter the power, they need a species which is their representation and formal likeness, through which they are united to the power. The species, therefore, in intelligible and representative being, is entirely the same as the object is in entitative being, nor does it constitute a numerically distinct thing from it — just as the image of Caesar, in the being of an image, is entirely the same as Caesar is in natural being — so that the species of a horse, e.g., contains in itself the form and nature of the horse entirely the same as that which is in the horse, not under a natural mode, but under an intelligible mode; and the species of this individual man is this same individual man in intelligible being. Otherwise the species would not represent the object as it is, and through it the object could not be known.

Note 2°: A twofold species is distinguished, impressed and expressed: the impressed represents the object as knowable, the expressed as it is known; the impressed moves toward cognition, the expressed terminates it. The question, therefore, concerns both of these species, whether it is given, or can be given, in the vision of God.

I say 1°: An impressed species is not given, nor can it be given, in the beatific vision¹. The first part is common. The second is that of the Thomists and of very many others.

Proof of the first part. An impressed species in the beatific vision is superfluous. Therefore it is not given. — Proof of the antecedent. An impressed species is required then, when either the object does not exist, or is not present to the intellect through itself, or is not sufficiently intelligible on account of its materiality. But the object of the beatific vision, namely God, exists essentially, is intimately present through himself to any blessed intellect whatever, and is supremely intelligible, because he is supremely immaterial. Therefore.

Proof of the second part. 1° An impressed species must agree with the object in the same degree of immateriality, otherwise it will not represent it as it is in itself, because it is representative to the extent that it is intelligible, and it is intelligible to the extent that it is immaterial; hence through material species we cannot know a spirit. But no created or creatable species can attain to the degree of immateriality that belongs to God. Therefore.

Proof 2°. An impressed species is the very quiddity of the object in intelligible being, as has been said². But it is contradictory that a created species should be the quiddity of God in intelligible being. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. The quiddity of God is his very being, even in intelligible being. But it is contradictory that a created species should be its own being, even in intelligible and representative being. Therefore.

I say 2°: An expressed species is not given, nor can it be given, in the beatific vision. As regards both parts, it is the more common opinion among the Thomists.

Proof of the first part. 1° An expressed species is given for this purpose: that the object, which is intelligible through the impressed species, may become understood in act through the expressed species, and may stand within the intellect as its term³. But the divine essence is united to the created intellect as understood in act, making itself understood in act through itself alone⁴. Therefore. — The minor is St. Thomas's. And it is evident, because the divine essence is the purest act in intelligible being, just as in the other genera, and hence is understanding in act, and as such is intimately present to the intellect. Therefore.

Proof 2°, overturning the foundation of the adversaries. According to them, an expressed species is given in the beatific vision for this reason: that a term of that action, produced by the action itself, must be assigned. But this reasoning is worthless. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. It does not belong to the nature of an immanent action to produce an effect, although this often happens to it. But the beatific vision is an immanent action. Therefore. — Proof of the major. 1° In this an immanent action is distinguished from a transient one: that the latter is for the sake of an effect, while the former is for the sake of the perfection of the subject in which it remains. 2° Because the divine Word sees and understands, and yet does not produce another word or expressed species. 3° When we contemplate, purely beholding a word already formed in the mind, we frame no other, and then cognition is simply understanding, and not utterance. Therefore.

Proof of the second part by the same grounds by which the second part of the first conclusion was proved. For if an impressed species of such perfection and immateriality as would represent God as he is in himself cannot be given, then a fortiori neither can an expressed species, since the latter must be more perfect, or at least equally perfect as the impressed; for it belongs to the expressed species to represent the object as understood in second act, while it belongs to the impressed species to represent it as merely intelligible in first act. Therefore.