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051 - Li Reasons For Inquiring How There Is A Multitude Of Things Understood In The Divine Intellect · Summa Contra Gentiles, First Book (On God)

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  Speaker 1: Chapter fifty one of Suma Contragentilees, first Book on God
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  Speaker 1: by Saint Thomas aquinas translated by the Fathers of the
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  Speaker 1: English Dominican Province. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: Chapter fifty one reasons for inquiring how there is a
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  Speaker 1: multitude of things understood in the Divine intellect? Lest However,
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  Speaker 1: from the fact that God understands many things, we be
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  Speaker 1: led to conclude that there is composition in the divine intellect.
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  Speaker 1: We must examine in what way the things He understands
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  Speaker 1: are many. Now, they cannot be understood to be many,
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  Speaker 1: as though the many things God understands had a distinct
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  Speaker 1: being in him. For these understood things would either be
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  Speaker 1: the same as the divine essence, and thus we should
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  Speaker 1: have multitude in the essence of God, which has been
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  Speaker 1: disproved above in many ways, or else they would be
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  Speaker 1: added to the divine essence, and thus there would be
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  Speaker 1: something accidental in God. And this again we have proved
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  Speaker 1: above to be impossible. Nor again can it be admitted
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  Speaker 1: that these intelligible forms exist per se. As Plato, in
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  Speaker 1: order to avoid the above impossibilities, seems to have maintained
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  Speaker 1: by holding the existence of ideas, because the forms of
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  Speaker 1: natural things cannot exist apart from matter, since neither are
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  Speaker 1: they understood without matter. And even if the above supposition
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  Speaker 1: were admissible, it would not suffice to explain how God
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  Speaker 1: understands many things. For since the aforesaid forms are outside
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  Speaker 1: the essence of God, if God were unable without them
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  Speaker 1: to understand the multitude of things, as is requisite for
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  Speaker 1: the perfection of his intellect, it would follow that the
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  Speaker 1: perfection of understanding depends on something else, and consequently the
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  Speaker 1: perfection also of his being, since his being is his
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  Speaker 1: act of intelligence, the contrary of which has been shown above. Again,
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  Speaker 1: since all that is beside his essence is caused by him,
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  Speaker 1: as we shall prove further on, it must needs be
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  Speaker 1: that if the aforesaid forms are outside God, then they
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  Speaker 1: are caused by him. Now He is the cause of
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  Speaker 1: things by his intellect, as we shall show further on. Therefore,
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  Speaker 1: in order that these intelligible forms may exist, it is
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  Speaker 1: required that previously in the order of nature, God should
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  Speaker 1: understand them. And consequently God does not understand multitude through
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  Speaker 1: the fact that many intelligible things exist per se outside him. Again,
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  Speaker 1: the intell elligible in act is the intellect in act,
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  Speaker 1: even as the sensible in act is the sense in act.
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  Speaker 1: But so far as the intelligible is distinct from the intellect,
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  Speaker 1: both are in potentiality, as appears in the senses. For
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  Speaker 1: neither is the sight actually seeing, nor the visible actually seen,
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  Speaker 1: except when the site is informed by the species of
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  Speaker 1: the visible object, so that one thing results from sight invisible. Accordingly,
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  Speaker 1: if the intelligible objects of God are outside his intellect,
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  Speaker 1: he will follow that his intellect is in potentiality, and
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  Speaker 1: likewise his intelligible objects, and thus he will need something
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  Speaker 1: to reduce him to actuality. But this is impossible, since
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  Speaker 1: this thing would be previous to him. Further, the object
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  Speaker 1: understood must be in the intellect. Therefore, in order to
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  Speaker 1: explain how God understands the multitude of things, it is
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  Speaker 1: not enough to suppose that the forms of things exist
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  Speaker 1: per se outside the divine intellect, but it is necessary
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  Speaker 1: that they be in the divine intellect itself. End of
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  Speaker 1: Chapter fifty one, read by Michael Shane, Craig, Lambert, Elsie