angels

[billcu1]

What’s St. Thomas’s idea of angels deiscussed in summa Theologica? Maybe someone can explain it to me because it certainly is confusing. Is they’re makeup like the divine?

 

[Katholish]

What’s St. Thomas’s idea of angels deiscussed in summa Theologica? Maybe someone can explain it to me because it certainly is confusing. Is they’re makeup like the divine?

Like God or the human soul, angels are immaterial substances empowered with intellect and will. The best way to get a better understanding is probably to ask whatever specific questions you can think of because most posters probably aren’t just going to post a 30,000 word treatise on angelic nature.

 

[billcu1]

The substance of angels I guess is what I’m looking for. Can they be in more than one place at a time. What is their motion? That part of the treatise on angels. Is there a doctor in the church of demonology? Someone must know something or there wouldn’t be excorcisms.

B

 

[Katholish]

St. Thomas Aquinas is the “Angelic Doctor” He is the expert on the nature of angels (and hence also demons).

Angels are not bound to bodies as we are, and hence when we speak about their location, we do so in a non-material sense. However, when we do speak of angesl being present or having location, that is determined by the location of their actions in the physical world. Thus, if an angel acts on me, then he is at my location. Angelic action doesn’t just mean supernatiral manifestations, but can be as simple as praying for us. When our guardian angel prays for us, he is present with us.

When an angel goes from location to location (i.e. travels) they do so at the speed of thought.

 

[billcu1]

St. Thomas Aquinas is the “Angelic Doctor” He is the expert on the nature of angels (and hence also demons).

Angels are not bound to bodies as we are, and hence when we speak about their location, we do so in a non-material sense. However, when we do speak of angesl being present or having location, that is determined by the location of their actions in the physical world. Thus, if an angel acts on me, then he is at my location. Angelic action doesn’t just mean supernatiral manifestations, but can be as simple as praying for us. When our guardian angel prays for us, he is present with us.

When an angel goes from location to location (i.e. travels) they do so at the speed of thought.

After reading some of the location treatise it seems I may be right that an angel can be in heaven or whereever and have a human’s body. Our guardian angel’s for example. I don’t know much about Aristotle. I know he rejected Plato’s idea of forms. I do agree and follow Plato’s platonic solids doctrine and things spelled out in timaeus if explained right by modern philosophers and understood by the church.

Bill

 

[Katholish]

After reading some of the location treatise it seems I may be right that an angel can be in heaven or whereever and have a human’s body. Our guardian angel’s for example. I don’t know much about Aristotle. I know he rejected Plato’s idea of forms. I do agree and follow Plato’s platonic solids doctrine and things spelled out in timaeus if explained right by modern philosophers and understood by the church.

Bill

Whenever a being experiences the Beatific Vision, it can be said that they are “in Heaven”. Heaven, while also referring to a physical location, most directly refers to a state of being. Angels cannot “leave Heaven”, but it may not entirely be correct to say that they are always “located” in Heaven because that sense of location emphasizes more a physical reality which does not belong to the angels. In the same way, a demon might possess a person on earth, but they do not “leave Hell” to do so.

I am not quite sure what you are referring to as Platonic solids, but am also not sure how it applies.

 

[billcu1]

Whenever a being experiences the Beatific Vision, it can be said that they are “in Heaven”. Heaven, while also referring to a physical location, most directly refers to a state of being. Angels cannot “leave Heaven”, but it may not entirely be correct to say that they are always “located” in Heaven because that sense of location emphasizes more a physical reality which does not belong to the angels. In the same way, a demon might possess a person on earth, but they do not “leave Hell” to do so.

I am not quite sure what you are referring to as Platonic solids, but am also not sure how it applies.

So is “located” a spatial concept? When dealing with angels what I keep getting out of summa is much talk about time.

Plato’s metaphysics isn’t really related to Christian theology. But Plato was Aristotle’s teacher. Plato said the universe was created with a dodecahedron and believed in the theory of forms. This of course has nothing to do with summa theologica. You can google “Theory of forms” if interested.

Bill

 

[MarcoPolo]

As I recall from Aquinas, “located” does not refer to anything spatial because angels are incorporeal. It refers to where they are active. This is not defined scientifically, but it is not a “physical” phenomenon.

If the subject interests you, see also Pope John Paul II’s Catechesis on Angels from 1986.

 

[billcu1]

As I recall from Aquinas, “located” does not refer to anything spatial because angels are incorporeal. It refers to where they are active. This is not defined scientifically, but it is not a “physical” phenomenon.

If the subject interests you, see also Pope John Paul II’s Catechesis on Angels from 1986.

What I have understood as I believe I have is that angels move at the spead of thought. Thomas then mentions * or severals nows and said they don’t have to go between intermediaries as we do as we have bodies. And they can pass though and stop at any intermediary they please. Can they not as spirits come into the womb before a human spirit does and thus be an incarnate angel?

Bill*

 

[MarcoPolo]

What I have understood as I believe I have is that angels move at the spead of thought. Thomas then mentions * or severals nows and said they don’t have to go between intermediaries as we do as we have bodies. And they can pass though and stop at any intermediary they please. Can they not as spirits come into the womb before a human spirit does and thus be an incarnate angel?

Bill*

Scientifically speaking, our thoughts are limited by the brain’s processes of synapses, so it may be wise to understand Aquinas in light of how he understood “thoughts” to occur in his lifetime.

I don’t believe an angel can go into a womb and be born because they are not human and can’t make themselves incarnate. God supplies the soul at conception and the angel is only capable of manifesting when God permits it, so I don’t see how an angel could will to make itself incarnate.