The great commentator Cornelius a Lapide says.
What is this heaven? 1. S. Basil (Hom. i. in Hexem.) infers from this that there is not merely one heaven, as Chrysostom thought, nor two, as Theophylact held, but at least three. Some add that there are three only, and that the third is the highest. But all the astronomers of olden times will dispute this, for they reckoned eight at least, as will moderns, who count at least eleven.
- S. Thomas says (ii. ii. qu. 175, art. 3, ad. 4): “By the third heaven may be understood any supernatural vision, and in three ways it may be called the third heaven. First, with relation to man’s cognitive powers. Then the first heaven will be any supernatural, corporal vision, seen by the bodily eye, such as that of the handwriting on the wall, described in Daniel v. The second heaven will be any vision presented to the imagination, such as that of Isaiah, and of S. John in the Apocalypse. The third heaven will be any intellectual vision, such as is explained by S. Augustine (super Gen. ad Litt. 12).
“Secondly, the distinction may be made according to the different orders of the objects of consciousness. Then the first heaven will be the knowledge of celestial bodies; the second, the knowledge of celestial spirits; the third, the knowledge of God Himself.
“Thirdly, the three heavens may be the different steps of the knowledge by which God is seen. The first will then belong to the angels of the lowest hierarchy; the second to the angels of the middle hierarchy; the third to the angels of the highest.” According to this test, S. Paul would have been caught up to the third and highest hierarchy of angels, and standing there with the seraphim, have seen most clearly the essence of God, and from thence have been enkindled with that burning fire of charity with which he afterwards set on fire the whole world.
But I should say that the third heaven is the highest, or the empyrean, where the Blessed dwell. Hence, in ver. 4, it is called Paradise. It is called the third by a Hebraism. The number three denotes completion, being the first number to which the word all may be applied. We do not speak of “all two,” but we may and do say “all three.” Hence the poet says: “Oh, thrice and four times blessed they,” &c., i.e., completely blessed. Again (in Amos i. 3) we read, “for three transgressions of Damascus,” meaning, for all. In ver. 8 of this chapter again, we have, “I besought the Lord thrice,” or, very often, till I could ask no more, until the answer came. “My grace is sufficient for thee.”
- It is simplest of all to say with S. Thomas, in the passage above quoted, that “the first heaven is the sidereal, the second the crystalline, the third the empyrean;” or, rather, that “the first is the aerial, the second the sidereal, the third the empyrean,” as Theophylact gives them. With him agree Julian Pomerius, and Damascene (de Fide, lib. ii. c. 6), and many others. “The air” in Scripture is commonly called “the heaven;” hence we get “the birds of heaven.” The air, therefore, is the first heaven, and is called the aerial one. All the heavenly orbs are the second heaven, or the etherial, and the third is the empyrean. Hence Cajetan is wrong in rejecting the empyrean, in which the Blessed dwell, and supposing that the third is the crystalline. In this latter are the waters which, in Gen. i. and elsewhere, are said to be above the firmament.
