Distinction of three Persons

[Alterum]

Quick question concerning the Augustinian use of relational predications to distinguish the three Persons of the Trinity. (I studied this but seem to have forgotten some of it, unfortunately.)

As I recall, relational predications of God must be non-essential (and non-accidental). But if they are non-essential, I can remove them from an otherwise complete description of God (if one existed, humor me) and still retain an essentially complete description of God. The relational predicates cannot add “content” to my description of God, can they? So what prevents a description of God being complete if I were to give only a complete description of His substance?

 

[James_S_Saint]

Description is a process of communication. Communication requires that content be in a form that the receiver can digest. Any one description, although complete, can easily be too far removed from meaningful description for the recipient to correlate or digest concerning their existing understanding. Thus one thing being described in many ways can be essential so as to communicate the full significance of the thing.

In the case of describing God, many groups have different foundational concerns for what and who God must be. Thus it is important to relay that the Catholic God is not merely founded upon one of those groups concerns, but is actually related directly to many of them yet is the same one God.

The Son of God issue tends to bring up the idea that a Son must be a god also and thus propose that there are 2 gods. But in reality, because the Son is always coherent and consistent with the Father, they represent 2 understandings and concerns, yet are actually the same one God. The issue of the Holy Spirit is a third view and concern and thus again, it is imperative that it be understood that there is no incoherence involving the Father or the Son or the Holy Spirit, they are all the same God, merely understood from a different perspective with different concerns being addressed.

 

[Alterum]

Unfortunately this has little to do with my question.

 

[Katholish]

The Relations in God are essential. Not in the sense of each being its own essence, but in the sense that each relation is identical with the Divine Essence. Since the relations are necessary, they cannot be removed from a complete description of God–to borrow your terminology.

 

[Alterum]

Okay… but if they were essential, wouldn’t they have to be predicable of each person of the Trinity? I thought Augustine was trying to develop a non-essential and non-accidental predication in order to distinguish the three persons. I’d like to know more about the nature of that predication… perhaps someone can suggest reading?

 

[Syntax]

This is how I understand Augustine back when I read his stuff alot more…This should be somewhat correct…hopefully

Each person of the Trinity is distinct from the other, but each Person cannot exist independent of the other, nor independent of the same identical substance each of which it is. The Father gets His substance from being God which He is, not from His being Father. The Son likewise gets His substance from being God which He is, not from His being Son. (This is the looming contradiction, but I will ignore it and speak of non-accidental, non-essential properites.)

Here’s is why the relation between each Person is said to be both non-essential and non-accidental to the Godhead. Each Person gets its own unique property in virtue of which relation it shares to some other Person in the Trinity; that is, each unique property (father-hood, son-hood, holy-spirit-hood) springs from the very relation it has to the other Person. So it is in virtue of this *very relation *to the other Person each Person is what it is. This is why we say that the Son exists in virtue of his very relation of *origin *and procession from the Father. And the Father exists in virtue of His relationship He has to His Son.

However, each relation between each person, is a different relation. This is why they are said to b *non-essential *properties of the one substance, God, because the relationship the Father and Son share, cannot be predicated as belonging to the relationship, say, the Son and the Holy Spirit share.

Moreover, each relation is said to be *non-accidental *since if you were to remove the relation, say, the Father had towards His Son, He would simply no longer be the Father, and likewise the Son would no longer be the Son.

In sum: Yes, those relations of God that are said to be accidental are the extrinsic relations God has to other entities like the universe or human beings, such that if you annihilated one of the members of the relation, the other member remaining would have its essence unaffected. The relations found within God between the Persons, however, are more like intrinisic relations since each person is God Himself…In an analogous way, when I say “my legs are longer than my arms,” I am speaking of a relation “longer than” that two parts of me share to one another. But since neither my leg nor my arm is a substance or a “thing” in its own right independent of me since when I severe either the one or the other from my body, the one is no longer a leg and the other is no longer an arm, but just dead matter, so essentialy, I can only be saying that I am relating myself to myself, rather than relating myself to something else or relating two independently distinct objects. Similar for God, each Person shares a unique relation to each other Person each of which God is. So with respect to the Trinity God has both non-essential, non-accidental properties or relations.

This is how I understand Augustine anyway…

 

[Katholish]

Okay… but if they were essential, wouldn’t they have to be predicable of each person of the Trinity? I thought Augustine was trying to develop a non-essential and non-accidental predication in order to distinguish the three persons. I’d like to know more about the nature of that predication… perhaps someone can suggest reading?

It is predicable of each person that they have a Trinitarian substance, and so in that sense each relation is predicated of the whole. This does not allow for an identity between persons, however, because of the subsistent relations of opposition. Thus, the relation of father is identical with the Divine Essence, as is the relation of Son, without the Father being identical with the Son.
I have read some of Augustine directly on this, but not volumes. I am getting Augustine partly through the synthesis of Aquinas, so I cannot speak authoritatively as to the differences, if any, between the two. Augustine wrote a work entitled De Trinitate which is obviously the first place to look.