Help in Understanding Transubstantiation, Accidents and Substance

  • Thread starter Thread starter Roscoe_Turner
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Lets start here. How is substance not merely a concept?

I can’t point to something physically that is unique at a base level. Everything is made up of the same building blocks. The smaller you go the sameness increases not decreases.
 
Verbum Caro & Rosco

Re: Help in Understanding Transubstantiation, Accidents and Substance.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Roscoe Turner
I keep hearing it’s the underlying reality that changes but no one can point to what that is other than our idea of something.

I don’t think substance is an actual thing. Just a concept. So if it’s just a concept, it is just how we think about the Host and Wine that changes. No one can point to substance in anyway but as a concept, and ideal. It just an idea. There is no “thing” that can be changed, just how we think about it.

RT,

Perhaps Linusthe2nd is coming at this from a top-down approach (see his list of First Substances), and I am coming at this from a bottom-up approach (which, I think, integrates into a top-down, or rather, observational approach).

The bottom-up approach is this: when you get to the primary particle, what is it that makes it real? What thing can you point to that gives it it’s reality? From whence does it’s being come? I assume one might point to atoms to explain the reality of a tree, and to subatomic particles to explain the reality of the atom. But, what about that first (or final) particle? What could one point to?

VC
.

As Thomas says in S.T. 1, 45, 4 " I answer that, To be created is, in a manner, to be made, as was shown above (44, 2, ad 2,3). Now, to be made is directed to the being of a thing. Hence to be made and to be created properly belong to whatever being belongs; which, indeed, belongs properly to subsisting things, whether they are simple things, as in the case of separate substances, or composite, as in the case of material substances. For being belongs to that which has being–that is, to what subsists in its own being. But forms and accidents and the like are called beings, not as if they themselves were, but because something is by them; as whiteness is called a being, inasmuch as its subject is white by it. Hence, according to the Philosopher (Metaph. vii, text 2) accident is more properly said to be “of a being” than “a being.” Therefore, as accidents and forms and the like non-subsisting things are to be said to co-exist rather than to exist, so they ought to be called rather “concreated” than “created” things; whereas, properly speaking, created things are subsisting beings.

Reply to Objection 1. In the proposition “the first of created things is being,” the word “being” does not refer to the subject of creation, but to the proper concept of the object of creation. For a created thing is called created because it is a being, not because it is “this” being, since creation is the emanation of all being from the Universal Being, as was said above (Article 1). We use a similar way of speaking when we say that “the first visible thing is color,” although, strictly speaking, the thing colored is what is seen.

Reply to Objection 2. Creation does not mean the building up of a composite thing from pre-existing principles; but it means that the “composite” is created so that it is brought into being at the same time with all its principles.

Reply to Objection 3. This reason does not prove that matter alone is created, but that matter does not exist except by creation; for creation is the production of the whole being, and not only matter "

Again, in 45, 5 he states, " Among all effects the most universal is existence itself…"

and further on he says, " Now God’s proper effect is that which is presupposed to any other, namely existence tout court ( simply ). "

Therefore, whatever is a part of a being ( i.e. atoms, electrons, etc. ) is so by the " act of existence, " which is created along with the being as the principle which makes the being exist. In short, in each being, all that it is, is a product of creation, including existence itself, which, properly speaking, is prior to everything else in a being.

Linus2nd
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
Lets start here. How is substance not merely a concept?

I can’t point to something physically that is unique at a base level. Everything is made up of the same building blocks. The smaller you go the sameness increases not decreases.
Click to expand...
RT,

I think JimG (or maybe someone else) wanted us to be careful to not oppose concept with reality, in so far as some of our concepts correspond to reality. I think everyone who holds substance theory would agree that substance is a concept, but not a mere concept, i.e. it doesn’t just exist in our heads, but describes an objective reality. Also, it is probably important to keep in mind that substance would be a rational concept which corresponds to reality, and not an imaginative concept. By this I mean that since a bare substance isn’t ordered towards our senses, we can’t construct an “image” of it, we can’t imagine it. We would have to investigate it in our reason, not in our imagination.

I think you are right that the smaller you go you find similarity with everything, and I think that would be an important reason for identifying a substance at a macro level if you identify at a micro level. So, that is why I am asking about the micro level.

You say that everything is made up of the same building blocks. . . but what are the building blocks made of? If they are included in the set of everything, why aren’t they made up of building blocks?

So, let’s talk about the fundamental block, the smallest particle or unit that we find. We could call it particle X or a superstring or whatever. Even if you think we haven’t found it yet, you probably still think it exists, right? The alternative would be that you can find smaller particles forever. I assume that you think there is a fundamental particle or building block. Is that a correct assumption?

If that is a correct assumption, the question that I am asking is what gives that primary particle it’s reality? So far we have been borrowing reality from the particles that make up things. But when you get to the primary particle, what do you base it’s reality on?

VC
 
Verbum_Caro said:
RT,

I think JimG (or maybe someone else) wanted us to be careful to not oppose concept with reality, in so far as some of our concepts correspond to reality. I think everyone who holds substance theory would agree that substance is a concept, but not a mere concept, i.e. it doesn’t just exist in our heads, but describes an objective reality. Also, it is probably important to keep in mind that substance would be a rational concept which corresponds to reality, and not an imaginative concept. By this I mean that since a bare substance isn’t ordered towards our senses, we can’t construct an “image” of it, we can’t imagine it. We would have to investigate it in our reason, not in our imagination.

I think you are right that the smaller you go you find similarity with everything, and I think that would be an important reason for identifying a substance at a macro level if you identify at a micro level. So, that is why I am asking about the micro level.

You say that everything is made up of the same building blocks. . . but what are the building blocks made of? If they are included in the set of everything, why aren’t they made up of building blocks?

So, let’s talk about the fundamental block, the smallest particle or unit that we find. We could call it particle X or a superstring or whatever. Even if you think we haven’t found it yet, you probably still think it exists, right? The alternative would be that you can find smaller particles forever. I assume that you think there is a fundamental particle or building block. Is that a correct assumption?

If that is a correct assumption, the question that I am asking is what gives that primary particle it’s reality? So far we have been borrowing reality from the particles that make up things. But when you get to the primary particle, what do you base it’s reality on?

VC
Click to expand...
All existence in our Universe was created in a singularity, often called the big bang. All existence, all particles come from that event. If you want to call that “substance”, then everything shares the same “substance” There isn’t any point in distinguishing things at a base level because there is no distinction.

If you are asking what makes things have mass it’s the higgs boson, aka the god particle.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higgs_boson
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
You can’t show them Transubstantiation, you can only show them the Host and Wine. That there is a transformation is a matter of faith, not observable fact.
Click to expand...
Well, of course it’s a matter of faith. No one in this thread is saying otherwise. As Linusthe2nd already said:
Linusthe2nd said:
Can you explain how God created the universe out of nothing, can you explain how a Virgin gave birth to a man, can you explain how God became man, can you explain how He rose from the dead, can you explain how there are Three Persons in God? Then why be so puzzled over the change of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ?

Just accept the reality and stop trying to figure how it is possible.
Click to expand...
If you accept that God can be something unreasonable to us like one in nature but three in person, then what’s the problem with God appearing to be bread and wine? Do you also ask how God could appear to Moses as a burning bush? If God can appear to be a talking plant that burns but is not turned to ash, then appearing to be bread and wine seems a lot easier. The Eucharist doesn’t have to do anything fancy like the burning bush. It just has to sit there and be our friend Jesus.

Our explanations of any divine mystery are predicated upon faith. I do not have faith in transubstantiation because reason tells me it is true. I have faith in transubstantiation because I have faith that God is able to do such a thing.
 
Alindawyl said:
Well, of course it’s a matter of faith. No one in this thread is saying otherwise. As Linusthe2nd already said:

If you accept that God can be something unreasonable to us like one in nature but three in person, then what’s the problem with God appearing to be bread and wine? Do you also ask how God could appear to Moses as a burning bush? If God can appear to be a talking plant that burns but is not turned to ash, then appearing to be bread and wine seems a lot easier. The Eucharist doesn’t have to do anything fancy like the burning bush. It just has to sit there and be our friend Jesus.

Our explanations of any divine mystery are predicated upon faith. I do not have faith in transubstantiation because reason tells me it is true. I have faith in transubstantiation because I have faith that God is able to do such a thing.
Click to expand...
I have said the same. It is a matter of faith. What isn’t a matter of faith is the explanation. St. Thomas explains it using an Aristotelian view of the world. Like most things Aristotle proposed it is flawed and not based in the world as we know it. It’s a thought experiment not anything observable. Even St. Thomas states that substance is something only grasped by the intellect. It’s a thought.

If substance is just a thought, then the only thing that changes is our thinking about the bread and wine. It gains significance because we think about it differently because of our faith and the celebration of the Mass.

When explaining the trinity the Catechism says - it’s a mystery. Try as you might, you can’t figure it out. inaccessible to reason
237 The Trinity is a mystery of faith in the strict sense, one of the “mysteries that are hidden in God, which can never be known unless they are revealed by God”.58 To be sure, God has left traces of his Trinitarian being in his work of creation and in his Revelation throughout the Old Testament. But his inmost Being as Holy Trinity is a mystery that is inaccessible to reason alone or even to Israel’s faith before the Incarnation of God’s Son and the sending of the Holy Spirit.
Click to expand...
Transubstantiation on the other hand
1376 The Council of Trent summarizes the Catholic faith by declaring: “Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his body that he was offering under the species of bread, it has always been the conviction of the Church of God, and this holy Council now declares again, that by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation.”
Click to expand...
Changing “the whole substance” again is changing how we think about it, the reverence we give it. Which isn’t how the Church explains it. The Church says it is more than just how we think about it.

The way I’m looking at it goes like this: Transubstantiation is a Change in Substance, Substance is a thought, a concept. So to change substance is to change the concept or thought of that thing.

The Church seems to think of Substance as something more than thought but still hinges their explanation on St.Thomas who says substance can only be touched by the intellect. Which is just a thought.

If they would have settled on “it’s a mystery” like the Trinity, I wouldn’t be having this issue. :o
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
Even St. Thomas states that substance is something only grasped by the intellect. It’s a thought.
Click to expand...
St. Thomas says the first, but not the second. You say the second, apparently as a result of your assumption that what he means by “something only grasped by the intellect” is “something imaginary”. But substance is not imaginary. What it is, is immaterial. Think of substance as spirit rather than matter. That may help you to understand what St. Thomas is getting at.

That which is grasped by the intellect is imaginary only if it exists in the mind but not outside of the mind. A thing does not exist only in the mind simply because it is not material. Our senses can’t perceive anything spiritual, such as God, angels, or our souls. Our senses cannot perceive love. Yet you believe these exist, correct? If you love someone, can you see or smell or hear that love? No, yet you believe it exists. Your senses don’t tell you that; your intellect does. My senses can’t perceive the love my wife has for me. But my intellect, my reason, tells me that my faith in the fact that she loves me is correct, that it is not blind faith but reasonable faith. That is the meaning of St. Thomas saying we can perceive an immaterial thing, such as substance, with our intellect.

To use Aristotilean language, you can think of love as a substance and the actions people take when they love someone as the accidents. Our senses perceive the accidents, but not the substance. Our intellect, however, can perceive the substance. And we know that that substance, that love, isn’t imaginary. Love is something real and grasped by the intellect as such, even though all that the senses are able to perceive is physical actions which are not in and of themselves love.
 
I don’t see love as an intellectual process but rather an emotional one. Love and reason rarely go hand in hand. It’s not a quid pro quo venture. Love is experienced not a conceptual construct.

Substance only exists in the mind.
 
Here’s something I developed to help understand it.

Imagine I’m an art thief. I steal the Mona Lisa. Now imagine I also have a neato, SciFi molecular level replication device. I use it to make an EXACT copy, down to the atomic level, of the Mona Lisa.

Are there now TWO Mona Lisas? No. There is only one (and a really good fake). My SciFi replicator can only duplicate material features. But the major feature of what the Mona Lisa IS is a painting by DeVinci. My copy can never claim that. It does not have the substance of the Mona Lisa.

If I take a Sharpie marker and draw a mustache and goatee on the original, does the copy now become the REAL Mona Lisa since it is the only painting in existence that matches the precise descriptions? No, the Mona Lisa is still the Mona Lisa, even if defaced. In other words, even though the “accidents” of the fake completely align with the definition of what Mona Lisa is and the original no longer does, the substance is not changed.

These concepts are hard for us moderns because we live in a materialist culture that doesn’t believe in substance. Only accidents matter. An example is the popular toleration of abortion in society. Anybody who understands substance can see that abortion is no different than post-birth infanticide. Materialists can’t though. They see differences in accidents and for them it is enough.

Another example is what authors imagine would happen in SciFi shows with such a replication device. They always assume that physically replicating a person will result in there being TWO of that person now (See Farscape, for example). The catholic imagination would not expect that outcome. We don’t believe that a physical replicator would be able to copy a soul (substance) of a person.

In short, substance is the deepest reality of what something IS. Accidents are what our senses perceive it to be. Arguing that the difference is only in the mind betrays a materialist worldview. God created us a union of body and soul. Both aspects are equally real.
 
manualman said:
Here’s something I developed to help understand it.

Imagine I’m an art thief. I steal the Mona Lisa. Now imagine I also have a neato, SciFi molecular level replication device. I use it to make an EXACT copy, down to the atomic level, of the Mona Lisa.

Are there now TWO Mona Lisas? No. There is only one (and a really good fake). My SciFi replicator can only duplicate material features. But the major feature of what the Mona Lisa IS is a painting by DeVinci. My copy can never claim that. It does not have the substance of the Mona Lisa.

If I take a Sharpie marker and draw a mustache and goatee on the original, does the copy now become the REAL Mona Lisa since it is the only painting in existence that matches the precise descriptions? No, the Mona Lisa is still the Mona Lisa, even if defaced. In other words, even though the “accidents” of the fake completely align with the definition of what Mona Lisa is and the original no longer does, the substance is not changed.

These concepts are hard for us moderns because we live in a materialist culture that doesn’t believe in substance. Only accidents matter. An example is the popular toleration of abortion in society. Anybody who understands substance can see that abortion is no different than post-birth infanticide. Materialists can’t though. They see differences in accidents and for them it is enough.

Another example is what authors imagine would happen in SciFi shows with such a replication device. They always assume that physically replicating a person will result in there being TWO of that person now (See Farscape, for example). The catholic imagination would not expect that outcome. We don’t believe that a physical replicator would be able to copy a soul (substance) of a person.

In short, substance is the deepest reality of what something IS. Accidents are what our senses perceive it to be. Arguing that the difference is only in the mind betrays a materialist worldview. God created us a union of body and soul. Both aspects are equally real.
Click to expand...
How would you tell the two paintings apart? Say I mixed them up without your knowledge.
 
Verbum_Caro said:
RT,

I think JimG (or maybe someone else) wanted us to be careful to not oppose concept with reality, in so far as some of our concepts correspond to reality. I think everyone who holds substance theory would agree that substance is a concept, but not a mere concept, i.e. it doesn’t just exist in our heads, but describes an objective reality. VC
Click to expand...
Yes. Everything we know of reality ends up as an idea—a concept—which reflects the reality outside of our minds.

All our knowledge of the world begins with sense knowledge—the data that we gather with our senses. And that data is integrated by our brains and transformed by our intellect into a concept. And the concept is how we know reality.

And since all our knowledge begins with sensory (name removed by moderator)ut, that means that everything we know begins with the accidents of things. We don’t get direct (name removed by moderator)ut of the thing itself. Only angels or God can do that.

If all the material universe is composed of bosons or of waves or strings or subatomic particles, this much still holds true: we only know them through their accidents! It is the accidents of things, whether unamplified, or amplified by scientific instruments, that bring us knowledge of outside reality. From those accidents we build our concepts. A concept is not opposed to reality. It is how we know reality.

The Church does NOT teach: Look, here is the bread and wine after consecration. It is indistinguishable from the bread and wine before consecration. But we want you to THINK of it as the body and blood of Christ.

No, that’s not the teaching. The teaching is this: Here is the Eucharist after consecration. It looks like bread and wine and is indistinguishable from bread and wine because the accidents are unchanged. But only the accidents remain. The reality of what it is has changed. The bread and wine is gone, replaced by Jesus.

Accidents are how we know reality, but they are not reality itself.

If one uses transignification theory, one might as well say that all of the outside world exists only in our mind, because we only know it as our concepts. But that’s not the case. Reality exists outside of our minds. We know it through its accidents by sensory (name removed by moderator)ut, and then by concept.
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
How would you tell the two paintings apart? Say I mixed them up without your knowledge.
Click to expand...
I couldn’t. No human could. Isn’t that fun? Nevertheless, one would be a fake and the other the real Mona Lisa. Reality doesn’t care if you can perceive a difference or not.

The same goes for the Eucharist. No human can tell an unconsecrated host from a consecrated one without cheating. And yet the difference is GALACTIC!
 
manualman said:
I couldn’t. No human could. Isn’t that fun? Nevertheless, one would be a fake and the other the real Mona Lisa. Reality doesn’t care if you can perceive a difference or not.

The same goes for the Eucharist. No human can tell an unconsecrated host from a consecrated one without cheating. And yet the difference is GALACTIC!
Click to expand...
How do you know that “essential property” wasn’t replicated as well? Perhaps it was inherent in the matter / form / accidents.
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
What is reality then?
Click to expand...
Accidents are real, but they are real through another. You cannot touch my human nature, my animalness and my humaness. You can however know them through my accidents, which inheres in them; my size, color, shape, limbs, movement, sense perceptors, activity, etc. These are all accidents that have reality only because they inhere in my nature. My nature, as an existent, is the real me, it is my Second Substance, what you see is my First Substance.

Linus2nd
 
Linusthe2nd said:
From my post #54: You cannot touch my human nature, my animalness and my humaness. " You can however know them through my accidents, which inheres in them…"

Linus2nd
Click to expand...
So your human nature is your substance is your human nature is your substance…
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
I don’t see love as an intellectual process but rather an emotional one. Love and reason rarely go hand in hand. It’s not a quid pro quo venture. Love is experienced not a conceptual construct.

Substance only exists in the mind.
Click to expand...
The Church says in the doctrine of transubstantiation that Jesus is really present in the Eucharist. You say it’s just our imagination.

Does authority in matters of faith and morals reside with you, or with the magisterium? If you, then we need to make you pope instead of Francis and immediate cease Eucharistic adoration because we’re committing blasphemy by imagining that bread and wine post-consecration are God. If the Church, then you need to accept that you’re mistaken and pray for the Holy Spirit to help you accept this.
 
Roscoe_Turner said:
So your human nature is your substance is your human nature is your substance…
Click to expand...
My First Substance is my human nature comingled with an act of existence. What you see is my Second Substance, all the accidents inhering in my hidden nature comingled with its act of existence, or my First Substance. My First Substance is just a name or sign to indicate my human nature comingled with its act of existence.

Linus2nd
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top