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Linusthe2nd
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Again :clapping::clapping::clapping:, there is still hope based on the few who stand fast.
Linus2nd
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Linus2nd
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Linusthe2nd
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Linusthe2nd
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If one considers the case of the Incarnation, God does assume a human nature and so pervasively that the composition is a Person, the Divine Person of Jesus Christ. And instead of supporting Linux’s argument, it supports my own.
First of all this is a miracle. But in the instance of the rest of creation God is not working a miracle. For in the instance of the rest of creation this is not the case, because in them their esse is their own. In the instance of the rest of creation God is not working a miracle. This demonstrates that the " conjoining " the Esse of God to that of a creature is Miracle and is not the case for the rest of creation. For them, their esse is their own.
Secondly, the instance of the Incarnation it proves that if the Esse of God is " conjoined " with the essence of a creature, the resulting being is God. And this is a result that Linux has steadfastly denied. For it is his contention that to " conjoin " the esse of God to the essence of a creature does not make the resultant being identical to God. That is, it does not turn it into God. Conversely, it has been my contention that to " conjoin the Esse of God to the essence of a creature transforms the creature into God.
So, the instance of the Incarnation proves my argument correct and demonstrates that Linux’s argument is wrong on these points.
Linus2nd
First of all this is a miracle. But in the instance of the rest of creation God is not working a miracle. For in the instance of the rest of creation this is not the case, because in them their esse is their own. In the instance of the rest of creation God is not working a miracle. This demonstrates that the " conjoining " the Esse of God to that of a creature is Miracle and is not the case for the rest of creation. For them, their esse is their own.
Secondly, the instance of the Incarnation it proves that if the Esse of God is " conjoined " with the essence of a creature, the resulting being is God. And this is a result that Linux has steadfastly denied. For it is his contention that to " conjoin " the esse of God to the essence of a creature does not make the resultant being identical to God. That is, it does not turn it into God. Conversely, it has been my contention that to " conjoin the Esse of God to the essence of a creature transforms the creature into God.
So, the instance of the Incarnation proves my argument correct and demonstrates that Linux’s argument is wrong on these points.
Linus2nd
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Linux
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That is simply not true. God cannot do the metaphysically impossible. If your God can, then I don’t believe in your God, and neither do I believe that is the God of the Catholic Church. That is a fairy tale God.
You haven’t justified why adding the word “God” makes it possible to create the act of existing out of nothing. This is just an unjustified assertion.
No I am not. I am imposing metaphysical limitations on God.
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utunumsint
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The nothing referred to here is a nothing in terms of order. The somthing that is produced after the nothing comes from God’s power.
God bless,
Ut
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JDaniel
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Linux:
A little exercise you can employ: the moment you sense hostility, jump to the next post. And to the next, etc., until you come to one that merits a Christian response. I know you can do it - I’ve seen it.
I’m not ready to jump into this thread yet, but I’ll keep watching it.
God bless,
jd
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tdgesq
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I agree with you, but my question really is: what do you mean when you use terms like “conjoined”? If it’s what Aquinas means - that God is continuously present as the cause of being of all essences (such as light is caused in the air by the sun as long as the air remains illuminated) - then I understand. But it seems you are claiming there is some other relationship between God and other essences. That is what I want to know.
To the extent the Form of a thing no longer exists, like a tree that burns to the ground, its essence no longer exists, at least in that particular tree. This can be explained by God withholding his causal power as to the mode of being of that particular thing. It seems that Aquinas has an explanation for how things may no longer “be.”
On the other hand, you concede that, under your view, you don’t know how “esse does not become identical with essence.” Thus, your view lacks explanatory power when compared to Aquinas’.
What does your theory explain that Aquinas’ doesn’t?
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Linux
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God is the esse of all essences. He is not the “whatness” of a thing (that a thing is a cow or a frog), but he is the “isness” of all things (God is what makes them real cows and real frogs).
Gods esse is his power, and so he withholds his esse to that particular essence.
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polytropos
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If God is a pure act of existence and is simple, how does God conjoin the essences of creatures - which are not pure acts of existence - with His esse, since He cannot “divide up” His esse?
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tdgesq
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Well, that’s what you keep saying, and I keep asking what it means that God “is” the esse (a synonym for essence, or as a verb - the act of being) of all essences. So far you’ve stated that you don’t know. Could it be that it means that God is the ever present cause of the being of other essences?
Yes, I agree that God is not the substantial form of a cow or a frog or any other thing. How is it that God is the “isness” or the “being” of all other things? I simply don’t know what you are claiming, unless you mean that God is the continuing cause of everything that is or that “bes”.
We certainly agree here. The only question is: how does He make them be or exist without making them - well - Him.
That would be Aquinas’ answer, but it is based on God withholding his causal power and causal presence. It is also how Aquinas would differentiate God in his essence from the effects of his essence. How do you manage this same feat without adopting Aquinas’ view? I’m just not seeing where you have a theory that explains what Aquinas’ does.
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Linusthe2nd
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You must keep in mind that no thing is a substance unless it has or is existence. There is no room for equivocating, finessing or disguising the fact that unless a substance has its own act of existence, it is not a created being. As Thomas says, God creates substances, whole and entire, including their act of existence. Now how in the world can God create His own act of existence? For that is what He would have to do if the act of existence of created substances, which He created, was His own act of existence? !!!
As Thomas says in S.T. 1, 45, 4 " God is the cause of created substances, which includes existence. And to be created, means also to be absolutely other than God, even in their " act of existence. "
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 ). "
And again in S.C.G., Book 1, ch 26 Thomas says: "… Chapter 26
THAT GOD IS NOT THE FORMAL BEING OF ALL THINGS
[1] We are now able to refute the error of certain persons who said that God is nothing other than the formal being of each thing.
[2] This being is divided into the being of substance and the being of accident. Now, we have proved that the divine being is neither the being of substance nor that of accident. God, therefore, cannot be that being by which each thing formally is…"
dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles1.htm#26
Or again, in 1 Sentences, Distinction 37, Ques 1, Thomas says : " Solution: I answer that it should be said that God is essentially in all things, not nonetheless so that he is mixed together with things as if he were a part of any thing…"
www4.desales.edu/~philtheo/lo…ntd37q1a1.html
So when Thomas says created beings " share " in existence, he means they share in the common note or perfection of existence God has given to each created extent. They are said to " share " or " participate, " not because they share in God’s own Existence, but becuase they each have a limited or imperfect existence, which is the same type of " act " that each other created being has been given, but differing in its perfection, as determined by the limiting potency of their respective forms.
Now since they each have the same perfection, differing only in degree, none can have caused that perfection. It can only be caused by that Being who is Perfect Existence. But this applies to their entire substances and all that goes into the make up of their substances, includling matter, form, and existence, their whole and entire being. They " share " nothing with God. But they do have a real Realation with God, as effects which are caused by Him.
Linus2nd
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Linux
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Linux
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You are asserting that God creates esse and then conjoins it to an essence. But if God is esse then he does not need to create an esse to make essences actual and neither is it rational to say that God creates that which he is identical to.
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Linusthe2nd
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Everything that receives something from another is in potency with respect to what it receives, and that which is received in the thing is its act; therefore, a quiddity or form that is an intelligence is in potency with respect to the existence that it receives from God, and this received existence is received as its act. And thus there are found in the intelligences both potency and act but not matter and form, unless in some equivocal sense. So too to suffer, to receive, to be a subject and everything of this type that seem to pertain to things by reason of their matter are said of intellectual substances and corporeal substances equivocally, as the Commentator says in De Anima III, com. 14. Furthermore, since, as said above, the quiddity of an intelligence is the intelligence itself, its quiddity or essence is itself the very thing that exists, and its existence received from God is that by which it subsists in the nature of things; and because of this some people say that substances of this kind are composed of what is and that by which it is, or of what is and existence, as Boethius says in De Hebdomadibus (PL 64, 1311 B-C).
Being and Essence, chap IV, para VII fordham.edu/halsall/basis/aquinas-esse.asp
Now if the received act of existence is its own act, it cannot be the act of existence which is God. For then it would be both its own act and God’s, which would be violate the law of non-contradiction. Thus the act of existence of created beings is not the act of existence of God.
You will also have to explain my post # 111 above.
Linus2nd
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