Out of nothing comes nothing, So how is creation exnihilo possible?

[IWantGod]

I’ve learned that Thomas did not necessarily hold that all moments in time exist as one big block before God eternally.

I don’t see how that could not be the case.

If God is not a being in time then God is not bound by the passage of time, and therefore does not experience things as changing but rather he experiences all points in time as actual.

Everything that will happen has already happened for God.

 

[Vico]

…Can we say God was before creation? Simply by saying before we’ve applied concepts of time.

Consider that time is not real but subjective and that God is real. It is by our manner of thinking that God is before.

 

[setarcos]

God does not conceive , or form an idea, this applies to the human mind. God’s all knowing, omniscience, is not a collection of ideas, or concepts. God is His attributes. With humans knowing and willing are two separate powers, in God they are One. He is Perfection, no potentiality, He is Pure Being, Existence and Essence are one in God. If something existed eternally with God, then God would not be God because that something that existed eternally with God, to be that something would have to have something that God didn’t have to be itself and not God. This is a contradiction, then God would not be Pure Being or Existence, lacking Pure Being, then God would have a potential

Greetings knowledgeable one. You are truly blessed with insight.
Interesting “concept”; that humans form ideas but God does not. Yet humans were apparently concieved in the image of God. I believe it is a matter of class that we are dealing with here. Humans concieve or form ideas not ex nihilo but rather become aware of already existant concepts whereas God being the ultimate, so to speak, conciever is already aware and what’s more is the originator of all that can be concieved. By definition the attribute of omniscience is this awareness.
Not sure what you mean by God being his attributes if you would care to allaborate. God is what he is and what we attribute to his being is how we define him. Should he lack any of these characteristics in his being by definition it is not God . That said though if God were not more than merely a combination of attributes he himself would have no will, in the same manner that we may classify certain animals by their attributes but this in itself would not ensure that they have a soul.
Why do you believe knowing and willing are two separate things in man? This again is a matter of degree or perspective. Can man deny his own will? If he has free will. Can man deny truth in his soul? If a man has accurate knowledge that it is raining outside can he will it not to? Of course not. Why? Because a mans will cannot deny his accurate knowledge. He certainly can wish it weren’t raining but his will cannot make it so because of this fact. However if man wills that it weren’t raining outside then finds accurate knowledge that it is true can we deny his will? It is merely a matter of reletive perspective that we find any difference between it raining because the man willed it or it only being coincidental to each other. Now what if a man wills what does not come to pass or is found inaccurate? Has his knowledge denied his will? I believe no, since a persons will cannot manifest itself against accurate knowledge, once accurate knowledge is determined then it can no longer be his will. In this manner a man cannot sustain his will in light of inaccurate knowledge. Wishful thinking and desire is not the same, in my opinion, as manifesting ones will.
In the same manner God cannot deny his own will because of his accurate knowledge and vice versa. The difference of degree is that God is the self sustaining source of his own will and all knowledge whereas mans knowledge comes in part and his will is sustained from and by God .
I’m somewhat confused by your last remarks. Can your clarify what you mean?
Once again we use that term “eternally” mistakenly as it applies to God because it implies a timed period. My conjecture is that creation cannot have been ex nihilo -see my previous post-
without collapsing our conception of God . Since there is no time before creation one can say it sits within timelessness, and indeed it does, it sits within Gods sustaining essence. Now since God is “outside” of time we cannot apply terms like eternal to him. It by definition would be meaningless. It is also meaningless to use terms like before or after, first or last, etc. in a timeless state. This is why God could only be the alpha and omega as related to being in a timed state. This is why the event of creation being an event containing the beginning of time but being an event happening in a state in which there is no time can be said to never have not existed but not with God, implying a separate existence, but within God . Thus perhaps allowing for him to retain his zero potential, or as some have said, his infinite simplicity.
P.s. what is pure being as compared to some other type of being?
Eternal grateful for God guiding presence.

 

[Aloysium]

:twocents:

Jesus is the revelation in time of the Alpha and Omega, the Word of God by which creation, from the beginning to the end is brought into being, following the will of the Father who exists outside time in eternity and is also infinite in His attributes. God exists in His eternal Now, having no past and no future, of which our finite, ever-changing now is an image. He reaches us in time through the Grace of His Holy Spirit, and by virtue of Christ’s incarnation and sacrifice, allowing us the hope of participation in the eternal communion that is the Trinity.

It is in contrast with the “nihilo”, the reality I do not exist necessarily, that all this wonder becomes apparent. Although death has been conquered, it remains as our earthly destiny. All this will be lost, taken if not returned. Whether I continue or not doesn’t matter any more than any and each day previous that has slipped away, almost all unremembered. Joy lies in the recognition of the Cause of all this glory, the vastness of space and time, the heights and depths of human experience, remains the eternal, ever-brilliant Font who brings all into being, an ocean of His infinite compassion.

 

[Vico]

:twocents:

Jesus is the revelation in time of the Alpha and Omega, the Word of God by which creation, from the beginning to the end is brought into being, following the will of the Father who exists outside time in eternity and is also infinite in His attributes. God exists in His eternal Now, having no past and no future, of which our finite, ever-changing now is an image. He reaches us in time through the Grace of His Holy Spirit, and by virtue of Christ’s incarnation and sacrifice, allowing us the hope of participation in the eternal communion that is the Trinity.

It is in contrast with the “nihilo”, the reality I do not exist necessarily, that all this wonder becomes apparent. Although death has been conquered, it remains as our earthly destiny. All this will be lost, taken if not surrendered. Whether I continue or not doesn’t matter any more than any and each day previous that has slipped away, almost all unremembered. Joy lies in the recognition that the Cause of all this glory, the vastness of space and time, the heights and depths of human existence, remains the eternal, ever-brilliant Font who brings all into being, an ocean of His infinite compassion.

Using the definition of person as composite of soul and body, then the person ceases to exist at bodily death and the person is resurrected with the body, however the “I” can be a reference to the essence, the soul, comprised of will and intelligence and attributes suiting it uniquely to it’s body.

 

[Aloysium]

Using the definition of person as composite of soul and body, then the person ceases to exist at bodily death and the person is resurrected with the body, however the “I” can be a reference to the essence, the soul, comprised of will and intelligence and attributes suiting it uniquely to it’s body.

It makes sense; I agree. The way I see it, we as spririt remain after death, existing unbounded by time in an ever-present finite now that constitutes our relationship with God. Our spiritual essence exists not of its own will, but by virtue of His will. To clarify, this “I” would not be some spiritual thing in isolation. We are relational. Our existence is self-other, mirroring the perfect relationality, who is God, Love. To be human persons who exist in relation to the material world, we require a body.

 

[Wesrock]

Using the definition of person as composite of soul and body, then the person ceases to exist at bodily death and the person is resurrected with the body, however the “I” can be a reference to the essence, the soul, comprised of will and intelligence and attributes suiting it uniquely to it’s body.

Well, I suppose that depends on whether you favor survivalism or corruptionism. In favor of survivalism . . .

The human soul exists after death. But a soul is a substantial form, and a substantial form only exists when informing the substance of which it is the form. So, the substance of which the human soul is the form must exist after death. But that substance is a human being, where a human being is a single substance rather than two substances. So, the human being must exist after death.

edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2016/03/so-what-are-you-doing-after-your-funeral.html?m=1

 

[Vico]

Well, I suppose that depends on whether you favor survivalism or corruptionism. In favor of survivalism . . .

I can see how that debate arose. The Catechism affirms the soul as the form of the body, from Council of Vienne.

365 The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to consider the soul to be the “form” of the body:234 i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of matter becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their union forms a single nature.
234 Cf. Council of Vienne (1312): DS 902.

Denzinger (old numbering) Council of Vienna (1312) – also Lateran IV in 1215, Lyons II in 1274, and Florence in 1439. From Council of Vienna:

481 [The soul as a form of the body]. Furthermore, with the approval of the above mentioned sacred council we reprove as erroneous and inimical to the Catholic faith every doctrine or position rashly asserting or turning to doubt that the substance of the rational or intellective soul truly and in itself is not a form of the human body, defining, so that the truth of sincere faith may be known to all, and the approach to all errors may be cut off, lest they steal in upon us, that whoever shall obstinately presume in turn to assert, define, or hold that the rational or intellective soul is not the form of the human body in itself and essentially must be regarded as a heretic.

 

[Wesrock]

Survivalism is not in opposition to those statements, if that’s what you are alleging.

 

[Vico]

Survivalism is not in opposition to those statements, if that’s what you are alleging.

No alleging. I can see how survivalism and corruptionism (and also intermittent existence) debate arose.

To be clear about St. Thomas Aquinas requires a look at this:

Man’s humanity is the total form, opposed to* partial form*, which is the soul, and the total form differs from the partial form because total form contains both matter *and *form.

Summa Contra Gentiles 4, 81

Objections against the Resurrection

[3] Furthermore, what is not continuous seems not to he numerically identical. And this is manifest not only in sizes and motions, but even in qualities and forms, for if, after healing, a man becomes sick and is healed again, the health which returns will not be the same in number. Now, clearly, man’s being is taken away by death, since corruption is a change from being to non-being. It is, then, impossible that man’s being be repeated with numerical identity. Then, neither will the man be the same in number, for things which are the same in number are the same in being.

Solutions of the objects mentioned

[11] However, what is said in the third argument—that being is not one because it is not continuous—rests on a false foundation. For, clearly, the being of matter and form is one; matter has no actual being except by form. Nonetheless, in this respect the rational soul differs from other forms. For there is no being of other forms except in their concrete union with matter, since they exceed matter neither in being nor in operation. But the rational soul plainly exceeds matter in its operation, for it has an operation in which no bodily organ takes part; namely, the act of understanding. Hence, its being, also, is not merely in its concrete union with matter. Its being, therefore, which is that of the composite, remains in the soul even when the body is dissolved; when the body is restored in the resurrection, it is returned to the same being which persisted in the soul…

dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles4.htm#81

 

[ynotzap]

setarcos:

Not sure what you mean by God being his attributes if you would care to allaborate. .
Why do you believe knowing and willing are two separate things in man?

Attributes are something assigned or given, humans have attributes such as intelligence and free will, the emphasis is on the word “have” We can’t say man is intelligence for intelligence is a power or faculty of the soul, the same goes for free will. God is the giver of all things, spiritual and physical. God has no attributes, as something given, but is the source of all attributes, and how can He give what He dosen’t have? If He is the source, then logically He must be His attributes The difference is that we HAVE intelligence, and God IS Intelligence All of God’s attributes are One in His nature, He is Pure Spirit, has no parts, simple. God is Existence (the I Am ) and we HAVE existence as part of our nature, as something given. God is Complete Being, our being is a becoming being, for we are moving toward completeness, we have potency , being fulfilled when in act, but we are never fulfilled completely, we are being fulfilled God makes us LIKE Himself, He can never make us as Himself. The soul of man is spiritual like God, it subsists without matter, but is dependent on God for it’s existence. Man shows powers in his actions, these powers are the power to know, and the power to will, make choices, volition. These powers are not physical, for if they were they could be displayed physically. Since they are spiritual in nature, non-physical, these powers have a spiritual source called the “rational soul of man” With the power of intelligence man can acquire truth, and with the power of volition, man can acquire “the good”, the ultimate truth, and ultimate good are both found in God, for they are His essence. Intelligence, or the power to know, and the power to choose what we know, are two powers, not one. In God to know is to will, in man to know is not to will. The mind of man can abstract ideas from the objective world outside of man’s mind. He can know that he knows, the power of self-awareness, not a physical power, the power of reflection upon oneself. Man is not the source of his powers, he is finite, not infinite, he is limited, not unlimited, he is dependent, not independent, he is moved by another, he does not move himself. What I state by no means exhausts the full meaning of the topics discussed, but a thumbnail sketch of some metaphysical concepts dealing with the ultimate causes and effects. Being means the real, that to which existence belongs, some prefer to describe being as the same as essence, or thing. Man’s being can be or not be, and is dependent.