ARTICLE IX

In the Ninth Article We Ask: DOES A PROPHET ALWAYS LOSE SENSE-CONSCIOUSNESS WHEN HE IS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF THE SPIRIT OF PROPHECY?

Difficulties:

It seems that he does, for

1. Numbers (12:6) says: "If there be among you a prophet of the Lord, I will appear in a vision or I will speak to him in a dream." But as the Gloss says, prophecy takes place "through dreams and visions" when it takes place "through those things which seem to be said or done." But when there is an appearance of those things which seem to be said or done and they are not actually said or done, a man is transported out of his senses. Therefore, the sight of prophecy is always in a prophet who is transported out of his senses.

2. When one power is applied intensely to its activity, another power must be withdrawn from its activity. But in the sight of prophecy the interior powers, that is, the intellect and the imagination, are intensely applied to their activities, since prophetic sight is the most perfect thing which they can reach in this life. Therefore, in prophetic sight the prophet is always withdrawn from the activity of the exterior powers.

3. Intellectual sight is more noble than the sight of imagination, and this latter is more noble than bodily sight. But combination with that which is less noble detracts somewhat from the perfection of the more noble. Therefore, intellectual sight and the sight of imagination are more perfect when they are not combined with bodily sight. Therefore, since they reach their highest perfection in this life in prophetic sight, it seems that they are not at all combined with bodily sight in such a way that the prophet would make use of bodily sight together with them.

4. The senses are more remote from the understanding and the imagination than lower reason is from higher reason. But the consideration of higher reason, by which one devotes himself to the contemplation of eternal things, withdraws man from the consideration of lower reason, by which man employs himself in things temporal. With much more reason does the prophetic sight of the understanding and the imagination withdraw man from bodily sight.

5. One and the same power cannot apply itself to many things simultaneously. But, when one is using his bodily senses, his understanding and imagination are occupied with those things which are seen bodily. Therefore, one cannot at the same time occupy himself with this and with those things which appear in prophetic sight apart from the senses of the body.

To the Contrary:

1'. The first Epistle to the Corinthians (14:32) says: "The spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets." But this would not be so if the prophet lost sense-consciousness, for then he would not have control over himself. Therefore, prophecy does not take place in a man who has lost sense-consciousness.

2'. Through the sight of prophecy one receives certain and inerrant knowledge of things. But in those who are transported out of their senses, either in a dream, or in some other way, the knowledge is mixed with error and is uncertain. For they hold fast to likenesses of things as if they were the things themselves, as Augustine says. Therefore, prophecy does not take place when one loses sense-consciousness.

3'. If we posit this, we seem to fall into the error of Montanus, who said that the prophets spoke as insane people who did not know what they were saying.

4'. As the Gloss says, prophecy sometimes takes place through words and deeds: "Through deeds, as the ark of Noe signified the Church, and through words, as those which the angels spoke to Abraham." But it is clear that Noe, when building the ark, and Abraham, when conversing with angels and serving them, were not transported out of their senses. Therefore, prophecy does not always take place through transport out of the senses.

REPLY:

Prophecy has two acts: one is principal, namely, sight, and the other is secondary, namely, announcing.

The prophet does the announcing either by words or even by deeds, as is clear in Jeremias (13:5), inasmuch as he put his girdle near the river to rot. But in whichever of the two ways the prophetic announcing is made, it is always made by a man not transported out of his senses, for such an announcing takes place through certain sensible signs. Hence, the prophet doing the announcing has to use his senses for his announcement to be perfect. Otherwise, he would make the announcement like an insane person.

But in the sight of prophecy two things concur, as we have said earlier, namely, judgment and the proper reception of the prophecy. Now, when the prophet is divinely inspired, so that only his judgment is supernatural, and not his reception, such inspiration does not require transport out of the senses, for the judgment of the understanding is more perfect according to its nature in one who has the use of his senses than in one who does not have the use of them.

But the supernatural reception proper to prophecy is in the sight of imagination, and in order to see this vision human power is enraptured by some spirit and transported out of the senses, as Augustine says. The reason for this is that the power of imagination is mainly intent on the things which are received through the senses, as long as one uses his senses. Hence, its primary attention can be transferred to those things which are received from another source only when the man is transported out of his senses. Hence, whenever prophecy takes place according to the sight of imagination, the prophet must be transported out of his senses.

But this transport happens in two ways. In one it is from some cause in the soul, and in the other, from a physical cause. It comes from a physical cause when the external senses become dull either because of sickness or because of the vapors occurring in sleep, which ascend to the brain and deaden the organ of touch. It comes from a cause in the soul when a man, from too much attention to the objects of the understanding or the imagination, is altogether abstracted from the external senses.

However, transport from the bodily senses never takes place in a prophet through sickness, as happens in epileptics and those who are mad, but only through a properly disposed physical cause, as through sleep. Therefore, prophecy which takes place with the sight of imagination always comes either in a dream, when one is deprived of sense-consciousness through a properly disposed physical cause, or in a vision, when the transport comes from some cause in the soul.

Nevertheless, between the prophet in his transport out of the senses, whether it be through a dream or through a vision, and all others who are carried out of their senses, there is this difference, that the mind of the prophet is enlightened about those things which are seen in the sight of imagination. Consequently, he knows that they are not things, but in some way the likenesses of things about which his judgment is certain because of the light of the mind. Therefore, it is clear from this that the inspiration of prophecy takes place sometimes with transport out of the senses and sometimes without it. Hence, we must answer both sets of difficulties.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. In those words our Lord wanted to show the pre-eminence of Moses over the other prophets in supernatural reception. For Moses was raised to the sight of the very essence of God in itself. But everything which the prophets have received they have received only in the likenesses belonging to dreams or visions. Nevertheless, the judgment of the prophet is not by means of the likenesses belonging to dreams or visions. Hence judgment of prophecy takes place without transport out of the senses.

2. When an interior power applies itself to the sight of its object, if there is perfect attention, it is cut off from exterior sight. But no matter how perfect the judgment of the interior power is, it does not withdraw from exterior activity, for it is the duty of the internal power to judge of the external. Hence, the judgment of that which is higher is ordained to the same thing as the exterior activity. Therefore, they do not hinder each other.

3. This argument follows for the sight of the intellect and the imagination according to reception, but not according to judgment, as has been said.*

4. The powers of the soul hinder each other in their operations because they are rooted in the one essence of the soul. Hence, the closer the powers are to each other, the more they naturally hinder each other if they are directed toward different objects. Hence, the argument does not follow.

5. This argument follows for supernatural reception of the imaginative or intellectual power, but not for judgment.

Answers to Contrary Difficulties:

1'. The Apostle is speaking of the announcing of prophecy, for it is in the power of free choice to announce or not to announce those things about which he is inspired. However, as concerns the revelation, the prophet himself is subject to the spirit, for the revelation does not take place as the prophet wishes, but as the revealing spirit wishes.

2'. It is from the light of prophecy that the mind of the prophet is so enlightened that even in the transport out of his senses he has a true judgment about those things which he sees in the dream or vision.

3'. Montanus erred on two points. First, he took away from the prophets the light of mind by which they have true judgment about the things which they have seen. Second, he said that, when they were announcing, they were carried out of their senses, as happens with those who are mad, or with those who talk in their sleep. But this does not follow from the above position.

4'. The fact that prophecy is said to take place through words or deeds is to be referred more to the announcing of prophecy than to prophetic sight.