ARTICLE I

IS THERE POWER IN GOD?

Sum. Th. I, Q. xxv, A. 1: C.G. I, 16; II, 7

THE question before us concerns God's power: the first point of inquiry is whether there is power in God. And it would seem that the reply should be in the negative.

             1. Power is a principle of operation. Now God's operation, which is his essence, has no principle, since neither is it begotten nor does it proceed. Therefore power is not in God.

             2. Whatever is most perfect should be ascribed to God, according to Anselm (Monolog. xiv). Hence that which implies a relation to something more perfect should not be ascribed to God. But all power bears a relation to something more perfect, namely a passive form and an active operation. Therefore we should not ascribe power to God.

             3. Power according to the Philosopher (Metaph. v, 12), denotes a principle of transmutation terminating in another thing as such. Now a principle indicates relationship: and power is the relation of God to his creatures, significative of his ability to create or move them. But no such relation is really in God, but only in our way of thinking. Therefore power is not really in God.

             4. Habit is more perfect than power, since it is closer to operation. But there are no habits in God. Neither, therefore, is there power in him.

             5. No expression should be employed that is derogatory to God's primacy or simplicity. Now God by virtue of his simplicity, and considered as first agent, acts by his essence. Therefore we should not speak of him as acting by his power, which at least in its manner of signifying connotes something added to his essence.

             6. According to the Philosopher (Phys. iii, 4), in everlasting things there is no difference between actual being and possible being: and much more must this be the case in God. Now where two things are identical, they should have one name taken from the more dignified. But essence is more dignified than power, because power is an addition to essence. Therefore we should speak only of God's essence and not of his power.

             7. As primary matter is pure potentiality (potentia), so is God pure act. Now primary matter considered in its essence is entirely void of act. Therefore God considered in his essence is void of all power (potentia).

             8. Any power apart from its act is imperfect, so that as no imperfection may be ascribed to God, such a power cannot be in him. If then there is power in God, it must needs be always united to its act, and consequently the power to create will always be united to the act of creation: so that it will follow that God created things from eternity: which is heretical.

             9. When one thing suffices for a certain action, it is superfluous to add another. But God's essence suffices for God to act through it. Therefore it is superfluous to say that he has power whereby to act.

             10. To this you may reply that God's power differs from his essence, not really but only in our way of thinking.--On the contrary, a concept to which there is no corresponding reality is void and senseless.

             11. Substance is the most excellent of the predicaments; and yet, as Augustine asserts, it is not ascribed to God (De Trin. vii, 6). Much less, therefore, is the predicament of quality. Now power is assigned to the second species of quality. Therefore it should not be ascribed to God.

             12. You will say, perhaps, that power as attributed to God is not a quality, but the very essence of God, differing therefrom but logically.--On the contrary, either there is something real corresponding to this logical distinction, or there is nothing. If nothing, the objection fails. If something, then it follows that in God power is in addition to his essence, even as the notion of power is distinct from the notion of essence.

             13. According to the Philosopher (Topic. iv, 5) all power or energy is for the sake of some eligible end. But nothing of this kind can be said of God, since he is not for the sake of something else. Therefore power is unbecoming to God.

             14. According to Dionysius (De Coel. Hier. xi) energy is a medium between substance and work. But God does not work through a medium. Therefore he does not work by energy, nor consequently by power: and thus it follows that power is not in God.

             15. According to the Philosopher (Metaph. v, 12; ix, 1) active power, which alone can be ascribed to God, is a principle of transmutation terminating in another thing as such. But God acts without transmutation: for instance, in the creation. Therefore active power cannot be attributed to God.

             16. The Philosopher says (ibid.) that active and passive power are in the same subject. But passive power is unbecoming to God. Therefore active power is also.

             17. The Philosopher says (ibid.) that a contrary privation attaches to an active power. Now it is in the nature of contraries to have the same subject. Since then there can nowise be privation in God, neither can power be in him.

             18. The Master says (II D. i.) that action is not properly speaking attributable to God. But where action is not, there can be no power, active or passive. Therefore no kind of power is in God.

             On the contrary, it is written (Ps. lxxxviii, 9): Thou art mighty, O Lord, and thy truth is round about thee.

             Again it is written (Matt. iii, 9): God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham.

             Moreover, all operation proceeds from power. Now operation is supremely attributable to God. Therefore power is most becoming to God.

             I answer that to make the point at issue clear we must observe that we speak of power in relation to act. Now act is twofold; the first act which is a form, and the second act which is operation. Seemingly the word 'act' was first universally employed in the sense of operation, and then, secondly, transferred to indicate the form, inasmuch as the form is the principle and end of operation. Wherefore in like manner power is twofold: active power corresponding to that act which is operation--and seemingly it was in this sense that the word 'power' was first employed:--and passive power, corresponding to the first act or the form,--to which seemingly the name of power was subsequently given.

             Now, just as nothing suffers save by reason of a passive power, so nothing acts except by reason of the first act, namely the form. For it has been stated that this first act is so called from action. Now God is act both pure and primary, wherefore it is most befitting to him to act and communicate his likeness to other things: and consequently active power is most becoming to him: since power is called active forasmuch as it is a principle of action. We must also observe that our mind strives to describe God as a most perfect being. And seeing that it is unable to get at him save by likening him to his effects, while it fails to find any creature so supremely perfect as to be wholly devoid of imperfection, consequently it endeavours to describe him as possessing the various perfections it discovers in creatures, although each of those perfections is in some way at fault, yet so as to remove from God whatever imperfection is connected with them. For instance, being denotes something complete and simple, yet non-subsistent: substance denotes something subsistent, yet the subject of something. Accordingly we ascribe being and substance to God; but substance by reason of subsistence not of substanding; and being by reason of simplicity and completeness, not of inherence whereby it inheres to something. In like manner we ascribe to God operation by reason of its being the ultimate perfection, not by reason of that into which operation passes. And we attribute power to God by reason of that which is permanent and is the principle of power, and not by reason of that which is made complete by operation.

             Reply to the First Objection. Power is a principle not only of the operation but also of the effect. Hence it does not follow if power be in God as the principle of his effect, that it is a principle of God's essence which is his operation.--Another and a better reply is that there is a twofold relation in God. One is real, that namely, by which the persons are mutually distinct, for instance, paternity and filiation; otherwise the divine persons would be distinct not really but logically, as Sabellius maintained. The other kind of relation is logical, and is indicated when we say that the divine operation comes from the divine essence, or that God works by his essence: for prepositions indicate some kind of relationship. This is because when we attribute to God operation considered as requiring a principle, we attribute to him also the relationship of that which derives its existence from a principle, wherefore such relation is only logical. Now operation involves a principle, whereas essence does not: hence, although the divine essence has no principle, neither really nor logically, yet the divine operation has a principle in our way of thinking.

             Reply to the Second Objection. Although all that is most perfect should be attributed to God, it does not follow that whatsoever is attributed to him is most perfect, but that it is suitable to designate that which is most perfect. The reason is that to a most perfect thing something may be attributed, so far as it is itself perfect, which however admits of something else more perfect still, though lacking the perfection which the other has.

             Reply to the Third Objection. Power is said to be a principle, not as though it were the very relation signified by the name principle, but because it is identical with the principle.

             Reply to the Fourth Objection. Habit is never in an active power, but only in a passive power, and is more perfect than it: such a power, however, is not attributed to God.

             Reply to the Fifth Objection. It is absurd to say that though God works by his essence there is no power in God. Because that which is a principle of action is a power: wherefore the mere fact that God works by his essence implies that there is power in God. Hence the notion of power in God does not derogate from his simplicity or his primacy, since it does not indicate something in addition to his essence.

             Reply to the Sixth Objection. The statement that in everlasting things there is no difference between actual being and possible being, refers to passive power: consequently it has no bearing on the point at issue, because no such power is in God. Nevertheless, since it is true that active power in God is identical with his essence, we must reply that although the divine essence and power are the same in reality, yet seeing that power by its manner of signification indicates something in addition, it requires a special name: for names correspond to ideas, as the Philosopher says (Periherm. i).

             Reply to the Seventh Objection. This argument proves that there is no passive power in God: and this we grant.

             Reply to the Eighth Objection. God's power is always united to act, i.e. to operation (for operation is the divine essence): but the effects follow according as his will commands and his wisdom ordains. Consequently it does not follow that his power is always united to its effect, or that creatures have existed from eternity.

             Reply to the Ninth Objection. God's essence suffices for him to act thereby: and yet his power is not superfluous: because it is understood not as a thing in addition to his essence, but as connoting in our way of thinking the sole relation of a principle: for from the mere fact that the essence is the principle of action it follows that it has the formality of power.

             Reply to the Tenth Objection. The reality corresponds to the concept in two ways. First, immediately, that is to say, when the intellect conceives the idea of a thing existing outside the mind, for instance, a man or a stone. Secondly, mediately, when, namely, something follows the act of the intellect, and the intellect considers it by reflecting on itself. So that the reality corresponds to that consideration of the intellect mediately, that is to say, through the medium of the intellect's concept of the thing. For instance, the intellect understands animal nature in a man, a horse, and many other species: and consequently it understands that nature as a genus: to this act, however, whereby the intellect understands a genus, there does not correspond immediately outside the mind a thing that is a genus; and yet there is something that corresponds to the thought that is the foundation of this mental process. It is the same with the relation of principle that power adds to essence: since something corresponds to it in reality, not however immediately, but mediately. For our mind conceives the creature as bearing a relation to and dependent on its Creator: and for this very reason, being unable to conceive one thing related to another, without on the other hand conceiving that relation to be reciprocal, it conceives in God a certain relation of principle, consequent to its mode of understanding, which relation is referred to the thing mediately.

             Reply to the Eleventh Objection. The power that is assigned to the second species of quality is not ascribed to God: it belongs to creatures who do not act immediately through their essential forms, but through the medium of accidental forms, whereas God acts immediately by his essence.

             Reply to the Twelfth Objection. Something does indeed correspond in the divine reality to our various concepts of the divine attributes, but that something is one and the same. Because our mind is compelled to represent by means of various forms, that most simple being which is God, by reason of his incomprehensibility: so that these various forms which our mind conceives about God, are indeed in God as the cause of truth, in so far as the thing which is God can be represented by all these forms: nevertheless they are in our mind as their subject.

             Reply to the Thirteenth Objection. The saying of the Philosopher applies to active and effective powers and the like, as applied to the productions of art and human activity: since not even in the physical order is it always true that an active power is for the sake of its effects. Thus it were absurd to say that the power of the sun is for the sake of the worms produced by its power: and much less is the divine power for the sake of its effects.

             Reply to the Fourteenth Objection. God's power is not a medium in reality, since it differs not from his essence except logically: which suffices for our speaking of it as though it were a medium. But God does not work through a medium that is really distinct from himself: wherefore the argument fails.

             Reply to the Fifteenth Objection. Action is twofold. One is accompanied by transmutation of matter; the other presupposes no matter, for instance, creation: and God can act either way, as we shall see further on. Hence active power may rightly be ascribed to God, although he does not always act by causing a change in something.

             Reply to the Sixteenth Objection. The Philosopher's statement is not general but particular, and applies to a thing which, like an animal, causes its own movement. When, however, one thing is moved by another, passive and active power do not coincide.

             Reply to the Seventeenth Objection. The privation that is contrary to power is impotence. But we must not speak of contraries in connection with God, because nothing in God has a contrary, since he is not in a genus.

             Reply to the Eighteenth Objection. We do not remove action as such from God, but that kind of action which belongs to nature, where things are at the same time active and passive.