ARTICLE IV

IF MENTAL ABSTRACTION BE MADE OF THE RELATIONS, DO THE DIVINE HYPOSTASES REMAIN?

Sum. Th. I, Q. xl, A. 3

THE fourth point of inquiry is whether if we make mental abstraction of the relations the divine hypostases remain: and it would seem that they do remain.

             1. In the created world everything is made to a likeness of what is in God. Now if we make abstraction of the relations and properties of the human hypostasis there still remains the hypostasis. Therefore the same applies to God.

             2. It is not owing to the same reason that the Father is someone and that he is the Father: for the Son also is someone and yet he is not the Father. Hence if we remove Paternity from the Father he is still someone. Now he is someone inasmuch as he is a hypostasis. Therefore if we remove Paternity by mental abstraction, the hypostasis of the Father still remains.

             3. Seeing that we understand a thing through its definition, we can understand anything even if abstraction be made of what is not included in its definition. Now relation is not included in the definition of a hypostasis. Therefore we can make abstraction of the relation and still understand the hypostasis.

             4. Jews and heathens understand that there is a hypostasis in God, for they conceive him to be a self-subsistent being: yet they do not understand Paternity, Filiation and like relations in him. Therefore if we make abstraction of such relations the hypostases still remain in God.

             5. That to which anything is added remains when the addition is removed: thus man adds rational to animal (since man is a rational animal): wherefore if we remove rational, animal remains. Now person adds a property to hypostasis: for person signifies a hypostasis distinguished by a property of dignity. Therefore if by abstraction we remove property from the Person, the hypostasis remains.

             6. Augustine says (De Trin. vii, 2) that the Word is begotten Wisdom. Now wisdom presupposes the hypostasis and begotten presupposes the property. Therefore if we remove from the Word that he is begotten, his hypostasis still remains: and the same applies to the other Persons.

             7. If we make abstraction of Paternity and Filiation there still remain in God the One (proceeding) from another and One from whom another (proceeds). But these denote the hypostases. Therefore abstraction being made of the relations the hypostases remain in God.

             8. Though the constituent difference be removed the genus remains. Now the personal properties by constituting the Persons are in God as constituent differences. Therefore if these properties be removed, the genus person or hypostasis remains.

             9. Augustine says (De Trin. v, 6) that if we remove the fact that (this Person) is the Father, it still remains that he is unbegotten. Now unbegotten is a property that can have no other subject but a hypostasis. Therefore if we make abstraction of Paternity, the hypostasis of the Father still remains.

             10. As the relations are properties of the hypostases, so are the attributes properties of the essence. Now if we make abstraction of an essential attribute we still conceive the divine substance: thus Boethius says (De Hebd.) that if by abstraction we remove goodness from God, it still remains that he is God. Therefore in like manner if we remove the relations, the hypostases still remain in God.

             11. According to Boethius (Super Prooem. Porphyr. in Praed.) it is proper to the intellect to separate things that are naturally united. Now property and hypostasis are really united in God. Therefore the intellect can separate them.

             12. It is possible to conceive a thing after removing what it contains: thus we can conceive a subject after an accident has been removed from it. Now the divine relations are said to be in the hypostases. Therefore after the relations have been removed by abstraction the hypostases remain.

             On the contrary, in God no distinction is possible except by the relations. Now the hypostasis denotes something distinct. Therefore the hypostases do not remain if the relations be removed. For seeing that in God there are only two modes of predication, namely substantive and relative, if the relations be removed nothing remains to be predicated except substantively: and such are things that regard the essence, so that the hypostases will no longer be distinct.

             I answer that as stated above (A. 3) some have contended that in God the hypostases are not constituted or distinguished by the relations but only by their origin. And they held relation to be consequent to the origin of the Person as terminating and completing it, so as to indicate a certain dignity. Wherefore since person is thought to denote dignity, they said that the hypostasis with the added relation is conceived to constitute the Person; and thus they held the relations to constitute the Person and not the hypostasis. In this sense it is customary with some to call these relations Personalities: and consequently just as with us if we remove from a man that which pertains to dignity and makes him a person, his hypostasis remains, even so in God if we mentally abstract these personal relations from the Persons they say that the hypostases but not the Persons will remain. Seeing, however, that as we have proved above (A. 3) these relations both constitute and distinguish the hypostases, we must hold the contrary opinion that abstraction being made of these relations neither the Persons nor the hypostases remain: because if the constituents of a thing be removed the thing itself cannot remain.

             Reply to the First Objection. Neither relations nor properties constitute the human hypostasis, whereas we have proved that they constitute the divine hypostasis: wherefore the comparison fails.

             Reply to the Second Objection. From the same cause the Father is someone and is the Father: the same that is, really and not only logically, yet with a logical distinction, either as that of generic and specific, or of common and proper. Thus it is plain that from the same form man is an animal and is a man (since one thing has not several actually distinct substantial forms): yet from his soul inasmuch as it is a sensible soul, he is only an animal, and from his soul as both sensible and rational, he is a man. Hence a horse is an animal but is not a man; because its sensible soul is not the same sensible soul as that of a man, and for that reason it is not the same individual animal as a man. The same applies to the question in point. The Father is someone and is the Father on account of the relation: but he is someone on account of the relation considered in general: while that he is a particular someone is due to this particular relation which is Paternity. For this reason again the Son, in whom is a relation, but not the relation of Paternity, is someone, but he is not that particular someone that is the Father.

             Reply to the Third Objection. The definition of a thing may include something in two ways: explicitly, i.e. actually, or implicitly, i.e. potentially. The definition of an animal does not include the rational soul explicitly and actually, for then every animal would have a rational soul: but it includes it implicitly and potentially, because an animal is a sensible animate substance. Now just as soul includes rational soul potentially, so does animated being contain rational being potentially: so that where the definition of animal is actually applied to man, rational must be included in the definition of animal explicitly, for as much as animal is the same as man. It is thus in the case in point: for hypostasis considered in general is a distinct substance, wherefore since there can be no distinction in God except by reason of relation, when I say 'divine hypostasis' it must of necessity be conceived as distinct by reason of a relation. Hence although relation is not included in the definition of the hypostasis that is a man, it is included in the definition of a divine hypostasis.

             Reply to the Fourth Objection. Jews and heathens do not conceive the essence as distinct except from things of another nature, and such distinction arises from the divine essence itself. We, however, conceive the hypostasis as distinct from that which is of the same nature, and from which it cannot be distinguished otherwise than by relation alone. Hence the objection proves nothing.

             Reply to the Fifth Objection. The manner of definition differs in accidents and substances. Substances are not defined by something outside their essence: wherefore the first thing included in the definition of a substance is the genus, which is predicated essentially of the thing defined. Whereas an accident is defined by something outside its essence, namely by its subject, on which it depends for its being. Hence in its definition the subject takes the place of the genus: for instance,' Simous means flat-nosed.' Accordingly just as, if we remove the difference from the definition of a substance the genus remains, even so if we remove the accident (which takes the place of the difference) from the definition of an accident the subject remains. There is, however, a difference. When the difference is removed the genus remains, but not identically the same: thus if we remove rational, the same identical animal which is rational animal does not remain; whereas when from the definition of an accident we remove that which takes the place of the difference the same identical subject remains, thus the same nose remains when we remove the curved or 'pug' shape. This is because an accident does not complete the essence of its subject as the difference completes the essence of the genus. When therefore we say, 'a person is a hypostasis distinguished by a property pertaining to dignity,' hypostasis is included in the definition of person not as subject but as genus. Wherefore if we remove the property pertaining to dignity the hypostasis does not remain the same identically or specifically but only generically, and as applied to nonrational substances.

             Reply to the Sixth Objection. When we say, The Word is Begotten Wisdom,' Wisdom' stands for the hypostasis, although it does not signify it. Hence it does not include the property in its signification, and so it is necessary to add it: thus I might say that God is the Begotten Son.

             Reply to the Seventh Objection. He that proceeds from another and he from whom another proceeds do not differ from Filiation and Paternity save as common from proper: since Son denotes him who is from another by generation, and Father signifies him from whom another is by generation: unless we contend that he who is from another and he from whom another is denote the origin, while Father and Son denote the consequent relations. But we have already made it plain that the hypostases are constituted not by their origins but by their relations.

             Reply to the Eighth Objection. After abstraction of the constituent difference, the genus remains in common but not in any species or individual.

             Reply to the Ninth Objection. Augustine does not mean to say that God the Father remains unbegotten if we abstract his Paternity, except perhaps in so far as unbegotten would then denote a condition of nature and not a property of the Person. His intention was to show that if we abstract the Paternity, unbegotten may still remain in general: since it is not necessary that whatsoever is unbegotten be the Father.

             Reply to the Tenth Objection. The notion of goodness does not constitute the notion of the essence, in fact good is conceived as informing being. On the other hand the property constitutes the hypostasis: wherefore the comparison fails.

             Reply to the Eleventh Objection. Although the mind is able to separate certain things that are united, it cannot do so in every case: for it cannot separate things one of which enters into the definition of the other; thus it cannot separate animal from man. Now property enters into the definition of the hypostasis: wherefore the objection does not prove.

             Reply to the Twelfth Objection. If one removes that which is in another as subject or place, that in which it was remains: but it is not so if we remove that which is part of a thing's essence: thus man no longer remains if we remove rational: and in like manner if we remove the property, the hypostasis does not remain.