Question 2
QUESTION II.
Whether God knows things through likenesses of things, or through their essence.
Supposing that God knows infinite things, it is asked whether He knows those things which He knows through likenesses of things, or through their essence. And that it is through likenesses, seems to be shown:
1. First, by the authority of Scripture. John 1: What was made, in Him was life: therefore all things that were made previously existed in God who knows: therefore either through likeness or through truth: but not through truth, since nothing yet existed: therefore through likeness.
2. Likewise, Augustine in the sixth book On the Trinity says that "the Son is the art full of all living and unchangeable reasons"; but reasons in an art are nothing other than likenesses of things made by art and known by the artisan: therefore the same as before.
3. Likewise, Augustine in the ninth book On the Trinity, chapter eleven, says: "All knowledge according to species is similar to the thing which it knows"; but divine knowledge, since it is not according to privation, is according to species: therefore it is necessary that it be similar to the thing which it knows. But it would not be similar unless it had a likeness of the thing: therefore etc.
4. Likewise, the Philosopher says "that the intellect is in a certain way all things"; but this is for no other reason than that the one who understands, by the very fact that he understands, is assimilated to the thing understood: therefore if this belongs to the general nature of understanding: if God understands and knows anything, it is necessary that He have likenesses of the things which He knows: therefore etc.
5. Likewise, for something to be perfectly known, there must be an adequation of the intellect to the intelligible; but a created thing cannot be adequated to the creating intellect through its own nature, since the latter is simple and the former composite: therefore it is necessary that it be adequated to it through some simple likeness separated from all matter: therefore etc.
6. Likewise, God knows things in the same way after they were made as He knew them before they were made, because divine knowledge does not change: but before they were made, He could not know them through their own essences: and He knew them either through their likenesses or through their essences: and not through their essences: therefore through their likenesses. And He knows now in the same way as then, therefore etc.
7. Likewise, God is an agent acting from purpose; but every agent acting from purpose preconceives that which it is about to make: moreover, everything that preconceives something has it in some way within itself, either through truth or through likeness: therefore if, before things were made, God did not have them within Himself with respect to their essences, then with respect to their likenesses.
8. Likewise, God is an exemplar truly and properly, just as He is truly and properly an efficient cause and an end: but an exemplar truly and properly is nothing other than what has likenesses of the things exemplified, through which it knows and makes them: therefore just as the nature of exemplarity belongs to God, so also does the nature of likeness.
9. Again, God truly is an eternal mirror leading to the knowing of every other knowable thing: but a mirror does not lead to the knowing of another thing unless it has its likeness: therefore the same as before.
10. Again, God truly and properly is a word: but a word is a likeness of that which is spoken: therefore if the Son of God is the word by which all things are spoken, it is necessary that in him there be likenesses of all things spoken.
11. Again, two things concur for the perfection of cognition, namely light and likeness: but the account of the most perfect light is entirely preserved in divine cognition: therefore likewise also the account of an expressive likeness.
To the contrary: 1. Anselm in the Monologion, chapter thirty-one: "It is manifest that in the Word, through whom all things were made, there is not a likeness of those things, but true and simple essence": therefore if God does not know through something outside himself, he does not know through a likeness, but rather through essence.
2. Again, wherever there is likeness, there is agreement, and wherever there is agreement, there is communication of some one thing by many: but God and creature share nothing one in common, because then that thing would be simpler than the Creator: therefore it is impossible that there be any likeness in the Creator with respect to the creature, or conversely.
3. Again, likeness is a relation of equiparance; but between the Creator and the creature there can be no relation of equiparance: therefore neither likeness.
4. Again, just as equality is caused by unity in quantity, so likeness is caused by unity in quality; but between the Creator and the creature equality is in no way found, neither truly nor metaphorically: therefore neither likeness for the same reason: or if likeness is found there and not equality, the question is asked, whence this may be.
5. Again, if there is any likeness between the Creator and the creature, it is the least: therefore if likeness is the ground of knowing, speaking per se, where there is greater likeness, there is a greater ground of knowing, and where there is the least, the least: if therefore God knows things through likenesses, it follows from this that he would have the least knowledge of things: which is blasphemous to say.
6. Again, one creature is more assimilated to God than another, as that which exists, lives, and senses, more than that which merely exists: if therefore greater likeness is a greater ground of knowing, then God knows one creature more than another.
7. Again, if our intellect were entirely in act, it would not need a likeness: therefore since the divine intellect is entirely in act and is light with respect to every knowable thing, it seems that no account of likeness is required for God's cognition.
8. Again, likeness is a ground leading to another, namely to that of which it is a likeness: but where there is such a leading, there is discursion and ratiocinative comparison, and this in no way befits divine cognition: therefore neither does the account of likeness.
9. Again, truth is the principle of knowing; therefore in the most excellent cognition the character of truth is most excellently preserved. But truth is more preserved in the thing itself than in its likeness. Therefore, if divine cognition is the most noble, it knows things not through likenesses but through essences.
10. Again, the Philosopher, in the third book of On the Soul: "In things separated from matter, that which is understood and that by which it is understood are the same." But God is entirely separated from matter; therefore that which he knows and that by which he knows are the same. But he knows things outside himself; therefore he knows them through their essences, not through any likenesses.
11. Again, wherever there is an immediate and undivided conjunction of the knower and the knowable, there is no need for a likeness. But God is intimate to every created thing; therefore for his cognition he does not need any likeness.
12. Again, the mode of knowing through essence is nobler than through likeness, which is evident because this mode of knowing pertains to the third heaven, as Augustine says in the twelfth book of his Literal Commentary on Genesis. Therefore, if the nobler things are to be attributed to God, it seems more fitting to hold that God knows things through essences than through likenesses.
13. Again, the nobler the cognition, the more immediate is the conjunction and union of the knower with the knowable. But divine cognition possesses every kind of nobility; therefore it also possesses the most perfect union. But the conjunction and union is more immediate when the knower is united to the knowable with respect to its essence than with respect to its likeness; therefore, etc.
CONCLUSION.
God knows things through the eternal reasons, which are the exemplary likenesses of things, most perfectly representative and expressive, and essentially identical with God himself.
I respond: It must be said that according to blessed Dionysius and according to blessed Augustine in many places, God knows things through the eternal reasons. For blessed Dionysius says in the book On the Divine Names, chapter five: "We say that the exemplars are the substantifying reasons of existing things, singularly pre-existing in God, which theology calls predefinitions, and the divine and good wills that are determinative and productive of existing things, according to which the supersubstantial being predefined and produced all things." Likewise, Augustine in the first book of the Confessions, near the beginning, speaking to God, says thus: "God and Lord of all things that you have created, with you the causes of all unstable things stand firm, and the immutable origins of all mutable things remain, and the sempiternal reasons of all irrational and temporal things live." Likewise, in the eleventh book of the City of God, chapter ten, the same says: "There are not many wisdoms, but one wisdom, in which are certain infinite things and infinite treasures of intelligible things, in which are all the invisible and immutable reasons of things, even of visible and mutable things, which were made through it, since God did not make anything without knowing it," etc.
Now these eternal reasons are not the true essences and quiddities of things, since they are not other than the Creator; but creature and Creator necessarily have different essences: and therefore it is necessary that they be exemplar forms, and thereby representative likenesses of the things themselves; and therefore they are reasons of knowing, because knowledge, by the very fact that it is knowledge, implies an assimilation and expression between the knower and the knowable. And therefore it must be held, as the Saints say and arguments show, that God knows things through their likenesses.
For the understanding of the question itself and the objections, it should be noted that likeness is said in two ways: in one way through the agreement of two things in a third, in which way it is said that "the likeness of different things is the same quality." In another way likeness is said because one thing is the likeness of another: and this is twofold: one kind is an imitative likeness, and thus the creature is a likeness of the Creator; another kind is an exemplative likeness, and thus in the Creator the exemplar reason is a likeness of the creature. Now likeness said in both ways, namely imitative and exemplative, is expressing and expressive; and this is the likeness that is required for having knowledge of things.
But some knowledge is causing things, and some is caused by things. For knowledge caused by things, an imitative likeness is required; and this likeness is from without, and therefore it posits some composition and addition in the knowing intellect; and hence it is that it attests to imperfection.
But for knowledge causing things, an exemplative likeness is required, and this indeed is not from without, nor does it introduce any composition, nor does it attest to any imperfection, but rather to perfection in every way. For since the divine intellect itself is the highest light and full truth and pure act, just as the divine power in causing things is sufficient of itself to produce all things, so the divine light and truth is sufficient to express all things: and because to express is an intrinsic act, it is therefore eternal; and because expression is a certain assimilation, therefore the divine intellect, eternally expressing all things by its highest truth, eternally possesses the exemplar likenesses of all things, which are not other than itself, but are what it is essentially.
Again, because it expresses insofar as it is the highest light and pure act, therefore it expresses most lucidly, most expressly, most perfectly, and thereby equally and according to the intention of a likeness diminished in nothing; and hence it is that it knows all things most perfectly, most distinctly, and most completely.
Having seen these things, it is easy to respond to the objections.
1. To that therefore which is first objected from Anselm, it must be said that Anselm speaks there of a likeness that is caused by the truth of the thing; whence he takes likeness there insofar as it expresses under the notion of imitation rather than exemplarity; and in this way it is placed in the product with respect to the producer, and not conversely, as he goes on to say; but in the other way, nothing prevents it from being placed in the producer with respect to the product.
2. To that which is objected — wherever there is likeness, there is agreement, etc. — it must be said that the likeness which is the agreement of two things in a third is not placed in God with respect to the creature; but a likeness by which something is said to be imitative of another can well be placed in the creature with respect to the Creator, and a likeness by which something is said to be exemplative of another, in the Creator with respect to the creature. For this likeness does not require agreement through participation in something common, but the agreement of order suffices, according to the notion of the causing and the caused, the expressing and the expressed.
3. 4. To that which is objected — that likeness is a relation of equiparance, etc. — it must be said that this is true of that likeness which is caused through the agreement of one participated third; and in this way we do not posit it here.
And through this the response is clear to that which is objected concerning equality.
Yet as to what is asked — why is there not equality in some way, as there is likeness? — it must be said that equality includes in itself commensuration, which can in no way exist between the finite and the infinite; but likeness bespeaks expression, and this can well exist between the Creator and the creature. Whence, just as it does not follow: this is not equal to that, therefore it does not imitate that, or is not exemplated by that — so it must be understood in the matter at hand.
5. To that which is objected — that if there is any likeness between the Creator and the creature, it is minimal, etc. — the response is now clear: because likeness through participation is not only minimal, but indeed none at all; but likeness through imitation is greater and lesser in the creature, according as it approaches more or less to the divine goodness; but likeness through exemplation and expression is supreme in the Creator with respect to every creature, because the truth itself, since it is the supreme light, supremely expresses all things — and therefore it does not follow that He knows one creature more than another.
6. To that which is objected — that one creature is more assimilated to God than another, etc. — the response is likewise now clear: for this is true of imitative likeness on the part of the creature; but this is not the basis of knowing, but the other, namely exemplative likeness, which supremely and equally expresses all things.
7. To that which is objected, that if our intellect were entirely in act, it would not need a likeness, etc.: it must be said that it is true that it would not need a likeness taken in or received from without, but nevertheless it would use itself as a likeness for knowing other things: and in this way, not in another, we posit a likeness in divine cognition.
8. To that which is objected, that a likeness is a principle leading into another, etc.: it must be said that this is true of a likeness that depends on a thing outside: but of the other likeness it is not true that it leads by way of passage and journey, but only by way of a light perfectly expressing and quieting the knower himself.
9. To that which is objected, that truth is the principle of knowing, etc.: it must be said that truth is spoken of in two ways: in one way truth is the same as the entity of the thing, according to what Augustine says in the Soliloquies, that "the true is that which is." In another way truth is an expressive light in intellectual cognition, according to what Anselm says in the book On Truth, that "truth is a rectitude perceptible by the mind alone." In the first way truth is the principle of knowing, but a remote one: in the second way it is the proximate and immediate principle of knowing. Therefore when it is said that truth is more preserved in the entity of the thing itself than in a likeness: this is true of truth in the first way, not in the second. But that truth which is the proximate and immediate principle of knowing is more preserved in the likeness that is in the intellect, most especially and principally in that likeness which is exemplative of things: for that exemplar likeness expresses a thing more perfectly than the caused thing itself expresses itself. And on account of this God knows things more perfectly through those likenesses than He would know them through their own essences: and the Angels know more perfectly in the Word than in their proper genus. On account of which Augustine also frequently says that cognition in the Word is likened to the light of day, but cognition in the proper genus is likened to evening, because every creature is darkness in comparison to the divine light.
10. To that which is objected, that in things separated from matter there is no difference, etc.: it must be said that that statement is understood not only of things separated from matter on the part of those understanding, but also of the intelligibles, namely when that which is separated from matter understands that which is separated from matter, then that which it understands and that by which it is understood will be the same: and this not always, but when the intellect turns upon itself. And this has place when God understands Himself: but it does not have place in Him with respect to creatures, because, although God is separated from matter, the things understood nevertheless are not.
11. To that objection that where there is immediacy between the knower and the knowable, etc., it must be said that the union of the knower and the knowable can be twofold: either according to the nature of being and conserving and causing, or according to the nature of knowing. Now there is an immediate conjunction according to the nature of causing when the cause immediately produces and causes and sustains the effect; and there is an immediate conjunction according to the nature of knowing when the knower knows the knowable either through the essence of the knower or through the essence of the known; and then there is no need for an intermediate likeness that differs from both extremes. Nevertheless, the essence itself, insofar as it is the ground of knowing, holds the nature of a likeness; and in this way we posit a likeness with respect to divine cognition, which is nothing other than the very essence of the knower.
12. To that objection that cognition through essence is nobler than cognition through likeness, etc., it must be said that this is true of that likeness which is abstracted and caused by the very essence of a thing—the sort of likeness required for caused cognition—but it is not true of a likeness that is identical with the essence of the knower. For that cognition by which the knower uses itself as a likeness for knowing something is more perfect than the cognition by which the knower receives something from the side of the known.
13. To that objection that the nobler the cognition, the more immediate is the conjunction and union of the knower to the knowable, etc., the answer is already clear: because a likeness that is nothing other than the knower itself posits no distance either in reality or even in reason, since the knower insofar as it is a knower implies the nature of a likeness; and therefore a likeness that is the ground of knowing in no way goes beyond the nature of the knower and the knowable.