Introduction
Introduction
This volume is the first complete English edition of Thomas Aquinas’s Quodlibetal Questions (Quaestiones de Quolibet).1 Now often referred to as his “quodlibetals” or his “quodlibets,” these questions are a collection of texts deriving from disputations over which Aquinas presided while teaching at the University of Paris from 1256 to 1259 and again from 1268 to 1272. Many of the questions discussed in the quodlibetals are ones which Aquinas deals with in his other works, but some of them are unique.2 Indeed, taken overall, his quodlibetals give us a sense of Aquinas as a thinker that differs from what we find in other texts attributable to him. In his quodlibetals, as nowhere else, we find him responding to questions that were not of his own choosing but, rather, were raised for him to answer in something like what Americans call a “town hall meeting,” in which aspiring politicians field unexpected questions from both friends and foes. All the questions discussed by Aquinas in his quodlibetals reflect, as we might put it, “questions from the floor in a public context,” which makes them unique among his published writings. Normally Aquinas wrote at leisure and decided for himself what to discuss, but in his quodlibetals we find his report of what he was forced by others to discuss in “real time.”
Quodlibetal Disputations
By 1256, disputations (disputationes) had come to feature strongly as a means of teaching in the Universities of Oxford and Paris. Normally, a presiding expert, or “master” (magister), would raise a question. One or more of his students would then be required to provide arguments for a possible answer, and the master would comment on the question and the preceding arguments. As a Parisian master of theology, Aquinas was formally bound to conduct or preside over such disputations regularly, and to resolve or “determine” the questions raised at them.3 Such regular disputations were called “ordinary” disputations.
Aquinas clearly valued the practice of disputation. His own published ordinary disputations (his Quaestiones Disputatae) clearly show this to be so, as does his way of speaking in his commentary on the book of Job, where he characterizes the discussions between Job and his “comforters” as a disputation (disputatio).4 In Aquinas’s best known work, his Summa Theologiae, the basic unit (the “article”) is always, effectively, a mini-disputation in which a question is raised, with arguments against one way of answering it, followed by Aquinas’s view of what should be said in answer to the question, and then a response to the preceding arguments. All the articles in the Summa Theologiae indicate the extent to which Aquinas took the form of a disputation to be a good method of teaching.
In Aquinas’s day, a quodlibetal disputation was sometimes referred to as a “common disputation” (disputatio communis) or “general disputation” (disputatio generalis). Such common or general disputations differed from ordinary ones. They began to take place among theologians at Paris early in the thirteenth century (around 1230) and possibly in the study houses of Dominican and Franciscan friars.5 When Aquinas taught at the University of Paris, they only occurred over a few days during the seasons of Advent and Lent.6 Masters of theology were not obliged to conduct quodlibetal disputations, and some of them never did so.7 It is easy to imagine why a master might not have wished to conduct quodlibetal disputations, which were open for all to attend and raise questions of their choice, not ones set in advance by the presiding master.8 As Brian Lawn observes: “Literally anyone could attend, masters and scholars from other schools, all kinds of ecclesiastics and prelates, and even civil authorities, all the ‘intellectuals’ of the time who were always attracted to skirmishes of this kind, and all of whom had a right to ask questions and oppose arguments.”9
So, a Parisian quodlibetal disputation presented a willing master with a serious self-imposed challenge. During the first day or the first part of such a disputation, questions could be orally raised in the presence of a master by anyone (a quolibet) about anything (de quolibet). On this occasion, the master was probably able to relax to some extent while allowing one or more of his bachelors (student assistants) to deal with questions coming from the floor, though he was entitled to make interventions and to try, if he wished, to come to the aid of the bachelors.10 In this sense, the first day or first part of a general disputation was a trial for the bachelors working under a master, rather than for the master himself, though it seems that some masters might have weighed in at this stage to some extent.11 Be that as it may, it is clear that masters had to prepare their formal resolution or “determination” (determinatio) of the questions previously raised and discussed, most probably to be delivered in the presence of many of those who had attended the general disputation.12 Masters had little time to prepare (two or three days at the most). But they were obliged to provide their determinations, and in doing so, they had to impose some order on what was said at the general discussion. So, their scholarly and editorial abilities were definitely tested at this stage of the quodlibetal process.
In due course, a master such as Aquinas was able, if he wished, to provide an edited account of quodlibetal disputations over which he had presided and determined. Aquinas provided such accounts of almost all his quodlibetal disputations, which would be sent to the university bookseller, where they could be rented for copying purposes.13 But these accounts cannot be taken as verbatim reports of all that was said and argued during the first part of the disputation or the determination from which they derive. Rather, they give us Aquinas’s account of what, on reflection, he wanted to present as reports from the disputation as a whole. So, we must presume that his published quodlibetals connect us to events lying behind them at a certain degree of remove, and with an organization attributable more to him than to those present at the original discussions.
Quodlibets VII to XI date from the first time that Aquinas functioned as a master of theology at the University of Paris. Quodlibets I to VI and XII date from his second Parisian regency (the second time Aquinas functioned as a master in Paris). So, the traditional numbering of Aquinas’s quodlibets, which is followed in this volume, is not an accurate chronological ordering. The inaccuracy of the traditional numbering now seems to be established in the Leonine edition of Aquinas’s Quodlibetal Questions, published in 1996 under the direction of René-Antoine Gauthier (1913–1999). Given Gauthier’s meticulous work, which drew on that of Pierre Mandonnet (1858–1936), the true chronology of Aquinas’s quodlibets seems to be as follows: VII (Lent 1256), VIII (Lent 1257), IX (Advent 1257), X (Lent or Advent 1258), XI (Lent 1259), I (Lent 1269), II (Advent 1269), III (Lent 1270), VI (Advent 1270), IV (Lent 1271), V (Advent 1271), and XII (Lent 1272).
In spite of their length, Aquinas’s quodlibetals only constitute a relatively small portion of his enormous literary output, and we have some reason to suppose that he might not have been overly fond of the genre to which they belong. In his foreword to the Summa Theologiae, Aquinas observes that students of “Catholic truth” are “greatly hindered by various writings on the subject, partly because of pointless questions, articles, and arguments, partly because essential information is given according to the requirements of textual commentary or the occasions of academic debate (occasio disputandi).”14 The phrase “occasions of academic debate” here could be taken as a reference to quodlibetal disputations in general.15
Nevertheless, Aquinas’s quodlibetal questions tell us a lot about him and about issues of interest at Paris when he conducted them. They obviously make it clear how Aquinas wanted finally to respond to certain questions raised during the disputations. Since we can now date his quodlibetal disputations with a fair degree of confidence, they also help us to understand what Aquinas was thinking on certain matters around or not long after the time that they took place. They also help us to identify changes (if any) in Aquinas’s thinking over time, given that he conducted quodlibetal disputations both early and late in his relatively short career. At the same time, they give us a sense of issues that were on the minds of Aquinas’s contemporaries. Some of these issues were ones to which theologians had long paid attention. But some of them, such as those dealing with secular priests and members of religious orders, clearly spring from new discussions taking place at Paris when Aquinas was teaching there. Aquinas’s treatment of these matters in his quodlibetals helps us to understand what he thought about them while also giving us a sense of what his critics wanted to argue with him face to face.
Aquinas’s Life
Thomas Aquinas was born in 1226 in Roccasecca, which was then part of the kingdom of Naples.16 He died on March 7, 1274, at the Cistercian monastery in Fossanova, some sixty-two miles southeast of Rome.17 He was canonized by Pope John XXII in 1325, and in 1567, Pope Pius V declared him a Doctor of the Church. Aquinas was a prolific and influential author of texts dealing with theological and philosophical issues, but he was also very much a teacher. As noted earlier, he taught for two different periods at the University of Paris. At other times he taught in Italian houses of the Dominican Order of Preachers, to which he belonged. He also taught for a while at the University of Naples.
The Dominicans were founded by St. Dominic (1170–1221).18 Aquinas joined them around 1243, when he would have been about sixteen years of age and a student at the University of Naples, which was founded by the emperor Frederick II (1194–1250) as what was then known as a studium generale.19 Members of his family objected to his choice of religious life.20 They even detained him at home for two years or so, probably in their castle at Montesangiovanni and later at Roccasecca.21 Yet Aquinas persevered in his desire to be a Dominican. From his own writings, we can assume that his attraction to the Dominicans largely derived from their official commitment to study and preaching.22 Aquinas’s approval of study and teaching is evident in his quodlibetal questions.
Following his release from family detention, Aquinas may well have lived briefly in Naples. But he was soon in Paris, where he studied for at least one year with St. Albert the Great (1200–1280). In 1248, however, Albert moved to Cologne in order to establish a Dominican studium generale there.23 Aquinas joined Albert in Cologne and continued to study under him. He also served as Albert’s secretary. Albert was clearly struck by Aquinas’s intellectual abilities. He asked Aquinas to transcribe lectures that he delivered in both Paris and Cologne, and he recommended that Aquinas be returned to Paris to prepare to become a master in the university’s Faculty of Theology.
At that time, the Dominicans were authorized to have two of their members teaching at Paris as masters of theology. The Dominican masters functioned as such in their priory of Saint-Jacques. The Dominicans first arrived in Paris in 1217, and they seem to have began their presence there by occupying a house on the Isle de la Cité. In 1221, however, they received a gift of property coming from an individual donor and the University of Paris.24 They were henceforth based in the Dominican priory of Saint-Jacques, founded as a place in which friars could live and house meetings. Located in what is now known as the Latin Quarter, Saint-Jacques quickly became one of the Dominicans’ major centers of study.25 Aquinas arrived there late in 1252, and began lecturing on the Sentences of Peter Lombard (1100–1160) while he prepared to become a master of theology. When he became a master in 1256, his inaugural lecture focused on Psalm 103:13 in the Vulgate edition of the Old Testament: “Watering the mountains from above, the earth will be filled with the fruit of your works.” Aquinas applies this text to teachers of theology, noting that their job is to expound biblical revelation with an awareness of the extent to which it challenges human understanding. He goes on to say that teachers of theology need to be morally good, well informed, and able to argue cogently.26
Parisian masters of theology in Aquinas’s day were formally required to lecture (legere) or comment on the Bible, to preside over disputations (disputare), and to preach (predicare). So, Aquinas did all of these things. For example, from 1251 to 1252 or 1252 to 1253, he lectured on Isaiah and Jeremiah. Again, from 1269 to 1270, he lectured on the Gospel of Matthew, and from 1263 to 1265, he lectured on Job.27 Given the scarcity of evidence, his “academic” sermons are hard to date by sermon, though some of them must derive from times when he worked in Paris.28
By the end of 1259, Aquinas was no longer a Parisian teaching master, and by around 1261 or 1262, he was living in the priory of San Domenico at Orvieto in Italy. He ceased to function as a master in Paris because the Dominicans at this time were anxious to regularly replace Dominican masters there in order to provide a steady flow of Dominican masters able to teach in their priories elsewhere. That fact explains Aquinas’s move to Orvieto, where he continued to write his Summa Contra Gentiles, on which he started work while still a master at Paris.29 In 1265, however, he was assigned to the priory of Santa Sabina in Rome so as to teach Dominican students of the order’s Roman province, to which he belonged.30 It was while teaching at Santa Sabina that he embarked on his Summa Theologiae.31
Aquinas’s time at Santa Sabina was relatively short; he was back in Paris before the end of 1268. Why the Dominicans returned him to Paris is a matter of speculation, but we know that he left the city again in 1272 and was teaching in Naples later that year. But by the end of 1273, he was clearly physically ailing. He was invited to attend the Second Council of Lyons (due to begin in May 1274) as a theological advisor, and he accepted the invitation. But he became increasingly sick on his way to the council. He spent some time at the home of his niece in Maenza, but evidently feeling that his end was near, he asked to be taken to the nearby Cistercian monastery of Fossanova, where he died a month or so later, attended by his long-time friend and secretary, Reginald of Piperno (1230–1290), by a few other Dominicans, by some monks of Fossanova, and by the Franciscan bishop of Terracina, together with some of his Franciscan companions. The clinical cause of Aquinas’s death remains unknown.
Aquinas’s Writings
Aquinas wrote many things, which come down to us via multiple manuscripts. For this reason, students of Aquinas are seriously indebted to the Leonine Commission, established by Pope Leo XIII in 1879, which currently aims to produce critical editions of his writings (a work still in progress).32 The most significant of Aquinas’s writings fall into several distinguishable categories.33
First, there are lengthy discussions of theological and philosophical matters written with a focus on key Christian teachings. The Summa Theologiae and the Summa Contra Gentiles obviously fall into this category, as does Aquinas’s commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, which derives from his earliest lectures in Paris. The Summa Contra Gentiles is a long prose work that bears little formal resemblance to Aquinas’s disputations. But, as previously noted, the Summa Theologiae reflects the style of disputation as Aquinas practiced it.
Then, there are a range of commentaries. Some of these are on biblical texts while others are on works of Aristotle (384–322 bc) and Boethius (c. 476–526). Aquinas’s biblical commentaries, not all of which are complete, include expositions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Job, Psalms, Matthew, John, and several of the letters attributed to St. Paul in the New Testament.34 Aquinas also commented on Aristotle’s On the Soul, On Sense and the Sensed Object, On Memory, Physics, Meteorology, On Interpretation, Posterior Analytics, Nicomachean Ethics, Politics, Metaphysics, On the Heavens, and On Generation and Corruption.35 Aquinas also wrote commentaries on Boethius’s De Trinitate and Quomodo Substantiae.36 In addition to all this, and to his work on Lombard’s Sentences, Aquinas wrote two other commentaries, one on The Divine Names and one on the Book on Causes.37 The Divine Names is one of several works by someone who was believed in Aquinas’s day to be the Dionysius mentioned in Acts 17:34 as a disciple of St. Paul.38 The Book on Causes (Liber De Causis) was, prior to Aquinas, often believed to be a work of Aristotle, though Aquinas was able to recognize that it draws heavily upon the Elements of Theology by the Neoplatonist Proclus (410–485).39
In addition to his commentaries, Aquinas wrote what can be categorized as (1) shorter polemical works on controverted philosophical matters, and (2) other distinct treatises. His shorter polemical works include three texts dealing with the life of religious—that is, people belonging to religious orders (something on which Aquinas has things to say in his quodlibets). These are Against the Opponents of Worship and Religion (c. 1256), On the Perfection of the Spiritual Life (1269 or 1270), and Against the Teaching of Those Who Draw People Away from the Religious Life (1261).40 Aquinas also wrote On the Unicity of the Intellect Against the Averroists (1270), about whether all human beings share a single intellect, and On the Eternity of the World Against Murmurers (probably 1271), about whether the universe has always existed, a question which also comes up for discussion in his quodlibetals.41
Aquinas’s other distinct treatises include On the Principles of Nature, On Being and Essence, and the Compendium of Theology.42 In spite of its short length, On Being and Essence, which Aquinas wrote around 1252 or 1253, is arguably one of his most important and influential publications. Among other things, it presents God as making all creatures to exist from moment to moment, a thought to which Aquinas returns in many of his later works, including his quodlibetals. The Compendium of Theology was written at the request of Reginald of Piperno, Aquinas’s friend and secretary. He seems to have started work on it around 1266, but he died before finishing it. It is broken down into sections on faith and hope, but it deals briefly with many of the topics discussed in the Summa Theologiae, the Summa Contra Gentiles, and the Commentary on the Sentences.43
Finally, there are Aquinas’s disputed questions, based on his ordinary and quodlibetal disputations. The genesis and practice of quodlibetal disputations was explained earlier, but readers might like to know more about Aquinas’s ordinary disputations.44 They comprise questions On Truth, On the Power of God, On Evil, On Spiritual Creatures, On the Soul, On the Virtues in General, and On the Union of the Word Incarnate.45
Like quodlibetal disputations, medieval ordinary disputations can be viewed as arising from a respect for dialogue. Considered as things to be read, dialogues date back to ancient times. Hence the famous dialogues of Plato (427–347 bc).46 But dialogues can also be found among the writings of Christian authors such as St. Augustine of Hippo (354–430) and St. Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109).47 Their purpose was to show how good results can come from debating and considering arguments for and against various conclusions. It was a respect for the value of dialogue that led medieval universities and religious orders, such as the Dominicans, to incorporate disputation into their system of studies. These universities and orders had scholars commenting on texts of one kind or another, but they recognized that commentary naturally leads to questions, first about how to interpret what the text says and then about whether what the text says is true. Such questions invite arguments for and against various interpretations and positions, which motivated the rise and establishment of disputations in academic contexts by Aquinas’s time. People engaging in these disputations relied heavily on a knowledge of Aristotelian logic lacking to many previous practitioners of dialogue.48 Yet, they shared with earlier practitioners the same desire: to reach a conclusion after taking account of arguments for and against it.
Ordinary disputations were an established vehicle for teaching at the University of Paris before Aquinas’s time there. As noted earlier, they were presided over by a master, whose job it was to provide a response to a question in light of arguments which surfaced during a discussion of it. These disputations, however, were of two main kinds.
First, there was the public disputation (disputatio publica) that masters held at regular intervals during the academic year. Disputations of this kind took place in the master’s own school (in Aquinas’s case, the priory of Saint-Jacques). The master decided on the question or questions to be discussed. He then appointed people to take part in the disputation, which was advertised in advance. The dispute ran for one or two days, during which visitors from other schools (possibly including other masters) raised points from the floor, usually in opposition to the position ultimately defended by the master presiding over the disputation. These points were replied to by someone appointed by the master (normally his bachelor), and notes were taken on the proceedings. On the following day or the following Sunday, the master “determined” or resolved the questions previously debated by giving his own views.
Aquinas was also familiar with disputations of a less public kind: the private disputation (disputatio privata). Disputations of this kind took place only between a master and his own students and bachelors. They seem to have been much more frequent than public disputations, yet they took basically the same form. A question was chosen, arguments were advanced in defense of conflicting answers, and the master then determined or settled the question. In some ways, the private disputation resembled the modern university seminar, in which students are required to contribute to a discussion in the presence of a teacher whose aim is to inform students, as well as to listen to them. It may well be that many of Aquinas’s ordinary disputed questions originated in such private disputations. His quodlibetal disputations were certainly public events, but that may not always have been the case with his ordinary disputations.
One reason for thinking it was not the case derives from a plausible way of answering the question “What was the basic unit of a disputed question?” In their written form, Aquinas’s ordinary disputed questions are broken down into questions. But each question comprises several articles, and each article deals with its own particular question. Hence, for example, the De Veritate contains twenty-nine questions, the second of which contains fifteen articles, each dealing with a particular question about God’s knowledge (e.g., “Is there knowledge in God?,” “Does God know things other than himself?,” “Does God’s knowledge change?”). Now, when Aquinas conducted disputations in Paris, was it a whole question (i.e., a set of related questions) or merely an article (i.e., one particular question) that occupied participants in a single session of discussion? Some scholars have held that it was an article.49 But that suggestion would leave Aquinas conducting disputations much more frequently than seems plausible, given the length of the terms and the other teaching that took place at the University of Paris. So, perhaps we should conclude that the basic unit of Aquinas’s ordinary disputations was a whole question.50 But that suggestion also poses problems. As Weisheipl notes: “It does not, for example, explain how a question of twenty articles compares with a question of two articles in an afternoon session.”51 One might plausibly surmise that, at least in the case of the De Veritate, Aquinas disputed privately and frequently with an article on the agenda for a single meeting. In that case, however, disputed questions of Aquinas other than the De Veritate may also have been privately disputed article by article.
To what extent do any of Aquinas’s disputed questions represent what was actually said on a particular occasion? And to what extent do they represent the thinking of Aquinas himself? We know that the Summa Theologiae and a number of other writings come from Aquinas’s own hand. But are his published disputed questions to be thought of in the same way? The answer is basically yes, but with certain qualifications. Masters of theology in the thirteenth century had the option to prepare an edited account of ordinary disputations at which they presided and determined.52 This account, especially its determinations, can be thought of as the work of the master. But masters did not script all the counterarguments offered during an occurring disputation. So, their published disputations almost certainly incorporate ideas brought up by others. Yet these ideas were evidently incorporated into finished texts by the master, who must therefore be regarded as essentially their author. Aquinas’s ordinary disputed questions, as we have them now, most likely include less than was said during the discussions they reflect. For, as Jean-Pierre Torrell puts it, speaking of Aquinas’s private disputations:
It appears probable that the final result does not resemble, except in a very general way, the real unfolding of these private discussions between the Master and the students. It suffices to read the text of the De Veritate or the De Potentia to understand that these texts are very much above the level of what a discussion could be for average students. The students of Paris . . . could doubtless follow the most difficult expositions, but even with them the discussion could not have taken the exact form of long, complex, and probing research; by necessity it was briefer and simpler. We, therefore, must admit that what has come down to us bears witness to considerable editing.53
In other words, even though Aquinas’s ordinary disputed questions certainly put us in touch with a lively and relatively spontaneous debate, they are also very much the work of Aquinas and should be read as such.54 The same can be said of Aquinas’s quodlibetal questions, although he had little control over the questions raised at the sessions from which they were derived.
The Contents of Aquinas’s Quodlibetal Questions
In sum, Aquinas’s quodlibetals are mostly editorially polished accounts of disputations over which he presided and determined. One exception is Quodlibet XII, which appears to be unfinished: some of its questions lack objections and replies, and others seem to provide what appear to be only drafts of answers to questions and replies to objections.55 In general, though, Aquinas’s quodlibetals present discussions of questions as coming from him as their author, though the questions were chosen by others. These questions are many and various, as readers of the present volume will quickly see by glancing through the table of contents. So, an introduction to Aquinas’s quodlibets cannot even come close to noting everything to be found in them. A full account of them would need a volume in itself, probably a very long one. As Jean-Pierre Torrell understandably notes about the quodlibetals in his general account of Aquinas’s life and works: “It would be impossible to enumerate all the subjects dealt with by Thomas in these public discussions without running the risk of tiring the reader (there are 260 such subjects, which gives an average of 20 for each session).”56 Bearing these facts in mind, we now aim simply to offer readers an introductory and selective account of things found in Aquinas’s quodlibetals.
All of Aquinas’s quodlibets (none of which come with titles) typically begin with a brief note indicating what sorts of questions follow. Then we have “questions,” which are often divided into a number of “articles.”57 Take, for example, Quodlibet VII. Here, Aquinas first notes: “There were three sorts of questions. The first were about spiritual substances, the second about the sacrament of the altar, and the third about the bodies of the damned. The first questions on spiritual substances were about their knowledge, the second about the enjoyment of Christ’s soul during the passion, and the third about the plurality found among spiritual substances.” Aquinas then goes on to provide discussions broken down into seven questions, amounting to a total of eighteen articles.58 Or again, consider Quodlibet XI. Here we first read: “There were questions about God, about angels, and about human beings. The questions about God were on God’s infinity, knowledge, and predestination.” Then we find ten questions, containing a total of thirteen articles.
What are the main topics discussed in Aquinas’s quodlibetals? We might roughly group them under the following headings: (1) the divine nature, (2) God as triune and incarnate, (3) angels, (4) blessedness, (5), damnation, (6) grace, (7) sin, (8) human nature (9), matters concerning clerics and members of religious orders, (10) pastoral concerns, and (11) motley questions which cannot easily be listed under a general heading.59
The Divine Nature
The positions on God’s nature that Aquinas adopts in his quodlibets cohere with what he says in many of his other works. They contain no discussion of the question “Does God exist?” presumably because nobody present at Aquinas’s quodlibetal disputations had doubts about the reality of God. But their reasoning certainly squares with what Aquinas says elsewhere about what we can know God to be. So, we find him offering the following conclusions: (1) God is the source of the existence (esse) of all creatures for as long as they exist; (2) God is entirely simple—that is, God is not physically or metaphysically composite, and all that is in God is God (cf. Summa Theologiae I, q.3); (3) God is omnipotent, omniscient, immutable, omnipresent, and at work in all things directing them to their ends; (4) God is to be sharply distinguished from creatures since God’s essence (essentia) is God’s existence (esse), which is not the case with creatures; (5) God’s causality and direction of things does not impose necessity on them; (6) God is not something whose essence we can see or seriously understand in this life.
Hence, for example, in Quodlibet XI, q.1, a.1, we find Aquinas saying: “God surpasses not only those creatures that exist, that have existed, and that will exist but also all those that can be imagined. So, God is present not only in those creatures that exist, that have existed, and that will exist but also in those that can be imagined to exist.” Again, in Quodlibet XI, q.3, a.1, we find him saying: “God’s foreknowledge is certain. For God knows things in a more noble way than we do. Our knowledge is in time, and hence our awareness of things is based on the nature of time—past, present, and future. Accordingly, we know past things as past, present things as present, future things as future, and naturally so. But God’s knowledge is above time and measured only by eternity.” Yet again, in Quodlibet I, q.1, a.1, Aquinas denies that even St. Benedict (c. 480–543) “saw” the divine essence.
Many of the questions about God’s nature concern the extent of divine omnipotence. As he does elsewhere, in these questions Aquinas regularly explains God’s omnipotence as the power to bring about anything that is not logically impossible (like a square circle or a married bachelor). Thus, there are many things that Aquinas thinks an omnipotent God cannot do, such as change the past (i.e., make what has been not to have been), although he prefers to say that such things cannot be done, rather than that God cannot do them. Hence, the questions about divine omnipotence tell us much more about what Aquinas thinks is possible, given the nature of the things involved, than they tell us about God. For example, there are questions about whether God can make something actually infinite, which give us Aquinas’s thoughts on infinity. There is a question about whether God can make the same body to be located in two places at once, which give us his thoughts on the nature of bodies and their extension. There is also a question about whether God can annihilate something and then recreate it numerically same. This question is discussed in Quodlibet IV, q.3, a.2, which lacks parallels in Aquinas’s other writings. Here, Aquinas argues, with various qualifications, that God can indeed reduce something to nothing and then recreate it from nothing numerically the same. But what exactly is Aquinas saying here, and how does it square with what he says in his other works? Recent scholarly discussions of the matter disagree.60 But Quodlibet IV, q.3, a.2, clearly presents us with something unique in Aquinas’s writings.
There are two other articles in the quodlibets concerning God’s nature that lack parallels in Aquinas’s other writings. These occur in Quodlibet V, q.1, and Quodlibet VIII, q.1. In the first question of Quodlibet V, we find Aquinas considering whether God knows the first instant the world could be created. In the first article of Quodlibet VIII, he deals with the question “Is the number six the creator or a creature?”61
When it comes to God’s knowledge of the first instant the world could be created, Aquinas first notes that God is the maker of all space and time, and that there is no space or time outside the spatiotemporal world. He then reasons that God could have made a world that had always existed without a beginning, though, as divine revelation teaches, that is not what God did. So, Aquinas concludes that God cannot know the world to have existed before it began to exist, given that it began to exist, though God can know that the world could have begun to exist earlier than it did. “There is,” he says, “no first instant the world could have been made by God, although there is a first instant it was made, just as there is a farthest point to which the world was made by God, although there is no farthest point beyond which it could not have been made.” That the world could have lacked a beginning is a thesis briefly reiterated in Quodlibet XII, q.5, a.1. It was a controversial thesis at the time that Aquinas conducted this disputation. His Franciscan contemporary St. Bonaventure (1221–1274) rejected it, as did others. But it was a thesis which Aquinas defended at some length in his De Aeternitate Mundi (On the Eternity of the World), dateable to 1271, and in Summa Theologiae I, q.46.
The question about whether the number six is the creator might seem to be a frivolous one, but Aquinas considers it seriously and at some length.62 The question springs from the thought that the six days of creation mentioned in the book of Genesis presuppose the reality of the number six independent of the created order, which would seem to imply that the number six is the creator. In response to this thought, Aquinas’s basic argument is that six things are six not because they conform to some independently existing “six” but because they are countable as material individuals, and things are countable as such because God makes them to be so as the individuals that they are.
This line of reasoning about God’s causality can be connected with what we find in Quodlibet IV, q.1, a.1, which discusses divine ideas.63 Aquinas deals with the topic of divine ideas in a number of works, but his treatment in the quodlibets is his final one, and some have suggested that it conflicts with what he says about it in his earlier works.64 Generally, Aquinas thinks of a divine idea as “nothing but a given way in which God views his essence as capable of being imitated by a creature . . . if it is ever brought into actual being.”65 He argues that the forms of God’s effects can be likened to patterns in the mind of human makers and, therefore, amount to “exemplars.” In this connection, in Summa Theologiae I, q.15, a.1, Aquinas appeals to architects who conceive of the buildings they intend to construct and who then build them according to their conception. Like architects, God has a conception of something to be produced, which is an idea in God. And since God can produce many things, there are many ideas in God. But can the notion of there being many ideas in God square with the thought that God is entirely simple and that all that is in God is God? This is the issue at stake in Quodlibet IV, q.1, a.1, where the question is “Does God have multiple ideas?” Aquinas’s treatment of this question is interesting since, though it concludes that there are many ideas in God, it might be thought to depart at least in structure from some of his earlier treatments of the question.66 The structure of Quodlibet IV, q.1, a.1, is clearly indebted to the thought of St. Bonaventure found in his Sentences commentary and his De Scientia Christi.67 According to Bonaventure, there is no distinction of things in God, whose essence lacks composition, but a distinction of ideas can be affirmed of God’s essence insofar as God eternally knows what he can and does create. In most of his discussions of divine ideas, Aquinas emphasizes the first thought. In Quodlibet IV, q.1, a.1, he emphasizes the second thought without contradicting the first.
God as Triune and Incarnate
In his other works, Aquinas has much to say about God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.68 But, surprisingly perhaps, the quodlibets have only four articles bearing directly on the doctrine of the Trinity as defined by the councils of the Church prior to the time of Aquinas. These are Quodlibet VII, q.3, a.1; Quodlibet VI, q.1; and Quodlibet IV, q.4, a.1 and a.2.
The questions on the Trinity discussed in Quodlibets VI and IV have Aquinas holding what he affirms elsewhere. The question in Quodlibet VI asks, “Is the one divine essence counted in addition to each one of the divine persons?” In response, Aquinas insists that the divine persons are not distinct from the divine essence and should be considered in terms of their “relative opposition.” Thus, he says, “the one divine essence is not counted in addition to each one of the divine persons as if they were distinct in reality, but only in the way that we think about them.” In Quodlibet IV, q.4, a.1, Aquinas discusses the question “Does the Father utter himself and creation by the same word?” In response, Aquinas says that God’s understanding of himself is such that God “does not have a succession of words one after another. And just as God knows himself and everything else with the same knowledge, God also utters himself and everything else with the same word.” Here, Aquinas is thinking that if God were able to form a concept (so to speak) of himself, that concept would be his mental “word,” which is at work in all that God creates.
In Quodlibet VII, q.3, a.1, Aquinas addresses a question that he does not discuss in his other writings: “Is divine immeasurability incompatible with a plurality of divine persons?” He answers by insisting that divine immeasurability “is only incompatible with plurality if it eliminates determination, which is the source of plurality.” Then he distinguishes between two kinds of determination: limiting and distinguishing. He then argues that, while limiting determination cannot be ascribed to God at all, distinguishing determination can be affirmed of God in two ways. First, he observes, God can be distinguished from all creatures because God is not limited, while creatures are limited. Second, he notes: “one divine person is distinguished from another by the relation of origin, which is not a function of any limitation, but of the opposition involved in a relation.” So, Aquinas concludes, since divine immeasurability is not incompatible with the second kind of determination, which is the basis for the distinction between the divine persons, it is not incompatible with a plurality of persons in the Trinity.
It is hardly surprising that Aquinas maintains these positions on God as triune in the quodlibets, and there is nothing unexpected in what he says in them about Jesus as God incarnate. All the discussions of Christ in the quodlibets have parallels in other works of Aquinas. But there is one exception: Quodlibet V, q.3, a.2, which asks, “Which is the greater sign of Christ’s love for us: suffering for us, or giving us his body as food in the sacrament?” The sacrament referred to here is that of the Eucharist, and Aquinas’s reply is very straightforward. He says: “Christ laying down his soul by suffering for us was the greatest sign of love for us, whereas giving us his body as food in the sacrament involves no loss for him at all. Thus, the former is clearly the greater sign of Christ’s love.”
Angels
Aquinas believed in the existence of angels. His belief in them derives chiefly from biblical texts, but he also thought that some demonstrative arguments can be offered for their existence.69 As in a number of his other works, angels feature prominently in the quodlibets. All of them, apart from Quodlibets VIII and IV, contain discussions of angels.
Do these texts present new ideas on angels not to be found elsewhere in Aquinas’s writings? Not to any large extent. They contain many of the conclusions about angels defended in the long treatise on angels in Summa Theologiae I, qq.50–64. Hence, for example, we find Aquinas saying that angels are purely immaterial, that they have knowledge and will, that they can know created particulars, that they can somehow act on bodies, that some of them fell into sin, and that they derive their existence from God and do not exist by virtue of their nature. On the other hand, in Quodlibet II, q.2, a.2, Aquinas seems to present what looks like it could be a revised approach to angels not to be found elsewhere in his writings.
In several other texts Aquinas states that there is no composition of subject (suppositum) and nature in angels since they are wholly immaterial. By “subject” Aquinas basically means “individual.” He is thinking that, while, say, Socrates and Plato share a nature (human nature), they are distinct individuals. Socrates is this human being, and Plato is that one. Thus, Aquinas will typically say that Socrates and Plato, though sharing a common nature, are two individual subjects (supposita) of it. He will also typically say that their individuality amounts to material difference: Socrates is this material thing, and Plato is that one. With these thoughts in mind, he will frequently argue that what is totally nonmaterial (God and angels) lacks a composition of subject and nature. Hence, for instance, we find Summa Theologiae I, q.3, a.3, declaring that wholly nonmaterial things cannot derive their individuality from anything material and are intrinsically individual. In such things, there is no distinction of subject and nature, Aquinas says. But in Quodlibet II, q.2, a.2, Aquinas appears to take a different line. The question under discussion is whether a particular angel is the same as its nature (whether subject and nature differ in angels). In response, Aquinas seems to argue that subject and nature differ in angels largely because, as is not the case with God, the nature of an angel is other than its act of existing.
Do we here have Aquinas rejecting his otherwise general claim that, in angels, subject and nature are not different? At first sight, it looks as though Aquinas is doing just this. But some scholars have tried to reconcile Quodlibet II, q.2, a.2, with what Aquinas says elsewhere. They have argued that differences between that article and what Aquinas says in other texts are terminological rather than substantial, that in Quodlibet II, q.2, a.2, he is construing “subject” differently from how he does in other places. But it is worth noting that there is some kind of discrepancy between that quodlibetal article and things that we read elsewhere in Aquinas.70